Any time an announcer mentions the Padres, they mention how fantastic the pitching staff is and how putrid the hitters are. Rarely is it noted that Petco seriously reduces scoring. So, exactly how overrated is the San Diego pitching staff and how underrated are their hitters?
I turned to Baseball-Reference’s league page to get ERA+ and OPS+ for each NL team. Both metrics are ballpark adjusted, then compared to league average. Higher is better.
As you can see in the chart below, the Padres do have the league’s best set of pitchers, although their advantage over the other teams shrinks when you take park effects into account. Arizona, Colorado, and Cincinnati have underrated staffs, which makes sense when you consider all their home parks are great places to hit. The Mets’ staff is overrated.
Tm R/G RK ERA+ RK SDP 3.84 1 118 1 ARI 4.49 6 114 2 LAD 4.35 4 110 3 CHC 4.33 3 110 3 COL 4.73 9 106 5 NYM 4.3 2 105 6 SFG 4.44 5 105 6 ATL 4.58 7 103 8 MIL 4.84 10 97 9 WSN 4.65 8 96 10 CIN 5.24 15 96 10 PHI 4.96 11 95 12 HOU 5.08 12 93 13 PIT 5.08 12 92 14 STL 5.09 14 91 15 FLA 5.25 16 88 16 TOT 4.61
Turning to hitting, the Padres are almost league-average, tied for 8th with a 96 OPS+. That’s much better than ranking 13th in raw runs per game. Here’s the full list:
Tm R/G RK OPS+ RK PHI 5.42 1 114 1 FLA 4.88 4 114 1 ATL 4.98 3 110 3 MIL 4.76 5 108 4 NYM 4.75 6 108 4 COL 5.08 2 103 6 STL 4.49 10 99 7 CIN 4.74 7 96 8 HOU 4.55 9 96 8 SDP 4.33 13 96 8 CHC 4.64 8 95 11 LAD 4.39 11 94 12 PIT 4.34 12 92 13 SFG 4.24 15 90 14 ARI 4.26 14 89 15 WSN 3.91 16 89 15 Tot 4.61
It’s strange how similar the Diamondbacks and Padres are, when you park-adjust their numbers. They sport the two top pitching staffs in the NL, and have offenses that fall in the bottom half of the league. In fact, if the Diamondbacks wanted to be as good as the Padres, they’d need to bump up their offense a bit. That’s not a comment you often hear.
In summary,
- the Padres do have the league’s best pitching staff, but sport an offense that’s just a touch below average.
- home ballparks can significantly skew our thoughts of how good a team’s offense and defense actually are. Sure, neutralizing statistics is not a perfect science, but it’s something that should be done more often.
- The Marlins are the DRays of the NL. If you like run-scoring, move to Florida.
Popularity: 1% [?]
Share This
Sky is a baseball fan and racket sport afficianado living in upstate NY. His favorite color is orange and is just about ready to give up on his life-long dream to become the next Magnus ver Magnuson (World's Strongest Man). His favorite baseball teams are the Yankees and Red Sox, proving that there's hope in the Middle East.