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Who out there will get tricked into selecting Carlos Zambrano as their #1 starter in the 5th or 6th round? Hmmmmm... Speak up. You know you are out there.



Zambrano's 2007 #'s ...

18 wins

177 K's

3.95 era

1.33 whip



Truth be told, they were pretty good, but is that good enough to be taken in the 5th or 6th rounds (like is being done in the mock drafts)? I don't think so. From my #1 pitcher, I want to get value in all 4 pitching categories, not just two.



His era and whip are already teetering on the edge of robbing Zambrano of significant value. Wins can be fickle and his K's really declined last year. Will anyone be surprised if Zambrano misses significant time with a shoulder or elbow injury this year?



Here's a "Guess Who". Which pitcher has thrown the most pitches in MLB over the past three seasons?

mark prior???

Originally posted by Gordon Gekko:

Who out there will get tricked into selecting Carlos Zambrano as their #1 starter in the 5th or 6th round? Hmmmmm... Speak up. You know you are out there.



Zambrano's 2007 #'s ...

18 wins

177 K's

3.95 era

1.33 whip



Truth be told, they were pretty good, but is that good enough to be taken in the 5th or 6th rounds (like is being done in the mock drafts)? I don't think so. From my #1 pitcher, I want to get value in all 4 pitching categories, not just two.



His era and whip are already teetering on the edge of robbing Zambrano of significant value. Wins can be fickle and his K's really declined last year. Will anyone be surprised if Zambrano misses significant time with a shoulder or elbow injury this year?



Here's a "Guess Who". Which pitcher has thrown the most pitches in MLB over the past three seasons? I like you better when you give misinformation not good information.

Originally posted by Gordon Gekko:

Will anyone be surprised if Zambrano misses significant time with a shoulder or elbow injury this year? Yes.



Same old pre-season worry every season. In addition to pitching the most innings over the past few seasons, he also is probably the biggest, strongest pitcher in the lge. I'll take the big durable guy and his 200+ IP per season over a skinny-armed guy who's tossed 175.

Leaderboard for # of starts in which 110 pitches or more were thrown:



Zambrano 19

Matsuzaka 17

Halladay 16

Cain 16

Harang 15



Lots of ways to interpret that, though. Take Harang for example. With Baker as manager he is likely to lead this list for 2008 provided he is healthy. Getting more innings would be a plus. Wearing down would be a minus. But we tend to think of abuse as bad because major league teams want to keep guys healthy over a long period of time. For a one year rental (as you have in non-keeper fantasy), maybe the innings are worth the risk.



Zambrano's sporadic control and altering arm angles point to disaster, though, and one way or another I wouldn't assume he could hold out for another year. These are things you notice if you aren't biased toward him just because he is a 'Cub-type' of guy.



[ December 03, 2007, 01:36 AM: Message edited by: bjoak ]

Originally posted by Chest Rockwell:

quote:Originally posted by Gordon Gekko:

Who out there will get tricked into selecting Carlos Zambrano as their #1 starter in the 5th or 6th round? Hmmmmm... Speak up. You know you are out there.



Zambrano's 2007 #'s ...

18 wins

177 K's

3.95 era

1.33 whip



Truth be told, they were pretty good, but is that good enough to be taken in the 5th or 6th rounds (like is being done in the mock drafts)? I don't think so. From my #1 pitcher, I want to get value in all 4 pitching categories, not just two.



His era and whip are already teetering on the edge of robbing Zambrano of significant value. Wins can be fickle and his K's really declined last year. Will anyone be surprised if Zambrano misses significant time with a shoulder or elbow injury this year?



Here's a "Guess Who". Which pitcher has thrown the most pitches in MLB over the past three seasons? I like you better when you give misinformation not good information. [/QUOTE]One more thought while I can't sleep. Gekko fancies himself a skilled arbitrager who benefits from any volatility in the market. In that sense, even giving good information helps him. Or, to look at it another way, no offense to anyone, but mostly dead money will be taking Zambrano in round 4. If you push him back to round 7, you have a better chance of having a good team take him where he still won't live up to expectations and will be more likely to increase Gekko's rank in the league and overall standings.

I guess the question is, are there 15 starting pitchers you would rather have than Zambrano that you could not get in a later round? I am not so sure about that, though I admit I have avoided him because of his workload.



Just FYI, he was picked as the 10th and 15th SP taken in the first two NFBC Mock Drafts.

Seeing how you are on the Zambrano subject-



16-Carlos Zambrano-Carlos should be ranked in the top 15 pitchers, but there is something to those 100+ walks two years in a row. After 5 full seasons in the majors, he should start to show signs of developing better command. If he is your ace, you will need to draft real well to knock down his 1.30 whip he has had the last two years. He is very emotional pitcher. He had a 5.62 ERA on June 1st and he had a stretch from August 8th until September 3 where he gave up 30 earned runs in 28 2/3 innings. Carlos had a walk to strikeout rate of 36/49 the last two months of the season and a whip of 1.56. He has electric stuff when he can get the ball over the plate. The last four years batters are batting under .220 against him. Last year he had a two month stretch where he was 9-3 with a 1.02 whip and 1.98 ERA. Carlos could be special in 2008 or he could be one hell of a roller coater ride. If he could ever slide in the draft, he would be worth a gamble. As your ace, he better be good or it will be a long season.



[ December 03, 2007, 09:12 AM: Message edited by: CC's Desperados ]

Originally posted by Edwards Kings:

I guess the question is, are there 15 starting pitchers you would rather have than Zambrano that you could not get in a later round? I am not so sure about that, though I admit I have avoided him because of his workload.



Just FYI, he was picked as the 10th and 15th SP taken in the first two NFBC Mock Drafts. Last year, I had him ranked 79th among starting pitchers and that's without accounting for injury risk.



Of course he performed better than that, but if he had pitched in those two great months like he pitched in the other four, he would have been somewhere south of 79th. Last year I had Mets Perez, Maine, and Hernandez ahead of him, for example and you'd have probably laughed at me then--not so much now. At any rate, I don't expect my system will be much kinder to him this year, so yes, there are hordes of pitchers I can get later that I'd rather have.



[ December 03, 2007, 07:59 AM: Message edited by: bjoak ]

Most of Zammy's value was wrapped up in the volatile 'wins' category anyway. I don't subscribe to Shandler's site but does anyone know how he ranked in terms of pure quality starts? I'd bet he took a beating in that stat.



[ December 03, 2007, 08:23 AM: Message edited by: bjoak ]

Originally posted by bjoak:

quote:Originally posted by Edwards Kings:

I guess the question is, are there 15 starting pitchers you would rather have than Zambrano that you could not get in a later round? I am not so sure about that, though I admit I have avoided him because of his workload.



Just FYI, he was picked as the 10th and 15th SP taken in the first two NFBC Mock Drafts. Last year, I had him ranked 79th among starting pitchers and that's without accounting for injury risk.



Of course he performed better than that, but if he had pitched in those two great months like he pitched in the other four, he would have been somewhere south of 79th. Last year I had Mets Perez, Maine, and Hernandez ahead of him, for example and you'd have probably laughed at me then--not so much now. At any rate, I don't expect my system will be much kinder to him this year, so yes, there are hordes of pitchers I can get later that I'd rather have. [/QUOTE]Boy, you are one tough grader! At #79 you have him as no more than an average #3 starter.

oops!



[ December 03, 2007, 08:27 AM: Message edited by: Edwards Kings ]

Originally posted by bjoak:

Most of Zammy's value was wrapped up in the volatile 'wins' category anyway. I don't subscribe to Shandler's site but does anyone know how he ranked in terms of pure quality starts? I'd bet he took a beating in that stat. He had 19 starts where he went 6 inning or more and gave up 3 runs or less. In the quality starts he lasted only 6 innnings, he never gave up three runs in any of them. All of them were two runs or less. He had three other starts that he went 5 1/3, 5, and 5 innings. He gave up 2,1, and 0 runs in those games. So he had 22 good starts.



[ December 03, 2007, 08:41 AM: Message edited by: CC's Desperados ]

Originally posted by CC's Desperados:

quote:Originally posted by bjoak:

Most of Zammy's value was wrapped up in the volatile 'wins' category anyway. I don't subscribe to Shandler's site but does anyone know how he ranked in terms of pure quality starts? I'd bet he took a beating in that stat. He had 19 starts where he went 6 inning or more and gave up 3 runs or less. In the quality starts he lasted only 6 innnings, he never gave up three runs in any of them. All of them were two runs or less. He had three other starts that he went 5 1/3, 5, and 5 innings. He gave up 2,1, and 0 runs in those games. So he had 22 good starts. [/QUOTE]No, Shandler has a stat called 'pure quality starts' which he posits is better than 'quality starts' at determining how effective a pitcher has been. Basically, it measures peripheral stats rather than earned runs. While I think there are better ways to evaluate pitchers, it is a good measure of consistency.



I know Edward Kings doesn't ever let his Shandler subscription slip so perhaps he can tell us how well I graded compared to that stat.

Originally posted by Edwards Kings:

quote:Originally posted by bjoak:

quote:Originally posted by Edwards Kings:

I guess the question is, are there 15 starting pitchers you would rather have than Zambrano that you could not get in a later round? I am not so sure about that, though I admit I have avoided him because of his workload.



Just FYI, he was picked as the 10th and 15th SP taken in the first two NFBC Mock Drafts. Last year, I had him ranked 79th among starting pitchers and that's without accounting for injury risk.



Of course he performed better than that, but if he had pitched in those two great months like he pitched in the other four, he would have been somewhere south of 79th. Last year I had Mets Perez, Maine, and Hernandez ahead of him, for example and you'd have probably laughed at me then--not so much now. At any rate, I don't expect my system will be much kinder to him this year, so yes, there are hordes of pitchers I can get later that I'd rather have. [/QUOTE]Boy, you are one tough grader! At #79 you have him as no more than an average #3 starter. [/QUOTE]My system is objective so I didn't really grade or place him there. To be fair, it docked him for the Cubs crappy 2006 offense so his wins were way too short. BTW, my system was a little bit more accurate than PECOTA and a little less accurate than Shandler so it is not without value. Shandler's optimistic pitching projections worked out quite well last year as offense was down accross the league.

Originally posted by bjoak:

quote:Originally posted by Edwards Kings:

I guess the question is, are there 15 starting pitchers you would rather have than Zambrano that you could not get in a later round? I am not so sure about that, though I admit I have avoided him because of his workload.



Just FYI, he was picked as the 10th and 15th SP taken in the first two NFBC Mock Drafts. Last year, I had him ranked 79th among starting pitchers and that's without accounting for injury risk.



Of course he performed better than that, but if he had pitched in those two great months like he pitched in the other four, he would have been somewhere south of 79th. Last year I had Mets Perez, Maine, and Hernandez ahead of him, for example and you'd have probably laughed at me then--not so much now. At any rate, I don't expect my system will be much kinder to him this year, so yes, there are hordes of pitchers I can get later that I'd rather have. [/QUOTE]There are some things I don't understand here. I'm not trying to pick a fight, however Hernandez is a less "risk" than Zambrano? I know this is always about the next year not the past, but if I'm not mistaken Hernandez has never had a full season. At least not in the U.S. You can count on him going on the dl. In fact you better count on that. He is also about a million years old and that's if his birth date is correct. I wouldn't assume that either. Has Zambrano ever been on the dl? Now I'm not a Zambrano guy. I've never had him and probably never will unless he drops a bit as Shawn has suggested, and he probably won't. I do not fear the innings pitched what so ever. That is a myth perpetrated by today's non sense babying of pitchers. Go back to my era. Nobody babyed Ryan, Gibson, Jenkins, Marichal, Seaver etc. They threw complete games. No pitch counts. No closers, let alone set up men, middle relievers etc. Bill James has Ryan at a 257 pitch count for 1 game once. Not an exceptional occurance for Ryan. He had lots of 200+ pitch counts before they were counting. Didn't shorten his career or contribute to a high injury rate. These guys built up their arms cause they weren't babyed. Zambrano is the same. Now if and when Z does break down everybody and their mother will claim it's the pitch counts coming home to roost. Pitchers break down, "a lot". That's why I don't subscibe to the "ace" drafting belief. If your "ace" goes down, a reasonable likely hood in any year no matter who it is. Your screwed. (btw I won the content panel league not drafting a sp before round 10). I don't like Z because of the high whip for those rounds. I give him extra marks for durability. IE don't expect a break down. Just my 2 cents provided where not asked for again.

Shandler? Never heard of him!



Oh, wait. Now I remember. Shandler ranks starts (PQS) as either a 4 or 5 (Dominate), 2 or 3 (OK or just keeping your team in the game) or 0-1 (Disaster). In 2007, Shandler had Zambrano's 34 starts as 20-9-5 (DOM, OK, DIS) respectively or 59%/26%/15%. Unfortunately if you were going for a league title, two of those five DIS starts were in September.



BTW, Shandler has never proposed that his PQS was end all, be all. Rather, it is one part of the information that will hopefully let you manage your risks. Just a little plug there.

A couple more things on Zambrano. He was a great road pitcher (12 Wins, 3.061 ERA and 1.186 WHIP). Cincinnati owned him at Wrigley (3GS, 8.817 ERA, 2.143 WHIP), while Zambrano owned the Reds in two out of three starts IN Cincinnati.



ATL pounded him as well in both starts against the Braves (one home, one road). All in all, Zambrano gave up 5 ER or more in nine starts. Five of those nine starts were against CIN and ATL.

Originally posted by Vander:

quote:Originally posted by bjoak:

quote:Originally posted by Edwards Kings:

I guess the question is, are there 15 starting pitchers you would rather have than Zambrano that you could not get in a later round? I am not so sure about that, though I admit I have avoided him because of his workload.



Just FYI, he was picked as the 10th and 15th SP taken in the first two NFBC Mock Drafts. Last year, I had him ranked 79th among starting pitchers and that's without accounting for injury risk.



Of course he performed better than that, but if he had pitched in those two great months like he pitched in the other four, he would have been somewhere south of 79th. Last year I had Mets Perez, Maine, and Hernandez ahead of him, for example and you'd have probably laughed at me then--not so much now. At any rate, I don't expect my system will be much kinder to him this year, so yes, there are hordes of pitchers I can get later that I'd rather have. [/QUOTE]There are some things I don't understand here. I'm not trying to pick a fight, however Hernandez is a less "risk" than Zambrano? I know this is always about the next year not the past, but if I'm not mistaken Hernandez has never had a full season. At least not in the U.S. You can count on him going on the dl. In fact you better count on that. He is also about a million years old and that's if his birth date is correct. I wouldn't assume that either. Has Zambrano ever been on the dl? Now I'm not a Zambrano guy. I've never had him and probably never will unless he drops a bit as Shawn has suggested, and he probably won't. I do not fear the innings pitched what so ever. That is a myth perpetrated by today's non sense babying of pitchers. Go back to my era. Nobody babyed Ryan, Gibson, Jenkins, Marichal, Seaver etc. They threw complete games. No pitch counts. No closers, let alone set up men, middle relievers etc. Bill James has Ryan at a 257 pitch count for 1 game once. Not an exceptional occurance for Ryan. He had lots of 200+ pitch counts before they were counting. Didn't shorten his career or contribute to a high injury rate. These guys built up their arms cause they weren't babyed. Zambrano is the same. Now if and when Z does break down everybody and their mother will claim it's the pitch counts coming home to roost. Pitchers break down, "a lot". That's why I don't subscibe to the "ace" drafting belief. If your "ace" goes down, a reasonable likely hood in any year no matter who it is. Your screwed. (btw I won the content panel league not drafting a sp before round 10). I don't like Z because of the high whip for those rounds. I give him extra marks for durability. IE don't expect a break down. Just my 2 cents provided where not asked for again. [/QUOTE]I believe my post says 'without accounting for injury risk.' I'm not sure how much more clear I can be. With that qualification, there is little doubt that El Duque was more dominant, even if you want to account for his luck on balls in play.



As for babying guys, there is no way to prove it for certain, but it is widely believed that pitchers of the past did not use maximum effort on every pitch, and that became less and less true as the power hitters of today rose up. That seems intuitive if you think of a Zumaya vs. Tyner matchup. Does he really need to break out the hard stuff there? Today's pitcher injuries are proven to happen more frequently with number of pitches thrown and since everybody isn't healthy, there is your proof that guys breakdown under a workload.



IMO, Boston took it too far this year with Buchholz. Also I don't think innings matter; it's # of pitches. Teams keep track of warm-ups too and that is good.



[ December 03, 2007, 05:38 PM: Message edited by: bjoak ]

As for El Duque, I have no answer for his success last year and wouldn't expect a repeat. He knows how to pitch. Other than that yikes!!! As for why pitchers break down so often now, I believe kids now only play when they're in little league games or other organized events. They're pitches or innings are almost always limited "for their safety". And god knows you don't want to be the coach that encouraged the kid to pitch more, then he comes up hurt. The world would certainly blame you. When I was a kid we played everyday. Had to wait for the big kids to get off our field and hoped they didn't come back before we were done. The littler kids had to wait for us to finish. The fields were never empty sun up to sun down. Now the same fields are empty. All the time. Nobody plays and they park cars there now cause they're not used anyway. When I pitched years later I finished what I started AND was the closer in game 2. Not a start the 9th closer. Sometimes 2 or 3 more innings. I had no control whatsoever. Lots of full counts. A walk to innings ratio off the charts. I also didn't get hit often either. Lots and lots of K's. Yes I hurt my arm. Not pitching. Being a j@#$^&s. If kids were inclined to and allowed to build up their arm strength I think less not more arm injuries would follow. No I can't prove it, and nobody else will either cause nobody wants to be blamed if a kid ever comes up with a sore arm. It would automatically be from too much throwing regardless of the real cause.

Originally posted by Edwards Kings:

A couple more things on Zambrano. He was a great road pitcher (12 Wins, 3.061 ERA and 1.186 WHIP). Cincinnati owned him at Wrigley (3GS, 8.817 ERA, 2.143 WHIP), while Zambrano owned the Reds in two out of three starts IN Cincinnati.



ATL pounded him as well in both starts against the Braves (one home, one road). All in all, Zambrano gave up 5 ER or more in nine starts. Five of those nine starts were against CIN and ATL. I think you can toss out all of those stats on Zambrano. Doesn't matter much where he's pitching. When he is on his game (mostly mental), he is almost untouchable. When his head is elsewhere he lacks control which leads to walks and extra base hits. He also seems to work much better with Blanco behind the plate; not sure if the stats support that, but I'd guess they do.

Originally posted by KJ Duke:

quote:Originally posted by Edwards Kings:

A couple more things on Zambrano. He was a great road pitcher (12 Wins, 3.061 ERA and 1.186 WHIP). Cincinnati owned him at Wrigley (3GS, 8.817 ERA, 2.143 WHIP), while Zambrano owned the Reds in two out of three starts IN Cincinnati.



ATL pounded him as well in both starts against the Braves (one home, one road). All in all, Zambrano gave up 5 ER or more in nine starts. Five of those nine starts were against CIN and ATL. I think you can toss out all of those stats on Zambrano. Doesn't matter much where he's pitching. When he is on his game (mostly mental), he is almost untouchable. When his head is elsewhere he lacks control which leads to walks and extra base hits. He also seems to work much better with Blanco behind the plate; not sure if the stats support that, but I'd guess they do. [/QUOTE]Agreed. I don't think the matchups matter with him. He's either on or not. He over throws early in games especially if he's really pumped up, which is often. Some of his really bad starts are cause he can't find the strike zone and if he does he's throwing so hard if flattens out and it gets hit even though he's usually thorwing high 90's at that time. I beleive he has requested not throwing on opening day for that very reason. Too pumped up, bad consiquence. His opening day performances have not been stellar. Bodes ill if they ever make the playoffs again I guess.

Originally posted by Vander:

As for El Duque, I have no answer for his success last year and wouldn't expect a repeat. He knows how to pitch. Other than that yikes!!! As for why pitchers break down so often now, I believe kids now only play when they're in little league games or other organized events. They're pitches or innings are almost always limited "for their safety". And god knows you don't want to be the coach that encouraged the kid to pitch more, then he comes up hurt. The world would certainly blame you. When I was a kid we played everyday. Had to wait for the big kids to get off our field and hoped they didn't come back before we were done. The littler kids had to wait for us to finish. The fields were never empty sun up to sun down. Now the same fields are empty. All the time. Nobody plays and they park cars there now cause they're not used anyway. When I pitched years later I finished what I started AND was the closer in game 2. Not a start the 9th closer. Sometimes 2 or 3 more innings. I had no control whatsoever. Lots of full counts. A walk to innings ratio off the charts. I also didn't get hit often either. Lots and lots of K's. Yes I hurt my arm. Not pitching. Being a j@#$^&s. If kids were inclined to and allowed to build up their arm strength I think less not more arm injuries would follow. No I can't prove it, and nobody else will either cause nobody wants to be blamed if a kid ever comes up with a sore arm. It would automatically be from too much throwing regardless of the real cause. Yeah! And the other thing is kids don't get paddled enough these days. That's what's wrong with kids today. Boy, in my day we'd tie them up in the basement and beat the evil out of them. And you know what, kids acted right! But today, with their j-pods and the MTZ, these kids have it all. Give them a good beatin', I say. That's how you make them smarter, you beat the sense into them.

not a bad idea bjoak

duke - what # is zambrano on your SP list? just curious.