Shelby Miller loses again, can’t buy a win this season 
For the better part of the past decade, Seattle Mariners ace Felix Hernandez has been the poster boy for the relative irrelevance of a pitcher’s win-loss record.
This season, Shelby Miller of the Atlanta Braves can make a good case that he’s now baseball’s most hard-luck loser.
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Miller had pitched six scoreless innings Wednesday night against the Colorado Rockies and entered the seventh with a 3-0 lead.
All of a sudden, the Rockies figured out the Braves right-hander, scoring four runs off him in that inning and going on to win the game 6-3.
It’s just been that kind of year for Miller.
Over his last 18 starts, Miller has been saddled with the loss 10 times. The other eight outings have been no-decisions. His ERA over that span? 3.24. On the season his 2.62 ERA has only been good for a 5-11 record. His last win came May 17. AL rookie of the year favorite Carlos Correa was still over two weeks away from playing his first major-league game the last time Miller ended up with a W.
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We know major-league teams are less beholden by W-L record when evaluating a pitcher’s performance than they were in the past. Earlier this month, the Toronto Blue Jays sent starter Drew Hutchison and his ERA over five down to Triple-A despite his sterling 12-2 record.
Even with his shoddy record, Miller was recognized as an All-Star this season. It shows how far we’ve come in understanding that a pitcher doesn’t have total control over his individual wins and losses. Next time a fellow fan uses W-L record to assess a starting pitcher, all you have to do is point to Shelby Miller.
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Israel Fehr is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter. Follow @israelfehr
