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I have no clue how Bonderman did it. Really.
Well, he did fiugre out that the slider was his pitch for the night and stuck with it. Did it early. Kudos to Shoppach.
Gimme Taijuan.
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Our Backstory
Jeremy Bonderman quit baseball in 2011. As Joe Pawlikowski put it, it's not often that a pitcher with a career xFIP of 4.11 is required to go to camp and fight for a job. Bonderman declined to do so. You and I might find that understandable, but baseball sure as shootin' wasn't going to.
MLB(TM) baseball is a privilege, one you play respectfully, after putting your pants on one leg at a time. If you trivialize what we do out here, call into question the immense value of the profession, you're going to do some penance before (if) you're ever allowed back in.
I've always liked that part about Jack Zduriencik, the fact that he'll bid $180M for a very fat player, that he'll be the one guy to chase a sore-shouldered NPB pitcher, that he'll allow P.E. teachers to set up for him and allow bartenders to close for him. Jack Zduriencik, man, there just isn't an ounce of baloney about him.
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xFIP
This stat being your ERA, if your defense were average, your BABIP were average and your homers-per-fly average. Last year, an xFIP of 4.11 would have been #20 in the American League, almost exactly even with C.J. Wilson. You think C.J. Wilson was going to have to go to camp and fight for a job?
Bonderman, with his career xFIP of 4.11, did get powerflushed out of baseball, and the reason is that GM's don't always take "normalized" stats at face value. Jeremy Bonderman is the poster boy for lousy pitchability, for throwing out-and-over 3-and-1 fastballs that get screamed into the power alleys at 98 MPH. Bonderman's "theoretical" ERA was 4.11; his actual ERA was 4.91, and his velocity was declining.
Not a single GM in baseball believed the xFIP stat over the ERA stat. But if you're a "sabermetric purist" (?! is that term?) then you should be all over Jeremy Bonderman. A 4.11 xFIP is worth mucho dinero. Jered Weaver's xFIP is 4.07, lifetime. Fly by your instruments, not your instincts, brotha.
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Seattle Sports Insider
We grok'ked, in spring training, that Bonderman had a chance to become a #3 starter again. That chance rested on his willingness to grovel for a half year, hat in hand, over his audacity in taking MLB(TM) for granted, and it rested on his willingness to change his pitch selection.
For the first 1/3 of the season, he grovelled, hat in hand. Then on Friday night, he changed his pitch selection, big time.
Here are the simple numbers:
| Season | FB % | Slider % |
| 2009 | 75 (!) | 21 |
| 2010 | 65 | 31 |
| Friday night | 57 | 35 |
But even those numbers don't do justice. Against the Yankees' lefthanded stars -- Brett Gardner, Robinson Cano, Mark Teixeira, Travis Hafner, Ichiro -- and armed with just a fastball and slider :- ) Jeremy Bonderman threw one slider after another in hitters' counts.
By the 4th inning, the befuddled Yankees were "in between" and it's no accident that the heavily-lefthand Yankees got only 3 hits on the night. They didn't swing and miss too much -- 6 times -- but they got "meh" swings on the ball and there were few dive-and-grabs behind Bonderman. Now, once the relievers came in, then there were dive-and-grabs. The final out off Wilhelmsen almost tore Seager's glove off.
By the way, Bonderman had -6 strikes taken from him and +2 given to him. The strikes taken away were especially painful on Friday. They came at key moments and came on great, great pitches that crossed the Yankees up and were obviously strikes. Of those six pitches, probably five fooled the ump as bad as they fooled Teixeira and Wells.
Bonderman fought through them manfully. The entire game was a TOR performance!
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Jeremy Bonderman has always had 1st-round stuff. His fastball is back to a very reliable 92-94 MPH and has its usual tight spin and late bite. His slider has fastball arm action and breaks considerably more than the average ML slider.
This Jeremy Bonderman, the one who threw the ball on Friday night, I'll take him over Joe Saunders or Aaron Harang.
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He still didn't look like he enjoyed the game, even when he was winning. And I don't care. Doesn't matter to me whether Jeremy Bonderman likes baseball. Disassociated = calm. Calm is what I want my surgeon to be.
Cheers,
Dr D