Bret Saberhagen: Greg Maddux with Injuries

To most, Bret Saberhagen was a "very good" pitcher. He had a lifetime record of 167-117, and struck out 1715 batters in 2562 2/3 innings. He won Cy Young Awards in both 1985 and 1989, a World Series MVP with the Royals in 1985, the SN Comeback Player of the Year in 1987 and 1998, and pitched a no-hitter in 1991. He is arguably the greatest pitcher in the history of the Kansas City Royals, and also had good seasons with the Mets in 1994 and with Boston in the late '90s. Despite these accomplishments, however, most people would not consider him to be close to the Hall of Fame, mostly due to his relatively low career totals. The BBWAA voters agreed, as he received just 1.3% of the vote in 2007, and as a result dropped off the ballot in his first year. Read on to learn more about Saberhagen's career.


Digging deeper, however, reveals that Sabes definitely deserves a second look. During the span of his career (1984-2001), among pitchers with at least 2000 IP, Saberhagen ranks 5th in ERA, behind only Greg Maddux, Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson, and Kevin Brown. In addition, Saberhagen ranks as one of the greatest control pitchers of all time. He is 49th in WHIP, 35th in BB/9, and 13th in SO/BB. Since 1920, however, among pitchers with at least 2000 IP, he ranks 9th in WHIP, 4th in BB/9, and 5th in SO/BB. He also holds the single-season SO/BB record, set in 1994 at 11.0. That season he struck out 143 batters and walked just 13.

Using more advanced statistics, from 1985 to 1994, Saberhagen ranks 2nd in WAR among all pitchers, behind only Roger Clemens. His career WAR is 59.1, with a 36.8 WAA, and a JAWS of 51.3. By comparison, Hall of Fame pitcher Don Drsydale has a 61.2 WAR, 28.6 WAA, and a JAWS of 56.0. The Hall of Stats, a website that uses a mathematical formula to repopulate the Hall of Fame, gives Saberhagen a Hall Rating of 121, putting him safely above the borderline. In addition, Saberhagen ranks 18th since 1893 among Pitching WAR through age 30; none of the 17 players ahead of him failed to have Hall of Fame careers.

Looking for a pitcher to compare Saberhagen to, I stumbled upon the remarkable statistical similarities he has with Greg Maddux. Take for example their career rate stats:

	ERA+	WHIP	H/9	HR/9	BB/9	SO/9	SO/BB
Maddux	132	1.143	8.5	0.6	1.8	6.1	3.37
Saberhagen	126	1.141	8.6	0.8	1.7	6.0	3.64

The only statistically significant difference between the two is in the home run rate, although one has to believe that is mostly due to Saberhagen pitching in Coors and Fenway later in his career.

Their per/162 games numbers are also eerily similar:

	W-L	IP	SO	CG	ShO
Maddux	16-10	229	154	5	2
Saberhagen	15-10	226	151	7	1

Here are their WAR and WAA, per 1000 innings:

	WAR	WAA
Maddux	20.9	13.0
Saberhagen	23.1	14.4

Both pitchers have WAA as 62% of their WAR for their careers. In addition, among the 100 pitchers with at least 50 WAR, Saberhagen ranks 12th in WAR/1000 innings.

Lastly, let's compare the two in their peak seasons:

	Year	W-L	IP	SO	ERA	ERA+	WAR
Maddux	1995	19-2	209.2	181	1.63	260	9.7
Saberhagen	1989	23-6	262.1	193	2.16	180	9.7

Obviously, Maddux pitched a lot more innings than Saberhagen; in fact, the difference is almost 2 to 1 (5008.1 to 2562.2). However, this was mostly due to all the time that Saberhagen spent on the disabled list. According to the ESPN Baseball Encyclopedia, Saberhagen spent 1016 total days on the DL. If we were to assume that he makes a start every 5th day, he likely lost at least 200 career starts to injury. Keeping his rates compared to starts and innings pitched the same, here are Saberhagen's projected career numbers had he stayed healthy:

258-181, 574 GS, 3922 IP, 2615 SO, 90.4 WAR

No pitcher with 250 wins and 2500 strikeouts, or with 90 WAR, has ever been denied entry into the Hall of Fame. 

As far as I can tell, no pitcher has ever spent more days on the DL than Bret Saberhagen. Here are the all-time "leaders", using the available data (through 2007):

Rk	Pitcher	Days on DL
1	Bret Saberhagen	1016
2	Chad Fox	955
3	Matt Mantei	948
4	Steve Ontiveros	886
5	Darren Dreifort	878

It is possible that Carl Pavano has more days now, as he was at 747 through 2007, but I really don't have any way of finding out.

Among pitchers with at least 50 WAR, no one comes close to Saberhagen:

Rk	Pitcher	Days on DL
1	Bret Saberhagen	1016
2	Rick Reuschel	459
3	Tommy John	444
4	Curt Schilling	434
5	Bert Blyleven	425

Lastly, as a side note, the propensity of pitchers who played for the Royals to get injured is astonishing. For example here are the DL Days for the members of the 1985 Royals:

Pitcher	Days on DL
Bret Saberhagen	1016
Mark Gubicza	488
Danny Jackson	460
Bud Black	266
Charlie Leibrandt	91

Other notable Royals pitchers include Kevin Appier (416), David Cone (310), Tom Gordon (565) and Dennis Leonard (535).