Why I Think Gavin Floyd Could Be Better Than Jake Peavy

EDITOR'S NOTE: Do you not understand FIP, xFIP, or a lot about sabermetrics? I recommend you read this first before proceeding to get a better understanding of the arguments being made.

Yes, I said it, WHAT! Also, before anyone comments, please note they key word "could", not "will" be better.

There are two keys to this argument. The first point is that Gavin Floyd improved greatly over the past two season which is why I like him in general (especially for how late you can get Floyd). The second is that Jake Peavy away from PETCO is not THAT good. And guess where his home is now? The hitters park known at Comiskey (I refuse to call it U.S. Cellular Field. Maybe The Cell).

On to the latter point. Here's some key home/away splits for Peavy

ERA: 2.82/ 3.79
FIP: 2.83/ 4.20
xFIP: 3.27/ 3.94
K/9: 9.63/ 8.30
BB/9: 2.63/ 3.25
HR/FB%: 7.10/ 12.3

I don't think anyone will deny that Jake Peavy's great career numbers came from the fact that he played in THE best pitcher park. And not only that, Peavy played in the NL. He's not only coming to a hitter's park (Comiskey ranked top 10 the past three years in HR given up) AND coming over to the harder league. All these are indicators that Peavy's numbers while he's wearing a White Sox uniform will nowhere match the numbers Peavy wore while wearing a Padres one.

Next, we have Gavin Floyd. After giving up 30 HRs in 2008 and magically (and luckily) having an ERA of 3.85, I was on board the bandwagon in saying that Floyd would regress. But he proved us wrong (I'm happy to say) and took great strides forward. He increased his K/9 (6.32 to 7.60), lowered his BB/9 rate (3.05 to 2.75), lowered his FIP by a full run (4.77 to 3.77) and lowered his xFIP (4.56 to 3.69).

The biggest improvement in Floyd's game was lowering the total amount of HRs he gave up (30 in 2008 down to 21 in 2009). This was done by giving up more ground balls- and subsequently giving up less fly balls (which naturally leads to less home runs). And it was not like Floyd got lucky or unlucky with the amount of HR he gave up (not like Clayton Kershaw). In '08 Floyd had a 11.8 HR/FB% in '08 and a 11.3 HR/FB% in '09 which falls right along the line of where it should.

The White Sox defense is slightly improved, especially the outfield which should benefit both pitchers. Having Rios and Pierre should help these flyballers and are a big step up from Rios' awful year, the Wise/ Anderson platoon, and the awful awful AWFUL defender that is Jermaine Dye.

But off my side tangent, here's a look now side by side of Peavy's career away numbers (on the left) vs. Floyd's 2009 numbers (on the right). And keep in mind, the trend shows that Floyd's improving. (I mean, the dude is only 27, about to enter into his prime, and only has two full years of big league experience)

Peavy vs. Floyd
ERA: 3.79 vs. 4.06
FIP: 4.20 vs. 3.77
xFIP: 3.94 vs.3.69
K/9: 8.30 vs. 7.60
BB/9: 3.25 vs. 2.75
WHIP: 1.29 vs. 1.23
GB/FB%: 1.08 vs. 1.34
HR/FB%: 12.3 vs. 11.8

The only two categories Peavy gets the edge in is ERA and K/9. But as shown by the pitcher's FIP and xFIP, I believe that Floyd will have the better ERA considering he has the better FIP and xFIP and the two have the same defense.

But the K/9 is the reason I'm not making a crazy bold prediction that Floyd will be better. Peavy is a strikeout guy and despite the drop off between Peavy's home/away splits, he still strikes out a lot of guys. And strikeouts are the main thing a pitcher can actually control. But I am banking on the fact that Floyd will improve his strike out rate like he did last year. If he improves his K/9 rate at the same rate he did last year though, his K/9 would be 9.14- a rate better than Peavy's away numbers. Now this of course is a big assumption to make, but I'm not convinced that Peavy will have significantly more strike outs than Floyd- if he does.

Not to mention that Peavy is coming off of a season where he only pitched in 16 games- three at the end of the year that probably didn't mean crap for your team. (Despite me saying that, I have a theory that the WBC hurts major league pitchers. Peavy's worst seasons were in 2006 and 2009- the years he pitched in the WBC. I also blame it for the injuries to Roy Oswalt, Dice-K, and Ted Lilly).

But even if you think Peavy will have better and more strikeouts, I don't think it will be by such a wide margin as you might think. Combine that with the fact that Peavy and Floyd will probably have similar WHIPs and ERA and both have the same crappy offensive behind them (and mediocre defense), why take Peavy when you can get a guy who's just as good, later or cheaper in your draft?

In the recent GOI auction draft, Peavy went for $18, whereas I got Floyd for ten bucks cheaper. For snake/normal leagues, the ADP of Peavy is 107.62 versus Floyd which is about 80 picks later at 186.67 (which is also behind John Danks. Although Yahoo! rankings agree with me and rank Floyd ahead of Peavy, but I doubt anyone in your league will do that).

I'm not going to go so far as to Put It On The Board that Floyd will be better than Peavy because it's absolutely not unreasonable and is foreseeable that Peavy will have the better ERA and WHIP, and even if it's close- have much more strikeouts. But when I drafted, I took the risk of waiting to get Floyd and I think you should too.