Pitch count negotiations

[pravata]

What's the right number of pitches a major league pitcher should throw in March when he's pitching for his country in the inaugural World Baseball Classic instead of a laid-back spring training game?

That's what general managers have had a hard time deciding at their meetings here. The original recommendation was to allow a maximum of 75 pitches in the WBC -- about five innings. But several GMs objected to that number and suggested that 60 pitches was a better, safer limit. Major League Baseball's Technical Committee, chaired by Padres president Sandy Alderson, will continue to study the issue and ultimately decide on the limit.
The Link

[JimR]

i think 17 is about right. better count the warmup pitches, too.

[Ty in Tampa]

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i think 17 is about right. better count the warmup pitches, too.

Meat grinder.

[Navin R Johnson]

"140 a start, and 40 or so in relief a couple days later"

-Wayne Graham and Cliff Gustafson.

BTW, anyone else notice that all three of Niemann, Humber and Townsend are having arm surgery this winter?  shocking.

Baugh, Skaggss, iemann, Humber and Townsend.... Hopefully Wayno will take it easy on Savory, that kid is a hoss.

[HudsonHawk]

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"140 a start, and 40 or so in relief a couple days later"

-Wayne Graham and Cliff Gustafson.

BTW, anyone else notice that all three of Niemann, Humber and Townsend are having arm surgery this winter?  shocking.

Baugh, Skaggss, iemann, Humber and Townsend.... Hopefully Wayno will take it easy on Savory, that kid is a hoss.

Graham's (or any other college coach) job is to win college baseball games, not to baby sit major league potential.  The last thing Graham needs to be thinking is "gee, I wonder what this will do to his ability to throw 200 innings 4 years from now"?

[astro pete]

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Graham's (or any other college coach) job is to win college baseball games, not to baby sit major league potential.  The last thing Graham needs to be thinking is "gee, I wonder what this will do to his ability to throw 200 innings 4 years from now"?

Graham has an obligation to look after the health of his kids.  What do you think he (or any other college coach) tells the kids he's recruiting?  What do you think he tells their parents?

[HudsonHawk]

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Graham has an obligation to look after the health of his kids.  

He has the obligation to look after their health, not baby them in case they may have major league potential.    

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What do you think he (or any other college coach) tells the kids he's recruiting?  What do you think he tells their parents?

That they get to go to Rice and compete in an elite D1 program.  If he tells them that he's going to coddle them at the team's expense so they may could turn pro later, then he'd guilty of lying.  But that's it.

[JimR]

that is nonsense, pete. total nonsense. they were smiling in Omaha, weren't they?

[astro pete]

I was responding to your assertion that his only job is to win; it's really more complicated than that.  He promises his recruits, pitchers in particular, that he will make sure they come out of his program better players.  Healthy players.  So yes, if he makes that promise, his job becomes more complicated than just winning at all costs.

Now, I suppose the real question is whether he is responsible for his pitchers' arm troubles.  I have no idea.

[astro pete]

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that is nonsense, pete. total nonsense. they were smiling in Omaha, weren't they?

They were not smiling this year.  We knocked 'em off.

[HudsonHawk]

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I was responding to your assertion that his only job is to win;

I never said it was his job to win at any cost.  I said winning the games he coaches, what he's paid to do, should be his focus.  I assumed we all understood that was within some reasonable legal and/or ethical boundaries, but I guess not.

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He promises his recruits, pitchers in particular, that he will make sure they come out of his program better players.

No, that's not his promise.

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  Healthy players.

No way.  No way ANY coach, in ANY sport guarantees his/her players will not get injured.  That's just insane.

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  So yes, if he makes that promise, his job becomes more complicated than just winning at all costs.

Well he doesn't, so this is a moot point.

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Now, I suppose the real question is whether he is responsible for his pitchers' arm troubles.  I have no idea.

Why is a college coach any more repsonsible than professional coaches?  After all, if the kid quit after college, and never pitched professionally, it's highly unlikely he'd devlope arm troubles.  Why do you characterize the college coach as some lying, deceitful, unethical scumbag who'll do anything to better his team, yet portray the professional organizations as kindly benefactors, victimized by the unscrupulous?

[astro pete]

I'm not really all that interested in a point-by-point refutation of what you said or didn't say.  I was responding to a comment that I read to suggest that a college baseball coach's job is to win and only to win.  I don't think this was an unfair reading, especially considering you were responding to a post insinuating that Wayne Graham was responsible for his former pitchers' arm problems.  Since you agree that Graham has an obligation to look after his kids, we don't really have anything to talk about.  

But since we're both here...

I didn't mean that Graham promised his kids wouldn't get injured.  But then again, I didn't say that either.  What Graham tells his kids is that he'll look after them, protect their arms, and that by coming to Rice and playing for him they could have an opportunity to continue playing professionally.  In other words, he wouldn't destroy his pitchers' arms.  At least, this is what he told one of the players mentioned above when he recruited him.  Or, that is how Graham's pitch was characterized to me by that player.  Maybe he lied.    

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Why do you characterize the college coach as some lying, deceitful, unethical scumbag who'll do anything to better his team, yet portray the professional organizations as kindly benefactors, victimized by the unscrupulous?

I didn't characterize anyone as anything.  Huh?

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

Hmmmmmm, fascinating material to ponder. Wonder what the Barzilla formula would tell 'em? I'm guessing 56. Whatever they do they shouldn't ask the pitchers 'cause they're too competitive to know when to shut it down.

[Navin R Johnson]

Dammit!  I thought for sure by throwing Cliff in there it would warrant an F-OFF from Jim R.  Oh well, i will try to be more offensive next time...

As to HH.

College is a place to prepare you for your professional life.  It is the job of a professor or a coach to provide you with an opportunity to exceed in the profession you choose go into.

If you could provide evidence to Graham that throwing Kenny Buagh for 181 pitches in a single game (he actually did this) would likely ruin his chance to succeed professionally, i am sure Wayne wouldn?t have done it.  A respectable coach isn?t going to knowingly jeopardize his kids to win a game, if they do they should get fired.  Winning a game isnt worth ruining a kids livelihood.   Graham is just old school and doesn?t think pitch counts or overuse lead to injury.   Of course the surgeries that his most used pitchers have under gone, immediately after leaving Rice suggest differently.

Of course 4 of those 5 pitchers have 6 figure bank accounts now, so maybe they don?t care.

[HudsonHawk]

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I'm not really all that interested in a point-by-point refutation of what you said or didn't say.  I was responding to a comment that I read to suggest that a college baseball coach's job is to win and only to win.

That *is* his job.  That doesn't mean there aren't boundaries.  I don't expect a coach should be able to assassinate the opposing quarterback the night before the big game.  There are boundaries.  But a coach's job is to win.  Period.

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What Graham tells his kids is that he'll look after them, protect their arms, and that by coming to Rice and playing for him they could have an opportunity to continue playing professionally.

No that's not what he tells them.  That'd be absurd.  Do you also think Mack Brown told Vince Young that he was only going to be allowed to hand the ball off because he has a future in the NFL and he wouldn't want to get dropping back to pass?

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In other words, he wouldn't destroy his pitchers' arms.  At least, this is what he told one of the players mentioned above when he recruited him.  Or, that is how Graham's pitch was characterized to me by that player.  Maybe he lied.    

Which player had his arm destroyed by Graham?  Sounds to me like said player is re-remembering things to pass the buck.

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I didn't characterize anyone as anything.

Yeah, you have.  You've basically said that college coaches unscrupulously use players at the expense of their possible professional careers.  That's total BS.

[HudsonHawk]

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It is the job of a professor or a coach to provide you with an opportunity to exceed in the profession you choose go into.

Absolute, 100%, unequivocal BULLSHIT!

[astro pete]

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Yeah, you have.  You've basically said that college coaches unscrupulously use players at the expense of their possible professional careers.  That's total BS.

I've never said this.  You're making shit up.  Stop it.

[HudsonHawk]

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I've never said this.  

Yes you have.  You've basically said that Graham promises his recruits that he'll baby their arms then goes out and abuses them.  That's bullshit.

[astro pete]

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Yes you have.  You've basically said that Graham promises his recruits that he'll baby their arms then goes out and abuses them.  That's bullshit.

What's bullshit is your continually asserting I've said anything remotely resembling that.  Stop it.

[HudsonHawk]

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What's bullshit is your continually asserting I've said anything remotely resembling that.  

What's bullshit is your crawfishing.

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Stop it.

Fuck off.

[HudsonHawk]

Uh oh...

Pete, I accidentally deleted your reply thinking there was a double post.  Sorry about that.  Please post again.

[astro pete]

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Uh oh...

Pete, I accidentally deleted your reply thinking there was a double post.  Sorry about that.  Please post again.

It was probably deleted along with my post where I characterized Wayne Graham a "lying, deceitful, unethical scumbag," and where I went on ad nauseum about professional organizations as victims of the "unscrupulous" coach.  

The one where I confessed I had no idea if Wayne Graham was responsible for his pitchers' arm problems is still there, though.

[HudsonHawk]

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It was probably deleted along with my post where I characterized Wayne Graham a "lying, deceitful, unethical scumbag," and where I went on ad nauseum about professional organizations as victims of the "unscrupulous" coach.

No, that's still there.

[astro pete]

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No, that's still there.

Can't see it here; must be an admin perk.

[HudsonHawk]

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Can't see it here

Must be the booze.

[astro pete]

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Can't see it here

Must be the booze.

Then stop drinking. The "dazed and confused" moniker now makes sense.

[HudsonHawk]

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Can't see it here

Must be the booze.

Then stop drinking. The "dazed and confused" moniker now makes sense.

So does your little green starfish holding a testicle.

[shortstop]

A couple of good articles about pitch counts from Baseball Prospectus:

 PAP

 PAP follow -up

 web page

[HudsonHawk]

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A couple of good articles about pitch counts from Baseball Prospectus:

 PAP

 PAP follow -up

 web page

I dont' believe in pitch counts.

[JimR]

when you cite BP as authority for why there should be pitch counts, you further erode your credibility. that publication is funny and entertaining, but that is all that it is.

[hostros7]

Pete, kind of embarrassing how I came across this but Moake is in a group on the facebook entitled "coach graham eats elbows for breakfast" or something like that, and it includes several rice pitchers.  So perhaps there is some validity to your claims.

[shortstop]

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I dont' believe in pitch counts.

Hummh ... I gotta chuckle at that, it's a bit vague. Do you mean you don't believe in pitch count limits? Or do you mean you don't believe that they are a useful tool to take into account (along with other factors such as: pitcher's history, arm strength, health and conditioning, effectiveness etc.) to gage both the pitchers projected short term effectiveness and long term arm health? Or do I take your statement at face value and interpret that to mean that you don't believe there is any benefit in keeping pitch counts at all?

[NeilT]

This is really getting desperate.  I'm quoting meaningless defensive statistics, and we're about to start the pitch count discussion again.  The Link

When do pitchers and catchers report?

[HudsonHawk]

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I dont' believe in pitch counts.

Hummh ... I gotta chuckle at that, it's a bit vague. Do you mean you don't believe in pitch count limits? Or do you mean you don't believe that they are a useful tool to take into account (along with other factors such as: pitcher's history, arm strength, health and conditioning, effectiveness etc.) to gage both the pitchers projected short term effectiveness and long term arm health? Or do I take your statement at face value and interpret that to mean that you don't believe there is any benefit in keeping pitch counts at all?

I dont' believe pitch counts are good for anything other than counting pitches (kind of like OPS isn't good for anything other than ranking players according to OPS).  Pitchers get injured for all sorts of reasons, including when they get tired.  But for one pitcher, that might be 40 pitches, for another 120.  Will one pitch hurt a pitcher?  Probably not.  Will 1,000?  Probably so.  The limit is likely somewhere in between, but there is not set number.  Picking an arbitrary number like 100 and say "that's too many, you should never throw more" is abssurd.  There are much better ways to tell if a pitcher is getting tired and should stop other than simply counting the pitches.

[astro pete]

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Pete, kind of embarrassing how I came across this but Moake is in a group on the facebook entitled "coach graham eats elbows for breakfast" or something like that, and it includes several rice pitchers.  So perhaps there is some validity to your claims.

My claim that I was told this by a Rice pitcher while he was at Rice is a fact.  Any claim that I said Graham caused his pitchers' injuries was made up by HH during his impressive performance last night.  Like I said, I have no idea.

[shortstop]

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when you cite BP as authority for why there should be pitch counts, you further erode your credibility. that publication is funny and entertaining, but that is all that it is.

Look man ... I never said there should be pitch counts. All I said is here are some intersting articles about pitch counts from BP! The articles themselves don't even say there should be pitch counts.  Besides ... pitch counts are a fact. There is no reason to cite anything to support whther there should be pitch counts or not. There is! Pitch count LIMITS are another thing.

[HudsonHawk]

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My claim that I was told this by a Rice pitcher while he was at Rice is a fact.  Any claim that I said Graham caused his pitchers' injuries was made up by HH during his impressive performance last night.  Like I said, I have no idea.

I never said you claimed Graham caused the injuries.  I said you characterized him as unscrupulous and lying to prospective recruits about protecting them from injury and then for some ulterior motive (because apparently winning isn't his job) ignoring said promises and physically abusing them against their will.

[shortstop]

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I dont' believe pitch counts are good for anything other than counting pitches (kind of like OPS isn't good for anything other than ranking players according to OPS).  Pitchers get injured for all sorts of reasons, including when they get tired.  But for one pitcher, that might be 40 pitches, for another 120.  Will one pitch hurt a pitcher?  Probably not.  Will 1,000?  Probably so.  The limit is likely somewhere in between, but there is not set number.  Picking an arbitrary number like 100 and say "that's too many, you should never throw more" is abssurd.  There are much better ways to tell if a pitcher is getting tired and should stop other than simply counting the pitches.

From my read of the articles, that's pretty much what they say ... I think they would go a step further and add that tracking counts for a period of time is useful to give you a sample of data to consider when making a call whether the pitcher is gassed or just off. I also think that at high pitch counts you need to watch a guy's mechanics more closely, because fatigue that leads to poor mecahnics can injure an arm so much more than simply a lot of pitches.

Personally, I like OPS as a tool for ranking players contribution to team offense. If there was something that ranked OPS in "clutch" situations ... that would be even better.

[astro pete]

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I never said you claimed Graham caused the injuries.  I said you characterized him as unscrupulous and lying to prospective recruits about protecting them from injury and then for some ulterior motive (because apparently winning isn't his job) ignoring said promises and physically abusing them against their will.

Given the context of the discussion, I understand why you originally interpreted my comment that part of Graham's job is to protect the health of his pitchers the way you did.  What I don't understand is why you wouldn't give me the benefit of the doubt when I made it abundantly clear that the scope of my first post wasn't remotely as large as you made it out to be.  I misinterpreted your first post the way you did mine, only I accepted your clarification.  In my mind, it looked as if you were just looking for a fight.

[HudsonHawk]

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I never said you claimed Graham caused the injuries.  I said you characterized him as unscrupulous and lying to prospective recruits about protecting them from injury and then for some ulterior motive (because apparently winning isn't his job) ignoring said promises and physically abusing them against their will.

Given the context of the discussion, I understand why you originally interpreted my comment that part of Graham's job is to protect the health of his pitchers the way you did.  What I don't understand is why you wouldn't give me the benefit of the doubt when I made it abundantly clear that the scope of my first post wasn't remotely as large as you made it out to be.  I misinterpreted your first post the way you did mine, only I accepted your clarification.  In my mind, it looked as if you were just looking for a fight.

How many days until pitchers and catchers report?

[JimR]

BS. BP's first number for "abuse" was 100. then they moved it to 110. fantacrap.

[lc_db]

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How many days until pitchers and catchers report?

Counting the days is like counting pitches?..  frivolous for some, necessary to others.

[astro pete]

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How many days until pitchers and catchers report?

One fewer than last night, thank God.

[Arky Vaughan]

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I dont' believe pitch counts are good for anything other than counting pitches (kind of like OPS isn't good for anything other than ranking players according to OPS).  Pitchers get injured for all sorts of reasons, including when they get tired.  But for one pitcher, that might be 40 pitches, for another 120.  Will one pitch hurt a pitcher?  Probably not.  Will 1,000?  Probably so.  The limit is likely somewhere in between, but there is not set number.  Picking an arbitrary number like 100 and say "that's too many, you should never throw more" is abssurd.  There are much better ways to tell if a pitcher is getting tired and should stop other than simply counting the pitches.

From my read of the articles, that's pretty much what they say ... I think they would go a step further and add that tracking counts for a period of time is useful to give you a sample of data to consider when making a call whether the pitcher is gassed or just off. I also think that at high pitch counts you need to watch a guy's mechanics more closely, because fatigue that leads to poor mecahnics can injure an arm so much more than simply a lot of pitches.

Personally, I like OPS as a tool for ranking players contribution to team offense. If there was something that ranked OPS in "clutch" situations ... that would be even better.

Read Bill James in his Guide to Pitchers. He disagrees with the conclusions drawn from the BP pitch count articles.