B, but these are both Pineda, right? My guess is that B is his second half.

Without knowing sample size I’d have to assume B.  However if it is over a large enough sample size that the BABIP and HR/FB numbers could no longer be considered a fluke, I’d take A.

And I agree with #1

B.

A couple of extra HRs make B seem worse, despite better peripheral stats.

from an article linked to in the comments of one of the earlier posts on DHs:

With Sabathia signed through 2016 and Pineda and Ivan Nova coming off productive rookie seasons, the Yankees’ rotation could be set for years to come, with Phil Hughes, Joba Chamberlain and A.J. Burnett among those fighting for the last two spots.

Joba?! Back to the rotation?  Who’ll pitch the 6th?

It’s definitely Pineda.

[4] Joba won’t be ready to pitch until May, So he won’t be battling for a spot in ST. But IMO, the Yankees best option is to have him rehab as a starter so that if needed he can step into the 5th starter role in May/June if needed.

B, but these are both Pineda, right? My guess is that B is his second half.

Yep. Pitcher A is Pineda through 7/4, Pitcher B is Pineda after that.  Of course the “He had a 5.71 ERA in the second half!!!!!11!!” crowd won’t be swayed by this.

It’s pretty impressive that his K and BB numbers stayed so similar during the second half given his unusual usage pattern. I’m looking forward to seeing him in pinstripes for the foreseeable future. He’s a monster.

I just had my initial introduction to “SIERA” while checking out Pineda’s stats on FG.  Has this been discussed here?  SIERA loves Sabathia and Pineda (no surprise).  However, it more or less hates Freddy and Ivan.  And it thinks AJ was actually about average in 2011.  (This is all just based on 2011.)

The one thing that should be noted is that his first half K/BF was lower in part because of that .249 BABIP.  When those balls in play become hits more often, you get more opportunities for strikeouts.

I think between the BB/K numbers and the increase in ground balls and the Pineda Rules that were used in the second half making his work somewhat erratic there’s no reason to think his second half ERA was predictive of anything.  He may have pitched even better in the second half than he did in the first half.

I can understand disliking the trade for losing Montero, and I didn’t like that either, but I can’t understand people pretending that Pineda is nothing special.  He’s got a chance to become one of the best pitchers in baseball, and the Yankees have him for the next five years.

Was his usage really that unusual? I thought they wre just giving him as much extra rest as possible. It’s not like he went back & forth between starting & relieving 3 or 4 times.

SIERA seems fine, but I don’t know that it adds much more than all the other run estimators we have.  Also, since I can’t calculate it myself without knowing the coefficients, I tend to be wary of using it.  I prefer white box stuff to black box stuff.

[9] Most advanced metrics don’t like Nova at all, because he doesn’t K a lot of people and isn’t super stingy with the walks, nor does he surpress hits particularly well. The only outstanding aspect of his numbers is his GB %.

Was his usage really that unusual? I thought they wre just giving him as much extra rest as possible.

Days of rest before each of his last 11 starts.

4,9,4,5,9,5,5,5,6,6,10

Maybe it’s not that unusual, and I completely understand why it was done, but it was definitely not typical.

[13] In general extreme GB pitchers don’t fare particuarly well in advanced metrics because a lot of them don’t strike out a lot of batters and give upa good number of hits. They make up for it by surrendering fewer XBH and limiting the impact of baserunners by higher than normal numbers of DPs.

He’s got a chance to become one of the best pitchers in baseball, and the Yankees have him for the next five years.

I am very wary of this new practice of not giving players a paycheck earned elsewhere so they can safely dog it while here.

[16] It’s a pretty risky manuever, but just think about all the money the Yankees are gonig to be able to give him in the future!

Also, Manuever is a great word. Manuever.

[15]  That may be true, but I would think that’s more a reflection of the quality of the pitcher than a reflection on the quality of the metrics.  I mean, as a general matter, a pitcher who allows a good number of hits and doesn’t strike out a lot of batters is not someone you want on the mound.

Fun fact:  With the addition of Pineda, the Yankees now have 3 of the top 12 SPs in the MLB (qualified) in terms of bats missed (contact percentage) for 2011.  Pineda is 6th on this list, CC is 8th.  Guess who is 12th?

Burnett

Joba, who will continue making no contact until at least May.

[18]
Unless unusually few of those hits are extra-base hits and they get a lot of double-plays and… wait, we’re back to where we started.

[18] That’s why extreme GB pitchers are rarely elite. Because they get so many ground balls, their BABIP is higher than a flyball pitcher. But they give up fewer XBH and get more DPs.

I am very wary of this new practice of not giving players a paycheck earned elsewhere so they can safely dog it while here.

I’m sure the Yankees will give Pinedo an opt out before season end. That’s the Yankee way, no?

I couldn’t tell from what little video I saw of Pinedo, does he do the inverted W? That’s one of the few things I know about pitching, which is main reason I asked.

[20]  Correct: it’s A.J.

[25] WPs are a not inconsiderable part of his arsenal.

Of the top 15 GB% with at least 80 IP in 2012, there are only 4 pitchers with a H/9 significantly under average (Tim Hudson, Chacin, Romero and Cueto), if you expand it to all pitcher with GB% 50 or greater, there are 27 pitcher only 6 of which have a H/9 significantly under average (Hamels and Buccholz).

Of those 27, 13 have a K rate above average (most have a K rate way below average), although only 6 have a K rate that is signicantly above average (Tim Hudson, Chacin, Romero, Jaime Garcia, Edinson Volquez and Hamels).

Only 9 of those 27 have a BB+HBP rate that is around average or lower (Only Jaime Garcia, Porcello, Volstad, Hamels and Pavano had BB+HBP/9 comfortably under the average).

At the other end of the extreme (pitcher with GB% under 38), 18 of 28 had H/9 under average, 14 had K rates significantly over average and 14 had BB/9 under average.

How likely is a 23-year-old fastball/slider pitcher to develop an effective change up?

[28] He’s pretty big, maybe a splitter could be an option as well?

Right now his change is reportedly bad, with his command, velocity and slider he probably only needs to get the change up to a servicable level.

Darvish cost: 18.6 for 6 years. More, figuring the interest loss on the uprontitude.

[30] Contract seems reasonable, the posting fees are insane.

[30]

?????

Reports are 6/60 for Yu.  Incentives could be another 10.

[32] He added the posting fee in. So over the 6 years of the deal the 60+51.7 = 18.6 per.

Seems a tad high for an unproven rookie.

[26]
Nice.

[34] The Rangers are ruining baseball.

It really surprised me to see Darvish only get $8 million more than Dice-K.

It is not so surprising to see that the Yankees are on Sunday Night Baseball three times, with two of those three being at Boston (one hosting the Angels).

[37] I’m not, Matsuzaka was not a good investment, Darvish is probably going to be better, but Matsuzaka’s failure had a big impact.

I thought that the posting fee would be smaller and the contract a bit larger, but I’m not surprised by the total cost.

[38] I have come to hate every game against the Red Sox.

What does it say about Boston that the Patriots are embarrassed to use the name of the city?

They won’t even agree to be associated with the state.

They were the Boston Patriots in the AFL days.

41: of course the Giants and Jets are loathe to include the state they play and practice in in their name.

[44]
Whereas the Dodgers and the baseball Giants ignore the state & city they belong to and include only the state they play and practice in in their name.

Shit. No Dodgers, D-Backs or Padres in interleague. Only series against the Angels is on a M-T-W. Time to talk the girl into roadtripping to Oakland at the end of May.

40 - Oh my God, every single Red Sox game last year was unbearable. Even after they started winning them. As if the ridiculous pace, CC getting shelled and annoying Red Sox personalities weren’t enough, they put over half the games on Fox or ESPN, which, what more can I say?

Yeah, the games against TWN are too annoying. I know going into the season I will watch (live or via delay) or listen to about 120 of the games but will miss some. I have been more prone to skip the games against TWN just because 5 hours is a large time commitment.

47. It was brutal man, you are definitely correct. I remember getting so mad at a Sunday Night Baseball game that C.C. did not pitch well in that turned out meaning nothing in the long run. The lesson is, human beings are passionate, irrational creatures, and ESPN blows hard.

[0] Is Pineda on the verge of collapse?

(First!)

[35] Thanks.  Cool that you’re hanging out here again after an (iirc protracted) absence.

[47]&[48] - Pretty much these.

I skip most of the Yankees games against TWN.  When I watch, it is frequently with the volume turned off.

I generally just watch the first 3 innings when its on NESPN.  3 innings is enough for the starter to dissolve and also the maximum amount of time you can listen to the announcers before suicidal thoughts begin creeping in.  It also allows you to check in around the 9th to see if its worth resuming watching after your psychologically mandated respite.

Funny, NYA-BOS didn’t used to be unwatchable.
 
[35]Rilke, thanks for saying so! Yrc - what happened is I was insanely busy IRL.  But eventually it turned out that I was actually getting things done, lots of things.
So I rushed back here, of course.

Am I the only one who DVRs games?  I avoid the score, fast forward between hitters, and all the useless crap and can usually watch any sporting event in 45 minutes to an hour.

For baseball there are certain pitchers I’ll watch (though I’ll fast forward between pitches to save a few seconds each pitch), but for the most part I just fast forward until there is a resolution to an AB.

[56]
sd, since the meat of the game (imho) is the game between pitcher and hitter, don’t you miss a lot by doing that?
I find that the best part of the game is thinking along - what pitch, and where, should come next. Then comparing it with what happens.

I usually only watch an hour or less of the game anyway and then catch the recap the next morning.  It’s very hard for me to sit still for more than that (movies are almost out of the question).

The DVR game experience is fantastic, although when I used to do it I’d only FF through commercials and/or garbage time…still, even doing that, it saves a ton of time, and you don’t lose precious brain cells to advertisement.

Usually I have baseball games on and do other things.  For example, read.  I actually get *more* reading done during the baseball season than I do other times!  I’m pretty good at being able to read and look up in time to get the pitch.  I can also ride my exercise bike, do laundry, etc.  Basically, the pace of baseball games allows me to be extremely productive getting other things done, while still watching the game and not feel like I’m wasting time.  So in that regard, Bos-NYY games are the best…

I have to admit, I often lose interest if the game is no longer in question, though I might stick around if a great pitcher is pitching.

[57] - Yes.  But not every pitcher is worth doing that with.  The pitchers that are worth watching that closely I do.  Or even when Hughes is struggling and I want to look for signs of him turning it around I will watch more closely.  Or a particular batter who is in a slump/hot streak I’ll watch closer, but do I really care about the chess game between the Yankees batters and Scott Baker?  Maybe every few hundred AB there is something worth watching in the pitch progression but for the most part I’m ok with missing that. 

Between that, commercial breaks, pitching changes, etc there is a ton of time to save.  Who has 3 extra hours every day 120-180 times a year?

Always turn off volume games @ Fenway.  Usually channel surf most games.

Am I the only one who DVRs games?  I avoid the score, fast forward between hitters, and all the useless crap and can usually watch any sporting event in 45 minutes to an hour.

When I had a real-by-gawd DVR before the digitial TV fiasco, I used to do this, as east coast games start at 4pm here. So I’d roll in around the 6/7th inning, put the dvr on 10xFF and mostly watch the scoreboard and baserunner indicators, stopping to watch the hits/scoring plays, or anything where the broadcast itself bothered to run a replay. I’d catch up in about 20 minutes and watch the last 3 innings live.

Sadly, the DVR from Comcast does not allow fine control of FF, R, Play. And MLBEI requires you to check the listings every morning and manually set up the recording. I’d sometimes forget to do this, or they might shift to another channel if the previous game on that channel went long. I’d come home to find a riveting battle between the Reds and Brewers.

MLBTV, when it works, is better.

But I still miss my real DVR, the one with the DVD Burner built in, so I could move content to long term archive.

I’m looking forward to mobile HUD displays in sunglasses being readily available. That way I will just run and work out during games. Will keep the stress level way down.

“HUD display” = “ATM machine”.

[65] Good point. Anyway, they already exist for consumers now, they just need a year or two to be worth it.

[67] There are now lab prototypes of HUD embedded in contact lenses. I think all they’ve done so far is place a couple of dots in view.