Pettitte-san

I've had a little time to digest the numbers I projected for Kei Igawa, and I've found something very interesting. My calculations for Matsuzaka were very close to the numbers that Clay Davenport of BR made for the future Red Sox ace, with the exception of the ERA, which came in far too low. The rest was in the ballpark.

I'll take that as a sign of confidence in the method as a rough way to gauge a Japanese pitcher's value. It's been in the ballpark in the past, and seems likely to be in the future as well. Knowing all that, I'd like to post the translated projection again, and expand upon my player comparison to show a possible predictor of Yankee value on Igawa.

You may be right, I may be crazy, but it may just be the starting guy we're looking for......


I projected the following, based on Igawa's 2006 season with Hanshin:

29 GS
209 IP
14-9 record (1 decision for every 9 IP)
4.20 ERA
194 hits
21 HR
53 BB
172 K
1.182 WHIP
3.25 K/BB
7.41 K/9

The ERA and W/L has been adjusted up from my calculations, but the WHIP has not. We'll see about all of that. I mentioned that a possible scenario for Igawa was the 2006 campaign of Andy Pettitte. The problem with that was the AL/NL differences, and the fact that a 1.44 WHIP and .284 BAA seemed to be more of a road to disaster than I was willing to admit. I went back and looked more closely at what Pettitte accomplished in his Yankee years to see if his numbers bore any consistency. They do.

In 1998, 1999, and 2000 Pettitte pitched ERAs of 4.21, 4.70, and 4.35 respectively. He put up 80-90 walks each of those years, against 120-140 strikeouts. I'll list his important ratios below so you can see what he did.

Note that Pettitte's WHIP is consistently over 1.400 and that his K-rate is between 5.50 and 6.00 during this stretch. His ratios aren't anything remarkable to look at, really, but considering the reverence with which Yankee fans hold Pettitte, and the thought that we might bring him back to the Yankees at the age of 33-34, it's important to note. Is it a stretch to consider these numbers a fair range for Igawa? He's a lefty with numbers that translate along these very lines, if not better, and he is pitching in the same age range from which Pettitte is shown above. People who have been watching Matsuzaka have been comparing him with the finest pitchers in the world. The names Roger Clemens,Roy Halladay, Brandon Webb, Chris Carpenter, Jason Schmidt, Josh Beckett, Pedro Martinez, Tim Hudson and Jake Peavy have been used. Igawa has not been of this caliber in Japan, despite being an ace, but then again neither was Pettitte.

The scouting report on Igawa is "good fastball made much more effective by a great change and plus slider." In 1998 SI asked MLB scouts to boil down the Yankees to a sentence or two that best describes their style of play. For Pettitte they said, "Lives on his changeup and cut fastball. Has a good curve and should use it more." Rob Neyer gave this description of Pettitte more recently: Scouting Report: "Andy Pettitte has morphed into a different guy. He's not able to overpower anybody, but he's deceptive--hitters can't see his ball. He's in and out, up and down with his fastball, and he sells his changeup well."

Finally, Stats, Inc. has a comment or two on Pettitte in his Fox Sports profile: "Pettitte throws a fastball and a cutter that is probably his best pitch. He throws the cutter to both sides of the plate and also has a good curve and a changeup, and he moves all of his pitches in and out at varying speeds. Pettitte can throw in the low 90s but rarely had his normal velocity most of last season. He depended much of the time on moving the ball in and out and trying to coax hitters into swinging at bad pitches. The Astros admired his toughness and willingness to fight through the pain."

Aside from the physical issues that Pettitte has been plagued with and which cost him his job with the Bombers, it seems that the two players are even similar types. Andy is clearly a bigger guy, but has never counted his size as one of his most important assets, considering his fastball is a cutter rather than a Clemens heater.

Pettitte's VORP during the 3 year stretch in question were:

1998 39.2 (40th)
1999 31.4 (67th)
2000 41.8 (36th)

That makes him a great sidekick and one of the strongest #2 starters in baseball. It's also MUCH better than the Lillys, Meches, and Suppans which are out there at the same money. Pettitte's player comparisons for the years between 1998 and 2000 are:

Roy Halladay
Jack McDowell
Mark Mulder

Halladay wasn't Halladay at that point in his career, as he took a little time to refine his stuff, but McDowell sports a 111 career ERA+, which was hurt by his gigantic collapse in his final four years in baseball. I defy anyone to tell me they wouldn't take McDowell's 1995 season in pinstripes from Igawa, minus the middle finger. Look at it again. Likewise, Mark Mulder has put up a fantastic career. Last year was awful, but he has experienced some injuries that have hurt him severely. His career ERA+ is 109, and I think we'd all be thrilled if Igawa put up anything resembling his final year in Oakland, which wasn't even remotely his best work. If Matsuzaka is Clemens, then Igawa may be Pettitte. I like that idea, and I'm going to stick with it until he proves me wrong.

In the end, I don't think the bar is set too high here. If Igawa does Pettitte-like work at $10-11 million a season, he'll be an absolute steal in this market. He'll also win a lot of games with the Yankees 6 runs behind him, and should he muster any of the Andy magic in the playoffs, he may become a darling son of New York. Time will tell, but I'm more and more optimistic by the day. Cashman is playing it low profile, calling Igawa "a back end starter", but I think he's well aware of the upside and is managin fan expectations and salary negotiations at the moment. Stay tuned!