Stop abusing Gallardo!

[topper09er]

It doesn't work that way, there are 3 different levels of fatigue a team needs to be concerned with... pitches in an inning, pitches in a game, pitches in a season.

So you are saying resting your arm for 9 days opposed to 4 has no effect at all? Based on my own personal experience I know my arm feels better when I have more rest.

[TheCrew07]

When they rest a pitcher in that manner you'll have a case, until then you're grasping at straws trying to justify a course of action for which there isn't justification.

[Baldkin]

The risk is NOT worth the reward.

10-20 extra innings a year out of your starting pitcher is not worth the increased risk of killing his arm for the next 1,000 innings the Brewers need him to throw over the next 5 years.

[jeffy]

Asserting things does not make them so. I could say "an extra 10-20 innings per year is very unlikely to, in and of itself, cause a significant problem". Besides, shouldn't it be the number of pitches?

 

There is no known bright line here between a "safe" number of pitches and an "unsafe" number of pitches. Throwing over 100 pitches does not equal abuse. If limiting starters to 100 pitches is safer, all else being equal, than letting them go 120, then it is likely that limiting them to 80 would be safer than 100...so why not do that?

 

How do you know that the risk is worth the reward if he goes 100 rather than 80, but that in the case of letting him go 120 rather than 100 the risk is not worth the reward?

[TheCrew07]

Innings are generally used as a pitch approximation by us little people. The whole point is that we don't know exactly what Yo's arm can take, so are the 20 extra innings worth it when we are in 4th place in our own division and a game below .500? The team isn't out of it yet, but they've been on a steady decline for the past 6 weeks. Isn't Yo's long-term more important to this franchise than an extra 20-30 innings this season?

 

Learn from the mistakes of the past, like Neugebauer for the Brewers... or Prior and Wood for the Cubs. Was that one playoff appearance the Cubs rode Prior and Wood to more important than getting 6 full healthy seasons out of each pitcher? How good would the Cubs have been with Zambrano, Wood, and Prior in the rotation all this time? How bad is our rotation without Yo?

[Baldkin]

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=1480

31% of all injured pitchers had above average career PAP totals for their career pitch counts.

9% of all healthy pitchers had above average career PAP totals for their career pitch counts.

 

This suggests that high PAP pitchers are more than three times as likely to be injured as low PAP pitchers of who've thrown similar numbers of pitches. We have our first piece of evidence that PAP provides predictive information beyond what pitch counts alone can tell us.

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=2633

Roughly speaking, "too many pitches" seems to translate to "over 100".

Once a pitcher hits his fatigue point, his risk of injury goes up very quickly with each additional pitch.

Pitchers under the age of 25 are exquisitely sensitive to overuse.

While I'll admit that PAP is not a perfect metric and obviously every individual is different, the numbers are there.

 

And jeffyscott, I didn't want to use pitches. Trotting Yo back out there for an extra inning bringing him from 100 to 120 pitches every other start is what I was referring to. That's 10-20 innings per year.

[MJLiverock]

Learn from the mistakes of the past, like Neugebauer for the Brewers... or Prior and Wood for the Cubs. Was that one playoff appearance the Cubs rode Prior and Wood to more important than getting 6 full healthy seasons out of each pitcher? How good would the Cubs have been with Zambrano, Wood, and Prior in the rotation all this time? How bad is our rotation without Yo?

The assumption you make is that had they pitched less that one year they wouldn't have gotten hurt. There is no way of knowinig that Wood and Prior wouldn't have had the same arm problems anyway even with 20 less pitches per outing or whatever. There are genetics, body construction, mechanics, type of pitches thrown, build up of 15+ years of pitching, etc. in other words a whole host of variables that contribute to a pitcher getting hurt beyond just pitch counts and assuming that throwing 10 or 20 less pitches occasionally will eliminate those problems.

 

Of course young pitchers get hurt more, they are then weeded out of the population of guys who become old pitchers, sort of a self fulfiling prophecy. Young pitcher also probably have bad mechanics, or haven't had their mechanics fixed/tweeked until an injury occurs. They have been abused all through HS or college, making them an injury waiting to happen as micro tears in tendons build and are ready to give on pitch 1 or 50 of an outing. Maybe they have been breaking off nasty curve balls and sliders since they were 13 it all adds up and declaring that 100 pitches is the number for everyone at the ML level is just not provable.

[lcbj68c]

Roughly speaking, "too many pitches" seems to translate to "over 100". ~~ Baldkin

 

It says roughly speaking. I just think that goes to show that "the line" is not so bright and is rather blurred. I'm not a physical therapist and know nothing about about the body, but doesn't Gallardo at some point, have to some longer outings with which to "build arm strength"? I know when I go the gym, they preach making your muscles tired and working those few extra reps. It's when the muscles are nearly fatigued that they start to build up. I'm not saying run him out there every outing to 140+, but you'd think a few longer outings around 120 pitches would be good for the arm, no?

[cwolf2012]

The key word there is "nearly." If he's going to throw those last 20 pitches, he better be not be fatigued. When the velocity begins to dip hard, that means pull the pitcher.

[TheCrew07]

Or maybe it had something to do with Wood going from 114 IP in '96, to 151 IP in '97, to 166 by Aug 31, 2008 (on pace to break 200 IP) and then on the shelf for surgery.

 

Maybe it was Prior pitching 167.2 IP in his first professional season, following that season with 211.2? His career high in IP had been 138 for USC in 2001.

 

Maybe it was Neugebauer going from 80 IP in his debut as an 18 year old to 130 IP in his second season? In his 3rd season he made it to August pitching 6 innings for Milwaukee, then was shut down for injury. In 2002 he made it to May 8th before being shutdown, came back in Sept, made the last start of his career on Sept 24, 2002 going 2.2 IP before being shutdown again. Neugy's issues actually led me to find Brewerfan.net as I hoping we had another pitching prospect close to MLB.

 

Maybe, just maybe it's best to slowly build up young pitchers to the 200 IP threshold jumping 20 IP per season to protect their arms and the team's investment, then once they get there let them go wild... then again, maybe all the work that's been put into the injury nexus the last 10 years is meaningless...

[MJLiverock]

Maybe, just maybe it's best to slowly build up young pitchers to the 200 IP threshold jumping 20 IP per season to protect their arms and the team's investment, then once they get there let them go wild... then again, maybe all the work that's been put into the injury nexus the last 10 years is meaningless...

You don't find it a bit odd and arbitrary that these "safe" numbers are such even number of 100 /200 and 20? Sounds completely made up or severely rounded which means to me that 110 120 aren't much different than 100. If 20 IP per season was so reliable why do pitchers still get hurt following that regimine? Why do relievers like Dave Riske get hurt when they have never thrown near a 100 pitches in a game and have been in the majors for years? Why does pitch selection and mechanics not matter? Heck, why did I nearly tear my elbow tendon in High School having never pitched an inning in a game? Why can some guys be labeled as a rubber arm? If some guys can be in the tail of the curve and be freaks isn't it logical that some guys are going to get hurt no matter what they do? Or better yet, maybe each arm as a set amount of pitches it can throw before it gives out be it 10,000 or 20,000 for some guys. I am not advocating making a guy throw till his arm hurts or he can't lift it, I just don't find any concrete provable evidence that 100 pitches is a magic number for every guy in every situation.

[logan82]

Well, Parra tired out almost exactly at 30 extra innings last year.

[TheCrew07]

I am not advocating making a guy throw till his arm hurts or he can't lift it, I just don't find any concrete provable evidence that 100 pitches is a magic number for every guy in every situation.

Since no one has been able to establish a way to measure how many pitches any given arm has in it, why not err on the side of caution while you are developing a guy? Is there some overwhelming need to push them as far as they can possibly go? Wouldn't the Cubs have been better off with a healthy Kerry Wood pitching in the rotation every season? Or the Brewers getting more than 61 IP out of Neugy's entire career? It's not about pinpointing an exact number of pitches per inning, game, or per season for an individual pitcher, it's about trying to get pitchers through their age 25 season healthy and effective. Until a player reaches physical maturity they are at significant risk for injury, how much sense does it make to push the envelope with a devleoping arm? When you have a pitcher who's already at high risk because of his age, why would you ever want to risk pushing him to fatigue?

 

It doesn't matter if 20 IP is arbitrary or not because it's been proven effective. We aren't talking about Suppan, Looper, or Bush... we're talking about young men who are still building into their careers. There are 2 different and distinct groups of players here, and the rules should not be the same for both sets of players. How many young promising pitchers have blown out their arms due to abuse over the years? Particularily post expansion in the 70s? 200 IP isn't necessarily arbitrary, most players don't get to that threshold anymore... once a player gets there, in theory they are about 24 years old and have been slowly stretched out, so their development IP wise is completed. I don't have a problem with a pitcher jumping from 200 to 240 IP has he reaches his peak. I just don't think it's fair to compare Yo to other established pitchers around the league, when he's never had the opportunity to pitch a full MLB season yet. At this point in time Braun isn't the franchise, Gallardo is the franchise, he's our only starting pitcher of significance all the way down to A+.

[Thurston Fluff]

31% of all injured pitchers had above average career PAP totals for their career pitch counts.

9% of all healthy pitchers had above average career PAP totals for their career pitch counts.

 

This suggests that high PAP pitchers are more than three times as likely to be injured as low PAP pitchers of who've thrown similar numbers of pitches. We have our first piece of evidence that PAP provides predictive information beyond what pitch counts alone can tell us.

 

It also suggests 69% of the pitchers who get injured are not overworked. Now take into account that only a fraction of the total amount of pitchers actually get injured. Even less in their first six years and you will find it is far more likely the pitcher will not get injured or get injured through random luck than from overuse.

I think sometimes people get so involved in the raised injury risk they lose sight of the actual risk of injury. For instance if YoGa gets used in a way that makes his injury risk go from 10% to 12% is that 2% injury risk increase really worth not using him as much as we could? So if someone can show me what his actual injury risk is used one way vs the other then maybe those stats will be more telling than simply saying almost 1/3 of all injured players were overused. If all that can be shown is his risk of injury goes up but no real % of risk associated with it then I don't see how that is really cause for us not to use him as needed for the team to win more games.

It isn't about the higher % chance as much as it is the total % chance of injury.

I am not advocating having him pitch 125 every game just allow him to go deeper in situations where the team needs him to go as deep as possible. Given the way the starters have been going lately, YoGa included, now is one of those situations.

[cwolf2012]

"If 20 IP per season was so reliable why do pitchers still get hurt following that regimine?"

 

Because of uncertainty? There's always risk of getting injured, period. This risk is even higher with pitchers than pretty much any position in any sport.

 

If you're going to insist on results based thinking, then screw it, throw caution to the wind. Let him pitch 140 pitches a game and throw 270 innings. If he gets injured, you can fall back on "he might have gotten hurt anyway" and if he doesn't and he somehow doesn't perform incredibly poorly, then you can say you were right. It's a can't lose situation.

 

EDIT: I think my favorite example of someone who didn't get injured due to abuse, but lost career length due to abuse is Livan Hernandez. He was a stud for a few years, and he led the league by a LOT in abuse points. He went from a guy who could have been a top-tier pitcher for a long time to a mediocre starter in 3 seasons.

 

Do you want Gallardo to follow that same career path? Do you want to risk it?

[MJLiverock]

Crew, I don't think your opinion and mine are that far apart. I fully concede there is a point where you can burn a guy up I just don't buy into the very strict 100 limit as it seems this thread focuses on. If you occasionally throws 110 or 115 it isn't necessarily causing him damage or abusing him. The visits to the mound or in the dugout are usually for gauging how a pitcher feels, as well as observation on his mechanics, velocity, and control to help guide a pitching coach or manager on when the player is fatiguing vs. saying nope a 100 is all anyone can expect out of a pitcher below X age. A guy may have felt like a million bucks on a day and is pitching with ease or hasn't felt the need to go max effort often and his arm feels strong pumping fastballs at 90% effort vs. a day when every pitch seems to take full effort or the breaking stuff is requiring more twist making a 90 pitch effort more damaging than 115. I just don't think we should jump to the conclusion that he is abused everytime he throws over 100. As backup catchers said there is a risk reward profile to look at and the risk may not be all that great from 100 to 112 for a guy, and may make the difference in winning or losing a game. The extreme position is being totally risk averse which has drawbacks as well. At some point the team has to trust the pitchinig coach and player to know the limits of a guy vs. relying on a generic formula that is full of holes.

[lcbj68c]

I think what he is saying is. Why let him go 100 pitches? Why not cut him off at 80? Or hell..60? Where is his fatigue threshold? Have we proven it to be 100? Is it 120? Maybe it's 60? I think Macha has a pretty good understanding of what his fatigue threshhold is and it's likely closer to 120, hence why his pitching pattern has been such.

[sheethead]

Gallardo will be fine, as long as he stays away from a Cub sliding into a stampeding Prince.

[cwolf2012]

I'm not trying to say that 100 pitches is the correct cutoff, but you have to maximize value while minimizing risk. Very very few pitchers in the world are capable of throwing at the same effectiveness after 100 or so pitches. I remember a study saying that performance, on average, begins to diminish at around 80 pitches, and starts getting exponentially worse after 100 pitches. Now, this is on average, so a pitcher may have different thresholds, but with a young pitcher like Gallardo who is coming off an injury, why would you treat him as having an above average threshold?

 

Similarly, there have been a lot of studies that have shown the injury risk goes up at a much higher rate when you go past the previous years innings total by more than 20-30. I think it's safe to say that we don't have to hold him to this standard this year, but going 30 over 2007's total seems like a really big stretch to me.

 

I have no doubt that Gallardo does have a strong arm that could handle some extra pitches, I just think it's dumb to treat him like he's CC Sabathia.

[lcbj68c]

I think there is a happy medium. CC Sabathia pitched 8+ innnings many times, Gallardo has yet to do that often. CC pitched on 3 days rest many times, Gallardo has yet to do that. The injury involved the leg and Gallardo was still doing throwing mechanics with his arm. Certainly not pitching 100+ innings, but let's not assume he was sitting on his couch eating Cheesy Poofs from Oct. through February. He was getting his body ready for the work he missed from May to September. That said, I think Gallardo will find a happy medium around 190 innings. Maybe that's 20 innings more than "neccessary". And with the team being out of the playoff race, maybe they'll account accordingly and move him to the pen. It's July and so if they have a plan to limit his innings later, than maybe this is premature about nothing? I'm concerned, just can't be overly concerned not knowing what plan is or isn't in place.

[Thurston Fluff]

Do you want Gallardo to follow that same career path? Do you want to risk it?

 

If we can get those three seasons of top level pitching before he becomes average yes. More than likely that's all we will have him for anyway. Again what exactly is the actual risk? People keep saying it's a bigger risk but they have yet to quantify the actual difference or even how much there is one way or the other. If it goes from 10% to 50% chance of injury stop doing it. If it goes from 10% to 12% chance of injury that would be a risk well worth taking.

[jeffy]

31% of all injured pitchers had above average career PAP totals for their career pitch counts.

9% of all healthy pitchers had above average career PAP totals for their career pitch counts.

Could this not also mean pitchers who suck don't get used as much and pitchers who don't pitch much, because they suck, do not get injured as often?

[lcbj68c]

Sounds accurate jeffyscott. I don't understand the stat myself. Does that mean that 69% of all injured pitchers have below average career PAP totals? Meaning, they get injured early in the season or....? Seems like the information is good information, I just don't understand all the variables.

[topper09er]

31% of all injured pitchers had above average career PAP totals for their career pitch counts.

9% of all healthy pitchers had above average career PAP totals for their career pitch counts.

 

Just because these 31% had above average PAP does not mean the extra pitches caused the injury. Does this include Mark Prior's base running injury?

[lcbj68c]

Good point topper. I think the injury situations are far too complicated to pin directly on pitch count, innings pitched, days of rest alone. It goes much deeper, such as between outings work regime, etc.