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TRGS: The Stat Vegas Uses To Evaluate Starting Pitchers

By Steve Contursi

Oct 10, 2015; St. Louis, MO, USA; A postseason base on the field before game two of the NLDS between the St. Louis Cardinals and the Chicago Cubs at Busch Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jasen Vinlove-USA TODAY Sports
Oct 10, 2015; St. Louis, MO, USA; A postseason base on the field before game two of the NLDS between the St. Louis Cardinals and the Chicago Cubs at Busch Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jasen Vinlove-USA TODAY Sports /
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TRGS (Team Record in Games Started) is a little known, but very revealing, stat that is used by Las Vegas in handicapping baseball games. More specifically, it can be used as a telling method of evaluating starting pitchers in a way that no other stat comes close to. Here’s how it works…..

TRGS is a stat that attempts to quantify the value of a starting pitcher in unique terms that measures what happens to their team when they start a game. In short, does their team have a tendency to win or lose games on the day that they make a start.

Now, offhand you might think that’s an easy one. Just look at the pitcher’s won lost record. What else do you need to know? Well, not so fast. Let’s take a recent example from a game between the Yankees and Red Sox. It’s typical of what often happens. Luis Cessa was the starting pitcher for the Yankees. He went six innings giving up only two runs. He left the game finishing with a no decision, but the Yankees, largely due to his efforts, won the game. Cessa gets credit for nothing in the box score.

Not so in Las Vegas though. Because in Las Vegas, they use TRGS as the primary tool when they handicap baseball games. They use it for a very good reason. Because more than a won-loss record, more than strikeouts, and even more than a pitcher’s ERA, TRGS tells the truth about how a team fares when a pitcher makes a start. Does he, and this is the way we usually hear it expressed, “give his team a chance to win?”

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And beyond that, when he starts does the team have a built in confidence that translates into a better chance to win the game he’s pitching in. Take, for example, Clayton Kershaw whose record stands at 12-3. Pretty good, but it gets even better when you realize that his TRGS is 17-3 meaning that the Dodgers have won all five games he’s started but did not receive the decision. That’s true value.

In the same vein, Collin McHugh, who is starting for the Astros tonight, has a ho hum record of 12-10 for the season. And yet, his TRGS for the Astros is 20-12 meaning that his team is 8-2 when he pitches well enough to win, but gets a no decision. 20-12 puts him in the discussion for the Cy Young, while 12-10 gets you only a yawn.

Conversely, you can have someone like Albert Suarez, who’s starting a critical game with playoff implications against the Dodgers tonight, with a won loss record of 3-5 but a TRGS of 3-9. With that in mind, it’s no surprise that the Dodgers are favored over the Giants tonight. And it doesn’t hurt either that Kershaw is pitching for Los Angeles.

The trouble with TRGS is s the fact that the stat is tied directly to gambling and Las Vegas odds making. And therefore, you have to search long and hard to find the stat. And you won’t, for example, find the stat anywhere on the MLB pages, or for that matter even on ESPN.

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And that’s unfortunate because TRGS fills in the bigger picture beyond a mere win loss record and demonstrates the true value of a starting pitcher.

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