Anatomy of an Importance Score: Pitcher Deep Dive

 Starting last season, I began a series of posts that explain the method to my madness in terms of how I arrive at the Importance Scores that I share. So far I've talked about the different methods of calculating WAR and done a deep dive on a position player. During the HOF Committee's debates this season, we had some discussions about Slim Stewart...but I didn't have any data on him yet so he makes a lot of logical sense to be the focus of my deep dive on a pitcher. 

Just like with position players, I have an Estimated WAR total and a Park Adjusted WAR total. The difference is that I calculate the Estimated WAR for pitchers differently than I do for hitters. In the case of pitchers, I use the HOF Monitor Score and convert that to an Estimated WAR mark based on the different scales that are used. In other words, a HOF Monitor Score of 130 is considered an absolute lock for the HOF and 100 Career WAR is also considered an absolute lock...so I take the HOF Monitor Score and divide by 1.3 to get an Estimated WAR total. This method is significantly less accurate than the Estimated WAR for hitters in terms of being close to the Park Adjusted WAR total but still does a good job of identifying viable candidates. 

Here's how I arrived at Slim Stewart's Importance Score: 

• 4 years with 18 or 19 wins = 16 HOFM points
• 6 years with 15-17 wins = 12 HOFM points
• 1 year with 200-249 K = 2 HOFM points
• 4 years with 14 + Wins & .700 + Win% = 8 HOFM points
• 9 years with ERA under 3.00 and 150 IP = 9 HOFM points 
• 9 All Star selections = 27 HOFM points 
• 260 Career Wins = 20 HOFM points
• 0.639 Career Win % = 8 HOFM points 
• 7 playoff wins = 7 HOFM points
• 2.98 Career ERA = 10 HOFM points
• 3166 Career K = 10 HOFM points = 129 total HOFM points

129 HOFM points/1.3 = 99 Estimated Career WAR; 19 ML seasons = ~5.20 WAR/season

With the Importance Score being WAR/season with bonus points for Cy Youngs, WS Rings and MVP Awards as well as seasons with 4+ WAR the final category gets left out until I calculate Park Adjusted WAR. So, for right now Stewart's Importance Score is 5.2 + 2 bonus points for his World Series Ring = 7.20 total...but that will (likely) go up when I have time to calculate all 19 of his Park Adjusted WAR seasons.