Feeling Pedro-nized?

Pedro Martinez, although congratulating Barry Zito on edging him out in the Cy Young voting, is at the same time questioning the motives of the voters.

I am disappointed about all the excuses I have heard about why I didn't win. I had a great year. I would have liked it better if they just say they are giving it to him [Zito]. I would respect that then, instead of making all these excuses, making me look bad... You hear about all these excuses- he didn't make his last start, his number of wins, and so on. Doesn't it make you think a bit?

All these excuses _ that I didn't face tough teams this year. What about Seattle, Anaheim, Texas, all those teams in the West? I would dare for one of those people who say that to bring up a name that faced the Yankees more in the past several years. And the Yankees have been the best team.

I do agree that Pedro's announcement that he wouldn't make his last start while the Red Sox were still theoretically in a pennant race hurt him with the voters. Quite frankly, it should have. Here's the scene: he had been growing fatigued throughout September and had just won his 20th game of the year with one start remaining, and that's when he chose to deliver this:

"This is it. I'm done. To ask for a little more would be greedy. I'm going to let (Josh) Hancock show what he has, to see if he can be of any help to us next year. I don't have anything else to prove."

The Red Sox were eliminated before his scheduled non-start, but Martinez for the second straight year had made an issue of not finishing out the year. I believe that he was correct in resting in the final start. Doing otherwise would have been nothing more than a blatant attempt to pad his stats-like Zito did on the last day of the season and it may have hurt the A's playoff hopes. However, his message was not delivered very diplomatically. It appeared that Pedro was putting his personal goals before the teams: "I've won my twenty. I don't care if the Sox make the playoffs." It just left a bad taste in the voters' mouths.

Besides, Pedro's telescoping innings pitched per start towards the end of the year, the probability of him and teammate Derek Lowe splitting their support, and just the fact that they were so close statistically didn't help him either.

But does Pedro's argument that he faced tougher teams hold water? Let's see. I compiled the trio's record against playoff caliber teams (basically anyway who was in a race in September). Zito faced Anaheim, Boston, the Yankees, San Francisco, and Seattle. Lowe faced Anaheim, Atlanta, LA, the Yankees, Oakland, and Seattle. Pedro faced Anaheim, Arizona, Atlanta, Minnesota, the Yankees, Oakland, and Seattle. Her is a comparison of their stats in those games:

        ERA W L  G GS CG  IP   H  R ER HR BB  SO
Lowe     3.19 7 5 12 12  0 84.2 76 30 30  6 18  54
Martinez 2.14 7 4 13 13  2 92.1 69 30 22  6 21 109
Zito     3.96 8 4 14 14  1 86.1 82 40 38  8 35  64

Maybe Pedro has something there. His stats are far superior to the other two. He has a much lower ERA (even when you consider the 8 unearned runs), more innings, more complete games, and many more strikeouts.

Well, perhaps these stats were compiled in the early months when a playoff race was academic. What did each pitcher do down the stretch?

Zito           ERA  W L  G GS CG  IP     H  R ER HR BB  SO 
Pre All-Star  3.49 11 3 19 19  0 121.1 104 48 47 17 40 108 
Post All-Star 1.92 12 2 16 16  1 108    78 31 23  7 38  74 
August        2.16  4 2  6  6  1  41.2  29 14 10  3 15  30 
September     2.33  4 0  6  6  0  38.2  32 14 10  3 11  28 

Lowe           ERA  W L  G GS CG  IP     H  R ER HR BB  SO
Pre All-Star  2.36 12 4 17 17  1 118    81 32 31  4 28  74 
Post All-Star 2.83  9 4 15 15  0 101.2  85 33 32  8 20  53 
August        2.66  4 1  6  6  0  40.2  35 13 12  3  8  19 
September     3.97  3 2  5  5  0  34    33 15 15  4  5  20 

Martinez       ERA  W L  G GS CG  IP     H  R ER HR BB  SO
Pre All-Star  2.72 11 2 18 18  1 115.2  88 42 35  9 23 141 
Post All-Star 1.61  9 2 12 12  1  83.2  56 20 15  4 17  98 
August        1.69  3 2  5  5  1  37.1  26 10  7  3  6  43 
September     2.65  3 0  3  3  0  17    16  5  5  1  4  18

The first thing that pops out is that Lowe is just a peg below the other two. His ERA went up in the second half (though still 2.83) and ballooned in September. Martinez had a miniscule 1.61 ERA after the All-Star break, over 30 points below Zito. Zito does have 3 more wins and 25 innings, which are significant. It's very close.

I would give it to Martinez by virtue of his record against playoff teams. However, I don't think that you can fault Zito's record. I think close examine does convince me that this should have been a two-man race. Let's assume that the 7 people who voted for Lowe over Martinez and Zito for second were in error and redistribute their votes (also let's get rid of Washburn altogether):

Actual Vote:

Player        1st 2nd 3rd Total
Zito, Oak.     17   9   2  114
Martinez, Bos. 11  12   5   96
Lowe, Bos.      0   7  20   41 
Washburn, Ana.  0   0   1    1

Shouldabeen Vote:

Player        1st 2nd 3rd Total
Zito, Oak.     17  11   0  118
Martinez, Bos. 11  17   0  106
Lowe, Bos.      0   0  28   28

That's pretty close. Perhaps Martinez's pitching his final game and getting one more win and another 6-7 innings would have been enough to sway the necessary (7) votes his way. We'll never know now, but Pedro's protestations may be an outward manifestation of his inward butt-kicking over not making that last start.