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Wednesday, September 20
Why not Pedro for MVP?

By Jeff Hildebrand
Special to ESPN.com

Editor's note: The team of writers from the Baseball Prospectus (tm) will be writing twice a week for ESPN.com. You can check out more of their work at their web site at baseballprospectus.com.

Last year's American League MVP vote generated a lot of debate on the subject of whether a pitcher should be considered for the award. The cause of that debate was, of course, Pedro Martinez, who had put up phenomenal numbers while leading the Boston Red Sox to a playoff berth and ultimately a spot in the ALCS.

So far, that debate has not resurfaced this year, but perhaps it should. Martinez is having an even better season than he did in 1999, and his performance is the biggest reason the Red Sox are still in the playoff hunt.

Michael Wolverton's Support-Neutral statistics have been discussed here previously, primarily in measuring the luckiest and unluckiest pitchers in the majors. Because these statistics require fairly detailed information about individual games, we don't have complete data for all seasons. However, thanks to the work of Project Retrosheet, which provided data from 1979 to 1990, we can assemble a list of some of the top seasons of recent years. This list covers the years 1973, 1979-1990 and 1992-2000.

Pitcher         Year  Team    SNW   SNL  SNPct    W  L  SNWAR
Roger Clemens   1997   Tor   22.4   5.7   .797   21  7   10.4
Dwight Gooden   1985   NYM   22.1   6.0   .786   24  4   10.2
Pedro Martinez  2000   Bos   18.7   2.9   .865   17  5    9.5
Randy Johnson   1999   Ari   21.0   7.2   .745   17  9    9.0
Tom Seaver      1973   NYM   21.5   8.1   .728   19 10    9.0
Pedro Martinez  1999   Bos   18.3   3.8   .828   22  4    8.9
Greg Maddux     1995   Atl   18.1   3.5   .836   19  2    8.9
Jim Palmer      1973   Bal   21.5   9.3   .698   22  9    8.4
Greg Maddux     1997   Atl   18.6   5.5   .771   19  4    8.3
Pedro Martinez  1997   Mon   18.8   6.1   .756   17  8    8.2

These seasons are sorted by Support-Neutral Wins Above Replacement, where for our purposes a replacement-level pitcher is one with a .425 winning percentage. With three starts left, Martinez has a very good chance to catch Dwight Gooden for second place on this list; with three very good starts, he could catch Roger Clemens for the top spot.


	Pedro Martinez has allowed three or fewer runs in 26 of his 28 starts this season.

While that would certainly be an impressive feat, a look at the team rankings shows how remarkable it really is. Given the struggles that Boston's offense has had -- placing well below the AL average in runs scored despite playing half their games in a hitters' park -- it's quite clear that they are in the playoff hunt based solely on their pitching.

After Sunday's game, Boston's starting staff ranked second in baseball Support-Neutral winning percentage at .562. However, without Martinez the situation would be very different indeed. The SNPct for Boston starters other than Martinez is .477, which would rank 23rd. Martinez represents the difference between having one of the best rotations in the majors and one that's in the bottom third.

Any team with a below-average lineup and starting rotation has no hope at all of competing for a playoff spot. It's clear that without Martinez, the Red Sox wouldn't be chasing the wild card; they would be worrying about staying ahead of the Orioles and Devil Rays at the bottom of the division. When one player makes that much of a difference, he has to be considered for MVP.

In addition to the issue of this season's awards, Martinez is clearly staking a claim to being the greatest pitcher of this era. Martinez has three of the top 10 seasons listed above. Greg Maddux is the only pitcher with even two. Martinez has established an astonishing peak level of performance. In an extreme hitters' era he is posting ERAs that would have been very strong in the pitchers' paradise of the 1960s.

The only possible knock on Martinez' performance is that he always seems to miss a few starts every year with various nicks, aches and pains. Still, he is so dominant when he does pitch that it makes up for the occasional absence. What's more, the brief rests during the season may allow him to avoid serious injury, and that is likely the only thing standing in the way of a Hall of Fame career.

With his talent and his flair for the dramatic, Pedro Martinez is creating stories that will be told for many years to come, while single-handedly carrying his team into playoff contention. Maybe he's not the MVP, but he certainly belongs in the discussion.

Jeff Hildebrand may be reached at jhildebrand@baseballprospectus.com.


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