Using RE24 to Evaluate Relievers

Run expectation is one way to measure a player's effectiveness, either on offense or pitching.  In every 24-out situation, there's a different run expectation depending on the the baserunners and outs (the inning and score is irrelevant in RE24).  The difference between the run expectation at the start of a PA and the end of the PA gets charged to both the hitter and pitcher.  FanGraphs provides an example using the Red Sox and Rockies 2007 World Series game.  At the start of an inning the run expectation was .52 (this is just the league runs/league innings), then Ellsbury doubled that changed the run expectation to 1.15.  The difference between 1.15 and .52 is 0.63.  Therefore Ellsbury gets charged with +0.63 and Cook gets charged with -0.63.  

During the course of the season, these run expectation differences get added and subtracted to the player's total and at the end of the season they get a cumulative total that shows how much better they've been than league average.  Run expectation is extremely useful in generating linear weights which then can be applied to stats such as wOBA.  However, many analysts agree that RE24 can be very useful in proving relief pitcher value because they often come in and leave in the middle of an inning.  Say a starter loads the bases in the 7th inning and a reliever comes in and gives up a 3-run double and then a strikeout.  All 3 runs get charged to the starter while the reliever gets a scoreless 1/3 of an inning.  ERA doesn't properly show what happened, but RE24 does. 

The table below shows the Tigers relievers' RE24 as of games played through 8/31 provided by FanGraphs:

Player	IP	RE24
Joaquin Benoit	54 2/3	19.91
Drew Smyly	69	16.70
Jeremy Bonderman	14 1/3	3.50
Jose Veras	14 1/3	1.57
Jose Ortega	11 2/3	0.93
Rick Porcello	2	0.84
Bruce Rondon	26	-0.11
Evan Reed	18	-0.35
Luke Putkonen	22 2/3	-2.18
Jose Valverde	19 1/3	-2.38
Al Alburquerque	39	-3.27
Darin Downs	33	-3.73
Jose Alvarez	4	-4.78
Octavio Dotel	4 2/3	-6.02
Phil Coke	36	-6.46
Brayan Villarreal	4 1/3	-8.73

Tangotiger recently showed us how we can put RE24 on a RA9 or ERA scale:

If it helps, we can recast RE24 into an RA9 scale (i.e., similar to ERA) as follows.  Say the league average is .48 runs per inning.  Say you have a pitcher that has an RE24 of +40 runs and has pitched 200 innings.  That means the league average is .48 x 200 = 96 runs, and our pitcher here is 40 runs better than that, or 56 runs allowed.  So, his (RE24-based) RA9 is simply 56/200*9 = 2.52.

So far there have been 16,965 runs allowed in 36,380 1/3 IP for a league run/inning of 0.47 so far in 2013.  Using Joaquin Benoit as an example, he has pitched 54 2/3 innings; the league average would allow 0.47 * 54 2/3 = 25.49 runs.  Benoit has been 19.91 runs better or (25.49-19.91) 5.58 runs.  5.58 divided by 54 2/3 times 9 = 0.92.  The table below shows all of the Tigers relievers using this new metric (which I'm calling reRA9):

Player	IP	reRA9
Rick Porcello	2	0.42
Joaquin Benoit	54 2/3	0.92
Jeremy Bonderman	14 1/3	2.00
Drew Smyly	69	2.02
Jose Veras	14 1/3	3.21
Jose Ortega	11 2/3	3.48
Bruce Rondon	26	4.23
Evan Reed	18	4.37
Al Alburquerque	39	4.95
Luke Putkonen	22 2/3	5.06
Darin Downs	33	5.21
Jose Valverde	19 1/3	5.30
Phil Coke	36	5.81
Jose Alvarez	4	14.95
Octavio Dotel	4 2/3	15.81
Brayan Villarreal	4 1/3	22.33

We could then compare the pitcher's reRA9 to his ERA to see if he's been overvalued or undervalued:

Player	IP	reRA9	ERA	Difference
Octavio Dotel	4 2/3	15.81	13.50	2.31
Luke Putkonen	22 2/3	5.06	2.78	2.28
Brayan Villarreal	4 1/3	22.33	20.77	1.56
Evan Reed	18	4.37	3.00	1.37
Phil Coke	36	5.81	5.00	0.81
Bruce Rondon	26	4.23	3.81	0.43
Rick Porcello	2	0.42	0.00	0.42
Al Alburquerque	39	4.95	4.85	0.11
Jose Veras	14 1/3	3.21	3.14	0.07
Darin Downs	33	5.21	5.18	0.03
Drew Smyly	69	2.02	2.22	-0.20
Jose Valverde	19 1/3	5.30	5.59	-0.28
Jose Ortega	11 2/3	3.48	3.86	-0.38
Jeremy Bonderman	14 1/3	2.00	2.51	-0.51
Joaquin Benoit	54 2/3	0.92	1.48	-0.56
Jose Alvarez	4	14.95	15.75	-0.80

Villarreal and Valverde are no longer with us.  Other pitchers like Dotel, Porcello and Alvarez have too small of a sample size to tell us much.  It looks like Putkonen, who has a nice ERA, has been overvalued according to his RE24.  And Benoit, who has been extremely good in his role this year, looks to be even better by looking at RE24.  

Who's Your Tiger Closer?

The Tigers are obviously going by a closer by committee, at least to start the season.  Jim Leyland brilliantly managed the 9th inning of the first game by sending Joaquin Benoit back out to get one out in the 9th inning before taking him out and using Phil Coke to get the last two outs.  The opposing batters were right-handed hitter Josh Willingham, left-handed hitter Justin Morneau and switch hitter Ryan Doumit.  By using Benoit against the right-hander and Coke against the left-hander and the switch hitter (where he does significantly worse against left-handed pitchers) is what made the move brilliant.  He went unconventional and played the match-ups instead of going by the unwritten rule that the closer has to start the 9th inning.

Below is a table generated by Baseball Reference's Play Index (which is on a free trial until April 15th).  I set the parameters from 2009-2013, which only included how they performed in the 9th inning.  I then deleted out everyone that isn't currently in the Tigers bullpen: 

Rk	Player	Split	From	To	G	ERA	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	IBB	SO	HBP	BF	WHIP	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
11	Al Alburquerque	9th inning	2011	2011	11	1.08	8.1	6	1	1	0	8	2	16	1	40	1.680	.194	.375	.194	.569
13	Brayan Villarreal	9th inning	2011	2012	12	2.89	9.1	6	4	3	0	8	0	10	0	41	1.500	.182	.341	.212	.554
15	Joaquin Benoit	9th inning	2011	2013	31	3.67	27.0	18	12	11	3	7	1	29	0	102	0.926	.191	.245	.340	.586
17	Phil Coke	9th inning	2010	2013	34	4.23	27.2	29	12	13	1	13	3	17	1	115	1.518	.299	.384	.392	.776
19	Darin Downs	9th inning	2012	2012	2	4.50	2.0	2	1	1	0	1	0	3	0	9	1.500	.250	.333	.375	.708
22	Octavio Dotel	9th inning	2012	2012	12	12.38	8.0	14	10	11	1	5	2	6	0	43	2.375	.378	.442	.541	.982

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used

Generated 4/2/2013.

Obviously, we're dealing with small sample sizes here.  Only Joaquin Benoit and Phil Coke have significant innings in the 9th inning, and even then it's only 27 innings.  So this has to be taken with a grain of salt, but it's still interesting to look at.  Some notes:

Al Alburquerque and Brayan Villarreal have low ERA's, but very high WHIP's due to a lot of walks.  

Joaquin Benoit's looks like the best option.  Not only does he have a lot of experience (at least more than anyone other than Coke), but he's held opponents to only a .191 AVG, he has more than a K/inning and very low walk totals.  

Phil Coke's ERA doesn't look too bad, but his WHIP and opponents batting line against does, probably due to facing right-handed batters.

Darin Downs only has 2 innings of experience pitching the 9th inning, not nearly enough to  properly evaluate (then again, technically neither is 8-9 innings).

Octavio Dotel surprised me the most.  He has the most experience closing out games, yet he has the highest ERA.  This is a good example of why small samples shouldn't be used, as he probably wouldn't be this awful if given the bulk of the save opportunities.  Also, it's only restricting him to 2012, since I set the parameters to only Tigers pitchers (2012 was the only year he's pitched as a Tiger).  Luckily, we can get the information from his total years in the 9th inning from 2009-2012:
  

Rk	Player	Split	From	To	G	SO	ERA	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	IBB	HBP	BF	WHIP	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
44	Octavio Dotel	9th inning	2009	2012	76	74	4.82	65.1	58	41	35	9	25	3	3	280	1.270	.235	.308	.429	.737

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used

Generated 4/2/2013.

Now we have a much higher sample size, much more than anyone else currently in the Tigers bullpen, but the ERA is still alarming.  

Maybe ERA isn't the best stat to use.  One sabermetric stat is Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP) , which only uses home runs, walks, hit by pitches and strikeouts (events that the pitcher has the most control over).  The formula is ((13*HR)+(3*(BB+HBP))-(2*K))/IP + constant.  The constant puts it on the same scale as ERA.  For simplicity's sake, I'm going to use 3.2 as the constant.

	FIP
Darin Downs	1.70
Al Alburquerque	2.60
Joaquin Benoit	3.27
Brayan Villarreal	3.63
Phil Coke	3.96
Octavio Dotel*	4.01

I'm still dismissing Downs due to a small sample size (again, it's not like anyone other than Dotel has a big sample anyway).  *I'm using the full 65 1/3 inning sample from Dotel in this calculation, and he still comes off as the weakest one (but not much worse than Phil Coke).  I find that very interesting.  In the meantime, Alburquerque, Benoit and Villarreal still look like very capable options.  

Who should get the most Save Oppotunities?

• Al Alburquerque
• Joaquin Benoit
• Brayan Villarreal
• Phil Coke
• Darin Downs
• Octavio Dotel

Freeblogpolls

More polls: Iphone headset

Where Does Al Alburquerque Fit In?

Last year Al Alburquerque came out of nowhere to dominate in the Tigers bullpen with a 1.87 ERA and a 13.92 K/9 in a little over 43 IP.  It wasn’t all luck as he also had a 2.08 FIP and a 2.78 xFIP.  Even though he had some control issues (6.02 BB/9), Alburquerque looked like someone who could potentially be a future closer.

They key to Alburquerque’s success is his devastating slider.  He loved that pitch so much, that he threw it over 50% of the time!  There has been speculation that throwing too many sliders could lead to injuries in the future.  So when it was discovered that Alburquerque needed a screw inserted in his elbow due to a non-displaced stress fracture, one could argue that this surgery was directly related to the overuse of his slider. 

Now Alburquerque is rehabbing in AAA and it looks like a mid-August return is likely.  The thing is, the bullpen has been performing so well, that there isn’t an obvious move on who will get sent down.

Jose Valverde – 3.71 ERA, 3.98 FIP, 4.97 xFIP

Joaquin Benoit – 2.81 ERA, 3.60 FIP, 3.21 xFIP

Octavio Dotel – 3.34 ERA, 1.80 FIP, 2.40 xFIP

Phil Coke – 3.56 ERA, 3.50 FIP, 3.77 xFIP

Duane Below – 3.40 ERA, 3.79 FIP, 3.89 xFIP

Brayan Villarreal – 1.32 ERA, 2.35 FIP, 3.32 xFIP

Darin Downs – 1.86 ERA, 2.98 FIP, 2.40 xFIP

Valverde, Benoit, Dotel and Coke aren’t going anywhere. Villarreal is doing what Alburquerque did last year, coming out of nowhere to post a great ERA and strikeout rate (11.91 K/9) in 34 innings.  It could be argued that he has been the Tigers best bullpen arm this year, so it would be a shame to send him down.  Downs has put up his numbers in only 9 2/3 innings, so his inexperience could lead to his demotion, despite pitching well enough to stay. Below is the wild card; he’s been able to hold onto a ML job all year, but lately hasn’t been performing all that well (8 ER in his last 11 2/3 IP).  His overall numbers are very solid, though.  

Drew Smyly adds another variable.  If the Tigers want him on the post-season roster, he’ll have to be added to the 25-man roster before September 1^st, which means someone else has to be sent down.  Smyly lost his starting rotation spot when the Tigers acquired Anibal Sanchez.  Instead of getting sent to the bullpen, the Tigers optioned him to AAA when he got healthy despite having solid overall numbers (4.42 ERA, 3.86 FIP, 3.88 xFIP) including 10 strikeouts in 6 IP in his last ML start. 

It appears that 1 or 2 pitchers might get left off the post-season roster (if the Tigers even make the playoffs) despite pitching well enough to earn a spot.  It’s a nice problem to have as they say, "you can't have enough pitching."  At least if Alburquerque can get back to what he was able to do last year and remain healthy, then losing of Valverde to free agency won’t be a huge loss.

Ryan Raburn or Don Kelly?

The Tigers are going to have to make a decision pretty soon when Andy Dirks comes off the DL.  They are going to have to make room on the 25-man roster and it might come down to either keeping Ryan Raburn or Don Kelly.  There is a 3^rd option in sending down Quintin Berry, but he has become a fan favorite.  The Tigers released an official Berry jersey for fans to buy and it seems like he gotten enough clutch hits to earn a spot on the roster for at least the rest of the season. 

Neither Raburn nor Kelly have had much offensive production this year.  Raburn is hitting .172/.227/.255 with only 1 HR and12 RBI.  He was already sent to the minors once this year, right before his “veteran” clause kicked in that would allow him to refuse the assignment.  Since returning to the Tigers, Raburn has hit .217/.260/.333, which is better but a far cry from the 2^nd half numbers we are used to seeing from him the last couple of years.  His sub-.500 OPS is even lower than his career .641 1^st half OPS, suggesting that his 2^nd half resurgence isn’t even going to happen this year.  And now that he can refuse an assignment to the minors, he isn't the obvious choice anymore.

Then there’s Don Kelly.  Kelly has never been on offensive juggernaut, hitting only .244/.282/.378 over the last 2 years.  However, this year he’s hit a pathetic .178/.272/.248, which is far below expectations. 

Of course, offensive has always been secondary to Kelly as his true talents have always been flexibility and defense.  He has mainly played in the OF this year, but has also filled in the infield.  His DRS and UZR have shown him to be an average to an above average defensive player.  But his defense might not help him this time, as he has regressed as he’s gotten older and his dWAR is only at -0.1 this year. 

Raburn also has flexibility, playing 2B and OF this year.  He was forced out of the 2B position when the Tigers acquired Omar Infante, but Leyland expressed that he still wanted to play Raburn in LF when there’s a left-hander on the mound.  Quintin Berry has struggled against lefties this year, only hitting .224/.240/.367 against them, so Leyland may want to continue benching him when a left-hander starts.

As far as Raburn’s defense is concerned, he’s been bad at 2B, with a -3 DRS and -2.2 UZR this year (-18 DRS and -16.6 UZR career).  Although, he has been better in the OF (even though people only seem to remember the HR he helped assist).  With Ramon Santiago now back to a fulltime back-up infielder, Raburn might now only be seen as an outfielder.  That helps Kelly’s case as he can do both OF and INF, but Raburn is a right-handed bat.  Kelly, Berry and Dirks are all left-handed hitters.  Leyland might want to keep Raburn around just so he can go to a right-hander when a southpaw is on the mound.

If it were my choice – flip a coin.  Neither one is going to have that much of an impact.  Both have been below replacement level, Raburn at a -1.3 fWAR, -1.8 rWAR and Kelly at -0.5 fWAR, -0.5 rWAR.  Neither one is going to be the first choice off the bench.  Santiago will handle the back-up infield positions and Berry will handle the back-up outfield positions (assuming Dirks is handed the LF position). 

Both Kelly and Raburn are Leyland guys, so my guess on what the Tigers will do is to delay this inevitable decision and send pitcher Darin Downs back to the minors.  Dombrowski rarely goes with less than 12 pitchers, but with the acquisition of Anibal Sanchez, the Tigers are deep in starting rotation.  When Drew Smyly gets healthy and comes back, then the Raburn/Kelly decision will be made.  Maybe by then, something else will happen (like another injury or trade) that will delay the decision even further.  After all, this is such a tough decision as both Kelly and Raburn are so close to equal value.