In the wake of the Twins acquiring Hector Santiago from the Angels, some have questioned how big of an upgrade he'll be over Ricky Nolasco, mainly pointing to Nolasco's vastly superior numbers in terms of FIP (fielding independent pitching). While the peripheral stats may be in Nolasco's favor, they don't tell the whole story.

The biggest divide between these two players is how they bear down when things start to not go in their favor. If you take a look into how each pitcher performs with runners on, it's clear that while Nolasco crumbles, Santiago shines

Career FIP vs. ERA

Santiago: 4.63 FIP, 3.68 ERA (0.95 worse)

Nolasco: 3.85 FIP, 4.58 ERA (0.73 better)

So you can see that both pitchers have been FIP busters, with Santiago looking a great deal worse than the ERA he has pitched to. These kinds of gaps are abnormal for veteran pitchers. Just for reference, Ervin Santana's FIP and ERA are only off by a difference of 0.11 over his career (4.24 FIP, 4.13 ERA).

FIP is a great indicator of pitcher performance because it only looks at home runs, walks, hit batsmen and strikeouts. As the name would indicate, any plays in which defense is a factor are not taken into account. Another thing FIP doesn't take into account, however, is game situation. Obviously, it's better to not allow batters to reach safely, but Santiago has limited damage with runners on at an elite level. Even just skimming the surface it's easy to see this is where Santiago gains a considerable amount of value over Nolasco.

Career with men on base

Santiago: .216/.322/.336 (.658 OPS)

Nolasco: .294/.345/.448 (.793)

Career with RISP

Santiago: .184/.300/.271 (.571)

Nolasco: .287/.347/.437 (.784)

Career with 2 outs and RISP

Santiago: .173/.310/.248 (.558)

Nolasco: .264/.355/.397 (.752)

To put some perspective on just how excellent those numbers are for Santiago, Johan Santana was only slightly better over his career with men on base (.647 OPS) but not nearly as good with RISP (.623) or with RISP and two outs (.606).

Santiago's greatest weakness is walks, and looking at his excellent July it's a wonder how he managed to put up such great results with how many free passes he issued. But, while he did walk 21 batters, in the following at bat opponents went just 1-for-18 with eight strikeouts and two walks (for those of you tallying things up at home, he was pulled for a reliever after one of those walks). That is a small sample, but it shows a slice of how effective Santiago can be at stepping up, wiggling out of jams and neutralizing the walks.

There are people who don't believe in the concept of clutch, or even pitchers adjusting their approach based on game situation (pitching to the score for example). But after over 650 career innings, it seems like a stretch to look at Santiago's excellent track record in adverse situations and just say he's just been lucky. He clearly is unfazed by the pressure of pitching with men on base.

Hector Santiago plays with fire but rarely gets burned. If he can continue to demonstrate this skill, he should also continue to outperform Ricky Nolasco with ease.