Suppan may start Sunday 10/4

[sgtcluels]

Since the Suppan thread is locked I'll put it here. Per Adam McCalvy

 

Suppan could start Sun. in STL. Needs 1 more for 11th straight season of 30 GS. Only Livan Hernandez (12) has longer active streak

[DougJones43]

In case anybody was wondering, Suppan needs to give up 13 earned runs (without recording an out) to finish the season with an ERA above 6. That would give us 3 starters with an ERA over 6, which would have to be some kind of world record. It's not likely to happen, but you never know!

[Schlitz001]

Right, and if Suppan pitches a 10 inning complete game shutout he will have an ERA under 5.00.

 

I don't understand what kind of misery you must be going through to think that Suppan is going to give up 13 earned runs without giving up an out. His ERA right now is 5.30. Most projections at the beginning of the year had his ERA above 5.00. Last year it was 4.96 and the year before that it was 4.62. He has aged and he has regressed accordingly, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have value to this rotation. 11 straight seasons of 30 GS is really impressive. He is an innings eater and a 5th starter. The starting staff as a whole has been a disapointment, but I'm not sure Suppan deserves a lot of the blame.

[AJAY]

Suppan is an innings eater? I don't recall him pitching into the 7th or 8th inning as consistently as starters on other teams. I think he actually chews up the bullpen with short outings. I personally hope he gets shelled on Sunday just to reinforce to the Brewers management that he has no business being in the rotation next season.

[TooLiveBrew]

I just wish the Brewers hadn't backloaded his contract. I think (just imo) they were planning on being able to unload him towards the end of the contract, since FA contracts had exploded so much in value. At the time, $12.5M AAV didn't look like it'd be so bad for a #5 SP.

 

It actually would have made more sense to front-load the contract, since the core guys were all still pretty cheap.

[DougJones43]

I don't understand what kind of misery you must be going through to think that Suppan is going to give up 13 earned runs without giving up an out.

It wasn't meant to be taken seriously. And I agree with AJAY -- no way is Suppan even an innings eater at this point. He's averaging less than 5.2 innings per start. His longest start was 7.0 innings, which he only did 4 times. I don't think you can call a guy an innings eater when he never recorded an out in the 8th inning a single time all season.

[crewcrazy]

Suppan is dependable in that you can usually count on him to make a start every 5 days, but like others have said, I don't think "innings eater" applies to him anymore. The only season with Milwaukee in which Suppan has hit the 200-inning mark was his first year here.

[pitchleague]

I would call him a "starts eater" as he is, over his career, a guy that can be depended on to make just about every start and finish with 30+ over each season.

[RockCoCougars]

I'd lean towards calling Suppan a "bullpen killer" instead of an "innings eater". He has to be leading the league in 'unquality starts'....isn't he?

[JohnBriggs12]

Suppan never was an innings eater. At his best when he was a Cardinal, he never reached 200 innings.

[mletto157]

How's this for a hilarious statistic. Suppan "held" opposing hitters to a .896 OPS this year. To put it into perspective, Evan Longoria had an OPS of .892! In other words, having Suppan on the mound is WORSE than going against a lineup of 9 Evan Longorias!

 

Imagine that. If the average player turns into Evan Longoria... what does an above average player turn into? That would mean to me that Jason Kendall would turn into himself when he was good, pitchers all turn into Micah Owings, and players like Prince and Braun would turn into Barry Bonds circa early 2000's… That's amazing to me. He faces a lineup with no holes every time he pitches.

[bklynbrewcrew]

That statistic would be hilarious if Suppan didnt pitch for the Brewers but it really does illustrate how bad he is.

[Schlitz001]

Suppan is an innings eater? I don't recall him pitching into the 7th or 8th inning as consistently as starters on other teams. I think he actually chews up the bullpen with short outings. I personally hope he gets shelled on Sunday just to reinforce to the Brewers management that he has no business being in the rotation next season.

His first year with the Brewers he led the team in IP and the past two he has been 3rd. I'm not claiming that Suppan is the next Cy Young, just that he holds some value in the sense that he doesn't get injured and puts up decent number for a number 5 starter.

 

I'm just not sure what people expected from Suppan at the beginning of the season that everyone is so disappointed with his performance this year. Shouldn't this blame be going to Dave Bush and Manny Parra? The two pitchers in the game with the worst ERAs for pitchers who threw at least 100 innings? They are the ones not living up to expectations.

[Schlitz001]

Suppan never was an innings eater. At his best when he was a Cardinal, he never reached 200 innings.

You are right. He never did reach 200 IP with the Cardinals. These are still good yearly IP totals.

 

1999 - 208.2

2000 - 217.0

2001 - 218.1

2002 - 208.0

2003 - 204.0

2004 - 188.0

2005 - 194.1

2006 - 190.0

2007 - 206.2

2008 - 177.2

[AJAY]

I'd lean towards calling Suppan a "bullpen killer" instead of an "innings eater". He has to be leading the league in 'unquality starts'....isn't he?

 

I would lean towards calling him a "money eater"

[fallingleaves]

Suppan and Parra need to go to the BP next year. What a joke.

[joepepsi]

I'm just not sure what people expected from Suppan at the beginning of the season that everyone is so disappointed with his performance this year. Shouldn't this blame be going to Dave Bush and Manny Parra? The two pitchers in the game with the worst ERAs for pitchers who threw at least 100 innings? They are the ones not living up to expectations.

This is the gist of the Brewers season. I made basically the same point on the preseason prediction topic.

 

Yes, Suppan makes a lot of money and he is getting worse, but he wasn't the problem. For his career he's been an league average starter throwing 197 innings a year on average, making 31 starts. He certainly has been an innings eater over his career. He missed a month this year, otherwise he'd probably be around 180+ innings.

 

I suspect moving forward he'll battle more injuries and be less effective when he does start. It won't surprised me at all if he retires after next year.

[TheCrew07]

I have no problem with people placing the blame on Bush and Parra more so than Suppan. Suppan was about what I expected, I never had high expectations for him.

 

The thing is that I still don't see the point in bringing back Parra before he had established dominance again in AAA. Why not bring up Narveson or Wright, what would the difference have been for the MLB team? I would think not much, and maybe Parra would have regained that mental edge he appears to have lost.

 

At this point I think Parra is a safe bet to start in the rotation in 2010, but Yo might be the only current pitcher in the rotation who is still in the rotation for 2011.

 

I'm ashamed to admit this but part of me hopes Suppan stinks if he does go on Sunday. I don't have anything against him personally, he is what he is, I just would like to reinforce the point that DM needs to aggressively address the rotation this off season.

[Never Outhustled]

Suppan is well below replacement level for 2 years running. He will only continue to regress. I think the team should consider cutting ties with him this offseason. He's really not worth a 40 man roster spot. It would be easier to attract replacements if he wasn't here assuming a rotation spot.

[owbc]

Suppan has given the Brewers exactly what they should have expected.

[endaround]

No he hasn't. When signed there is not even a pessimist who thought he would have been as bad last year and this year as he was. He was expected to be average for 2 years, barely above replacement this year and below replacement next year.

[trwi7]

St. Louis - It looks like Jeff Suppan will be starting Sunday for the Brewers. He's out in the bullpen throwing at Busch Stadium right now, and he wouldn't be doing that if he was done for the season.

As stated in an earlier blog, Suppan needs one more start to extend his string to 11 consecutive seasons with 30 starts. Livan Hernandez just boosted his to 12 in a row, so he's the active leader.

I'm expecting Macha to allow Suppan to start the season finale, then after an inning or two switch to left-hander Chris Narveson, who originally was scheduled to start.

What do you folks think? Is this 30-start thing a big enough deal to go with Suppan, who is 7-12 with a 5.30 ERA this season?

Well isn't that lovely?

[And That]

Chris Narveson must have put Macha in a zim zam. Congrats on your 30th start, Jeff, I guess.

[Yeti73]

The 2006 off-season, I remember three similar signings of pitchers like Soup. Interesting to see how they went:

 

-- Dodgers inked Schmidt to a 3 year $47 million deal most people agreed that we got the better deal. Schmidt has started ten games over those three years to Soup's 90.

--Gil Meche was signed that same season for 5-years $55 mil., Meche has pitched better than expected

--Ted Lilly signed a 4 year $40 mil

--Some guy on the Giants signed a 7 year $125 million deal.

 

Soup, in my mind, falls in the middle of the pack, although some of you probably wish he'd have as many starts as Schmidt. He's been better for the buck than Zito and Schmidt. Cubs did well with Lilly and Meche has really beaten expectations so far, but has two more years. Just shows you how ridiculous things were in the 2006 off-season.

[RockCoCougars]

It just amazes me how many people still defend Suppan. Must be because he seems like such a good dude off the field or something. Worst free agent signing in Brewers history in my opinion.