Comments on: Edwin Jackson in Control

By: dfreit808

dfreit808 — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 06:09:47 +0000

Check this article out: http://www.fangraphs.com/fantasy/index.php/gauging-edwin-jackson

By: LeeTro

LeeTro — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:50:37 +0000

I’m not too sure what to make of Jackson. He had some significant Plate Discipline changes this year. Hitters chased 5-6% more balls against him this year than in years past. He also kept the contact rate at his pre-2008 levels, down 4% from ’08. A very peculiar stat was him throwing a career-low percentage of pitches in the zone without getting first-pitch strikes against more hitters. That combination usually does not lead to improving BB rates.

Also, in his pitch F/X data, I found two possible changes, though the first one would seem to be a bad thing. His fastball added an inch of tail and had about .6 inches less “life.” A much bigger change was in the slider, going from an average of 2 inches of HM to only .3 inches. This was also accompanied by an extra inch of drop. I think I’m just rambling at this point…

By: Ray

Ray — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:35:59 +0000

Fair enough. How much of his drastic drop-off in production over the course of the season can really be attributed to higher pitch counts though? I’m not saying there isn’t something there, but he completely fell apart in the second half–every meaningful number was trending to the negative more and more as the year went on. So while some of it may have been workload I just wonder how much of it was regression/batters figuring him out.

Regardless, I’ll be very interested to see how he performs next season.

By: Mike Rogers

Mike Rogers — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 20:32:09 +0000

He only went up ~30 innings, but he threw wayyyy more pitches. 2008 saw him throw 2955 pitches in 32 games for an average of 89.5 (call it 90).

2009 saw him throw 3454 in 33 games for an average 104.6 (call it 105).

Essentially 15 more pitches per outing which is a considerable amount, in my opinion.

By: Ray

Ray — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 16:49:46 +0000

No mention of his dramatic splits this year? He had a dominant April and May, a solid June and July but absolutely fell apart in August and September. For some young pitchers you could say that the innings caught up to him but Jackson only saw an increase of ~30 innings this season. His K rate and BB rate both fell as the season went on, he was dramatically more hittable and I would imagine the advanced metrics would show the same (I couldn’t find season splits of FIP, xFIP, etc).

By: Paul

Paul — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 16:12:00 +0000

He’s going to be overvalued because Burnett’s FIP was higher. I wouldn’t be surprised to see the Cards go get him and capitalize on the upside.