Fangraphs: Is Pitch Framing Even A Thing?

[weams]

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/how-bad-could-a-pitch-framer-possibly-be/

Quote

Nearly 40% of pitches wound up in areas with a 0% called-strike rate. The framer’s lack of talent doesn’t matter there. We can begin with the most extreme case imaginable. Our catcher doesn’t receive a single called strike. Not one! Not even on pitches down the middle. Running all that math, and adjusting for playing time, we’d get a framing value of about -400 runs, compared to average. This would be costing a few runs every single game.

A protest: Even this extreme hypothetical is impossible to imagine. Umpires are still going to call strikes on those pitches down the gut. So let’s give our framer full strike credit for pitches thrown to zones with a called-strike rate of 100%. Now the framer’s value shows up at -350 runs.

We can extend that a little, if we want to. Let’s be nice. Why cut it off at the 100% threshold? Let’s set a new threshold at 95%. Those are all still pretty much pitches over the middle. We’ll give our framer credit for an average performance on pitches within those zones. Still no strikes anywhere else. The value sits around -225 runs.

For the final adjustment, let’s move that threshold one more time, to 90%. Our framer gets credit for average performance on all pitches thrown within zones with a called-strike rate of at least 90%. Those are mostly gimme pitches. Once again, no strikes elsewhere. Now our calculated value settles around -200 runs. That’s 200 runs worse than the average receiver, over the equivalent of regular playing time.

That’s like -20 wins.