Comments on: Yu Darvish is coming to the United States . . . in 2012

By: Walk

Walk — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 08:41:21 +0000

I learned my lesson watching kenshin kawakami pitch. On 5 days rest he seemed ok, 6-7 days the guy was an ace. Less than 5 days rest he was a mop up pitcher. Listening to the commentary this year the issue seemed that Kenshin was used to pitching in a rotation that featured six starters on a regular basis. He did ok the first season but fell off sharply at the end of the year and carried that fatigue into the next season. Buyer beware indeed.

By: mcsnide

mcsnide — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 17:53:58 +0000

Exactly. Thing is, even a guy like Dice-K has value. He’s a solid middle of the rotation guy, and his actual salary tracks his value quite well. But that ignores the $50 mil or so you have to pay the Japanese team. If you’re gonna drop $100 mil or so on a guy, he has to be better than middle of the rotation.

By: BC

BC — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 16:09:51 +0000

Dice-K redux. I wouldn’t touch him.

By: mcsnide

mcsnide — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 16:04:04 +0000

he’s got more miles on that odometer than U.S. pitchers several years his senior. Buyer beware. All Japanese pitchers should have this attached to their unis as a warning label.

By: madaozeki

madaozeki — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 15:30:44 +0000

On the other hand, he’s only making 25 starts a season, pitching once a week, for around 180-200 innings. So “mileage” may have different definitions since the pitch count research correlating with injury is anything but conclusive. He may in fact have far LESS mileage than if he had come up through the minors and MLB at this age.