Johan's Velocity This Season

by James Kannengieser on Jun 15, 2009 9:30 PM EDT

The red dots represent Johan Santana's maximum four-seam fastball velocity in each of his 2009 starts. The blue dots represent average four-seam fastball velocity. All data is from Brooks Baseball, which is missing Santana's Opening Day start for some reason. The rest of his starts are available:

(click to embiggen)

Reduced strikeout rate and decreased velocity are often signs of injury. Santana has struck out just 8 in his last 3 starts, spanning 16 innings. His average fastball velocity has hovered around 90 mph in these starts, after being in the 91-91.5 range early on. The man says he's not hurt (although Dan Warthen says he has some minor aches and pains), so it's possible this is just a "dead arm" period. Either way, Saturday's start vs. the Rays is a pivotal one. I'll be more interested in his radar gun readings than the outcome of the game.

Check out Tommy Rancel's post at Beyond the Boxscore for more on Santana. Tommy correctly notes that in recent years Santana's velocity has experienced peaks and valleys.

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Comments

Just what we needed right now

more phantom injuries to worry about.

King of the bling come to lay down the evidence//Not George Bush, L-Millz be da president

by Sam Page on Jun 16, 2009 12:53 AM EDT reply actions

if Johan is hurt

they should just put Frankie, Wright, and Beltran on the 60-day DL, freeze them, Reyes, and Santana, tank the rest of the year and go for it again next year. I’d so much rather see that than Minaya make a panic trade and/or one of those guys risk getting seriously injured.

by cjmulrain on Jun 16, 2009 1:05 AM EDT up reply actions

If he is injured

I hope to god they shut him down until he’s better. The last thing we need is Johan throwing average games over and over again and hurting himself to where he’s useless next year. If he is injured, let’s hope it’s a minor one where he only has to skip one start.

"We must win and we must know how to win rather than win because we have statistical people."

by Evan_S on Jun 16, 2009 2:04 AM EDT reply actions

This probably isn't the place...

but did anyone see this quote from Jerry?

In a telephone interview on Monday, Minaya said "the only reason we’ve been competitive" is because of contributions from players like Hernandez and Santos.

W-T-F?

by DonGately on Jun 16, 2009 2:33 AM EDT reply actions

Maybe Jerry is finally getting on board with statistical numbers:

competitive contribution = win shares x grission factor

Livan and Santos have incredibly high GFs. The numbers don’t lie!

by deadspy3 on Jun 16, 2009 2:37 AM EDT up reply actions

He doesn't realize that with players we have/had like Niese and Castro in place of Livan and Omir we would essentially have the same record.

Yet if we were to use Reed over Beltran and Murphy over Wright, the Mets would have around what, 9 wins, maybe 10.

He should be fired for even thinking something that stupid. The only players on this team right now who aren’t replaceable (excluding DL) are Wright, Beltran, Santana, and Frankie. We could do a lottery with the rest of baseball put all the names of players on a 40 man roster in a hat, one hat per position, pick out of that and we’d have, at worst, an equal team. On the offensive side, who on the Mets other than Wright and Beltran have been average? Sheff has been pretty good but the chances of him keeping it up are slim. After that, the next highest wOBA, from a player with any significant playing time (again excluding DL which is essentially saying Jose) is .328 from Castillo and Cora. That is terrible.

Wright and Beltran are carrying this offense, keeping us a competitive team until we get Jose and hopefully Delgado back or until Omar makes a trade, it has little to do with Omir Santos and Livan Hernandez

"We must win and we must know how to win rather than win because we have statistical people."

by Evan_S on Jun 16, 2009 4:22 AM EDT up reply actions 1 recs

I take it that he meant

that the only reason the team has been competitive [considering the injuries to key hitters and pitchers] is because we have gotten contributions from [unexpected sources such as] Hernandez and Santos [plus, as usual, great work from our stars like Wright and Beltran and Santana].

I really don’t think Omar is suggesting the team would be better off missing Wright or Beltran as opposed to Santos.

by wobatus on Jun 16, 2009 11:06 AM EDT up reply actions

Jerry said the quote.

"I dunno. I never smoked any Astroturf"
-Tug McGraw

by squid92 on Jun 16, 2009 11:39 AM EDT up reply actions

really?

the initial post in this thread has Jerry saying it at one point, but in highlights it said Minaya said it.

Either way, I suspect that it meant that contributions from unexpected sources were helping keep the team afloat, not that somehow Santos is more valuable to the team than Wright and beltran. But if you don’t have a catcher you get a lotta passed balls. :)

by wobatus on Jun 16, 2009 1:14 PM EDT up reply actions

all the close games

can that have anything to do with it? Santana’s pitch counts were not outrageous this year, but he got locked in a lot of tight games, with either no hitting or bad d putting him in a lot of tough situations. maybe he had to reach back for something extra just a few too many times too early this year? Just tossing that out there. And of course, tail end of last year.

I hope we get some rainouts and let him ease up a bit, get him some early huge leads, maybe an extra day or 2 around the all-star break.

by wobatus on Jun 16, 2009 11:12 AM EDT reply actions

Interesting thought

and definitely something worth looking into. Unfortunately he’ll probably be an All Star so the rest at the break might not happen. Unless he can come up with a classic “All Star Game injury.”

by James Kannengieser on Jun 16, 2009 11:40 AM EDT up reply actions