Bedard

[ELC]

Count me for one who likes Bedard more for the way he deals with reporters. I can respect a man who doesn't have time to sit through the same cliche questions over and over again.

[HoodGuy007]

Also guys, quick question, wasn't this the same guy that two years ago we couldn't depend on to pitch past the fourth? He is working on his endurance... yeah, he isn't going to throw into the ninth that much, but with all of our pitching woes right now, why would you want to push him to a level where he is uncomfortable? Especially a guy who has already had surgeries?

[Sports Guy]

Did Bedard ask to come out last night or did Sammy just pull him cause he was losing his command?

I get your point Chris but at the end of the day, an extension is going to be for 4/40 or less...We are not talking about a 5-7 year deal for 15+ million a year.

4/40 got the Yanks Pavano and Lilly for the Cubs.

[tennOsfan]

Yes, I am 100% serious Drungo, beacuse the sample size I am talking about is not just last night's start, but every start of his career... closing in on 100 at this point...

Also, when you are in the 2nd week of May.. and he has TWO starts where he has gone exactly 7IP.. and that is the max.. there is something being shown there.

He is very talented.. have no problem paying a fair contract to keep him... there is no impetus to trading him, with his current contract going through '09 and him being one of the most talented pitchers in the league... but I am def getting to the point that if we are going to unload players and try a legitimate rebuilding effort.. that I won't have a problem if he is included...

Not going to get more for anyone, including Tejada (yes it does say something that we would get more for him)....

Just saying at the end of the day you either need to extend him out, or trade him... and as talented as he is, I am not sure he is the pitcher you sink a lot of $$ into long-term...

Likely for the reasons you've stated, Bedard's not going to cost us mega bucks to extend. There's a lot worse pitchers we could sign for 4/40 or so. In today's market, he's definitely worth that.

[Sports Guy]

According to Roch's blog.. he told Perlozzo he was done.

Well he looked done....5 or 6 3 balls counts in 2 innings when he didn't have any before that...3 walks and almost a 4th on his last hitter.

I get your point though...He only threw 97 pitches, he needed to go back out there but had he gone back out and struggled, we probably lose the game and everyone jumps on Sammy for bringing him out when he was obviously done.

[DrungoHazewood]

Well he looked done....5 or 6 3 balls counts in 2 innings when he didn't have any before that...3 walks and almost a 4th on his last hitter.

I get your point though...He only threw 97 pitches, he needed to go back out there but had he gone back out and struggled, we probably lose the game and everyone jumps on Sammy for bringing him out when he was obviously done.

You can't use pitch counts in a vaccuum. If a pitcher is losing command/velocity/mechanics you have to pull him whether he's thrown 60 pitches or 120. Leaving him in to gut through it is jeopardizing the game and the pitcher's health for no good reason.

If Perlozzo and Mazzone couldn't see he was going downhill they weren't doing their jobs. They should have (and I'm sure did) know he was done before the routine "how ya feelin'?" was even asked.

[Camden_yardbird]

I have agree that pitching is changing, and that because of that CG are very rare. It is a good point. As for IP/start here are some stats:

Bedard: 5.9 innings per start

Santana: 6.8

Wang: 6.6

Halladay: 6.8

Rodgers: 6.1

Verlander: 6.2

I do not think that these statistics are dispostive of what you are trying to measure. Your are measuring essentially "Heart", or want to go out and finish the game. To do this I think you need to measure how many pitches a pitcher has pitched in pitcher per start.

Bedard: 100 pitches per start

Santana: 101.5

Wang: 92.7

Halladay: 95.3

Rodgers: 94.6

Verlander: 99.1

Looking at these statistics, placing Bedard in with the Cy Young candidates it shows that he went out there an threw more pitches per start then all of them except Santana...

So if you are going to measure how much effort Bedard is putting in per start you are very mistaken if you think he does not put effort in. The one thing you can accuse Bedard of being is not efficient.

Here's what I have to say to that: A pitcher can pitch to contact more often if he has a solid offense to count on. If he has runs behind him then the pitcher does not have SO every batter. However becuase Bedard is on the team with the weakest offense in this group he has to spend more time pitching away from contact - making him less efficient.

Bedard deserves our praise, not our criticism.

[PaulFolk]

As I said earlier, thought they should have taken him out...

Just a character issue to me, with him not having had thrown even 100 pitches, in a game he has dominated… and begging out.. That’s it… and would be one thing if it was isolated, but track record shows its not.

When did Bedard "beg out"? Perlozzo asked if he was tired, and Bedard answered honestly, "A little bit." Perlozzo checked with Leo and made the decision to pull him. I'm sure Erik wouldn't have objected to continuing to pitch.

[Frobby]

Last year Halladay had eight starts where he went fewer than eight innings and allowed three or fewer runs. Last August 15th, against these same Rays, he was pulled after seven innings in a 2-2 game.

Well, first of all, shame on me for using a word like "never." And shame on me for not defining "a game like that." By which I meant, (1) a very close game, (2) in which the pitcher has been quite dominant, and (3) has a low pitch count.

But put it this way, for 2006:

Complete games: Halladay 5, Bedard 0

8.0 - 8.2 IP: Halladay 2, Bedard 3

7.1-7.2 IP: Halladay 7, Bedard 0

Halladay pitched into the 8th inning 14 times to Bedard's 3. And that is part of what separates the two. I'm not assigning a character flaw to Bedard because of this, just saying that Halladay has a little something extra that Bedard lacks.

P.S. -- just read the excellent post by Camden_yardbird on pitch counts. To me, what it suggests is that Bedard does not lack heart, just pitch efficiency.

[PaulFolk]

That is certianly what I ascertained in Roch's blog today... that he had no fight left...

None of the comments by Perlozzo or Bedard indicated that Erik asked to be taken out. Perhaps I'm interpreting things differently than Roch did, but I didn't get that feeling from the post-game interviews.

I'll agree that Bedard didn't seem to be dragged off the mound kicking and screaming, but I definitely disagree that he "begged out."

[Camden_yardbird]

The other pitchers are showing they can be more economical with their pitches, and work deeper into games.. so maybe me questioning his heart was poor.. but clearly you question how economical he is with his pitches.

If you still think this then you did not read my entire post. I provided a reason for why Bedard is not economic with his pitches. He has a poor offense behind him so he has to pitch for SO's rather than contact. Some more statistics:

Bedard: 6.19 runs per nine IP

Santana: 5.05

Wang: 6.32

Halladay: 6.01

Rogers: 6.4

Verlander: 6.77

I was a little suprised to see Bedard got as much run support as he does. But I still think the theory holds. Only Santana and Halladay get more run support, but they are what I would call elite pitchers. I do not know that I would call anyone else here elite, but they are all certainly extemely good. Also the offenses of the Yankees, Twins, Toronto, and the Tigers were better than the Orioles.

Certainly last night he was not getting run support as well. And his YTD RS is 4.21 much lower than I would guess the league average is.

To compare Beckett who is off to an amazing start has a 9.84 RS number. To put this into persepctive. Looking at the statistics there is not a starter with 5 or more starts anywhere close to Beckett. CC Sabathia is the closest and has a RS of 9. What I intend by this is to show that RS allows you to be more efficient becase you can pitch to contact.

Bedard has heart, and he is a very good pitcher. He may have minor problems with efficiency but given run support I think he would have to strike out less batters.

BTW Bedard leads MLB with 56 Strike outs. A guy with that skill deserves the money we should give him.

[Say O!]

Re: Bedard's pitch counts...

Ever notice how Bedard seems to get a disproportionate amount of foul balls (haven't seen much of him this year, but remember this being the case the past 2 seasons)? Instead of striking the batter out or getting them to roll over a ground ball, I get the impression that Bedard has a lot of batters with high pitch counts due to excessive fouling pitches off. I'm not sure that is attributable to luck or skill, at any rate, there's just something there that makes Bedard prone to the foul off's.

[Frobby]

Re: Bedard's pitch counts...

Ever notice how Bedard seems to get a disproportionate amount of foul balls (haven't seen much of him this year, but remember this being the case the past 2 seasons)? Instead of striking the batter out or getting them to roll over a ground ball, I get the impression that Bedard has a lot of batters with high pitch counts due to excessive fouling pitches off. I'm not sure that is attributable to luck or skill, at any rate, there's just something there that makes Bedard prone to the foul off's.

That usually happens when he is not using his changeup, and or when he can't throw his curve for strikes. No such problems last night.

His curve ball is unbelievably good. When we have a rotation of Bedard, Cabrera, Loewen and Olson we may have the best curve ball staff in the entire major leagues.

[Tony-OH]

If you still think this then you did not read my entire post. I provided a reason for why Bedard is not economic with his pitches. He has a poor offense behind him so he has to pitch for SO's rather than contact.

Unfortunately, I can't buy this line of thinking because Bedard has always pitched this way. He's a strikeout pitcher who goes for strikeouts. He's been that way since the first game I saw him pitch in Delmarva.

Some more statistics:

Bedard: 6.19 runs per nine IP

Santana: 5.05

Wang: 6.32

Halladay: 6.01

Rogers: 6.4

Verlander: 6.77

I was a little suprised to see Bedard got as much run support as he does. But I still think the theory holds. Only Santana and Halladay get more run support, but they are what I would call elite pitchers. I do not know that I would call anyone else here elite, but they are all certainly extemely good. Also the offenses of the Yankees, Twins, Toronto, and the Tigers were better than the Orioles.

You're own numbers reject the "lack of offense" excuse.

Bedard has heart, and he is a very good pitcher. He may have minor problems with efficiency but given run support I think he would have to strike out less batters.

BTW Bedard leads MLB with 56 Strike outs. A guy with that skill deserves the money we should give him.

First off I agree Bedard is a very good pitcher and one I think the Orioles should lock up into a long term deal after the season or move him for top prospects if the right deal comes up.

Bedard doesn't really want to be an ace and if you see most of his comments after being named the number one starter, you can tell he's a lot more like Mike Mussina than a true leader. Mussina was exactly the same way, he didn't want the pressure of being the number one guy or the guy people looked to for leadership.

Bedard would probably flurish as a number two guy where the spotlight would not be on him. He doesn't like to talk to the media, and would prefer if everyone just left him alone to pitch. Don't get me wrong, if he gives the Orioles seven strong innings each outing I don't care if he hates the media and or looks down at the fans. He's aloof, big deal as long as he can pitch.

But don't believe that's what makes an ace.

As for his heart, I have had questions at times since it appears he can be shaken by a bad break, an error, or a hit. Several times this year including the opening day game against the Twins and the Red Sox games he was shaken up by homerun or hit, and then made some bad pitches immediately afterwards.

Is Bedard the team's best pitcher right now? Absolutely. Is he one of the best pitchers in the American League, I like to think so. Is he a true Ace who can command three plus pitches and shows leadership and has to be pulled from the mound because he feels it's his game? I don't think so.

I think Bedard is very happy with going six or seven strong innings with a bunch of strikeouts and one or two runs allowed. I don't think many of us would mind that either.

But let's not make Bedard into something he's not. He's a very good pitcher and one who the Orioles should either build around or use in a trade to get better for the future.

[tywright]

That usually happens when he is not using his changeup, and or when he can't throw his curve for strikes. No such problems last night.

His curve ball is unbelievably good. When we have a rotation of Bedard, Cabrera, Loewen and Olson we may have the best curve ball staff in the entire major leagues.

3 lefties...very niiice