April 18 starting pitcher preview: Los Angeles Angels at New York Yankees

Clarke Schmidt (0-0, 8.44 ERA) will likely be the starting pitcher for the New York Yankees on Tuesday night against the Los Angeles Angels and it will be his fourth start of the regular season.

According to my own created statistics, Schmidt has .444 actual wins and 1.000 actual losses so far during the regular season.

(Actual wins are a percentage of innings pitched in all games Schmidt actually pitched in that the New York Yankees actually won while actual losses are determined by a percentage of runs given up in all games Schmidt actually pitched in that the Yankees actually lost)!

In other words, the New York Yankees are 1-2 in the regular season in Schmidt’s starts.

Schmidt’s True ERA in the regular season is 8.44.

(To read more about my own created statistics about actual wins, actual losses, true ERA and other forms of run average and earned run average you can read more about that right here.)

Throughout the entire season (including Spring Training), Schmidt is 1-2 with a 6.23 ERA.

According to my own created statistics, Schmidt has 1.148 actual wins and 2.432 actual losses (.321 winning percentage) for the entire season.

New York has won three of the nine games he has pitched in so far this season (including Spring Training).

Schmidt’s True ERA throughout the entire season (including Spring Training) is 6.01.

Let’s look at the statistics for Suarez this season.

During the regular season, opponents against Suarez have a .419 batting average, a .432 on-base percentage, a .651 slugging percentage and a 1.083 on-base plus slugging percentage.

Opponents against Suarez have a .636 True OPS, in which unlike the formula for on-base plus slugging percentage, nothing is counted twice.

(In other words, it is my own created statistic that doesn’t punish a pitcher more than once for simply giving up a hit. It is the formula that has been debated by people for a long time as far as accuracy of even being truthful to begin with! That’s what I am talking about in this instance.

If you want to read more about my opinions and thoughts about True OPS, scroll down to the end of this story).

The offense for Suarez’s opponents has resulted in 57 bases advanced in 45 plate appearances (1.267). Meaning that, even a stolen base, a passed ball and a wild pitch counts here, not just a hit, a walk, a hit by pitch or even reaching base via an error.

During Spring Training, opponents against Suarez have a .343 batting average, a .390 on-base percentage, a .538 slugging percentage and a .929 on-base plus slugging percentage.

Opponents against Suarez have a .436 True OPS, in which unlike the formula for on-base plus slugging percentage, nothing is counted twice.

The offense for Suarez’s opponents has resulted in 41 bases advanced in 41 plate appearances (1.000). Meaning that, even a stolen base, a passed ball and a wild pitch counts here, not just a hit, a walk, a hit by pitch or even reaching base via an error.

During the entire season (including Spring Training), opponents against Suarez have a .385 batting average, a .412 on-base percentage, a .609 slugging percentage and a 1.020 on-base plus slugging percentage.

Opponents against Suarez have a .541 True OPS, in which unlike the formula for on-base plus slugging percentage, nothing is counted twice.

The offense for Suarez’s opponents has resulted in 98 bases advanced in 86 plate appearances (1.140). Meaning that, even a stolen base, a passed ball and a wild pitch counts here, not just a hit, a walk, a hit by pitch or even reaching base via an error.

Let’s look at the statistics for Schmidt this season.

During the regular season, opponents against Schmidt have a .340 batting average, a .396 on-base percentage, a .617 slugging percentage and a 1.013 on-base plus slugging percentage.

Opponents against Schmidt have a .642 True OPS, in which unlike the formula for on-base plus slugging percentage, nothing is counted twice.

(If you want to read more about my opinions and thoughts about True OPS, scroll down to the end of this story).

The offense for Schmidt’s opponents has resulted in 59 bases advanced in 53 plate appearances (1.113). Meaning that, even a stolen base, a passed ball and a wild pitch counts here, not just a hit, a walk, a hit by pitch or even reaching base via an error.

During Spring Training, opponents against Schmidt have a .225 batting average, a .276 on-base percentage, a .366 slugging percentage and a .643 on-base plus slugging percentage.

Opponents against Schmidt have a .408 True OPS, in which unlike the formula for on-base plus slugging percentage, nothing is counted twice.

The offense for Schmidt’s opponents has resulted in 56 bases advanced in 76 plate appearances (.737). Meaning that, even a stolen base, a passed ball and a wild pitch counts here, not just a hit, a walk, a hit by pitch or even reaching base via an error.

During the entire season (including Spring Training), opponents against Schmidt have a .271 batting average, a .326 on-base percentage, a .466 slugging percentage and a .792 on-base plus slugging percentage.

Opponents against Schmidt have a .504 True OPS, in which unlike the formula for on-base plus slugging percentage, nothing is counted twice.

The offense for Schmidt’s opponents has resulted in 115 bases advanced in 129 plate appearances (.891). Meaning that, even a stolen base, a passed ball and a wild pitch counts here, not just a hit, a walk, a hit by pitch or even reaching base via an error.

So how should we evaluate Suarez’s performance so far this season?

Suarez’s won-lost record in the regular season if we were evaluating his performance (for every game) regardless of the win or loss result likely would be 0-2.

His won-lost record in Spring Training if we were evaluating his performance (for every game) regardless of the win or loss result likely would be 1-2.

So based off of his performance (regardless of the win or loss result), Suarez is 1-4 this season!

By this standard, Suarez hasn’t even had a winning performance (regardless of the win or loss result) since his March 11 game when he pitched three innings and definitely wasn’t the only pitcher on the Angels to give up runs in that game as four other Angels pitchers (not including Suarez) gave up eight runs total in an 11-10 Angels win over the Arizona Diamondbacks!

So Suarez has had three straight losing performances and he gave up more than half the runs in all three of those games!

The bottom line is that if the Suarez can keep the other team from scoring a lot of runs, the Angels have a chance to win!

Suarez’s performance regardless of the win or loss result for any one specific game for the entire regular season so far written like a winning percentage is .444. That’s not winning! That’s losing! But I guess it is close to .500, so that is better than a lot of other pitchers!

Jose’s performance regardless of the win or loss result for any one specific game for Spring Training is .399.

His performance regardless of the win or loss result for any one specific game game for the entire season (including Spring Training) is .420.

So how should we evaluate Schmidt’s performance so far this season?

Schmidt’s won-lost record in the regular season if we were evaluating his performance (for every game) regardless of the win or loss result likely would be 0-3.

His won-lost record in Spring Training if we were evaluating his performance (for every game) regardless of the win or loss result likely would be 3-3.

So based off of his performance (regardless of the win or loss result), Schmidt is 3-6 this season and again that also just happens to be the Yankees won-lost record this season in games Schmidt has pitched in so far this season!

By this standard, Schmidt hasn’t even had a winning performance (regardless of the win or loss result) since his March 16 game when he pitched five innings (the most innings pitched he has thrown in a game so far this season)!

So Schmidt has had five straight losing performances, he has given up more than half the runs in four of his last five starts, and if he has a bad outing on Tuesday (or whenever his next game is) it will be his sixth straight losing performance!

Before Thursday’s games on April 13, 2023, his performance regardless of the win or loss result for any one specific game for the entire regular season so far is ranked 13th on the Yankees!

Which players are ahead of him?

Colten Brewer 1.000
Wandy Peralta 1.000
Ron Marinaccio .792
Albert Abreu .757
Clay Holmes .688
Gerrit Cole .656
Ian Hamilton .650
Michael King .565
Jhony Brito .526
Nestor Cortes .448
Jimmy Cordero .432
Domingo German .398
Clarke Schmidt .381

Out of how many people? Fourteen!

Who was behind him? Jonathan Loaisiga (.297)!

His performance regardless of the win or loss result for any one specific game in Spring Training is .537.

His performance regardless of the win or loss result for any one specific game for the entire season (including Spring Training) written like a winning percentage is .469. He is ranked 35th on the Yankees in that department. (Again, the rankings are before any games on Thursday, April 13th).

Before any games on Thursday, April 13, Schmidt is tied for sixth among all Yankees pitchers in the regular season with .444 actual wins. Also, before any games on Thursday, April 13th, he also has the sixth-most wins this season (including Spring Training) of any Yankees pitcher at the Major League level and the Triple-A level combined with 1.148 actual wins!

He has had the second most actual losses (2.432) this season (including Spring Training) of any Yankees pitcher since after the April 10th game. (Domingo German has the most actual losses for the Yankees with 2.563).

As of today, April 18, 2023, former Boston Red Sox pitcher Ryan Weber has the most actual losses (2.875) this season (including Spring Training) of any Yankees pitcher at the Major League and Triple-A levels combined.

The best start of the season for Suarez was his last start in Spring Training on March 17 against the Kansas City Royals!

In that game he was simply better than he has been in any other game this season (and it wasn’t even close)! He pitched four innings giving up just one run, one earned run and allowing four hits.

Not impressed so far?

Not only all of that, his opponent batting average was .286 (second-best in a game was .333 in his first Spring Training start), on-base percentage was .353 (second-best was .364 in his first regular season start), a .286 slugging percentage (second-best was .444 in first Spring Training start), an on-base plus slugging percentage was .639 (second-best was .844 in first Spring Training start), a True OPS of .353 (second-best was .500 in first and second Spring Training starts and his second regular season start), allowed only 12 bases total by the offense in 17 plate appearances (.706, second-best was allowing 12 bases in 10 plate appearances in his first Spring Training start) and he only allowed 12 bases total (via batting only) by the offense out of 101 possible bases (.119, second-best was allowing 11 bases total via batting only by the offense out of 62 possible bases for a success rate of .177 in his first Spring Training start).

All of those things I just mentioned were simply the best by Suarez this season! And his second-best start of the season obviously was his first Spring Training start!

Determining his worst start of the entire season is a little more complicated.

Suarez’s worst start in terms of opponent batting average (.476) and on-base percentage (.432) came in his last start on April 10 against the Washington Nationals! In terms of opponent slugging percentage (.773), on-base plus slugging percentage (1.136), a True OPS of .773, and the offense advancing 29 bases in 22 plate appearances (1.318) were all the worst for Suarez this season in his first regular season start on April 4th at the Seattle Mariners! In his second Spring Training start, Suarez allowed 16 bases (via batting only) out of 86 possible bases (.186) on March 11th vs. the Arizona Diamondbacks!

His worst four starts this season (via batting only) were all very similar in terms of bases allowed out of possible bases allowed! They were all within 9 out of 1,000 (one thousand) percentage points of each other!

So I think his worst start clearly was his first regular season start on April 4.

It would be irresponsible of me to not say that his opponents’ batting average was actually the third-worst (or third-best) on April 4 (.364) and his opponents’ on-base percentage (.364) was actually the second-worst, as in fourth-best out of five (and the second-best for Suarez), this season!

In other words, a high opponent batting average (.417) and on-base percentage (.432) which he had on March 11 and were both the second-worst for Suarez this season, may not be a bad thing for Suarez if he can find a way to get out of some jams and keep the Yankees from slugging the ball a ton!

However, like I already said, his worst four starts were all very similar, and his start on March 11 was his third-best start of the entire season, so anything that looks like an improvement for Suarez is likely going to be very subtle with the way he has pitched so far this season. In other words, you may barely notice it during or shortly after Tuesday night’s game until you actually calculate the final statistics of Tuesday night’s game yourself!

Clearly, if you haven’t figured it out at this point, Suarez’s two regular-season starts were his worst starts this season! Maybe I should not even say it, but that’s the truth when looking at multiple statistics, combined with the fact that the Angels have only played one playoff team from last year (the Seattle Mariners) so far in Suarez’s starts!

And there is bounce back potential for Suarez on Tuesday night, if he can act like or pretend like that he is not supposed to be stressed about anything (like what is supposed to happen in Spring Training despite the obvious pressures of Spring Training) and combine it with the things that he did do right on April 4!

According to fangraphs.com, Suarez has a WAR of 0.1 and according to Baseball-Reference.com, he has a WAR of -0.4.

Schmidt’s second best start of the season was clearly was on February 26 vs. the Atlanta Braves, his first Spring Training start in which he was totally lights out and threw two scoreless innings with five strikeouts!

There’s really nothing else that needs to be said!

His best start of the season was on March 16 vs. the Pittsburgh Pirates in which he threw five scoreless innings with seven strikeouts and he was totally lights out again!

His worst game (not a start) of the season (his only non-start of the entire season) was his second Spring Training game on March 3 versus the Detroit Tigers!

The opponent batting average was .375 (second worst of season), on-base percentage was .500 (tied for the worst with his start at the Washington Nationals on March 22nd), slugging percentage was .875 (worst of entire season), on-base plus slugging percentage was 1.375 (worst), a True OPS of .900 (worst), and he allowed the Tigers offense to advance 15 bases in 10 plate appearances (1.500, which was the worst of the entire season, which includes both batting and base running.) Schmidt also allowed the Tigers to advance 14 bases out of 51 possible bases via batting only (.275), clearly his worst of the entire season.

Schmidt’s worse start (underline start, that’s not a note) in terms of batting average (.429) and on-base percentage (.500) was on March 22 at the Washington Nationals. In terms of slugging percentage (.800), on-base plus slugging percentage (1.175) and True OPS (.813) it was in his first regular season start vs. the San Francisco Giants on April 1. The offense for Schmidt’s opponent performed best on April 7th advancing 24 bases through 19 plate appearances (1.263) which includes both batting and base running. Schmidt’s worst start allowed the opponent to advance 19 bases out of 84 possible bases via batting only (.226) on March 22nd.

Schmidt’s second worst start (underline start, that’s not just a note) in terms of batting average (.364) and slugging percentage (.636) and True OPS (.636) it was on March 9. In terms of on-base percentage (.421) it was on April 7th. In terms of on-base plus slugging percentage (1.071) it was on March 22nd. In terms of offense, Schmidt’s second worst start was on March 22nd and April 1st in which 18 bases were taken in 16 plate appearances by the offense which includes both batting and base running (1.125). Schmidt’s second worst start was on April 1st when he allowed 17 out of 84 possible bases (.202) via batting only.

According to FanGraphs.com, Schmidt has a WAR of -0.1 and according to Baseball-Reference.com, he has a WAR of -0.3.

The Comparison

So which pitcher is better?

Clarke Schmidt is clearly better. Obviously, some of that has to do with the fact that he plays for the New York Yankees and anyone who has been paying any attention at all to baseball in recent years knows the Yankees have been a favorite to win the World Series while the Los Angeles Angels simply are not even a playoff team!

In the regular season (via batting only), Suarez has allowed 55 bases out of 263 possible bases (.209) while has Schmidt allowed 57 bases out of 304 possible bases (.188).

Suarez in Spring Training (via batting only) has allowed 39 bases out of 249 possible bases (.157) while has Schmidt allowed 54 bases out of 360 possible bases (.150).

Throughout the entire season, including Spring Training (via batting only), Suarez has allowed 94 bases out of 512 possible bases (.184) while has Schmidt allowed 111 bases out of 664 possible bases (.167).

In the regular season, Schmidt is better than Suarez in terms of opponent BA, OBP, SLG and OPS. Suarez’s True OPS is barely better in the regular season so far. Suarez and Schmidt have not pitched well in the regular season and neither pitcher has even had a winning performance yet (regardless of the win or loss result for any one specific game).

Suarez is better than Schmidt in terms of performance regardless of the win or loss result for any one specific game in the regular season. Schmidt is better than Suarez in terms of performance regardless of the win or loss result for any one specific game in Spring Training! Schmidt is better than Suarez in terms of performance regardless of the win or loss result for any one specific game this season (including Spring Training)!

Suarez has a better won-lost record throughout the entire season of 2-2 compared to Schmidt’s 1-2.

Clarke Schmidt had two perfect games essentially that were better than Jose Suarez’s best game on the mound!

Suarez was better than Schmidt in Suarez’s worst games (plural) this season compared to Schmidt’s worst game on March 3 in all of the following categories except for batting average: On-base percentage, slugging percentage, on-base plus slugging percentage, True OPS, offensive production (via batting and baserunning) and bases advanced divided by total possible bases advanced (via batting only).

Suarez is better in WAR than Schmidt on FanGraphs.com, but Schmidt is better than Suarez on Baseball-Reference.com.

Ultimately, these pitchers will tell you who is better on Tuesday night.

I like the Yankees chances of winning tonight a lot more than the Angels only because Los Angeles defeated the Boston Red Sox yesterday on Marathon Monday.

True On-Base Plus Slugging Percentage (True OPS)

(True OPS is my own created statistic that doesn’t punish a pitcher more than once for simply giving up a hit.

But the weight of my formula is still going to punish a pitcher if he gives up a home run, like slugging percentage compared to batting average, you are going to notice the difference!

Basically, it is the correct implementation of the basic formula for OPS, which I know many people have talked about and debated several times before, because I believe the formula for OPS inflates a player’s OPS, which is why I call my formula “True OPS”.

And that’s what I am trying to do and show here.

So a perfect True OPS would be 4.000.

The formula for True OPS is total bases + walks + hit by pitch divided by at bats + walks + hit by pitch + sacrifice flies.

So if you still don’t get True OPS, it is the formula for OPS without splitting it into two separate formulas and without “rewarding” a hitter with a hit more than once!

I am probably making a mistake by calling it “True OPS” in the first place because it isn’t entirely “true” or accurate to everything a batter does positively for his team and it still doesn’t reward a batter for advancing a runner via a simple groundout, a flyout, a sacrifice fly, a sacrifice bunt, catcher’s interference or anything else such as umpire’s interference that doesn’t happen very often!

I guess people should assume by default that “True OPS” is the correct implementation of OPS whenever I write about it!

To read more about my thoughts about True OPS and likely future baseball offensive statistics, I compared Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani in the first half of the regular season in 2021, so you can read more about that right here).