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November 21, 2007

When Four Aces Don't Matter

The 1940 White Sox

by Brandon Isleib

Since 1901, the major leagues have sported 2166 single team seasons, 2182 if you count the Federal League. In that time, the top 15 or so pitchers each season are generally thought of as aces, with adjusted ERA (ERA+, or ERA normalized for parks and leagues, with 100 being average) serving as the easy guide to an ace. After adding a few thresholds--22 GS/130 IP (to weed out some super-relievers from the '70s and a few rookie sensations called up in July), no fewer than nine wins, and a WHIP under 1.4 to help weed out flukes and pitchers who don’t go deep enough into ballgames to get regular decisions--I got down to 1478 of these ace-level seasons, which seemed about right. It’s not a perfect way of identifying aces, but since an ace is as much about perception as it is the performance, ERA+ with some qualifiers serves as a decent enough proxy. There are worse methods.

By this standard, some teams have multiple aces in a year. Forty-nine clubs had three aces (or ace-level performers, if you prefer), and five others had at least four. Here are those five, with their ERA+ listed next to their names:

• 1905 Cubs: Ed Reulbach (209), Bob Wicker (146), Mordecai Brown (137), Jake Weimer (131)
• 1907 Cubs: Jack Pfiester (216), Carl Lundgren (212), Mordecai Brown (179), Orval Overall (148), Ed Reulbach (147)
• 1912 Giants: Jeff Tesreau (171), Christy Mathewson (159), Red Ames (137), Rube Marquard (131)
• 1940 White Sox: Johnny Rigney (142), Eddie Smith (138), Ted Lyons (137), Thornton Lee (127)
• 1997 Braves: Greg Maddux (191), Tom Glavine (142), Denny Neagle (142), John Smoltz (139)

Four of these pitching staffs were part of dominant teams which you might immediately be familiar with. The 1940 White Sox, on the other hand, didn’t even reach 10 games over .500 until September 12, and finished the year 82-72, tied for fourth place and eight games out. It would be easy to say that Chicago’s mediocre offense or Detroit’s having three of the top five pitchers in the AL that year would explain it all, but it still doesn’t change that the Cubs, Giants, and Braves were great teams, and the White Sox decidedly weren’t. What accounts for having four aces and no chance at the pennant?

Season Context

Oddly enough, the 1940 White Sox weren’t even the best pitching staff in their league. The pennant-winning Tigers--led by Bobo Newsom, Tommy Bridges, and Schoolboy Rowe, all three among top five pitchers in the AL--achieved a staff-wide ERA+ of 120, an outstanding figure, and one that's better than the White Sox's mark of 118. The Tigers' 120 is in the top 50 all-time in the AL, while 118 doesn’t quite make that list; it’s still very good. Although the Tigers’ raw numbers don’t look like much (4.01 ERA), their ballpark pitching factor was 109, or somewhere in between Citizens Bank Park and Coors in 2005. In a league scoring 4.97 runs per game (this year’s AL scored 4.90 per game), 4.01 in a launching pad is remarkable.