2006 Season, Pitching, Uncategorized

The Big Three

6 Comments

John Sickels has a “Prospect Smackdown” with the big 3 righthanded prospects for 2006: Chad Billingsley, Matt Cain, and Justin Verlander. Sickels ranks them

  1. Verlander
  2. Cain
  3. Billingsley

He gives the edge to Verlander due to Justin’s fastball’s higher peak velocity, physical stature, and minor league performance last year.

All 3 pitchers are pretty comparable, and it’s really a matter of who you ask as to how they rank. Baseball Prospectus ranks them Cain/Verlander/Billingsley. On the other hand Baseball America ranks them Billingsley/Verlander/Cain. Meanwhile, Bryan Smith from Baseball Analysts has it at Cain/Billingsley/Verlander.

Whatever the case, it’s just nice to have a Tiger in the mix for a change.
prospects, detroit tigers, baseball

6 thoughts on “The Big Three”

  1. I’m not particularly familiar with Cain or Billingsley, but I do know that Cain walked something like 72 guys last year. Sickels says that he tops out around 95 and needs work on his changeup. Is his breaking ball better than Verlander’s? I doubt it, but maybe. It’s tough for me to see how one justifies ranking him over Verlander other than by using age, which matters less (IMO) for pitchers than it does for hitters. I suppose perhaps they’re factoring in that Cain played in the PCL. I don’t know. I also remember thinking that Billingsley’s stats were clearly inferior to Verlander’s, though I can’t cite them for you here. Again, is it only age? He doesn’t have Verlander’s velocity. He doesn’t have better secondary stuff. I mean, these people know what they’re doing, but I don’t really get how Verlander ranks below those two on so many lists. Maybe LA and SF sell more copy.

    Oh, so if it’s only age, why wouldn’t Zumaya also rank ahead of Verlander. He seems to me to be a better comp for Cain and Billingsley, and again, I’m not sure he’s not the superior prospect.

    Perhaps I’ll go dig up the stats.

  2. This obviously neglects previous seasons’ stats.

    Verlander (2/20/83)
    Lakeland: 86 ip, 104/19 k/bb, 1.67 era, 70 hits, 3 hr
    Erie: 32.2 ip, 32/7 k/bb, 0.28 era, 11 hits, 1 hr
    Detroit: 11.1 ip, 7/5 k/bb, 15 hits, 1 hr

    Cain (10/1/84)
    Fresno (PCL): 145.2 ip, 176/73 k/bb, 4.39 era, 118 hits, 22 hr
    SF: 46.1 ip, 30/19 k/bb, 2.33 era, 24 hits, 4 hr

    Billingsley (7/29/84)
    Jacksonville (Sou): 146 ip, 162/50 k/bb, 3.51 era, 116 hits, 12 hr

    Zumaya (11/9/84)
    Erie (EL): 107.1ip, 143/52 k/bb, 2.77 era, 71 hits, 8 hr
    Toledo (IL): 44 ip, 56/24 k/bb, 2.66 era, 30 hits, 2 hr

    Cain had limited success in the majors (k/bb ratio suggests the ERA was artificially low) and other than that Zumaya’s better than him in every way he’s better than Verlander (performance against higher levels, youth, strikeout rate) so it seems inconsistent to have Cain ahead of Verlander and not have Zumaya ahead of both.

    Oh well. At least we’re finally in the debate, and we’ve got two of the top pitching prospects in baseball.

  4. BAs Top 50 is out.. 3 Bengals in it, Verlander in the top 10. Maybin and Zumaya also. What are the odds on Zumaya taking over as closer by the ASB?

  5. Joe,

    Thanks for getting the stats. This may sound strange coming from a saber-type guy, but I don’t know if they tell the whole story. There must be something else that the scouts are seeing. I think the only knock on Verlander would the the lack of experience above A ball. As for Zumaya, statisically he’s right there. I think the only thing keeping him out of the discussion is this belief that he’s destined to be a closer. I just don’t know if that is a fair tag after what he did last year.

  6. I have to say, that I could not agree with you in 100% regarding The Big Three, but it’s just my opinion, which could be wrong 🙂

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