Wednesday’s column on the Pedro Martinez/Ramon Ortiz duel speculated
on the game’s possible place on a list of 2000’s top combined Game Scores,
since the two pitchers had combined to post a 160. Game Scores are a simple
measure of the quality of a start, first published in the 1988 Baseball
Abstract and calculated as follows:
Start at 50 Add 1 point for each batter retired Add 2 points for each complete inning from the fifth on Add 1 point for each strikeout Subtract 1 point for each walk allowed Subtract 2 points for each hit allowed Subtract 4 points for each earned run allowed Subtract 2 points for each unearned run allowed
A nine-inning outing provides a base score of 87 plus strikeouts, which
makes calculations off those games easy. You can also add hits, runs and
earned runs and multiply by two to combine the last few steps.
The scale of starts run roughly from 1 to 100, with a 100 every couple of
years and negative scores a possibility–Jamie Moyer put up a -9 on
Wednesday night.
It’s a fun thing to play with, and once you do a couple, you can do them
almost unconsciously. (I’m sure the formula is old to many of you. Thanks
for not skipping straight to
Transaction Analysis.)
A number of people wrote in to nominate games as possible contenders for
best combined Game Score. First, let’s take a look at the top starts of
2000 (all data courtesy BP’s wizard, Keith Woolner):
Date Pitcher W/L IP H R ER BB SO GS5/12 Pedro Martinez W 9.0 2 0 0 0 15 98 8/1 Mike Mussina W 9.0 1 0 0 2 15 98 7/23 Pedro Martinez W 9.0 6 0 0 0 15 90 4/9 Randy Johnson W 9.0 5 0 0 0 13 90 5/7 Ryan Dempster W 9.0 1 0 0 4 8 89 6/8 Pedro Martinez W 8.0 1 0 0 1 10 89 5/6 Steve Trachsel W 9.0 3 0 0 3 11 89 6/15 Kevin Brown W 9.0 4 0 0 0 10 89 5/9 James Baldwin W 9.0 3 0 0 1 8 88 4/25 Tom Glavine W 9.0 3 0 0 1 7 87 5/28 Pedro Martinez W 9.0 4 0 0 1 9 87 5/6 Pedro Martinez L 9.0 6 1 1 1 17 87
No one has cracked the magical 100 barrier yet this season, with the
season’s best outings by the American League’s best pitchers topping the
list by far. Note that two of the starts on the list, Steve
Trachsel‘s and the last Martinez start, were in the same game, that
memorable Saturday afternoon duel at Fenway Park. Three of the others came
in the next few days.
Pedro’s Tuesday start, in which he lost despite a Game Score of 77, got me
wondering what the top Game Scores in a loss have been. Enter Keith Woolner:
Date Pitcher W/L IP H R ER BB SO GS5/6 Pedro Martinez L 9.0 6 1 1 1 17 87 5/29 Jon Lieber L 8.0 2 1 1 1 12 85 5/28 Roger Clemens L 9.0 5 2 2 0 13 82 5/16 Randy Johnson L 8.0 5 2 1 0 12 78 5/21 Frank Castillo L 7.0 1 2 0 1 6 76 7/6 Chris Holt L 8.0 4 2 1 1 7 74 6/5 Kevin Brown L 8.0 5 2 2 0 9 73 6/19 Chuck Smith L 7.2 4 2 2 1 11 73 5/11 O. Hernandez L 9.0 7 1 1 2 6 73 4/23 Jason Dickson L 7.0 4 1 0 1 6 72 5/5 Masato Yoshii L 7.0 2 1 1 0 3 72 7/7 Curt Schilling L 9.0 7 2 2 1 8 72 7/23 Mike Sirotka L 8.0 5 1 0 2 4 72
Just three pitchers have lost with a Game Score of 80 or above, and two of
those, Martinez and Roger Clemens, lost to a performance on the
first list. Jon Lieber lost 1-0 to Greg Maddux, who put up a
complete-game 81 on Memorial Day.
Those three games figure prominently on our final list, the top combined
Game Scores:
Date Pitcher GS Pitcher GS Total5/6 Pedro Martinez 87 Steve Trachsel 89 176 5/28 Pedro Martinez 87 Roger Clemens 82 169 4/16 Chuck Finley 84 Esteban Loaiza 82 166 5/29 Greg Maddux 81 Jon Lieber 85 166 7/23 Mike Sirotka 72 Pedro Martinez 90 162 8/8 Ramon Ortiz 83 Pedro Martinez 77 160 7/20 Darryl Kile 81 Randy Johnson 77 158 4/9 Jason Schmidt 66 Randy Johnson 90 156 5/7 Glendon Rusch 66 Ryan Dempster 89 155 6/3 Jamey Wright 76 Pedro Astacio 79 155 5/16 Javier Vazquez 77 Randy Johnson 78 155 5/13 Chan Ho Park 81 Rick Ankiel 74 155
Pedro Martinez has been involved in four of the top six games, two of those
on the losing end. It takes a great night to beat the best, so both
Trachsel and Ortiz deserve all the credit in the world for their performances.
Thanks to Sam Hutcheson, Kyung Ro and Mark Allen for pointing out the first
two games on the list.
Joe Sheehan can be reached at jsheehan@baseballprospectus.com.
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