Eaton Followers

[Ender]

ERA is a useless stat, don't judge a player using that.

Eaton's WHIP is better than previous years, his K's are where they should be but he's given up a lot more HR's than last year. This could just be luck, it could be a sign of a problem with one of his pitches in particular or it could be he's tipping his pitches somehow. I wouldn't exactly panic over the ERA though, pitchers with a 1.25 WHIP generally settle into an ERA around 4.00 or lower. If you take May out of his stats they aren't so bad, his stats were horrible last may as well for some reason.

[thetongueofire]

yes hes failed to put it together this season. but i agree with Ender just looking at just era isnt the way to go. his FIP (fielding independant pitching) era is more like 3.9. anyways, he has definitely shown signs of improvement. his current whip of 1.25 is by far the lowest of his career. hes managed to not give up walks while still maintaining a healthy strikeout rate. that imo is a pretty positive step. i think he should be able to be at least decent fantasywise for the rest of the season. hes already gone through his killer stretch in June. imo hes a good buy low guy in a keeper league. im sure theres a lot of people out there who were expecting a breakout season but are real dissapointed right now.

[josebach]

ERA is a useless stat, don't judge a player using that.

I don't know how anybody that knows anything about baseball can say ERA is a useless stat. Granted, it's not the only important stat, but it is important. Having a high ERA and a low WHIP is an indication that he doesn't pitch very well with runners in scoring position. This got me thinking, so I looked it up...
Eaton's BAA
Bases empty: .232
Runners on: .300
RISP .308
RISP w/2 outs .389

After looking at these stats, it seems to me that he is nowhere near as effective pitching out of the stretch as he is in his wind-up. To me, this means that WHIP is the useless stat and not ERA. If a guy gives up 3 hits in an inning and nobody scores... who cares.

Think about it. Who's more valuable. A guy with a 3.00 ERA and 1.30 WHIP? or a guy with a 4.00 ERA and a 1.15 WHIP? I know who I would choose.

[Pedantic]

His DIPS ERA is 4.32. That's a difference of 0.58 between his actual ERA and dERA. So while his ERA probably might lose a few points eventually, he's also not pitched as well as some might think. His 1.22 HR/9 is the problem, which is an appalling number, especially considering his home ballpark.

[Transmogrifier]

dropped him for Hampton after last night's start. Gonna ride the hot hand.

[zepfan]

I'm gonna keep him on my bench for his next start but if he tanks again, I'll probably drop him for now.

[Ender]

don't know how anybody that knows anything about baseball can say ERA is a useless stat. Granted, it's not the only important stat, but it is important. Having a high ERA and a low WHIP is an indication that he doesn't pitch very well with runners in scoring position. This got me thinking, so I looked it up...
Eaton's BAA
Bases empty: .232
Runners on: .300
RISP .308
RISP w/2 outs .389

I don't know how anyone that knows anything about baseball could think that ERA matters in the slightest. What you just pointed out is a small sample size. One year he'll have those numbers, the next year he'll have a .240 BAA in clutch situations. The difference between a 4.50 ERA and a 3.50 ERA given the same exact stats is simply luck. Relievers let in a few runs on you, you get unlucky and a hot hitter gets a 3 run shot off you, there is a bad play that doesn't get called an error that lets 3 runs in etc. If you want to judge a pitcher there are around 8 areas you can look at before you even consider ERA, its just not an important stat for judging a pitcher.

[uucrook3d]

whether era is relevant or not, one thing is for sure: there are better pitchers available than adam eaton. if he is not taken, take a look at weaver. he has allowed 3 or less er in his last 10 starts and helped my team a lot.

[josebach]

I don't know how anyone that knows anything about baseball could think that ERA matters in the slightest.

I'm sorry, I had to quote you. Where I would have believed somebody may have posted this, I never would have guessed that the poster was serious.

The difference between a 4.50 ERA and a 3.50 ERA given the same exact stats is simply luck.

Your logic makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. ERA = Earned Runs x 9 divided by innings pitched. Aren't earned runs and innings pitched statistics? What pitching statistics could possibly be more important than earned runs allowed? I'd love to see a team celebrate after losing a 1-0 game because their pitcher allowed fewer hits.

If you want to judge a pitcher there are around 8 areas you can look at before you even consider ERA

What, like WHIP? You're telling me that a single is the same as a home run?

It's just not an important stat for judging a pitcher?

You may want to write ESPN a letter telling them that ERA isn't important and that they "don't know anything about baseball".

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlbhist/allti ... ers?type=1

type=1 (ERA) is their default sort order.

I can't believe I just wasted 10 minutes responding to this. I've told myself time and time again. Don't argue logic with an illogical person.

[josebach]

If ERA isn't important. Why is it that only two out of 84 Cy Young award winners had an ERA over 3.50... both of which were in the American league. The highest ERA of a National League Cy Young award winner was 3.12... 3.12 But you're right. Anybody that thinks ERA is important knows nothing about baseball.