Author Topic: Strasburg in October..  (Read 43999 times)

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Offline tomterp

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Re: Strasburg in October..
« Reply #1050: August 29, 2012, 01:22:47 PM »
Major piece in BP on the topic today.  An excerpt:

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=18174#commentMessage

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What Stephen Strasburg's Season Could Have Looked Like
 
by Ben Lindbergh
....
But despite the similarities—the surgery, the recovery timeline, the innings limit—Strasburg and Medlen aren’t much alike. Strasburg is the former best pitching prospect ever, a prodigy who pitched like an ace from his first start on. Medlen is a former 10th-round pick with a mid-rotation ceiling. Medlen had major-league experience in relief, while Strasburg has never pitched out of the pen as a pro. Converting from the rotation to the bullpen and back isn’t without its risks, both physical and psychological, and while plenty of promising pitchers have debuted in the bullpen before snagging a rotation spot, few have gone back again after establishing themselves as starters. Those risks were much lower in Medlen’s case, both because he’s a less valuable arm and because he’s 2 ½ years older, which puts him out of the injury nexus.
 
There’s another factor to consider here: the Braves were expected to contend, while the Nationals weren’t. The BP staff picked the Nats to finish fourth in the East, without a single first-place vote.  An early end to the season for Strasburg wouldn’t be a big issue if the Nats were well out of the race. When Jordan Zimmermann was shut down in late August of last year, Washington was over 20 games out in the East, and no one said a word. The Nats’ success probably shouldn’t have been as surprising to them as it was to outside observers, but expecting the NL’s best record would have been unrealistic. Something else to keep in mind: the Nats are ahead in the East by only four games. If the Braves finish strong, those extra regular-season innings from Strasburg might make the difference between a Wild Card spot and a guaranteed trip to the NLDS. And the gain in championship expectancy from avoiding a play-in game could be greater than the gain from starting Strasburg over Detwiler a few times in October.....

Nate Silver discusses the "Injury nexux".

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=17718

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Conclusion
We have already discussed how the first of the three physiological elements of injury risk--the intrinsic strain that the pitching motion requires--is of greatest concern for very young pitchers. Indeed, based on a limited sample of MLB injury data reviewed by Under the Knife, pitchers under the age of 24 are especially likely to experience injuries to their elbows and shoulders, those body parts that are put under the greatest stress by the pitching motion. However, it may be more proper to associate the pitching motion itself with the underlying risk of injury observed among pitchers of all ages.
 
The relationship between age and fatigue is more ambiguous. Our attrition rate study focused only on performance in the most recent season, rather than fatigue accumulated over the course of the career. However, from what specific data we do have available, it appears that fatigue-based injuries are more likely to afflict older pitchers. According to MLB data, while the risk of tears and fractures decreases with age, the risk of strain and inflammation increases. So too does the risk of injury to body parts that are secondary to a pitcher's motion, such as his back, knee, and hamstrings. Fatigue-based injuries such as these may account for the gradual slope upward in injury risk after the age of 25.
 
It is the final factor--mechanics--that may be responsible for the high incidence of injuries among very young pitchers. It is likely that pitchers with inherently poor mechanics are weeded out very early in their careers. Our attrition rate data suggest that injury risk is very high even for 21- and 22- year-olds who have pitched successfully in the major leagues. One can imagine that it is higher still for pitchers who have not yet turned professional, and for pitchers whose mechanics are sufficiently poor that they do not develop the command necessary to reach the major leagues at all.
 
There is no ready statistical metric to evaluate a pitcher's mechanics, and even case-by-case observation can obscure the physiology unique to each pitcher. Thus, the most powerful measure of the efficiency of a pitcher's motion may simply be the passage of time without his encountering serious injury. The so-called injury nexus does appear to be a real phenomenon, but it occurs before the age of 23, a younger age than some previous studies have suggested.