Top 10 starting pitchers for next year (through Sep. 29)

[maligned]

Jurrjens is another one that has ERA results that don't reflect his raw data. He gives up a lot of baserunners. Couple that with the fact that he plays in a pitcher-friendly park and pitcher-friendly league. The result is that his final Strat card won't be as strong as we might think when we look at his ERA only. I'm a Braves fan, btw, so it's definitely not about love or no love. I love to cheer for the guy, but his Strat card won't be on the first page of SPs next year.

[maligned]

Top 25 through September 29 (5 days remaining):

1 Zack Greinke S7*
2 Dan Haren S7*
3 Tim Lincecum S7*
4 Javier Vazquez S7*
5 CC Sabathia S7*
6 Josh Johnson S7*
7 Felix Hernandez S7*
8 Chris Carpenter S7
9 Ubaldo Jimenez S7*
10 Justin Verlander S7*
11 Roy Halladay S7*
12 Josh Beckett S7*
13 Matt Cain S7*
14 Joel Pineiro S7*
15 Jair Jurrjens S7*
16 Robinson Tejeda S5
17 Adam Wainwright S7*
18 Ted Lilly S6
19 Randy Wolf S6*
20 Scott Baker S6*
21 Edwin Jackson S7*
22 Jon Lester S6*
23 Jason Marquis S7*
24 Josh Outman S6
25 Cliff Lee S7*

To review from page 1 of this thread, I project these rankings based on the Component ERA (raw performance) of each pitcher. This ERC is adjusted for stadium, league, and team defense. The value of each pitcher is then calculated and adjusted for endurance and * or no*.

[TefJ]

maligned,

Are you sure Carp won't have a star? Granted, he only had 28 starts, but he did finish with 192.2 ip. Last year, the highest total for a non * starter was 191.2. I don't know enough about how they figure it out to say that he definitely will have a *, but he's right on the cusp. Where would he rank if he did?

[maligned]

SOM's criteria for a star is based on two things: Innings Pitched and Games Started. 2008 is a bit misleading if you use it to analyze where a star will come. There seems to be a cutoff between 191.1 and 193 IP. In fact, pitchers with 30 starts or less do not get a star if they have less than 200 innings. Look at 2007 for example. Chien-Ming Wang had 199 IP--more than numerous star starters--but did not have a star. This is because he only started 30 games. The same goes for Kelvim Escobar from 2007. 195+ IP, 30 starts, no star.
192.2 IP does seem to be a cutoff for where a starter with 33 or 34 starts could still be given a star...although even that's not guaranteed. Miguel Batista recently pitched 193 with 33 starts and had no star.

All this to say, Carpenter will be a no-* starter unless SOM decides to give him a past performance or Cy Young freebie (if he wins it this year). I don't see that happening though.

With a star he would be #4 on this list after Sept. 29 (slightly behind Lincecum/Haren). But he had another good outing yesterday while Haren struggled, so his value might be as good as #2 with a star now. I'll run the final numbers after the season...he'll still be projected as a no-* though.

[maligned]

[quote:746205c7d8="jagman28"]no love for jurrjens?[/quote:746205c7d8]

It's funny we had this discussion, then Jurrjens was lights out for two starts and jumped 15 spots in my rankings. As long as he doesn't tank his final start, he's obviously solidly in the top 25 now.