Snobs vs. Slobs

Ross ripped off my idea to do one of these, but somehow managed to travel back in time to post his first. That wily bastard.

1. How healthy is Kerry Wood?
For the fourth straight season, the Cubs’ chances at making a run at the pennant are resting on the right arms of Mark Prior, Kerry Wood and Carlos Zambrano. With all three of them healthy, the Cubs are a force to be reckoned with. Without one of them, their chances to contend become less good. Without two of them, the Cubs are a 79 win team again, if not even worse. For what feels like the seventh straight season, the Cubs enter camp wondering if Kerry Wood will stay healthy enough to make 20 starts. Wood threw 70 pitches off a mound in Mesa the other day, so that is a good sign, but the Cubs do not expect him to be ready for opening day. According to Prospectus’ Will Carroll, Wood’s injury is a frayed labrum. I’m not going to pretend I know what that means or how serious it is. I will say this, though: even if Kerry Wood is healthy at some point this season, I think there’s an extremely good chance he’ll get re-injured, if not by overuse from Dusty (more on that in question number 3), then from his shoulder-poppingly devastating stuff or the mechanics that help to create said stuff.

2. Assuming Wood is healthy at some point this season, who fills out the rotation?
The Cubs have two or three potential number fives, depending on when Wade Miller is able to return. Glendon Rusch and Jerome Williams both will likely be in the rotation come opening day, but one of them will go to the bullpen (or get traded) when Kerry Wood is ready. Let’s look at Rusch’s and Williams’ numbers from last season:
Rusch:
As Starter: 4.32 ERA, 110.1 IP, 35 BB, 77 K
As Reliever: 5.14 ERA, 35.0 IP, 18 BB, 34 K
Total: 4.52 ERA, 145.1 IP, 53 BB, 111 K, .799 OPS allowed

Williams:
As Starter: 4.28 ERA, 120 IP , 46 BB, 68 K
As Reliever: 3.38 ERA, 3.2 IP, 3BB, 2 K,
Total: 4.26 ERA, 123.2 IP, 49 BB, 70 K, .755 OPS allowed

I think this is basically a wash. Rusch’s strikeout to walk ratio is much better than Williams’, which would normally make me want to go with Rusch. But opponents hit the ball a little harder against Rusch, Williams has a (marginally) better groundball to flyball ratio, Williams’ career ERA is nearly a run better than Rusch’s (albeit in nearly 1,000 fewere career innings) and most importantly, Williams is 24 and Rusch is 31. Fortunately for Dusty, this problem will probably resolve itself as the season goes along; whoever pitches better while Kerry Wood is rehabbing will stay in the rotation… wait, sorry. Whoever has more wins will stay in the rotation.

3. Whose arm is going to fall off next?/Will Dusty manage the pitching staff differently?
At times, Dusty Baker has come under fire for leaving his young pitchers in for too long. There is good reason for this; Dusty Baker leaves his young pitchers in for too long. Baseball Prospectus has created a stat called Pitcher Abuse Points, which measures pitcher “abuse” through pitch counts. An outing in which a pitcher throws 100 pitches or less is awarded 0 PAP points. Every pitch after 100 is worth exponentially more abuse points. Dusty Baker has had one or more of his starting five in the top ten in PAP since he took the helm of the Cubs:
2003: Kerry Wood (3rd), Mark Prior (4th), Carlos Zambrano (10th)
2004: Carlos Zambrano (3rd), Kerry Wood (16th, but 8th in PAP average – although Kerry Wood didn’t finish in the top 10 in the league in total PAP, he finished 8th in the league in average PAP - points per outing. The only reason Kerry Wood didn’t finish in the top ten in total PAP in 2004 is because he only made 22 starts.)
2005: Carlos Zambrano (2nd), Mark Prior (3rd).

What’s truly amazing to me is that Dusty Baker continues to leave these guys in despite their youth and their injuries. It is flabbergasting and horrifying to me that Mark Prior finished third in the majors in PAP last year considering he started 27 games and got hit in the pitching elbow with a line drive in the middle of the season. Wood is the oldest of this trio, at 28. Prior is 25 and Zambrano is 24. None of them are at the age where you might not mind if he threw 110-120 pitches consistently (like, older than 30). Their ages and injury histories indicate that their pitch counts should be monitored strictly.

Also, did you notice the only one who was on the list all three years? Yes, Carlos. The only reason Prior and Wood aren’t also on it all three years is because in the years they’re not in the top ten, they didn’t pitch enough to get there because they were injured. Zambrano has been in the top ten all three years, which does not bode well for the future. I would not be in the slightest bit surprised if Zambrano suffered a major arm injury this year… but at the same time, he’s survived thus far, and he may be a rubber-armed guy in the mold of Livan Hernandez. Only time will tell.

You would think with Kerry Wood entering spring training with arm troubles for the umpteenth time in his career and Mark Prior avoiding the World Baseball Classic because of injury concerns (not to mention he has been on the DL in each of his three full major league seasons), Dusty would have learned something by now. But unfortunately he’s got the ultimate pro-pitcher abuse example in his clubhouse in Zambrano.

Dusty has implied in the past that he’s hesitated to go to his bullpen because of the lack of good (veteran) choices out there. Well, the Cubs seem to think they have a bullpen now, so perhaps Dusty will be quicker with the hook this year. I wouldn’t count on it though. Speaking of the bullpen…

4. What should we expect from Howry and Eyre?
You should not expect great things. Howry’s a nice pitcher, but his strikeout rate plummetted last year. Still, he could wind up being the best pitcher in the bullpen; his walk rate plummeted along with his strikeout rate, so he pounds the strike zone. What’s more, he’s had an ERA under 3 in his last 106 innings (the last two seasons). He might end up being the best pitcher in that bullpen… but again, that strikeout rate worries me.

Right after it happened, I expressed my distaste for the Scott Eyre deal in this post. Here’s the short version of why I hate the Eyre signing:
2005: 2.63 ERA, 68.3 IP, 65 K, 26 BB, 1.08 WHIP (2.50 K:BB, 8.56 K/9)
Before 2005: 4.83 ERA, 411.7 IP, 300 K, 218 BB, 1.60 WHIP (1.38 K:BB, 6.56 K/9)

I guess all that wouldn’t be so bad if 2005 was Eyre’s age 25 season, but it wasn’t; Eyre is going to be 34 on May 30. Nice as it is, his 2005 season reeks of flukiness, and this deal he signed with the Cubs – 3 years, $11 million – reeks of Remlingeriness. Hopefully the Cubs will get a good season out of him.

5. Will Ryan Dempster be an effective closer all season long?
Ryan Dempster’s splits were remarkable this season:
As Starter: 5.35 ERA, 34.2 IP, 37 H, 22 BB, 36 SO (1.63 WHIP)
As Reliever: 1.85 ERA, 58.1 IP, 46 H, 27 BB, 53 SO (1.25 WHIP)

Obviously, he was much better as a closer; for whatever reason, he let up a lot fewer hits as a closer, although his strikeout rate remained the same. The question with Dempster always seems to be with his control – he has a career BB/9 rate of 4.71. That’s very high. How did he do in that department last season? It seemed like he was walking fewer guys when he went to the bullpen…
As Starter: 5.71 BB/9
As Reliever: 4.16 BB/9

It wasn’t an optical illusion, Cubs fans; Ryan Dempster was walking a lot fewer guys when he went to the bullpen. The problem is, it’s still kind of a lot. I have a feeling that if Dempster walks 4 per 9 over the course of a full season, it might catch up with him. We’ll see.

Despite some of the pessimistic things I’ve said here, the Cubs pitching staff is actually the part of the team with the most upside. Mark Prior finished off last season very well; Zambrano had another great season; Greg Maddux will be a solid innings eater (if not better) and a pleasure to watch; and Kerry Wood will probably be healthy enough to pitch at some point. When I think of the talent the Cubs have in that starting rotation – Wood, Prior, and Zambrano are three of the top pitchers in the league when healthy, and really, because of the three of them, the Cubs always have the potential to contend. It absolutely breaks my heart to think that that potential is ruined every year because two of them are continually breaking down… and that the team’s current management probably has had something to do that. Imagine what a team could do with three of the best starting pitchers in the league making 30+ starts each, even with a bad or poorly assembled offense...