Tazawa isn’t posting because he’s BYPASSING Nippon Pro Baseball entirely and going straight to the US. He’s not signed with any of the major teams, and informed them not to draft him.

As for really great Japanese pitchers, how about Hideo Nomo? How about Hideki Okajima? How about Hiroki Kuroda? How about Takashi Saito?

as some sort of triumph.

I realize his ERA and win/loss record were stellar this year… but i expect that ERA to be over 4.00 next year unless he changes his ability to throw strikes.

Lets look at the actual pitcher skills. 167.2 ip in 29 starts…. thats about 5.2 ip per start…. a pitcher who cant pitch 6 innings at the MLB level isnt a front of the rotation starter (i know my words not yours). In thos 167.2 ip Dice K had 154 ks which is quite respectable, but he also had 94 bbs… that is HORRIBLE. That is over 5 bbs per 9 ip. Somehow he managerd a .260 BABIP way below the expect .300. Which is really the only reason he was able to keep his era at such a great level. That and the redsox would pull him as soon as he got into trouble.

Also K/BB ratio has a very strong correlation with success for pitchers… his K/BB was 1.64… out of pitchers who threw more then 140 innings, he ranks 93rd. If you filter that for just the AL he ranked 41st out of 48, just ahead of Daniel Cabrera, Kenny Rogers, and Dana eveland.

I dont want to get into this idea that he is somehow a better pitcher with runners on base, he may very well be, but the fact is, he has two seasons at the MLB level. And both of his seasons produced skill sets that are more likely to result in an era between 4-5. Year 1, that was accurate, year 2 he managed a 2.90. I would not gamble on him being able to have a sub 4.00 era next year unless he improves his underlying skills, or unless he has some new method of pitching that no one else knows or can measure.

You also have to keep in mind that Dice K has the equivelent of a 6 year 100+ million dollar contract (yes i know he doesnt get all of that) but if you put the posting fee along with his salary, the expense the team is paying for him is up there with the elite starters of the game, I dont think that is what they have in Dice K.

oh, you’re funny. retiring Jose Molina is just as tough as Derek Jeter. who knew?

show me where i said Japanese players can’t succeed here.

why do i waste my time on you?

Truth … you’re a jackass. Video isn’t a magic 8 ball that tells you a guy is going to be “obviously a very high quality pitcher.” Video is one dimensional in that it really only paints a landscape of a pitcher’s delivery and little more. Pitching evaluators of which I’m certain you aren’t one use a series of resources (video being one of them) to scrutinize talent.

No one, (not even you, Andy Roth) had a clue how Dice K would fare against MLB talent. Epstein took an expensive gamble, and thus far it’s proven successful. However, I would caution you. Dice K has only been in the league for two years, and has thrown less than 400 innings. Wait until he cracks the 1000 innings pitched mark before erecting a statue to him…. But as a perveyor of pitching talent, Andy, I guess you already knew that, right?

EVER bring up a pitcher’s record as evidence of his effectiveness (or lack thereof).

that BAA is a skill controlable by a pitcher, this has been proven completely untrue, the only thing a pitcher can control is what type of balls in play (and how many balls in play) he allows. But roughly all pitchers hangout around a BABIP of .300.

So lets correct his .260 (where do you get .242?) BABIP to .300 and see how that .211 avg changes to .240. The amount of hits he gave up would jump from 128 to 146 combined with his 94 walks (insane amount of walks), would give him 240 base runners in 167.2 ip or a WHIP of 1.43 (EEK).

Keep this in mind, Dice K allowed 128 hits 94 walks that is 222 base runners (not counting HBP or errors). 80% of those base runners did not score THe typical elite pitcher will keep closer to 70% of runners from scoring. So we factor in his expected number of hits plus a normal expected number of runs scored based on his baserunners, he would 240 baserunners – 12 hr is 228 baserunners, that would mean 70% not scoring would be about 160, so 68 of them should score, bring back the 12 homers thats 80 ER. Which is an era of 4.30.

Of course he only allowed 12 of 202 flyballs to leave the park, studies have shown pitchers to all regardless of skill sit at around 10-11% of fly balls go for HR (this is not true for hitters). So one would expect closer to 20 homers. even if we assume those are all solo shots thats 8 more runs which is 88 er which brings his skill based era to 4.72.

By the way no pitcher who has as many innings as him has this drastic a difference between a skill based ERA and his real ERA. Its hard to know exactly why this is, but history and proven statistical analysis has shown that his era should approach his expected ERA in upcoming seasons, so will it be 4.72 next year, who knows, but his 2.90 era is a complete illusion.