Pitch count/Dusty Baker

[WietersOvechkin]

I just noticed this weekend that Edinson Volquez had Tommy John Surgery and will be out for 12 months. This got me thinking about all the great pitchers that Dusty Baker has managed over the past 10 years. Kerry Wood, Mark Prior and now Edinson Voquez.

Last year I started taking a closer look at Dusty Baker's pitchers. Every time I checked the box score his pitcher would be consistently pitching over 110 pitches every night and it turned into a joke amongst some of my friends (we use to take bets on the over under of 115 pitches when Volquez or Cueto pitched). These two pitchers were in there first year in the league and yet Dusty was trotting them out to the mound every night for over 110 pitches.

Now this is the 3rd time (and I may be missing some other pitchers that have had the same problem being managed by Dusty Baker. Maybe Rob Nen but he does not help prove my point)that a pitcher had to have surgery that would keep them out for multiple seasons.

The point that I am trying make is that clearly a pitch count is necessary at least early on the career of players because they need to learn how to pitch efficiently in the league so that they can last longer in games. Another point that I wanted to make in this thread is that Johnny Cueto is next if Dusty continues to throw him out there for 115 pitches a night.

[TGO]

I was going to post that surely this "Dusty Baker abuses pitchers" thing is out of date. He must have changed his ways by now. But I looked it up and what do you know, Arroyo, Volquez, and Harang were all in the top 20 for pitcher abuse points last year, with Cueto at 27. This year, Arroyo and Harang are top 15. I guess those guys are veterans at least and the future of the Reds is not dependent on them.