Clipping:Chadwick on earned runs, ERA
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| Date | Wednesday, February 1, 1888 |
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| Text | [from Chadwick's column] When I introduced the scoring of earned runs in the game, twenty odd years ago...my sole object in view was to get at reliable data on which to base a sure criterion of excellence in pitching, and the data which yielded what I wanted was simply the record of base hits. Experience had plainly pointed out that it was not justice to a pitcher to charge his work in the position with the result of any errors committed by any of the eight players engaged to support his pitching, whether those errors were such glaring ones a those of dropped fly balls, fumbled or muffed batted balls, or of muffed thrown balls, or were secondary errors such as those arising from failures to prevent successful base-running, or from a lack of judgment in not accepting plain chances for catches off the bat in cases where the falling ball was not handled. Any class of earned runs other than those earned from base hits I did not care about, as they afforded no criterion of individual excellence as regards the pitche5r's work. To runs earned from the pitching, therefore, and to those only did I pay any attention, and I want this fact borne in mind by those who since then have added to the record of earned runs such runs as are only earned off the fielding and not off the pitching, and just here I want to show the difference between runs earned off the pitching and those earned ff the fielding. A run earned off the pitching is only scored when it has been the result of a clean home run, made before three chances for outs have been given off the pitching. This to begin with. Secondly, when a three-base hit is made, and the runner sent home by another two-bagger. In other words a run is earned off the pitching only where it is scored solely by the aid of base hits, and not through the assistance of successful base-running, with one exception, and that is when a runner steals a base through the plain failure of the pitcher to watch the bases properly, and this is an exceptional case. A run earned off the fielding is scored when a runner, after reaching first base by a safe hit, steals to second through the failure of the catcher or second baseman to play his position properly, and when such runner gets to third base and then home in a similar, that is through the failure of the catcher or third baseman or the short stop check the runner's successful progress. Now, to charge a pitcher with an earned run against his pitching when a run is scored under such circumstances is gross injustice, inasmuch as only a single base hit has been made off his pitching, the run scored being actually the result of the failure of the fielders to do their work properly, and this, too, without taking into calculation any gross fielding errors. Runs earned off the fielding count for nothing as against any individual player, such as base hits do against the pitcher, and I have therefore never taken them into account in my estimate of earned runs. I wanted to get at a reliable criterion of a pitcher's work in the box, and I found it in the data of runs scored against his pitching entirely by base hits and nothing else. In regard to bases given on called balls being taken in as data in the estimate of earned runs, I ignore them altogether, inasmuch as they certainly cannot be credited to the batsman as any evidence of skillful play at the bat, and neither can they be regarded in the light of fielding errors, as called balls may be due to inaccurate pitching, to purposely giving a base on balls to get rid of a skilful batsman, or to the bad judgement of the umpire in calling them. Under these circumstances they cannot be estimated as errors such as direct fielding errors are, and so I do not consider them either as against the pitcher as an error, or in favor of the batsman as a factor in earned runs. Taking into consideration the plain fact that a pitcher cannot be justly charged as having his pitching “punished,” except through the medium of clean base hits, yielding runs before three chances for outs are offered the fielders, I do not see how any other data than base hits can be used in estimating earned runs. |
| Source | Sporting Life |
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| Submitted by | Richard Hershberger |
| Origin | Initial Hershberger Clippings |
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