Win Shares and the Cy Young

[WiffleWOOD]

http://www.robneyer.com/book_04_CYvsWS.html

"So was Bill James right? Do Win Shares match up with Cy Young voting better than MVP voting?

Yes. Throughout history, the Cy Young winner led the league in pitching Win Shares about 58 percent of the time (compared to 41 percent for MVPs), and was within 2 Win Shares of the leader about 72 percent the time (50 percent for MVPs).

.....

So who will win the Cy Young in 2004? In The Neyer/James Guide To Pitchers, the authors introduce an ingenious method (over 80 percent accurate! good enough!) for predicting who will win the award. As of mid-August, the formula tells us that Mariano Rivera and Jason Schmidt are “leading,” which seems pretty reasonable. But both races are fairly close, and the lead could easily change hands before the end of the season. (Click here to see the formula and current leaders.)

Ah, but now you want to know if Rivera and Schmidt are pacing their respective leagues in Win Shares? They are! Sort of! Schmidt is leading the NL in pitching Win Shares and Rivera trails the AL leaders (Mark Mulder and Johan Santana) by a mere three Win Shares. The system works! "

[slamminsammya]

Even win shares is a flawed system. Anything awarding a pitcher for getting 3 outs with a three run lead cannot be totally trusted. VORP is probably a better indicator of the best pitcher, albeit not necessarily the Cy Young.