The sarcasm regarding this is getting beyond old, and you've only been doing it a couple days. But I'll make a joint response to you and mmzznnxx. First, for mm, yeah, Wang pitched for the Yankees and had their support. He pitches for another team, he doesn't have that level of success. But I watched him pitch for NY at times, and for us even. Even with us, he's shown flashes of what he had for a season in NY. And that is incredibly above average control and the rarest of the rare, mastery of his repertoire. And you know, that's something stats don't show, but like picturesography, you know it when you see it. And I've seen it with Wang. Now? Yeah, he blows monkey chunks.
But first of all, there's the issue of reputation. Wang has one, Detwiler doesn't, bottom line. Given the same quality stuff, the reputation means one player gets more chances than another. Fair? No. But that's life. But secondly, Detwiler has never shown that genuine mastery. He's just been consistent, and at this point, I'd say consistently above average. But even so, the reason we are giving Wang all the chances in the world, and more importantly, the reason we should? Even if it's a 20% chance Wang somehow finds what he once had, he's shown he does have th ability to do it. If he could regain what he's had for a season, he's a 20+ game winner. Detwiler, at best, is going to be consistent, but never win 20 games. So the 1 in 5 chance of a 20+ game winner, plus reputation, means they should give Wang extra chances and a weighted consideration in comparison to Detwiler. Because if, and at this chance it's highly unlikely, but if Wang gets back what he has had, then he blows Detwiler out of the water. Fair? Maybe, maybe not. But there is logic to continuing to give Wang a shot over Detwiler, despite the realities of their 2012 performances.
These are important points. The problem with Detwiler is that he hasn't made their decision as difficult as he could have. If Harper had struggled over his first couple weeks, he may not have been kept up. Instead, he made it impossible for them to send him back down. If Detwiler had shown consistency, it would make it tougher. They obviously wanted Detwiler to succeed for a lot of obvious reasons. They demoted Lannan to give him a chance. He has shown some real control problems out of the pen. Is it possible that Detwiler would have ultimately done better than Wang if he had been given the starts? Very much so, but he didn't make that easy bet. And he hasn't done himself favors coming in and throwing a half dozen balls in a row. Still, when he is doing well, he at least offers a long relief option.
With Wang, ideally, he would have been able to have an extended stint of rehab, but that is just not an option. So that is essentially happening at the big league level. We saw how he could be effective when his stuff was working last season, and the reputation goes a long way given that he has shown that he can hit the higher velocities.
The guy is a sinker ball, ground ball pitcher. Any mechanics issues are going to put him in a situation to get tagged, which is what we see. They are obviously in love with his potential, and must think that he is at least close to form with some more work or tinkering. If he was unable to survive a couple of innings at a time and struggling to top out in the high 80s, they would likely have already moved him to the pen or put him on the DL. But they have a lot invested in a guy who actually knows how to pitch and appears to have at least recovered physically. He just hasn't had the extended time to get into game form. I wouldn't disagree with putting him in the pen or trying something else, because he is struggling right now. But it is clear why they are trying to make it work.
