No matter where you turned, Zito jokes abounded, and with good reason: during a twenty-game stretch the previous season, the lefty had won only three games, and was even relegated to the bullpen one time (albeit, only for an inning). As frustrated as Giants fans had become during the Zito Experience, each poor outing he turned in led to a fresh layer of disappointment. Die-hards cursed the man and even casual fans seemed to pick up on the stench of disaster that accompanied every Zito start.
Meanwhile, more realistic fans like me and Nick began to realize that it was no longer fair to expect Zito to rediscover the magic that led to his then-record $126 million, seven-year payout. The Good Zito wasn't coming back, and if we were going to survive the remaining five-plus years on Bad Zito's contract without suffering massive cranial leakage, we all needed to shift our already-low expectations.
One night at AT&T Park, Nick and I observed the train wreck in person. Trying to scavenge for something constructive, we brainstormed various ways we could help salvage Zito's career by looking at the results of his "performance" from a non-traditional viewpoint. Much in the same that way that a rehabbing ace pitches against collegiate or low-minors batters to build up strength and confidence on his path to recovery, even a pitcher barely hanging on to his job like Zito will look like an All-Star if we lower the bar sufficiently.
Like Alexander Cartwright and Bill James before us, that night we invented the Zito Win.
When trying to evaluate a starting pitcher's success rate, it's not uncommon to look at his win-loss record. It's not a perfect metric by any means, but in Zito's case, through his first season and a half, his W-L record stood at 14-25. This was a terrible record, and certainly reflective of Zito's dismal performance, but somehow it just didn't seem to do him justice, and here's why:
If you listen to baseball broadcasts on TV or on the radio, you'll hear the color commentator celebrate a pitcher because his team has a high winning percentage in games started by that pitcher --- "He gives his team a chance to win every time he goes out." Well, through 2007 and the first part of 2008, Barry Zito certainly hadn't given the Giants a chance to win every night, but when the Giants did win, he must had something to do with it, right?
If you listen to baseball broadcasts on TV or on the radio, you'll hear the color commentator celebrate a pitcher because his team has a high winning percentage in games started by that pitcher --- "He gives his team a chance to win every time he goes out." Well, through 2007 and the first part of 2008, Barry Zito certainly hadn't given the Giants a chance to win every night, but when the Giants did win, he must had something to do with it, right?
How to earn a Zito Win, Method #1:
If your team wins and you were the starter, you get the win.
If your team wins and you were the starter, you get the win.
Another expression we've all heard baseball announcers say is that a pitcher's done his job if he "keeps his team in the game." Different teams score different amount of runs, and the Quality Start metric tracks a pitcher's ability to complete six innings while allowing three runs or fewer. Nick and I decided that Zito needed a little more rope than that, though, because he'd been struggling so much. Besides, "quality" isn't an adjective, anyway, so we felt it was okay to re-write the definition a little bit:
How to earn a Zito Win, Method #2:
If you pitch at least give innings, and give up no more than five runs, you get the win.
Barry Zito may not have been performing up to the All-Star standards the Giants were paying him to, but by our Zito Win method, he had a real chance to succeed game in, game out. We figured that if Zito heard about this metric he might feel good about himself and start to turn things around. Maybe he heard us that night, and maybe he didn't. But one thing's for sure: Barry Zito has one heck of a ZW-L record:
Even with my terrible HTML layout skills, it's plain to see that we're looking at a pretty special few seasons as as long as we're measuring Zito this way. All of the team's wins became Zito Wins, and many of the other games that were originally no-decisions or losses become Zito Wins as well because of the pitcher's sub-9.00 ERA, or ZERA.
Tonight Barry Zito makes his first start of the season for the Giants, against an Astros lineup that doesn't have a lot of thunder. I think I smell a Zito Win.
If you pitch at least give innings, and give up no more than five runs, you get the win.
Barry Zito may not have been performing up to the All-Star standards the Giants were paying him to, but by our Zito Win method, he had a real chance to succeed game in, game out. We figured that if Zito heard about this metric he might feel good about himself and start to turn things around. Maybe he heard us that night, and maybe he didn't. But one thing's for sure: Barry Zito has one heck of a ZW-L record:
| 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | Total | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Original WL | 11-13 | 10-17 | 10-13 | 31-43 |
| Zito WL | 24-9 | 25-7 | 27-6 | 76-22 |
Even with my terrible HTML layout skills, it's plain to see that we're looking at a pretty special few seasons as as long as we're measuring Zito this way. All of the team's wins became Zito Wins, and many of the other games that were originally no-decisions or losses become Zito Wins as well because of the pitcher's sub-9.00 ERA, or ZERA.
Tonight Barry Zito makes his first start of the season for the Giants, against an Astros lineup that doesn't have a lot of thunder. I think I smell a Zito Win.
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