Could the 2011 Phillies have 3 Grade A starters?

Brian Cavanagh can finally take his mind off the weather in Philly and focus on important things like baseball and APBA.  He writes:

 

what do you think the chances are that the Phillies will have 3-4 “A” starters next season????

 

It’s a fair question.  Here are some relevant stats of the Phillies’ starting staff as of September 8:

 

W L W-L% ERA G GS CG SHO IP H R ER HR BB SO ERA+
Cliff Lee* 16 7 .696 2.47 28 28 6 6 203.2 170 58 56 15 40 204 157
Roy Halladay 16 5 .762 2.49 28 28 7 0 202.2 188 60 56 9 26 195 156
Cole Hamels* 13 7 .650 2.63 27 27 2 0 185.0 141 54 54 12 38 169 148
Roy Oswalt 7 8 .467 3.72 19 19 0 0 111.1 127 49 46 8 28 76 105
Vance Worley 11 1 .917 2.85 20 18 1 0 110.1 93 38 35 8 36 96 136
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 9/8/2011.

It’s a tough call.  APBA has been stingy with giving out Grade As to starters lately.  Jamie Garcia (2.76) and Roy Oswalt (2.70) both ended up with Bs last year.  Oswalt’s case wasn’t helped by the fact that he had control.  The extra boost of a grade bump would have over-compensated.

Assuming the Phillies continue to do well, these starters will no doubt be helped by being on a pennant team.  APBA has historically made sure that winners in real life will be winners on the cards.

That said, I’m not sure three As will be in the cards (so to speak) for the Phils.  Assuming everyone continues their rate of play (and continues to play, that makes a big difference too), my guess is that Lee and Halladay are in like Flynn but Hamels is only a distinct possibility.  He ranks fifth in adjusted ERA in the National League.   That’s pretty good but if we go solely on that (and no, I know that’s not all grades are determined), you would have ten A starters in the set.  A 2.63 ERA might be stretching it and considering Hamels has control won’t help.

One point in favor of giving Hamels an A is that currently, the Phils lead the league in ERA with a pretty formidable ERA of 3.05.  If APBA wants to make sure they maintain their pitching prowess, one way is to give their pitchers the higher grade if they are sitting on the fence.  Hamels is one such pitcher.

One last topic of relevance is one I will hit on but should probably save for another article.  It’s the radically lower ERA across the league.  In the National League right now, the ERA is a miniscule 3.83.  To compare, last year’s was 4.02, in 2009, it was 4.19 and the year before it was 4.29.  What APBA does with APBA cards will be interesting.  Will they adjust the barometer for pitching grades (I guess that might be why I think Hamels will get the B) or will they adjust each hitter’s card, making it stronger to compensate (like they did in 1968)?  It’s anyone’s guess at this point.

Hamels has a few weeks to get that ERA down.  A couple shutouts and it will be down to the 2.40 range and APBA won’t have much choice than to give him that A.  Of course, I’m no expert at APBA card predicting.  I didn’t see Manny Parra getting a C this year.

Thomas Nelshoppen

I am an IT consultant by day and an APBA media mogul by night. My passions are baseball (specifically Illini baseball), photography and of course, APBA. I have been fortunate to be part of the basic game Illowa APBA League since 1980 as well as the BBW Boys of Summer APBA League since 2014. I am slogging through a 1966 NL replay and hope to finish before I die.

6 Comments:

  1. I am not nearly as sure as you are about Roy Halladay’s chances.

    If he gets (ZZ) as expected, I think he’s less than 50/50 to be an A Pitcher.

    DonS.

  2. You make a good point, Don. I didn’t even consider the ZZ factor.

    I’m not a big fan of control letters “controlling” a pitcher’s grade but the fact is, they do. Plus the ZZ is a beast, keeping so many baserunners off the basepaths.

    I’m inclined to agree with your odds.

  3. I do not even know how I stopped up here, but I assumed this publish used to be great. I do not understand who you’re but definitely you’re going to a famous blogger in the event you are not already. Cheers!

  4. Let me step back for a second and qufaliy my statements. I wasn’t calling for anybody to be fired, I was just saying that if Ricketts wants to establish credibility as a winning owner he needs put the guys below him on notice that the there is only one goal- to win. You can have the best facilities in the world but if the people using them aren’t held accountable there won’t be any drive to change the product. Until the Cubs show a little fire they’ll always be known as the lovable losers- something I’ve always hated. As for Wilken, his choice of Hayden Simpson still sticks in my craw. If he doesn’t pan out it’ll be the Bradley-effect for me. Never forgave Hendry for that signing, and I never will. So if I’m calling for anybody to fired, it WOULD be Hendry. And for the 85% of players being from other teams, sure that number was exagerated. What I meant was only 15% of our home grown players are worth a damn. Soto has alot to make up for after last year. So does Wells. Cashner, Colvin and Russell are question marks, Coleman is a huge question mark. Z is a head case. Marmol is a little too. Marshall and Castro are solid. Again, about 15%. IMO

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  6. Such an impressive answer! You’ve beaten us all with that!

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