Brewers WAR pie
Guys like Bill Hall and J.J. Hardy have taken a lot of heat for the Brewers’ failure to make the playoffs this season. But a quick look at the Brewers WAR pie shows that the team’s biggest problem was a lack of pitching.
Just how bad was the team’s pitching in 2009? Milwaukee pitchers had the lowest WAR of any team in the majors this year (yes, including the Nationals). In fact, the Brewers pitchers were worth a full win less than the Nats.
Fangraphs says the Brewers pitchers were worth a total of $9MM in 2009. Meanwhile, Jeff Suppan alone was paid $12.5MM (and he’ll make $12.5MM again in 2010!).
Here’s a fun fact: Yovani Gallardo’s WAR is 2.8, but the Brewers’ pitchers combined WAR is only 2.2. How is that possible? Milwaukee can thank guys like Braden Looper, David Bush, Suppan and Carlos Villaneuva, who combined for 91 starts and a -1.4 WAR.
Thanks to terrible pitching performances from just about everyone not named Gallardo or Hoffman, Milwaukee was forced to rely heavily on its position players. Just look at this insane breakdown of pitchers’ WAR vs. position players’ WAR:
That pretty much says it all right there, doesn’t it? Despite outstanding seasons from Prince Fielder, Ryan Braun and Mike Cameron, the Brewers never really had a chance. You simply can’t win when your pitching contributes less than 10 percent of overall team WAR.
September 4th, 2009 at 8:15 pm
Wow Coley. That IS an insane WAR pie!
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September 4th, 2009 at 10:19 pm
The first WAR pie is misleading, b/c it’s like, “wee colors!” But the second one hammers it home, b/c it’s all, “whoa blue!”
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September 4th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
Whoa! That is a seriously lopsided team.
And you are right – I had no idea the Brewers pitchers were so bad.
Nobody talks about that, but then again, nobody ever talks about the
Brewers. I bet the baseball tonight guys have never watched a single
Brewers game.
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September 9th, 2009 at 10:26 pm
Care to redo your post about WAR and how Pujols isn’t deserving of the MVP?
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September 10th, 2009 at 11:29 am
Adam, I simply don’t have time to redo that post every time there is a change atop the WAR leaderboard. But I will do an update at the end of the season, and if Pujols is still on top then I’ll be the first to anoint him MVP.
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