The Blue Jays Thread: 2008 Season

[Bobblehead]

Any idea where to find the Jay's record with VW in the lineup vs with him out?

It just seems to me that the Jays go on a tear every time Vernon is on the DL.

[JayP]

Originally Posted by Sylvanfan

Burnett has been pretty solid here lately as he turned in another good outing last night. Unfortunately after him and Halladay the rest of the rotation has pretty much fallen apart. Scott Downs is having an absolutely stellar year as well, he's been fantastic as a set up type guy all year. I guess Burnette isn't used to pitching in May and June as he's usually on the DL. It's not even August, he's not had a great year as his ERA is 4.50 and he's already tied his career high for wins.

Burnett has been sorely under-rated this year.

All his controllable pitching stats (K/9, BB/9, K/BB, HR/9) are all better than his career average.

His fielding independent pitching (FIP) ERA is 3.50 - a 1.1 drop from his current 4.50 ERA. That's good for 17th in the league among starters. For comparison's sake, Halladay's ERA is 2.87, but his FIP is 2.96.

Burnett's batting average of balls in play is the 8th highest in the league. That's a stat that will average itself out over the second half of the season.

Burnett has been a great pitcher this year. It's simply a matter of looking past useless stats like ERA.

The Jays are actually probably the best bet for a sleeper playoff team right now. They have a ridiculous amount of games against the teams ahead of them in the standings. The big thing is that if you look at any site that looks at important team statistics and predicts/equalizes the standings the Jays are always well below where they should be. ESPN has them with-in 1 game of the wild and Baseball Prospectus has them tied for the wild card. I guess we'll see if that actually amounts to anything in the coming weeks.

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by Bobblehead

Any idea where to find the Jay's record with VW in the lineup vs with him out?

It just seems to me that the Jays go on a tear every time Vernon is on the DL.

Something to the effect of 2 wins to every loss.

Don't understand that at all though, VW is a wonderful player.

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by JayP

Burnett has been a great pitcher this year.

Plus, he leads the league in strikeouts. Not the best indicator of being a dominant pitcher (Halladay used to never get Ks, just groundouts) but it makes it way more fun to watch a game.

Plus in a bases loaded, no outs jam after an ump badly misses a call - it's nice to have a pitcher ring a guy up.

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by Gozer

Something to the effect of 2 wins to every loss.

Don't understand that at all though, VW is a wonderful player.

I'm not a hater, either. I don't think he is living up to his contract, but he is still a very good player, much better than he is showing. But it isn't like his presence in the lineup should be a drag on the team. He may not be winning games for the Jays, but he can't be costing them that many.

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by Bobblehead

I'm not a hater, either. I don't think he is living up to his contract, but he is still a very good player, much better than he is showing. But it isn't like his presence in the lineup should be a drag on the team. He may not be winning games for the Jays, but he can't be costing them that many.

I thought he had an MVP calibre season when he got his contract extension. I didn't blink at the time. Hindsight says its a lot of money to have tied up in a not-quite-elite player.

[Sylvanfan]

Originally Posted by Gozer

Plus, he leads the league in strikeouts. Not the best indicator of being a dominant pitcher (Halladay used to never get Ks, just groundouts) but it makes it way more fun to watch a game.

Plus in a bases loaded, no outs jam after an ump badly misses a call - it's nice to have a pitcher ring a guy up.

Well a guy like Halladay has strikeout stuff, his MO is to throw stuff that hitters think they can hit, but really can't hit effectively to keep his pitch counts down so he can pitch late into the game every time out. Burnett still tends to end up having 110 pitches thrown in the 6th or 7th inning because of the number of strikeouts. The average strikeout is probably at least a 5 pitch at bat, and Halladay tends to be a guy who's thrown 100 pitches after facing 30 hitters.

I wonder with Burnett if he's more effective as the season wears on and it fatigues him a bit because he can get more break on his offspeed stuff and a bit more movement on the fastball. When he threw on 4 days rest against the Yankees he was great, and in his last two years has tended to be more effective in the second half after the innings started to get racked up. Most of the outings where he has problems tend to come early in the year it seems.

[Bobblehead]

I've often wondered if there aren't a group of pitchers out there who would be better in a 4 man rotation. I'd love to see a team try it.

[JayP]

Originally Posted by Sylvanfan

Well a guy like Halladay has strikeout stuff, his MO is to throw stuff that hitters think they can hit, but really can't hit effectively to keep his pitch counts down so he can pitch late into the game every time out. Burnett still tends to end up having 110 pitches thrown in the 6th or 7th inning because of the number of strikeouts. The average strikeout is probably at least a 5 pitch at bat, and Halladay tends to be a guy who's thrown 100 pitches after facing 30 hitters.

I wonder with Burnett if he's more effective as the season wears on and it fatigues him a bit because he can get more break on his offspeed stuff and a bit more movement on the fastball. When he threw on 4 days rest against the Yankees he was great, and in his last two years has tended to be more effective in the second half after the innings started to get racked up. Most of the outings where he has problems tend to come early in the year it seems.

That's always been Burnett's biggest problem - he's not an inning eater. But that's why he's AJ Burnett and not Roy Halladay. And there's nothing wrong with that.

[JayP]

Originally Posted by Bobblehead

I've often wondered if there aren't a group of pitchers out there who would be better in a 4 man rotation. I'd love to see a team try it.

I was just going to suggest it. I read an article by Baseball Prospectus a year or two ago that analyzed the 4-man rotation vs. the 5-man rotation and they couldn't come up with a single reason not to go with the 4-man. It doesn't seem to have any effect on fatigue late in the season or injury troubles. Injury troubles tend to occur from running a guy out there for 120+ pitches consistently and not pitching 100 pitch games every 4 days.

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by Sylvanfan

Well a guy like Halladay has strikeout stuff, his MO is to throw stuff that hitters think they can hit, but really can't hit effectively to keep his pitch counts down so he can pitch late into the game every time out. Burnett still tends to end up having 110 pitches thrown in the 6th or 7th inning because of the number of strikeouts. The average strikeout is probably at least a 5 pitch at bat, and Halladay tends to be a guy who's thrown 100 pitches after facing 30 hitters.

Agreed. Halladay is so freaking good its silly. He's gonna throw three strikes in the first four pitches of every at-bat - the batters know strikes are coming, they just can't do anything with them.
Used to be he'd pitch to weak-contact, but this year he's getting a combo of weak-contact and strikeouts while keeping his pitch count very low.

Silly-good.

DJF* often says the problem with AJ is that he's not Doc. Too true.

http://drunkjaysfans.blogspot.com/
If you're a Jays fan you have to read this blog.

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by JayP

That's always been Burnett's biggest problem - he's not an inning eater. But that's why he's AJ Burnett and not Roy Halladay. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Not an inning eater? He's averaging 6 1/3 IP/start this year.
(free inning in there from relief).
Last year was even better.

Nothing wrong with that.

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by Bobblehead

I've often wondered if there aren't a group of pitchers out there who would be better in a 4 man rotation. I'd love to see a team try it.

An injury would lead to the manager getting skewered though. No one will try it.

[Sylvanfan]

Originally Posted by Gozer

Not an inning eater? He's averaging 6 1/3 IP/start this year.
(free inning in there from relief).
Last year was even better.

Nothing wrong with that.

No, there isn't. But he has Ace pitcher quality stuff. In fact, on any given start he can go out there and out pitch anyone else in Baseball. Still your typical ace type pitcher does give you that extra inning on average and a chance to win nearly every one of his starts.

Burnett's "problem" is that he has that Ace quality stuff, but it doesn't seem to be honed to the level that a true ace pitcher typically has. Plus the injury issues in previous seasons. As a result he can be pretty frustrating. But the 12 wins this year so far is pretty solid. Really when the Jays signed him they were probably hoping for a 15 win guy who could throw 200 innings a year and they'll get that out of him this year, and the last two years they might have if not for injury. I think last year Marcum was second on the staff with 12 wins and IIRC the Jays haven't really had a second pitcher on their staff win more than 12 games in the past few years. The issue this year is likely going to be that they might not have a third pitcher win 10 games due to injury or inconsistancy.

[flamesaresmokin]

Originally Posted by JayP

I was just going to suggest it. I read an article by Baseball Prospectus a year or two ago that analyzed the 4-man rotation vs. the 5-man rotation and they couldn't come up with a single reason not to go with the 4-man. It doesn't seem to have any effect on fatigue late in the season or injury troubles. Injury troubles tend to occur from running a guy out there for 120+ pitches consistently and not pitching 100 pitch games every 4 days.

Teams do this in the playoffs all the time, i'd love to see the jays try it out. As long as you have someone like litch or whoever who can give you the odd maintenance start once or twice a month there really shouldn't be a huge issue.

Plus you get to pitch your best pitchers way more often and in the jays case this could be huge.

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by Gozer

An injury would lead to the manager getting skewered though. No one will try it.

See, I just don't think there would be more injuries.

Look at the great pitchers from the past, it doesn't look like their careers were shortened by 4 man rotations.

Here is the Baseball Prospectus article:
http://www.baseballprospectus.com/ne...octoring.shtml

Bottom line: if these numbers suggest anything, it's that pitching in a four-man rotation is less damaging than pitching in a five-man rotation. Now, the difference between the two groups isn't enormous, and neither is the sample size, so I'll concede the point that these differences are not statistically significant. I'm not trying to argue that working on three days' rest is more healthy than working on four days' rest, only that it isn't less healthy.

Here is another analysis:

If starting pitchers are better than non-starters and the decline in starter innings is due to the five-man rotation (I acknowledge these are two big “ifs”), then the four-man rotation may be a better way to configure your pitching staff in a season. On the other hand, fewer innings per season may prolong the entire career of a pitcher, which might offset the loss in one particular season. But really, what incentives do managers have to increase the career length of his starting pitchers by a few years?

http://www.sabernomics.com/sabernomi...-man-rotation/

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by Bobblehead

See, I just don't think there would be more injuries.

I'm not suggesting reality, I'm referring to perception.

Example: Gibbons declares at the start of the '08 season we'd have a four man rotation. On Halladay's second start he tears his *arm-jargon* and is finished for the year / career?.
Fans would be calling for him to be fired on the spot, and I'd be one of them.
Fans would drive from Saskatchwan to drop feces on his lawn.

The shortened rotation may have nothing to do with it, but the organization would be skewered. No one will put their arse on the line like that.

[Sylvanfan]

It seems that teams these days are lucky to have 3 pitchers stay healthy enough to throw 160 innings a year. So really...in terms of extending careers....it's probably only increasing the amount of time owners are paying pitchers to recover from their various injuries. Pick your 4 best guys and go with the 4 man rotation. You'll be able to carry an extra guy in the bullpen for spot starts, rainout double headers anyways. Plus a team like the Jays can still use the likes of Carlson or Downs to get right handed hitters out so it's not like they have a spot for a specialist who can only throw to one hitter a game type of thing.

[JayP]

Originally Posted by Gozer

I'm not suggesting reality, I'm referring to perception.

Example: Gibbons declares at the start of the '08 season we'd have a four man rotation. On Halladay's second start he tears his *arm-jargon* and is finished for the year / career?.
Fans would be calling for him to be fired on the spot, and I'd be one of them.
Fans would drive from Saskatchwan to drop feces on his lawn.

The shortened rotation may have nothing to do with it, but the organization would be skewered. No one will put their arse on the line like that.

Exactly. With so many avenues for people to second guess decisions it will be truly ground-breaking to see someone put their ass on the line like that. Baseball is far too set it's ways (most of which have been proven wrong) for there to be much change. I mean, stats like OBP, SLG, and OPS have without a shadow of a doubt been proven to be better predictors of success than batting average and RBI (for 20+ years too) and we still see the same AVG HR RBI statline when the batter comes to the plate. There might be no legitimate reason for a 5 man rotation, but that doesn't really matter in baseball.

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by Gozer

I'm not suggesting reality, I'm referring to perception.

Example: Gibbons declares at the start of the '08 season we'd have a four man rotation. On Halladay's second start he tears his *arm-jargon* and is finished for the year / career?.
Fans would be calling for him to be fired on the spot, and I'd be one of them.
Fans would drive from Saskatchwan to drop feces on his lawn.

The shortened rotation may have nothing to do with it, but the organization would be skewered. No one will put their arse on the line like that.

I see what you are saying, but what if, on the other hand, a team goes with 4 starters and wins the division by a game or 2? Then the GM would be visionary.

I agree with you that managers don't do it for fear of injury, but I think that fear is misplaced. I think that large pitch counts (110+) with fatigue leading to poor mechanics is a bigger cause.

The second part of that Baseball Prospectus article (I found on a different site - http://www.baseball-analysis.com/art...articleid=1605) mentions:

With less rest, the starters let their defense work for them, with fewer walks and fewer strikeouts.

(emphasis mine)
The extended pitch count estimator says that the average number of pitches for each ball in play is 3.3, while strikeouts average 4.8 pitches and walks require an average of 5.5 pitches. So by putting a pitcher on a pitch count and sending him to the mound on 3 days rest, he should be able to pitch deeper in to the game than a pitcher on the same pitch count but on 4 days rest.

I just think that letting your top pitchers start more games is a good thing, especially when you are a team like the Jays with (currently) 2 upper tier starters.


Interesting topic.