Can You Name This Pitcher?
I don’t think this is exactly going to work, but I love those articles (Joe Posnanski does them relatively frequently) where you’re given two different players’ stats. After you’ve made some non-name based decision about the stats, it’s revealed who is player X and who is player Y (or sometimes just player X) and you go through some Greek Tragedy level catharsis when you realize that Curt Schilling wasn’t that great outside of one bloody sock game. So I can try that here, briefly, and you all can pardon my inexperience and ambition.
Pitcher A, in his last full minor league season, featured an impressive fastball to go along with his high strikeout numbers (8.64 per 9 innings pitched, in fact). But his everything else – and especially control – kind of flew up red flags. You could tell because he walked 5.46 batters per nine.
Pitcher B, in his last full minor league season, featured an impressive fastball to go along with his high strikeout numbers (10.6/9). But his everything else – and especially control – kind of flew up red flags. You could tell because he walked 4.53/9.
B is somewhat better looking in the numbers department than A, but with a caveat that pitcher A rarely if ever gave up home runs but pitcher B has a problem with the long ball. Also, pitcher A turned out to be a dud, mostly because he was rushed, and his last full minor league season was in Delmarva (low A). B’s season in question was in Bowie, last year, and he is David Hernandez. Pitcher A is the Taxi to Nowhere, the DC Cab, Daniel Cabrera.
I kind of despise major league comparisons to minor league players, but the basic similarities here bother me a lot. Hernandez has the power pitcher frame, tall and strong. And he’s got a good fastball in the low 90s and some secondary stuff (slider, change) that needs a lot of work. His control is his big problem. He got really lucky last year with a .217 batting average against (I can’t find his BABIP – that is, batting average on balls in play (non walks, non sacrifices, non strikeouts, non home runs, and generally totally independent of the pitcher’s talents) but I imagine it’s way lower than the norm.
In summary, I’m just not impressed at all with David Hernandez. I saw him in person, he seemed to have more heat than AAers could handle and little else. He also tipped his pitches. Can anyone give me a reason to like this guy?
Also: apologies to Neal, since I totally ran rampant over his weekend thread (but com’on…there wasn’t going to be any news this weekend). And for my final week of previews, I’m going to do two catch all threads, one for hitters, one for pitchers. Very brief looks at as many guys as possible. If there’s anyone special you want to talk about, let me know. They’ll get at least two words.
For everyone in the TLC Fantasy Baseball league, sorry for the stop/start in the draft the other day. We apparently can’t continue on unless we get another team because Yahoo! won’t let us draft with an odd number.
The good news though, is this doesn’t effect the drafting process overall once we get that new member (i.e. Yahoo! doesn’t auto-pick for us since we slipped by our date).
So for anyone still interested in Fantasy Baseball, especially the newcomers I’ve seen here a lot, you’re more than welcome to join! Just shoot me an email at tengle at mix dot wvu dot edu, and I’ll email you the name and password for the league.
Here’s a good one Andrew:
Three pitchers in the Orioles minor leagues:
K/9—-BB/9-K/BB-HR/9-AVG-WHIP-BABIP-LOB—–ERA—FIP
10.60 4.53 2.34 0.64- .220- 1.30- .306- 77.8%- 2.68 3.43
10.22 4.31 2.37 0.66- .231- 1.33- .315- 77.1%- 3.18 3.41
9.56– 4.06 2.35 0.56- .201- 1.16- .269- 73.1%- 2.87 3.39
(i tried to space out the stats using the preview mode down here, so we’ll see if it works)
All of these pitchers are very similar. One is David Hernandez.
If you haven’t guessed who they are, the second one is Tillman, the third is Arrieta. Out of the four, Cabrera’s K/BB rate was one full strikeout lower than everyone. I don’t see how Hernandez is comparable to Cabrera, when he is almost the mirror image of Tillman (actually with slightly better numbers than Tillman across the board).
I think that if you want to pull Hernandez into the “he’s a future Daniel Cabrera”, then you need to pull Arrieta and Tillman into that too.
@Greg – Maybe in terms of numbers (although it’s certainly telling that Hernandez’s FIP and BB/9 are higher than both of the other dudes). I was referring to a comparison more in terms of stuff. Good fastball, bad command.
While it’s definitely the God’s truth that Tillman and Arrieta need to improve on their command (something Matusz shouldn’t have a problem with, luckily) they at least have a strong complement of secondary pitches (Tillman’s are the best, Arrieta’s are average, but Hernandez’s are below average). But it’s interesting.
None of those BABIPs are sustainable, especially Arreita. You know, the more I learn, the less curious it is that he is ranked noticeably below Matusz and Tillman.
Still not sold on Hernandez…although he could make a good closer option (I’m not a believer in having your best reliever your closer, so it’s kind of like damning with faint praise, but he could be good). However, I do believe that he is aware of his own shortcomings. If he can do anything about them, that’d be huge.
If Hernandez was 2 years younger, he’d be a top 50 prospect in the minors.
@Greg – I’m guessing you are saying that because Jake Arrieta is two years younger than David Hernandez and is comparable stat-wise. Except Arrieta’s fastball is better than Hernandez’s has ever been, and he has more secondary pitches – and those are better than Hernandez’s secondary stuff anyway.
And Arrieta isn’t a top 50 prospect anyway. I don’t think it’s fair to Hernandez to compare him with the even younger and better Chris Tillman, so I won’t go there.
But I think you are very wrong. Hernandez doesn’t have the stuff, and if he ends up in Baltimore, it’ll be as a reliever – there’re too many better options than him coming into the rotation.
At his age in AA you can’t be considered a prospect any more. This has nothing to do with the ages of Tillman and Arrieta. Hernandez, like Bergesen, is behind where he should be, and should have already had his rookie year under his belt by now with his numbers. Unfortunately he just “turned it on” very recently and he’s following the Nolan Reimold path to the MLB. This is treacherous for both David and Nolan in terms of their future careers, as we have seen in Montanez, Salazar, and Reimold. There comes a point when age is a bigger factor than your production.
True, but I don’t think his age is what’s holding him down from the top prospect list. Well, his age is certainly a concern, but his stuff is the bigger concern. The lack of control coupled with a lack of anything except a fastball, combined by strong flyball tendencies and a single great year marred by low BABIP and age are troubling.
“I kind of despise” is an awesome phrase. I mean that in all seriousness. The implication is great. Can I steal it?
Too early to disregard David Hernandez, I think. There are plenty of reasons to like him, like those strikeout rates and the fact that he’s a good power arm in the system, regardless of whether he projects as a starter or a reliever in the bigs. Sure the walks are bad but he clearly has some talent or he wouldn’t be blowing guys away. That said, let’s see how he fares in AAA. If he had been in AAA last year putting up identical numbers, he’d be a virtual lock for the major league rotation this year, walks be damned. If he becomes another Radhames Liz and moves to the bullpen, it’s hard to complain about that, really, because the guy was never as highly touted as even Liz.
I was wondering when you’d chime in with the sunshine, Dan (no offense intended, just I’ve never heard you badmouth an Oriole). And, just so we’re clear, I’m open to any of these guys going out and blowing me away. I just don’t see that much value in David Hernandez except out of the bullpen (Liz is a good comp).
I was pondering just now some projected picks for the season, since it is the week to do it. I need to think about division winners and what not, but I’m ready to say the Orioles will get 79 wins this summer and finish in 4th place.
Here’s the thing. Last year they should have gotten 73 wins, that was their pythag record, but they got unlucky and only ended up with 68. Also important to note was their record against the AL East: 22-50. Ouch. But, I can’t picture it getting any worst, despite New York, Boston, and Tampa Bay all making various improvements of differing degrees.
So, if they did nothing this past winter but resigned all their guys, we’d probably be looking at about 71 wins or so, factoring in return to median year from Huff, improvement from Markakis and Jones, and decline from Millar, Payton, Mora, and Hernandez. But they made some moves that distinctly improved them.
For one, we’ll all behold Matt Wieters replacing Ramon Hernandez, and Cesar Izturis replacing those clowns at short. Freel replaces Payton nicely, and Wigginton replaces Millar nicely. The pitching should remain roughly the same level of dreck, although it is possible to get good years from Uehara, Bergesen, and perhaps Troy Patton.
So I’m betting the pitching improves (mostly due to the improved defense, but also the staff is a slight upgrade, however hard that is to believe) and the hitting improves a lot. 79 wins. It’s almost mediocre enough to be respectable.
I’m not really going overboard with the sunshine, I don’t think. I’m just saying if you expect Hernandez to be a #2 starter, you’re going to be disappointed, probably. But I don’t think he was ever that highly touted, so if he ends up being a decent bullpen guy, then I’ll take it.
And if you’ve never heard me “badmouth” an Oriole, you clearly haven’t been listening. Off the top of my head in recent years..
-Ramon Hernandez
-Jay Gibbons
-Erik Bedard
-D-Cab
-Hayden Penn
-Danys Baez
-Miguel Tejada
-Sam Perlozzo
All were at one point (or are still) deserving of some badmouthing. I find it hard to badmouth minor leaguers because they’re a work in progress. I’m rooting for any Oriole unless they dog it on the field or just flat out suck.
Regarding picks for this year, I think Toronto is going to claim last place. It seems to me (without doing a shred of research) that they had a chance at one point to really get good if they added or subtracted here or there. But when you think of Toronto, is there anybody that excites? I’ll give them Roy Halladay. He’s awesome. But Vernon Wells… meh. Alex Rios… meh. They didn’t do a damn thing this winter. They do have some good young prospects, but nothing like we do. I feel like they are the one team without a plan in the AL East, and that’s exactly what we were for the last 10 years.
I’m one of those guys who will swear up and down that there’s no chance in hell that the Blue Jays could outperform the Orioles, given their seemingly stagnant offense and rotation that just lost Burnett, Marcum and McGowan. I also bleed black and orange and drink the koolaid and I am a Baltimore homer of sorts. So there is a bias there.
The guys over at Drunk Jays Fans recently did an article claiming the opposite: with Eaton and Hendrickson rounding out the back of our rotation how could the Orioles possibly be better than the Jays?
http://www.drunkjaysfans.com/2009/03/friday-bullshit.html
Check it out. It’s sobering. I think both arguments are valid, and ultimately think I would be more surprised if the Orioles finished 4th than if they finished 5th. Pitching wins games, and their rotation, in spite of it’s losses… just completely spanks ours.
@dan the man – Well, the Jays have Halladay, Snider, Rios, who are good or great or fucking great players. Wells is wonderfully bad and overpaid. They have B.J. Ryan, who for a while was my favorite Oriole to watch (oh…2005…)
The counterarguement to the Drunk Jays Fans (which is the cream of the toronto sites, by the way) is that Hendrickson and Eaton both suck enough that they won’t be in the rotation very long. I think by mid-May, when Wieters is called up, we’re all very sick and tired of watching those bums and someone else is given an opportunity (I can see Bergesen getting called up with Wieters).
Oh, and Dan – I really didn’t mean any offense, you’re just very pro-Oriole. I don’t see anything wrong with it.
I know you didn’t man it’s all good. I love me some orange kool aid.
I dunno, yeah the Jays have some alright starting pitching, sort of. But we might, too. Hendrickson won’t be sticking around in the rotation for long. Plus our bullpen is better. BJ Ryan is hitting 85 MPH on his fastball right now with no sign of gaining any velocity. Good luck with that, BJ.
I just think when you look at the Jays vs. the O’s, the Jays have a flaccid offense and one (1) dominant pitcher. We have a great offense and a bunch of mediocre pitchers, but at least we have a good bullpen and young guys in the wings. And DT. And some soul. The Jays have no soul.
And speed and defense, I might add.