BUT HE CAN’T PITCH IN NEW YORK!!!!!

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Interesting. What is your source for these stats?

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re: kjc

to find out the source, you might want to click on those links, just maybe

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links? I have not heard of such things.

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Don’t you guys hate pants!?!?!

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Nope Pete…..we just hate you. By the way how does it feel to go from a single post that gets 1000 responses to a post that gets 7? 2 of which are Yankee fans mocking you.

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I’d like to put some wood on Javy Vazquez.

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By the way how does it feel to go from a single post that gets 1000 responses to a post that gets 7? 2 of which are Yankee fans mocking you.

—————————————

And the other 5 are Peter defending himself against the first 2 comments.

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Don’t make me feel great if Pavano is #1!

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That he’s in such illustrious company completely changes my prior-held opinion that this was a huge mistake. Seriously.

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By the way thanks for giving us a heads-up before you try to use a useless statistic to justify a stupid acquisition, mighty big of you.

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I actually don’t mind him coming back as our #4 starter. He’s a 1st or 2nd on almost any other team. It’s awfully nice to have that luxury and he is entering his last year. He’ll be pitching for a new contract AND he won’t have nearly as much pressure to be leading the way. That’s what helped A.J. sign with the Yanks after they signed C.C. .

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So Brendan your counterpoint is that getting 0-1 on a hitter is not a good thing? Having the lowest percentage of swings that result in contact is also a bad thing?

Please just explain yourself rather than trying to sound intelligent by besmirching some pertinent statistics.

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Maybe I should have put “useless statistic” in all caps. He posted similar numbers in 2008 (65.1% first-strike, 77.9% contact) when he put up that stellar 98 ERA+ and 1.32 WHIP.

That’s our $11 million man.

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But it’s okay, nomaas can go ahead and start tagging all vazquez posts #firststrikejesus, it’ll make for ironic amusement in June articles about him being lifted in the third after giving up six runs. Maybe they can tag those same posts with #imissmelky.

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.328 BABIP that year. Seriously, at least attempt to look deeper.

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His career BABIP is .309. His BABIP in his one shitty season in New York was .284. What’s your point?

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You apparently realized it – he had worse luck than usual on balls in play in ’08, but his underlying performance was right in line with everything else he’s done the past five years. In ’04 there was other stuff going on with him (pink eye, fatigue after being ridden into the ground in ’03). Stop being obtuse.

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You sure I’m being obtuse and it’s not just that you’re being a Cashman fanboy? Let’s deal Joba and Zach MacAllister, bring back Pavano and we can hear about his propensity to get ahead of hitters.

You know who had a .328 BABIP in 2009? Justin Verlander. His BABIP the year before, when he sucked to beat the band, was .305. Either these statistics have some utility in predicting a player’s value or they don’t.

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@ Brendan,

they do have utility. If a guy had a high BABIP against then he is a serious candidate for a bounce back, there’s no such thing as a fool proof baseball prediction, that doesn’t mean Javy Vazquez won’t likely be the second most productive Yankee starter, and a fine bet for 5 WAR value

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Nice strawman, clearly Vazquez is the equivalent of the American Idle (hey, Pete Abe actually came up with something witty!), and Joba is the same as a 19 y.o. who hasn’t pitched outside of short-season ball. Given NoMaas’s saber-bent, I assumed that you were not a retarded chimp and understood that BABIP fluctuations can be used to explain why a pitcher’s ERA varies from year to year when his peripheral stats are relatively stable. 2004 did not have the same underlying performance as his more recent career has. Unless you think he’s likely to re-develop pink eye or secretly led the PAP tally last year, I see no reason to assume he’ll just melt again.

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Where’s the straw man? That was an exaggeration of the circumstances currently being discussed with humorous intent. Should I link you to the wikipedia page on Jokes? If I actually thought you’d advocate bringing back Pavano I’d kick you off my bookmarks bar.

The retarded chimp thing hurts bad man. I never even brought up ERA, and I understand what analytical function BABIP is supposed to serve. I brought up Verlander because his BABIP in 2009 was his highest in a full season, which also happened to be his best season to date, while the year before it was 23 points lower in what was easily his worst season to date. Javy’s lowest single-season BABIP was in 2004, his worst full season since his rookie year. You’re basically saying these stats are important and relevant so long as they boost the argument you’re trying to make.

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Also Verlander attended Goochland High in Goochland, Va, which is conveniently located near Ballsville. This is important stuff.

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You brought up his ERA+ and WHIP from 2008, both of which are subject to the vagaries of BABIP, despite the solid underlying performance you either didn’t bother to look hard enough for or deliberately ignored. Also, forgive me for not finding a comparison between trading a high-ceiling but distant prospect for a high-level pitcher and hypothetically trading a high-ceiling pitcher with two years of service time for a scrub to be particularly clever or funny. Vazquez is a good pitcher who flashes greatness, and the Yanks acquired him for a sold fourth outfielder and a 19 y.o. who’s at least three years away, all while not owing him a significant amount of dollars or years. Not sure what the problem here is.

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I really don’t get the vazquez hatred on all the boards. Sure his ’04 was subpar overall but he did make the freakin’ all star game! He had a very good first half and a terrible second have because his arm wasn’t right. His fastball that year averaged over a mile per hour less than his career average.

The guy’s a good pitcher. Even a 98 era+ is pretty much league average. That with 200 innings is a solid season for an sp, especially when you have cc, aj, and pettitte. If that’s his floor and a 130 era+ with 200 innings is a ceiling, that’s a pitcher that can really help out a bullpen and potentially be a staff ace. The Yankees are a much better team with vazquez than they were without, plain and simple.

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He definitely throws first pitch strikes. The contact percentage seems a little low…at least to me.

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I like having him in the rotation. What’s the other option? Joba 4th, Hughes 5th? You can’t tell me that gives you more confidence. After watching Hughes get lit up time after time as a starter I have no confidence in him starting….yet at least.

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The only reason anyone is down on this move is that Javy played a role in the 2004 debacle. If Javy never played for the Yankees, 100% of Yankee fans support this trade. Come on, Melky, Mike Dunn and a 19-year old prospect (talented but years away from contributing) for a guy with a sub-3 ERA last year whose peripherals show it wasn’t a fluke. This is a good trade.

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what about his FIP numbers, Brendan? They’ve been excellent. Explain that away faginator.

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There’s only one way to develop young talent into star power, and that’s let them frigging pitch. I have enough confidence in CC, AJ and Andy getting the job done to let Hughes and some other in-house candidate take the ball every five days. Personally I’d prefer Joba in the pen but you could pencil one of the SWB kids or some scrap-heap claim into the five-slot and let them take their lumps while earning the league minimum, knowing that more likely than not the offense will pick them up anyway. That formula only won them a championship in ’09.

Instead we trade a perfectly serviceable left fielder and highly-rated pitching prospect for an $11.5 mill fourth starter with a career 102 ERA+ in the AL who’s a free agent after 2010 anyway. Not only are we overpaying for Vazquez but we basically ran ourselves right out of the Holliday stakes.

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@stevie

Calling people fags is a great way to generate serious responses.

That said, your point is a decent one. Vazquez’s FIP puts him among the upper tier of ML starting pitchers, but taking his career stats as a whole I don’t see how anyone could conclude that he is, in fact, a solidly upper-tier starter, especially given how his numbers have been sweetened by virtue of spending 2/3rds of his career in Quadruple-A. His career 107 ERA+ places him in a six-way tie for 37th among active players with Ryan Franklin, Ted Lilly, Matt Morris, Arthur Rhodes and Mike Hampton.

Look, we’re just going to keep selectively referencing statistics that fit the respective arguments we’re making. I’m willing to cede I’m a little harsh on Javy and my take is driven somewhat by emotion in that I liked Melky and loved watching him play and the last memory I have of Vazquez in pinstripes is an upper-deck grand slam by Johnny Damon. Still don’t think he’s worth what he’s making but I’ll withhold further comment until he’s on the mound pitching in a regulation game.

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I think taking a small sample size like the 2004 World Series is the best way to evaluate a Baseball player. It’s that same rationale that allowed us to know that A-Rod was really A-Fraud and he could never handle NY or do anything in the playoffs.

Vazquez pitched a total of 5 innings in the 2004 ALCS playoffs and that’s the only thing that should be considered.

Sure, last year, he faced a superior Phillies line-up in a Philly on 05/09/09, pitched well against the Red Sox on 06/27/09, and faced Philly again on 09/19/09.

His numbers against Philly last year were good.

But, this is recent history proving that Vazquez can handle good line-ups in small ballparks. That shouldn’t be considered, only the 5 innings in 2004.

That Vazquez might have been mishandled in the WS or in 2004 shouldn’t be considered. That he might have been fatigued from 2003 doesn’t count. That Joe Torre was like a serial killer to young pitchers also shouldn’t be considered (how many times did Torre pull a young pitcher the first moment they got in trouble, thus under-cutting their confidence?).

Vasquez sat on his rear and wasn’t used much in the ALCS, brought in cold to face a bases loaded situation against a ballplayer that historically had good numbers against him. Obviously, that was Vazquez’s fault, not Joe Torre.

Because, he’s the 4th starter and we all know that everyone else’s 4th starter pitches like Roy Halliday.

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fair enough. Still think you’re a fag. It’s Christmas Eve anyway. Lighten up, fagorama.

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He was a different and younger pitcher then sandwiched between 2 aging veterans in Mike Mussina and Kevin Brown. He had pitched his entire career up in Montreal in for 2,000+ fans a night in the Atlanta dominated NL East of that time period. He was thrusted into the rivalry at its hottest and basically melted from the pressure. Just ask Mr. Damon about that. Nowadays he’s a veteran RHP who can go 200+ per and k about the same. He’s our 4th starter w/ an offense that is and will be ridiculous in ’10. I see Javier Vazquez good for 10-15 W’s,an ERA somewhere around 4.30, it is the AL east for Christ’s sake,with 200+ IP’s and 180 K’s. His wins will come against the BoSox in ’10, believe me. So will his due in the post season.

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Boston sucks!

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In 2004 JV pitched well enough to make the All star team only to come down with a sore arm in the second half. I like this trade simply because it puts Joba in the bullpen where he wants to be and belongs.

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Didn’t he have some amazing statistics before the last time we acquired him?

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and please, enough with the pink eye excuse. sore shoulder, over used in 2003, ok. but pink eye? pink eye lasts about a week.

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Obviously a bunch of you guys are sabermetricians, some smoking British cigarettes — others, not fans of said British cigarettes. I am not (a sabermetrician or British cigarette). JV’s performance last year surprised the hell out of me, especially since I still wear the stain from 2004 courtesy of 5-rings Torre, Kevin Brown and Javy’s grand salami. I thought of him more as the guy who got bombed right after he left the Yanks — though I had thought of him as some messiah when he was on his way from the Montreal Exposeds. I have mixed feelings; I have the hope of seeing the messiah from pre-season 2004 and the first 4 innings of so of 2004. Remember that! I think he struck out the first 4 hitters or something. On the other hand, I remember second half 2004 and the grand salami (and solo home run?) to the chief idiot of the Idiots in the infamous 2004 castration. Insulted was added to injury when even Mark Bellhorn hit a homerun. God, this is really upsetting me again. I think I hate Javy Vazquez. I think I might dislike JV more than I dislike Glass Carl.

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