selig warming up to idea of rose in hof?

Since when is 200 innings almost "unheard of"? Last year, the top 10 pitchers in each league pitched at least 206 innings. Halladay had 246 and in 2003 he threw 266 to lead the AL.

Yeah, no one's getting near 300 innings anymore because of 5-man rotations but at least get the facts straight.

Another thing to remember is that in the days of 16 teams each team had significantly better pitching. The four and five starters on most teams now would have been languishing in triple-A back then. And don't forget the amount of money that's now invested in these players. There's much more incentive now to make sure they come along slowly and don't get seriously hurt. Unless your name is Dusty Baker.

Edit: Also what those guys said.

 

I also think pitch counts could be lowered with help from a couple of places:

Pitchers: Throw a damn strike.

Umpires: Call a damn strike.

 

That's a HUGE factor. Since the early-mid 1980s, the effective strike zone has been cut about 40% (see diagram -- although the text is wrong: by the rule book, the strike zone goes from the top of the kneecap to the armpit).

In MLB the last 20 years or so, nothing above the belt is ever called a strike. Nothing. Ever.

 

Sounds like launch time to me Starman. And apparently, others in MLB think so too.

 

Umpiring is definitely a part of it.

So is pitchers trying to hard to make perfect pitches. They don't trust their stuff and end up nibbling at the corners. .

I wonder if the use of aluminum bats is a factor as well. Pitchers grow up having less success challenging hitters than they should and some of them have to learn how to pitch inside on the professional level. They don't build the same confidence they would have had if they grew up breaking bats. This leads to more nibbling, which leads to more pitches thrown.

And maybe it is because they don't work enough, but we keep getting anecdotal evidence that pitchers can't handle the heavier workload. Dusty Baker askes Aaron Harang to work more than two innings in relief in between starts last year and he really hasn't been the same since. Brandon Webb racks up over 225 innings for four straight seasons and his 2009 season is ruined by a sore shoulder that will probably require surgery and may take him away for part of 2010 as well.

You think pitchers won't notice what happened to Webb? I can't see the Diamondbacks exercising his option for 2010, so now he's going into free agency injured, which is going to cost him a ridiculous amount of money.

Maybe pitchers do need to be throwing more and not less, but I doubt many organizations or pitchers will want to take that risk.

 

Part of that comes from being in an era where a mediocre SS can still hit 15-20 HR a year. 20 years ago, you got to the bottom of the order, you could get away with throwing slop because even if you made a mistake, the worst you gave up was a double. Now most hitters have the ability to hit a mistake pitch out of the park. You can't go inside and reclaim the inner black, hitters can hit the outside pitch with power and mistakes to almost any non-pitcher can be very costly. It demands perfection every pitch, so you nibble at the corners and have to give it your all. That wears on young arms.