From Razzball:
Mike Pelfrey
2008 Curve/Slider % - 14%
2008 Total Pitches: 3,323
Difference From 2007: +2,038 (est. +758 if minor league pitches included)
2008 First Year With 2,700+ Pitches - YES
Pelfrey rebounded from an awful 2007 to regain some of the luster he had prior to that season (although his minor league stats don’t look that great, I suppose it isn’t the first time the Mets oversold a prospect). From a fantasy perspective, his 110 Ks in 200 IP look awful but he does throw a high number of ground balls (~50%) which limits extra-base hits. He made this list because of his pitch count spike from 2007 to 2008. It is the type of thing that makes a borderline draftable pitcher a non-draftable pitcher.
Hey Mack...All offseason long, anytime someone has blogged about the Verducci effect and Pelfrey, I've said that the innings spike is irrelevant, because Mike was becoming more efficient with his pitches.
ReplyDeleteI was hoping somebody would do a post like yours, looking at 2007 vs 2008 pitch counts for the Big Pelf, as I am not sure where to get that data from.
Either way, it seemed pretty obvious that Pelf's pitch count increased, as he certainly had a heavier workload than in years past. The problem is, this type of analysis has not been done before, so we don't really know what the average threshold is for the increase in pitches thrown. I would go back in and translate those pitches into innings. How? Lets go with the assumption that 20 pitches/inning is average (with 15/inning being enough to qualify for a quality start) That means that Mike pitched about 38 more "average innings" than in 2007, including the minor leagues. That still puts him over the Verducci threshold, but only by 9 innings, as opposed to 20.
Ravi:
ReplyDeleteI'm with you on many of these new stats. There simply is no history with them.
What I can tell you is I've followed Pelfrey in person every spring training, and, as I said on FU, every year I would watch this kid working out at Traditions on field 3 or 4 and you just knew he was someday going to be a big time SP.
MLB SPs take time... period... there are only just so many that have the height, body frame, control, amount of pitchers, etc. that tell you early that... IF HANDLED CORRECTLY... they will make it.
One of the unwritten problems is these kids go through 4 0r 5 pitching coaches in the minors, plus 8-9 roving coaches, all who tell them to pitch differently than the last guy...
Plefrey is for real, and finally proved it last year, because it simply took that long for him mature and have the confidence to throw the friggen ball with the ability God gave him, not someone named Peterson.
BTW- same with Jon Niese... he will be big time, but probably won't show it until 2010.