Include w-l record or not?

On this site, I have always heard two things that people say are true for college coaches.  They dont care about stats, and they wont come out and watch high school games.  When it came to my son, both were not true.  He had coaches scout him at high school games and they went to the local site where high school stats were displayed.

If they are asking for numbers, I would include the win-loss record.  Once they see that he had a 1.16 ERA with a 3-4 record, they can do the math and realize the team didnt give him any run support.  Somebody will probably say that stat keepers in high school are horrible and his ERA is "deflated"  If these coaches already have a dialogue with him, they know what kind of pitcher he is.

You could easily leave W-L record out as it's not a very telling individual stat for pitchers. You could also list the team's record along with your son's... But I would recommend just leaving it out altogether.  His Ks per IP and low BB total are strong.  Other meaningful individual pitching stats would include: BB/K, WHIP, Batting Avg Against, swing and miss %.  

Don't say anything negative about team or teammates.  If the opportunity presents, you can mention maturity and composure but don't tie it to dealing with multiple errors.

If it asks for his overall record you list it.  College coaches are not stupid.  If they see a guy with a 3-4 record and the stats that you say your son has they can figure it out on their own.  Trust me, a 3-4 record, wont be the factor of your kid not getting to the next level.

I would agree with the posts above.  I don't think it matters if you include all the stats or not.  I'd also agree that coaches do come to HS games, my son has had several this year.

Thank you all for the replies.  I had always heard the same thing that coaches do not care about hs stats, yet they all seem to ask. My son and I did not want him to say anything negative about the team because it just isn't right. I figured with the stats and the w-l record they would figure something didn't add up, but since this will be an email and not a recruiting form where they ask for w-l if it was something that should be excluded.

I agree with most of whats above.

• Don't ever blame a bad team - just makes you look like an excuse maker.
• Include the W/L record - they won't care much anyways.
• The impressive things about your son's stats (and the only ones the coaches will care about really) are the low walks/inning and the high strikeouts/inning.  Those numbers are quite impressive, but don't leave out the ones you don't like.

Just be truthful and the impression of your son through the stats you stated will be plenty good enough to evoke interest.

I also agree with the poster who said college coaches do in fact watch HS games.  Through both of our sons, there were plenty of college coaches that came by to watch both of them.

They care about velo, K's, BB's mostly.  ERA, WHIP, BAA are all good but Velo is Number1, the ability to throw strikes 2 and the ability to throw a quality off speed 3.

baseballmomx4- I am of the strong opinion that stats can only hurt a prospect. If you possess the ability to play at the next level, you should be outperforming your competition. If you aren't, it could potentially be a red flag. 

Your son obviously doesn't have this issue, as he has performed well this spring. I am almost certain that the college coaches just want to make sure that the tools that they have seen in person have translated to expected success at that level. 

When I look at stats - at any level - I don't care what a pitcher's record is. A pitcher's record is about as meaningful as the color of his underwear. It's a nonsensical statistic. If you include it and a coach has an issue with it, and believes it's a measure of player performance, I have serious qualms about that coach's ability to be involved in the game of baseball.

Include the W-L record simply because it's a "thing". But I'd imagine no coaches would really care much about it.

+1JH.

If he was all conference, all county, etc., with a losing w-l record, he obviously performed "his" craft well.  I would not exclude stats intentionally, they are too easy to find anyway.

College coaches do not care about w-l records, however they do attend HS games for sure.  They are more plentiful at summer events, but have seen at several HS games this year as well.

I don't fully agree with you guys on the W/L record being completely irrelevant...in some cases at least.  (But in this case, I doubt it has any relevance).

Dang it JBB! Can't you see that JH is on this thread!!?? Now you went and did it...

Kidding.  But the last time the subject of pitcher's Wins being relevant or irrelevant came up, JH lol'd me for making the case that they do have SOME relevance as to a pitcher's overall effectiveness.  Man, I'm still a little chapped over that.  Kidding again.  Have since discovered JH as a great resource for info. That said, I remain unconvinced that a pitcher's Wins mean NOTHING about a guy's overall effectiveness on the hill.

In this case, it probably helps you. You don't need to tell a recruiter what the team record is - he'll know. He'll also know that three of the team's four wins were credited to your son and he saved the fourth (assuming he didn't pull the save in his own start - which is possible but unlikely). Those are good facts.

Obviously want to keep this all lighthearted, of course. But pitcher wins are nonsense. 

"The winning pitcher is defined as the pitcher who last pitched prior to the half-inning when the winning team took the lead for the last time.

           a. Exception 1, the starting pitcher must pitch at least 5 innings to be eligible for a win.

           b. Exception 2, if a relief pitcher, who would normally be in line for a win, makes a  "brief appearance" and is deemed ineffective, the official scorer can grant the win to the succeeding relief pitcher."

Pitcher wins rely on the team's overall performance and, in some rare instances, a scorer's discretion. There is absolutely no purpose or correlation between a pitcher's success and his W-L record because he can't control the variables involved in the statistic. It is, BY FAR, the most irrelevant statistic in the game of baseball and holds no value. As someone working in the industry, I have never and will never pay attention to a pitcher's W-L totals at all. It's simply a waste of ink on the page, to me.

JH,

I by no means want to derail this thread but your point raises a question - is your comment referring to high school baseball (because of the unevenness of the competition), or does it extend to all levels, including MLB.  I ask because at the MLB level a pitcher's W-L record is his most frequently cited stat, important to the Cy Young vote and HOF consideration.  I'd definitely agree with you regarding high school and even college, but perhaps not at the MLB level.

Wins are meaningless at every level of baseball. It shouldn't even be a statistic worth considering. Those that cite W-L in the media are not members of front offices that evaluate player performance and quantify a player's value to the team. There should be no stock put into a pitcher's record at any level of baseball.

I agree with Smitty28, I don't want to derail the thread here, nor do I want to come off as curt or rude in my responses. If anyone would like to continue a conversation about W-L, let's start a new thread or a DM conversation. The OP was referring to help with college recruiting and that's much more important in the scheme of this website than statistical analysis.

And just to recap my argument on it... I basically agree with JH's points about the limitations of a pitcher's Wins as a stat.  Where I disagree is saying that a pitcher's Wins have absolutely -0- validity about his effectiveness; I maintain that a consistently high Win total says something relevant about the guy's ability on the hill.  I agree that there are much better statistical indicators of a pitcher's effectiveness, but Wins still say something about a guy over the long haul, IMO.  Anyway... Not intending to derail this thread in that direction.

JH,

I get what you are saying, especially when it comes to the question in the original post, 100% agree.   W/L has nothing to do with how well a guy like Jeff Samardzija has pitched this year with the Cubs, to that end I 100% agree.   Assessing the talent of a recruit for our University and his ability to pitch for us, I 100% agree.   I get that and but to say…

 “There is absolutely no purpose or correlation between a pitcher's success and his W-L record”

That is not totally true.  I get what you are saying but I can’t agree with the totality of that statement. The statement is too encompassing on the topic of success over a long period of time and the correlation between a pitchers career success and his win loss record. 

Year-to-year correlation between W-L and RA9-WAR (Wins Above Replacement based on Runs Allowed Per 9 Innings), year-to-year correlation between W-L and W-L, and year-to-year correlation between W-L and ERA.

JH - I'm with you up to here, particularly with regards to relief pitchers...

"The winning pitcher is defined as the pitcher who last pitched prior to the half-inning when the winning team took the lead for the last time.

           a. Exception 1, the starting pitcher must pitch at least 5 innings to be eligible for a win.

           b. Exception 2, if a relief pitcher, who would normally be in line for a win, makes a  "brief appearance" and is deemed ineffective, the official scorer can grant the win to the succeeding relief pitcher."

 

Pitcher wins rely on the team's overall performance and, in some rare instances, a scorer's discretion. There is absolutely no purpose or correlation between a pitcher's success and his W-L record because he can't control the variables involved in the statistic....

But I do believe (without any statistical data to back it up - maybe you can convince me otherwise), that for starting pitchers, leveled against their team's overall performance...that W/L has some relevance.

For example, I'll change my mind a little and say that for THE PITCHER discussed in the OP, having 3 of his team's 4 wins (and only being 1 game under .500)...is relevant in a positive way.  At least it is to me.

Who do you think you are, bringing empirical evidence into the argument??!!

justbaseball- This cherry-picked statement is a good example why pitcher wins mean nothing. The statistic itself is predicated on team performance. Pitcher W-L is not a measure of individual success, and therefore shouldn't be taken into consideration when measuring a pitcher's individual performance. 

I certainly acknowledge that pitchers put stock into individual wins because of the feeling of positive contribution to the team. But that, to me, is more a result of a flawed thinking process and a misunderstanding of individual value than an actual, evidence-based theory. If all pitchers knew the true, intrinsic value of the statistics properly used to measure their individual performances, W-L wouldn't even be a blip on the radar.

Originally Posted by Soylent Green:

You could easily leave W-L record out as it's not a very telling individual stat for pitchers. You could also list the team's record along with your son's... But I would recommend just leaving it out altogether.  His Ks per IP and low BB total are strong.  Other meaningful individual pitching stats would include: BB/K, WHIP, Batting Avg Against, swing and miss %.  

I have something ready just for situations like this for both pitchers and hitters. They’re stats that can be fudged on, but if a coach wants to do that, he’s gonna do it no matter what. With the “objective” stats, scorer bias is pretty much eliminated. WHIP and BAA are a primary source of bias if there is any, so anything having to do with hits or errors I stay away from. I do a stat that shows miss %, but in all honesty, I don’t find many HSs that have that information.

Pitcher stats is an interesting subject.  There are so many factors beyond the pitchers control that impact his numbers.

2015 pitcher son plays on a very below average HS team in a very competitive area.  Mid 80’s velocity with good sink and four good pitches.  Don’t know his stats but they are not good – 2-6 record I know.  There have been several instances where a play, not ruled an error, should have been made.  Some examples – fly to left where the left fielder comes in a couple steps, waits a half second, realizes the ball is hit harder than he thought sprints back and misses the ball by a foot.  Turns an out into a triple that scores two runs.  Double plays that should have been made.  Many foul balls that should have been caught.  Grounders and bloop singles that should have been fielded but the infielders don’t have the range to make the play - ruled hits.  Grounders that take a “bad hop” and are ruled a hit when a good fielder would have made the play.  We also have a weak catcher who runners can run on at will.  So my son is considered an average pitcher in HS and will likely get no all-state, all conf, etc awards.  Lessor pitchers with great numbers on great teams will get those awards.  The only thing he can really control is strike-outs, and he has a lot of them.

Now on his summer team (great team) he is almost unhittable with a 15-1 record over the last two summers.  Last fall he pitched 35 innings and gave up 2 earned runs.

Did he all of a sudden become a poor pitcher?  I don’t think so.  Good defense sure helps make a good pitcher.  Stats are very deceiving.

This quote, coming from Nolan Ryan himself, makes a lot of sense. 

The coaches asked to be updated in how his spring is going. So do it and be honest. Coaches can figure out if a kid has a mediocre W/L, a very low ERA and made all the All-Everythings the team probably isn't very good. So provide the stats. The Ks per inning is good. The BBs per inning is awesome. If he was gunned during any of the games provide the peak velocity if it's impressive. More than anything the coaches are keeping the dialog open by having the player make continual contact.

I could have written your post word for word.  We are dealing with the same issue exactly.  Last year was pretty much the same at school, and he went on to have a great summer season. Pitched against much better competition in east Cobb, Ft Myers etc and gave up 1 run total the entire season aided by a great team behind him.  Unless he is going to strike out every single batter in school (and even then quite a few reach on dropped third strikes, LOL) it's almost impossible. He lost a 2 hitter where he struck out 15!! Tough to watch sometimes.Very happy the summer season starts soon.  Good luck to your son.

Pitching stats is a tough subject because it's almost impossible for an "involved" party (i.e., the pitcher or his parents) to discuss it without sounding like a whiner or a me-firster--even though the perspective of pitchers on teams with bad defense and poor run support is valid.

I speak as the parent of a pitcher who got a no-decision today in the last game of his college season after giving up one unearned run in 9 innings in 98 pitches.  No run support.  Indifferent defense.  No decision.  All these factors are unrelated to the gem he threw against a team that scored 25 runs the previous day in a doubleheader.

I agree with the consensus that W-L is often irrelevant or misleading but should be included without explanation to coaches. 

nolan ryan,

You are correct in that there are many factors beyond the pitcher’s control that impact his numbers, but that a hazard of playing a team sport. Everything done during a game affects someone’s numbers.

W-L would be a normal stat that coaches expect when asking for stats so I would vote include it without commentary. They can figure it out when they view the other stats, and if they so desire a cursory look at the School's web site would show they won 4 games and your son was 3-4 with a save. Hard to deduce anything but he was their best pitcher