Wheeler & Balfour: The FIP Story
We've looked at frequencies and magnitudes of failures in various states of leverage for Grant Balfour, J.P. Howell, and Dan Wheeler. Now let's look at each pitcher's FIP for each leverage scenario:
| Pitcher Lev | FIP | IP |
| Balfour High | 0.74 | 14.2 |
| Balfour VeHi | 1.37 | 6 |
| Howell High | 2.29 | 34 |
| Balfour Med | 2.45 | 18.2 |
| Howell Med | 3.05 | 26.2 |
| Howell Low | 3.4 | 51.1 |
| Wheeler VeHi | 3.61 | 9.2 |
| Balfour Low | 3.76 | 41.1 |
| Wheeler Low | 3.87 | 22.1 |
| Howell VeHi | 6 | 5 |
| Wheeler Hi | 6.01 | 25.2 |
| Wheeler Med | 6.7 | 26 |
While Wheeler has the lowest fail rate for low leverage situations, his FIP does measure higher. His relative FIP is much better however. Due to his penchant for HRs he will never be a qualifier for an extremely low FIP, but that does not account for frequency. Given his low failure frequency, the lesser magnitude of a home run in low leverage spots, and his relatively strong FIP, it is pretty clear where Wheeler's use is best suited. Likewise, there should be no further questions about Balfour, unless you want to discuss his health.
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12 comments
Comments
To the untrained eye (i.e. me)
it looks like Wheeler is best served coming in around the 6th inning with no one one base in a game we are way up or way down, and even then his FIP doesn’t compare favorably to the other two.
Are the numbers based on 2009, or career?
by Buc Wild on Jun 2, 2009 1:16 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs
pulled all reg season game logs from 08 and 09 from fangraphs and sorted by pLI
used both years to increase sample size
by FreeZorilla on Jun 2, 2009 1:40 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs
Huh, and J.P. only has 5 "Very High" innings?
That threw me for a loop.
by R.J. Anderson on Jun 2, 2009 1:43 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs
Yes, covers 8 outings
Has not fared well so outs and innings have not been accumulated.
by FreeZorilla on Jun 2, 2009 1:51 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs
The very high and high are confusing
I don’t know how you can get a definitive answer on their results from sample sizes of less then 10IP
Free Ray Durham!
by Sveet on Jun 2, 2009 1:51 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs
Should have said
I don’t know how you can draw a definitive conclusion from their results when samples sizes are so small.
Talking about the very high situations
I think thats clearer
Free Ray Durham!
by Sveet on Jun 2, 2009 1:55 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs
mentioned that on one of the previous posts
best to lump them together.
by FreeZorilla on Jun 2, 2009 1:57 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs
Thats true, thats why on the original post I combined low and middle and also high and very high
Those are the classes of the leverage index.
by FreeZorilla on Jun 2, 2009 1:56 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

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