Submitted by stephen, Sep 3, 2008 09:48

This was a great article and I hope the world of sports, especially baseball, sees more like it. Lincecum has an incredible ERA, but I think he's had a little help from Lady Luck and his home stadium. Only 7% of fly balls against him have been dingers, which is about 5% below MLB average, and no pitcher can consistently suppress the home runs per fly ball that much. Don't get me wrong--he's a mind boggling pitcher, but in a neutral park, I think he's more like a 3.20 pitcher. I disagree that Webb has been out pitched by 6 or so guys in the National League. Webb doesn't post the sort of K/BB ratios or raw K% of many of the guys you name, but he stands out at the very top of the NL in ground ball percentage--65%! That means Webb reduces extra base hitting and gets batters to ground into double plays. Webb's great GB% is what keeps his ERA as low as guys with more power and finesse, guys like Licecum, Haren and Peavey.

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