Lester Letdown? Don't Bet On It.

Or, at least, don't bet against Lester just because you think he has to be overvalued today following his no-no the last time out. Being a contrarian bettor, who likes to bet "against the public" on a regular basis, I have to admit that when I saw the highlights of Lester's no-hitter in his last start, my first thought wasn't "Wow, what a great performance!" or "Wow, what a great survival story!" My actual first thought was "Wow, the line on that guy is going to be WAY overinflated in his next game!" They call me Mr. Sensitive.

Out of curiosity, I went back and looked at the last 10 no-hitters and how those pitchers performed in their next start. Surprisingly (to me, anyway), if you had wagered on all 10 of those pitchers in their next start, you would have gone 9-1. 9-1! All 9 of those winning performances were quality starts (at least 6 innings, and no more than 3 earned runs). And, really, that should probably be 9-0 if you leave out the bizarre situation with Clay Buchholz at the end of last season. Buchholz throws a no-hitter and then is used out of the bullpen in his next appearance? Incidentally, he actually did pick up the win in that relief appearance (3 innings, 0 ER, 3 K), but since he didn't start, there's no real way you could have wagered on that. In his next actual start, TWO WEEKS AFTER his no-hitter, he got the loss, but pitched well (4.2 innings, 1 ER, 5 K).

So, it would appear that there was no post-no-hitter-letdown for any of the no-hitter pitchers over the last 7 years. And, looking at the lines from those games, it also doesn't appear that there was much over-inflation in the lines. The only line over -175 in the next appearance for any of the last 10 no-hit pitchers was a -210 for Derek Lowe and the Red Sox in 2002. But, that line wasn't out of whack from the lines the Red Sox were getting anyway that season. In the game before Lowe's next appearance, the line on Burkett was -185, and in the game before that, Pedro Martinez was -360. In 2001, A.J. Burnett was +100 in his next start for the Marlins following his no-hitter. Today, in fact, Lester and the powerhouse Red Sox are somehow only -102 against the powerless Oakland A's.

I was planning on writing a post about how you should look to fade Lester after the no-hitter inflates his value, but this strategy would have lost you a lot of money over the last several years. I'm not advocating you play on Lester today based on the performances by other no-hit pitchers described above, because obviously the way Hideo Nomo or Anibel Sanchez or Randy Johnson performed in their next start has no relation to how Lester will pitch today. But, I wanted to point out the importance of doing your homework on each game the same as you always would before betting, and not necessarily trusting your knee-jerk reaction to unusual circumstances. It's a mistake I came very close to making today.