Double-Dippin' in Chi-town

What a day; lots of good and some bad too.

Should I be more excited about winning another road series or more disappointed that Lawrence was lit up like a Christmas tree?

Should I be more excited about Peavy’s dominance or more disappointed that Lawrence gave up 6 two-strike hits to 13 hitters in the first two innings (including a double and a home run)?

Should I be more excited about Nady’s combined 5 for 8 or disappointed with Nevin’s 1 for 8?

The reality is, I can’t complain too much when we go into the Windy City and take 2 out of 3 and not just beat, but beat up on, one of the Wood-Prior twin aces.

Any John Maxwell fans out there? I’m listening to some of his tapes (CDs) on being better at…. … at whatever you do. They’re really good stuff. Anyway, this morning I was driving to work and one of the things Maxwell said was that you have to constantly change. If you don’t change, you stagnate. And when you stagnate you’re forced to change anyway. The problem is that when you’re forced to change, you’re forced to do so at great pain.

Being the baseball nut that I am, as I heard that, I couldn’t help but wonder if Billy Beane was a John Maxwell fan. This last off-season Billy changed the make-up of the A’s before he was forced to do so. His preemptive strike was a necessary one. And Oakland fans will enjoy far more combined wins the current team over the next three years than they would have if Billy had kept Hudson and Mulder for this season.

I say all that because I wonder if we should have traded Brian Lawrence this past off-season.

Let’s look at the numbers:

2001 114.2 IP, 107 H, 53 R, 44 ER, 10 HR, 34 BB, 84 SO
2002 210.o IP, 230 H, 97 R, 86 ER, 16 HR, 52 BB, 149 SO
2003 210.2 IP, 206 H, 106 R, 98 ER, 27 HR, 57 BB, 116 SO
2004 203.0 IP, 226 H, 101 R, 93 ER, 26 HR, 55 BB, 121 SO

Furthermore, B-Law’s K/9 IP rate is too low. I’ve read that pitchers generally need to keep their K/9 rate above 5.5. In 2001 it was 6.59. In subsequent years it has been 6.39, 4.96, and 5.37. His K/BB rates (how many strikeouts per walk) also show a disturbing trend: in 2001 B-Law posted a 2.47 K/BB rate. Since then that rate has been: 2.87, 2.04, and 2.20.

One last discouraging note: Brian is known as a ground-ball pitcher. And he still gets more ground balls than fly balls. But as he has drifted back towards being neutral he has become less successful: in 2001 2.42 groundballs per fly ball, since then: 2.51, 1.61, and 1.81.

I’m wondering how much “pain” we’ll have to go through with B-Law before we’re forced to make a change.

On a more positive note, Peavy is the da’ bomb!

7 IP, 6 H, 2 R (both earned), 1 BB, 7 SO, 1 HR – 102 pitches

I know it’s early in the season, but having just looked at B-Law’s numbers, I wondered over to look at Peavy’s numbers as well.

Looking at rate-stats again:

K/9 K/BB #P/IP
2002 8.29 2.73 16.8
2003 7.21 1.90 16.6
2004 9.36 3.26 16.2
2005 11.20 5.67 15.2

So Peavy is throwing fewer pitches per inning, walking fewer hitters, and striking out more batters. Now that’s the definition of dominance!