"Rubber Band" Pitch Counts

[Corsairs]

Here's something I've been trying to get a handle on for awhile now. I try to monitor my pitchers' pitch counts in my online league team. My goal is to have my starters pitch to a given pitch count relatively consistently (assuming they're not getting shelled, of course).

What ends up happening, though, is this "rubber band" effect between two starts. For instance, let's say I've got a pitcher with 75 out of 100 endurance whom I've set to a 105 pitch limit. In Game #1 he throws a solid game and is removed once he reaches 105 pitches. In Game #2 he is again throwing very well; however this time he's removed at 70 pitches. Moving on to Game #3 he's back up to 105 pitches. In Game #4 he's removed at 75 pitches despite only allowing two base runners through 5 innings. The cycle keeps going like that: one game with a "normal" pitch count, one game with a greatly reduced pitch count (regardless of whether he's pitching well or not). I should note that this is using a standard 5-man rotation in strict order.

Has anyone else noticed this behavior and, if so, what have you done to combat it? It seems like pitchers are tiring themselves out so much in their first start that they can only go about 75% as far as they normally could in their second start. I've tried lowering my pitch counts limits in an effort to keep them from getting tired and it's helped mitigate the differential from being quite as drastic, but it's still plenty obvious. Our 2008 season has just begun, but here's one example of what I'm talking about:

John Roach (73 out of 100 Endurance) in his April 8th start - 112 pitches over 8 innings
John Roach in his next start on April 13th - Pulled after 5 innings and 72 pitches despite allowing just 1 run and 4 runners

[endgame]

I don't know the answer, but your problem is very interesting. Maybe we need a Strict option for pitch counts, too.

[Corsairs]

Originally Posted by endgame

I don't know the answer, but your problem is very interesting. Maybe we need a Strict option for pitch counts, too.

That would indeed be a welcome feature, or as a minor modification perhaps a game strategy option along the lines of "Keep pitcher in game up to specified pitch count unless leading/trailing by 'X' runs".

[Markus Heinsohn]

What is his rest status prior to the 2nd start?

[Corsairs]

It varies from case to case - the rest status can be as low as in the 70% range or as high as the low 90% range. Most commonly it will be somewhere between 75-85%.

The thing that strikes me is that most real-life pitchers who throw 105 pitches in a start (the pitch count currently in use on most of my starters) wouldn't normally be so gassed that they would only be able to go ~70 pitches on a normal 5 days rest. That seems to be what's happening here, though.

[andymac]

Maybe 105 is too high of a pitch count for someone with his endurance and so it is taking him longer to recover?? It might be another side effect of the poor pitcher model when it comes to endurance.

[Corsairs]

It could be, but I've experienced this issue both with pitchers utilizing stricter pitch counts and pitchers with higher endurance. Also, the majority of the SPs in the league are rated in the 60-80 endurance range. Doesn't it seem strange that pitchers with "normal" endurance suffer so radically one start after throwing approximately 100 pitches (a number that is used as a general standard in modern baseball, which is the environment our league is modeling)?

Now I did just realize there is one thing I neglected to mention: in this league, pitcher endurance is set to "Very Low". I thought that was the standard setting for modern leagues; however I notice the MLB quickstart has this setting at "Low". Could this be the root of the problem?