Projo Fantasy Sports Blog

By Michael Salfino

Last week Joba Chamberlain, pitching in the sixth inning of his start, struck out the Padres Adrian Gonzalez and Chase Headley, which promptly caused manager Joe Girardi to race out to the mound to remove him because he had reached his 100-pitch limit.

This emphasis on pitch counts is rumored to have started at the insistence of Dr. Frank Jobe to protect his patient, Steve Busby, back in the mid-1970s. But if the number of pitches thrown was strongly correlated to pitching injuries, we should have seen a sharp decline in them since. We have not.

There must be guys today who could pitch 300-innings like pitchers did 30 years ago. But finding out who those guys are is viewed as akin to dunking witches.

There's no record of actual pitch counts in 1974, but Nolan Ryan on June 14 faced 58 Red Sox hitters, striking out 19 and walking 10 in 13 innings. For his career, he averaged four pitches per batter. That night, his figure was likely higher; but it still conservatively puts him at 232 pitches.

There's no hope for a modern Ryan emerging today. Bill James recently wrote on his web site that he had an idea to track how many starters get the ball to the closer. But on the Sunday he started tracking, no one did. End of stat.

Note that last year's NL Cy Young Award winner, Jake Peavy of the Padres, recorded ONE OUT after the seventh inning all season.

The Busby-effect was immediate. Before the advent of tracking pitch counts, No. 1 starters averaged 261 innings pitched in 1975. By 1980, post-Busby, it had declined to 238. In 1990, it sat at 216. Today it's about 207.

Forget about attempting what Nolan Ryan did in 1974: 332.7 innings, 367 Ks, 202 walks and 1,392 batters faced. (Very conservatively assuming four pitches per batter, that's 133 pitches per his 42 starts.)

But the time is ripe for some smart team to get more innings out of their better pitchers by slowly working up to higher workloads. Perhaps not even more pitches or innings per start, but less time between starts. Or maybe it's simply a matter of getting pitchers to work more quickly. There could be a time limit for the human body to endure the effort of pitching as much as there is a pitch limit.

A good testing ground for any or all of this would be a small-market team that can't afford to keep their best pitchers anyway. Work them hard while you have them rather than coddling them so that he, his agent and future big-market team reap the benefits of your care. Are you listening Billy Beane?

Of course, some pitchers will go the Rich Harden route. But guys like Harden have always been eaten up by any workload and always will be.

Doubt it can be done? Japan famously pushes pitchers by getting them to throw more. They routinely toss 200 pitches in bullpen sessions between starts and they warm up after their team makes the second out and continue right to the mound between innings like their U.S. counterparts. There's no evidence that Japanese pitchers get hurt more than do those in the Major Leagues.

Whether artificial or not, some young pitchers are going to start hitting the virtual wall and thus are good candidates for early shutdown (like a healthy James Shields was last year).

Buy

Joba Chamberlain, Yankees: GM Brian Cashman will get nervous at about 150 innings, leaving Joba 108 for the rest of the year -- about what you'd expect from a normal No. 1 starter going forward.

Roy Halladay, Blue Jays: Already has five complete games and is on pace for 241 innings, not quite old school but as good as we can hope for these days. By the way, there's no evidence that workhorses of the past declined as the season wore on. Ryan's best months in 1974 were August and September, and the last 300-inning pitcher, Steve Carlton in 1980, also excelled late in that year.

Hold

Scott Kazmir, Rays: He throws a lot of pitches per inning, but is so dominant while healthy that you have to roll the dice that his elbow holds up. He's averaged 179 innings the last three years and thus far has logged just 62. Maybe his 2008 injury is behind him.

Edinson Volquez, Reds: I was surprised to see he wasn't babied last year: 178 innings. The Reds won't get the pacifier and crib out for him until about 200 or so -- leaving 105 more frames to enjoy.

Sell

Zack Greinke, Royals: Had 10 Ks last night, but is at 100 innings this year after just 122 in 2007 and 111 the year before. Greinke is still just 24. The new pitching rules call for no more than a 50-inning jump in yearly workload (20 is preferred).

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