Quote:
Originally Posted by Prison Bitch
We've already discussed FIP data and the writeup from the Boston blogger who noted his pitch selection changes..... and you said it doesn't apply to him. That's where we left it, agree to disagree style.
|
I bought the "pitch selection" changes argument once before on Hochevar, and that was with a pitch mix much more aligned with success as a starting pitcher (fastball-slider is much more commonly successful than fastball-cutter, what he went to this season).
I said some guys can't be looked at with FIP. Some guys constantly outperform it, and some guys constantly underperform it.
FIP is a great way to explain outlier seasons. If a guy who has been good over the course of his career has a really bad year and his FIP is more in line with his traditional numbers, it helps explain the outlier. If a guy who has been bad over the course of his career has a really great year and his FIP is way higher than his traditional numbers, FIP help explains the outlier.
But when your sample size is as big as Hochevar's is at this point, it's unlikely that him UNDERPERFORMING compared to FIP is ever going to change.
I'd love for the guy to turn into Chris Carpenter and figure things out around age 30 after adding a cut fastball, but the odds against that are just incredibly low.