Q.  What was that over at the Bakery?

A.  Geoff Baker with an interesting column in which he proposes that David Aardsma is a more valuable pitcher to the M's than is Mark Lowe.

His main salvo:  that Aardsma gets ton more K's.  That's fair, and it's also something that SSI has been ignoring.

Hm.  Aardsma is a 10-K-per-game pitcher.  Another outside-the-box point by Geoffy.  Let's have a look...

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Q.  You were aanti-Aardsma in spring training, saying that (1) the broken delivery would (2) perpetuate his wildness.  Any change?

A.  No, not really.

Aardsma did walk fewer men in 2009, going from 6.5 per game to 4.3 per game.

But he did this by simply choosing to throw nothing but fastballs.  Aardsma threw an amazing 87.1% fastballs, which is to say, he always threw them.  He showed a wrinkle now and then, off the plate.

Go to fangraphs > leaders > relievers > FB% and you'll see that only six or eight guys in the majors threw even 80% or more fastballs.   Generally, they weren't very good.

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Q.  Is it possible for a reliever to throw 80% -- hey, 87% -- fastballs and sustain success?

A.  No.

Not unless there is something v-e-r-y special about that fastball.  Not "96 mph" special.  Special like, "Mariano Rivera's swerveball" special. 

Except for that, you'd better bring a thumbtack to the mound if, on a night-in night-out basis, you're going to throw 17 heaters and one slider outside the zone.

An ML hitter has a little dial on the bottom of his bat.  It's set on 92.  A quicker guy steps up to the mound, he twists it over to 95.  It's just a tick earlier.

Hey, Matt Anderson threw 102 :- ) and they had a setting for that on their bat dial, too.  Anderson wasn't real effective.   The guys just swing earlier.

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Jon Papelbon is the star who throws 80% fastballs.  He's got (A) excellent command of that 96 fastball, and (B) a vicious offspeed pitch that stays in the hitters' minds. 

Let me read that (B) part again, kiddies ...

...........

David Aardsma, on paper, does not work.  This bumblebee shouldn't fly.  :- )

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Q.  Why did it work?

A.  Aardsma threw the fastballs VERY high in the strike zone.  This results in K's and HR's -- but in 2009, the HR's landed on the warning track.  Voila!  A pitcher who does everything right...

Aardsma threw an amazing 54-24 flyball-groundball split.  That's 0.47 grounders per fly -- freakishly tilted toward balls up, up and away.

He risked the HR's to get the strikes and the strikeouts.  He wasn't punished by homers.

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Q.  Why wasn't he punished by homers?

A.  Because he was lucky.  End of story.

Aardsma gave up an unbelievable 4.2% homers per fly ball -- out of every 25 of those fly balls the batters hit, only 1 (count it) went over the fence.

I must have been at the park four times when he had a fly ball caught on the warning track.  I have no idea how many more homers he'd have given up in an UNlucky year.   Ten more homers?  You figure it out.

..........

Granted, Safeco helps a pitcher.  When Jarrod Washburn has 71 innings with 4% homers per fly, do you figure well, that's Safeco?  No, because he was at 10%, 11% most of his time here.

Safeco will save a few homers.  Aardsma might hope for an excellent 8% HR/FB rate, which would still leave him with 1.2, 1.4 gopheritis, considering his 0.47 GB ratio.   Even with a great HR/F rate, Aardsma would still have gopheritis.

.........

Supposing Aardsma had lost another 4-5 games on walkoffs in 2009.  Would this conversation be the same?  Would the year have been the same?

Jack Zduriencik needs to ask himself what happens if, in April-May 2010, five games are lost on walkoff homers.  It might not happen.  But let's say it does?

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Part 2