What is the difference between an ace and a #1?

Based on a conversation I had with my friend & also thinking about the state of free agent pitching this offseason. To my mind, there are few true aces at the moment. I feel an ace you know when you see (lol intangibles); they’re the guy you run out on Opening Day and they lead the team into the playoffs (though a #1 does that too).

Logan Webb is indisputably SF’s #1 but I am unable to see him as more than a Matt Cain style co-ace; I thought about why this was (his numbers are great, the man posts) and I think an ace needs a certain element of flash as well as excellence. That’s definitely something you can’t measure and is really unscientific.

Undisputed aces at various times:

Verlander
Halladay
Kershaw
Pedro
King Felix
Cole
DeGrom
Sale

Current players I think are aces but could go either way:

Gausman
Senga
Burnes
Gallen
Luis Castillo

He’s-the-best-on-this-staff-but-feels-like-a-1:

Webb
Gray
2022 Manoah
Steele
Pablo Lopez

Ace potential:

Kirby
Eury Perez

It’s really not that deep, though, but curious to know how the knowledgeable people of ILB (and the rest) think about this, or if it’s even a difference worth discussing at all?

https://i.postimg.cc/wvjPrX4m/IMG-4045.jpg

I don't know if there's a distinction in the moment, I see it more as a question of duration. When Jack Arrieta was at his peak, he was both--he matched up with Kershaw or Scherzer or anybody. He just couldn't keep it going for more than two or three seasons.

I don't like pre-season ROY/MVP/CY polls because nobody's actually predicting anything, they're either rehashing/reviewing the league's best players or going for longshot picks in the hope of looking like geniuses six months down the road.

That said, an ace is a pitcher who's a safe preseason CY pick. Luis Castillo: solid pitcher, but not a serious contender unless he gets to the next level. He *could* do it, but he's not a safe pick.

Possible (or likely) aces at the moment: Cole, Webb, Gallen, Burnes, Gausman, Wheeler. Those are off the top of my head. I think that it's tougher to identify aces these days because they don't pitch nearly as many innings as the Halladay/Felix/prime Verlander/prime Kershaw aces did.

He just couldn't keep it going for more than two or three seasons.

Yes, this relates to my point, if a pitcher is solid top-10 CY voting candidate for 3-4 years in a row, then he's a "safe preseason" pick and an ace. Peak Chris Sale: never won a CY, but was an ace. Robbie Ray: won a CY, not an ace.

Joe Sheehan got into this recently in his newsletter.

Consider the pitchers who are absolutely not #1s by my definition. Jacob deGrom has made 32 starts in three years and isn’t going to get to 50 next year. Blake Snell and his two Cy Young Awards? He’s 31 and has thrown 130 innings in a season twice. Aaron Nola just got a seven-year contract, and only Cole has pitched more innings since 2018. However, he’s had ERAs of 4.63 and 4.46 in two of the last three seasons, and 3.87 in 2019.

So do we lower the standards, and if we do, how far? Is 180 innings now the baseline for a #1? If so, where are teams finding those missing innings? If so, how do we value #1 starters in this environment? It still takes 162 starts and 1440 innings to get through a season, and at what point are the best pitchers in baseball just not taking enough of those to deserve that designation?

Gerrit Cole
Kevin Gausman
Spencer Strider
Zack Wheeler
Corbin Burnes

xp it’s weird cos I kind of feel that way about Blake Snell due to his lack of innings! He’s a weird anomaly in that the only years he got Cy Young votes are the years he won it. No other votes, at all.

xp didn’t we discuss Strider relatively recently ito his high ERA? If he’s a FIP guy that’s totally fine cos Strider has a league leading FIP but if you look at ERA first then he’s not The Guy ito run prevention.

a #1 is simply the team's best starter, it's framed within the context of a pitching staff. whereas an ace is a general term for a top tier starter, a team could have 0 or 2 aces.

^^^

when did starters become numbered? because they weren’t when i was a kid

Is it a scouting thing? 5 man rotation has been around since the 50s but according to this article, the numbers used to distinguish SPs from each order rely on scouting grades.

https://www.minorleagueball.com/platform/amp/2012/8/7/3226335/defining-1-2-3-4-5-starters

Also, this article has some interesting history on the rotation.

The problem with implementing a four- or five-man rotation in the nineteenth century was insufficient pitching depth. Many teams, like Ferguson’s Metropolitans, just presented awful pitchers as the fourth or fifth starters. To put it in a modern context, nineteenth century managers who dabbled with rotation use actually believed Duane Kuiper, on ten days of rest, could beat Steve Carlton on three days of rest.

Kind of crazy how the braves in the '90s, at their peak, had three aces going. And their number four was frequently a guy who'd be a number one elsewhere.

https://www.denverautographs.com/wp-content/uploads/HALLADAYROYMAGSIPHILLIES24687.jpg

vv kind of them to include Blanton

yeah it might be from scouts projecting how good a pitcher will be relative to a typical pitching staff. i dont really remember "#1" getting used much in general even 15 years ago when i was more tuned into baseball media tho

Kind of crazy to look at Cliff Lee and Roy Oswalt these days, those guys were legit Hall of Fame caliber. Better pitchers than some who made it into the hall, or who eventually will make it into the hall. They just did it for too brief a period.

vv kind of them to include Blanton

Undisputed aces at various times:

Verlander
Halladay
Kershaw
Pedro
King Felix
Cole
DeGrom
Sale

Maddux

Johnson
Schilling

It’s ok guys, it wasn’t an exhaustive list.

clemens u fules

as to the question itself i'd call an ace a post-facto designation of someone who was on a Hof Trajectory at some point for a number of years TBD + a dose of baseball metaphysics. based on that it makes sense that there are only like, 3 aces in the league at any given point. Santana was an ace for a while, so was kevin brown. # 1 is just the best pitcher on a given staff. who is the # 1 on the a's idk

Paul Blackburn had a sub-4 FIP last year

i was thinking about Blake Snell and how he's had two great seasons and won two Cy Young awards, but unlike every other multiple Cy guy, he's not someone i think of as an ace. feels like he's always on the edge of tipping over into another high ERA season of relative ineffectiveness.

It’s weird isn’t it, you don’t win two accidentally but he feels flukey especially with his lack of innings in most seasons

wasn’t paying attention to his usage in san diego, but tbf the rays simply wouldn’t let him pitch more. set down 18 straight and they’ll still pull you to avoid the dreaded third-time-through-the-order curse

as sheehan says, this is how it is now — snell just got there first bc rays

aces are less interested in sex, although it doesn't mean they don't _have_ sex - that's a common misconception.