I think the Halladay comparison is a non-starter, because Halladay totally changed his approach and arsenal, while Lincecum kept his basically the same. He’s one of those guys who doesn’t need an electric fastball to survive because of his great change and curve, but given that he used to throw 94 and by the end of the season he was averaging 90, I think that’s reason for concern.

Lincecum is a small guy, and he has 3 plus pitches. He can rear back and throw an electric fastball when he needs it, but why should he? His ERA and WHIP are both lower than last year when he won the Cy Young Award.

I do agree with you about Chris O’Leary.

Does anyone have an explanation for how or why this might have happened?

Efficiency and timing, that’s what needs to be concentrated on. Kazmir has habitual rushing, but his delivery is also as inefficient as they come, it’s no wonder he struggles to stay healthy.

The point was that Chris O’Leary was using the same video clip in each to point out strengths in 2007 and flaws in 2008. That’s what I was remarking on.

O’Leary’s paper clip metaphor is fine, I guess, except that he seems to imply that mechanics are the only thing that matter in a pitcher’s health. It’s a huge aspect of it, no doubt, and I’ll take the guy with clean rather than fringey mechanics all else being equal. But my point is, all else isn’t equal. That’s why guys with as divergent mechanics as Maddux, Unit, Ryan, Clemens, and Mussina all threw tons of innings in their day. Their mechanics weren’t even close to the same, though there were similarities, particularly in their arm actions. But they also had the same thing that some guys don’t: a body that responded better to the load. That’s why James Shields, with his borderline mechanics, is a workhorse, while Ben Sheets, with his borderline mechanics, is unemployed.

The bottom line is, mechanics mean everything when it comes to prolonging careers. Heck, even Johan Santana’s borderline delivery finally caught up to him (even though i saw it coming, if you’re losing control and have a declining fastball before 30 you might as well have a sign that says injury). The more borderline your mechanics are the longer you are going to last, but the injury bug will get you eventually.

“If you take a piece of soft metal (e.g. a straightened-out paper clip) and bend it back and forth repeatedly, it’s not going to break the first time you bend it. Instead, it’s going to handle the bending for maybe ten or every twenty cycles. However, it is gradually going to degrade to the point where it eventually breaks.”

Chris basically summed it all up with this metaphor.

I think that mechanics are supremely important. It bugs me, for instance, that no one has taught Joel Zumaya how to throw a fastball, and he keeps getting injured. You can look at guys like Anthony Reyes or some other trainwreck with ugly arm action and say, “no, that’s probably not going to work.” But I do think that there is a range of acceptable mechanics. Look at Nolan Ryan versus Randy Johnson. Two guys, 4000+ innings, workhorses, etc, and they couldn’t look more different. There are similarities in arm action, I guess, but Ryan strode forever and Randy basically stands straight up. Look at Josh Beckett. He’s got the long stride, decent arm action, and he’s still only pitched 200 innings a couple of times. James Shields is “too slow to footplant” but he throws 210 innings a year. Tim Lincecum’s mechanics are hailed as revolutionary but he lost 1.5 mph (!) off of his fastball in a year and struggled to average 90 down the stretch. Matt Cain has ugly arm action but starts every 5th day. CC Sabathia, Jered Weaver, and Ubaldo Jimenez have those super long arm actions that no one seems to like anymore and they’ve throw lots of innings, but Rick Porcello and Homer Bailey have it and they are “problematic.”

In short, I think there are many things one can do to lessen the chance of injury. But individual biology has a role, too, and some guys are just plain going to be more durable than others. Best case, you get a guy with clean mechanics who seems to be a workhorse, like Verlander or Haren or whoever. But there are a number of pitchers with slight hitches in their mechanics that prove able to throw just as many innings as those guys, like Shields or Santana, who are much more useful than someone like Ben Sheets, who has decentish mechanics but whose body just doesn’t seem to be able to withstand the workload.

Chris O Leary has yet to be wrong in his evaluations (he called out Marcum for instance years before it happened) so I would take what he says as quite truthful.

Kazmir has subtle mechanical issues that may well be hampering him. Not the kind of shoulder and elbow destroying mechanics that Prior or Reyes have/had, but more of a long term thing.

I think that in mechanical disucssions, people often put a little too much emphasis on them. All good mechanics can do is minimize the chance of injury, but some bodies just don’t seem able to stay healthy. That’s what I’d say about Sheets, anyway.