2023 Quality Start Details
The data is clear and convincing
I’ve spent a fair amount of time extolling the virtues of Quality Starts, so I won’t belabor the point any more than necessary today.
I’ve completed my research on Quality Starts for 2023 and the data is presented below.
I’m past the point of arguing about it, as I see the data as clear and convincing.
Those that rail against the “6 innings and 3 earned runs is bad”, do have a point though, as that doesn’t appear to be a winning formula and truth be told that is around the “average” starters ERA in 2023.
So, while “bad” might be a slight exaggeration, so too would be “quality”.
But those are a small percentage of quality starts (10.5%) and to throw away all quality starts for the sake of 10%, would be like throwing away all 100 MPH fastballs because a fraction are hit for home runs.
Think big picture.
The big picture is the averages above: 6.48 innings, 1.30 ER, 1.81 ERA and a 69% winning percentage for the team with the QS.
That 69% includes when the other team also has a quality start.
When only 1 team has a quality start the team with the quality start wins 79% of the time.
Think about that.
Fantasy players tend not to like quality starts because a QS doesn’t necessarily rack up fantasy points.
That’s not a great argument in the real world, where teams win and benefit from quality starts, as imperfect as the measure may be.
No baseball metric is perfect.
For me, it’s intuitive.
When you look at the highest percentage of quality starts, you see names like Cole, Webb, Steele and Wheeler.
Not Andrew Heaney or J.P. Sears.
I’ll be tracking these more closely this season as I now have the tools to do so.
Updates
Yesterday, I mentioned something called GameScore+ that I was working on developing, and I envisioned working similarly to other + metrics like OPS+ where 100 is the average.
Good news. I’ve figured it out.
Currently with the raw Game Score number it’s difficult to know at a glance if a 60, for example, is good or bad compared to the rest of the league.
With GameScore+ you’ll know at a glance with a single number.
This will make it simple to look at a GameScore of say 60 with a GameScore+ of 110 and say, “That’s 10% above league average” (numbers for example only).
With this and the addition of the Stress Index and Quality Start data, we’ll be monitoring pitching performance in much more depth than last season.
There will be a new episode of True Tales from the Big Leagues dropping tomorrow on Larry Yount.
If you don’t know, Larry is the older brother of Hall of Famer Robin Yount and has a distinct place in baseball history.
I’d appreciate it if you’d give it a listen and/or subscribe if you are so inclined.
Thanks for reading!