Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
April 23, 2008
Good News for Some Pitchers

There were a few aces last night trying to right poor starts to the season. Justin Verlander allowed just one run over six innings, although the strikeouts weren't there. C.C. Sabathia fooled the Royals, striking out eleven and walking just two in six innings.

Barry Zito didn't fare as well. He lasted just three innings, allowing three runs and losing for the fifth straight time. He continues to walk more batters than he strikes out, and when he comes in the zone, batters hammer him. The league is hitting .321 against him with a .509 slugging percentage. Basically, a hitter is an MVP candidate when he faces Barry. The good news is that there's less than six years left on his contract.

In one of those "I better not say what I'm really thinking" quotes, Bochy responded to a question about Zito by saying, with lips clenched, "It was not a good night, not a good outing for him. I'll leave it at that."

Posted by David Pinto at 08:00 AM | Pitchers | TrackBack (0)
Comments

The Royals and Rangers are hardly big-hitting teams, but Sabathia and Verlander did look a whole lot better last night. Zito just doesn't have that awe-inspiring curve any more. Instead he throws spinning meatballs right where the hitters like 'em...when they're in the zone at all.

It's a little odd that a couple pitchers got their groove back on a day when the hitters were mashing. The contests averaged over eleven runs a game, which I think is the highest-scoring day of the year so far.

That made for an entertaining session of flipping around on Extra Innings. The runs per game number continues to creep up toward last year's nine and a half.

Posted by: Casey Abell at April 23, 2008 10:12 AM

Zito still has the big curve, he just can't spot it consistently enough. Batters are sitting on his 84 mph fastball and hammering it. You don't see many swing-throughs on his heater. I'm afraid one of these days he's going to take a shot back through the box and have his handsome mug rearranged.

He needs to either start working on a knuckleball or get in touch with Greg Anderson.

Posted by: Mike Stoner at April 23, 2008 06:17 PM

When you strike out 11 you're not fooling - you are mowing them down.

Posted by: Bandit at April 24, 2008 10:08 AM
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