Roger Clemens ... does he have a case for non-support?
Tom Tippett
April 7, 1998
Two years ago, a caller to the Boston sports radio station decried the lack of support Roger Clemens had received from his bullpens over the years. It was early May, 1996, and the pen had already blown four leads in games Roger had started. His record was 1-4, and he deserved better. I wondered if the bullpen had been letting him down for years, or whether this was merely a brief run of bad luck.
So I wrote a little computer program to compile the results of all of Roger's career starts, and this is how his 359 career starts looked at the time:
- he was 75-21 in complete games
- in the 90 games in which he left with his team trailing, the Sox were 8-82, and Roger's record was 0-78. The team took him off the hook twelve times: eight wins and four games in which the team rallied to tie before a reliever took the loss.
- in 26 games when the score was tied when he departed, the Sox were 11-15
- he had handed the bullpen a lead 147 times, with the team winning 126 of those games. In addition to the 21 losses, there were 16 other games in which the pen gave up the lead before the Sox rallied to win.
In other words, the team had taken Clemens off the hook 12 times and had blown 37 leads. All in all, it seemed quite appropriate for Roger and his fans to be frustrated.
But what's normal? We hear lots of talk about saves and blown saves and save percentages, always from the perspective of the closer. But today's starters often hand the ball to middle relievers or setup men, and there may no longer be a save opportunity by the time the closer is summoned. How often does a starter get the victory after he leaves the game with a lead? And how often does he take the loss when he hands over a deficit? Does the record confirm that Roger was unlucky? Were there others who were even less fortunate?
Five-year Averages
To answer these questions, I updated the program and ran it for all pitchers for the five seasons from 1993-97. Let's start by looking at the overall averages for this period:
Margin GS TmW TmL TmPct PchrW PchrL Blown Pct OffHook Pct ------ ---- ---- ---- ----- ----- ----- ----- ---- ------- ---- -5+ 1650 72 1578 .044 1526 124 .075 -4 1338 87 1251 .065 1180 158 .118 -3 1649 175 1474 .106 1368 281 .170 -2 1853 282 1571 .152 1405 448 .242 -1 2063 492 1571 .238 1293 770 .373 0 2209 986 1223 .446 215 1 2295 1530 765 .667 1080 74 1215 .529 2 1863 1490 373 .800 1216 15 647 .347 3 1453 1267 186 .872 1108 345 .237 4 981 920 61 .938 838 143 .146 5+ 2030 2000 30 .985 1937 93 .046 Trail 8553 1108 7445 .130 1781 .208 Ahead 8622 7207 1415 .836 2443 .283 CG 1446 1114 332 .770
I'll take a moment to work through this table, since it establishes the framework for the rest of this article:
- the Margin column refers to the run difference when the starter left the game. If he left the game with his team down by five or more runs, his start goes into the first row. If he was trailing by four, it goes in the second row. And so on.
- the Trail and Ahead rows show totals for all situations where the starter left while trailing or leading by any number of runs.
- the last row is for complete games. In these outings, the starter always gets the win or loss.
- the second column shows the number of starts falling into each category, and the next three columns show the team's wins, losses, and winning percentage in these starts.
- the PchrW and PchrL column shows the starting pitcher's record in these games.
- if the pitcher leaves with the lead, he can still take the loss if he's responsible for baserunners that score the go-ahead runs. More often, however, he'll either get a win or nothing. The Blown column and the one that follows it show how often he gets nothing.
- a starter can never be given the win if he leaves with his team tied or behind, so in these games, what's interesting is how often he gets tagged with the loss and how often his team rallies to take him off the hook. Those figures are shown in the last two columns.
This table gives us some context in which to evaluate Clemens' experience. It's not a perfect match, of course, since the Clemens numbers go back to 1984 and the table is for the past five years only. And it's reasonable to assume that in this era of higher offense, leads would be a little harder to hold and deficits a little easier to make up. But it still provides some useful benchmarks.
Clemens' Career Record
First, however, let's update Clemens' career numbers to include the past two seasons:
Margin GS TmW TmL TmPct PchrW PchrL Blown Pct OffHook Pct ------ ---- --- --- ----- ----- ----- ----- ---- ------- ---- -5+ 18 0 18 .000 18 0 .000 -4 16 0 16 .000 16 0 .000 -3 23 5 18 .217 18 5 .217 -2 25 1 24 .040 22 3 .120 -1 24 4 20 .167 17 7 .292 0 31 14 17 .452 1 1 40 24 16 .600 17 2 21 .550 2 32 27 5 .844 24 8 .250 3 34 31 3 .912 27 7 .206 4 21 20 1 .952 17 4 .191 5+ 44 44 0 1.000 44 0 .000 Trail 106 10 96 .094 94 15 .142 Ahead 171 146 25 .854 129 42 .246 CG 108 84 24 .778
Here are a few things I notice when I compare this table to the overall averages:
- Clemens' record in complete games seems remarkable at first glance, but is really quite normal. What's unusual is the large number of complete games -- 108 in 416 starts, or 26%, while the MLB average was 11% from 1984-97.
- his teams rarely bailed him out when he left while behind (.142 vs an average of .208). In 416 starts over 14 seasons, his mates have never rallied from a deficit of four or more runs, and were also well below average with 1- and 2-run margins. If he'd been taken off the hook at the average rate (.208), he'd have about 7 fewer losses.
- his teams have done reasonably well when he left them with a lead. His pen has blown leads in only 24.6% of those starts, compared to an average of 28.3% over the past five years. That's partly because he's given them more than their share of big leads, and partly because we're using the past five years as our benchmark, but I think it's still fair to conclude that his bullpens haven't been quite as bad as they initially appeared.
- his overall ratio of blown leads (42) to off-hooks (15) is not good, but it's largely because he gives his bullpen the lead so often. The five year ratio of leads to deficits is about 50:50, but Clemens' ratio is 62:38.
- more than 60% of his wins (129 of 213) have required at least some assistance from his bullpen.
So Clemens has been a little unlucky over the years, but not nearly as much as I first thought. And it's clear that he's earned every bit of his .644 career winning percentage by completing more than a quarter of his starts and by giving his team the lead much more often than most.
Leaders Since 1993
Now let's take a look at some of the leaders during the past five years and in 1997. We'll start with the pitchers who have had their bullpens blow the most leads since 1993 (top 15 and ties are shown):
Jaime Navarro 18 Andy Benes 18 Wilson Alvarez 17 John Burkett 17 Ben McDonald 16 Mark Clark 16 Roger Clemens 16 Doug Drabek 16 Ricky Bones 16 Pete Harnisch 16 Ken Hill 16 Bob Tewksbury 15 Steve Avery 15 Andy Ashby 15 Scott Erickson 15 Mark Langston 15
Obviously, there's a bias in this list "in favor" of guys who made more starts and handed their bullpens more leads, so let's rank the guys who've seen leads blown in the highest percentage of their starts in the past five years (minimum of 60 starts to qualify):
Aaron Sele .206 Ricky Bones .203 Chris Haney .194 Mark Clark .186 Kirk Rueter .183 Pedro Astacio .176 Armando Reynoso .174 Andy Ashby .161 Kevin Foster .159 Wilson Alvarez .159 Allen Watson .159 Curt Schilling .157 Ben McDonald .152 Kenny Rogers .147 Donovan Osborne .143
Note that Clemens doesn't show up on this list. In fact, in the past five years, 88 other starters have given their team a lead and seen it wasted in a higher percentage of their starts.
How about the lucky ones? The guys who've been bailed out by their teammates the most. Here are the top 15 and ties over the past five years:
Pedro Astacio 16 Kenny Rogers 16 Pedro Martinez 15 Joey Hamilton 15 Steve Avery 15 Jamie Moyer 14 Doug Drabek 14 Pat Rapp 14 Scott Erickson 14 Ron Darling 13 Orel Hershiser 13 Ken Hill 12 Dennis Martinez 12 Bill VanLandingham 12 Ramon Martinez 12 Roger Pavlik 12 Tom Candiotti 12 Kent Mercker 12 Mark Leiter 12 Steve Trachsel 12
And here are the pitchers who've rescued most frequently over the past five years, as a percentage of their starts (minimum of 60 starts):
Pedro Astacio .216 Scott Kamieniecki .183 Bill VanLandingham .179 Kent Mercker .176 Pat Rapp .171 Kenny Rogers .168 Joey Hamilton .163 Pedro Martinez .160 Roger Pavlik .158 Kirk Rueter .150 Chris Hammond .145 Marvin Freeman .133 Aaron Sele .132 Steve Trachsel .128 Esteban Loaiza .123
Hmmm. A few really good pitchers who may show up here because they tend to leave behind smallish deficits. A bunch of mid-pack starters who are good enough to be given the required 60 starts but haven't ever been considered the aces of their staffs. I'm not sure what this list means, if anything, except that some of these guys might have W-L records a little better than they deserve and may therefore not be worth what they seem either in reality or fantasy ball.
The following starters were abandoned by their bullpens most often in 1997:
Mark Clark 7 Jeff Fassero 6 David Mlicki 6 Kirk Rueter 6 Steve Trachsel 6 Jose Rosado 6 John Thomson 5 Omar Olivares 5 John Burkett 5 Mike Mussina 5 Pat Hentgen 5 Dustin Hermanson 5 Curt Schilling 5 David Cone 5
It doesn't surprise me to see a lot of very good pitchers on this list. You have to give your team a lot of leads to have any chance of showing up here. Quite a few of them had good W/L records despite these blown leads (Clark 14-8, Fassero 16-9, and Rueter 13-6, for instance), while others (Mlicki and Trachsel, both 8-12) would have looked much more respectable had they received a little more help.
I wonder if Clark would have been traded by the Mets to Chicago if his luck had been better. Five of the blown leads occurred before the trade, and his pre-trade record could have been something like 12-7 instead of 8-7. True, his ERA with the Mets was 4.25, so a 12-7 record wasn't really justified. But with better bullpen support, he would have been near the league lead in wins at that point in the season, and how many clubs are going to trade a "winner"? After the trade, he was 6-1 for the Cubs despite two more blown leads.
Finally, here's a list of the pitchers who were taken off the hook most often in 1997:
Scott Kamieniecki 7 Jeff Suppan 6 Joey Hamilton 6 Mike Johnson 5 Jeff Juden 5 Pedro Astacio 5 Shane Reynolds 5 Steve Trachsel 4 Rick Reed 4 Pat Rapp 4 Scott Karl 4 Scott Erickson 4 Jason Dickson 4 Ariel Prieto 4
Showing up on this list shouldn't necessarily be considered a negative. It does mean that the pitcher left the game while behind quite a bit, but it doesn't mean he pitched badly. Consider the seven starts that earned Scott Kamieniecki the top ranking:
- 4/3 vs KC: 4 ER in 4-2/3 innings, left trailing 4-2 before O's rallied to win 6-4
- 4/9 at KC: left after 6 innings with a 2-0 deficit, Orioles won in 11
- 4/24 vs Bos: left a 1-0 game after seven, Sox won in extra innings
- 7/2 vs Phi: 4 ER in 5-2/3, was trailing 4-2, Philly ends up winning 10-6 when both bullpens blow up and trade the lead a couple of times
- 7/14 vs Tor: 3 ER in 5-1/3, saw his team rally from 3-2 down to win 9-5
- 8/29 vs Mets: came out with O's down 3-2 after seven, but Baltimore wins 4-3 in 12 innings
- 9/19 vs Det: left with a 3-0 deficit in the top of the 7th, O's rally for three in the ninth before losing in 11
While there are a couple of sub-par performances here, none were awful, and he kept his team in the game for the most part.
I guess that's enough for now. Please understand that this is not intended as a scientific study of starter or bullpen performance. There's a big difference between giving your team a one-run lead (a) with nobody out and two runners on in the 6th inning and (b) with nobody on and one out in the 9th. There's a big difference between handing your pen a 1-0 lead in the 8th and a 7-6 lead in the 6th. And a two-run lead means a lot less in Coors Field than in Dodger Stadium. So these numbers cannot, by themselves, be used to prove that one starter was more effective than another or that team X's bullpen was the worst over the past five years.
Even so, it was fun found to look at Clemens and other starters this way. Before doing this, I didn't have an intuitive sense of the average winning percentage in complete games, how often leads of various sizes are preserved by the bullpen as a whole (as opposed to focusing just on save percentages by closers), and which pitchers have been most and least helped by their pens in recent years.
And now we know that Clemens has been let down by his mates, but only a little, and not in the way I originally thought. It's true that they've blown quite a few leads, but only because he's given them so many in the first place. Their lack of support has been evident in their inability to fight back in many games after he's left them with a one- or two-run deficit.
NOTE: The statistics in the article were compiled using play-by-play data from Project Scoresheet, The Baseball Workshop, and Total Sports.
Copyright © 1998. Diamond Mind, Inc. All rights reserved.
