Archive for Starting Pitchers

Javier Vazquez has been a perpetual disappointment.

As Eric Seidman (and many others) has covered, Vazquez’s controllable skills have never quite equated to the run prevention that many analysts believe he is capable of. 2009 begins a new chapter, as Vazquez will be a member of the Atlanta Braves.

In 2008, Vazquez posted a 4.67 ERA, along with a 200/61 K/BB ratio in 208 innings. The move away from US Cellular Field and to the National League should benefit him, and he’s due for some regression to the mean as well.

Vazquez allowed a .328 BABIP in 2008. He’s consistently allowed higher-than-usual BABIPs, but last year was even higher – his career BABIP is .310. Additionally, he stranded only 68% of the runners who reached base, lower than his career mark of ~70%. Vazquez’s stuff appears unchanged from years past, and his velocity is the same as it ever was.

In the National League, Vazquez could see his already-high strikeout rate rise even more, thanks to inferior NL hitters and getting to face the pitcher’s spot three times per game. Vazquez will also benefit from being out of US Cellular Field, where it was very easy to hit home runs. Vazquez has allowed slightly more fly balls than ground balls throughout his career, and should benefit from this change of scenery. Furthermore, the Braves are likely to have a solid defense behind him, which should help his BABIP even more. They are also likely to be a much better team than they were in 2008, helping Vazquez’s win total.

By this point, it would be silly to say that Vazquez has been consistently unlucky throughout his career, even though his ERA is almost always higher than his FIP. However, we should also note that Vazquez has pitched in poor circumstances for several years in a row – he’s pitched in hitters’ parks in Chicago and Arizona, he struggled in the limelight of New York, and he’s rarely ever played in front of a good defense during his career. He played for a manager in Chicago who called him out in the media and questioned his dedication. While it may be unlikely that Vazquez has indeed been the victim of consistently bad luck, we musn’t overlook the possibility entirely.

In 2009, Vazquez is probably going to post similar stats as he has throughout his entire career. But there’s a chance that Vazquez finally makes good on his immense potential, thanks to pitching in a pitcher-friendly environment for the first time in six years. He will rack up the strikeouts regardless, and regression to the mean should help lower his ERA. Vazquez has been incredibly durable and should be an excellent value in 2009 – let others undervalue him thanks to his artificially high ERA in 2008.

When someone begins talking about the Rays rotation, most skip to Scott Kazmir or David Price or even Matt Garza, yet neither of those trio can claim the title of best Rays starter in 2008. Instead, that honor goes to James Shields. The-soon-to-be 27 year old right-hander completed his second consecutive 200-plus inning season and duplicated the tendencies that have made him one of the more successful pitchers in the American League East.

Shields 2007 and 2008 share a ton of similarities. In both seasons, Shields completed 215 innings and faced 874 and 877 batters respectively. Shields walked four more, and allowed four less homeruns, but the only thing that truly changed were his strikeouts, which dropped a full strikeout per nine. Shields pitch usage remained largely the same as well; using his fastball about 45% of the time, a cutter, a curve, and his change-up, one of the premiere breaking pitches in the league. Shields batted balls also remained the same, as you can see below, and his batting average on balls in play was yet again .292.

Moving forward there’s no reason to believe Shields can’t repeat for a third successful year, although perhaps not a clone of the prior two seasons.

The New York Yankees made their second splashy, long-term commitment to a top-of-the-rotation starter yesterday, inking righty A.J. Burnett to a five-year, $82.5 million deal (which, by the way, Dave Cameron absolutely nailed in Burnett’s Free Agent Value piece).

It’s virtually impossible to predict with any degree of certainty how those mega-deals will play out in the long run, given the injury and attrition risks associated with pitchers. However, the Yankees are at the top of the revenue curve , and each additional win added to the club’s roster brings them significantly closer to a playoff appearance. With CC and A.J. now headed to the Bronx, the AL East boasts three absolutely terrifying rotations in Tampa, Boston and New York. Somewhere, a Blue Jays fan is weeping.

Using a mid-90’s fastball and a devastating curveball, Burnett has the repertoire to dominate. Few pitchers possess as much movement on their curve as A.J., whose power breaker has over six inches of horizontal and vertical break. In other words, it has more side-to-side motion than most sliders, while simultaneously “dropping” in the zone more than most 12-to-6 curves. Burnett’s 76.2 Contact% ranked 6th among all starters and is a testament to the quality of his stuff.

If only the conversation could end there. 32 in January, Burnett might as well come with an “if healthy” sign plastered to his forehead, as that qualifier has been and will continue to be attached to him. His injury history is too lengthy to list here, but elbow soreness (2006) and shoulder pain (2007) are the latest ailments to sideline the 6-5, 230 pounder.

Burnett has a long track record of missing bats, getting grounders and showing average control, and all three of those trends continued in 2008. While Burnett’s ERA rose from 3.75 in 2007 to 4.07 in 2008, that was more the product of an unusually high .328 BABIP (especially strange, given Toronto’s slick fielding). His Fielding Independent ERA (FIP) actually dropped from 4.33 in 2007 to 3.45 this past year, but very little changed in his controllable skills. Rather, his sky-high 17.7 HR/FB rate from ’07 regressed to a more average 9.6% this past season.

Burnett’s peripherals remain very strong, as he punched out 9.39 batters per nine innings and walked 3.5, generating grounders at a 48.5% clip. Using Expected Fielding Independent ERA (XFIP) from The Hardball Times (which evaluates pitchers based on strikeouts walks and a “normalized” HR rate), we find that Burnett’s last two campaigns were essentially of the same quality, with XFIP’s of 3.70 and 3.65.

Despite the rather smooth glovework done by the Blue Jays overall (+19 as a team in UZR, 3rd in Defensive Efficiency), Burnett had pretty poor luck on balls put in play. As previously mentioned when discussing Andy Pettitte, the Yankee gloves were less than ideal in ’08, with -39.4 UZR and a 25th-place finish in Defensive Efficiency. However, two of the team’s biggest culprits, Bobby Abreu (-25.2 UZR) and Jason Giambi (-1.8 UZR), appear unlikely to return, which should help matters. In addition, the rumored Melky Cabrera-for-Mike Cameron swap would improve things, as the soon-to-be 36 year-old Cameron can still run ’em down (9.7 UZR).

A groundball pitcher like Burnett will surely want to see better work from Robinson Cano, who was a plus defender in ’07 (8.1 UZR) but had a rough go of it in 2008 (-7.3 UZR). Derek Jeter had one of his better fielding years in 2008, but he still only managed to post a -0.4 UZR. The previous year he was at -18.4, and he’s been in the red every year we have UZR data going back to 2002.

While Burnett is an extremely talented hurler, his durability remains the great unknown. Burnett tossed a career-high 221.1 IP in 2008, and he didn’t experience health problems during the course of the season. However, the other two seasons in which Burnett crossed the 200-inning threshold both came with consequences. In 2002 as a Marlin, he tossed 204.1 innings. The following year, he made just four starts before succumbing to Tommy John surgery. Burnett again topped 200 innings in 2005 (209 IP). He made just 21 and 25 starts in 2006 and 2007, respectively, dealing with the aforementioned elbow and shoulder maladies.

Will Burnett remain healthy and productive in the Bronx? It’s worth gambling to find out. Just don’t place too high of a wager on his dominant but oft-damaged right arm.

In terms of flashy major league debuts, no one can top Edwin Jackson. On his 20th birthday, the fireballing Dodgers rookie defeated Randy Johnson, punching out four batters in six scoreless innings. A 6th round pick in the 2001 draft, Jackson came equipped with an ideal pitcher’s frame (6-3, 190) and a fastball that crept up near triple digits at times. Considered one of the brightest prospects in a fertile Dodgers farm system, Jackson figured to play a prominent role in LA’s future.

That plan never came to fruition, however, as the German-born right-hander spent the 2004 and 2005 seasons sipping sour cups of coffee with the Dodgers (62 H, 42 R in 53.1 IP) and getting clobbered at hitter-friendly AAA Las Vegas (126 R in 145.1 IP). He found some measure of success upon a demotion to the AA Southern League in ’05 (6.4 K/9, 2.6 BB/9), but on the whole those two seasons were brutal. Los Angeles eventually grew tired of Jackson’s lack of progress and jettisoned him (along with lefty Chuck Tiffany) to Tampa Bay for Danys Baez and Lance Carter prior to the 2006 season.

Jackson more or less trudged along the same disappointing career path in 2006 (5.45 ERA) and 2007 (5.76) as well, before posting a mark below the league average for the first time in his career this past season. Still just 25 and coming off a campaign in which he shaved his ERA down to 4.42, Jackson only figures to get better, right?

Well, the Tigers certainly think so. The club shipped rangy, cost-controlled outfielder Matthew Joyce to the Rays to acquire Jackson’s services a few days ago in what Dave Cameron called a “ridiculously bad trade.” While Detroit’s starting staff ranked just 21st in WPA/LI and could use some external help, there just isn’t much evidence to suggest that their newest arm actually made significant progress in 2008.

In 2007, Jackson posted a 4.90 FIP. In 2008, despite the huge difference in ERA, that FIP figure remained static (4.88 FIP). While he knocked off over a walk per nine innings from his line (from 4.92 BB/9 in ’07 to 3.78 BB/9 in ’08), his strikeout rate dipped considerably, down from 7.16 per nine in 2007 to just 5.3 in 2008.

It wasn’t really Jackson that improved, but rather the defense around him. The dramatic shift in the quality of Tampa’s D has been well chronicled. After posting a gruesome -54.2 UZR in 2007, the Rays skyrocketed to +70.6 in ’08 (for those of you scoring at home, that’s about a twelve-and-a-half win swing). Jackson’s BABIP was .351 in 2007, but with the best defensive squad in the majors flanking him in 2008, that number dropped to .301. He also benefitted from stranding 76.1% of runners on base, well above his 69.7% career average.

Jackson is a great example of velocity not being everything for a pitcher. Despite routinely popping the catcher’s mitt at 94 MPH, Jackson’s swinging strike percentage was just 7.7% in 2008, slightly below the 7.8% average for starters. For comparison, former teammate Andy Sonnanstine (he of 87 MPH heat and four offspeed pitches) generated swinging strikes at a 7.3% clip and bested Jackson with 5.77 K/9. So, despite Jackson’s “stuff” advantage, he missed about the same number of bats as Sonny while walking over two times as many hitters (which, I guess, gives you an idea of why Andy is sticking around and Jackson is not).

While Jackson is still relatively young and it’s conceivable that he could improve, he’s no more than an adequate fifth starter at this point in time. Don’t be fooled by the superficial gains in his 2008 numbers: the only thing that changed about Jackson this past year was the quality of the defenders around him.

Dave covered the signing of CC Sabathia on the front page, but what about CC’s fantasy value?

Wins: Sabathia went 6-8 with the Indians and 11-2 after the trade to Milwaukee. Sabathia’s early season woes have something to do with the mediocre Indians record (remember how he allowed 27 earned runs in his first 18 innings? Neither do most people) Sabathia did have a few tough losses though, two with Cleveland in which he allowed two runs or less, and one with Milwaukee. The 2008 Yankees offense scored less runs than the Indians, despite seemingly have more offensive talent, they did outscore the Brewers. In 2009, without Jason Giambi and Bobby Abreu, but with Nick Swisher and Robinson Cano regressing towards being good again, and a few probable free agent additions, the offense should maintain decent run support for Sabathia.

ERA: Don’t go out of the way to get your hands on Sabathia expecting a 2.70 ERA again. It’s rough to estimate, but Marcels has him at 3.22. That’s a pretty reliable projection, and we should expect a slight bump in moving back to the American League.

Innings: Same story as ERA, it’s likely that 2008 was the absolute peak for Sabathia’s workload unless the Yankees get a little too frivolous with their new toy. He’s still CC Sabathia, and he’s still going to get a few complete games, but again, don’t expect a complete game one-third of the time.

Strikeouts and Walks: Sabathia struck out a career high per nine. Sabathia’s strikeout percentage of total batters faced increased a smidge, from 24.3% with Cleveland to 24.8% with Milwaukee. It’s possible for a bit of regression here, Sabathia’s been up trending for three straight seasons. Here’s a graphical look at Sabathia’s strikeout rates:

WHIP: With walk rates covered, let’s look at hit rates. Sabathia’s had a pretty average BABIP the past few seasons. As a team, Yankees pitchers had a collective .323 BABIP against last season good for third highest in the league last season. The Brewers and Indians were quite a bit better, which is to be expected, given both of those teams likely have better defense, suggesting it’s probable to see Sabathia’s batting average against raise.

Conclusion: It’s possible that Sabathia becomes less valuable despite potentially earning more wins. Expect his ERA and WHIP to increase while his strikeout rate and innings load dip.

Although their repertoires and approaches vary, Canadian hurlers Shawn Hill and Rich Harden share a common theme: their susceptibility to injury. Both players are also 27 years of age and both were selected in the 2000 draft – Hill in the sixth round and Harden in the 17th round.

Hill has never pitched more than 16 Major League games in one season thanks to his ongoing injury woes, which have included Tommy John surgery. In 206.1 career innings, the right-hander has a 4.93 ERA and has allowed 234 hits. In 2008, Hill never looked completely healthy for the Washington Nationals and he allowed 88 hits in 63.1 innings. He posted rates of 3.27 BB/9 and 5.54 K/9. Hill does a respectable job of keeping batted balls on the ground and he posted a HR/9 rate of 0.71 last season.

Hill averages right around 90 mph with his fastball and he has been fairly consistent with that pitch over the past three seasons. His curveball was thrown about three miles per hour harder in 2008 than in the previous two seasons, although his usage dropped about four percent – in part due to the emergence of a slider, which he used 5.5 percent of the time. Hill also uses a change-up just under seven percent of the time.

Harden, now with the Chicago Cubs, appeared in just 16 games between 2006 and 2007 thanks to numerous injuries to his arm and shoulder. When healthy, though, he has been dominating. He has a 3.23 career ERA in 612.2 innings. Harden, 27, has also allowed just 7.1 hits per nine innings during that span of time. Last season, he made 25 starts between Oakland and Chicago, which was his highest number of appearances at the Major League level since 2004.

Combined, Harden pitched 148 innings and allowed just 96 hits. He posted rates of 3.71 BB/9 and 11.01 K/9. The flyball pitcher did a nice job of keeping the ball in the park with a HR/9 rate of 0.67. Harden’s average fastball has lost about two miles per hour from where it sat in 2005. Perhaps in an effort to protect his arm, Harden has changed his repertoire and approach. He has all but eliminated his splitter in favor of his change-up, which he threw almost 30 percent of the time in 2008, compared to nine percent in 2005. Harden has also cut back on using his slider – which has regressed from a usage of 10.7 percent in 2005 to just under three percent in 2008.

Both players enter 2009 with question marks. Harden pitched the second highest number of Major League innings in his career, but he was absolutely dominating in both the American and National Leagues. He has the potential to be a top-tiered starter, but with a history of shoulder problems – including the rotator cuff – caution must be used when acquired him in a Fantasy draft. In other words, don’t overpay or spend too early of a pick on the hurler. Expect to get 120-140 above-average innings out of him, and be thankful for anything beyond that.

Hill, who missed significant time in 2008 with forearm tightness, had bone spurs removed from his elbow in September and is expected to be “healthy” when spring training rolls around. If the medical reports are indeed good as the regular season begins, he is a name you should remember in NL-only Fantasy Baseball Leagues. Hill has the potential to provide a number of quality starts, but his ceiling is significantly below that of Harden.

The Dodgers are coming off a season in which they won their division and finished second in the National League. Yet, it’s possible they could lose two-fifths of their rotation, their starting left fielder, and non-tender their closer. Whether the Dodgers decide to invest money towards CC Sabathia, Manny Ramirez, or whomever else is up to be decided, but one thing that should be a given is the placement of James McDonald in the starting rotation.

Despite making a cameo in the Dodgers playoff run late last season, McDonald is still a relative unknown. A low-90’s fastball and mid-70’s breaking stuff doesn’t do much for the imagination, but McDonald has shown the ability to excel without any pitch that “grades out” and commands a strong minor league track record. Drafted as a pitcher, McDonald spent 2003 in rookie ball, throwing 49 innings and showing little concern for the opposing lineup’s collective confidence levels. In 2004, the Dodgers would shift McDonald to the outfield and give him a bat. He’d struggle in 125 at-bats, recording only three extra base hits, and having a 12:44 walk-to-strikeout ratio. That would’ve been excellent, if only he were still pitching.

Los Angeles would correct their error in 2006, and McDonald would return to dominating in 2007; breezing through High-A and Double-A with K/BB ratios over four and FIPs of 2.88 and 3.03. McDonald spent most of 2008 in Double-A, encountering a few hiccups; the most prevalent being a decreased strikeout ratio and increased walk ratio. A 22 innings stint in Las Vegas capped off McDonald’s minor league season, as he soon joined the major league club.

Since 2007, McDonald faced 1,047 batters in the minors. Of those, 281 struck out, or 27%. That’s pretty impressive for someone without “plus stuff”. The one downfall for McDonald could be his fly ball tendencies leading to potentially high homerun totals. McDonald didn’t show too many concerns about this in the minors, with HR/9 ratios usually clocking in just under one per, and pitching within the homerun suppressant Dodger Stadium should help, but the out-via-air patterns are worth noting.

Marcels isn’t much help with McDonald’s non-existent major league profile, but it’s easy to see McDonald lapping Brad Penny’s 2008, and being a bit of a sleeper in wins, strikeouts, and WHIP categories.

When Carlos Zambrano broke into the major leagues in 2001, he was the epitome of power pitching. The burly 6-5, 255 pounder pumped mid-90’s gas, and though he didn’t always know where it was headed, he racked up big strikeout totals. Zambrano punched out over 7 batters per nine innings between 2002 and 2003, before graduating into 8 K/9 territory. He whiffed 8.07 per nine in 2004 and 8.14/9 in 2006, before culminating at 8.83 K/9 in 2006.

However, as Big Z was racking up the K’s, his control was suffering. After walking about three-and-a-half batters per nine innings in ’04 and ’05, his BB/9 rocketed to 4.84 in 2006. Despite the higher strikeout rates, Zambrano’s controllable skills were headed in the wrong direction:

Zambrano’s Fielding Independent ERA’s, 2003-2006:

2003: 3.47
2004: 3.57
2005: 3.70
2006: 4.14

In 2007, Zambrano’s control took a (relative) step in the right direction, as he cut his walk rate to 4.20 batters per nine innings. However, that improvement seemed to come with a cost, as Zambrano’s K rate fell to 7.36/9. That shift produced further slippage in his FIP, as Big Z posted a career-high 4.58 mark.

Zambrano’s halted his rapidly ascending FIP in 2008, posting a 4.23 figure. He showed further improvement with the free passes (his 3.43 BB/9 was the lowest mark of his career), but Zambrano’s refined control came at the further expense of his strikeout rate. Big Z struck out a downright pedestrian 6.2 batters per nine innings, a far cry from his work just a few seasons prior.

While some might still categorize Zambrano as a power arm, he doesn’t really seem to fit the description anymore. Big Z once lit up the radar guns, but his fastball velocity has dipped in each of the past four seasons:

Zambrano’s fastball velocity, 2005-2008:

2005: 92.8 MPH
2006: 92.2 MPH
2007: 91.6 MPH
2008: 91.3 MPH

The 2008 version of Zambrano was at least more economical with his pitches. He posted his lowest pitches per plate appearance (3.80) and pitches/IP (16.0) since 2003. Big Z has also become more adept at getting batters to chase his offerings outside of the strike zone. His O-Swing% during his high-K 2006 season was 19.8%, but that figure climbed to 25.3% in 2007 and 25.7% this past season. With more pitches being thrown around the strike zone, batters seem less apt to lay off in hopes of coaxing a walk.

The combination of decreased velocity, K’s and walks leads one to believe that Zambrano is making an effort to show better control and put the ball around the plate more often. However, that improved command has significantly cut into his number of swings and misses generated. Once one of the more difficult starting pitchers to make contact with, Zambrano now ranks in the middle of the pack:

Zambrano’s Contact%, 2005-2008

2005: 77.9%
2006: 78.1%
2007: 78.8%
2008: 82.5%

It’s difficult to be very enthusiastic about the new, lower-octane Zambrano. Sure, his control is better. But he’s not going to be confused with Curt Schilling or Mike Mussina any time soon, and his whiff rate has dipped to the point where he’s actually below the NL league average of 6.99 in that department.

A pitcher can certainly be successful with a moderate K rate and worm-burning skills, but typically that sort of profile also requires the ability to paint the corners. Zambrano has improved in that regard, but his gains in the walk department still leave his control rating as just ordinary. When you combine a league-average K rate with a league-average walk rate, you get…a league average pitcher.

Still just 27, Zambrano has already accumulated nearly 1,400 innings on his right arm. That’s a Herculean workload, one that appears to be taken some bite off of his pitches. Courtesy of Baseball-Reference, we find that Zambrano’s most comparable player through age 27 is Ramon Martinez.

Like Zambrano, Martinez routinely crossed the 200-inning mark in his early 20’s, compiling plenty of strikeouts and walks along the way. However, such a massive workload at such a young age cut Martinez’s career short. Martinez’s major league career was effectively over by the age of 30 when his shoulder gave out, though he trudged on a little longer before calling it quits at 33. Perhaps Big Z finds his fastball zip this offseason, but all signs point to his days as a certifiable ace being over. As Martinez can attest, few youthful pitchers overcome such arduous innings totals to enjoy a lengthy career.

We all know Barry Zito. He is the biggest bust in free agent history. Zito is the guy who walks over five batters per nine. He is the fellow with the -2.79 WPA, the fourth-worst mark among starting pitchers last year. Zito is also the guy who falls down in high leverage situations, as his -1.34 Clutch rate was the third-worst for starters. He is the pitcher with an average fastball velocity of 84.9, the fifth-slowest mark in baseball and surrounded by guys in their 40s.

So, why on earth would we focus on him as a fantasy player?

In the beginning of the century, Zito was one of the top pitchers in baseball. There is a combination of ability and pitching smarts hidden beneath the wreckage of the past two seasons.

Well, that and he rebounded to pitch half decently after an awful start in 2008.

After nine starts, Zito was 0-8 with a 6.25 ERA along with 24 walks and 22 strikeouts in 44.2 innings. And just for kicks he allowed six home runs in that stretch. Not much return for $14.5 million, was it?

But from May 23 until the end of the season, Zito was 10-9 with a 4.79 ERA. Now, that’s hardly anything to get excited about but at the very least it was a drastic improvement over what he did at the beginning of the season. His K/9 ratio jumped to 6.52 while his BB/9 actually increased to 5.19 from 4.84 earlier in the season. And he also kept the ball in the park, allowing a 0.67 HR/9 mark.

One of the keys to Zito’s turnaround is that he actually showed a little more life on his fastball as the season progressed. According to Dan Brooks’ PitchFX site, in his penultimate start of the year, Zito’s fastball averaged 87.17 mph with a high of 89.4 compared to a season average of 84.9 as was mentioned earlier. By contrast, in his April 27 start, Zito’s fastball topped out at 84.4 and his average was 82.8 for the day.

With more life on his fastball, Zito went from awful to a league-average type starter. The final step in his rehabilitation will be to get his walk rate under control. And the main problem is still his fastball. According to Josh Kalk’s PITCHf/x tool, Zito’s fastball broke down like this:

Balls – 337
Called Strikes – 185
Swing and Miss – 36
Foul Ball – 123
Out Recorded – 78
Hit – 30

Clearly, with a heater that still doesn’t crack 90 mph, Zito can’t just lay his fastball down the heart of the plate. But hopefully, he can move closer to the strike zone and get more swings.

At this point, that is simply wishcasting. Zito actually has to go out and do it. Right now, he is not worth drafting in mixed leagues. But with the improvement that he showed last year, and with his past pedigree, Zito is someone to target late in NL-only leagues. And my hunch is that he will be a popular addition in mixed leagues during the season.

John Lackey’s ERA was the highest it has been since 2004, and his FIP was even higher. Should you be worried?

No.

In 2008, Lackey posted a 3.75 ERA and a 4.53 FIP. However, much of this can be attributed to an extremely high HR/FB. In fact, 15.3% of Lackey’s fly balls became homers last year, as compared to 7.3%, 5.7%, 6.6% and 9.0% over the previous four years, respectively. Lackey’s career HR/FB is 9.3% – just a tick under league average, and there’s no reason to think he suddenly became more homer-prone in 2008.

Lackey’s strikeout rate remained identical to his 2007 rate (and remember, he posted a 3.01 ERA in 2007), as he struck out 7.16 batters per nine in 08 and 7.19 per nine in 07. His walk rate also remained the same: 2.20 walks per nine in 08, 2.09 per nine in 07. Both his strikeout and walk rate have been trending down since 2005, and it appears that they have stabilized over the last two years.

Lackey’s batted ball data from 2008 was essentially in line with his career averages: batters hit line drives 20.2% of the time, ground balls 45.1% of the time and fly balls 34.7%. His career averages in these categories are 21.2% LD, 43.0% GB and 34.7% FB. Additionally, his pitch velocity and selection appear to be unchanged.

If you want to find something to be concerned about, it is worth noting that the amount of swinging strikes that Lackey has induced has gone down for four years running. In 2005, batters swung and missed at 10.2% of Lackey’s pitches; in 06 that fell to 9.7%, then 8.8% in 07 and 8.5% this year. This is still above average (league average for starters is 7.5%), but the downward trend is worrisome.

Overall, however, that’s the only warning sign for 2009, and it’s a relatively minor one at that. Lackey had a high LOB% in 2008 – he stranded 80.2% of the runners who reached base – and that number should regress towards his career average of 73.3%. However, that regression will likely be negated by the regression he should experience in his home run rate as well.

Lackey’s ERA probably won’t be 3.01 like it was in 2007, but it’s unlikely to be any higher than the 3.75 of 2008. A return to his 2005-2006 level of ERA is most likely. Lackey’s biggest problem may be the team around him, as I believe the Angels are in for a (perhaps serious) decline in 2009, one that could leave Lackey’s win total wanting. That, and his relatively low strikeout rate, probably prevent him from being a top-10 fantasy starter, but his durability and general skills probably leave him comfortably in the 11-20 range.

He’s still a very good pitcher, but his name recognition may slightly outpace his performance (even with an expected regression in HR/FB), perhaps leaving him a little overvalued in some leagues.