The Pitching Grade Challenge 7 balloting is now closed. Thanks to everyone who voted!
Each year of the Pitching Grade Challenge, I take the Challenge myself as soon as it goes live. Of course, I am not eligible to be a winner seeing as it’s my own contest but it is a way of keeping me honest in a way. Do I really know the game as well as I purport?
We’ll find out eventually. So far in the first six years, I have had relative success.
| Year | Right | Wrong | Pct. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 PGC | 15 | 5 | 75% |
| 2019 PGC | 18 | 2 | 90% |
| 2020 PGC | 13 | 7 | 65% |
| 2021 PGC | 13 | 7 | 65% |
| 2022 PGC | 16 | 4 | 80% |
| 2023 PGC | 15 | 5 | 75% |
As you can see, I rebounded the last two years from my 2020-2021 dip to 13 right. However, I still would like to regain my glory days of 2019. Indeed, how did I get 18 correct?
Some background
Before I go into who I pick, here’s a look into how I pick the pitchers for each Challenge. There is a method to my madness. I take several factors into mind.
- Whether are not they are on the bubble in terms of an APBA pitcher’s grade. I obviously want to make this as difficult as possible.
- Picking pitchers from the entire ERA spectrum. You will see potential grade A pitchers, potential grade D ones and those in between.
- A diverse group in terms of which teams and leagues they hail.
- And yes, I sneak at least one of my Thunderchickens for some reason. This year, King and Freeland were on the ballot.
This year around, I decided to have a shorter time that the ballot was open. It didn’t really affect participation as I got about the same amount of voters. I figure, In fact, 2024 broke the record for participation!
After I choose the pitchers and create ballot, I take it for real. Honestly, as I set it up, I take it dozens of times to make sure everything works. A lot of work goes into it but it’s fun and I hear from a lot of you APBA fans!
But the last time is the one that counts.
Okay, but what about Tom’s ballot?
As I took the PGC7, I started to wonder ‘did I make it too easy?’. The last thing we need is 50 people being tied with 20 for 20. I’m pretty sure there is one ‘gimme’ on this ballot.
That said, I received assurances from readers that it was challenging. Maybe they were just being nice.
Here is my ballot I filled out. Please note: this is NOT the official APBA grades and only my guesses.
| Pitcher | Team | W | L | IP | ERA | Tom’s Guess |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Zach Eflin | 2TM | 10 | 9 | 165 1/3 | 3.59 | B |
| Joey Estes | OAK | 7 | 9 | 127 2/3 | 5.01 | D |
| Jack Flaherty | LAD | 6 | 2 | 55 1/3 | 3.58 | B |
| Kyle Freeland | COL | 5 | 8 | 113 1/3 | 5.24 | D |
| Zac Gallen | ARI | 14 | 6 | 148 | 3.65 | C |
| Austin Gomber | COL | 5 | 12 | 165 | 4.75 | C |
| Kyle Harrison | SFG | 7 | 7 | 124 1/3 | 4.56 | C |
| Shota Imanaga | CHC | 15 | 3 | 173 1/3 | 2.91 | A |
| Jake Irvin | WSN | 10 | 14 | 187 2/3 | 4.41 | C |
| Michael King | SDP | 13 | 9 | 173 2/3 | 2.95 | B |
| Zack Littell | TBR | 8 | 10 | 196 1/3 | 3.63 | C |
| Nick Lodolo | CIN | 9 | 6 | 115 1/3 | 4.76 | C |
| Miles Mikolas | STL | 10 | 11 | 171 2/3 | 5.35 | D |
| Bryce Miller | SEA | 12 | 8 | 180 1/3 | 2.94 | B |
| Freddy Peralta | MIL | 11 | 9 | 173 2/3 | 3.68 | C |
| Brandon Pfaadt | ARI | 11 | 10 | 181 2/3 | 4.71 | C |
| Carlos Rodón | NYY | 16 | 9 | 175 | 3.96 | C |
| Grayson Rodriguez | BAL | 13 | 4 | 116 2/3 | 3.86 | C |
| Tarik Skubal | DET | 18 | 4 | 192 | 2.39 | A |
| Framber Valdez | HOU | 15 | 7 | 176 1/3 | 2.91 | A |
I don’t think we had as many grade A quality pitchers in the Challenge as we did this year and I responded to a point. You will notice I didn’t reward Michael King, who is on my Thunderchickens, with an A. Those of you who voted A on him, I hope you are right.
For me, the toughest pitchers to pick are ones like Gallen and Littell who are in the 3.60 ERA range. That is the bubble between B and C where we need to start looking at wins. Looking at my ballot, I was pretty harsh on that type. It’s almost like the B pitcher is becoming extinct and the metrics for C pitcher are expanding.
Did I underestimate Carlos Rodon who won 16 games? That figure for wins was tied for third in the league. Maybe. Wins wasn’t always the first factor in determining a pitcher’s grade. But that figure is hard to ignore.
Once again, thank you for participating in the seventh Pitching Grade Challenge. We will find out the correct grades soon as the product schedule has been released. Once the 2024 set is available on APBA GO, I will process the results and announce the winner. And as always, I’ll do a breakdown of which pitchers were the easiest and hardest to predict.
Happy Thanksgiving!
