Josh Beckett

Baseball Player Won-Loss Records
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Josh Beckett

2020 Hall of Fame Ballot Series: Josh Beckett

Five facts about Josh Beckett:

Josh Beckett was the second pick in the 1999 MLB amateur draft (behind Josh Hamilton)

Josh Beckett was named to three All-Star teams, in 2007, 2009, and 2011.

Beckett's best regular season was 2007 when he made his first All-Star team and led the American League in wins (20). He finished with at traditional record of 20-7 with a 3.27 ERA, 194 strikeouts, and only 40 walks in 200.2 innings pitched. He finished second in Cy Young voting (to C.C. Sabathia).

In 2003, Beckett was named World Series MVP. Across the three rounds of the 2003 playoffs, Beckett had a traditional record of 2-2 with a 2.11 ERA and 47 K in 42.2 IP. Both of his wins were complete-game shutouts, the first in Game 5 of the NLCS to stave off elimination (the Cubs led 3 games to 1 at the time); the second in the deciding Game 6 of the World Series.

In 2007, Beckett was named ALCS MVP. Across the three rounds of the 2007 playoffs, Beckett had a traditional record of 4-0 with a 1.20 ERA and 35 K in 30 IP, including a complete-game shutout in Game 1 of the ALDS.

The first two tables below present Josh Beckett's career as measured by Player won-lost records, in and out of context.

Season	Team	Age	Games	pWins	pLosses	pWORL	pWOPA

Basic Player Won-Lost Records
						Value Decomposition
2001	FLO	21	4	1.9	1.9	0.4	0.2
2002	FLO	22	23	5.8	6.9	0.2	-0.6
2003	FLO	23	24	9.0	7.6	3.1	2.1
2004	FLO	24	26	10.4	10.0	2.4	1.1
2005	FLO	25	29	12.1	10.3	4.0	2.6
2006	BOS	26	33	12.0	12.2	1.6	-0.0
2007	BOS	27	30	11.8	8.1	5.4	4.0
2008	BOS	28	27	10.1	8.9	2.7	1.4
2009	BOS	29	32	13.7	9.8	5.8	4.2
2010	BOS	30	21	6.8	7.4	0.4	-0.5
2011	BOS	31	30	10.8	8.8	3.5	2.2
+– 2012		32	28	9.2	11.6	-0.5	-1.9
	BOS		21	7.0	8.9	-0.6	-1.7
	LAN		7	2.2	2.6	0.1	-0.2
2013	LAN	33	8	2.2	4.0	-1.3	-1.7
2014	LAN	34	20	6.3	6.9	0.8	-0.0
			------	------	------	------	------
CAREER (reg. season)			335	122.2	114.3	28.7	13.1
			------	------	------	------	------
PostSeason (career)			14	6.2	4.0	3.1	2.4
			------	------	------	------	------
COMBINED			349	128.4	118.3	31.8	15.5

Season	Team	Age	Games	eWins	eLosses	eWORL	eWOPA

Expected Player Won-Lost Records
						Value Decomposition
2001	FLO	21	4	2.2	1.6	0.9	0.7
2002	FLO	22	23	6.2	6.5	1.1	0.2
2003	FLO	23	24	9.2	7.3	3.7	2.6
2004	FLO	24	26	10.8	9.6	3.3	2.0
2005	FLO	25	29	11.9	10.4	3.7	2.3
2006	BOS	26	33	12.0	12.3	1.7	0.1
2007	BOS	27	30	11.6	8.3	5.1	3.7
2008	BOS	28	27	10.8	8.3	4.0	2.7
2009	BOS	29	32	13.0	10.5	4.3	2.7
2010	BOS	30	21	6.5	7.7	-0.1	-1.1
2011	BOS	31	30	10.7	8.9	3.3	2.0
+– 2012		32	28	10.0	10.8	1.1	-0.3
	BOS		21	7.8	8.1	0.9	-0.1
	LAN		7	2.2	2.6	0.1	-0.2
2013	LAN	33	8	2.5	3.7	-0.6	-1.0
2014	LAN	34	20	5.9	7.3	-0.1	-0.9
			------	------	------	------	------
CAREER (reg. season)			335	123.3	113.2	31.3	15.6
			------	------	------	------	------
PostSeason (career)			14	6.0	4.2	2.8	2.1
			------	------	------	------	------
COMBINED			349	129.4	117.3	34.1	17.8

This is Josh Beckett's first year on the Hall-of-Fame ballot.

Vote Prediction

Josh Beckett was the pitching ace of two World Series champions. That's a really nice line to put on a Hall-of-Fame resume. Unfortunately for Josh Beckett, it's really the only line on his Hall-of-Fame resume.

One thing that the easing of the ballot crunch might do, though, is to give some writers a bit more of an opportunity to throw a courtesy vote or two to a personal favorite even if the writer knows the player isn't really a Hall-of-Famer. I could see Beckett getting perhaps a handful of such votes, perhaps enough to flirt with - but probably fall just short of - one percent. Call it maybe 0.8%.

Player Won-Lost Records and Josh Beckett

As noted above, Josh Beckett pitched for two World Series winners, pitching briliantly in the postseason both seasons. Overall, Beckett pitched in the postseason in four seasons. In 14 postseason games (13 starts), he had a traditional won-lost record of 7-3 with a 3.07 ERA and 99 strikeouts in 93.2 innings pitched. He was named the MVP of the 2003 World Series and the 2007 ALCS.

The next two tables show the top 25 players in career postseason pWins over both positional average and replacement level (pWOPA, pWORL) for whom I have calculated Player won-lost records.

		Postseason pWins over Positional Average Top 25 Players
	Player	pWins	pLosses	pWOPA	pWORL
1	Mariano Rivera	12.9	3.5	9.1	10.7
2	Albert Pujols	12.2	6.9	4.6	5.6
3	Curt Schilling	9.3	5.5	4.3	5.2
4	Lou Gehrig	6.5	2.3	3.9	4.4
5	Derek Jeter	21.3	18.4	3.9	5.8
6	John Smoltz	12.3	9.3	3.7	5.1
7	Paul O'Neill	11.8	7.9	3.4	4.4
8	Andy Pettitte	17.0	14.2	3.4	5.5
9	David Ortiz	9.6	6.1	3.2	4.2
10	Justin Turner	8.8	5.4	3.1	3.8
11	Cliff P. Lee	6.3	3.6	3.0	3.6
12	Babe Ruth	8.0	4.8	2.9	3.6
13	Jim Palmer	7.8	5.5	2.8	3.6
14	Chuck Knoblauch	8.7	6.2	2.7	3.4
15	Carlos Beltran	8.9	6.0	2.7	3.4
16	Orlando Hernandez	7.4	5.0	2.6	3.5
17	Madison Bumgarner	7.4	5.3	2.6	3.4
18	Bernie Williams	15.9	13.2	2.6	4.1
19	Josh Beckett	6.2	4.0	2.4	3.1
20	Stephen Strasburg	4.2	2.2	2.3	2.7
21	Bob Gibson	5.4	3.5	2.3	2.8
22	Manny Ramirez	15.2	12.3	2.2	3.6
23	Pete Rose Sr.	9.4	6.6	2.2	3.0
24	Red Ruffing	6.2	4.4	2.2	2.8
25	Wade Davis	3.9	1.7	2.2	2.7

		Postseason pWins over Replacement Level Top 25 Players
	Player	pWins	pLosses	pWOPA	pWORL
1	Mariano Rivera	12.9	3.5	9.1	10.7
2	Derek Jeter	21.3	18.4	3.9	5.8
3	Albert Pujols	12.2	6.9	4.6	5.6
4	Andy Pettitte	17.0	14.2	3.4	5.5
5	Curt Schilling	9.3	5.5	4.3	5.2
6	John Smoltz	12.3	9.3	3.7	5.1
7	Paul O'Neill	11.8	7.9	3.4	4.4
8	Lou Gehrig	6.5	2.3	3.9	4.4
9	David Ortiz	9.6	6.1	3.2	4.2
10	Bernie Williams	15.9	13.2	2.6	4.1
11	Justin Turner	8.8	5.4	3.1	3.8
12	Jim Palmer	7.8	5.5	2.8	3.6
13	Babe Ruth	8.0	4.8	2.9	3.6
14	Cliff P. Lee	6.3	3.6	3.0	3.6
15	Manny Ramirez	15.2	12.3	2.2	3.6
16	Orlando Hernandez	7.4	5.0	2.6	3.5
17	Chuck Knoblauch	8.7	6.2	2.7	3.4
18	Carlos Beltran	8.9	6.0	2.7	3.4
19	Madison Bumgarner	7.4	5.3	2.6	3.4
20	Roger Clemens	12.4	11.2	1.7	3.3
21	Justin Verlander	12.6	11.5	1.5	3.2
22	Jon Lester	8.8	7.1	2.1	3.1
23	Josh Beckett	6.2	4.0	2.4	3.1
24	Pete Rose Sr.	9.4	6.6	2.2	3.0
25	Chris Carpenter (1997)	8.2	6.9	1.9	2.9

Article last updated: November 19, 2019

2020 Hall of Fame Ballot Series

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