2011 Pitching Review: Starters – Misses

In my last column I broke down my greatest “hits” of starting pitchers, those that I identified and suggested you add to your stable of hurlers for the 2011 season who succeeded. Today I’ll ding myself by pointing out the hurlers that failed to deliver based on my personal expectations.

For the “hits” see PART I.

NOTE: Please remember that while some of these “calls” seem obvious, they really weren’t back in March of 2011.

MISSES

Josh Johnson (#8): Shoulder woes limited Johnson to just nine starts and 60.1 innings in 2011. He was spectacular when on the hill with a 1.64 ERA and 0.98 WHIP, not to mention 56 Ks in 60.1 innings, but his future is cloudy as he simply cannot be counted on to take the hill every five games.

Roy Oswalt (#13): Back woes limited him to his worst season, possibly ever. He won only nine games against 10 loses, lasted just 139 innings (his lowest total since 2003), and saw his K/9 dip to 6.02 (the worst mark of his career). He wasn’t horrible with a 3.69 ERA and 1.34 WHIP, but he was drafted to be a strong #2 hurler, not a depth play.

Chad Billingsley (#18): It’s time to give up on him becoming an elite pitcher, but he should still be better than he was this season. Chad produced a five year low with 11 victories, a career worst 4.21 ERA, a 5-year worst in K/9 (7.28) and a 5-year high in BB/9 (4.02). Simply put, he wasn’t very good, but he’s still only 27 years old and did toss 188 innings, his fourth straight year hitting that mark.

Francisco Liriano (#23): He will never be the pitcher he was before he blew his arm out, so put that thought out of your head as he’s lost three mph off his fastball since his heyday. As a result, his K/9 fell a batter and a half from his career rate, down to 7.50 per nine, and he was simply dreadful at throwing strikes walking 5.02 batters per nine innings. That’s just shameful.

Ryan Dempster (#25): The good – he threw more than 200 innings with at least 170 K’s for a fourth straight season. The bad – his ERA was awful at 4.80 and his WHIP wasn’t much better at 1.45. A lot of that has to do with his horrible start to the year, though his 3.70 xFIP was actually right in line with his previous three seasons (3.69, 3.76 and 3.74). He wasn’t as bad as he appeared to be.

Ricky Nolasco (#29): I give up. The guy has tantalizing skills including 4-straight years with a K/BB ratio of at least 3.36, and his xFIP keeps saying that his ERA should be well below where it always is (5.06, 4.51 and 4.67 the last three years). I’m still gonna draft him late in 2012, but only at a point where I know he’ll give me value versus at a level that I hope he will be able to live up to.

Brett Anderson (#30): Couldn’t help this one as there was no way to predict that he would need Tommy John surgery in July. He ended the year 3-6 with a 4.00 ERA and 1.33 WHIP over 13 starts.

Jonathan Sanchez (#31): He still owns hellacious stuff, see his 9.06 K/9 mark, but he rarely seems to know where it is going (see his ghastly 5.86 BB/9 mark). It’s as simple as this; until he starts throwing strikes he’s simply not someone that you can trust, at all.

John Lackey (#42): Seems like everything that could go wrong with the Boston righty did in 2011. He won 12 games, his 9th straight season of double-digits, but he threw a nine year low of 160 innings. The Sox may not have been complaining though given his 6.41 ERA and 1.62 WHIP. Amazingly, his K/9 has gone down each of the last six years while his BB/9 has gone up each of the last four.

Ian Kennedy (#55): No one predicted this effort. I’ll tip my hat to the guy as he went 21-4 with a 2.88 ERA, 1.09 WHIP and 198 Ks. I don’t think he has a chance in hell of repeating that effort, but he was dynamite in 2011.

Jake Peavy (#56): I thought putting him in the second half of the top-100 was being fair. Turns out, it wasn’t. Peavy only lasted 111.2 innings, posted an abysmal 4.92 ERA, and he has serious questions about whether or not he will ever be able to even take the ball 30 times a year again.

Michael Pineda (#95): Here is my quote, and my reasoning as to why he was so low in my original rankings. “I’d be surprised if he was up before June, but he will be a strikeout force when the Mariners finally turn to him.” I totally missed the time line which is why my ranking of him was so off.

By Ray Flowers

The Little Things Matter

With all the big deals in the game of baseball the past couple of days, I wanted to make sure I didn’t neglect a couple of the lesser names on the market, either those that have signed or those that are on the brink of inking a new deal.

Why is Marlon Byrd such a hot option? I know he had a nice season with a .283 average, 20 homers and 89 RBI for the Rangers, but does any of that really excite anyone in fantasyland? Maybe not, but the Cubs certainly appear to want to add the 32 year old to their outfield for next season, that if they can ever rid themselves of malcontent Milton Bradley. As for Byrd, I know last season was his first full year in the bigs 9at-bat wise), but he has been over 400 at-bats in each of the past three seasons. Still, he has only one season with more than 10 homers, and he owns a career line of .279/.340/.422, and that ain’t much better than average folks. BY the by, here is how he has done per 162 games in his career: .279-12-69-78-8 with a .762 OPS. Don’t know about you, but I don’t think anyone should be too excited about adding that bat, especially the Cubs since they already have a virtually identical batter in Kosuke Fukudome who hit .259-11-54-79 with six steals last season.

Mike Cameron is a Red Sox. What can we expect from him in 2010? Glad you asked. You can read my thoughts in Breaking Down: Mike Cameron.

Jeff Francoeur hit .319 over his final 36 games last season, and overall he .311 with a .498 SLG in 75 games with the Mets, a marked improvement over his early season work with the Braves (.250, .352 SLG in 82 games). With late season numbers like that you would think that he was fully healthy at the end of the year. In fact, you might think he was injured earlier in the year given the struggles with the Braves. Well if you thought that you would be wrong. Turns out Frenchie had left thumb surgery after the season, and the thumb was so jacked up that the doctors needed to replace a ligament (one was taken from his forearm). He should be fully healed by the time the season starts, and he is clearly one tough cookie.

Matt Holliday was reportedly offered an 8-year deal for $128 million by the Cardinals. However, Buster Olney of ESPN refuted the St. Louis Post-Dispatch report and said the team doesn’t want to go beyond five years. No matter what the offer is, it doesn’t seem likely to be enough to entice Matt Holliday, at least for the moment. To read more about the whole Holliday saga give Ryan Boyer’s Is it five years or eight years for Holliday?

I gave my thoughts on the outlook of Hideki Matsui in his new home with the Angels in Breaking Down: Hideki Matsui.

John Lackey and the Red Sox continue to hold off on officially ratifying the 5-year deal that is thought to be worth $85 million. Looks like the Sox want to have the contract include some language in it to protect themselves from any previously suffered injuries, should the arise again. It’s really just semantics – don’t worry, the deal will get done.

Seems like Ben Sheets is still angling for a one year deal worth $12 million. Of course that includes a boatload of bonuses built into the deal, but after missing all of last season is there really a team out there that is crazy enough to offer him that much even if its almost entirely incentive based?

By Ray Flowers

Halladay, Lackey, Lee on Move

Huge news today all over the ball field highlighted by three of the top-15 arms in the AL switching rosters while a national icon nicknamed Godzilla also switched his address.

Lackey Joins Red Sox

My thoughts on the John Lackey to Red Sox deal? A great move that gives the club the best top of the rotation in the AL as Lackey will team with Josh Beckett and Jon Lester. To read more about the move (a reported 5-year, $85 million deal) and what can be expected from Lackey in 2010 click on the link to Breaking Down: John Lackey.

My Twitter account was blowing up all day with updates on the above deal, as well as those that I’m about to discuss. You can sign up to follow me at the BaseballGuys’ Twitter Page. Come say hi, it’s really a great source to check in with all day for updated info while I’m busy plowing through feature length articles.

Did you catch the Fantasy Buffet Podcast this morning by the way? I think I’m pretty darn good answering the questions, at least better than running the show and asking them. Ted Carlson joined me on Monday, Kyle Elfrink was unavailable, and the show went well, but I’m clearly more effective at blabbing answers than pushing buttons. Luckily I’ll be returning to my more familiar an effective role on Tuesday. The show is Monday through Friday, 8-9 AM PST, for those of you that want to give it a listen.

Matsui to Angels

I wrote a breakdown of the Hideki Matsui to Angels’ deal that is being widely reported, and it should be posted sometime on Tuesday at Fanball. A quick synopsis follows:

1- Matsui is still a nice bat, though expecting anything more than last year’s .274-28-90 effort will likely lead to disappointment.

2- The move out of Yankee Stadium to Anaheim might not be as negative as you think.

3- The Angels might use the fact that they lost Lackey and only spent $6.5 million on a 1-year deal for Matsui to sign Jason Bay. After all, they have millions left to throw at a player and Bay would look great in the middle of that lineup.

And last but not least, the biggest deal of the day.

Halladay to Jays, Lee to Mariners

This deal has been reported by everyone, but all the details are still a bit foggy and could take another day or two to be ironed out. Here is what we think we know about the 3-way deal.

Phillies receive: Roy Halladay
Mariners receive: Cliff Lee
Blue Jays receive: C Travis D’Arnaud, OF Michael Turner, RHP Phillippe Aumont
(a late report said that Aumont was not in the deal but Kyle Drabek was).

There could be more names added to the deal, we are still trying to lock it down, but it’s a huge deal for the Phillies and Mariners.

So why did the Phillies do this, basically shipping out one top of the rotation ace for another? Here is what we think is the reason: money. Apparently Lee wanted a CC Sabathia-like deal to remain with the Phils, something like 7-years and $160 million. The Phils decided there was no way they would do that. Therefore, they parlayed Lee in the deal to bring in Halladay, who not only is a better pitcher, but one who was willing to sign a more reasonable deal with early reports being that Halladay will sign a 3-year, $60+ million deal with at least one, and possibly two, option years tacked on.

In total, the Phillies upgraded slightly on the hill, kept their payroll at an acceptable level by not giving a massive extension to Lee, and also seemingly held on to their top minor league talent that they were unwilling to move at the trade deadline when they tried unsuccessfully to add Halladay.

As for Lee, he gets to pitch in a nice pitcher’s park in the Northwest, though we’ll have to see if the club is willing to give the soon to be free agent (2010 is his last year under contract) the massive dollar figures he wants to serve as the #2 arm in their rotation behind Felix Hernandez.

All in all this was one hell of a day for the middle of December. I need to take a break now, pull back on some spiked eggnog, and truly reflect on yet another wonderful day at my job.

Cheers.

By Ray Flowers

Oddity Reigns

I wanted to focus on a few or the oddest news stories of Tuesday so I picked out four of those, while adding a bit of true baseball insight as I discuss the outlook of the next great one behind the dish.

Jason Marquis is 15-12 with a 3.98 ERA and 1.35 WHIP for the Rockies in what has arguably been the best season of his career. Marquis made the All-Star game as he entered the break with 11 victories and a 3.65 ERA, but his numbers have dropped since including a 4-6 record with a 4.46 ERA over his last 13 starts. Even worse, his September work has been downright scary with a 6.28 ERA and a 1.78 WHIP over five starts (he is 1-3). Now comes word that he may not even be on the Rockies playoff roster because of his struggles and the return to health of Aaron Cook. Pretty tough when you win 15 games and don’t get to start a playoff game, let alone suffer the potential indignity of not even being on the active roster. Marquis, by the way, bas won at least 11 games in each of the last six seasons. You know how many hurlers have done that? It’s a pretty small list: Johan Santana, John Lackey, Javier Vazquez, CC Sabathia, Derek Lowe and Marquis. He may be the worst pitcher on the list, but he is the quintessential innings eater who more often than not gives his team a chance to win.

Pedro Martinez hopes to return from his injured neck on Wednesday. I wonder if manager Charlie Manuel will again let Pedro throw 130 pitches, as he did in the start that really precipitated the injury, or if he will prepare Martinez for the possibility of starting a playoff game that lasts 12 innings by letting him throw 150 pitches.

The Tigers now say that they probably won’t start Rick Porcello again this week in order to save the youngsters arm. After all, he has thrown all of 165 innigns this season, the most in the history of the universe for a young pitcher. The Tigers have a one game lead over the Twins as I write this. You think any Tigers’ fans will care about how old Porcello is, or how many pitches he has thrown this season if they miss out on the playoffs because they decided to rest Porcello, specially since Porcello has a 5-2 record with a 3.19 ERA since the start of August? Seriously, hasn’t this babying of pitchers gone far enough? If a guy can’t go out there an pitch every fifth day, then why bother having him on your roster? It’s obviously completely unfair to compare any modern hurler to Cy Young, but take a gander at his record – he was held to only 147.2 innings as a rookie before the Spiders let him go for 423.2 innings in his second season. In fact, that began a stretch of 4-straight 400-innings seasons and 15-straight years of at least 300-innings. When men were men I guess…

Matt Wieters has all of a sudden gotten good. Not really of course, he has always been good, but his performance has finally started to come around, and in fact he has been tearing it up in September hitting .360 with a .952 OPS in 23 games in the final month of the year. Going back a bit further, Wieters is hitting .308 over his last 59 games to raise his overall mark to .292 in 90 games. That breakout that was predicted, it’s already started. Beware the hype machine heading into 2010, but Wieters clearly looks like a potential top-10 option behind the dish next season.

And lastly —-

Did you see this news report? Junior Seau, you know, the potential HOF linebacker, was at a rodeo this weekend. He entered the ring and was then run over by the bull. He apparently escaped unharmed, but if he can take on a bull why couldn’t he still have enough left to stop a 235 lbs running back?

By Ray Flowers

The Resurgence of Zito

Castigated the world over as the worst free agent signing since Kevin Brown or Mike Hampton, the Giants’ Barry Zito will never be able to live up to his $126 million deal. However, that doesn’t mean you should throw Zito into the garbage bin like some mere bit of refuse. OK, I’m a Giants fan so I’m a bit biased, but in this case there clearly is support for the contention that Zito really hasn’t been as bad as you think he has been this season. In fact, since the All-Star break, is it possible that Zito has been the best Giants starter, better than Tim Lincecum or Matt Cain? Let’s take a look at the three hurlers performances since the break.

Lincecum: 2-2, 2.87 ERA, 1.02 WHIP in 57.2 IP
Cain: 2-2. 2.53 ERA, 0.96 WHIP in 53.1 IP
Zito: 3-2, 2.36 ERA, 1.10 WHIP in 42 IP

Granted there is a lot more to look at with a pitcher than the few numbers I tossed out there, but the point is clearly made; Zito has pitched as well as the Giants “aces” since the All-Star break, a fact that appears to have been lost on almost everyone in the game. I mean a 2.36 ERA and a 1.10 WHIP is some serious pitching folks, and though we are only talking about seven starts, Zito has been better in those seven appearances than Cain has been this season (2.43 ERA, 1.15 WHIP). Looking for some more data? How about this.

Over the past 30 days —

Zito has a 2.51 ERA, the 10th best mark in baseball and better than guys like Jon Lester (2.70), Johan Santana (3.19) and CC Sabathia (3.35).

Zito has a 3.43 K/BB ratio better than guys like Lincecum (3.29) and Zack Greinke (3.27).

Zito has a 1.12 WHIP better than Gavin Floyd (1.18), John Lackey (1.24) and Tommy Hanson (1.24) to name a few.

Obviously, Zito is trending in the right direction and doing so with resounding vigor.

Should you be surprised by this? Well yes, if you are one of the thousands who castigate the Giants and Zito on a daily basis because of the fact that he can burn dollar bills in the fireplace for the rest of his life and never run out of money. Still, history shows us that Mr. Zito is usually a much better pitcher in the second half after the All-Star break. Here are the career numbers.

Pre Break: 58-66, 4.23 ERA, 1.37 WHIP, 1.65 K/BB
Post Break: 73-38, 3.42 ERA, 1.22 WHIP, 1.91 K/BB

Moreover, Zito has posted the best number of his career in August with a 2.96 ERA and 1.12 WHIP over 58 games and his career record in September is 24-12.

Does all of this mean that Zito is better than Cain or Lincecum? What you think, I dropped some acid this morning before writing this piece? The point is that Zito has been really, really good of late and that his career record supports the position that he may indeed be a valuable fantasy part the rest of the way. Give the guy a break, it’s not like you would turn down $126 million if someone offered it to you, so don’t wish the guy ill simply because he was smart enough to sign the outrageous deal. Look at the numbers – they say that Zito should be rostered in mixed leagues and counted on for the rest of 2009.

By Ray Flowers

Injuries and Diagnosis

Tuesday has been yet another day of injury reports, sprinkled with a bit of info about player performance. In what follows, my analysis will fall along those lines as well.

Jose Contreras has hurled 15 scoreless innings at Triple-A since he was sent down to work on things. Just goes to show you how large the gap is between the majors and the minors cause I really don’t think he has turned back the clock 10 years in a mere two weeks.

Mike Fontenot is 1-for-29 of late to drop his average down to .204. So much for him building on a 2008 that included a .304 average, nine home runs and 40 RBI in just 243 ABs. In fact, Fontenot has been out-produced by lightweight Ryan Theriot who has gone deep as many times as Fontenot, five, while producing one more RBI (18) while hitting .294. That’s why they play the game folks, and the bottom line is that even when you have all your ducks in a row, it doesn’t always work out like you would expect it to (Theriot entered the year with seven home runs in 1,264 at-bats).

Vladimir Guerrero is hopeful of returning from his injured pectoral muscle soon, perhaps as early as next Monday. When he returns he will likely be limited to the DH spot, that is if his rehab work goes well this weekend. As for the team’s pitching staff who recently got back John Lackey and Ervin Santana, there is potentially more good news on the way as Kelvim Escobar(shoulder) is nearing his first rehab appearance of the year next week. He hopes to be able to throw upwards of 60 pitches in the outing. He is hoping to return as a starter, but even if the club eventually decides to slot him as a reliever, his return would not only provide an emotional lift to the club, his right arm could also present favorable returns if he can return to unleashing the filthy stuff that has been his calling card.

Noah Lowry will have another surgery, this one ending his 2009 season. Apparently he will have a rib removed in the same type of procedure that Jeremy Bonderman underwent last season (thoracic outlet syndrome). According to Lowry’s agent this condition has essentially gone undiagnosed for about two years, and this procedure should finally fix what ails the lefty hurler after years of failed attempts including other medical procedures. I wish him all the luck in the world, but it remains to be seen if we will ever see him on the field in the majors ever again, the same situation that may have befallen A’s third baseman Eric Chavez who might have to end his career because of a herniated disc in his back as there is concern that any further baseball related damage could hinder his quality off life moving forward.

Carlos Quentin missed a third straight game because of his heel injury on Tuesday. With Brian Anderson back off the DL, could Quentin be headed to it soon?

Joakim Soria threw on Tuesday for the first time since hitting the DL on May 7th. Obviously that means he will not be ready to go when eligible on Saturday as he only threw off of flat ground. Reports are positive and this news still means that he will likely be back by next week, but continue to look for Juan Cruz to be the man they turn to in the ninth inning for the rest of the week. Speaking of Cruz, his 13 to 10 K/BB ratio is awful and well below his normal 1.99 K/BB rate. Why? The main reason is that his K-rate has plummeted from over 12 per nine the past two years to 6.27 this season. He is still throwing as hard as ever (94.1 mph is his average fastball speed), so expect his K-rate to rise no matter what role he fills moving forward.

I said it on the podcast his morning, and I’m feeling even more secure in the statement I made. Joey Votto’s dizziness continues on without an explanation, and it’s looking more and more like a DL stint is coming. He might avoid it, he last played on May 16th, but even if he doesn’t end up on the DL it looks like this week is pretty much shot, not to mention it remains to be seen how he will fair once he returns because it’s not like you can hit a baseball when you are even slightly dizzy.

Windy City Baseball

I ended up discussing a bunch of White Sox player’s in today’s piece (and even a Cubs’ one). Don’t worry if you aren’t a fan of Chicago baseball though as I also made sure to touch on some non-Windy City events as well.

Jose Contreras was sent to the minors after looking pitiful in six starts this season during which time he went 0-5 with a 8.19 ERA and a 1.89 WHIP. He also struck out no one (5.16 K/9) while walking everyone (4.85 BB/9). The only shock here is that he wasn’t removed from the rotation sooner. If you bought in to his hot spring, well, you should have listened to your truly who told you this would happen. By the way, the other washed up returning starting pitcher for club, Bartolo Colon, has been serviceable for those of you in AL-only leagues going 2-3 with a 4.88 ERA and a 1.44 WHIP. Of course, his K/BB is awful 1.92, and his average fastball is just 89 mph (92.5 for his career). I would be worried about the bottom falling out there as well.

Bobby Jenks sent a message to the Rangers’ Ian Kinsler on Sunday when he fired a fastball behind Kinsler. “You don’t want to see anyone getting hurt. My intentions were not to hurt the guy, like I said before, but I was protecting my guys as well.” The White Sox apparently are tired of their hitters being hit as they have been plunked 16 times this season, the fifth highest total in the majors (they have been hit by a pitch 331 times since the start of 2004 while their pitchers have only hit 270 batters). I love Jenks for standing up for his guys, but really, what does it serve to say what he did to the press? The only thing he will likely be serving is a suspension being that he admitted to throwing at Kinsler. That brings up another point – since when did throwing at a guy deserve a suspension? If that was the case back when the game was played by men, how many times would Bob Gibson have been suspended? He may never have pitched a single complete game (he amazingly threw 255 in 528 starts) if today’s rules were in effect when his menacing presence was terrorizing hitters in the 1960′s and 70′s.

Watch out for the Angels who are just half a game behind the Rangers in the AL West. The club sits about in the middle of the back in the pitching categories, but they are about to get all kinds of healthy with John Lackey and Ervin Santana likely to join the club by the end of the week. Playing .533 ball without your two best starters is certainly something. If you add into that mix two of the top-20 starting pitchers in the American League, well, you’ll have to feel pretty good about things if you cheer along with the Rally Monkey and the Angels.

Derrek Lee’s neck injury isn’t career threatening. That was the report out of the Chicago Tribune. Look, any injury to someone’s neck is extremely serious, but was the club really so concerned about Lee and his bulging disc that they thought he might have to hang up his spikes? If so, they sure did a good job of making it sound like he was merely missing a few days to rest things. He should avoid the DL and be back by mid-week according to the latest reports.

Lastings Milledge suffered a broken finger at Triple-A, an injury that will obviously remove the possibility of returning to the bigs in May, not that he deserved to be considered for a promotion anyway. Milledge is hitting only .253 in 79 at-bats as he had failed to go deep once while knocking in only four runners. Lastings did steal six bags but with an OPS of .594 it was clear that he clearly hadn’t taken the demotion as a chance to prove everyone in Washington wrong. Now it looks like a return before the end of June seems unlikely.

J.R. Towles has been sent back to the minors as the Astros are ready to activate Humberto Quintero. Towles hit only .182 with the club this year, but he was only given 11 at-bats behind Ivan Rodriguez. At some point, don’t the ‘Stros need to move this guy? Towles was hitting .344 in Triple-A this year, is just 25 years old, and owns a .302 average and .866 OPS in more than 1,100 minor-league ABs. Certainly someone can find a backup job for a bat like that behind the dish can’t they?

By Ray Flowers