Random Thursday: June 13, 1995, Baltimore vs. Cleveland

Do you remember back before the season, everyone was a bit abuzz over Mike Mussina. Lar at wezenball had a post up. Jason at It's About the Money Stupid, Shyster was weighing in. There was a general desire to assess and dissect the man’s career, to decide his place among the games’ elites. Even The Common Man himself weighed in concluding that “it's not a stretch to say that the majority of Mussina's problems in New York were caused by the disappointing defense playing behind him, rather than the attrition of his ability.”

But lest we forget, all was not wine and roses for Mussina in Baltimore. For instance, in this week’s randomation, we find a June 13, 1995 contest between Mussina’s Orioles and the eventual AL Champion Cleveland Indians, who won 100 games in just 144 contests. In that strike-shortened year, the Orioles got great work out of Mussina, who went all 19-9, 3.29, 2.0 BB/9, 3.16 K/BB, and 1.069 WHIP on the American League in 221.2 innings (Randy Johnson won the Cy Young that year, but Mussina inexplicably finished 5th, behind Jose Mesa (who got two first place votes (raise your hand if you’re the idiot who voted for him…)), Tim Wakefield, and David Cone). However, his Orioles finished 71-73, good for 3rd place in the AL East.

This game is notable for a number of reasons. First off, it’s a terrible rout. The Indians touched up Mussina for a three run homer (by 3B(!) Jim Thome) and a solo shot (Albert Belle). He left after 5.2 innings, having given up 6 runs. His replacements weren’t much better. Jamie Moyer relieved and gave up three straight singles to Thome, Manny Ramirez, and Paul Sorrento before giving way to Alan Mills. Mills got out of the 6th without further damage, but couldn’t record an out in the 7th. He gave way to Jesse Orosco, who allowed a couple of sac flies. By the end of the 7th, the Indians had an 11-0 lead, which they would hold. El Presidente, Dennis Martinez, pitched the shutout for Cleveland.

But an 11-0 drubbing is only so interesting. Great players have bad games. It's just the way of the world. More interesting here is the composition of the lineups and teams themselves. While these teams were qualitatively very different (and the Orioles were worse almost across the board that year), the career values of the two squads is incredibly interesting. Take a look at who played in this game:

Mussina--270 career wins
Moyer--249 career wins (and counting)
Martinez—245 career wins
Orosco—1252 games pitched (MLB record)
Doug Jones—303 career saves
Thome—547 HR (14th all time, and counting)
Belle—381 HR
Ramirez—533 HR (19th all time, and counting)
Eddie Murray—3255 H (12th all time), 504 HR, 1917 RBI (9th all time)
Omar Vizquel—2670 hits (and counting), 11 Gold Gloves
Kenny Lofton—2428 hits, 622 SB
Tony Pena—4 Gold Gloves
Rafael Palmeiro—3020 hits, 569 HR (10th all time), 1835 RBI (14th all time)
Harold Baines—2866 hits, 384 HR
And, of course,
Cal Ripken—3184 H (14th all time), 431 HR, 2630 consecutive games (ML Record), 2 Gold Gloves, 2 time AL MVP

And that’s not even counting three-time all stars Carlos Baerga and Brady Anderson.
Not appearing in that contest were Kevin Brown (211 wins), Dave Winfield (3110 H, 465 HR), Bobby Bonilla, Andy Van Slyke, Brian Giles, and Jeromy Burnitz.

These rosters were filled with players who either had had tremendous careers, or had tremendous careers ahead of them. In all, the pitchers in this game won 959 games, lost 725, saved 470, appeared in 4445, and threw 14403.7 innings. The hitters totaled 34771 hits, 4717 homers, 18,488 RBI, and 18561 R. In all, to The Common Man, that seems awfully prolific. In the post war era, this has got to be one of the most amazing accumulations of talent on one ball field, doesn’t it? The Common Man wonders if there’s a way to check that out without devoting the next six months of his life to the project. Class, any ideas?

Moose Hunting

Lar's retrospective on the career of Mike Mussina yesterday on wezen-ball, ended on an interesting note:

"The last eight years of his career, though, which he spent on the Yankees, were not nearly as good as his first. Whether this is a product of his complacency after signing a big contract, or a result of the pressure of pitching in New York City, or just a natural result of his aging (after all, he didn't sign with the Yankees until he was 32), it's hard to say. It is clear that those Yankees years were not up to the standard that he set for himself in Baltimore, and that seems to be the main reason that some people don't remember him as being great."

That stuck in The Common Man's craw, and he started to wonder what, if anything, happened to Mussina during the move from The Charm City to The Big Apple. Now, The Common Man should preface this by saying that he is not a number cruncher by trade, and that some of the conclusions here may be rough. He leaves it to those with better resources and more time at their disposal (or just to the peanut gallery of armchair bloggers) to figure out if The Common Man is on to something here. All statistics were derived from that trustiest of trusty sites, baseballreference.com.

Here are Mussina's rate stats for his time as an Oriole and a Yankee:

Orioles ERA: 3.53
Yankees ERA: 3.88

Orioles K/9: 6.9
Yankees K/9: 6.2

Orioles BB/9: 2.1
Yankees BB/9: 1.8

Orioles HR/9: .94
Yankees HR/9: .96

As you'd expect, the raw data seems to indicate that Lar is right. Moose's ERA is a third of a run higher as a Yankee, and his declining strikeout and walk rates seem to indicate a pitcher who's compensating for a loss of velocity. In addition, the relative stability of his homerun rate could be a result of moving from a good homerun park (Oriole Park at Camden Yards) to a more difficult one (Yankee Stadium). Like most pitchers, as he aged Mike Mussina had to survive by pitching more to contact.

And given the state of the Yankees defense, perhaps this was exactly the wrong time for Mussina to have to make this adjustment. In his prime, up the middle in Baltimore, Mussina had Ripkens (plural), Harold Reynolds, Mike Devereaux, Robbie Alomar, Brady Anderson, and Mike Bordick, all players with excellent defensive repuations. Meanwhile, as a Yankee, he's had Soriano, Jeter, Miguel Cairo, an aging Bernie Williams, Robinson Cano, Johnny Damon, and Melky Cabrera. Defense has not been a hallmark of the Yankees of late, and Mussina's shift in pitching strategy seemed destined to lead to more basehits.

Indeed, if one crunches the defensive numbers, Mussina's Orioles allowed a .293 average on balls in play, while his Yankees allowed a .298 batting average. As Mussina's strike out rate dropped, one would assume that this more porous defense would affect his overall performance even greater. And indeed Mussina gave up 8.5 hits/9 as an Oriole, but 9.1 as a Yankee. And given how many Baltimore singles may have ended up as New York gappers, perhaps it's not a stretch to say that the majority of Mussina's problems in New York were caused by the disappointing defense playing behind him, rather than the attrition of his ability (during which he maintained a respectable K/9).

The case is, of course, far from proven. There's significant noise in that data and a lot of logical leaps that The Common Man made. Perhaps as Mussina gets closer to his enshrinement in the Hall of Fame, others can do some of the heavier lifting, and demonstrate just how effective Moose remained in the Yankee years, and how deserving he is of baseball's highest honor. In the meantime, since it seems to bring you people back in droves (and The Common Man does love droves), here's Mike Mussina's Strat-o-Matic card from his fabled 1992 season (18-5, 2.54 ERA, 48 BB, 16 HR, 130 K in 241 IP, and a 157 ERA+):


As you can see, Mussina has a pronounced reverse platoon split. He allows fewer hits and less power to lefties (in his real season, lefties managed to hit just .220/.269/.280 off Moose, with just one homer in 459 plate appearances), has a strong ability to induce the double play (any grounder with an A next to it is a DP), and can go deep into games (8 innings without tiring). He even holds runners well, automatically decreasing their chances of stealing second by 15% (the hold -3 rating). In all, this is what The Common Man dreams about at night, when he thinks about the perfect pitcher. And only 23!