Quite a Horse Race for AL Cy Young Award

How amazing is it that Tuesday night featured all three of the year's top contenders for the American League Cy Young Award pitching on the same night? They all won. All three were impressive. The three contenders are C.C. Sabathia, Jared Weaver and Justin Verlander. There could be a fourth as Dan Haren has had a terrific year too. But we'll stick with these three. Unlike last year when the top pick was barely winning any games, this year's trio seem to win all the time. The three pitchers are a combined 43-14! Let's take a quick look at how the race may play out.

C.C. Sabathia: Joe Girardi probably did Sabathia no favors by bringing the pitcher back after the second rain delay last night. Sabathia had nothing after two delays and walked three straight batters to start the eighth. David Robertson got out of the jam but it still cost Sabathia in the stat department. If Sabathia doesn't start that inning, his line looks like this: 7-1-0-0-0-14. Instead, it ended up, 7-1-1-1-3-14. Still impressive but ill advised on the part of Girardi. Even so, Sabathia still leads the other two in fWAR. He also leads the majors in wins. He has the highest ERA of the three at 2.56, but his FIP leads the other two. He also has the best home run per nine inning rate among the three, which is impressive considering where he throws his home games.

• ZIPs projection for the rest of the season: 8-3 with a slightly higher ERA. That would make Sabathia 23-8 and tough to beat.

Justin Verlander: Verlander has the 100 MPH fastball and a no hitter this year. So it's hard to forget about those things. Plus, he is pitching in a dogfight of a division race and came up big last night against the White Sox. He gives up more homers than the other two, but consistently throws more innings and more pitches. Verlander has the flash the other two lack.

• ZIPs projection for the rest of the season: 6-4 with a higher ERA. That would finish Verlander at 20-9 and that won't beat Sabathia. But again, Verlander could pitch in more big games and if he wins them, look out.

Jared Weaver: Weaver has the toughest task because the Angels are not prolific scorers. If he keeps his ERA under two like it is now at 1.79, that would be hard for voters to ignore. His K/BB ratio is fantastic but falls slightly behind his two competitors in that category. He'll get starts down the stretch against the Mariners and Athletics in his own division and that will certainly help him. If the Angels can keep this a race against the Rangers, that will help him too.

• ZIPs projection for the rest of the season: 5-4 with a 3.38 ERA. That will leave Weaver at 19-8 and will hurt his chances. But that projection seems overly pessimistic to this observer. 

If you were to simply bet this horse race based on ZIPs projections, Sabathia would seem to have the inside track to win the award this year. But again, Jared Weaver and Justin Verlander have a chance to make a difference in their division races while Sabathia will simply keep the Yankees on course for the wild card (no way they catch Boston). If the Angels and Tigers stay relevant down the stretch and Weaver and Verlander have big parts to play in those races, either of them could upset the Sabathia-train and steal this award. It's going to be a great race to watch.

Verlander and Sabathia

Perusing the leader board over at Fangraphs.com, it's easy to see the elite pitchers in baseball. Roy Halladay is on top followed by Jared Weaver, Cole Hamels, Cliff Lee, Clayton Kershaw, Dan Haren and Daniel Hudson. Few of us would argue with such a list. Daniel Hudson is only a surprise to those of us that haven't been paying much attention this season. But just under Hudson is C. C. Sabathia and Justin Verlander. Both the Yankees' and Tigers' aces are tied with exactly 3.0 WAR and a valuation of $12.1 million.

Please understand that we are talking about the smallest of margins between these pitchers and those above them. For example, Kershaw and Haren are currently valued at $12.3 million and Hudson at $12.2 million. That's a difference that is all but imperceptible. The bottom line is that these are all elite pitchers who are at the top of their game. But, still, their relative ranking left this writer puzzled. Thinking of the season Verlander and Sabathia are having, which would you choose if you could only choose one?

Okay, in fairness, that question is complicated by the fact that one is left-handed and the other not and you'd have to consider the match ups you were choosing them for. But again, wouldn't anyone who was watching ESPN's Baseball Tonight or MLB Network's programming all season think that Verlander is having the more dominant season?

Let's put them head to head. Both have made 16 starts. Verlander has more innings at 120.7 to Sabathia's 114. Verlander has 8.2 strikeouts per nine to Sabathia's 6.63. Verlander's walks per nine are under 2 at 1.94. Sabathia is at 2.29. Sabathia has a lower home run per nine inning rate at 0.39 compared to Verlander's 0.89.  Verlander has given up 77 hits to Sabathia's 112 and as you can imagine, Valander's BABIP is much, much lower than Sabathia's. Verlander's WPA (win probability added) sits at 2.08 while Sabathia's sits at 0.98. There isn't a pitch type that Verlander and Sabathia share (which is most of them) and Verlander's pitch values are all higher than Sabathia's. Sabathia has a slightly lower FIP and xFIP than Verlander.

As you look at the two pitchers head to head, you'd have to say that Justin Verlander is having the better season. Please understand that this writer is no expert on such things. This writer has no more understanding of why Sabathia's FIP and xFIP are lower than Verlander than a Tibetan monk would have. More homework is needed on this side of the typewriter to understand such things. Obviously, it's needed. It's also obvious that Verlander pitches half his games in a pitcher's park and Sabathia in a hitter's park. But even so, it seems really odd that both pitchers are rated exactly as equals this season.

Again, please understand that both pitchers are among the best in the game. If you could have either in your dugout, wouldn't you? This isn't a knock on C. C. Sabathia. The Fan loves the guy. It's simply puzzling, that's all.

Stud Pitchers On Parade

On a night when the Reds, Yankees and Bay Rays needed a win to seal their playoff spots and the Braves needed a win to keep them in charge of the wild card spot, stud pitchers stepped up and carried the day. But they weren't alone. Seattle got another ace performance from their Cy Young candidate, the Phillies got an excellent tune up outing from their trade deadline stud in a game the Phillies eventually lost because a veteran pitcher for the Nationals had a sensational start after a disappointing season and two young relievers were lights out after his night was done. Let's recap.

The Reds have been dancing around that clinching game for several days now. They simply needed to get the job done so they can start figuring out their playoff match ups. But until they slammed the door on the Cardinals, they had to keep throwing their A-game out there. Edinson Voquez is peaking at just the right time. The erstwhile ace has had a tough year returning from a long-term injury. He still had the power stuff of the past, but his command was all over the place. But he's had four good games in a row now and his efforts on Tuesday night helped his team to its clinching win.

Volquez matched the tough Wandy Rodriguez for six innings. Both pitchers only gave up two runs before departing for pinch hitters. Volquez struck out eight and more importantly, only walked one. The game became a bullpen battle after that and the Reds' bullpen was one run better than Houston's. First, the Amazing Arthur Rhodes did his thing and pitched a scoreless inning. Then Rhodes' young student, Nick Masset threw a perfect eight and then the Reds turned to their secret weapon. Aroldis Chapman pitched the ninth and struck out two to give the Reds' offense a chance to win the game.

Jay Bruce won the game in walk off fashion with a homer in the ninth (more on him in the next post). It was a game the Reds needed to set their house in order and Voquez, Rhodes, Masset and Chapman made it happen. Congratulations Reds on your first division title in many years.

The Yankees seemed to be playing rope-a-dope for the previous three weeks and things got a bit surreal after A. J. Burnett again went up in flames on Monday night. In stepped Sabathia like the ace he is supposed to be and pitched eight and a third innings of three-hit, one-run ball against the mighty offense of the Toronto Blue Jays in their home ballpark. Sabathia's performance allowed the Yankee hitters to relax, take control of the game and win it easily. It also allowed Mariano Rivera to get some work in during the ninth as he came in to get the final two outs in a non-save situation. The Yankees can't relax because they are still in a dogfight for the division title and the best record in the AL is at stake. But Sabathia at least put the playoff berth to bed in a performance that the Yankees really needed to have.

David Price did the same thing for the Bay Rays. Price pitched eight scoreless innings on six hits and no walks. Price struck out eight and then Soria came in and pitched a perfect ninth, striking out two more. If it wasn't for King Felix, Price would have an excellent argument for Cy Young and won his 19th game. The win clinched a playoff spot for the Bay Rays and kept them ahead of the Yankees in the AL East. The Bay Rays only had nine base runners the entire game but scored five of them in a clutch offensive performance.

The two wins by the Bay Rays and Yankees means that the Red Sox hopes are finally dashed. You have to have much respect for the Red Sox as they battled everything under the sun and still stayed relevant right up until the last week of the season. All due credit must go to Terry Francona and David Ortiz for keeping that team from hanging their heads. They kept plugging along and came up short.

Meanwhile, Bobby Cox, manager of the Atlanta Braves, bit the bullet and all of his best starters are pitching on three days rest this week. He has no choice if his team is to get into the promised land. Tim Hudson, who is the Braves ace in heart (if not in stuff, that goes to Hanson) took the ball and gave Cox six gutty innings. They weren't spectacular innings as he allowed eleven base runners, but somehow managed to allow only one of them to score. Gaby Sanchez stranded six Marlins all by himself, Corbin Maybin got himself picked off by Hudson and Bonifacio, who shouldn't be playing, hit into a crucial double play.

The Braves' bullpen again got the job done. The amazing Billy Wagner closed the door with 36th save by striking out the side in the ninth. Wagner now has a 1.34 ERA. This may be the finest season of his stellar career and maybe he'll reconsider his retirement announcement.

The Phillies are living the high life these days as they are assured the top spot in the NL playoff pole. But they have to play out the rest of the season. Roy Oswalt got a tune up for the playoffs and pitched his obligatory five innings. He only gave up one run and was as sharp as he's been since his second start for the Phillies. On the other side, Jason Marquis, who has had nothing short of a disastrous first season with the Nationals due to injury and ineffectiveness, was juat as good for the Nationals and kept the mighty Phillies (who played most of their regulars) to just one run. He handed the ball off to young Tyler Clippard, who pitched two scoreless innings, striking out two. Drew Storen, the other Nationals phenom, pitched a perfect inning to get the win when Donkey Dunn hit his 38th homer of the season in walk off fashion off of the ancient LOOGY, Tim Byrdak.

Down in Texas, Felix Hernandez might just have sealed his Cy Young Award with another dominating performance. He pitched eight innings, allowing only seven base runners while striking out five. He only gave up one run and lowered his ERA to 2.27. With Price hitting all cylinders and Sabathia pitching the Yankees into the post season, it was a performance that Hernandez really needed to put him over the top. And over the top he should be. King Felix has to be the league's Cy Young. Forget his 13-12 record. He's just been a head above anybody else in the American League.

A Tremendous Game in Tampa

You could not be a baseball fan and not like the duel waged in Florida between the two best teams in the American League. The Yankees and the Bay Rays are battling for the AL East pennant and in a sense, it doesn't really matter because whatever team doesn't win the division will still be the wild card. But it's a pride thing and both teams want first place. And both teams had their aces on the mound in a match up of two pitchers among the top five in the American League. And both David Price and C. C. Sabathia were fantastic.

Watching the entire game, it was evident that neither Price nor Sabathia were willing to give in and both were determined to keep the other team from scoring. Both pitched eight full innings. Both gave up five hits combined. Both never looked to be in the slightest bit of trouble. Both threw nearly 120 pitches of dominating baseball. Price relied almost completely on his fastball and the Yankees knew it was coming but couldn't square it up. Sabathia had a good fastball too but mixed in plenty of change ups and breaking pitches to keep the Bay Rays off balance. Carl Crawford came into the game as one of the hottest hitters in baseball and he looked silly against Sabathia.

Price doesn't throw many breaking pitches. He relies on constantly changing the eye level of the hitter with his fastball, which averaged from 95 to 96 all night. He alternated up and down, in and out and the Yankees had no answer. Sabathia was masterful and was again denied his 20th win and remains stuck on 19.

The defense was excellent. Golson made a great play for the Yankees, Teixeira made another amazing play at first base (what are those zone rating people looking at!?) and the Bay Rays outfielders don't let anything hit the ground. Jeter also made a great play on a bad hope against Crawford.

But the score remained scoreless and the starting pitchers were pulled. The Fan predicted earlier in the Game Picks that this would turn into a battle of the bullpens and it really wasn't a fair fight. Kerry Wood was great (again) and pitched a scoreless ninth and the Bay Rays, having the luxury of being the home team, used their closer in the bottom of the ninth. No problems there. Benoit had no problem in the tenth. Then it got curious.

Boone Logan started the tenth. No problem there. He's been great. Logan struck out his only batter (Pena). But then Joe Girardi brought in Chad Gaudin. Yankee fans collectively gasped in horror. Gaudin loaded the bases, but somehow struck out two guys to get out of the tenth.

The Yankees got a lead off hit in the eleventh and Girardi asked Granderson to bunt against Grant Balfour. You know how the Fan feels about bunts. They are a total waste of an out. Granderson got to face a right-hander for the first time all night and he is a threat to hit it out of the park. Why take the bat out of his hands? Why waste an out against Grant Balfour, who has been struggling like crazy lately. That was like giving a drunk training wheels during a sobriety test.. Balfour then got Curtis to fly out and Jeter hit the ball on the nose, but his deep liner to right was caught. The inning was over.

Then the Yankees brought in Sergio Mitre. Another groan from the Yankee fans. Why Mitre? Why indeed. Read Brignac, a kid the Fan really likes, immediately hit the game winning homer.

It was a fantastic game and it was a game that makes baseball the best sport on earth. But those who follow the Yankees will be left scratching their heads at the choices made by the Yankee manager. The Fan understand not using your closer in a tie game when the team is on the road. Got that. But what about Chamberlain? What about Jonathan Albaladejo who was the Triple A closer of the year? He's pitched six times for the Yankees and has only given up one run. Why does Girardi trust Mitre and Gaudin more than him? Who knows. It certainly doesn't make sense on this end of the keyboard and combined with the waste of an out with Granderson, it was hardly Girardi's finest hour.

Does Paycheck Devalue Sabathia?

In C. C. Sabathia's last eighty starts, he is 49-15. That, friends, is a .765 winning percentage. And yet, since he's become a Yankee with a fat paycheck, he's never really considered an elite pitcher in the eyes of today's most popular analysts. And this is puzzling. The Fan is torn himself about the lack of respect Sabathia receives. Lee is a better pitcher...so they say. Greinke is a better pitcher. Felix Hernandez is a better pitcher. Maybe they are. Today's metrics all rate those pitchers higher (in WAR) than Sabathia. It's considered old school to talk about wins. Wins are overrated. Anyone can win with a big hitting team. Except they don't.

It might have been Mike Mussina that said a really good pitcher will win half of his starts. Sabathia has made 317 starts in his career and has won 155 of them. That's pretty close. In those 317 starts, he has averaged 6.6 innings per start. His won-loss percentage in those starts is .642. Cliff Lee, who was a teammate of Sabathia's for many years, has a .625 winning percentage in 103 less starts. What seems to set Lee apart is that he's been crazy stingy about walks since the start of the 2008 season. And this year, the walk totals for Lee are astounding.

The Fan gets the numbers. There is xFIP which is Fielding Independent Pitching. Without going into great details, this strips out fielding from the equation and tries to rate the pitcher's true earned run average. Right now, in the American League, Liriano and Felix Hernadez are one and two. If we are talking about Cy Young Award right now, it would have to be those two as the front runners. All the stats place Sabathia around 20th in effectiveness. His xFIP (before Thursday's gem against Oakland) is sitting at 3.85. Liriano's is at 3.02 and King Felix sits at 3.26. The Fan gets it. So the Fan isn't saying Sabathia is the best pitcher in the American League this year. All he's saying is that the guy just goes out there every five days, pounds you for seven or eight innings and gets the 'W."

Sabathia has only missed about three or four starts in his entire career. He's like a clock, you can set your watch by him. He'll bend here and there with a few runs, but he rarely breaks. Other than opening day, Sabathia has had only two outings all year where he's pitched less than six innings. He is practically unbeatable at home in Yankee Stadium. He's as reliable as they come and it's hard to figure out where the Yankees would be without him the last two years or where Milwaukee would have been the year before that. For that level of consistency and that level of success, he's worth every penny the Yankees are paying him.

So yeah, maybe there are better pitchers. Maybe other pitchers should win Cy Young. But Sabathia deserves more credit than he gets and there is something to be said for winning 76.5 percent of your decisions out of the last 80 starts.

Chapman, Strasburg and Arms

David Brown posted an interesting observation on his blog today at Yahoo Sports. His post was about Aroldis Chapman, the Reds' phenom from Cuba hitting 105 on the radar gun at a recent Triple A outing. That alone is interesting, but that wasn't the interesting part. The interesting part was Brown's concern that in the aftermath of Stephen Strasburg's unfortunate injury, perhaps Chapman shouldn't be throwing so hard. That is a natural fear that Strasburg's injury has clouded over the entire sport.

The Fan has read a lot of articles about Strasburg's injury and a common theme is that the human arm isn't supposed to throw a little round object that fast without serious injury. And the more that the Fan read on the subject, the more the Fan realized that nobody really knows the secrets of protecting golden arms. After all the science and all the pitch counts and all the protections put on pitchers today, just as many elbows and shoulders are blowing out as there ever has been.

Consider how for every story about Dusty Baker blowing out Mark Prior's arm due to overuse there is another one about a Stephen Strasburg getting more protection than all due diligence could offer and still ending up in the same place as Prior. It seems the more we know, the more we don't know.

You hear all kinds of theories. For example, one theory suggests that young kids don't throw as much like we did as kids (us older folks anyway). And while it's true that baseball doesn't hold the same place in American society as it did when the Fan was growing up, the Fan really doesn't think pitchers today blow their arms out any more than they did years ago. The landscape of all eras is full of dead arms. The Fan's first wife had a cousin in the Yankees organization who once was a stud pitcher until his arm blew up. That was 30 years ago.

We hear about it more now because there are wire services telling us instantly who is going on the disabled list and why. Years ago, we had to wait for the once a week Sporting News to give us the transaction news and the team news to find out who go hurt and even then there was no mention of minor league players that got hurt. Now we have published scouting combines that give us ratings for all players in all organizations that keep us up to date on such things. Without knowing the numbers, the Fan would guess the casualty rates really haven't changed all the much since the turn of the century.

We hear a lot these days about pitch counts. 100 per game seems to be the willy-nilly of this era. But is that an accurate number? Does it change for different pitchers? Does it matter for preventing injuries? Nolan Ryan was quoted last week with what sounded like a really intelligent organizational plan for building pitchers through the system with a graduated innings pitched per year system. But will that work any better at preventing injuries than any other plan?

There are cases where abuse seems to happen. One well-known case involved Gil Meche of the Royals. In Meche's case, he was a really effective pitcher until his manager left him in a game to throw 130 pitches. According to that story, Meche has never been the same since. But the nagging question is if we really know that's what toasted Meche? Years ago, the case was made that Ralph Houk ruined a young Jim Bouton because Bouton was thrown out there for 525 innings combined in 1963 and 1964. Bouton wrecked his arm in 1965 and Houk was forever blamed. But how does that explain the arm injuries sustained by Phill Hughes and Ian Kennedy a few years ago for those same Yankees when both of those young pitchers were on pitch counts and innings limits?

We just don't know. Research seems to suggest that a pitcher's efficiency decreases after 120 pitches. That makes sense. But little else does. The Fan's theory is that it simply doesn't matter all that much in the grand scheme of things. Those pitchers that escape serious injuries to their arms are simply pitchers that are freaks of nature or simply beat the odds. Nolan Ryan certainly threw his share of pitches. Satchel Paige threw his share of pitches. They were the freaks, not the other way around. Seattle's great, Felix Hernandez, has been throwing 190+ pitches since he first came into the league. He doesn't appear to show any effects and is getting better all the time. C. C. Sabathia has been making 33 starts since his rookie season and he doesn't seem to have a problem. Those guys are simply freaks or lucky freaks, one or the other.

Imagine the head scratching going on around baseball concerning Strasburg. Ever since he started playing college ball, he's been watched and coddled and babied and brought along slowly. Despite all that, to all of our sadness, he's done until at least 2012 and there is no guarantee he'll ever make it back to this year's magic. Baseball wags everywhere must be wondering what to do now. The Fan doesn't know if there is an answer. All you can really do is keep throwing talent at the wall. Like spaghetti, a few will stick and a whole lot will hit the floor.

Think the Yankees Are Scary Now?

The Yankees have a two game lead in the American League East despite down production from Derek Jeter, Mark Teixeira, Alex Rodriguez and to some degree, C. C. Sabathia. Many stories have been written concerning Jeter and A-Rod and most include stories about their age. The other two have always been slow starters, but this year, the start has gone deeper into the season.

Derek Jeter had such a good season last season that this year looks terrible in comparison. But Jeter really turned it on in the second half last season. In fact, going back to this same June 24th of that season, he was sitting at his low point for the season in Average and On Base Percentage. From June 25 of last year until the end of the season, he raised his batting average 33 points and his OBP 37 points. In 2008, he had a similar phenomenon. From June 25th to the end of the season in 2008, Jeter raised his BA 22 points and his OBP 18 points. Jeter is a year older, but the fielding stats show him to be having one of his best fielding years in a long time. Jeter will come around. This Fan would bet on it.

Teixeira has already started to hit much better, but his early season sluggishness has gone on much longer than usual. Last year, his BA was much higher than it is now. But he did raise his OPS by 12 points from June 25 to the end of the season. It does not seem possible for Teixeira to reach his career norms by the end of this season. But if he simply hits his norms for the rest of the season, he'll be a big contributor to the Yankees from here on out.

At this point last year, C. C. Sabathia was 6-4 with a 3.71 ERA. The big lefty went 13-4 the rest of the way and lowered his ERA by 27 points. The year before that, Sabathia started 6-6 with Cleveland with an ERA of 3.83. He then went 11-2 with the Brewers and lowered his ERA to 2.70 for the season. Sabathia is already 8-3 this year with a better ERA at this point in the season than last season. His K/9 is exactly the same as last year. After looking at the numbers, this Fan might conclude that he hasn't started badly at all! He'll be fine.

The only one that isn't a good bet is Alex Rodriguez simply because his health hasn't seemed right for a while now. His range of motion is way down and he isn't getting to pitches he used to cream. But Alex Rodriguez was the best player in the game for so many years, it's hard to count him out. If he can at least match his last year's numbers for the rest of the season, it will be enough.

The Yankees have the best record in the majors to date, but they haven't even hit their stride yet. That's a pretty scary thought for the rest of the division.

Alex Rodriguez Makes an Immediate Impact

Literally. On his first pitch of the 2009 season, Alex Rodriguez hit a three run blast which was the difference on a night that C. C. Sabathia pitched like a $100+ million dollar pitcher. True, it was only the Orioles, and true, it's only one game. But Joe Girardi had to be breathing a little easier than in recent times.

Love him or hate him, Alex Rodriguez makes a difference for the Yankees. He has been sorely missed while he was away. The Yankees used three players at third while A-Rod was out: Cody Ransom, Angel Berroa and Ramiro Pena. Between the three, they are a combined 23 for 105 with 12 runs scored and 10 RBI. They hit eight doubles and no other extra base hits. They walked only 7 times. Between the three, they had an OPS around .550. So, yeah, there was a big hole in the lineup.

And with Posada's hot bat sitting on the disabled list, Teixeira mired in a season long slump and Swisher falling back to his true self (and Nady out for who knows how long), there just wasn't enough lumber to compensate for a struggling pitching staff. A-Rod will give Teixeira some protection now and give them the boost needed and take some of the pressure off of rest of the lineup.

As for Sabathia, he was brilliant. His fastball and change up were consistently in the strike zone and it looked like he was really comfortable with Cervelli behind the plate. He pitched with better rhythm than of late and was dominant. Even the four hits he gave up in his complete game shutout were doinkers.

The rotation is showing a little sign of life for the Yankees. If Sabathia becomes the anchor as expected, Pettitte continues to keep the team in the game (if not spectacularly), Chamberlain continues to grow and Hughes pitches well most of the time, this rotation will be okay. Burnett has had a few rough outings lately though.

The bullpen still looks to be a problem. Girardi keeps running Veras out there and he keeps getting knocked around. Rivera has not been dominant thus far and only Phil Coke seems to be doing his job on a regular basis. It's no wonder that Sabathia stayed out there all nine innings.

It won't be lost on major league fans that Manny Ramirez checks out for fifty days at the same time that Alex Rodriguez checks in. But if you ask Yankee fans and Joe Girardi, it's sure to be a welcome relief to have him back.