{"id":126,"date":"2025-07-18T15:16:28","date_gmt":"2025-07-18T15:16:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/glossary\/?p=126"},"modified":"2025-09-05T15:40:45","modified_gmt":"2025-09-05T15:40:45","slug":"game-score","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/glossary\/game-score\/","title":{"rendered":"Game Score"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-what-is-baseball-game-score\">What is Baseball Game Score?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Game score<\/strong>, a metric created by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/bullpen\/Bill_James\">Bill James<\/a>, measures a&nbsp;starting pitcher&#8217;s effectiveness in a single game. It uses a system of pluses and minuses to create a score. That score can easily be compared to standard benchmarks to determine how well the pitcher performed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-how-is-game-score-used\">How is Game Score used?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Game score is analyzed on a fairly intuitive scale. A score of 50 reflects an average outing. Conversely, scores of 0 or below (very bad) or 100 or greater (very good) rarely happen. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The average score for a starting pitcher at home is slightly higher than for the road starter, reflecting baseball&#8217;s&nbsp;home field advantage. In practice, the difference comes from a better&nbsp;strikeout&nbsp;rate for home starters. Some believe that unconscious bias by&nbsp;home plate umpires causes that difference, giving a few extra strikes per games to the home side.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Game score often correlates closely with pitching&nbsp;wins. However, this correlation breaks down at the very top end of the scale (scores of 90 or more). Many of these very high scores happen in games that go to&nbsp;extra innings, making it much harder for the starting pitcher to pick up the win.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-how-to-calculate-game-score\">How to calculate Game Score?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Start with 50 points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Add:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>1 point for each out (or 3 points per inning)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>2 points for each inning completed after the 4th<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>1 point for each strikeout<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Subtract<\/strong>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>2 points for each hit allowed<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>4 points for each earned run allowed<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>2 points for each unearned run allowed<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>1 point for each walk.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The total is the pitcher&#8217;s score for that game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-game-score-calculator\">Game Score Calculator<\/h2>\n\n\n<style>@media (max-width:480px){#cff-iframe-1{min-height:891px;}}@media (max-width:768px){#cff-iframe-1{min-height:717px;}}@media (max-width:1024px){#cff-iframe-1{min-height:552px;}}@media (min-width:1024px){#cff-iframe-1{min-height:524px;}}<\/style><script type=\"text\/javascript\">window.addEventListener(\"message\", function(e) {\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tif (\"data\" in e && typeof e.data == \"object\" && ! Array.isArray(e.data) && \"cff_height\" in e.data && \"cff_iframe\" in e.data) {\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\ttry{\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tlet el = document.getElementById(e.data.cff_iframe);\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tel.style.height = e.data.cff_height + \"px\";\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tel.style.minHeight=\"auto\";\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tif( \"parent\" in window ) parent.postMessage({sentinel: \"amp\",type:\"embed-size\",height: e.data.cff_height+25}, \"*\");\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t} catch(err){}\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t\t\t\t}, false);\n\t\t\t\t\t\twindow.addEventListener(\"load\", function() {\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tlet el = document.getElementById(\"cff-iframe-1\");\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tif(el && el.hasAttribute(\"data-cff-src\")) el.setAttribute(\"src\", el.getAttribute(\"data-cff-src\"));\n\t\t\t\t\t\t});<\/script><iframe  id=\"cff-iframe-1\" src=\"\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/glossary\/?cff-form=13&amp;cff_iframe=cff-iframe-1\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;overflow-y:hidden;\" onload=\"try{this.width=this.contentWindow.document.body.scrollWidth;this.height=this.contentWindow.document.body.scrollHeight+40;this.style.minHeight='auto';}catch(err){}\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-game-score-examples\">Game Score Examples<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Let&#8217;s use <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/bullpen\/Kerry_Wood\">Kerry Wood<\/a>&#8216;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/gl.fcgi?id=woodke02&amp;t=p&amp;year=1998\">May 6, 1998<\/a> one-hitter as an example of how to calculate game score. (Hint: it&#8217;s the best score in a nine-inning game.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Start with 50 points.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Add 1 point for each out. Since Woods pitched all 9 innings, we can add 3 points per inning. 3*9 = 27. 50+27 = 77.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Add 2 points for each inning completed after the 4th. Woods pitched all 9 innings, so he pitched 5 innings after the 4th. 5*2 = 10. 77+10 = 87.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Add 1 point for each strikeout. Woods had 20 strikeouts. 87+20 = 107.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Subtract 2 points for each hit allowed. Woods only allowed 1 hit. 107-2 = 105.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Woods did not allow any runs, earned or unearned, so no points will be subtracted for allowing runs.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Woods did not walk any batters, so no points will be subtracted for walks, either.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p>Woods&#8217; score (the best in a nine-inning game) was 105.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-interesting-game-score-stats\">Interesting Game Score Stats<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/bullpen\/Dean_Chance\">Dean Chance<\/a>&nbsp;recorded the best game score since 1957, with a 116 score in&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/bullpen\/1964_Angels\">1964<\/a>. He threw 14 shutout innings, giving up just 3 hits and striking out 12.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On the other hand, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/bullpen\/Mike_Oquist\">Mike Oquist<\/a> recorded a -21 score in 1998 for the worst score since 1957. Oquist gave up 14 earned runs in 5 innings. The worst score between 1901 and 2021 was -56 by&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/bullpen\/George_LeClair\">George LeClair<\/a>&nbsp;of the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/bullpen\/Pittsburgh_Rebels\">Pittsburgh Rebels<\/a>&nbsp;on August 16, 1914.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>From 1957 to 2007, only 40 games recorded a 100+ score.&nbsp;Four of those games belonged to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/bullpen\/Nolan_Ryan\">Nolan Ryan<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What is Baseball Game Score? Game score, a metric created by Bill James, measures a&nbsp;starting pitcher&#8217;s effectiveness in a single game. It uses a system of pluses and minuses to create a score. That score can easily be compared to standard benchmarks to determine how well the pitcher performed. How is Game Score used? Game [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-statistics"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.7.1 (Yoast SEO v25.7) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Game Score: Baseball-Reference.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Game score\u00a0measures a\u00a0starting pitcher&#039;s effectiveness in a single game, using a system of pluses and minuses to create a score.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/glossary\/game-score\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" 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