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Tim Dierkes recently asked the Royals’ Brian Bannister a few questions, and is posting the responses at his blog, MLB Trade Rumors. To be honest, I think Bannister is overrated. His 3.87 ERA in 2007 benefitted from some excellent Kansas City fielding and a bit of luck. He only struck out 4.2 hitters per nine innings, while still walking 2.4 — not a recipe for success.

However, from his answers to Tim’s questions, I’m now a fan of the guy. Bannister sounds extremely smart and takes an extremely analytical approach towards pitching. Here’s hoping he can continue to improve. My favorite answer of his is below, and you can read more responses in parts one and two at MLB Trade Rumors.

MLBTR: What’s the most misunderstood aspect of succeeding in baseball by typical fans, sportswriters, and announcers?

Bannister: There are two things that make baseball unique from other sports. One, baseball is a game of skill that is accentuated by the physical tools of the person performing those skills. Most people superficially judge a position player solely on size, strength, and speed, when his eyesight, balance, rhythm, hand-eye coordination, and mental makeup are much more influential factors in his future success. It is when a player embodies all of these qualities that we get our superstars and hall-of-famers. I would much rather face a hitter with “80″ power and “80″ speed but bad strike zone discipline than one with no power and a .400+ OBP. Over the course of time, the hitter with the .400+ OBP is going to hurt me much, much more, especially if he is surrounded by other good hitters.

Secondly, whether you like it or not, baseball is a game of randomness. We play outdoors (mostly) in changing elements and field dimensions, and each pitch results in a series of events that can go in either teams favor. One thing that I have have come to accept is that just because I train hard physically, I practice perfectly, I prepare diligently, and execute a pitch exactly as I wanted, it can still result in a home run. In golf, if you analyze all the variables correctly (lie, distance, slope, wind, etc.) and execute your swing perfectly, it will result in a great shot. Not so for a pitcher or a hitter. A hitter can swing the bat perfectly and it will result in an out more than six times out of ten. Therefore, as a pitcher, I study and play to put the percentages in my favor more than anything because I know that I can’t control the outcome in a single game or series of games, but over the course of a season or a career I will be better than average.

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Dave Pinto just started his series on 2007 fielding using his play-by-play system (Probabilistic Model of Range — PMR). Today he posted rating of the fielding behind every pitcher with at least 300 balls in play. This is a great opportunity to discuss another aspect of fielding that’s too often ignored: its ability to cloud our opinions of pitchers.

Here are the top ten most fortunate starting pitchers in 2007, as ranked by the actual percentage of balls in play turned into outs compared to what you’d expect an average defense to turn into outs given the spray of batted balls. A higher number represents a pitcher received better fielding.

Pitcher 	Team 	Ratio
Chien-Ming Wang	NYY	108.0
Jeremy Guthrie	Bal	105.2
Dustin McGowan	Tor	104.8
Sean Marshall	ChC	104.5
Roger Clemens	NYY	104.4
Brian Bannister	KC	104.4
Jarrod Washburn	Sea	104.2
Mike Bacsik	Was	104.1
Tom Glavine	NYM	104.0

I’m not saying these numbers are perfect. After all, PMR ranks the Yankees as the best fielding team in 2007. I’m open to considering that possibility, but no other system thinks they were much better than average.

But doesn’t it make sense that the breakthrough performances from Jeremy Guthrie and Brian Bannister were aided by help from their fielders? Most of the pitchers on that list had better seasons than were expected. Just maybe they pitched similarly to their skills in the past, but enjoyed deflated ERAs thanks to the guys behind them.

As a reference point, Wang’s fielders turned 33 extra balls in play into outs than expected. At .8 runs each, that’s 26 fewer runs charged to Wang, vaulting him into undeserved Cy Young consideration.

How about the least fortunate starters of 2007? These are the guys who received the least help from their fielders, according to PMR:

Pitcher 	Team 	Ratio
Joe Kennedy	Oak	96.8
Scott Kazmir	TB	96.6
Chris Capuano	Mil	96.5
Robinson Tejeda	Tex	96.2
David Wells	SD	96.0
David Bush	Mil	95.7
Zach Duke	Pit	95.2
Jose Contreras	CWS	95.1
Kip Wells	StL	94.9
Scott Olsen	Fla	94.5

This is a pretty good list of pitchers who were considered disappointments in 2007. Chris Capuano, David Wells, David Bush, Jose Contreras, and Scott Olsen especially stick out. For Capuano and Bush, two Milwaukee hurlers, the awful fielding reputations of Ryan Braun, Rickie Weeks, and Prince Fielder are certainly taking their toll.

I know I harp on it a lot (and I’ll continue to do so), but fielding isn’t just a footnote to a great season by a hitter or a pitcher. Not only do many position players deserve significant credit or blame for their fielding abilities, pitchers deserve to have the performance of their fielders separated from their own contributions.

Kansas City would be best served by exploring a trade for Brian Bannister, while his value is high. If teams are willling to pay $8 million per season for league-average starters, what would they be willing to give up for a guy making the minimum who appears to be a top of the rotation pitcher?

A smart team would ignore Bannister and instead make a move for Jose Contreras, a guy who’s shown solid talent in the past and is currently underrated thanks to an awful Chicago defense.

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