103-59: How Was It Done?

As we all know, last year, the New York Yankees were the best team in baseball.  Why was this?  What were the factors that led to having the most wins?  Starting Pitching?  Hitting Home Runs?  The Bullpen?

I decided to look through some team statistics in the AL and see if there were any common elements in all of the best teams, with emphasis on the Yankees of course.  Here are some numbers I found in regard to late innings of games (bullpen and 7th inning or later batting).  I got my statistics from the team statistics generator on espn.com

[Here Win%-Win% is Bullpen Win% - Overall Win%]

I found some of these results to be a little bit surprising.  I'll draw your attention to a few of these stats, and try and make reasonable conclusions from there.

The Yankees crushed in the late innings of games.  Of the "AL contenders" listed above, they are the only team to OPS at a higher rate after the 7th inning than their overall numbers.  Also, their 92 HRs in late innings absolutely laps the field.

Also, the Yankees, like all of the other teams listed except the Angles, pitched to a lower ERA out of the bullpen.  So, in high leverage situations late in games, the Yankees were able to shut teams down, while they themselves were blasting home runs.

The relievers most likely to be used in high leverage situations (Hughes, Aceves, Rivera) accounted for 18 wins in relief.  I know that wins is a bad individual stat, but I think here it is an excellent way of showing that 18 times last year, the Yankees were losing or tied in a game, used a top reliever, and then hit their way back into the lead.

Now when discussing our young stud pitchers (Hughes, Chamberlain), I have been known to somewhat "dump on teh pen."  But some of these numbers are forcing me to reconsider.  While it still is true that starting pitching is more valuable than relief pitching, I think an excellent argument can be made for a top-heavy bullpen being very valuable to a contending team.

Meaning, it is more important to have 3-4 good to excellent relievers than to have 6-8 mediocre relievers.  The Yankees ability to win close games by using their top relievers and hit late home runs is what separated them from the pack.

Also, I was very interested by taking a closer look at the Mariners season.  The Mariners led the league in team ERA with 3.87, and posted an excellent 3.83 ERA out of the bullpen.  They play in a huge stadium, they play great defense, and led the league in sacrifice hits.  And yet they are one of the only teams to post a considerably worse winning percentage in games decided in the bullpen.

This flies in the face of the conventional wisdom that being able to manufacture a run late by playing ABC ball will win you a lot of close games.  The Mariners had 30 losses in the bullpen, easily the most, while posting one of the top bullpen ERAs.  This is more proof to me that ABC baseball is fundamentally inferior to the "bloop and blast", slugging, new age AL style baseball.

In conclusion, based on the stats that I've looked at from 2009, here are some ideas that I would follow if I were building a team.

-Build a hitters ballpark

-Draft as many starting pitchers as possible

-Put high OBP guys at the top of the lineup with sluggers behind them

-Develop 3-4 excellent bullpen options

I think that the Yankees are doing most of these things and that makes me happy.  Thoughts?