Another Joe Posnanski homer ... or strikeout?

http://www.kansascity.com/180/story/190463.html

Amazing stuff by Joe. Funny how some of the best pitchers in Kansas City history were not anything that resembled power pitchers. You could say Bret Saberhagen, Steve Busby and Mark Gubicza were, but Larry Gura, Paul Splitorff, Charlie Liebrandt, Buddy Black and Kevin Appier were not. Dan Quisenberry? The opposite of power.

I also love how Poz mentions that the Royals spent a million bucks on Colt Griffin, who never sniffed Triple-A and barely reached Double-A. Now one of the best pitchers the Royals have in the minors - Rowdy Hardy - touched 82 mph on the gun. But he's been dominating in his brief pro career, including being pitcher of the year in a rookie league last year. He signed for $1,000 or something like that.

 

Very good story. Makes a lot of interesting points -- particularly that the first and foremost idea of pitching is to get hitters out.

 

Love Joe's stuff. Tho, I'd have to admit that a 82mph fastball doesn't exactly inspire great confidence.

 

You're right, but that's also the whole point. Hardy just gets guys out.

 

That was a really good article. And I got a kick out of Rowdy Hardy (sounds like he was the drug-addicted brother of Frank and Joe) not being named among the top 30 Royals prospects. Yeah, cause there's 29 guys ahead of him who are GUARANTEED to make the big leagues.

That said...

Yeah. At Single-A. That slop will not work in the majors. Ask John Stephens, ex-Orioles farmhand who dominated by throwing slop in the minors but never put it together in the majors.

Even Paul Byrd throws 86.

 

Even if I don't agree with Posnanski, he always makes for great baseball discussion.

 

Granted, guys like Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine and Pedro Martinez were never 82-mph pitchers, but they never blew people away with their fastballs, either. I think pitching is an art. Sure, watching gunslingers like Nolan Ryan, Randy Johnson and Billy Wagner challenge hitter with consistent heat is fun, but I've got more respect for guys who have to out-think the opposition with nearly every pitch.

 

a good major pitching coach could tinker with him enough, arm slots, etc., to boost that fastball by a few mph.

 

That was what I thought. If you have a guy with great control who knows how to pitch, you might (MIGHT) be able to teach him to drive off his back leg a bit more and get that fastball up to 85 mph.

I think part of the problem with guys who don't have zip is that all pitchers get shelled at some point, but when guys who throw mid-90s gas get shelled, people say, "Well, he just had a bad day." When guys throwing in the 80s get shelled, the first response is always, "He can't get guys out with that shit." That might be true, but Jamie Moyer gets guys out.

 

I think the margin of error is smaller if you throw 85 as opposed to 97. But major league hitters can hit anything -- ANYTHING -- if their timing is right.

I remember a sequence about 10 years ago where a batter (Eric Anthony maybe?) was going against Mark Wohlers. Wohlers threw like six straight 99 mph heaters. Anthony was way behind on the first one, missed the second, nicked the third, fouled off the fourth and fifth and then drilled a home run 400 feet with the sixth.

 

Jamie Moyer has been getting away with it for years, at least in the regular season. That shit tends not to work so well in the playoffs.

 

Um, at least in Moyer's case, I'd say it has worked pretty well in the playoffs. At least well enough for a career 2.66 postseason ERA with a total of seven earned runs over four postseason starts, and a postseason WHIP of .91. He's 3-1 to boot. Not a huge sample size, but his postseason WHIP and ERA are both below his regular season career numbers. It doesn't matter how hard you throw, if you have good command of your pitches you will get the hitters out, no matter if it is in the regular season or postseason. Then you just have to hope your team puts some runs across.