Promise Fulfilled
Felix was really good last night. Forget the four runs allowed – that was about as good as a pitcher can throw. The 11 strikeouts were a season high, and he did it on the same night that he ran a 15/2 GB/FB rate. There’s usually a trade-off between ground balls and strikeouts – you go for one at the expense of the other. Felix faced 33 batters, and 26 of them either struck out or hit it on the ground. That’s incredible.
Over his last 10 starts, Felix is running a 60% GB% and an 8.25 K/9. For the last couple of months, he’s been as good as he was during his first two months the majors back in 2005, when he burst on the scene and looked like the best young pitcher in the history of baseball. It took him four years to get back to that level, but he’s done it. Hitters adjusted, he struggled with his command, he had to learn how to pitch, but he’s back to that level.
He is, once again, that amazing combination of groundball and strikeout dominator. For the last two months, he’s been the Roy Halladay type ace that we always thought he could be.
It’s been a frustrating journey at times, because we all knew Felix was capable of so much more. But, the struggles have matured him, made him better, and turned him into an ace.
Zack Greinke has had a better 2009 season, but right now, Felix Hernandez may be the best pitcher in baseball. He’s ascending to the throne before our very eyes.
Long Live King Felix.
And let’s hope the M’s find a way to keep him.
I heard a bit of the post-game call-in on Felix Is The Cy Young, and I was pleasantly surprised that at least 80% of the callers’ comments were along the line of “I love Felix, Felix Is My King, but Greinke deserves it more.”
That said, Greinke is 25. Felix is 23. Greinke may be close to his potential peak. Felix, meanwhile, still can improve more, and probably will.
Here’s Felix’s yearly ERA (yeah, yeah, ERA = bad, etc.) over the last four full seasons:
4.52
3.92
3.45
2.49
I think he still has a Pedro 2000 season still in him, maybe two.
Great post! I think only three of the runs were earned though.
Yep, only 3 earned runs.
I find myself increasingly anxious over the Felix contract situation. You soooo want to lock him up long-term, yet at the same time he has so much trade value. Almost feels like Mark Langston all over again. As painful as that was, it sure turned out nice for the M’s.
Felix has been so good this season, that I haven’t been paying attention to that bugaboo from a couple of years ago, the “establishing the fastball” rut that he got himself into. Has part of his improvement been due to better pitch selection, including not continually tossing fastballs in the early innings?
I think it might have more to do with Felix new ability to be able to put the fastball where he wants it.
I haven’t payed enough attention to his pitch selection to know if it’s improved really, but pitch selection becomes less of a problem when you can make a pitch go where you want it to.
DW –
Better data from Fangraphs (that removes the fact that the M’s are defensively way better in 2009 than they were in the past few years):
Year FIP tRA
2006 3.91 4.19
2007 3.75 3.79
2008 3.80 4.16
2009 3.08 3.30
He’s lowered his FIP and tRA by .72 and .86 respectively this year.
For comparison, Greinke:
Year FIP tRA
2006 5.04 7.84
2007 3.74 4.40
2008 3.56 4.00
2009 2.33 2.73
Holy crap. That’s just an amazing improvement.
I’m looking forward to the AL Cy Young race for the next few years.
Dave, I completely agree with you. Promise fulfilled. I live on the east coast and for the past few years I’ve had to listen to all Boston and NYY fans tell me that Felix is over-rated and will never be an elite pitcher. Now, all I hear from them is how he will be the next great Red Sox pitcher and I think nothing makes my blood boil like that. I wish nothing more than to see Felix be a lifetime Mariner.
I think Felix’s improved fastball has certainly been a huge benefit. I don’t think his approach has changed too much, it’s just that his fastball is now awesome due to better command. It is a top 10 fastball, and when you couple that with his freeze-you curve [which isn’t quite the royal curve any more, just watch his 2006 highlights on mlb.tv for that] and his nasty changeup/splitter, and his excellent stamina, you are dealing with a true ace.
I haven’t looked at Pitch FX in detail to correlate each 3rd strike pitch with pitch type, but according to the interviews he did after the game
The aggregate pitch data from Pitch FX doesn’t seem to agree with that: of the 108 pitches he threw, it categorized 8 as “sinker,” 7 as “slider,” 15 as “curve,” and 78 as four-seam fastball. Either it was mischaracterizing his changeup as a curve (and/or slider), or he’s not remembering accurately. Certainly from this it looks like only about half of his strike-outs were off-speed pitches, but I’m no expert at interpreting Pitch FX.
I don’t think we can deny that Greinke’s comeback has been something remarkable. His problems with depression and anxiety, especially in a baseball environment, make Felix’s problems with “establishing the fastball” look less than piddling.
I think Greinke should win the Cy Young. Felix winning it wouldn’t be the worst thing ever, but Greinke would have been denied what belongs to him. Sabathia winning the Cy Young would be a travesty somewhere between Bob Welch’s win in ’90 and Rafael Palmeiro’s ’99 Gold Glove for playing 28 games at 1b.
MKT & Faceplant-
Based on Fangraphs Pitch Types and Pitch Type Values, he’s throwing his FB at about the same rate as last year (and the 2nd highest rate in his career) and his other pitches are also around 2008 mix rates.
He’s just throwing them all for better results this year. His fastball is worth .5 runs per 100 thrown more than last year. His slider is worth almost .87 runs per 100 better, his curveball is 1.38 /100 better, and his change is .18 / 100 better (and at 2.43 runs /100 is amazing).
Of qualified starters in MLB (78 total), he has the 7th best change (in Pitch Value per 100 thrown), 25th best curve, 33rd best slider, and 13th best fastball.
One interesting thing about that fastball: Felix has lost only a little over 1 mph on average on that pitch over the past few years. He used to average a little over 95; now he sits at 94. That’s still good enough to place him in the top ten in fastball speed on Fangraphs, but no longer in the top five (in part due to new fireballers like Ubaldo Jimenez). If taking 1-2MPH off the fastball is what is giving him this better command (and allowing him to go deep into games), that’s a fantastic trade-off.
Please, dear god, RE-SIGN FELIX!
But couldn’t he conceivably be throwing the fastball at the same rate, yet not being as predictable with it?
When I have time I’m going to have to start pouring over gameday data.
I happened to be in Toronto this week and just made it to the game during the 6th inning. It was worth it to see Felix and Aardsma finish them off. Ugly-ass carpet there, when you see it up close. Two interesting things I heard on local radio postgame: 1)The announcers thought Felix’s stuff was the toughest the Jays have faced all year, and 2)Speculation by one of the broadcasters that the Jays will open up the checkbook and pursue King Felix as an offseason acquisition. I think Felix bedazzled the Jays broadcast team to the point that they weren’t making much sense.
Say Felix puts together a full season of being an ace, like we have seen over the last few weeks, in terms of WAR, how much could Felix be worth?
Pay Felix whatever he wants! Brake the bank for him!!!
I have heard all the reasons for him leaving, but maybe being the leader of what could be a growing dynasty could be appealing to him as well. The team seems to have a plan and be going in the right direction for the first time since he has been in the big league. Hopefully he will see the potential!
Are you referring to trade value or $ on the open market?
I personally think Felix’s success this year is entirely due to getting to throw to Rob Johnson and not Johjima… /end sarcasm 🙂
Why would we need to brake the bank? Is it moving? ;o)
Seriously though, while my greatest hope is that the M’s sign him to an extention, it does have to be a smart contract for the team too.
If they can sign him this offseason for somewhere in the range of 5/70 – 5/90 they would probably be safe enough and get good value from it. But if he wants all the money now, and more than 5 years,say 8/180+ you are potentially hamstringing your team if he gets hurt or loses the strike zone. Or even if you end up trading him during that monster contract, and he’s still dominating, you could end up eating tons of cash. (see Hicks, Tom and Rodriguez, Alexander Emmanuel)
Give Felix (and Rob Johnson) lifetime Mariner contracts!
And what’s remarkable: Matt Wieters is 6 weeks younger than Felix; David Price is 8 months older. Felix is top prospect age, as if the major leagues were AA ball and he’s ready to be moved up.
Indeed, that is the most remarkable part of this whole story. At the age of 23, he has 4+ MLB seasons under his belt. Not only is he still improving and developing physically and physiologically (in terms of understanding his body, knowing the body dynamics associated with pitching, etc), but his psychological make-up is that of a seasoned veteran – most 23-year-olds are still prone to shit fits and tantrums, but he has been able to avoid that for the most part.
Without trying to look like a baseball fan that understands about 10% of the stats and how they can/should be interpreted most of the time, what is the ceiling for this (still) young man? Are we witnessing the ascention of a perennial Cy Young candidate, a la Pedro Martinez, Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson et al? Or, are we to wonder how much of his improved results are due to the amazing defense being provided behind him? Is this the “career year” of a pitcher, kind of like Doc Gooden when he was 20? The knock on Gooden was that he never really learned how to “pitch” – has Felix turned that corner, kind of like when Randy Johnson flicked a switch (with a big nudge from Nolan Ryan) in 1993 and transformed himself into the most dominant pitcher of his era?
Only time will tell, of course, but damn… this kid is good. Really good.
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