Atlanta Braves Winter Meeting Simulation day 1: James Paxton mock trade

He’s always injured

Yes and no. Jeff Sullivan at Fangraphs addressed this the other day with lots of statistics that I won’t bore you with now. His conclusion, in not so many words, boils down to the way we remember things.  Fans recall every miss and accept the good stuff as what should happen. Here’s the complete list of injury time from pro-sports transactions.

The line drive wasn’t his fault, and he didn’t try to catch pneumonia. He would easily have thrown 190 innings minus the line drive and pneumonia.

The rest doesn’t indicate a pattern. Jeff Sullivan put it this way.

"Paxton’s shoulder has never exploded. His elbow has never exploded. The problems in 2018 don’t seem like problems with a super high probability of recurrence . . . . . . Paxton has never had Tommy John surgery. That doesn’t mean Paxton will never require Tommy John surgery"

Paxton’s ERA isn’t great; he should be better.

Let’s talk about ERA a minute; it’s as big a dinosaur as any of the traditional stats. It’s based on nine innings. Once upon a time, starters went nine innings and the bullpen slept.

We talk about innings in thirds; Jo pitched 2 1/3 innings like that gives us a specific marker; it doesn’t. I have a lot of ideas about the fallacies of ERA but that’s another post.

ERA provides a standardized measure. However flawed it may be, everyone gets the same opportunity to look bad when they pitched well or the other way around.

Sullivan looks at ERA- and concluded that Paxton’s pretty danged good

". . . Paxton’s a big lefty, and he throws hard. Based on the strikes, the walks, and the zone rate, it’s easy to tell that Paxton repeats his delivery and doesn’t often miss . ."

Sullivan points out that of 162 pitchers, Paxton ranks:

• Fifth in FIP-
• Seventh in xFIP –
• Eighth in expected wOBA

He concludes that bit by saying:

".From a statistical perspective, Paxton’s built the profile of an ace. . ."

I like to check pitchers against Baseball Prospectus deserved run average (DRA) metric. DRA. IN 2018 78 pitchers threw 150 or more innings. Paxton ranked tenth and that puts him in elite company.

I agree with Sullivan, Paxton pitches like an ace.

[Editor’s note:  he would also significantly benefit in having a Braves defense behind him vs. that of the Mariners… never mind the change in leagues. ]