WasWatching.com

Steve,

This is one of those times where I think the way you use stats is wrong, because the questions you are asking lead to erroneous results.

Yes, it's true that the composite pitching line for the Yankee pitchers has been somewhat lackluster since July 15th.

HOWEVER, the 20 Yankee losses during that period include at least 8 shellackings, namely: a) July 20th (when they lost 14-4 vs. Tampa);

b) August 2nd (when they lost 13-9 vs. the ChiSox);

c) August 8th (when they lost 15-4 vs. the Jays);

d) August 14th (when they lost 12-0 vs. the Orioles);

e) August 21st (when they lost 18-9 vs. the Angels);

f) August 27th (when they lost 16-0 vs. the Tigers);

g) August 31st (when they lost 9-1 vs. Tampa); and

h) September 15th (when they lost 10-1 vs. the BoSox).

(The Yankees also lost 8-2 vs. Tampa on Sept. 2nd and 7-1 vs. the Mariners on Sept. 3rd).

Other than the 16-8 win against KC on August 4th and the 8-7 win against Boston on September 14th, I can't find a Yankee win in which they had more than 6 runs scored against them.

So in essence, the Yankee pitchers have been bombed at least 8 times (defined by me as a game where they either had more than 10 runs scored against them or the Yankees lost by at least 8 runs or both).

The conclusion that you can come at, once you look at the games themselves (and not the compressed stats from this time period), is that when the Yankees aren't getting shellacked, the pitching has been good.

The conclusion that I come to is that as of July 15th, 2007, the Yankees either get good pitching or horrid pitching.

Were they bombed at least 8 times before 7/15 too? If so, does that not offset?

What about the BP #s?

That's in interesting question Zack - esp. when it comes to BB allowed. I'm not sure if the data is out there on that one. But, I would like to see it.

Not all blowouts are alike, so things don’t necessarily even out. That’s why you have to control for outliers when using statistics.

Ok, using my definition in the previous post, the Yankees were shellacked in the following games in the first half:

a) April 23rd (when they lost 10-8 to Tampa);

b) April 27th (when they lost 11-4 to the BoSox);

c) May 4th (when they lost 15-11 to Seattle);

d) May 10th (when they lost 14-2 to Texas);

e) May 19th (when they lost 10-7 to the Mets);

f) May 25th (when they lost 10-6 to the Angels);

g) June 2nd (when they lost 11-6 to the BoSox); and,

h) July 1st (when they lost 11-5 to the A’s).

(They Yanks also lost 7-0 to Oakland on June 30th)

There’s a couple of wins where the Yankee pitchers were tagged for some runs (April 7th, 10-7 vs. the Orioles; June 16th, 11-8 vs. the Mets; June 28th, 8-7 vs. the Orioles and July 6th, 14-9 vs. the Angels).

As you can see from the above, no game in the 1st half was as horrendous as the 16-0 vs. the Tigers, and only the 14-2 loss to Texas was for a margin of more than 7 runs.

Again, the Yankees in the 2nd half have had either good pitching or horrid pitching, and composite numbers don’t really reflect that.

~~~That’s why you have to control for outliers when using statistics.~~~

So, how does the Yankees pitching look, pre and post-7/15, if you took out the outliers on both ends?