Zaaaaaaaach !!!

[Moose Milligan]

This is the part where JTrea re-enters the thread, totally ignoring several posts that have proved his theories wrong and acts like nothing ever happened.

I know I haven't posted much in awhile but I'm glad to see some things haven't changed...

[Stotle]

I'm torn. What makes less sense:

1. The idea that 2 games in April from a rookie in the #5 slot means more than a full year of control in that player's prime;

or

2.

[OFFNY]

I'm torn. What makes less sense:

1. The idea that 2 games in April from a rookie in the #5 slot means more than a full year of control in that player's prime;

Stotle, I really thought that Notre Dame would make the Final Two this season, and lose to San Diego State in the National Title Game. Oh well.

[RandyM]

Isn't this a perfect example of what Keith Law was talking about about possible over exuberance causing potential harm long term? Would this even be a debate if the team didn't have an overly optimistic view of competing this year?

My worry all along -- and I know I’m going on a tangent here -- is that if they get to the middle of June and the team isn’t performing and Chris Tillman has a 4.80 ERA, are they going to stick with Tillman and let him get another 100 innings the rest of the season to try to continue to develop him as a big-league starter? Or will that emphasis on short-term performance cause them to treat their young players differently?

[JTrea81]

Of all the irrational thoughts Jtrea has had, this has to be the most irrational.

To actually believe that a few starts is worth more than an extra year of service time is mind boggling.

That extra year means a lot in terms of money, service time and potential trade value.

These things can't be ignored. The fact is that this is a business and since we are talking a few starts, yes the business aspect of this is clearly more important.

And besides, if Trea wants to argue that he could get hurt, then why was he advocating trading Tillman and not Britton? In fact, why keep any pitching? Just trade every pitcher for bats and just sign Millwood and Guthrie type guys to short FA contracts?

We should actually be cycling through pitching, as the majority of it will likely have peaked before 27 as pitchers tend to peak earlier than hitters.

You should never extend a pitcher unless they are dominating and even then beyond 27 you won't likely get that performance when they were 23.

This year or next year could be Britton's career year so we need to get as many innings out of his arm at the ML level that we can at his peak level.

I'd much rather have more innings from Britton pre-prime than post-prime.

Besides, Britton is still going to be expensive in that 7th year and not as effective as he'll be a year or two from now, so now is the time to get as many innings from that arm that you can while he's still cheap and effective.

[DrungoHazewood]

We should actually be cycling through pitching, as the majority of it will likely have peaked before 27 as pitchers tend to peak earlier than hitters.

You may wish to reassess your entire train of thought here, since the basis (as stated above) is factually incorrect. Pitchers peak at 27, just like everyone else.

[scOtt]

We should actually be cycling through pitching, as the majority of it will likely have peaked before 27 as pitchers tend to peak earlier than hitters.

You should never extend a pitcher unless they are dominating and even then beyond 27 you won't likely get that performance when they were 23.

This year or next year could be Britton's career year so we need to get as many innings out of his arm at the ML level that we can at his peak level.

I'd much rather have more innings from Britton pre-prime than post-prime.

Besides, Britton is still going to be expensive in that 7th year and not as effective as he'll be a year or two from now, so now is the time to get as many innings from that arm that you can while he's still cheap and effective.

Dusty Baker, ladies and gentlemen! Give him a hand! Dusty Baker!

[Frobby]

Last night was my first chance to get a good look at Britton. Two things I liked about him that haven't been mentioned much:

1. His delivery seems very compact and simple. He doesn't seem like the kind of guy who would suddenly lose command due to mechanical issues.

2. Even though he doesn't have pinpoint command, everything he threw was close to the strike zone. I didn't see pitches bouncing a foot in front of the plate, up over the shoulders, or way outside or inside. In other words, the batters don't get a lot of "free" balls. A lot of the pitches that were balls were fairly tempting to swing at.

I think that continued development of a change-up is going to be important for Britton. By his own admission, he is throwing a very high percentage of fastballs. That's fine for now, but once batters have seen him a few times he's going to need to demonstrate the ability to change speeds.

[Tony-OH]

We should actually be cycling through pitching, as the majority of it will likely have peaked before 27 as pitchers tend to peak earlier than hitters.

You should never extend a pitcher unless they are dominating and even then beyond 27 you won't likely get that performance when they were 23.

This year or next year could be Britton's career year so we need to get as many innings out of his arm at the ML level that we can at his peak level.

I'd much rather have more innings from Britton pre-prime than post-prime.

Besides, Britton is still going to be expensive in that 7th year and not as effective as he'll be a year or two from now, so now is the time to get as many innings from that arm that you can while he's still cheap and effective.

I believe Ozzie Osbourne once wrote a song about this thought process.... "Crazy Train."

You'd rather have 10-14 innings of Britton at 23-years old then potentially 200 innings as a 29-year old? Really? No one is advocating putting him in AAA until June 1st over his Super-2 status, they are talking about him missing two starts so the Orioles gain an extra year of control.

Two starts over a full year for a team that's going to be improved, but probably won't contend is not very smart if you ask me.

I don't like the stupid rule, but the way the rule is written, it makes total sense to put Britton in AAA until April 20th, and I've been one of Britton's biggest supporters.

[scOtt]

Last night was my first chance to get a good look at Britton. Two things I liked about him that haven't been mentioned much:

1. His delivery seems very compact and simple. He doesn't seem like the kind of guy who would suddenly lose command due to mechanical issues.

2. Even though he doesn't have pinpoint command, everything he threw was close to the strike zone. I didn't see pitches bouncing a foot in front of the plate, up over the shoulders, or way outside or inside. In other words, the batters don't get a lot of "free" balls. A lot of the pitches that were balls were fairly tempting to swing at.

I think that continued development of a change-up is going to be important for Britton. By his own admission, he is throwing a very high percentage of fastballs. That's fine for now, but once batters have seen him a few times he's going to need to demonstrate the ability to change speeds.

Even the few mistakes I've seen him make.. when he rarely throws something up by mistake... hitters just don't seem to connect. When he says he didn't have his best stuff, hitters drive it into the ground anyways.

For all the bad things you can legit say about him, hitters don't seem to catch it in time. He somehow gets away with it. Almost like Koji's meatball 86 mph fastballs. It just works.

[Tony-OH]

Last night was my first chance to get a good look at Britton. Two things I liked about him that haven't been mentioned much:

1. His delivery seems very compact and simple. He doesn't seem like the kind of guy who would suddenly lose command due to mechanical issues.

2. Even though he doesn't have pinpoint command, everything he threw was close to the strike zone. I didn't see pitches bouncing a foot in front of the plate, up over the shoulders, or way outside or inside. In other words, the batters don't get a lot of "free" balls. A lot of the pitches that were balls were fairly tempting to swing at.

I think that continued development of a change-up is going to be important for Britton. By his own admission, he is throwing a very high percentage of fastballs. That's fine for now, but once batters have seen him a few times he's going to need to demonstrate the ability to change speeds.

I agree with both of these points.

For me, the best thing about Britton is that his power sinker is so good, he can throw the pitch behind in the count and still get guys to pound it into the ground due to it's late movement. I don't know about you guys, but I've never seen a pitcher who can get so many outs while behind in the count.

The more I see of Britton, the more I get excited. I knew he was very, very good, but the more I see how he gets guys out the more I'm starting to think he's going to be very, very special.

I'm a huge Matusz fan, but if I had a gun to my head and I could only keep either him or Britton, I think I'm taking Britton due to his groundball tendencies and Matusz's flyball tendencies since Camden Yards is not a great flyball pitcher's park.

Tell you what though, it's great to have both. They will anchor this rotation for years to come.

[JTrea81]

You may wish to reassess your entire train of thought here, since the basis (as stated above) is factually incorrect. Pitchers peak at 27, just like everyone else.

First of all that data was based on 1926-1966. Things have changed a bit since then.

You might want to take a look at this:

Yes, it is probably true that if you stay healthy, you will get better with age and experience, but I am taking about and looking at all pitchers whether they stay healthy or not. For every Felix Hernandez there is at least one Mark Prior. And whether you can tell whether a pitcher is going to stay reasonably healthy and thus likely to get better is another story altogether. (I think that in general you can’t.)

When I say, “No matter what I do,” I mean this:

All pitchers from around age 21 to 26 are completely flat in runs allowed (against linear weights against). After that, they simply skyrocket in a nice smooth pattern to the tune of around .2 runs per 9 innings per year.

http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/no_matter_how_i_slice_or_dice_it_pitchers_get_worse_every_year/

Also pitchers that start out earlier and pitchers that are held back into their mid 20's both peak at the same time:

Another interesting result is that the peak often occurs at the same dang time. One question I had going in was would pitchers that came up later have the same aging curve as others, just begun later? In other words, would it take most of these groups the amount of time to reach their peak and prime? I don't see that happening in these results. Those that first established themselves from ages 20-25 peaked at about the same time - age 25 or 26. Only the age 22 pitchers missed out on that. Five of the first six groups all had their prime at either ages 23-7 or 24-8 (age 23 had their prime from 25-9). There are, obviously some differences, as guys who came up at age 28 peaked later than guys who came up at age 20, but whereas the early arrivals had a couple years to work up to their peak, the later arrivals often began in their peak. Ages 24-8 all began their prime either their first big year or the year after while only one of the earlier groups could say that.

http://www.baseballthinkfactory.org/files/primate_studies/discussion/a_new_look_at_pitcher_aging_patterns/

[DrungoHazewood]

We should actually be cycling through pitching, as the majority of it will likely have peaked before 27 as pitchers tend to peak earlier than hitters.

You should never extend a pitcher unless they are dominating and even then beyond 27 you won't likely get that performance when they were 23.

This year or next year could be Britton's career year so we need to get as many innings out of his arm at the ML level that we can at his peak level.

I'd much rather have more innings from Britton pre-prime than post-prime.

Besides, Britton is still going to be expensive in that 7th year and not as effective as he'll be a year or two from now, so now is the time to get as many innings from that arm that you can while he's still cheap and effective.

Let's look at some similar pitchers to what we hope Britton approaches, and see what you'd be trading if you'd picked their first three starts over their whole 7th year:

Kevin Brown: 21.1 innings, 9 runs, vs 233 innings of a 3.59.

Scott Erickson: 17 innings, 10 runs, vs 222 innings of a league-average ERA.

Brad Radke: 14 innings, 11 runs, vs 226 innings of a 3.94.

Tim Hudson: 19 innings, 6 runs, vs 192 innings of a 3.52.

Of course there are some others who work out less well, like Brandon Webb. But there's a legitimate chance you're trading 15-20 decent innings, for 200+ innings of a 120+ ERA+.

[DrungoHazewood]

First of all that data was based on 1926-1966. Things have changed a bit since then.

You might want to take a look at this:

http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/no_matter_how_i_slice_or_dice_it_pitchers_get_worse_every_year/

Also pitchers that start out earlier and pitchers that are held back into their mid 20's both peak at the same time:

http://www.baseballthinkfactory.org/files/primate_studies/discussion/a_new_look_at_pitcher_aging_patterns/

Oh I know, there was a lot of discussion last year about pitcher aging, and some people seem to believe they peak at a different time than 27. But I'm firmly in the camp of believing that the evidence is at best ambiguous, and there's lots of data that indicates 27 is the peak age.

Even if mgl's theory is true, he's saying that pitchers are relatively flat through their mid-20s, then start creeping up after 27. So if Britton follows this pattern and is a 3.50 ERA guy through his mid 20s, he'll still be a very effective pitcher in his 7th season. You want to trade 200 innings of a 4.00-ish ERA for 15 innings in 2011 that couldn't possibly be worth more than a fraction of a win, and that's unfathomably absurd.

[Arthur_Bryant]

Last night was my first chance to get a good look at Britton. Two things I liked about him that haven't been mentioned much:

1. His delivery seems very compact and simple. He doesn't seem like the kind of guy who would suddenly lose command due to mechanical issues.

2. Even though he doesn't have pinpoint command, everything he threw was close to the strike zone. I didn't see pitches bouncing a foot in front of the plate, up over the shoulders, or way outside or inside. In other words, the batters don't get a lot of "free" balls. A lot of the pitches that were balls were fairly tempting to swing at.

I think that continued development of a change-up is going to be important for Britton. By his own admission, he is throwing a very high percentage of fastballs. That's fine for now, but once batters have seen him a few times he's going to need to demonstrate the ability to change speeds.

It is also not a max-effort delivery.

I think his change is already good, to judge from the two games I've seen, and he already throws it in critical spots and counts. I am pretty sure that he got two of his strikeouts yesterday on changeups. The secondary pitch that seems to need work is the slider.

I don't mind him relying on the sinker, though. I thought he could have thrown it more often (as opposed to the four-seam). He can show that pitch three or four times in an at-bat. Teixeira was sitting on it twice yesterday at 3-2 and couldn't do anything with it either time.