Pineda in pinstripes

by King Kelly on Jan 14, 2012 12:49 AM EST

Bad news for the Jays? Yanks go from a rotation-on-the-rocks to possibly one of the best rotations in the AL with the addition of Pineda and Kuroda.

Possibly.

But – as with any young pitcher – there are questions about Pineda. Granted, he has only pitched 28 games, so the sample size is small. But it is interesting that …

His “away” ERA is 1.5 runs higher than his “home” ERA

Pineda’s 3.74 overall ERA in 2011 was excellent. But it is interesting that it is composed of a 2.92 at home in Safeco and a 4.40 on the road. Safeco was, of course, the 4th best pitchers park in baseball in 2011. As a reference, the MLB AL average ERA in 2011 was 4.08.

He struggled in AL East ballparks

He pitched well in Tampa, with an ERA of 3.00. But his ERA was 4.50 in Baltimore, 7.11 in Toronto, and 14.54 in Boston. He has never pitched in NY.

Good hitting teams hit him … good

Top 5 teams in the AL last year in runs scored were Boston, Yankees, Texas, Detroit, Toronto. Their average SLG was .442. In 10 games against those teams, of which 4 were in pitcher-friendly Safeco, Pineda held them to a SLG of .. .448.

He regressed in the second half

Pineda’s ERA in the first half was a stellar 3.03. In the second half, it was 5.12.

Could have been him tiring – he did pitch 171 innings in 2011. But of those 171 innings, 113 were in the first half … and in the minors in 2010, he pitched 139 innings. So SEA pretty much stayed within the "previous year + 30 innings" rule.

The alternate explanation could be that teams found him easier to hit the second time around.

His BABIP indicates some good luck

Pineda’s BABIP in the first half was .247. In the second half, it was .286. Conventional wisdom is that most pitchers’ BABIP will trend, long term, to the league average – which was .297 in 2011. It is true that better pitchers sometimes have a lower BABIP but that is rare – for example, Roy Halladay’s career BABIP over 10,000+ PAs is .295.

So – in BABIP terms – it appears that Pineda’s second half is a more probable indicator of his future performance than his first half.

** ** ** **

I am not suggesting that Pineda will be a flop, or that I would not have liked to see him on the Jays. But I think that there are still some questions to be answered. It will be interesting to see how he Pineda does in Pinstripes!

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Comments

nice summary of the comments on the fanshot

With any young kid, just have to wait and see how he plays out.
It’s not like either team got fleeced in the deal, they both gave up and got very good young players.

Not sure why people think this is a bigger impact then having Montero on there roster, why people are giving so much attention to it.

But i guess it just gives us something new to talk about!

+1 is only good if you actually rec the post

by Bowling_Guy25 on Jan 14, 2012 1:00 AM EST reply actions

Good point

Montero replacing Posada/whoever would probably be just as good for the Yankees as Pineda replacing so-so starter.

Man who has four balls cannot walk

by Beer Leaguer on Jan 14, 2012 1:04 AM EST via Android app up reply actions

In 10 years....

both teams might look back on this as “the trade”. I have a feeling this will work out great for both teams but I see Montero as having greater potential impact to his team.
Do keep in mind that Pineda’s WHIP was only 1.10. Helped along by BABIP but also very low walk rate.

Man who has four balls cannot walk

by Beer Leaguer on Jan 14, 2012 1:01 AM EST via Android app reply actions

Well..

We’re boned.
I like reading all the reasons why Pineda “might be over rated” and sure, he’s not a sure thing, but….. If it was the jays getting him, we’d all be jumping up and down like we won the world series. At least I would… godamn yanks, well there’s always next year…

In AA I trust

by FirstChurchofBLawrie on Jan 14, 2012 3:50 AM EST reply actions

I feel the same way

by Mike Andrew on Jan 14, 2012 11:52 AM EST up reply actions

Alvarez will outperform Pineda next year..

but down the road, I think the Yanks got a good one

by khaleeji on Jan 14, 2012 8:18 AM EST reply actions

Two Things

I haven’t read all of the comments in the fan shot, so forgive me if I’m just recycling others’ ideas, but I have two thoughts about this…

Having Burnett/Garcia/Hughes as your fifth starter is huge. As inconsistent as Burnett is, if he’s your fifth starter, yikes.

Now that the Mariners have a long term DH (or 1B should they try him out there) does it make sense for the Jays to pursue Smoak? He seems like a solid young 1B who was once highly regarded, but would now be expendable with Montero and Carp in Seattle. Seems like the type of guy AA loves to poach from teams.

At least I don't live in Cleveland

by agingrich1 on Jan 14, 2012 9:15 AM EST reply actions

ya, we talked about Smoak in the FanPost

would be nice to see us buy low on him

I tweet.

by benk on Jan 14, 2012 10:53 AM EST up reply actions

FanShot oops

I tweet.

by benk on Jan 14, 2012 10:54 AM EST up reply actions

Impossible to judge it

… right now. But my first impression was that this was a great move by the yankees. After reading/analyzing it more. I’m not as sure. The main reason is Pinedas weak (yet entirely inconclusive) splits outside of Safeco. He will be good and NY needed pitching but I’d be surprised if he turned into a stud.

As for Montero, this trade initially shocked me that he was going the othe way. One thing that made the Yankees successful was their core of home grown talent (augmented by FA at the right times PLUS finding excellent Brosius-like role players). I thought Montero was the next transition that continued the trend (along with Cano).

I think this makes the Yankees a bit better now but we will obviously know how much so later.

I’m just really glad they didn’t land Felix. Consider that as a Jays fan.

"Subdue the enemy without fighting" ~ Sun Tzu

by kdlishus on Jan 15, 2012 1:02 PM EST reply actions

it's not impossible to judge

in fact, it’s unfair to judge it in hindsight

I tweet.

by benk on Jan 15, 2012 1:24 PM EST up reply actions

I disagree

With really young players/prospects, theres a lot that can change. You can’t completely ignore the analysis at the time of the trade, and the rationales specifically, but you can say 5 years down the road, A outperformed B, The team that got B didn’t evaluate the talent as well. Now, if it’s injuries or something, that’s different, with two players without a big history of injuries then there’s bad luck.

by MjwW on Jan 15, 2012 1:44 PM EST up reply actions

I don't know

the teams making the trade don’t have the benefit of hindsight. to me, it’s like saying the Rios extension was a terrible idea – signing the best RF in baseball to a not-that-expensive extension is highly likely to be a good idea. it may not have worked out, but that doesn’t mean it was the wrong thing to do.

I don’t really see how prospects are any different. it’s still future performance evaluation

I tweet.

by benk on Jan 15, 2012 1:56 PM EST up reply actions

Right

But here’s the difference. Rios had 3+ years of performance at the MLB level from which that decision is made. That is a solid base to understand what that player’s true talent level is. Pineda has one year, Montero 69 PAs. The point is, this trade relies mostly on projecting future MLB performance from minor league numbers and scouting reports, not from major league performance. And there’s a lot more uncertainty about the true talent level.

So, I guess what it comesdown to is – if we have a good idea about the true talent level, we should avoid using hindsight bias. Bu tin this case, can you really say you have a good idea how good Montero will be as a major leaguer? I don’t think I can. Put another way, he’s probably around the 5 th best position prospect…that’s where Travis Snider was 3 years ago. So, we should keep the motivations for the trade (the rationale) when evaluating this down the road, but I think there’s room to say, Seattle made a really good talent evaluation and New York didn’t, or vice versa.

by MjwW on Jan 15, 2012 2:36 PM EST up reply actions