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The trouble with starting young
Posted: Wednesday May 24, 2000 08:15 AM
To send a question to Tom Verducci's Mailbag, click here. The next Golden Age of young starting pitching was on display at the 1997 All-Star game. The first-time All-Stars were Jason Dickson, then 24, Justin Thompson, 24, Jose Rosado, 22, Shawn Estes, 24, and Bobby Jones, 27. A 25-year-old righthander named Pedro Martinez was making his second All-Star appearance.. With the obvious exception of Pedro, the next generation of great starting pitchers never panned out. The Golden Age never happened. Over the next two seasons, Dickson, Thompson, Rosado, Estes and Jones went a combined 78-96 -- and none of them finished with a winning record. The news hasn't improved this year. Every one of them has been on the disabled list this season except Estes. Just as Jones came off the DL last week, Dickson went on with a hip flexor strain. Dickson also missed all of last season because of arm surgery. Rosado is on the DL after opening the season with a fastball that barely cracked the mid-80s. Thompson is done for the season and facing his fourth major surgical procedure related to his throwing arm. Many of the best young pitchers following in their footsteps this season have, predictably, run into their own obstacles. Kip Wells, 23, of the White Sox and Ramon Ortiz, 24, of the Angels have both been demoted to the minors already for mechanical tuneups. Florida's Brad Penny, who turns 23 this week, has come back to Earth after an eye-catching first month in the big leagues. Toronto's Roy Halladay, 23, has lost his confidence and his spot in the rotation. Ryan Rupe and Dan Wheeler -- 25 and 22, respectively -- of the Devil Rays have had a devil of a time holding on to their jobs in the Devil Rays' rotation. Octavio Dotel, 24, hasn't made the Mike Hampton deal look good for Houston just yet. Even 20-year-old Rick Ankiel of the Cardinals, the best young pitcher in the game today, has hit a patch of rough going lately, with three no decisions and a loss. The lesson here, of course, is nothing new. The collapse of the '97 All-Stars is an extreme example, but that and the troubles of the youngsters of 2000 remind us how volatile young hurlers can be. That's why it will be especially hard for the Expos, Blue Jays and White Sox to contend all year, and why the early gains of the Marlins and Royals have been nearly wiped out by recent slumps. All those teams rely heavily on young starting pitchers. It is an unpredictable business. Pitching coaches like to remind the media that Tom Glavine (7-17) and Greg Maddux (6-14) struggled in their first full seasons. True enough, but the kicker is that they have almost never struggled since then. With the exception of those early growing pains, the two of them have had only one losing season (by Glavine back in 1990). Glavine and Maddux were consistent winners at a young age. That is a rarity. Why are young pitchers so vulnerable to great swings in performance? As with the All-Star class of '97, injuries are one factor. Also, pitching, unlike hitting, is an acquired art that relies more on a basis of knowledge. There is no way to rush the learning curve, not when a position player can play almost every day of the year (including winter ball) while the starting pitcher must rest at least four days for every one in which he plays. In an expansion era that has seen the addition of four teams in a six-year span (that's roughly 68 pitching jobs, given DL spots), pitchers take care of their learning curves on the big league level and not in the minors. As an example, let's look at what the Tigers are doing with C.J. Nitkowski. He's 27 years old, and he entered this season with a lifetime record of 11-18 with a 5.50 ERA. Nonetheless, the Tigers guaranteed him a spot in their rotation when he came to spring training. Since then, Nitkowski has been lit up like Times Square at New Year's. He is 2-7 with a 7.59 ERA and he's throwing batting practice to righthanders, who have spanked him for a .355 average. Yet manager Phil Garner keeps running him out there. Nitkowski's main problem is that when he gets behind hitters, he simply pumps fastballs over the plate. Nitkowski lacks command of his changeup and breaking ball and thus doesn't have the confidence to throw those pitches when he's in trouble. "Once he learns to throw something other than his fastball in that situation, he'll win," Garner said. The Tigers are content to let Nitkowski take his lumps and lessons in the rotation. Garner has ruled out demoting him to the bullpen. "Got $15 million?" Garner asks. "Unless you've got that kind of money to spend on a pitcher, then C.J.'s going to be part of the starting rotation. And he's not going to get there next week. I want to see him do better, obviously. But you've got to learn. It's part of the process. He's learning.'' That's major league baseball at the turn of the century. Opportunities abound for young pitchers, as do cases of indigestion for their managers. From young to oldTake a look at the ages of the starting players of a certain AL team in one game last week, and try to guess which team we're talking about: Must be the Yankees, right? Or those veteran Cleveland Indians? Wrong and wrong. The lineup -- with an average player age of 32 -- belongs to a third-year expansion team coming off a 93-loss season. We are speaking, of course, of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. No one is exactly quite sure what is going on in St. Petersburg. One minute the Devil Dogs are building on young pitching and defense and the next they've practically installed at keg at second base to fit a slow-pitch softball style team. But this much we do know: they aren't building for the future. The D-Rays are so desperate to get people in the Tampa Bay area interested in baseball (700,000 paying customers bailed out on them last season) that they keep plugging in old players past their prime in an attempt to squeeze out a few more wins that might get them a respectable record. That tactic, by the way, isn't working. The Devil Rays had a chance to unload outfielder Dave Martinez last season to a contender while getting a prospect in return. GM Chuck LaMar, known for being one of the most difficult GMs in baseball with which to make a deal, held on to Martinez. So this year LaMar does deal Martinez, and for what? A 34-year-old lefthanded set-up man, Mark Guthrie. The Devil Rays even gave long-finished Billy Taylor a chance in their bullpen. Tampa Bay has lost 11 games this season in which it gave up the winning run in the eighth inning or later. So much for going with experience. Philly flopThe Phillies entered this week with a 31-64 (.326) record dating back to August 6. The front office missed badly on signing closer Mike Jackson, a guy who scared off several other teams because of his injury potential. Jackson, who hasn't thrown a pitch this season, may be done for the season because of soreness in his right shoulder. First baseman Rico Brogna has a broken arm, ace pitcher Curt Schilling missed the first month of the season, pitcher Andy Ashby has flopped and the Veterans Stadium turf continues to jeopardize the health of third baseman Scott Rolen's back. Nonetheless, the heat is just starting to get turned up on manager Terry Francona. The Phillies flopped late in each of the previous two seasons. But this season they must now put together a decent next month or two to bring in crowds through the summer months, rather than facing a 15-game deficit to the first-place Braves that would keep everyone home. The Phillies drew fewer than 19,000 for each of three games against the Cardinals last week. Those were the smallest crowds to watch Mark McGwire and company all season. If the Phillies can get through a nine-game trip to Houston, Los Angeles and San Francisco in decent shape, the schedule finally begins to offer them help. They get 22 of the 35 games before the All-Star break at home. Francona is a bright young manager who has done well to develop young players such as Rolen, Bobby Abreu, Doug Glanville and Mike Lieberthal. Now he gets a chance to groom Pat Burrell, who will be a stud in the big leagues -- the only question is when. Francona's honeymoon is almost over, though. The Phillies have improved each year under Francona, from 67 wins in 1996 under Jim Fregosi, to 68 to 75 to 77. That's a glacial pace, though -- one that might not afford Francona the luxury of backsliding in 2000. Sports Illustrated senior writer Tom Verducci covers baseball for the magazine and writes a column for CNNSI.com every Tuesday. Click here to send a question to his mailbag. The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer.
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