Other than Colon & Millwood (both debatable), I'd love to hear who the others are. You could make the argument for both Maddux and Ponson.
Maddux is definitely in the picture, Ponson though? That fat whiney jelloass of a headcase can stay as far from my team as possible.
I do think the addition of a great Lefty would be awesome, but i just hope we dont lock him up for too long, and he starts to become a scrub, and we start hating him for being overpaid, etc, etc
OK, here goes: 1. Colon 2. Millwood 3. Ponson - Another common misconception from an earlier post, Ponson actually pitched better with the Giants than with the Orioles, but his W/L record was much worse, so most assume he pitched worse 4. Livan Hernandez - Expos have an option that is not likely to be renewed 5. Maddux - Not as obvious as you would think, has age and durability questions 6. (maybe) Escobar - His upside is much greater than Pettitte's, but his downside is as well There are also a couple of guys (Nomo & Lowe) who I would put on the list who are eligible for FA, but whose options will likely be picked up before they hit the open market.
Well, I read in the Chronicle that Petitte is being raped by Houston fans who are begging him to come to Houston. (Including his friends and family).
Pettitte is going to get a $15 million dollar offer from the Yankees most likely, and he's not going to turn it down. Drayton Mclain is a cheap ass and won't match the $15 million. I'm glad that most likely Drayton will sell the team after the 2004 All-Star game to Tillman Fertitta of Landry's. That's why he only gave Hunsicker a 1-year deal...
So, if he wasn't a cheap ass in this situation, he'd just be a dumbass. $15 million for Pettitte would be a horrible move. Also, you'd think you'd know how to spell your employer's name.
I'll give you Milwood and perhaps Colon....but I would take Pettite over Maddux (at this point of Maddux's career), Ponson and any of the other guys mentioned. Livan Hernandez??? Are you kidding me? This is the 1st time in years that he had a winning record after June I believe. Escobar??? We have Escobar...his name is Dotel.
I actually may be in the process of changing my opinion on Pettitte. After doing some research, I have come to some conclusions that aren't really that apparent on the surface. Of course Pettitte wins games. IMO, there are three reasons for this. 1. Run Support - Pettitte has finished in the Top 10 in run support in every year he's pitched except 2 (he was #12 in '95, his rookie year, and #21 in '98). 2. Yankee Stadium - New York's park is one of the friendliest in the league to LHP. 3. Yankee Bullpen - Over Pettitte's career, the Yanks have had, if not the best, one of the best bullpens in the AL. I am a firm believer that Wins are the most over-rated statistic for a pitcher, particularly a starting pitcher, because they are so dependent on the rest of the team. I came to my conclusion that Pettitte is no more than a slightly above average starter based on (again IMO) the most important 'team-independent' pitching stats, such as OBA, OOPS, WHIP, ERA, etc. Pettitte's numbers in those areas just don't compete with the elite pitchers in the league. In fact, it would be difficult to call Pettitte anything better than mediocre according to these stats. I also reasoned that Pettitte would be a bad fit for the Astros because of the huge change in going from a gigantic left field power alley in Yankee Stadium to a short porch in Minute Maid. However... After examining the background behind these numbers, I think there is a reasonable chance that Pettitte could improve upon them for several reasons: 1. K/BB ratio - Pettitte has always had an excellent K/BB ratio, and this has always puzzled me, considering how pedestrian the rest of his stats are. 2. Groundball-Flyball Ratio - Pettitte is always among the league leaders in this stat, meaning that the significance of the stadium configuration is minimized somewhat. Pettitte will give up his fair share of HR's in Minute Maid, but he throws as many ground balls in the majors this side of Derek Lowe. This is also important when considering #3 3. Derek Jeter & Adam Everett - Pettitte would go from having the worst defensive SS in the majors to having perhaps the best defensive SS in the majors playing behind him. This alone will take a number of hits away from his OBA, and other resulting stats. The big thing is 3B defense. The Yanks typically have a great defensive 3B (Brosius, Ventura, Boone), and I'm not sold on Ensberg/Blum at 3B. Kent is a sub-par defensive 2B, but Soriano is worse, so that shouldn't effect the numbers. In the end, the improvement of SS defensive trumps the other positions by far. Sorry for the book, but I wanted to share my conclusions and justifications. The ultimate question is whether Pettitte will be worth the $10MM contract he'll likely command, probably more if the Yankees decide they want to keep him.
Hammer... the one thing you cant measure with stats is the fact that this guy wins BIG games Just about everytime that the Yanks have needed a big postseason win, he has gotten it...everytime the yanks are in a freefall in midseason (a freefall for the yanks may be a once or twice a season 3 game lsing streak) he stops the streak...his big game experience in invaluable to a team like the Astros. This past postseason... Yanks were down 1-0 in the series vs Minny and Pettite pitched a gem in game 2 to get them back and the Yanks never looked back. Yanks were down 1-0 vs Bost and Pettite again came in and pitched a good game to even the series. Game 6 vs Boston he got rocked Game 2 vs Fla (yanks down 1-0 in the series) he pitched his best game of the postseason Game 6 (which the yanks lost the game and series) Pettite went 7 innings and gave up 1 ER and lost. All in all, living up here and being exposed to the Yanks al the time...I can tell you that this guys wins a ton more big games than he loses...and its not all about run support. Also...the run support argument really doesnt hold much water here because the Astros aren't exactly a light hitting team (at least in the reg season)
So do you think he would win the BIG games if he pitched for Tampa Bay? Pettitte has a 3-4 career record in the World Series. Game don't get much bigger than that, do they? Pettitte's career post-season numbers? 13-8, 4.05 ERA. Those are remarkably similar to his regular season totals. The fact is that given a statistically significant sample set will perform similarly in big games as they do in every other game.
If Tampa was good enuf to make the postseason , yes. But that is irrelevant. We are talking about a team (Astros) with a very potent lineup. The 3-4 WS record is also misleading....in just the examples I gave you he was 1-1 but pitched 2 great games. That record also doesn't include the ND's he got where he pitched well enough to keep a good team in the game. Colon is 2-2 in the postseason...Maddux is 11-14...Ponson only pitched one game and got rocked...Livan is actually 6-2 with a 3.99 and he is easily the least desirable option...or at least a close second to Ponson.
Did you even TRY to watch this years world series? This guy was lights out as it gets. Lets compare Pettite to Beckett, the world series MVP. Pettite: 1-1; 0.57 ERA; 14/4 SO/BB; .207BAA Beckett: 1-1; 1.1 ERA; 19/5 SO/BB; .148BAA
OK, the D-Ray question was kind of dumb, but with no edit, it had to stay. You can't pick out a handful of games and make judgements on those. Pettitte has pitched roughly 200 IP in the post-season in his career and has put up numbers across the board that are nearly identical to his career regular season stats. I still contend that good pitchers will pitch good in the post-season, and poor pitchers will pitch poorly in the post-season. You bring up Maddux, but other than his W/L record, his post-season numbers are pretty good (3.23 ERA). Let me ask you this, you contend that Maddux is a poor post-season pitcher and that Hernandez is a great post-season pitcher. I'm certain that you would take Maddux in a heartbeat and pass on Hernandez. In these cases, you don't allow their post-season numbers to get in the way of their value, yet that is exactly what you are doing with Pettitte. And I'm not talking about team run support. I'm talking about individual run support. Pettitte has gotten more run support than any other pitcher in the majors over the course of his career. In 2003, the Yankees scored 5.4 runs/game (Houston scored 5.0), but in Pettitte's starts they scored over 7 runs/game. You'll find that consistently over his entire career. He has been tremendously lucky over his career in regards to run support, which has buoyed his win total.
What I'm really trying to convey is that we have (obviously) historically had no luck in the playoffs...period. I think some of that is due to the fact that we have had to send out guys like Brian Moeller or a broken down Shane Reynolds to pitch a big game. I truly believe that Pettitte would solve that problem given his experience and success in the postseason.
