There’s a lot of talk right now as to whether Erik Bedard’s current string of great outings makes him one of the best pitchers in baseball right now. So where does he rank?
There are a lot of ways to look at this. What I don’t get are those people who like to pull up the numbers from 3 or 4 years ago and use the overall numbers since then to prove that he isn’t. Yes, if you look at the overall numbers since 2004, Roy Halladay has been a better pitcher than has Erik Bedard. However, I say that anyone who really thinks Roy Halladay is a better pitcher right now than is Erik Bedard doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Having said that, I can also understand why we need to look at more than just this year’s numbers.
So I decided to go back to June 5 of last year. How does Bedard rank since then? There have been 78 pitchers who have at least 200 innings pitched since that date. Those are the 78 pitchers used for the following comparison.
Erik Bedard is third in ERA at 2.91 (behind Santana and Chris Young).
Bedard is fifth in H/9 at 7.44 (behind Young, Santana, Maine, and Zambrano).
Bedard is 41st in BB/9 with a very respectable 2.78 (the top three are Byrd, Maddux, and Sheets).
Bedard is 1st in K/9 at 10.05 (followed by Peavy, Hamels, and Santana).
Bedard is 13th in K/BB at 3.61 (the top three are Sheets, Sabathia, and Schilling).
Bedard is 12th in HR/9 at 0.74 (the top three are Wang, Lowe, and Peavy).
You probably know that one of my favorites measures of a pitcher is FIP ERA. Here are the top five:
- Peavy – 2.96
- Bedard – 3.03
- Smoltz – 3.25
- Santana – 3.31
- Escobar – 3.34
And Bedard’s ranking in some of the counting stats:
- tied for 7th with 42 starts.
- tied for 17th with 19 wins.
- 12 pitchers have fewer than his 10 losses (but only Santana and Harang match his 42 starts among those with fewer losses).
- Not a counting stat, but he is 13th with a .655 winning %.
- He is one of 34 with a shutout (Sabathia, Hernandez, Lackey and Contreras have two each)
- 15th in IP (he’s averaged 6.4 IP per start)
- 1st in strikeouts with 300 (Santan has 296, Peavy 273, and Harang 264).
That’s a lot of information. Bedard is in the top five in ERA, K/9, FIP ERA, and Strikeouts. Compare the top five in ERA and FIP ERA:
- Santana ( 2.58) / Peavy (2.96)
- Young (2.64) / Bedard (3.03)
- Bedard (2.91) / Smoltz (3.25)
- Escobar (3.15) / Santana (3.31)
- Smoltz (3.16) / Escobar (3.34)
Santana, Bedard, Escobar and Smoltz appear in both lists. If you were to give points based on rankings, Bedard ties with Santana for the most points (3 for 3rd, 4 for 2nd for a total of 7 points).
Part of the reason for determining who is the best pitcher is predicting future performance. Of the four pitchers who made both lists, only Smoltz has a smaller difference in FIP ERA and ERA than does Bedard.
I think Erik Bedard has a darn good argument as one of the best five pitchers in MLB right now. In fact, the only one I see who is really better (when taking things such as league and park into effect) is Johan Santana.
So I’ll say it:
Erik Bedard is the second best pitcher in baseball.
