Monday Quickie - Max attack

Look. I know the pen was terrible again. We can keep talking about it or we can accept the following points.

• You won't care nearly as much how the bullpen is doing in June as compared to how the bullpen is doing in September.
• At this point there will have to be some trade made to improve the pen, so evaluation of it now is not evaluating it as it will be when it matters. 
• Even if the bullpen became lights out today, you'd still worry about it in the playoffs because of these first two months and playoff history and because we're all just worrywarts at heart. 

It sucks.  It'll have to be dealt with. But at this point accept it for the absurd joke it is and don't let it get to you. If you want to concentrate on something, concentrate on hearing what we need to in the rumor mill because we're only like a month away from the post All-Star Game activities.

As for the Max question - I wrote about how Max was #2 last week, even appeared on a podcast to talk about it. Apparently that's more controversial than I thought because a lot of Nats fans think Scherzer is the bestest! Even Boz got in on the action, kind of insinuating that Kershaw and Max are neck and neck. Of course I can't let a good clumsy attempt at proving something using stats by Boz go unchallenged. It's like how every month or so I need to go to Taco Bell and get a bean burrito and a double decker supreme. I just have to. I don't control this part.

Boz mentions that they they are close in wins. Yeah, that's a middling stat for evaluating how good a pitcher really is but I'm not going to argue that point strongly. I like wins. Then Boz brings up strikeouts which is totally fair, but only one aspect of a pitcher's ability. Weak case so far. Then Boz brings up ERA.  He notes Kershaw has a career ERA of 2.36, and Scherzer's is 3.34. BUT he says - Scherzer's ERA in the NL is 2.79! So haha?

There's a few things wrong here. Immediately we have the implied assumption that if Scherzer was in the NL all these years his career ERA would be around 2.79.  Of course that is unlikely to be the case because Max just wasn't as good when he was younger. He did pitch in the NL first and put up a 4.12 ERA in his first full year. A couple years after that, in the AL, he put up a 4.43. It's likely if he was never traded he still would have struggled early on.

Second, look at that gap! 2.79 to 2.36 is 0.43 or nearly half a run better. That's a BIG gap. It's almost the difference between Max last year (2.96) and Joe Ross (3.43).  Would you try to compare those two as being close to the same last year?  It's a bit of a mind trick because Kershaw and Max are both kinda in the "mid" 2.00s so you can fool yourself to think that gap isn't as big as it is. But it is! Boz basically says "These guys are close!" then put out a stat that says "These guys aren't close!". 

Now getting into the nitty-gritty of the comparison. First I hate comparing two unequal time frames. Everyone's career generally starts slow so if you compare someone's best 3 years to someone else's career it's going to favor that first guy. We'll tackle a career to career comparison in a minute but what about Scherzer with the Nats to Kershaw the past 3 years?

Max :  41-23, 2.79 ERA, 147 ERA+, 0.928 WHIP, 6.5 H/9, 1.1 HR/9, 1.8 BB/9 11.2 K/9
Kershaw :  36-15, 2.00 ERA, 192 ERA+, 0.835 WHIP, 6.2 H/9, 0.7 HR/9, 1.3 BB/9, 11.0 K/9

It's not all that close. And understand it's not all that close and Max Scherzer has been FANTASTIC. Here you see the things that Boz didn't bring up. Kershaw gives up fewer hits. Kershaw gives up fewer walks. Kershaw gives up fewer homers. So even if Max is a better strikeout pitcher, Kershaw has been a better pitcher in regards to everything else a pitcher does.

Ok so what about career to career. Turns out there IS a stat that takes into account the league and ballpark they are in. It's imperfect but it's definitely your starting point for comparisons between time periods and between leagues. So what is the career ERA+ comparison?

Max :125*
This is great! Plenty of Hall of Famers around here. Smoltz, Drysdale, Feller. Hey! There's  Bob Gibson!** Now what about

Kershaw : 160!

Oh.  That is literally the best ever for a starting pitcher. I'm sure it'll go down as he ages and hits those off years but again. Currently. Best. Ever.

Here are the arguments you can make for Max vs Kershaw.

• You can argue Max has become a better strikeout pitcher than Kershaw. I would completely agree here. Sure it can be a matter of approach and what they are trying to do, but Max strikes out more guys. End of story.
• You can argue that so far in 2017 Max has been a better pitcher than Kershaw. That's completely reasonable. It's only 40% of the season but I'd listen to this. I might even agree.
• You can argue that you like Max's future more than Kershaw's. This is a little tougher because Max is almost four years older than Clayton but I suppose Kershaw's recent brush with injury could worry you. I would probably disagree here. 

That's it. Those are the comparisons you can make as we stand right now.  If we get to the end of the year and Max has had a better 2017? Then we can argue that he can take the crown away as the "best pitcher now" if he's better in 2018. That would give him two straight years of better pitching and three straight years of more value (since Kershaw pitched better in 2016 but only 150 innings). But right now? Kershaw is the King.

*Strasburg? 126.  Not saying at all he's better than Max right now. Max's Nats ERA plus is close to 150, but again it shows Strasburg has been really good and can definitely accumulate stats into a Hall of Fame career with luck. 

**It's kind of funny that all the live ball era pitchers I pulled out around Max are guys that I immediately thought "Hey that guy is kind of like Max!"