Clubs *could* try to control for pitcher injury data, at least a little bit ... you could take 21-year-old pitchers who are LHP's, who throw in James Paxton "families," who pitched in college, K rate, velocity, yada yada yada, and (over time) take 20 of them and test for one variable -- game pitch limits, IP on a season, or (coarsely defined) "pitches thrown when tired".
It would be hard to do retroactively, probably ... you might recall that James took BP's "Pitcher Abuse Points" (itself a very, VERY simple system) and tested it -- finding out that the most "abused" pitchers (# pitches after 100, 110, and 120) were the ones that went on to be the healthiest in later seasons!
Whereupon BP sniffed that James forgot that the "abused" pitchers were the Schillings and Clemenses, and that he forgot to control for skill level ......
Despite the fact that they had not noticed the fact that their system was predictively invalid ...
:- )
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