Zito

On May 5, 10:53�pm, JW <Jo....TakeThisOut@clearwire.net> wrote:
> At his age, why is his strength gone? �That big a drop has to be from
> more than just aging. Does he even work out as hard as some of the
> younger pitchers? �Besides rebuilding his psyche, they should work on
> his body.

Too much yoga , not enough weight training.
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On Mon, 5 May 2008 23:11:18 -0700 (PDT), "benf802961@aol.com"
<benf802961 RemoveThis @aol.com> wrote:

>On May 5, 10:53?pm, JW <Jo... RemoveThis @clearwire.net> wrote:
>> At his age, why is his strength gone? ?That big a drop has to be from
>> more than just aging. Does he even work out as hard as some of the
>> younger pitchers? ?Besides rebuilding his psyche, they should work on
>> his body.
>
>Too much yoga , not enough weight training.

Exactly!
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Jeanne Douglas <hlwdjsd DeleteThis @NOSPAMpacbell.net> wrote in news:hlwdjsd-
A062ED.22461905052008 DeleteThis @newsclstr02.news.prodigy.com:

> The velocity is gone, not much you can do about that, that ship has
> sailed (unless, of course, he's in denial about some injury). The
> command's also not there; I hope that can be improved on with hard work.
>
> It's time for Zito to see if he can become a Crafty Lefty. There are
> worse aspirations than becoming the next Jamie Moyer or Frank Tanana.

The problem is that Moyer and Tanana both started out with much better
fastballs than Zito did. Zito didn't exactly start as a Crafty Lefty, but
his best pitch was always the hook, not the heat. I'm not sure I can think
of a LHP who started out as a breaking ball pitcher who went on to be
anything in his 30s.

JHB
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On May 6, 8:35 am, Jonathan Bernstein <j....RemoveThis@socrates.berkeley.edu>
wrote:

> The problem is that Moyer and Tanana both started out with much better
> fastballs than Zito did. Zito didn't exactly start as a Crafty Lefty, but
> his best pitch was always the hook, not the heat. I'm not sure I can think
> of a LHP who started out as a breaking ball pitcher who went on to be
> anything in his 30s.

Jerry Reuss? Memory says he had a great curve when he came up. I do
know
that by his 30s he was basically a low fastball pitcher who threw an
occasional curve.

Certainly can't think of a prominent pitcher -- though I think you'd
settle for Reuss' early 30s.
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Glavine?
Tommy John?
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On Mon, 05 May 2008 22:46:19 -0700, Jeanne Douglas
<hlwdjsd RemoveThis @NOSPAMpacbell.net> wrote:

>The velocity is gone, not much you can do about that, that ship has
>sailed (unless, of course, he's in denial about some injury). The
>command's also not there; I hope that can be improved on with hard work.
>
>It's time for Zito to see if he can become a Crafty Lefty. There are
>worse aspirations than becoming the next Jamie Moyer or Frank Tanana.

Now, Eight Belles finishes second, breaks both her front ankles, and
gets shot in the head on the track. Zito goes 0-6, posts and ERA of
7.53, 56 W+H in 28.2 innings, and gets sent to the bullpen with $18m
for the season.

Where is justice in this world?

-T.E.S.
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Ron Johnson <johnson.RemoveThis@ccrs.nrcan.gc.ca> wrote in
news:6fe34bca-a799-452e-9f4b-d35b44dfb082@j22g2000hsf.googlegroups.com:

> On May 6, 8:35 am, Jonathan Bernstein <j....RemoveThis@socrates.berkeley.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> The problem is that Moyer and Tanana both started out with much
>> better fastballs than Zito did. Zito didn't exactly start as a
>> Crafty Lefty, but his best pitch was always the hook, not the heat.
>> I'm not sure I can think of a LHP who started out as a breaking ball
>> pitcher who went on to be anything in his 30s.
>
> Jerry Reuss? Memory says he had a great curve when he came up. I do
> know
> that by his 30s he was basically a low fastball pitcher who threw an
> occasional curve.
>
> Certainly can't think of a prominent pitcher -- though I think you'd
> settle for Reuss' early 30s.

Yeah -- I sure remember hating him quite a bit in those years.

OK, looking him up now...what an odd career. Looks like the Pirates
hitters basically carried him through his 20s; except for one
outstanding year at age 26, he couldn't even crack a (adjusted) league-
average ERA until he was in Chavez Ravine. He never struck out a ton of
guys, although he had one terrific K season in Houston at age 23, but it
looks like a fluke. And then he went to the Bums, improved his BB/IP
and HR/IP, and basically had a ten year run as an above average SP.

He doesn't follow any of the normal patterns; he was worked pretty hard
before age 25 but survived it, and he had a long career without starting
out as a good K/9 guy.

And even odder is that the guy he was traded for, Rhoden, also had a
late peak. Rhoden was better young, then went into a mediocre rut for
five or six years, and then suddenly had four good seasons out of five
years before getting old.

(Did the Dodgers of that era make a surprising number of pitcher-for-
pitcher challenge trades? Rhoden for Reuss, Hooten for Zahn, Singer (&
Robinson) for Messersmith...

The guy *he* was traded for, Doug Drabek, had a more normal career path:
after a couple years in the league getting the hang of it, pretty good
up through age 31, and then a bust after that. Drabek is relevant here
because he was a nice pitcher when the Astros signed him to a big-money
contract after his age 29 season: he gave them a league-average season,
then a very good season, and then two terrible years. But he had won an
iffy Cy Young award a few years before the Astros picked him up, so they
got to brag about getting a Big Name pitcher.

Oh, I should also add that I *still* really hate Doug Rau.

JHB
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On Tue, 06 May 2008 13:06:53 -0700, Thomas Edward Stosterone
<T.E.Stosterone.RemoveThis@highlevels.com> wrote:

>On Mon, 05 May 2008 22:46:19 -0700, Jeanne Douglas
><hlwdjsd.RemoveThis@NOSPAMpacbell.net> wrote:
>
>>The velocity is gone, not much you can do about that, that ship has
>>sailed (unless, of course, he's in denial about some injury). The
>>command's also not there; I hope that can be improved on with hard work.
>>
>>It's time for Zito to see if he can become a Crafty Lefty. There are
>>worse aspirations than becoming the next Jamie Moyer or Frank Tanana.
>
>Now, Eight Belles finishes second, breaks both her front ankles, and
>gets shot in the head on the track. Zito goes 0-6, posts and ERA of
>7.53, 56 W+H in 28.2 innings, and gets sent to the bullpen with $18m
>for the season.
>
>Where is justice in this world?
>
>-T.E.S.

Ummm ... Zito's too expensive to shoot and they can't can him and eat
him afterwards, so he just has to go out there and water his ERA and
watch it grow.
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On May 6, 3:06 pm, Jonathan Bernstein <j....DeleteThis@socrates.berkeley.edu>
wrote:
> Ron Johnson <john....DeleteThis@ccrs.nrcan.gc.ca> wrote innews:6fe34bca-a799-452e-9f4b-d35b44dfb082@j22g2000hsf.googlegroups.com:
>
>
>
> > On May 6, 8:35 am, Jonathan Bernstein <j....DeleteThis@socrates.berkeley.edu>
> > wrote:
>
> >> The problem is that Moyer and Tanana both started out with much
> >> better fastballs than Zito did. Zito didn't exactly start as a
> >> Crafty Lefty, but his best pitch was always the hook, not the heat.
> >> I'm not sure I can think of a LHP who started out as a breaking ball
> >> pitcher who went on to be anything in his 30s.
>
> > Jerry Reuss? Memory says he had a great curve when he came up. I do
> > know
> > that by his 30s he was basically a low fastball pitcher who threw an
> > occasional curve.
>
> > Certainly can't think of a prominent pitcher -- though I think you'd
> > settle for Reuss' early 30s.
>
> Yeah -- I sure remember hating him quite a bit in those years.
>
> OK, looking him up now...what an odd career. Looks like the Pirates
> hitters basically carried him through his 20s; except for one
> outstanding year at age 26, he couldn't even crack a (adjusted) league-
> average ERA until he was in Chavez Ravine. He never struck out a ton of
> guys, although he had one terrific K season in Houston at age 23, but it
> looks like a fluke. And then he went to the Bums, improved his BB/IP
> and HR/IP, and basically had a ten year run as an above average SP.

Worth noting that my memory of his style as a really young
pitcher is not correct. He came up as a pure low fastball
pitcher and added the curve later -- after he lost his a
lot of velocity to three elbow operations.

So he made te exact opposite adjustment that Zito
probably needs to make.

While I was checking Reuss out, I did find one guy
who was a pure left-handed curveballer and aged
fairly well -- Herb Pennock. OK, basically finished
at 34 but still I think you'd take his 30s.

And maybe David Wells. Tough for a lot of
people to remember but when he came up he had
outstanding stuff. A plus fastball and an
outstanding overhand curve. (He added a change
after being moved to the rotation. He was strictly
a two pitch pitcher when he first came up)

His curve suddenly lost its effectiveness and his
fastball had slipped enough (about 5 MPH) that he
had to re-make himself. He went to a "sweeping" curve
and sinkerball (with an effective change and an
occasional slider)

Not a perfect precedent. Among other things even
after his fastball slipped it was still probably
better than Zito's is now.

Yeah, in his late 30s on he was the classic crafty
lefty, but his stuff was good enough before then to
allow him to make a relatively gentle transition.
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On May 6, 2:38 pm, "benf802...@aol.com" <benf802... RemoveThis @aol.com> wrote:

Apologies if this comes through twice:

> Glavine?

Not really. He was more or less a pure fastball/change pitcher.
(According to Glavine he threw about 70% fastballs and like
a fair number of successful lefties almost never threw a curve
to a right-handed hitter)

> Tommy John?

Pure sinkerballer. Somewhere between 85 to 90 percent
of his pitches were sinkers.

Started out as a power sinkerballer (think Kevin Brown
though it wasn't as good as Brown at his best) and
lost most of his velocity to injury.

Spahn's second pitch was always his curve, but it
was nowhere near as good as Zito's. It was a
complimentary pitch rather than a primary weapon.

Cuellar threw everything, and his curve was OK. As
with Spahn though strictly a complimentary pitch.

Bobby Schantz. Primary pitch was his curve. However
he threw a lot of knucklers when he got ahead in
the count. Not sure he's of much use as a comp
for Zito.

A few other lefties whose primary pitch when
they came up was a curve. (Scanning Neyer/James Guide
to Pitchers)

First of all, a worrying example from the point
of view of Zito. Johnny Schmitz. Came up with a
big breaking curve. Had 3 straight good years,
scuffled around for the better part of a decade
and had one more good year and a few serviceable
ones.


Bunch of late deadball pitchers. I'm not counting
any of them. Like everybody they mostly threw
spitters.


Dave McNally. Not sure what he tells us. His
career came to an end due to chronic hiccups
(no I'm not joking) and he'd been worked hard for
years before then.

Eddie Lopat came up as a curve-baller and made a
successful transition to a fastball/screwball
pitcher. Didn't have a real long career though.

Max Lanier: Effective when healthy. Had two good
years in his mid-30s. Curve was his best pitch,
but he threw everything (including a knuckler)
and threw either sidearm or overhand depending
on what was working on the day.

Al Leiter: Forgot him. Came up as a big-time curveballer
and re-made himself. In part because chronic blister
problems. Perhaps due to pitch selection. At any rate
the blister problems largely went away when he became
a sinkerballer.

Don Mossi: Though he started out with a plus
fastball, his curve was always his best pitch.

Paul Assenmacher; Though he was a pure reliever.
His curve was his only major league caliber pitch.
Not an uncommon type of pitcher though most don't
last too long and are mostly relievers.

Tippy Martinez: Decent fastball but his overhand
curve was always his money pitch

Mike Flanagan's best pitch was always his curve,
but it was a different ptch than Zito's. A slow
curve. Scott McGregor's best pitch was was also
a really slow cureve -- supposedly thrown in the 60s.
(there are a few guys of similar profile who had a
few good years but didn'y last as long as these guys)
Lefty Stewart seems to have been similar.

Maybe John Candelaria: He mostly used his curve
against lefties though (and was usually
devastating against them) and was largely
a fastball pitcher against righties. And his
fastball was far better than Zito's is.

John Donaldson has a long career in the Negro
Leagues with a hard curve as his primary pitch.
Very different pitch from Zito's though. He
threw it fater than most pitcher's fastball.

Leroy Matlocak was another Negro league star.
Supposedly murder on lefties because of his
curve.
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