May 10, 2008
Returning to Form
Scott Kazmir is pitching much better in his second start of the season. He's shut out the Angels through six innings, striking out six and walking three. He's probably done for the night as he's thrown 108 pitches.
That's the main thing keeping Scott from becoming a true ace. He uses a lot of pitches to get his strikeouts (and his walks). Contrast that with Shields, who used just 92 pitches to complete the game Friday night.
Posted by David Pinto at
09:01 PM
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This problem has been hampering him since the get-go. He's basically a 6 inning pitcher and that's been fairly steady (with a slight trend to the positive) for the past 3 years.
It seems to me that after a few more seasons in the rotation, he is either going to improve or hurt himself and enjoy a move to the bullpen. If some of those great pitching prospects in Tampa pan out then what the heck... send him out for the 9th and you got a lights out, home grown closer. It may be a confidence factor, him not trusting his stuff. Dustin McGowan went through that (it surfaces from time to time) but then he realized that most hitters flail on his offspeed stuff after seeing a bunch of 98 mph fastballs.
And it should be noted that most power pitchers are inefficient. A.J. Burnett averages 6.5 innings per start.
Basically its the difference between Nolan Ryan and Pedro Martinez.