This kid is amazing. In what is a horrid season for the Giants, Lincecum is 10-2 with a 2.6 ERA. He has one of the worst offenses in MLB history. I really hope to see him start the All Star game at Yankee stadium. It would be pretty sick if he did that and won the Cy Young.

/thread

edison volquez imo

I like Volquez but he aint no Tiny Tim. His numbers may be slightly better this year so far but by the end of the year and for the rest of their careers I think Lincecum is much better. Plus Tim is probably the most entertaining player, not just pitcher, in the majors.

Go Huskies.

Would love to see Duscherer get the start for the AL, but he pitches this Sunday vs. L.A.. He's 10-5 with a 1.7 ERA. He should have 20 wins and a CY Young come years end.

Lincecum: 11-2 2.57 ERA 135K 1.25 WHIP

This is the only reason I'm still a Giants fan.

All-Star starters should be Volquez and Duchsherer. They have been the best in their respective league so far. Lincecum is great and has a HUGE upside, but Volquez should be the starter imo.

The Giants effectively took Lincecum out of consideration for the start by pitching him Sunday, and Volquez started Saturday. I wouldn't be surprised if Ben Sheets started.

The same reason why Duscherer won't be starting

Tough loss for the A's yesterday, although Duscherer again pitched great.

A caller on KNBR the other day said that he was a free agent at the end of the year - is that true? I can't believe that because one would think Beane would be shopping him now.

I would think the same thing, but he is in his 5th year which which would be near the end of his arbitration period. I would think that Beane would be shopping him just like he did Blanton and Harden. Maybe he's a free agent after the '09 season?


Sheets and Cliff Lee were just named the starters for the All Star game.

I was definitly impressed by him, really really great stuff

He's arbitration eligible in 09 and can become a FA in 10. So next year would be the year that Beane tries to trade him.

Did you see the Ann Killion puff piece on your favorite player, the gamer FP? She just fawns all over him for telling the truth about steroids

TYTY Andre for bringing this up, because I couldn't decide just where I'd get a chance to post my feelings on that article.

That article was awful; just as you said, a fluff piece somehow applauding a guy for being honest once he was caught. Radnich was talking about it today and I was almost tempted to call in and go on a FP rant but he seems to like the guy too.

She calls out Tiger Woods after the US Open, yet writes a fluff piece about that cheater (who still sucked while cheating)...SIGH.

I hate FP. He was a under achieving player that the Giants love. And he took 'roids. Most Giants fans seems to love him. asdfdfasfasdwerweaxwaebthre

LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLLL

General,

There is a great article in a recent Sports Illustrated about Lincecum. A must read for any baseball fan.....you learn a lot about why so many pitchers blow out their arms.

As far as Lincecum v. Duscherer.....I guess I would vote for Linc mostly because he has been a stud from the second he got into the majors and he has done it for a longer period. It is criminal how little attention Dusch has gotten though.....I bet most people think the Cubs got Oakland' "best" pitcher when they traded for Harden.

Is it possible the A's might keep Dusch? At some point you have to take a stand and keep somebody....thats what the Marlins did with Hanley. Maybe it is better to make that stand with a position player.

Billy Beane has shown, time and time again, that he really does not believe this. He's not going to give out a monster contract that will handicap the franchise and limit his maneuverability, especially to a pitcher. He's going to get whatever value he can from Duke, or -- if he thinks his team has a chance to win a WS -- hold onto him and eat it when he signs somewhere else.


Wang

With a pitcher I understand. With a positional player, I think you sign him early like FL did with Hanley, Tampa with Longoria, etc.

The word from Beane and the A's locally is that once they are in their new ballpark they will spend more money. Beane has hinted that might start even before that time in preparation - if they know they will be making money in the following years, they can start spending money prior to then.

That stadium won't be ready until 2011 at the earliest though (IIRC), and who knows if ownership will keep their promises.

My understanding of the Longoria deal was that it bought out -- at most -- a single free-agency year. It may have only taken him through his arb-eligible years, I dunno. They were basically just locking up club-controlled years, anyway, to save a little money in exchange for decreasing the player's risk.

It'll be a few years before Beane's allowed to increase the payroll enough to have the kind of freedom we're talking about. He simply does NOT give out contracts to non club-controlled players. The open-market is not Billy Beane's friend.

And as a fan of a team that has signed numerous awful contracts, I tend to agree with his position.

In this day and age the open market is only a friend to the 4-5 teams where money isn't an issue at all.

Well, money really isn't as issue for the Dodgers either; the problem is how they spend it.

I'd still take Duke over Lincecum right now. Like I stated in another thread, Duke's ERA and WHIP are both currently considerably lower than Lincecum's. Sure, Lincecum is younger and has done it for a tad longer, but Duscherer has only just recently been thrown in the starting rotation. But his relief numbers before that were even amazing.

And I also agree with the very little attention he's received, but as an A's fan I'm pretty used to that. If they're not on steroids and hitting a brazillion homers like back in the good ol' days, most A's players won't get the attention they deserve. Ryan Sweeney is proof of that. Here's a young kid who's batting .301, 30 RBI, 7 SB's, 3 HR's, and 31 Runs scored, and he was hurt for a bit. But because he's on the West Coast, he's not gonna get the coverage that an Evan Longoria is getting...even though he's batting like 26 points better. Ahhhh well, we're content being the underdog and the unknown's, but if we make the playoffs...watch the eff out.

And read my lips..."THE A'S WILL NOT LOSE JUSTIN DUSCHERER!" I guaran-FREAKIN-tee it.

that is all.

Longoria's OPS - .861
Sweeney's OPS - .762

Batting average is overrated - Juan Pierre is a career .300 hitter.

Also, on topic, LOL at Lincecum being out tonight because he has the flu or something. They were reporting on KNBR earlier that he was on a stretcher somewhere in NYC.

Also, Longoria's D is way above average (2nd in Fielding %, 4th in Range Factor) at a more critical fielding position. Rays' farm system is loaded too (Brignac, Beckham, Price, Davis, McGee, Jennings) so they could have staying power if they can keep their team together.

As for the Lincecum vs Duke argument. I'd rather have Lincecum due his younger age (24 vs 30) and the fact that the Duke has had trouble staying healthy in the past. Finally, if you look at BABIP, Lincecum is at .319 vs the Duke's .213 so the Duke has been much luckier with regards to BABIP this season. They both have been awesome this season but I'd go for Lincecum first, even over Volquez (his high BB/IP rate of 4.28 is somewhat scary although Volquez does pitch in a hitters park). Volquez is actually older than Lincecum by a year.

Not saying Sweeney is better, just that he's getting overlooked




Yeah I heard that too. I loved when D-Bruce said "and that splash you heard was every Giants fan driving simultaneously off the Golden Gate Bridge." Or something to that effect.

The Freak>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Duke. Duke is good but he doesnt have the track record Tim has, the stuff Tim has and like PMJ already pointed out Duke has been extremely lucky with BABIP this year. Ill take action with anyone on Tim having a better ERA for the rest of the year or VORP or almost whatever metric you want to use.

LOL @ The Freak...he's good, but he's not a freak lol. I pray that the reason he was sick is because he got wasted the night before, now that would be FREAKin awesome! That halo might have to be re-shined, no?

...oh, and I'll take that action on ERA for the rest of the year.

lol @ a's fans. can you just admit that Lincecum is a sick pitcher?

lol @ you lol'ing @ me lol'ing @ Lincecum...



























wait...what?

I would take Lincecum's post AS break ERA vs. Duchscherer.

Tim Lincecums BABIP- .319

J-Duke's BABIP- .213



It appears to me that Dukie's been significantly luckier than Lincy so far. Let's check the FIP's to get a gauge on real performance.

Lincecum FIP - 2.76

Duke FIP - 3.31



Lincecum's the favorite. Duke should regress a little.



Wang

Ill bet anything up to 400 on Stars. Escrowed based on how much you want to bet.

Not sure that luck has a whole lot to do with it.

Sorry, I'm not that much of a balla lol.

well when I read the Wik's article on Batting Average on Balls In Play, it said, "BABIP is commonly used as a red flag in sabermetric analysis, as a consistently high or low BABIP is hard to maintain - much more so for pitchers than hitters. Therefore, BABIP can be used to spot fluky seasons by pitchers, as those whose BABIPs are extremely high can often be expected to improve in the following season, and those pitchers whose BABIPs are extremely low can often be expected to regress in the following season."

Now, that makes sense but it seems like they just ignore the possibility that the guy with the high BABIP is just throwing stuff that is easier to hit. Either way, I don't think we can look at one guy with 319 and another with 210 or whatever they are and take too much into account with that. Especially when we consider it's only half a season. I don't really know too much about this stat as it's the first time I've thought about it. I have no idea what's extremely high and what's extremely low. If you're a betting man though, sometimes you have to stretch this a bit and take what little info you've got. If I knew more about this stat, I'd take more stock in it, but something better to look at could be that since Duke hasn't started regularly in some time, he could have a rough second half.



Link is a strikeout pitcher. So you'd expect that people aren't hitting as many balls in play as other pitchers and those that are in play are more likely to be for hits. Whereas someone like Duke will have more balls hit in play but presumably have more groundouts and flyouts. So I'd expect his BABIP to be lower but I'm not sure greater than a .100 difference is expected.

BABIP has been proven to be almost entirely random. There are a few exceptions like knuckleballers typically have lower BABIP and Tom Glavine has had a lower BABIP throughout his career than people have expected. Also when Brian Bannister was dominating at the beginning of the season alot of SABR inclined people thought that he could consistently keep his BABIP lower than most because he has really been a student of the science of pitching. But even these exemptions BABIPs wouldnt be predicted to be much lower than a typical pitcher.

For the most part ERA is pretty useless over smallish sample sizes. So even after 30 starts a pitchers ERA can be largely based on luck or BABIP. When evaluating pitcher performance over these small sample sizes look at things like strikeout rate, walk rate, HR rate, Groundball%. Basically stuff that isnt affected by a pitchers defense. There are a number of stats out there that are better than ERA like QERA, DERA, FIP like Wang mentioned already and FIPx. These stats basically just take a pitchers K/9, BB/9, HR/9 or GB% instead of HR/9 and weight those numbers according to what they have found to most affect runs and plug them into an equation.

Now correct me if I'm wrong (and I'm sure someone will lol), but wouldn't these two facts also point in direction that Lincecum would also tend to throw more pitches over the duration of the game? Hence, he will tend to go less innings than someone like Duke. As a matter of fact, here are the IP's for their last 6 games respectively...

Lincecum: 7.0, 5.0, 7.0, 6.0, 6.0, 8.0

Duchscherer: 8.0, 7.2, 8.0, 7.0, 9.0, 7.2


Now to me, this would mean that if someone has a bad outing, like Lincecum did against the Royals on 6/22 where he went 6 innings with 5 ER's, and 8 K's...that being a strikeout pitcher in a game like this is going to come back to haunt you right? Your pitch count is going to be high, therefore less innings and a decent amount of runs scored. Not that Lincecum, or Duke for that matter, are going to have many games like this. But when you do, wouldn't you rather be a ground ball out pitcher, rather than a K pitcher?

Bottom line is, I think being the ground ball/fly out pitcher is going to benefit Duke over the course of a year in terms of ERA.

Your right about Tim not throwing alot of innings for someone of his caliber. Alot of it is because he often goes deeper in counts then most and some of it is because he is young and the Giants dont want to blow out his arm. But I think your overestimating Dukes ability to go deep into games. Alot of this leads back to him being extremely lucky when it comes to allowing hits which means that hes going to face less batters per inning which will helps his pitch count alot allowing him to go deeper into games. Its still very impressive how deep Duke has went into games though considering that he hasnt started much before this year. At the beginning of the year I would have predicted he would last less than 6 innings per start.

Also your confusing Duke with a groundball pitcher. He has only had a 40% GB% this year when average is 47%. This is in line with his previous seasons too. This isnt a big deal though since in Oakland with its wide foul territories it helps there flyball pitchers alot more than it would in your average stadium. Also just for comparison Lincecum has a 45.1% GB% this year and a 47% last year.

Lincecum is still superior though and the ability to get strikeouts is the most important ability a pitcher can have imo. I think if you want to make your argument for Halladay instead of Duke being a better pitcher than Lincecum based on your points you may be on to something though.

How? Tell me why. You can't just say "he's superior" and expect me to just say "oh okay, you're right." Nothing in this post states why he's superior.

edit: Also, why is the ability to get K's the most importan ability that a pitcher can have? I would argue that the most important ability a pitcher could have is to be able to use the least amount of pitches to get the max amount of outs...no? And K's use up a lot of pitches, j/s.

Every time I see this thread title, I hear the KNBR morning show's Lincecum tribute song in my head lol...

As Lincecum matures, one would hope (rather, Giants fans should hope) that he learns to pitch for the quick inning more often and not for the strike out. Brad Penny really started to look like he was 'getting it' after watching Maddux and talking to him a lot (including one game where Maddux called his pitches from the dugout...); I know the Giants won't be one of the teams interested in Maddux this time around, but it wouldn't hurt to have someone like him around TL in the future. Matt Cain could def benefit as well, along with Jonathan Sanchez.

LOL me too...

Also, I really like Sanchez...that dude is gonna be a stud. That's gonna be a sick 1,2 punch in the years to come. I also heard a rumor on KNBR today that Philly is seriously interested in Cain, it'll be interesting to see if the Giants comply.

By the way Moneyball, I'm not saying that Lincecum is a not stud, but I'm also not completely sold that he's any better than Duke...other than the fact that he's younger and will prob. do it for more years. I'm just sick of Duke not getting any respect, when in fact his numbers thus far are better in 2008.

Every young pitcher could benefit from having Maddux as a teammate teaching them how to prolong their careers by pitching to contact rather than for the K, and by teaching them how important preparation is to being a successful pitcher.

A few reasons. First, a strikeout is preferable to any other out. If a batter hits the ball, bad things can happen (hit, error, move a runner, etc). A strikeout is the surest out.

Along those lines, strikeouts are incredibly valuable as rally-killers. Man on third, less than two outs.....it is important for a pitcher to be able to miss the bat to prevent the opposing team from scoring on a sac fly or groundout.

Also, K/BB ratio is almost always a great indicator of success.

Anecdotally, strikeout (power) pitchers seem to have the most success in the postseason. When the DBacks and Marlins broke up the Yankee dynasty they did it with power pitching (Zona = Randy Johnson, Curt Schilling.......FLA= Beckett, Penny, Burnett). The year the Cubs got close it was Prior and Wood. Those great Braves teams of the 90s? Maddux and Glavine were the regular season maniacs but if you look at the postseasons stats Smoltz, the power pitcher of the bunch, always had the most postseason success.

As far as Dusch v. Linc.....the only thing that really separates them is 30 vs. 24. Linc is six years younger therefore you should want him over Dusch. That and Linc has a longer track record of starting pitching success.....though I dont think Dusch is going to fall off the map by any means.

Hes superior because he has been better than Duke this year based on QERA and FIP which has much better predictive power than ERA when predicting future ERA, he has a better track record since he was great last year too while Duke was hurt or in the bullpen, 100% of scouts would agree that Lincecum has better stuff than Duke and Tims younger. So based on all those things I feel its safe to say hes superior. Duke is fine and all but hes not a 2.00 ERA pitcher he is like a 3.90 ERA pitcher truthfully which has alot of value, but is just not someone who should be compared with Tim Lincecum.

Ks are the most important ability a pitcher can have because a pitchers strikeout rate because out of all the stats like BB/9 GB% HR/9 it has the most predictive value in preventing runs. With 12 man pitching staffs nowadays using a low amount of pitches just isnt that important when you consider than striking someone out is a definite out compared to a ball in play which is only an out about 70% of the time and when it isnt an out it is often for extra bases.