In 10 years he's won 87 games.
Baseball-reference.com has him winning 12 games a year on average if he manages to stay healthy for an entire season - he's made 30 starts/season 3 times in 10 years.
On what are you basing your belief?
In the past two seasons Piniero has reinvented himself as a pitcher.
From 2000-2007 Piniero spent his career in the AL. During that time he went 59-56 with a 4.50 ERA a WHIP of 1.37 and a SO/BB% of 1.99
From 2007-2009 when Piniero switched over to the NL he has completely changed how he pitches.
He lowered his ERA from 4.50 to a 4.14. His WHIP dropped from 1.37 to 1.26 and his SO/BB% climbed from 1.99 to 3.05.
Now that's all good and well... but the change that really took place was in the 2009 season when he completely changed how he pitched... and how he got the outs.
First change: ControlWhile in the AL, Piniero averaged 5.9 K's per 9 innings. He also walked 3 hitters per 9 innings.
While in the NL, Piniero averaged 4.8 K's per 9 innings. He dropped his walks to 1.6 per 9 innings.
Second change: Relying on the fastballJoel Piniero has always sat right around 90 MPH on his fastball... that's a problem if you try to be a strike out pitcher like Piniero used to be. While trying to avoid using his fastball as much as possible while in the AL, Piniero was forced into using his secondary pitches to rack up the K's. Piniero only threw his fastball around 58% of the time from 2000-2008.
The change came in 2009 when Piniero completely remade himself by pounding the strike zone with fastball after fastball to a tune of 70% of all of the pitches he threw in 2009 were fastballs. The amazing thing about the change was that while Piniero was throwing 12% more fastballs than his career average... the average MPH on his pitch was 89 MPH. With a reliance on the fastball, Piniero no longer has to worry about throwing a bevy of pitches but can concentrate on his fastball and quality curveball.
Third change: The switch from a four seamer to a two seamerComing into 2009, Piniero was throwing his four seam fastball. That all changed in 2009 when Piniero threw a two seam fastball (same velocity as his four seamer I might add) slightly less than 50% of the time he threw a fastball.
The two seamers was a new pitch added to his arsenal and had a big change on his game. That change was.....
Fourth change: Piniero forces the ground ballComing into 2009, Joel Piniero has always sat around 45% GB rate. He also had a HR/FB ratio of about 13%. Once again, all of this would be common, and makes sense when you realize that Piniero was trying to be a strikeout artist with a subpar fastball.
2009 - Piniero induced an amazing 60.5% GB rate while lowering his HR/FB ratio to 6.5%. Some would say this change is unsustainable, but according to these stats, it's likely he won't regress but will continue on his path as a GB machine.
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/is-pinerios-newfound-groundball-success-sustainableUsing our groundball data (dating back to 2002) I looked at every starting pitcher with at least 100 innings during that season and compared their rates to the preceding and following seasons. I found eight cases where a pitcher increased 10% from one year to the next. Those cases include Cliff Lee, Josh Beckett, Ryan Drese, Jon Garland, Johan Santana, CC Sabathia, Kris Benson, and John Thomson.
None of the pitchers suffered a 50% or higher loss in the next season. Only Jon Garland lost 5% or more, and only two pitchers gained more than 1%. All of which is to say that if the pitcher can show such improvement in causing groundballs, then the improvement is most likely legitimate rather than a sample size fluke. So what’s the improved part of Pineiro’s game? His fastballs.
For one, Gameday is now classifying a large chunk of Pineiro’s fastballs as two-seamers, which seems accurate. Pineiro’s four-seam fastballs are also breaking in to righties more and ‘up’ less. Whatever the pitch is, Pineiro is giving batters of both hands absolute fits this season.
Closing:Did Dave Duncan lend a huge helping hand in making Piniero the pitcher he was in 2009? Absolutely. Can Joel Piniero sustain such momentum away from Duncan in 2010 and beyond? I believe it to be true.
As long as Piniero continues to pound the strike zone and pitch to contact rather than revert back to being a wanna-be strike out pitcher I see nothing that says Piniero cannot continue his success from 2009.
