The God-King of Baseball
By Zach
Ok, so the headline might be a bit dramatic. Still, it's time for me to put in writing what I've been thinking ever since King Felix Hernandez made his debut two weeks ago. He's already one of the best pitchers in baseball. Not "he's gonna be great someday," or "when he learns how to pitch, watch out." No, I'm ready to say that there are no more than a handful of pitchers in the league who are as good.
First, look at the raw, basic numbers. He's 2-1 this year, has pitched 21 innings, allowed 11 hits, walked 3, struck out 21, and given up two earned runs, making his ERA .086 and his WHIP .067. Let me throw a couple of other numbers out there: he's getting 4.11 ground balls for every fly ball, a dominant rate. Opponents are hitting .153 against him, reaching base at a .191 clip, and slugging .153. He has yet to allow an extra-base hit.
USS Mariner has a breakdown of where he'd rank among the league leaders had he thrown enough innings to qualify among league leaders. In short, he's in the top five in every catagory, and first in almost all of them.
Now come the (inevitable) caveats. He's faced the Tigers, Twins, and Royals. Those teams are 11th, 12th, and 14th in the AL in runs scored (the Mariners are 13th). Furthermore, those games have been at Detroit, at Seattle, and at Seattle. So it's not as if he's faced the toughest lineups in baseball, at the toughest hitters parks in baseball. But as I told Ben last night, he doesn't control who he faces, and where. His job is to get them out. And no one in baseball is doing a better job.
First, look at the raw, basic numbers. He's 2-1 this year, has pitched 21 innings, allowed 11 hits, walked 3, struck out 21, and given up two earned runs, making his ERA .086 and his WHIP .067. Let me throw a couple of other numbers out there: he's getting 4.11 ground balls for every fly ball, a dominant rate. Opponents are hitting .153 against him, reaching base at a .191 clip, and slugging .153. He has yet to allow an extra-base hit.
USS Mariner has a breakdown of where he'd rank among the league leaders had he thrown enough innings to qualify among league leaders. In short, he's in the top five in every catagory, and first in almost all of them.
Now come the (inevitable) caveats. He's faced the Tigers, Twins, and Royals. Those teams are 11th, 12th, and 14th in the AL in runs scored (the Mariners are 13th). Furthermore, those games have been at Detroit, at Seattle, and at Seattle. So it's not as if he's faced the toughest lineups in baseball, at the toughest hitters parks in baseball. But as I told Ben last night, he doesn't control who he faces, and where. His job is to get them out. And no one in baseball is doing a better job.
posted by Zach at 3:48 PM
1 Comments:
Ben, you of all people should hesitate before criticizing someone for hyping prospects. At least Felix is in the Bigs, unlike many a Met prospect I've heard about over the last couple of years.
But the substantial difference between Duke (and any other prospect) and Felix is that their numbers are good, quite good, but they don't reach the ridiculous levels that Felix's do. He's doing stuff that no one in the Majors is doing.
Will he have a bad start or two? Probably. But the fact is that very, very few pitchers can come up to the big leagues and both strike out batters at the rate he does (and not walk guys) and induce groundballs at the rate he does. For more, read this post on USS Mariner
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