===Weee Arrrrr SPARta ===

POTD Brandon League

POTD Shawn Kelley

POTD David Aardsma

Those 2.5 short men, along with Lowe, comprise the pennant-race-worthy Honor Guard in 2010.

 

=== HQ Dept. ===

You can order Shandler's book here. 

Remember what the HQ idea is ... Shandler stays focused on component "skills," especially DOM, CMD, CTL, mistake avoidance (HR/9) and stamina IP).  Tracking these "skills" across a series of years, he looks for patterns in the growth or dropoff, and looks at the way these relate to each other.

On Ian Snell this year, for example, Shandler picks out the DOM trend as critical -- the long sequence of K/9 decline "suggests he's living on the edge of disaster."  In other words, you see this pattern a lot, K's going down down down, and it often points to a fatal underlying cause.

.......

On Lowe, HQ sees the following:

1. Big gains in results -- ERA and WHIP
2. Caused by better health
3. "Sharp" growth in skills -- CMD, DOM -- in second half of 2009
4. Has new out pitch vs LH's (? - Dr D)
   
5. "Still young, so watch him" (for latent upside)

Shandler's projection is to 8.0 strikeouts, 3.7 walks, a 2.1 CTL and 0.8 homers for a 63 "Base Performance Value".

.

=== SSI Mixing Board Dept. ===

It's interesting to see Shandler split Lowe's 2009 out into first and second halves -- he's going, "Hey, quite a pitcher there if you look at second half only.  That's a 99 BPV after the All-Star break."

A 99-BPV reliever would be the #13 non-closer in the American League, right behind Shawn Kelley at #12.  So that's nothing to sneeze at.

Shandler synchs up with G-Moneyball's prediction from several years ago -- that you'd see Lowe very gradually gain strength, sort of accelerating downhill faster and faster like a semi-truck that has fried its brakes.  In 2H 2009, Lowe apparently hit 90 mph and could be on the brink of jelling as a top reliever.

.

=== Role ===

Lowe has always had a big platoon split.  He blows away righties and often struggles vs lefties.   LH's see the fastball well against him, perhaps because of the pitch's fade into their low-away contact red zone.

In 2009:

• vs RH - a Nellie-like .213/.257/.281
• vs LH - .253/.335/.466

The line against LH's isn't exactly tragic, as Nellie's wasn't.  But with two men on and a tie score against the Yankees, you don't really want to see Lowe (or Nellie) throw a slider into Teixiera's drop zone see Tex sock a frozen rope past Jose Lopez into RF.

By contrast, Shawn Kelley yielded a meager .209/.253/.302 line to LHB's last year -- with a control ratio of 25/4!   Kelley does this with his impeccable command just off the plate away, inducing a lot of overanxious fishing.

It sets Lowe up in the Jeff Nelson role and Kelley, by default, in the Arthur Rhodes role.

...

This leaves the question -- will a full-bore Mark Lowe be:

1. Jeff Nelson, 8th-inning righty killer extraordinaire - or -
   
2. A closer banking the big dinero

The Jeff Nelson role is not that of a ROOGY.  Piniella and Torre would use Nelson to lock down the 7th or 8th, whichever happened to be more righthand-heavy.   It's great to have two setup men, one right and one left, and you sequence them according to whichever inning gives them 2-for-3, 3-for-4 platoon advantage. 

Worst case for Lowe, you maneuver a bit to give him extra righties.  I'm not yet convinced that Lowe can shoot down lefties effectively.  Will be interesting to see whether it shakes out that Lowe has to fill the Nelson role, or moves into all-around fire duty.

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=== Dr's R/X ===

But the good news is -- this bullpen, with League and Kelley, allows Lowe the luxury of facing extra righties.   He can well afford to pick-and-choose his righties now.

With Jason Voorhees coming over from Toronto to anchor the bullpen, the M's other three tough guys just fall into place beautifully.  Should be a real pleasure for Wok.

Cheers,

Dr D