There has been much grousing about one baseball stat: wins.
Just because Jeff Samardzija is pitching great, but getting no run support, there is no reason to eliminate the win statistic. A pitcher's win stats are not irrelevant. It is a historical base line to compare pitchers from various eras.
A major league starting pitcher comes into the game with a mental state of throwing a complete game victory. At the beginning of professional baseball, pitchers were expected to throw complete games. There were no five man rotations or bullpen specialists. Cy Young started more than 40 games a season throughout his career. He averaged in his 22 years as a major league pitcher more than 334 innings per season, which led to an amazing 511 total victories.
A starter is the one player on the field that has the most control of the game. A commanding starting pitcher can make a bad team look good. Steve Carlton won 27 games in 1972 for a Phillies team that only went 59-97. Carlton was the victor in 45.6 percent of the Phillies wins that season.
Of course, the "win" stat is a "team" stat. But since scoring rules require a starter to throw 5 innings in order to "qualify" for a win, this shows the historic value of starting pitchers to the game. The old saying that a pitcher must keep his team "in the game" is a paramount aspect of the chess match between hitter (offense) and defense (pitching and fielding). Since the pitcher starts each play, what he does has a major impact on whether his team wins or loses.
And it makes sense that a starting pitcher that holds his opponent to three runs or less should be in a good position to lead his team to a win.
There are other stats that help evaluate a pitcher: ERA, WHIP, K/BB.
But wins is an easy stat to understand. It is the purpose of the game itself.
Pitchers put the burden upon themselves to will their teams to victories. As Ferguson Jenkins often tells when he got the ball to pitch, he expected from himself a complete game victory. Anything less was unacceptable. That is the approach he was taught as a young player.
But today, the modern pitcher is one of specialization. A starter is no longer pressured into complete games. Pitch counts plus a rotation of bullpen pitchers diminishes the number of innings a starter is expected to throw. A five man rotation decreases the number of starts. Those factor limit a pitcher's win total more than anything else.
Wins for pitchers is a historical stat which still has value. It is a starting point in comparing pitchers.
It is a starting point to sort good pitchers from bad ones. It is also a factor in determining how well teams play when various pitchers are on the mound. But most of all, win totals are still used as evidence in pitcher arbitration and contract negotiations.
