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Rick sez,

How's the leg plant looking, Doc?

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In the mind's eye, Paxton's finish had been (1) not my favorite way of finishing a pitch, but (2) a non-issue.

Looking back at the videos, he is indeed landing more heavily on the front heel (ugh!) than we remembered.  The knee locks out too, but it does not hyperextend and he's not "impaling" himself on his femur.  His decel does unbalance him a little bit, but not nearly the way it used to.

Quick aiki fix would be a little owie stuck into his shoe on the plant heel, teaching him to land a little more on the toes of the front foot.

The overall impression is that the 20 lbs around Paxton's midsection, and the pain in his front foot --- >  is causing him to pitch a little bit flat-footed.  Personally, I hate this heavy landing on the front foot, but I've got to admit that it's not really his issue.

IMHO his issue is just the huge interruption in his season.  Thanks Rickster.

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On the other hand, Diderot brought up Steve Carlton as a "frictionless" pitcher.   Good show!  

Carlton was glassy-smooth on the backstroke, and into the transition.  But if you want to see a grotesque finish, check this out.  It speaks to the fact that lefties --- >  just need reps.  A lot of them!

But yeah, Carlton's decel did not stress him.  Like Diderot says, he looks like a coin-op machine that could throw 200 of those truncated pitches.  The "pause at the top" was tear-inducingly gorgeous.  I mean I could cry, looking at that top photo.  You got to like Carlton's chances to throw 5,000 innings, that's for sure...

Carlton was interested in using his entire being, not just his one arm, to throw a baseball.  (You kiddies might not be aware that Carlton pioneered Eastern Hemisphere training methods in MLB(tm) -- training by driving his fingers into barrels of rice, taking martial arts, and so forth.)

One more thing:  If you'd put a 12-penny nail into Lefty's right hip pocket, he could have killed a Rottweiler with it.  Just like Paxton.  Very similar dynamics on the backstroke and transition.

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Mo' Dawg and Grizzle sez,

And Griz, Paxton is one of the best 5 or 10 starters in the game right now.  He's my #3 in the playoffs.  Do you not start Russell Wilson in the playoffs because he's a rookie? 

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The question had been, Do you move Paxton to the front of the line, Oktoberfest.

For me, Mo' has it right on, because of Game Theory.  The underdog wants to roll the dice, wants chaos.  

A backgammon player, who is a 3:1 favorite to lose a game?  He'll start leaving "blots" all over the board, taking crazy shots to send the leader back to bar -- the loser wants to muddy the water.  A 50-50 scenario is favorable for him.

The Mariners, in a playoff scenario, need a lot of things to go their way.  I roll the dice with Paxton, trying to muddy the water, even if he's not pitching as well as he is.  But the fact that he's reliably avoiding BB's and HR's, that makes it a no-brainer.

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Mojo sez,

So basically, in his rookie year, Paxton has the whole unhittable thing mastered, and he just needs to work on efficiency and good health?  Dude.  If he stays healthy, the Mariners are going places.  

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Dr. D has a lot of fun, underlining Paxton's historic ERA career launch.  But, of course, we all know that the career ERA could be 3.50 as well as it could be 1.71.

But Paxton's career BB rate is 2.6 (!) and his HR's a measly 0.7.  It speaks to just how much trouble he is giving ML batters in squaring up the blurry-fast, diving fastball.   Down in the count 2-0 or 3-1, he just spins the pinwheel forward, the ball comes down from the moon at 96 and they two-bounce it to 3B.

I don't expect that this fastball will suddenly become easy to hit.  By the time ML hitters are used to it, he's going to have his hook going.

BABVA,

Dr D