What is the difference between a starter and a reliever

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Battle tens of thousands of PT managers from all over the world and become a legend. Thread Tools. Find More Posts by daves. First are the stats for the pitchers who started in both the regular season and the playoffs, 66 pitcher-seasons in total.

I didn't want to count any of the relief stints from starters in the playoffs, so for both time periods, this is only looking at their stats as starters. Unsurprisingly, these pitchers walked more batters and allowed more runs, but somewhat surprisingly struck out the same number of opponents. This is viewing them as a group, however, and this doesn't communicate the average change for each individual.

I took each pitcher's differential in each category, and weighted it by the harmonic mean of their batters faced in the regular season and the playoffs before taking the average. As expected based on the above table and what we know of the playoffs, pitchers declined in all three categories, by runs the most, followed by walks and strikeouts.

What about the starters who joined the bullpen in the playoffs? Again, I'm only looking at players who started at least one game in the regular season and exclusively relieved in the postseason, of which there were 28 in and These pitchers were, as a group, worse than those who continued starting in the playoffs, which is to be expected.

Their group results didn't look exactly as expected -- after moving to relief, these pitchers gave up fewer runs, but walked more batters and struck out fewer. What about as individuals, using the same harmonic mean weighting?

Now, there are obviously big error bars on either side of these figures, since they're informed by relatively small samples, but by subtracting the regular season to postseason differential from the regular season starter to postseason reliever differential, the result should be an estimate of starter-to-reliever differential only. If we use the same league average starting stats for and run them through this conversion, the result is a 7. While this is a fun academic exercise, these samples are too small to draw any real conclusions -- if you rely on this data alone, it suggests that converted starters should strike out fewer batters and walk more than permanent relievers, but give up fewer runs, which doesn't make any sense.

If anything, what this might suggest is that the starter-to-reliever conversion is not as simple or easy as it may seem, and less of a guarantee than might be sensed. These pitchers didn't get much of a chance to adjust to working in relief, for the most part, and that could be why the results are more muddled than I initially expected. Or maybe there's just nothing here.

You can follow him on Twitter at henrydruschel. While repeating this cycle up to maybe 40 times a year. Postseason , World Series. Gotta think big! Resilience is key for relievers. Unfortunately, not everyone posseses a rubber arm.

Although, a reliever with a hot hand finds regular work until the flame burns out. So you have to be able to pitch several times a week. Much of this comes from being effective and economical.

Can you get loose in the pen quickly to save your bullets for the game? Importantly, can you be economical with your pitches in order to pitch on multiple days? Much of this comes with getting ahead of hitters. That will be the quickest hook possible. Relievers have to come in and throw strikes.

The margin for error is much smaller. In addition, a reliever cannot be afraid of the situation. You may feel like your hair is on fire, so you have to pitch like it. Feed off of the situation, just be in control of your emotions and stay within yourself.

If you get hit, you get hit. If you get beat, you deal with it. The team deals with it. Getting the job done and gaining trust from the manager and your teammates, can put you in the big spots, to gather the glory. That is where you want to be. Believe me! Let me know if this post has awoken you to knowing your value as a pitcher. What role do you feel you are best suited for in regards to embarrassing hitters on a nightly basis? Let me know in the comments below.

And as always…. About the Author. He is a former professional pitcher who blogs about all things Pitching.