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First Pitch: Why I’m Done Using the Term “Ace” to Evaluate Pitchers

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Recently, I’ve been making an effort to remove one word from my baseball vocabulary: Ace.

The word really has no meaning. It’s highly subjective, with different people applying different meanings to the word. And most of the time, there’s no real meaning attached. It’s a word that gets thrown out to define what a player isn’t, without saying what the term is.

Some people consider an ace a number one starter, meaning there are 30 of them, or one for each team in a perfect world. Some people think there are fewer than one per team, but then you get into a further breakdown. Some feel the number is 15. Some less than 10. Some in the half-dozen range.

I was writing up my article on Mitch Keller and his future, and I kept referring to him, Tyler Glasnow, and Jameson Taillon as “top of the rotation” starters. There’s still a bit of subjectivity there. Is “top of the rotation” just a number one starter, or a number two starter as well? I consider it both, since “bottom of the rotation” is usually numbers four and five. And it’s fairly easy to quantify a top of the rotation arm.

I bring up the topic of the word “Ace” because I’ve seen Gerrit Cole’s season and career so far evaluated so often solely on the idea of whether he’s an “ace”. And all of that loses sight of the fact that Cole has been a very, very good pitcher.

This year, Cole’s numbers are definitely down. He’s got a 3.25 ERA and a 3.91 xFIP. The ERA is between his 2015 (2.60) and 2014 (3.65) seasons. The xFIP is the worst of his career. Overall, this is a downgrade over what he did last year, with a drop in strikeouts being the biggest factor. But even in a down year, Cole is a top pitcher.

There are 107 starters with 100+ innings this year. Cole ranks 28th overall out of that group in ERA, and 39th in xFIP. That’s not bad for a down year. That would put him around the bottom of the #1 starter list, or near the top of the #2 starter list, and that’s in a bad year.

But what about his overall numbers? Cole has a 3.10 ERA and a 3.31 xFIP in his career. Out of 145 qualified starters from 2013-2016, he ranks 18th in ERA and 24th in xFIP. So for his career, this down year included, he is absolutely a number one starter.

If the guideline for an ace is an ERA under 3.00 or an xFIP under 3.15, then you’ve got about a dozen in this span, and Cole definitely isn’t in the group. But downgrading his value because he’s not one of the best 12 pitchers in baseball seems kind of silly when he actually has been one of the best 24 pitchers in the game (or 19 if you go by WAR).

Think about that last paragraph, and think about all of those Pirates teams from 1993-2012 who would have killed for Gerrit Cole, even this year’s down version. If Pirates fans during those years could read some of the comments about Cole this year, they’d punch 2016 Pirates fans right in the neck.

But I understand that a lot of the current comments come as a result of the down year, and a lot of them are reactionary to a few bad starts recently. There is some hypocrisy to all of this though. Pirates fans would have been fine selling the farm for Chris Sale, who is currently putting up a 3.16 ERA and a 3.74 xFIP. That down year is not far removed from Cole’s down year, although Sale has been one of those guys who might be called “aces” from 2013-16. Pirates fans would also be fine trading for Julio Teheran, who has a 2.81 ERA but a 4.06 xFIP. And since 2013, Teheran has been below Cole, with a 3.26 ERA and a 3.92 xFIP (Cole once again is 3.10/3.31).

It seems the biggest problem with Cole is that his down year is coming with the Pirates. If he was on another team, and mentioned in trade rumors, Pirates fans would be wanting to trade for him, and pointing out how he has been one of the best pitchers in the league. The grass is greener on the other side, but Cole is on this side, and he gets judged unfairly for it. It’s a very Ricky Bobby approach, where if you’re not first, you’re last. But that’s only if you evaluate him within the context that he has to be an “ace”.

If you drop that terminology, which once again really has no true meaning, then you’ll see that Cole has been one of the best pitchers in the game the last four seasons, is still one of the best pitchers in the game, even in a down year, and is definitely not a problem in the Pirates’ rotation.

With that said, here are the top articles from the last week, looking at some prospect features you might have missed:

10. I got a chance to profile some middle round picks from the last two drafts while I was in Morgantown, writing features after my first impressions of James Marvel, Dylan Prohoroff, and Cam Vieaux.

9. Brian Peloza reports that Max Moroff is starting to get some outfield work, which will definitely add an interesting twist to the potential September callups.

8. Austin Shields made his pro debut this week, which was filled with control issues. The Pirates went over-slot on the prep right-hander, taking him as a backup plan to Nick Lodolo. I wrote about why he has control problems, and his lack of time on the mound.

7. This one was a free article, since it was First Pitch, but I looked at the difference between Jameson Taillon and Tyler Glasnow, pointing out an exclusive quote that Alan Saunders got from Taillon which shows why Taillon is ready for the majors and Glasnow isn’t. While we’re talking about First Pitch articles, I had two of them looking at how the Pirates develop new picks which I enjoyed researching and writing, but which didn’t get a lot of attention because they didn’t mention the words “Liriano” or “Hutchison“. So you can find the articles in those links.

6. Speaking of Glasnow, things didn’t go well in his rehab start tonight, and he left early. Sean McCool has the details. Sean also has a recap of Chris Stewart’s rehab, noting this is a last ditch effort to see if he can return this year.

5. Luis Escobar is one of the best young arms in the lower levels, but still has a ways to go to be a top prospect. I broke down what is holding him back after seeing him this week, but also what he is progressing with.

4. One of the most impressive things about my Morgantown trip was seeing the defense of Stephen Alemais at shortstop. He was a highlight reel in every game. I wrote about his defense, and what he needs to do on offense to complete the other half of his game.

3. In a reverse of the Alemais theme, I saw 2016 first round pick Will Craig, who showed off a great bat, but questions about his defense. I wrote about the off-season plan he will have to improve in that area.

2. Drew Hutchison has already made a few starts for Indianapolis, and Brian Peloza saw one of them, talking with Hutchison about the trade, and breaking down the adjustment for the right-handed pitcher.

1. Finally, my favorite article of the week was the one that went up today, comparing Mitch Keller very favorably to Tyler Glasnow and Jameson Taillon.

Tim Williams
Tim Williams
Tim is the owner, producer, editor, and lead writer of PiratesProspects.com. He has been running Pirates Prospects since 2009, becoming the first new media reporter and outlet covering the Pirates at the MLB level in 2011 and 2012. His work can also be found in Baseball America, where he has been a contributor since 2014 and the Pirates' correspondent since 2019.

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