Milestones are usually defining moments in a player’s career. In many cases, the achievement and performer become synonymous. Pete Rose and hits, Barry Bonds and home runs, and Nolan Ryan and strikeouts are examples of players being permanently linked to the records they hold. However, when Mariano Rivera passes Trevor Hoffman on the all-time saves list, it will be nothing more than footnote because, in this instance, the man is so much bigger than the milestone.

Breakdown of Mariano Rivera’s 600 Saves

Source: Baseball-reference.com

Six hundred saves is not an insignificant accomplishment. The longevity and consistency required to reach the plateau are attributes that not many relievers possess, but in the case of Rivera, such traits are woefully inadequate when it comes to defining his greatness. After all, the Yankees’ closer has done more than just compile saves over a long career. He has dominated at every step along the way.

Pitchers Who Most Benefited from Rivera’s Save Total

Source: Baseball-reference.com

So, if not saves, what is the best way to measure Mariano Rivera’s success as a reliever? If you are a pitcher like Andy Pettitte or Mike Mussina, a handful of extra wins would be a good place to start. Opponents could probably start with the sinking feeling that comes when Enter Sandman begins to play, but for those who prefer a more tangible metric, the forest full of broken bats created by Rivera’s cutter would suffice. For the Yankees’ organization, an extra championship or two seems like an appropriate yard stick, especially when you consider his 0.71 ERA in 140 post season innings. Finally, many Yankees’ fans can probably translate Rivera’s success into lower blood pressure readings and better overall mental health. Forget the sweaty palms, pounding hearts, and upset stomachs. In 552 of his 600 saves, Rivera pitched a scoreless frame, and in 341, he didn’t even surrender a single hit. Ball game over.

Rivera’s Overall Performance in Saves

Source: Baseball-reference.com

Although some closers have approached Rivera’s level for a year or two, none have remained on that plateau for a prolonged period of time. Even Trevor Hoffman, whose record Rivera will soon break, shrinks under the scrutiny of a side-by-side analysis. In many ways, comparing Rivera to his peers only serves to illustrate the degree to which he stands alone. As Sparky Anderson might say, “you don’t ever compare anybody to Mariano Rivera. Don’t never embarrass nobody by comparing them to Mariano Rivera”.

Tale of the Tape: Hoffman vs. Rivera

Source: Baseball-reference.com and fangraphs.com

There is no one way to measure Mariano Rivera’s greatness. Even his failures speak of success. So throw out the numbers and just sit back and enjoy. For over 1,000 games, the great Yankees’ closer has been second to none, and, for all we know, the best may still be yet to come.

Mike Lupica on The Great Mariano:

This is what the great W.C. Heinz wrote once about Sugar Ray Robinson, the one the old-timers all say was the greatest fighter, pound for pound, who ever lived:

“When the young assault me with their atomic miracles and reject my Crosby records and find comical the movies that once moved me, I shall entice them into talking about fighters. (Sugar Ray Robinson) will be a form of social security for me because they will have seen nothing like him, and I am convinced they never will.”

Mo Rivera, who got to 600 saves Tuesday night, who got to his own magic number in the season of Derek Jeter getting to his own magic number on that 5-for-5 day against the Tampa Bay Rays, will be that kind of social security for us someday. Because after everything we have seen from the Yankees in this generation, all the winning they have done since the winning really started with Joe Torre’s Yankees in 1996, Rivera has been the greatest of all of them.

Mariano is three saves away from setting the all-time saves record. I liked this bit from Craig Calcaterra over at Hardball Talk:

I think that Rivera is just showing — again — how true greatness and dominance can get actually get boring after a while, causing us to lose sight of it. I mean, it would be one thing if there was a dramatic arc to Rivera’s career. But really there isn’t. It’s been greatness since he began, followed by greatness, and continuing on through greatness, basically unabated. Sure, you have a season of him as a mediocre starter for spice. A high-profile blown save a decade ago. But really that’s not enough to break the chain.

Say Word.

Over at SI.com, Joe Sheehan takes a look at the x-factor for each team in the playoff race. For the Yanks? Bartolo Colon:

The Yankees can expect to get great starting pitching from CC Sabathia, who will open the Division Series for them and pitch as often as possible. The dropoff from Sabathia is significant, however, and the best of the remaining starters — the likely Game 2 man — is Colon. In his comeback season after missing all of 2010, Colon has been nearly as good as he was in his Cy Young season of 2005, striking out 123 men and walking just 32 unintentionally in his 145 innings. He hasn’t been quite as effective since injuring his left hamstring in June: a 4.46 ERA and 51/17 K/BB, with a whopping 10 homers allowed in 66 2/3 innings over 12 starts. The Yankees have a deep bullpen that can carry the rotation to some extent, but the compressed postseason schedule means that they will have to get some kind of run prevention, and innings, from the non-Sabathia starters. Colon, with his demonstrated command, is their best chance for quality postseason starts.

Like most championship thoroughbreds, the Yankees have always been fantastic closers. Since 1901, the team has entered September leading the pack in 41 seasons, and, in all but one, crossed the finish line first.

Yankees’ September Winning Percentages

Note: Red triangles represent first place finishes.
Source: Baseball-Reference.com

The only time the Yankees stumbled down the stretch was in 2010. After entering last September ahead of the Rays by one game, they extended the lead to three, but then lost eight of the final 11 to end the year one game behind Tampa. Under normal circumstances, such a late season swoon would have been viewed as a collapse, but that month the Yankees and Rays engaged in a much less entertaining version of an Alphonse and Gaston routine. The Rays tried to give the Yankees the division, but, unfortunately, they refused to take it.

Years in Which the Yankees Finished First Despite Entering September in Second Place

Source: Baseball-Reference.com

This year, the Yankees began the final month 1 ½ games behind the Red Sox, but quickly assumed the top position with a six game winning streak. Unfortunately, that burst has been slowed by two sluggish losses to the last place Orioles, but nonetheless, the Yankees remain poised to take their sixth division crown by coming from behind. Not surprisingly, two of the Bronx Bombers’ other comebacks also came at the expense of the rival Boston Red Sox, although none was quite like the epic reversal of fortunes that occurred in 1978.

A.L. East Pennant Race Graph, 1978

Source: www.alexreisner.com

So, how will the Yankees finish up this year? Because the current wild card format has all but assured the team will make the playoffs, it remains to be seen how hard they’ll battle for the top spot. However, it’s worth noting the Yankees have never advanced to the World Series when making the playoffs via a consolation, so perhaps Joe Girardi should consider going to the whip? After all, when you’re riding a front runner, it doesn’t make sense to relinquish the lead, does it?

A few weeks ago, defensive metrics at Fangraphs had judged Curtis Granderson’s defense in center field to be more than nine runs below average. He’s shot up to under six below avegare. Recently, he was not a top-five MVP candidate according to fWAR. Now he is.

Did he save a bunch of runs or improve his defense in a few weeks? Not likely. But the landscape he’s measured against is constantly shifting, and his contribution is rated against that volatile context.

Jacoby Ellsbury, a center fielder so good that Boston shifted him to left field to make room for the 38 year-old Mike Cameron last year, is worth over 20 runs more than Granderson, and is now the fWAR MVP.

Let’s check in again at the end of the season and see how it shakes out.

Steady rain all day, with more scheduled for tonight. Will they get the game in? Hmmm. If they don’t, feel free to use this as an open thread.

[Photo Credit: Jianwei]

Shane Spencer, Kevin Maas, and going back even further, Joe Lefebvre and Sam Militello…still, nice that the kid had a good game yesterday.

We deserve each other. The Yanks and Sox have similar teams, the at bats are interminable, the games drone on. They are exciting but painful.  More than that, the fans on both sides are a bunch of whiny babies. I was crying and carrying on for the Yanks last night and I e-mailed and texted a few Sox fans who were doing plenty of bitching and moaning themselves. Never mind the reporters in Boston and New York.

Deserve each other. I’m exhausted, and it’s just August.

[Photo Credit: Timrobisonjr]

When Bill James updated his Historical Baseball Abstract with Winshares in 2001, he felt comfortable about the offensive components but still was uneasy about defense. It’s very difficult to measure defensive skill and defensive value, and to make matters worse, skill and value are not necessarily related.

In researching the odd statistical variance between Bill Buckner and Steve Garvey, he hit upon a key element of defense which makes it difficult to quantify: discretion. Specifically he noticed that Buckner, who carried a weak defensive reputation racked up a ton of assists while Garvey, who owned four Gold Gloves, did not.

In the real world, this was a trivial distinction; all it really indicates is the preference of each player in making a certain play. Baseball players are taught from a young age that, when a ground ball is hit to the first baseman, it is the pitcher’s responsibility to cover first base. Buckner, in part because he had constant pain in his legs, was fanatic about insisting that pitchers do this. I can still see him in my mind’s eye, standing five feet from first base, fielding a slow-hit grounder with the glove on his right hand, pointing vigorously to the bag with his left hand, saying “Your play. Get over there. Cover the bag.” … If a pitcher failed to cover first, Buckner would immediately go to the mound and tell him about it.

Garvey, on the other hand, was paranoid about making unnecessary throws, and strongly preferred to make the play himself if he could. As Garvey saw it, why risk the throw when you can make the play yourself? In part, he saw it this way, no doubt, because he couldn’t throw; he was a fine first baseman, but he had no arm.

…Thus if you use assists by a first baseman to represent “range,” you will reach the conclusion that Buckner was a much better defensive first baseman than Garvey. … The problem with this is, it’s just not true. Buckner was not an outstanding first baseman, and Garvey was not a poor defensive first baseman. A hundred and twenty extra assists per season doesn’t really have any value to the team in this case, because it doesn’t refelct anything other than a choice.

For most of my high-school career, I played in left field next to a speedy center fielder and behind pitchers that often over powered their competition. I played more shallow and towards the line than a typical left fielder would play. I wasn’t fast, but I made good reads and got good jumps. The centerfielder had a better arm than I did, so if we converged on a ball with men on base, I let him make the catch. His skill-set in center let me get to foul balls and turn bloop singles into outs. I may not have made as many plays as I would have as an individual playing a more conventional depth, but as a team, we probably made more plays.

We’ve come a long way since 2001 with the defensive statistics. FanGraphs uses UZR and there’s Dewan’s Fielding Bible’s +/- system plus tons of other stuff is evolving all the time. Not to mention proprietary information hoarded by some, if not all, of the clubs. These systems are dogged and incredibly detailed. The most widely employed use the best information available to divide the field into buckets and to describe the kinds of balls hit into those buckets, and then to assign credits and debits for the plays that are made or not made. It’s a little dizzying, but if you want to read about all the hard work this entails, and how well-thought out the systems are, check here, here and here.

(more…)

Entering this week’s series against the Athletics, the Yankees had a dominating 26-5 record against Oakland since 2008. Perhaps that’s why it seemed inevitable that the Bronx Bombers would rally to win each of the first two games. At least that’s how it must have felt to the Athletics. However, in both games, the comeback fell short, which gave Oakland consecutive wins against the Yankees for the first time since July 1, 2007.

The Yankees’ lack of late game heroics against the Athletics echoes a season long trend. Despite having the American League’s second best record and compiling statistics that rank among franchise highs in several categories, one area in which the Yankees have come up short (in some cases, as on Tuesday night, literally by inches) is in games played close and late. Under those conditions, the team’s current OPS+ of 107 would rank near the bottom since 1996, and lag, in some cases significantly, every championship season during that time period.

Yankees’ OPS+ in Close & Late vs. Winning Percentage When Tied or Trailing in the 7th Inning or Later

Source: baseball-reference.com

Because of the small samples involved, it’s hard to draw a meaningful conclusion about the future from this one split. However, looking back, we can probably conclude that the Yankees failure to produce late in games has cost them a few comeback victories. In fact, the team’s current winning percentage of .204 when tied or trailing entering the seventh inning is one of the lowest since 1996. When you consider that the Yankees’ bullpen leads the league in ERA and WAR (and important factor because offense alone demonstrates only a slight correlation to winning percentage in this split), the onus seems to fall squarely on the relative lack of late-game offensive production.

Yankees’ Walk-off Victories, Since 1950

Source: baseball-reference.com

Regardless of the implications of the Yankees’ muted offensive levels in close and late situations, whether looking forward or back, the team’s inability to finish off comebacks has robbed the season of one important element: the fun and excitement of the walk-off victory. To this point, the Yankees have left the opposition on the field in only three games, which pales in comparison to the 15 walk-offs recorded just two years ago. Although dramatic victories are not a pre-requisite for winning championships, they do provide enjoyable highlights over a long 162-game schedule. After all, anything that has Yankees’ fans clamoring to see A.J. Burnett must be pretty special.

Since 1950, the Yankees have had 441 walk-off victories prompted by outcomes ranging from home runs to reaching base on an error (the following pie chart, and what better way to display walk-off data, provides a break down). Just over half have come in the bottom of the ninth, with the rest occurring in extra innings, including one walk-off as late as the 20th frame: Horace Clark’s game winning single against the Red Sox’ Jose Santiago on August 29, 1967. Speaking of the Red Sox, the Yankees have left their rival on the field 57 times, more than any other opponent.

Yankees’ Walk-offs Since 1950, by Event and Opponent (click to enlarge)

Source: baseball-reference.com

Although the terminology wasn’t around at the time, no Yankee has authored more walk-offs than Mickey Mantle, who had 16 game-ending events. Among the current crop of Bronx Bombers, Jorge Posada, Derek Jeter, and Alex Rodriguez also rank in the top-10.

Tippy Martinez remains the Yankees’ most frequent walk-off victim, having surrendered five game-ending hits to the Bronx Bombers, including, most notably, Bobby Murcer’s two run double that cinched victory in the Thurman Munson tribute game. Of particular interest to current Yankees’ fans, Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon ranks among the large group of pitchers who have surrendered three Yankees’ walk-offs. Provided he remains in the American League for most of his career, Papelbon could eventually claim the victim’s mantle from Martinez.

Yankees Most Common Walk-off Heroes and Victims, Since 1950

Source: baseball-reference.com

Complaining about the lack of walk-offs from a team with a .600 winning percentage probably won’t sit too well with other teams’ fans, but those who follow the Yankees have grown accustomed to having their pie and eating it too. Besides, even though winning is fun in its own right, doing so in dramatic fashion makes it that much more memorable.

I can still vividly recall Don Mattingly’s game winning home run against Ron Davis on May 13, 1985 as if it happened yesterday. And, I am sure fans of every team can do the same. How about you?

As Jayson Stark points out, the Braves have tapped into an extraordinary vein of bullpen dominance with Jonny Venters setting up Craig Kimbrel. They’ve held hitters to absurdly low averages and only allowed two home runs between them. Respectively, their ERAs are 1.10 and 1.70.

The Yankees have a pretty impressive duo themselves, in Mariano Rivera and David Robertson. But Girardi has only used those guys for 100.1 innings while the Braves have called on their tandem for 137.1 innings. That divide scuttles any comparison.

Jason Stark notes that Kimbrel and Venters are possibly the best we’ve ever seen since the advent of current bullpen dogma. But he doesn’t consider Mariano Rivera and John Wetteland in 1996. Admittedly, their rate stats don’t come close to Venters and Kimbrel, but the Yankees got 171.1 innings  from their tag-team (thanks to heavy lifting – 107.2 – from Mo).

They didn’t stop there. Rivera and Wetteland spun another 26.2 innings in the postseason, allowed only four runs (1.35 ERA) and won the World Series. Wetteland was named World Series MVP. They toiled in a league which scored 5.36 runs per game. The 2011 Braves play in a league which socres 4.16 runs per game.

The Braves guys have a month and a half to go and could approach the innings total of Rivera and Wetteland. If they do that and maintain their statistical dominance, they’ve passed the Ol’ 96ers. But if Fredi González eases back on their usage or if they cough up some leads, I think you could at least make a good argument that the Yankees were as impressive covering more innings in a much harsher environment.

Looking at it another way, Rivera and Wetteland put up a combined 8.3 bWAR and 5.7 fWAR in the 1996 regular season. Kimbrel and Venters are at 6.7 and 5.0 and counting.  The Yankee hurlers combined for 9.658 WPA plus another 2.841 WPA during the title run. The Braves guys have only accumulated 7.6 WPA thus far. They have some work left to do.

I’m sure there were other duos that deserve inclusion. Wagner and Dotel combined for 172.3 stellar innings in 2002. Can you think of any others?

It also makes you wonder what Mo and Robertson could do if Girardi took off the leash? Mariano may be too old to give much more than he is giving now, but Robertson surely has gas in the tank. Would another ten innings for Rivera and another twenty from Robertson wreck their rates or put them in the conversation with Kimbrel and Venters?

For Yankee fans though, as long as Rivera and Roberston are strong in October, the title of best duo in the same bullpen can go to Atlanta.

Statistics from Baseball-Reference and FanGraphs

Over at Pinstriped Bible, Steve Goldman asks: Why did Joe Girardi play for one run in a two-run game?

In the bottom of the ninth inning of Tuesday night’s game against the A’s at Yankee Stadium, the Yankees trailed 6-3 entering the frame. Jorge Posada led off with a solo home run off of A’s closer Andrew Bailey, closing the deficit to 6-4. Russell Martin followed with a double, and Brett Gardner reached on third baseman Scott Sizemore’s error, putting runners on first and second with no outs and bringing Derek Jeter to the plate.

Jeter is tremendously hot right now. He came into the game hitting .339 since returning from the disabled list and he went 3-for-3 with a walk prior to the ninth-inning plate appearance. Again, the Yankees needed not one run, but two. In baseball this year, teams that have put runners on first and second with no outs have scored an average of 1.4 runs, which is to say the Yankees stood a very good chance of scoring one run there and a solid chance at scoring another. Teams that have runners on second and third with one out see their expected runs go down to 1.3, a fractionally smaller number, but it’s still less of a chance to score. I leave it to you whether eliminating the double play was worth trading that fraction of a run as well as the possibility of having three chances to score those two runs instead of two. Again, we’re talking about old school Derek Jeter here, not April-June Jeter. The formerly ground-ball obsessed GDP expert has hit into just three twin killings in 40 games, the last one coming about two weeks ago. What do you do?

Girardi chose to take the bat out of Jeter’s hands.

Fab Five Freddy, right, with Grandmaster Flash

Over at The Yankee Analysts, Moshe Mandel makes the case for Freddy Garcia.

Nice note about C.C. Sabathia’s visit to the Negro League Museum in Bats over at the Times. In the same piece, David Waldstein has an update on Alex Rodrgiuez:

Alex Rodriguez is still expected to join the Yankees in Minnesota on Thursday, but Joe Girardi said that he might not be immediately activated from the disabled list because of uncertainty about whether his right knee is ready.

“We may not activate him for a couple of days,” Girardi said.

Rodriguez, who had arthroscopic surgery on the knee last month, played third base for Class AAA Scranton/Wilkes-Barre on Wednesday, then was expected to fly to Minnesota. (He went 1 for 2, with two walks.) Girardi said he wanted to talk to Rodriguez and perhaps have him get some treatment from the trainer Gene Monahan, work in the batting cage and take ground balls before making a decision.

“A couple of days, if you rush it, could cost you a couple of weeks if you end up hurting something else,” Girardi said. “That’s why we want to take a look at him with our own eyes tomorrow and see how far he is away and see if he’s ready.”

Girardi said he might initially use Rodriguez as the designated hitter in order to ease him back into action.

Steve Goldman looks at Curtis Granderson as an MVP candidate. He examines stats from Baseball Prospectus, Fangraphs and Baseball-Reference and says that:

One of the main reasons for variance between these measurements is the way they handle fielding, with each having different ways of tabulating a player’s defensive contribution. What is fascinating is that despite this, all three rankings agree that Granderson shouldn’t be anywhere near the MVP award, and they agree on the reason: they think he has been a poor defensive player this year. Conversely, they agree that Brett Gardner has been a spectacular defensive player, which is why he shows up in the top 10 for two of the three sites (Gardner ranks 17th in BP’s hierarchy). BP’s fielding runs say that Granderson has set the Yankees back about 10 runs with the glove beyond what an average defender would have done, equivalent to a full win. Fangraphs’ version of the same says about the same thing with -8 runs, while BB-Ref generously only penalizes him seven runs.

What perplexes me here is that I can’t see it, whether on television or at the ballpark. When we talk about Derek Jeter’s defensive deficiencies, I have always been able to see his difficulties going to his left. The statistics merely confirmed what I already knew. In this case, Granderson’s problems aren’t obvious to me, so I ask you: have you noticed Granderson fail to play a solid center field?

That’s a good question. I have a hard time wrapping my head around fielding stats, that’s for sure.

[Photo Credit: ESPN]

Over at The Yankee Analysts, Mike Jaggers-Radolf plays Name That Pitcher.

[Photo Credit: N.Y. Daily News]

Every year for the past decade there is a period, a game or two, a few weeks, when Mariano Rivera struggles. During those times, the newspapers have articles about the decline and his career. But now, that kind of article has more resonance. Like this one from Tyler Kepner in the Times:

Rivera, who turns 42 in November, has 29 saves. Only one pitcher has had 30 saves at that age: Dennis Eckersley, for St. Louis in 1997. Eckersley played one more season, as a middle reliever with Boston. In the last inning of his career, in a playoff game against Cleveland, he served up a homer to Manny Ramirez that might still be going.

Nobody wants to see Rivera end like that. Or like the great Goose Gossage, bouncing to seven teams in his final seven seasons, picking up a stray save here or there. There is nobility in pitching as long as you can, in making summer last as long as possible. But it would not suit Rivera, a career Yankee who defines athletic grace.

“I don’t think he will hang around,” the Angels’ Torii Hunter said. “He loves the game, but every player wants to be the best. You don’t want to be last known as the guy who’s giving up two home runs in the World Series. He’s not even close to where he’s going to be out of the game, but I’m pretty sure a guy like that would love to go out on top.”

The final mystery in Mo’s career is how it will end. We hope for it to be special, for him to “go out on top,” though we know the reality will be messier than that.

[Painting by Stephen Holland]

Over at the YES Network, Jack Curry thinks it’s time to kick A.J. Burnett out of the starting rotation:

When Girardi removed Jorge Posada as the regular designated hitter and turned him into a reserve on Sunday in Boston, he said he was doing what was best for the team. Posada had not hit a homer since June 29 and had driven in four runs in his last 78 at-bats. After Eric Chavez returned from the disabled list, the Yankees spoke internally about how he could eventually take Posada’s at bats at the DH slot. Now Chavez has done that. Posada is a glorified pinch-hitter, a player who seems unlikely to make the postseason roster.

So what about Burnett’s status? The Yankees recognized how Posada’s unproductive at-bats were hurting them and made a change. It was decisive. The Yankees see how Burnett’s disappointing starts are hurting them, too. They need to be just as decisive with Burnett as they were with Posada. Since Ivan Nova has pitched much better than Burnett, and since Phil Hughes looked superb in his last start, why should they lose potential starts to Burnett? The answer is simple. They shouldn’t.

Amen.

[Photo Credit: N.Y. Daily News]