Pitching Prediction Poll

[Benjamin Grimm]

Which of these three pitchers do you think will have the best season in 2010?

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Hard question.

I'm predicting Maine turns into a reliever, and a good one, so he technically could have the best season but be less valuable than a starter with an OK season.


Uh, Pelfrey, and I don't know why.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Pelfrey is my hunch too. I fear that Perez is in a permanent tailspin. This will be a very important season for him, much like 2006 was for Beltran. (Hopefully Oliver will rise to the challenge as well as Beltran did.)

[smg58]

Pelfrey's younger, and probably has the most upside at this point.

[metirish]

Ollie will astound next season.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: Hard question. I'm predicting Maine turns into a reliever, and a good one, so he technically could have the best season but be less valuable than a starter with an OK season. Uh, Pelfrey, and I don't know why.

Same.

And I'm not sure anyone could explain their answer to this one. Maine supporters would have to go out on a limb and predict a full year of good health, and Olliefolk... well... it's pretty much ALL hunch there, no?

[metirish]

Hunch?....I looked into his soul and I saw wins.....17 of them

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Well, I think Ollie has the best chance of the 3 to completely suck but I think he's all upside in the sense that he won't be the Mets' problem anymore if he has a worse season that last year.

[metirish]

And there goes one of the few Ollie supporters that was left.

[TransMonk]

I think all 3 of these guys have good enough "stuff" to be above average pitchers. If any or all of them got their heads straight...look out. Their success or failure may depend as much on Warthen and Jerry as on the individual pitchers.

[ashie62]

You need a "safeword" when watching these 3 pitch

[Guest Rockin' Doc]

I went with Maine, but could just as easily have picked Pelfrey.

Pelfrey needs to develop a reliable secondary pitch to go with his fastball, if he can do that he could be very good.

Maine has the pitches if his arm is sound.

Perez wasn't even a consideration to me. I view him as a virtually hopeless headcase. He has the best stuff of the three, but he just seems to lack something (concentration?, mental fortitude?, confidence?). It doesn't matter how good your stuff is if you can't throw strikes and hit your target with reasonable regularity.

[Guest Edgy DC]

I try to stay as far away as possible from million-dollar-talent-ten-cent-head theories. They can be really unfair.

[Guest Rockin' Doc]

Edgy DC wrote: I try to stay as far away as possible from million-dollar-talent-ten-cent-head theories. They can be really unfair.

I know it's an often overused cliche, but it's the best explanation I can come up with after watching Perez pitch. At least it's more insightful than the overused assessment of "he sucks".

Perez has very good stuff, but his inability to hit his target reliably is exasperating. I have personally given up hope of his ever being a reliable starter, rather than the Jeckyll & Hyde he was the past two years. I hope he proves me wrong and turns into a steady, consistent starter next season and beyond. However, I'm not holding my breath and I wouldn't be counting on his revival if I was the GM either.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Isn't that what they used to say about Sandy Koufax before Sandy Koufax became Sandy Koufax?

[Guest Edgy DC]

Koufax?� Really?

I just struggle find workable answers to a couple of important questions regarding the ten-cent-head theory:

(1) Doesn't it take some headiness to achieve "stuff" as well as consistency?� Isn't something akin to biomechanical execution one of the multiple intelligences Howard Garner speaks of?

(2) Haven't Maine and Pelfrey struggling to find consistent form?� Just as Jeckly and Hydey?

(3) How do we really know who is the one with an inconsistent performance and a 4.50 ERA because he's squeezing all he can out of his talent and the one who gets there by talent that he is unable to consistently apply?� Pelfrey was the ninth pick in the nation, is six-seven, and throws in the mid-nineties, but sits dead last among these guys in K/9.� Why ins't he considered the guy too stupid to advance his talent?

(4) Why is the guy who has once achieved excellence and is trying to return there more vulnerable to this criticism than guys who have never achieved it?

(5) Why is this (and I imagine this isn't the starting point with Rockin' Doc at all but it's important to bring up) a tag disporpotionately laid on athletes of color?

A study was done back in the eighties, and I know I've referenced it before, but just as US sports announcer would disporportionately praise black players for their athletic prowess and whites for their moral/intellectual prowess, so would European football announcers distinguish Latin Americans from their white Euro-counterparts and even Canadian hockey announcers distinguish the Franco-Canadians from the Anglo- and Scots-Canadians.And we can't help but receive some of this wisdom, right or wrong, from the media who taught us so much of what we think we know about the game.�� I think it's something that fans need to be really guarded about, not leastwise because it's so incultureated that players half believe it, with white players comfortably saying in inteverview how nothing was every given to them and they've worked to get where they were, while the Strawberries will state almost apologetically state how conscious they are of their talent and how they need to ojnor the gifts they've been given with sufficient work.

"Hey, Darryl!" I'd scream, "You've worked plenty hard to get where you are and accomplished more than a kennel of Scrappy-Doos!� Give yourself a break and congratulate yourself a bit!"

(Hey, what's that soapbox doing under my feet?� Sorry about that.)

[Theoldmole]

I went with Pelfrey. In spite of last season, I see a pretty consistent development there. I realize that makes no sense, but I'm sticking with it anyway.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Kevin Burkhardt asked Bob Ojeda this very question last night on Mets Hot Stove Report.

Bobby O picked John Maine, because, he says, it's easier to recover from physical problems than from mental problems.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Bobby should know. He's had them both.

[MFS62]

batmagadanleadoff wrote: Isn't that what they used to say about Sandy Koufax before Sandy Koufax became Sandy Koufax?

I think the difference in the Koufax and Perez situations was that when Koufax "got it" he got it.

IIRC it was one of his catchers (Norm Sherry?) who told him that he didn't have to throw every pitch 110 MPH to be successful if he could control his fastball at 99 MPH (I may have the MPH numbers wrong, but you get the point).
Once he got the MPH/ control thingie down, he maintained a high level of consistency. To use your words, he "became Sandy Koufax".

Perez has received coaching on his release point. At times it has seemed that he got it, and he pitched effectively for a while. Then, it seems that he forgot what had worked, and has reverted to awful. He is still an enigma. Predicting his performance is like predicting where a leaf will land after the tornado passes.

It could be the inconsistency can be traced to adjustments he has made because of the knee pain. Now that he had the operation on it, maybe it will help. A lot of maybes there.

Later

[Frayed Knot]

Boras was trying to sell teams on the idea of Perez = Koufax during his FA period prior to last season: Both left-handed, wild, high-Ks, high-BBs, etc.

The fact that Koufax then "got it" at around age 27 and turned into what he turned into was what Boras tried to link to the then 27-ish Ollie.
Nice try.

[MFS62]

Well, Boras convinced one team that Ollie was worth a lot of money, didn't he?

Later

[Benjamin Grimm]

I thought I'd revisit this topic, now that we're about a third of the way through the season.

[TransMonk]

I was one of the 21% who voted for Ollie. Granted, it was 6 months ago and Ollie was supposedly in the best shape of his life and eager to prove he was worth his contract.

I'm of the opinion that he has the best raw talent of the three, but is the least focused. There's no doubt in my mind that Pelfrey has a look in his eyes this season that tells me he "gets it". It may be confidence or maturity, but either way, it makes his talent dominating.

I thought Perez might find that this year.

[Fman99]

I predict, boldly, that Pelfrey will be the best of these 3 for 2010.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Stick to your guns. The year isn't over.