Glossary of Terms — Relief Pitching

Glossary of Terms — Relief Pitching

GR — Games in Relief

IP — Innings Pitched

H — Hits allowed

ER — Earned Runs allowed

BB — Bases on Balls, otherwise known as walks

K — Strikeouts

HR — Home Runs allowed

TBF — Total Batters Faced

ERA — Earned Run Average. Formula: (ER*9)/IP

ERA-minus (ERA–) — A pitcher’s ERA adjusted to his home park, divided by the league-wide ERA, and multiplied by 100. A league average ERA-minus is 100. The lower, the better. Each digit is a percentage point better or worst than league average. If a player’s ERA is 0.00, his ERA-minus is 0.

Other Examples: League ERA is 4.00. Player’s adjusted ERA is 2.00. His ERA-minus is 50.

League ERA is 4.00. Player’s adjusted ERA is 8.00. His ERA-minus is 200.

WHIP — Walks and Hits per Inning Pitched. It indicates how many baserunners a pitcher allows per inning. League average is typically around 1.300. Formula: (BB+H)/IP

HR% — Home Run percentage. Percentage of opposing plate appearances that yield a home run. Also called home run rate. Formula: HR/TBF

K% — Strikeout percentage. Also called strikeout rate or K rate. Percentage of opposing plate appearances resulting in a strikeout. Formula: K/TBF

BB% — Walk percentage. Also called walk rate. Percentage of opposing plate appearances resulting in a walk. Formula: BB/TBF

K–BB% — Strikeout rate minus walk rate. Also called K minus walk rate. Difference in percentage points between a strikeout rate and a walk rate. A positive K–BB% means the pitcher struck out a higher percentage of opposing hitters than he walked.

IR — Inherited Runners. This is a runner that was on base when the reliever entered the game. Extra-inning automatic runners do not count toward IR.

IS — Inherited Runners Scored.

IS% — Percentage of inherited runners that ultimately scored.

ScOtg — Scoreless Outings. A relief appearance that saw no run of any kind charged to the pitcher.

IOtg — A relief appearance that saw the pitcher not have any runs charged to him while allowing at least one inherited runner to score.

UOtg — A relief appearance where a pitcher had one or more runs charged to him, but they were all unearned.

ScOtg% — Scoreless Outing Percentage. Formula: Scoreless Outings divided by Games in Relief.

ScOtg% (ER) — A variation of ScOtg that only holds earned runs against a pitcher. Formula: (ScOtg+UOtg)/GR.

TScOtg% — True Scoreless Outing Percentage. (ScOtg–IOtg)/GR.

Goose Eggs, Broken Eggs, and Mehs

A Goose Egg inning is seventh inning or later, maximum two-run lead or a tie game. Holding the opponent scoreless yields a Goose Egg (GE); allowing an earned run while not closing out a win gives a Broken Egg (BE). Doing neither yields a Meh (M). When listed together, it is either in the format GE–BE–M or GE–BE. GE/BE = GE per BE.

More Detailed Explanation of Goose Eggs

A Goose Egg is like a save, except more restrictive. Here are the main points…

• It’s done inning by inning, starting in the seventh.
• Maximum of a two-run lead, not three, but it also includes tie games. Like the save, exceptions are made if the tying run is on base or at bat. (Not on deck, however.)
• Run Breakdown:
  • No run of any kind — earned, unearned, or inherited — scores, it’s a goose egg (GE).
  • Earned run charged to the pitcher, it’s a broken egg (BE).
  • Any other run scores, it’s neither.
  • Earned run scores in an inning where he closes out the victory, it’s also neither.
  • Starts the inning and gives up no runs, but doesn’t finish the inning, it’s also neither.
• He must finish the inning while recording the following number of outs:
  • No one on when he starts the inning — all three;
  • One on — at least two;
  • Two or three on — at least one.
• Any time it’s “neither,” it’s called a “Meh,” as in “nothing special.” They’re like a stalemate in chess and count as nothing, so we don’t really talk about them.
• Most important is the ratio of GE to BE (GE/BE). The historical average, dating to 1921, is 3.0, or 3-to-1.

Score Formula for Rankings

Rankings are split into the following categories. These categories encompass what a relief pitcher’s jobs are and are weighted according to importance.

Team Rankings, Setup Men, and Closers

Clutch (45% of score) — How well they perform in late innings either while the game is tied or while holding a narrow lead. For clutch, we will use both the Goose Egg total (33%) and the ratio of Goose Eggs to Broken Eggs (67%) due to the major flaws in Saves and Holds.

Run Prevention (35%) — How well they keep runs off the board, including inherited runners. We will use a mixture of the Scoreless Outing Percentage (Earned Runs only), Inherited Runners Scored Percentage (IS%), and ERA-minus. ScOtg% is 75% of the score, IS% is 15%, and ERA-minus is 10%.

Baserunner Prevention (13%) — Who has the lowest WHIP and lowest home run percentage (HR%). WHIP is 85% of the Baserunner Prevention score, and HR% is 15%.

Command (7%) — Who has the best strikeout percentage minus walk percentage (K–BB%).

Middle Relievers

Run Prevention (60%), Baserunner Prevention (26%), Command (14%)

Totaling Up the Scores

The total score in each category is based on the league average. Zero points equals the league average. Positive scores are better than league average; negative scores are worse. The farther their score is from zero — either positive or negative — the farther they are from the league average.

(Note: Due to weighting each score, adding the categories together won’t equal the total score.)