Is Braden the worst pitcher with a perfect game?
This arose out of a set of emails at work, and I figured I’d post it here since I hadn’t really thought through it before. First off, here’s the list (the third column is career ERA+, by baseball-reference, as a starting point):
Dallas Braden 05-09-2010 96 Oakland 4, Tampa Bay 0
Mark Buehrle 07-23-2009 121 Chicago 5, Tampa Bay 0
David Cone 07-18-1999 121 New York 6, Montreal 0
David Wells 05-17-1998 108 New York 4, Minnesota 0
Kenny Rogers 07-28-1994 108 Texas 4, California 0
Mike Witt 09-30-1984 105 California 1, Texas 0
Len Barker 05-15-1981 94 Cleveland 3, Toronto 0
Catfish Hunter 05-08-1968 105 Oakland 4, Minnesota 0
Don Larsen 10-08-1956 99 New York 2, Brooklyn 0*
Charlie Robertson 04-30-1922 90 Chicago 2, Detroit 0
Addie Joss 10-02-1908 142 Cleveland 1, Chicago 0
Cy Young 05-05-1904 138 Boston 3, Philadelphia 0
Roy Halladay 05-29-2010 136 Philadelphia 1, Florida 0
Randy Johnson 05-18-2004 136 Arizona 2, Atlanta 0
Dennis Martinez 07-28-1991 106 Montreal 2, Los Angeles 0
Tom Browning 09-16-1988 98 Cincinnati 1, Los Angeles 0
Sandy Koufax 09-09-1965 131 Los Angeles 1, Chicago 0
Jim Bunning 06-21-1964 114 Philadelphia 6, New York 0
Monte Ward 06-17-1880 119 Providence 5, Buffalo 0
Lee Richmond 06-12-1880 94 Worcester 1, Cleveland 0
So the only pitchers to throw a perfect game with career ERAs below average are: Braden, Barker, Larsen, Robertson, Browning, and Richmond.
Richmond played a LONG time ago, before the modern era when there were things like a strike zone and 4-ball walks. Also, in the season he threw a perfect game, he pitched 590 innings. I’m going to exclude him because I don’t really know what to do with him, and we can say worst perfect game pitcher in the modern era.
Because it is really difficult to compare counting stats across eras (Braden is active, Barker is the 70s, Larsen is the 50s, Browning is the 80s, and Robertson is the 20s), I’m going to see if WAR can help.
Braden 3.2 WAR in 4 seasons 1.0 WAR in his perfect game season
Barker 12.6 / 11 2.3
Larsen 10.9 / 14 2.6
Browning 19.5 / 12 2.8
Robertson 3.2 / 8 3.6
From this, it looks clear to me that Browning is safe since he averaged nearly 2 WAR/season, and Barker is safe as the only other pitcher over 1. That leaves Braden, Larsen, and Robertson.
Robertson broke into the league in 1922 as a 26 year old and put up two great seasons. After that he was garbage for five more before retiring. Larsen broke in in 1953 and was good, but not great, for four years. After that, he had two more good years in the other 10. Braden broke in in 2007, and was terrible (6.72 ERA in 72 IP). He didn’t have a good year until 2009, and has been fine so far this year.
I don’t think the choice is Robertson, since his peak was quite high. For my money I would probably pick Larsen, who was blah for a long time over Braden, but it’s close. Larsen also isn’t on everyone’s list because his perfect game was in the post season.
Thoughts you FKers?
I very distinctly remember being told in ‘81 that Len Barker had thrown a perfecto, and saying “Len Barker? He sucks!”
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He never sucked like Braden sucked in 2007.
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That’s a little unfair to Braden given that in 2007
a) He was a rookie with a weak draft/scouting pedigree who got promoted after all of 11 starts in AAA
b) His peripherals were actually not so bad (4.50 FIP vs. 6.72 ERA)
Since then, he has 300 innings of being consistently (a bit) above average.
When Barker (who, looking at his stats and age was also probably brought up a bit prematurely) threw his, he had about 500 below-average innings under his belt.
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I’m not seeing it.
On Braden: His ERA was garbage, and his xFIP was 4.94. He walked over 3 per 9.
On the comparison: Barker had exactly one season with a FIP > 4.5 until the last two years of his career. His next highest FIP was 3.52.
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He walked over 3 per 9.
??
League average is 3.3 BB/9. Braden has always been better than that, and has also gotten better each year.
Barker had been worse than that for 5 straight years at the time of his perfect game.
It’s fair to point out that I used a bit of a double standard by citing Braden’s FIP for 2007 to argue that he was not as bad as you say, but using Barker’s actual ERA to classify him as below average. But you are doing the same in the reverse direction: Fangraphs doesn’t compute xFIP for the 70s and 80s, but if you want to use that stat as a basis for comparison, what do you suppose it would say about Barker in 1979 (4.92 ERA, 3.52 FIP, 6.09 K/9 vs. 4.59 BB/9)?
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I’m saying if we stick to FIP, Braden’s 4.50 is at least 0.98 worse than all but one of Barker’s first 9 seasons.
I’m also saying that FIP is probably making Braden’s 2007 look less shitty than it was.
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FIP makes Barker look less shitty than he was almost every year of his career.
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Maybe his defense sucked. That would, after all, be the point of FIP
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ERA is probably better than FIP in a huge sample like a whole career.
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Why?
Bunning because he’s an ass?
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But an ass every fourth day without fail. And also, being a member of the 1964 Phillies surely warped him for life.
Buehrle, judging by his name, is the wurst pitcher with a perfect game.
Photo from Addie Joss’s wikipedia page:
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How long had he been dead at the time of that photo?
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Zombie pitchers – you have to beat them to death with a baseball bat.
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Another observation:
I’m surprised that most of the modern perfect games are in the AL, where you’d expect it to be harder given the DH.
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Indeed – and the AL/NL discrepancy is biggest *after* the introduction of the DH.
Pre-1900: N/A – 2
Pre-WWII: 3 – 0
to 1969: 2 – 2 (mound lowered)
to 1973: 0 – 0 (DH)
to 2010: 7 – 4
Crazy stat I heard after Halladay’s perfect game (I hope it’s true): there have now been six perfectos in which the final score was 1-0. In all six, the run was unearned.
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I want lunar and astrological charts for all the perfectos.
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Six indeed (I have the scores on my post)
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True … no earned runs.
09-30-1984: California 1, Texas 0 (1b, pb, go, fc)
10-02-1908: Cleveland 1, Chicago 0 (looks like a hit, a steal and an e3 were involved)
05-29-2010: Philadelphia 1, Florida 0 (1b, e8)
09-16-1988: Cincinnati 1, Los Angeles 0 (2b, 1b/e5)
09-09-1965: Los Angeles 1, Chicago 0 (bb, sac, sb/e2)
06-12-1880: Worcester 1, Cleveland 0 (likely a hit and an e4 at least)
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OH. Totally missed that part.
Armando GalarragaNevermind.up
Harvey HaddixNevermind.up
Nah, Haddix was a pretty good pitcher over a long career.
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Right. That would have made this easier.