For many many years.Originally Posted by Kimmi
For many many years.
I always found it difficult to watch Wake. He was a very serviceable pitcher for us for years, but always afraid of that homerun ball or if runners on base a passed ball or wild pitch.
When Wake pitched that 3 inning stint in the Game 5 of the 2004 ALCS I honestly couldn't watch much of it. I was so sure it was going to end badly. I find it hard to watch even on DVD when I know they don't score. :-)
Wakefield had a lot of guts, I always thought. He gave you everything he had.
He sure did.
1995-2011
HR/9
Sox 0.9
Wake 1.2
WHIP
Sox 1.36
Wake 1.35
ERA-
Sox 93
Wake 96
From 2002 to 2011, fangraphs placed his value at $83.5M while his actual salary was $28M over that period. They did not compute value before 2002.
Again I did not say he was a bad pitcher I respect everything he did, but to watch him was painful. You do not have to show me stats every time I say something.
Yeah, I didn't take it that way.
Personally, I loved watching Wake pitch. He did well more than he did poorly. I think he had a 52% QS rate and was over 70% a couple years in a row for the Sox.
Towards the end, he was still a capable 5th starter type. Not having a capable catcher hurt. He only had over 10 WPs once up until his last few years- then it was like 4 out of his last 6 years with over 10.
I know many think it's pointless to do these "what ifs", but it's winter, and there's nothing much to discuss.
Had we not done the Kimbrel and Pom trades, could we have pulled off the Sale trade plus this one?
Margot, Espinosa, Geurra, Allen, Asuaje for Quintana?
We'd have Sale, Quintana, Price, Porcello, ERod & Wright (No Pom)
We'd have someone like Clippard and another pen arm instead of Kimbrel (and with his money saved).
I am taking this opportunity to recruit new team owners for the 2017 TalkSox Mike Grace Memorial Fantasy League. As of now, it looks like we have 8 confirmed teams down from the 12 that we had last year. TalkSox members are welcome to join. Statheads/StatGeeks are woefully under-represented in this league, which is all about stats and nothing about intangibles. If you are already in the league, please spread the word as it was a fun and competitive league last year with 12 teams. Let's try to get 4 new teams into the league.
The King of TalkSox has Spoken.
When Wake was on, he just seemed ace like - but when he was off - oh baby was it tough to watch. That is probably why the debate rages on with respect to knuckleball pitchers in general. If you value consistency, you might not want to be signing the knuckleballer. Probably why there were people out there who were for trading Wright last year when he was pitching so well.
You said it how I wanted to, they can lose it game to game and even inning to inning.
Most good (not great) pitchers have good and bad streaks. The either "have it" or "they don't". I really never viewed Wake as being any more inconsistent than other 3-4-5 starters in MLB at that time.
He was basically a one pitch pitcher, so maybe it's more noticeable when that pitch is not working. He had no other pitch to fall back on like others did which I think helped stoke the image of him being up and down more than others. If you actually look at his numbers and game logs, he was pretty consistent from year to year and withing each season- no more- no less than other back end starters in MLB.
Remember, he also pitched in a hitter's park, in the steroid era and on teams that sometimes lacked in plus defense. At times, he had catchers who had no clue as to how to catch a knuckler. I guess one could blame the pitcher for that, but I never did. If a pitcher can throw a pitch that is hard to catch, imagine how hard it must have been to hit!
Part of being consistent is being healthy and giving innings. He went 14 straight seasons and 16 out of his 17 seasons with Boston with 140+ IP! He had 13 seasons with 154+ IP and 9 with 180+ IP. His ERA was between 4.13 and 5.14 in 14 of 17 seasons with the Sox (1 at 2.95, 1 at 5.48 and 1 at 5.34). His ERA- was over 103 just once in his first 15 seasons with Boston! It was under 98 ten out of his first 15 seasons. His career WHIP was rather high (1.35), but he was pretty consistent there too by coming within 0.12 of his career norm in 12 of his 17 seasons with us. (3 of the other 5 seasons he was below by more than 0.12.)
Except for his last season here, in sesasons with 19 or more starts, his QS% was always between 47% and 73%.
All 17 Sox seasons:
3 seasons over 67% QS's
6 seasons from 52% to 60%
5 seasons from 47 to 48%
3 seasons from 29 to 35%% (all when split between starting and relieving)
I think if we compare Wake to the top 3 & 4 starters in MLB at that time, he'll look just as consistent.
So can just about every other fair to mediocre pitcher in MLB.
Travis Wood signs for $12M/2 or $18.5M/3 (option) with the Royals with no guarantee to make the rotation.
He'd have fit into our budget numbers, but I think saving luxury tax space for the deadline (or before) makes more sense than going after someone like Wood.
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