Yesterday, Dave Pinto looked at the PMR for defense behind pitchers. For those unfamiliar with PMR, it stands for Probabilistic Model of Range, and it compares the number of balls in play and compares it to predicted outs and actual outs. Read the link above for a better explanation and past PMR ratings. The defense behind pitchers is a neat one, because we’re supposed to see how a defense benefitted or hurt a pitcher.
The Yankees kind of stick out on this list. First is Chien-Ming Wang, who seems to be the pitcher most helped by his defense. On the other end of the spectrum are Andy Pettitte and Darrell Rasner, who are among the most hurt by the defense behind them. So what gives? Can the Yankees defense be like eight Omar Vizquels when Wang pitches, but turn into eight Jason Giambis when Pettitte and Rasner take the hill?
Clearly, I think this has something to do with the pitcher himself. One thing I’ve noticed over the years with Wang is not only his ability to induce groundballs, but also his ability to induce poor contact. Even balls in the air don’t have much under them. Yeah, you might make Johnny move a few steps, but it’s not like he’s giving up many screamers into the gap. That’s the beauty of Chien-Ming Wang.
On the other end, with Pettitte, I’m not sure what to think. It’s comforting, I suppose, to think that the defense behind Andy, which we know isn’t among the best in the league, played a role in his poor second half. But what if he was just giving up a lot of hard-hit balls, ones that the defense had no shot at? That’s going to show in these defensive numbers, even though it’s not necessarily the defense’s fault.
Another interesting note: Dice-K was second on the list. So he gave up the fourth most walks in baseball — most in the American League — and had his defense convert the second most balls in play into outs? I’m really interested to see how next year turns out.
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