Basically, I would be the idea (people) person; you will be the brains.
Thesis #1: If we remove a starting pitcher's worst two starts (as defined by lowest Game Score), we may uncover a few hidden gems - pitchers that perform very well most times out but have their stats - sabermetric or otherwise - crushed by these terrible performances. [Quality Start % does something similar, but I think this could yield results that give us more insight; if it helps, make up a fancy moniker like xQS%.]
ESPN* attempts to quantify each player's contribution to a particular game by assigning a Game Score. For pitchers, the formula for reads:
50 + 1*Outs + 2*IP after the 4th + 1*K - 2*H - 4*ER - 2*UnearnedRuns - 1*BB
The average Game Score this season for starting pitchers is approximately 50.8.
Doing some very rudimentary math, I filtered for any pitcher that made 10 or more starts through 8/19 (157 in total). I then removed his lowest two Game Scores and re-sorted by average Game Score.
w/o 2 = average Games Score rank after removing two worst starts
Pure = average Games Score rank including all starts
| Games Started | w/o 2 | Pure | GmSc Diff | |
| Felipe Paulino | 14 | 76 | 103 | -27 |
| Scott Olsen | 12 | 95 | 122 | -27 |
| Luke Hochevar | 13 | 81 | 106 | -25 |
| Homer Bailey | 10 | 78 | 102 | -24 |
| Brett Anderson | 10 | 14 | 37 | -23 |
| Jair Jurrjens | 14 | 44 | 64 | -20 |
| Joel Pineiro | 20 | 58 | 78 | -20 |
| Todd Wellemeyer | 11 | 109 | 129 | -20 |
| Hisanori Takahashi | 12 | 94 | 113 | -19 |
| Tim Wakefield | 16 | 112 | 131 | -19 |
| Vicente Padilla | 15 | 24 | 41 | -17 |
| Madison Bumgarner | 10 | 42 | 57 | -15 |
| Carlos Zambrano | 12 | 117 | 132 | -15 |
| Thomas Hanson | 25 | 30 | 44 | -14 |
| Tommy Hunter | 14 | 66 | 79 | -13 |
| Dana Eveland | 10 | 141 | 153 | -12 |
| Jake Peavy | 17 | 56 | 67 | -11 |
| Tom Gorzelanny | 18 | 93 | 82 | 11 |
| Randy Wells | 25 | 97 | 86 | 11 |
| Mark Buehrle | 25 | 101 | 89 | 12 |
| Jonathan Sanchez | 25 | 47 | 34 | 13 |
| Livan Hernandez | 25 | 60 | 47 | 13 |
| Kevin Correia | 23 | 110 | 96 | 14 |
| Clayton Richard | 25 | 87 | 72 | 15 |
| Jake Westbrook | 24 | 106 | 91 | 15 |
| Kris Medlen | 14 | 91 | 73 | 18 |
| Jon Garland | 25 | 71 | 51 | 20 |
Takeaways: If not for a couple brutal starts, Tommy Hanson would be getting talked about like an ace. Padres pitchers have been incredibly consistent.
w/o 2 = average ERA rank after removing two worst starts
Pure = average ERA rank including all starts
| Games Started | w/o 2 | Pure | ERA Diff | |
| Scott Olsen | 12 | 79 | 128 | -49 |
| Carlos Zambrano | 12 | 82 | 131 | -49 |
| Dana Eveland | 10 | 112 | 151 | -39 |
| Vicente Padilla | 15 | 35 | 71 | -36 |
| Tommy Hunter | 14 | 23 | 56 | -33 |
| Homer Bailey | 10 | 88 | 117 | -29 |
| Felipe Paulino | 14 | 62 | 89 | -27 |
| Joel Pineiro | 20 | 56 | 81 | -25 |
| Jair Jurrjens | 14 | 44 | 68 | -24 |
| Luke Hochevar | 13 | 95 | 119 | -24 |
| Hisanori Takahashi | 12 | 98 | 122 | -24 |
| Todd Wellemeyer | 11 | 123 | 146 | -23 |
| Thomas Hanson | 25 | 20 | 40 | -20 |
| Jhoulys Chacin | 13 | 57 | 77 | -20 |
| Vince Mazzaro | 14 | 34 | 52 | -18 |
| Brett Aarion Cecil | 20 | 54 | 72 | -18 |
| John Ely | 14 | 87 | 104 | -17 |
| Ben Sheets | 20 | 80 | 96 | -16 |
| Justin Verlander | 25 | 74 | 58 | 16 |
| Jeff Karstens | 17 | 106 | 90 | 16 |
| Kevin Correia | 23 | 119 | 103 | 16 |
| Ian Kennedy | 24 | 105 | 88 | 17 |
| Joe Saunders | 25 | 116 | 97 | 19 |
| Dan Haren | 26 | 107 | 87 | 20 |
| Colby Lewis | 24 | 59 | 36 | 23 |
| Ryan Dempster | 25 | 75 | 51 | 24 |
| Jake Westbrook | 24 | 118 | 94 | 24 |
| Kris Medlen | 14 | 90 | 60 | 30 |
Takeaways: I think this tells me players with negative differences have made two starts that were MUCH worse than players with positive differences.
General takeaway: I've been sitting on this data for over a week and wanted to get something out before it got too stale, but as I thought more about it, I realize I should have removed each pitcher's worst two games and compared those numbers against the rest of the pitchers without two starts removed.
Other things I came across during the study which I found interesting:
-Since 2007, no team failed to make the playoffs when they won 90 games (.556 winning percentage).
-King Felix leads MLB by a wide margin with a QS% sit around 89%. Great pitchers sit around 80%.
-One more chart you might find interesting:
| Pure ERA | StdDevGS | |
| Josh Beckett | 6.67 | 19.68079 |
| Kyle Lohse | 6.79 | 18.91334 |
| A.J. Burnett | 4.66 | 18.58501 |
| Bradley Bergesen | 5.89 | 18.50852 |
| Joe Saunders | 4.54 | 18.32362 |
| Dana Eveland | 6.34 | 18.04706 |
| Mike Pelfrey | 3.97 | 17.75738 |
| Scott Baker | 4.85 | 17.5601 |
| Brandon Morrow | 4.45 | 17.08355 |
| Hisanori Takahashi | 5.01 | 17.03232 |
| Jake Peavy | 4.63 | 16.96551 |
| Gavin Floyd | 3.97 | 16.93827 |
| Matt Garza | 3.76 | 16.89335 |
| Javier Vazquez | 4.90 | 16.78431 |
| Aaron Cook | 5.34 | 16.67158 |
| Justin Masterson | 5.23 | 16.50587 |
| Joel Pineiro | 4.18 | 16.32833 |
| Wandy Rodriguez | 4.04 | 16.24488 |
| Francisco Liriano | 3.45 | 16.20305 |
| Brett Anderson | 2.89 | 10.50085 |
| Kevin Correia | 4.63 | 10.3978 |
| Wade LeBlanc | 3.46 | 10.38217 |
| Brett Myers | 3.11 | 10.26853 |
| Justin Verlander | 3.77 | 10.23054 |
| Andy Pettitte | 2.88 | 10.13575 |
| David Price | 2.85 | 9.905987 |
| Jeff Karstens | 4.41 | 9.852242 |
| Jason Hammel | 4.36 | 9.531665 |
| Madison Bumgarner | 3.27 | 9.47082 |
| Derek Lowe | 4.32 | 9.463794 |
| Mike Leake | 3.78 | 9.194392 |
| Manny Parra | 5.86 | 9.031285 |
| Stephen Strasburg | 2.97 | 8.902247 |
| Carlos Zambrano | 5.16 | 8.167687 |
| Kris Medlen | 3.86 | 8.125437 |
| Vince Mazzaro | 3.63 | 7.191641 |
| Jair Jurrjens | 3.92 | 7.141428 |
*ESPN may not have invented this stat, but this is the only place I have seen it.
For anyone interested, I would be happy to provide any of the source data. Just email me - thesportsbanter@gmail.com. Special thanks to David Pinto (BaseballMusings.com) for providing the Game Scores.
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