We’ve officially played a month of baseball and the Giants have done surprisingly well. Their current record of 13-16 puts them at 3rd place in the National League West. A traditionally strong NL West has looked slightly weaker this year than previous years. The Rockies and Padres have both gotten off to slow starts and both share the same 11-17 record and last place. The Dodgers are in 2nd place with a 14-13 record and the Diamondbacks look like one of the best teams in baseball at 20-8.

The Giants’ 13-16 record is a little misleading because the team still has some big problems, namely the ability to put runs on the board — 15th in the NL in runs scored and 14th in OPS — and play defense. The Giants Revised Zone Rating of .806 is lowest in the National League and Pythagoras says that our record should be closer to 10-19 than 13-19. This team just isn’t one or two pieces away from being good again.

But enough of the weak points, how’s one of our perceived strengths, pitching, been playing out? It’s been a mixed bag. Lincecum and Sanchez have been great, Cain has struggled some, Correia got hurt, and Zito has been tremendously bad. Let’s check out some numbers.

1. Matt Cain 1-2, 4.41 ERA

	2008      Career
FIP     4.73      3.97
BABIP   .300      .272
K%      19.7      20.2
BB%     15.6      10.5
LD%     23.1      17
GB%     36.3      36.7
FB%     40.7      46.3

The first thing that pops out at me about Cain’s numbers is his BB% which is ungodly. Cain has always had some control issues — a career 10.6 BB% that could use some lowering before he takes another step forward as a pitcher — but never this bad. In 32.2 innings he’s walked 23 hitters. In 6 starts, Cain has waked 5 in two games, 3 in three games, and 4 in one game. Even in his first win of the season against the Rockies, he didn’t pitch marvelously, having trouble throwing strikes. His release point and arm slot really got out of whack in the Rockies game and he appeared to be “slinging” the ball.

I’ve always thought that Bochy was hard on Cain last year and in the first start of this season Bochy ran Cain out for 114 pitches. His control issues will be something to keep an eye on. I think it’s easy to forget that Cain is only 23 and on precipice of the injury nexus for young pitching. Let’s hope he’s healthy.

Otherwise, most of Cain’s numbers are inline with his career. He’s giving up less flyballs and more line drives right now, which has contributed to his higher-than-usual BABIP. If Cain can move his BB% back to his career levels and give up a few less LD’s, we should see some improvement but it’s all going to start with better control of the strike zone.

2. Tim Lincecum 4-1, 1.73 ERA

	2008      Career
FIP     2.68      3.41
BABIP   .352      .307
K%      26.4      24.7
BB%      9.9      10.4
LD%     21.7      16.6
GB%     46.7      47
FB%     31.5      36.4

Tim Lincecum has been the best pitcher for the Giants in 2008, a true ace. Notice how good his numbers look despite that really high BABIP — a testament to the Giants terrible defense. I suspect most Giants starters are going to have higher BABIP’s than normal because of the defense. Balls hit into play that would be turned into outs by an average defense are falling for hits. So much for the defense part of speed and defense?

Lincecum is doing a bunch of things right this year. He cut his BB% slightly and raised his K% by almost 2 percent. What’s always amazed me about Lincecum is the amount of groundballs he gets. League average GB% is around 42% and Lincecum is 4-5% above that. His line drive percentage is a little higher than usual and if he rolls it back some to previous levels, his numbers should improve even more. Lincecum is basically the best type of pitcher you could ask for, great strike out rate and when hitters do make contact, it’s usually on the ground and easier to turn into an out. You can’t hit a groundball over the fence.

Speaking of home runs, even though I’m not posting the HR/FB percentage for each pitcher, Lincecum’s is impossibly low right now at 3.4%. He’s given up 1 home run in 36.2 innings pitched and pitchers tend to give up HR’s at a percentage of 10-12%. So, Lincecum will most certainly see some correction at some point in this season in terms of giving up the longball.

3. Jonathan Sanchez 2-1, 3.48 ERA

	2008      Career
FIP     3.41      4.21
BABIP   .304      .334
K%      27.7      23.8
BB%     11.1      11.8
LD%     15.7      19.5
GB%     39.8      38.1
FB%     44.6      42.4

If Lincecum has been the best Giants starting pitcher this season, then Sanchez has been the 2nd best. He owns the best K% of any starting pitcher, even surpassing Lincecum. His BB% is high and in a perfect world, would come down, but Sanchez has always had some command problems. When he’s throwing strikes, he’s tough on hitters.

A flyball pitcher, Sanchez gives up a bunch of flyballs which Mays Field should help suppress. Sanchez has also kept his line drives down, almost 4% under his career levels. It’s interesting to see that Sanchez’s K% numbers have actually improved this year as a starter when the previous bulk of his MLB work has been out of the bullpen, which I would assume would add to his K% numbers. Coming out of the pen you can go full steam and not have to pace yourself throughout the game but Sanchez has a stronger K% right now as a starter. FIP tells us that given Sanchez’s current peripherals his ERA is for real. Go Sanchez!

I’ve been extremely pleased with the way Sanchez has thrown so far this season — being a self proclaimed huge fan of him — but he’ll probably hit speed bumps now and then when his control problems flair up. If Sanchez could throw 160 innings as a starter this year and gradually improve his control, it would be a great success for him and the team. He’s off to a great start.

4. Barry Zito 0-6, 7.53 ERA

	2008      Career
FIP     5.82      4.40
BABIP   .346      .271
K%       7.8      17.7
BB%     10.6       9.4
LD%     19.6      19.2
GB%     36.6      38.2
FB%     43.8      42.6

As bad as Zito has been, he’s not the 7+ ERA pitcher that we might think he his. According to FIP, he’s a 5.82 ERA pitcher right now. Hey, you take the small wins wherever you can get them.

His BABIP is enormous, which can be partially linked to our terrible defense but hitters are making a lot of hard contact against Zito with a batting line of (.336/.403/.525). The usual suspects are still problems for Zito — K’s and BB’s — he’s not striking out anybody at 7.8% for his K% and his BB% has slightly moved up from his career numbers. Hitters are only swinging and missing at Zito pitches 8% of the time which means that they’re making a lot of contact and that Zito lacks the command, control, pitch quality, or velocity to induce swing-throughs.

He’s currently in the bullpen working on pitching after taking a beating this month. When was the last time you saw a Cy Young award winner get yanked out of the rotation to “work on stuff” in the bullpen? That’s not a good sign my friends, not a good sign at all. Who knows that the Giants will get when Zito comes back from the bullpen but my bet is that it still won’t be that good.

5. Kevin Correia* 1-3, 4.50 ERA

	2008      Career
FIP     5.74      4.73
BABIP   .254      .259
K%      14.8      17.4
BB%      9.2       9.5
LD%     18.3      19.7
GB%     39.0      39.0
FB%     42.7      41.3

* Correia is currently on the DL with the dreaded oblique strain that has bothered Noah Lowry in the past.

Correia is what-he-is, a decent 5th option in a rotation but the only problem is that Barry Zito has been pitching like a 5th starter if not worse. Primarily a bullpen member and spot starter in the majors, Correia had a nice string of starts to round out the ‘07 season and earned himself a rotation spot for ‘08. He lost some strike outs it appears from his transition from the bullpen to the rotation, that seems to be expected.

He’s a flyball pitcher that has slightly worse than average control and a slightly lower than average K%. Not too much to get excited about but he’s most likely going to be “serviceable” in the role of 5th starter but with his injury he might not come back into the starting rotation. I’d much rather see Misch get a shot in the rotation than Correia. That’s not a dig against Correia but he’s entirely average, which won’t kill you from his rotation spot, but I’ll take a guy with upside — however slight Misch’s upside is — right now rather than someone who will be average at best. If and when Lowry get’s healthy, the Giants will probably slot him into the rotation and move Correia or Misch back into the bullpen.

—

The Giants have had some tremendous pitching performances early in the season. Lincecum and Sanchez have been two of the better pitchers in the NL. But the Giants have been absolutely killed by Barry Zito who could be one of the worst pitchers in the entire MLB right now. Cain has struggled with consistency and I pray that he’s not secretly hurting, I’d love to see him get on a roll. And Correia has been about what you would expect from his rotation spot, though I prefer to see Misch get some starts.

I think we can draw one conclusion from the early season and it’s that fans of this team could have drastically overstated our pitching depth. It’s something that I’ve been slightly worried with for some time since Lowry began to have injury problems and declining numbers. At this point you can’t count on Lowry and Zito to be productive pitchers, anything positive they give you is a plus. Sanchez, even with his dynamite start, still has a ways to go before we can count on him to be a corner of the rotation. Cain has struggled and I’ve got this nagging voice in the back of my head about him. And Lincecum has been an elite starter so far. To me, looks like there’s a lot more question marks than certainties right now but the rotation has a good chance to be good, maybe not “the best in the NL” as some fans had dreamed, but good. Let’s see what happens over the next month.

Comment Starter: Report card time! How would you grade our 5 starters thus far? Flunking out or star students?

It can’t be stressed enough. It just can’t. Barry Zito is probably my least favorite topic to think about, discuss, or devote any brain power to. On one hand, I feel bad for watching a once talented pitcher dissolve in front of our very eyes. It’s a metamorphosis none of us thought would happen this soon or this completely. Nobody expected Zito to do what he’s doing right now and I think even the most hard boiled critic of the Zito deal assumed that he’d be alright for the first couple of years and then slowly start to decline. The decline is now and it’s frightening.

On the other hand I think I feel like most Giants fans do. Zito is eating payroll — which face it matters to the team, even if you take a “it’s not my cash” approach it’s a limited resource that the Giants have a finite amount of, and affects their future ability to operate the team — and maybe even worse, he could soon be blocking talented young up-and-coming pitching from the Giants system. Maybe not this year because the pitching is still a bit off, but what do you do when Henry Sosa, Tim Alderson, Madison Bumgarner, Clayton Tanner, Ben Synder, or any semi-quasi interesting and talented Giants pitching prospect is knocking on the door while Zito continues to struggle in the year 201X? Heck, Patrick Misch might be a better starting pitcher than Barry Zito right now.

Zito’s problem is two-fold. Hitters are making a lot of contact against him and he’s walking hitters. Small sample size caveat aside, here’s Zito’s career numbers over the years in terms of BB% and K% and what he’s done so far in 2008.

Year     K%     BB%
2001    22.7    8.8
2002    19.3    8.3
2003    15.2    9.1
2004    17.6    8.7
2005    17.9    9.3
2006    15.9    10.4
2007    15.4    9.7
2008     7.8    10.6

Here’s a graph to illustrate the changes over time for Barry.

The yellow line is league average K% and the green line is league average BB%. I don’t think Zito was ever going to maintain a 20%+ K% like he did in 2001 and almost in 2002, but he settled into a nice groove from 2003-2006 where he was right around or above league average. He dropped to below league average in 2007 and in his small sample size in ‘08, he’s striking out hitters like Carlos Silva — career K% of 9.8 — but without his control or GB tendencies. The pattern that emerged in the spring for Zito, not striking out hitters, has continued into the early season. If you recall, Zito struck out just 4 hitters in 18 innings of Spring Training baseball. Zito’s fastball is also down by almost another mile-per-hour this year compared to last. On average, Zito is throwing his fastball at 83.7mph this year, compared to 84.5mph last year. Over the course of just 4 seasons, Zito has lost almost 4mph on his fastball. How much more will he lose?

Zito’s strong suit has never been his control and from the graph you can see that he’s been trending upward over the past few years, moving from around league average to above and beyond. Therein lies the problem for Barry Zito. He’s going to need to learn how to locate his pitches without walking hitters. Zito just doesn’t have that ability right now and he might not ever have it.

A question for my readers: Are there any historical examples of pitchers drastically improving their control at Zito’s age? Can it be done? I lean towards “no” but there might be a few examples of hope out there for Zito.

Asking Zito to turn into Greg Maddux or any other control artist is almost like asking Kirk Rueter to throw 95mph instead of 85mph, some guys just can’t pitch with that level of control and command. Zito has never demonstrated above average control in his career and I doubt he’ll be able to figure it out now.

For a pitcher like Zito that’s going to put the ball in play — doesn’t strike out many hitters — he’s also got another significant roadblock in his way. The Giants defense is pretty bad this year. The subtraction of Feliz and Omar has damaged the left side of the infield while Ray Durham continues to display the range of a wheelbarrow loaded full of bowling balls at second base.*

*Ray Durham Defense Tangent: Durham’s Revised Zone Rating of .657 is amazingly bad. That means that Durham is only converting 65.7% of balls hit into his zone into outs. Compare him to chronic bad defenders Dan Uggla (73.5%) and Jeff Kent (82.1%) and you get an idea of just how bad Durham is. Eugenio Velez is no gold-glover, but in 114 innings at 2B, his rate of (76.5%) while still poor, is much better than Durhams’. There is no reason to play Durham right now, both offensively and defensively.

The Giants, as a team, are also terrible defensively this year. As a team, they are well below average. The average NL team has a RZR of .836, the Giants are at .802. Thus, because of the poor defense behind Zito, his BABIP is very high (.339), when hitters hit the ball into play against Zito, they are hitting like a batting champion. The BABIP should come down some, eventually, but the defense isn’t going to do any Zito any favors, at least now barring any improvements.

According to the Mercury News, there’s a good chance that Zito will get moved to the bullpen soon. At minimum I’m almost certain they’ll skip his next start.

After another erratic and utterly hittable start in a 10-1 loss to the Cincinnati Reds on Sunday at AT&T Park, Giants Manager Bruce Bochy all but declared he would skip Zito or demote him to the bullpen.

“We’ve got to do something,” said Bochy, after Zito allowed a six-run first inning. “We can’t keep doing what we’re doing and getting what we’re getting.”

Here is what the Giants have received from their opening-day starter: an 0-6 record in six starts, a 7.53 ERA, a growing soundtrack of boos at home and no sign of a break in the clouds.

I’m not sure what moving him to the bullpen would do, but it might be the best option right now. I have no doubt that Zito is a bright guy but I think he’s got an extremely large challenge in front of him that he might not ever be able to get past. He’s a poor fit for this Giants team at the moment or any team. You’re essentially placing a pitcher who’s losing the ability to miss bats and control the strike zone and putting him in front of one of the worst defenses in the National League. Zito is forced to let hitters make contact — when he’s not walking them — and when they do make contact, most of that contact is going for hits. Even if you moved Zito to a team with an elite defense, he’s still going to have trouble. You can’t survive in baseball and do what he’s doing — walking hitters, not striking out hitters, all while throwing 83mph. Barring an injury that could explain his control problems and velocity loss — indicators of arm issues — Barry Zito is going to be the most expensive 5th starter in the history of baseball.

The Giants have to be really, really worried about how Zito is pitching and his prospects for future success. This is easily the worst contract in baseball history. In 2009 his salary kicks up to $18.5M. At least in contract blunders like Darren Dreifort or Mike Hampton, they were injured for lengths of their deals and couldn’t play. Zito is healthy, as far as we know, and continuing to take the mound. What’s better, expensive and not hurting the team by not playing or expensive and hurting the team by playing?

Comment Starter: Zito’s chances for setting the record for most losses by a Giants pitcher in a season? The record is currently held by Ray Sadecki for his 1968 season that ended in 18 losses. I’ll put Zito at a 60% chance right now, he’s already a third of the way there and it’s not even May.

The online Giants community has been perkin’ this past weekend. The team won a series against the Cardinals, which featured more Lincecum goodness with a side of Bowker power, and made a roster move that has some scratching their heads and others going “meh”.

Let’s talk about the roster move that took place. The Giants have DFA’d Rajai Davis, who is most famously not Matt Morris, and purchased the contract of SS Emmanuel Burriss from AAA Fresno. Burriss was the 33rd overall pick in the 2006 June Draft, also known as ‘The Year of the Lincecum’, out of Kent State.

Burriss’ 2007 had it’s ups and downs. He started the year in San Jose in the California League and struggled offensively — in a league known for it’s offense — and was eventually rolled back a level to the Augusta team. He only hit (.165/.237/.180) in San Jose over 139 AB’s. He finished the year strongly, both in Augusta and by his AFL performance. In Augusta he hit (.321/.374/.381) with 51 stolen bases. In the AFL he hit well but I believe he only got a little over 50 AB’s since he was a late addition. The AFL is generally a league with top prospects but I think that Burriss’ numbers are a little overstated. The AFL is usually a hitters league and 50 AB’s is the equivalent of 12-13 games. So, I’m slightly skeptical of numbers coming from the AFL, even more so when the league leader in OPS is Sam Fuld. If anyone could post his AFL numbers in the comments of this post, I’d greatly appreciate it. The AFL site is really buggy and impossible to navigate.

Burriss is a contact-styled hitter without any power. Over his Minor League career, he’s only slugged .340 — not including this year’s numbers in AAA. He’s got blazing speed — rated at the fastest baserunner in the Giants system by BA — and can field SS decently. His arm is probably below Bocock’s arm but he shouldn’t embarrass himself at the position. For Burriss to succeed, he needs to slap the ball on the ground and run, taking advantage of his speed.

Here’s Burriss’ Top 10 Comparable Players by PECOTA, comments are mine.

1 Wylie Campbell - Stole 34 bases in A-ball but never made it past A+ ball.

2 Shawn Livsey - One of two 1st round draft picks on our list — Remember that Burriss was a 1st rounder — Livsey played 7 years in the minor leagues and had a career line of (.264/.350/.350)

3 Freddie Bynum - So far, the 1st on our list to actually get MLB at-bats. To this date, has had 239 AB’s in the majors, most of which came in 2006 under Dusty Baker. Bynum is the classic Dusty Baker player — much like Neifi Perez, Jose Macias, and Shawon Dunston — low on talent, but high on heart which made him one of “Dusty’s guys” which translates into way more playing time than actually deserved, driving fans crazy.

4 Chone Figgins - Probably the best comp for Burriss so far on the list if everything goes right for him. Figgins has the most MLB playing time of anyone on this list and he’s turned into a decent utility player-slash-starter for the Angels. He’s stolen 200+ bases in both the minors and the majors.

5 Juan Francia - Mark down as a ‘Never Made It’. Stole a bunch of bases in the minors — 245 over 8 seasons — but at a poor rate of 69%. Split time last year between AA/AAA for the Yankees. Has hit only 8 HR’s over 2856 career AB’s.

6 Willie Bloomquist - A Mariner fan favorite! Another slappy MI on this list that has somehow, someway has gotten actual playing time in the MLB.

7 Cleatus Davidson - Great name. Not-so-good at the baseball thing. Minor league lifer that has played 13 seasons in the minors. He snuck into the majors in 1999 for 22 glorious career AB’s for the Twins. Stole 274 career bags in the minors at a 74% rate. Hasn’t been seen in baseball since ‘06.

8 Justin Baughman - Not much to say, 7 seasons in the minor leagues and 2 seasons in the majors. Speedy with a good SB% — 254 career thefts in the minors at 79% — but a weak bat. Has a career minor league OPS of .659

9 Alfredo Amezaga - Is Amezaga the 2nd most successful comp to Burriss so far on this list? You might be able to make that argument. Currently playing for the Marlins, he has 6 seasons in the majors. Utility player that played SS/2B/3B in the minors and has played CF in the majors, among other positions. It’s not pretty when a possible 2nd best comp has a career major league line of (.249/.314/.339)

10 Chris Burke - Our 2nd 1st round pick to make this list. Burke was chosen 10th overall in the 2001 draft by the Houston Astros. His 2001 season for the University of Tennessee was tremendous, he hit (.435/.537/.815) with 20 HR’s, 21 2B’s, and 11 3B’s while playing shortstop. That kind of power production form shortstop is very interesting and no doubt the reason he went so high in the draft. He struggled some initially in the minors, not reaching double digit HR’s until ‘04, and eventually made the Astros team as a utility guy. He never flashed the same power or promise that he did at the University of Tennessee — Ahhh, the beauty that is aluminum bats. On this list, he’s clearly the player with the most power, hitting 30 career minor league HR’s and another 20 in the majors.

By first glance, that’s some ugly company to be a part of. The list is mostly composed of players that never made it and players that did make it but as utility-type players.

The Giants have been aggressive with Burriss, sending him to AAA this year after his mixed results of ‘07, and I don’t mind that aggressiveness so much. He’s obviously the closest major-league-ready SS prospect that the Giants have, even if that says more about the lack of SS options in the Giants system than it does about Burriss as a player. But, what I do mind is the idea that Burriss will be a backup on the team, or that he and Bocock will swap time at SS.

From SFGiants.com

Burriss is expected to provide some depth in the infield, specifically behind rookie shortstop Brian Bocock. Burriss and Bocock both played in Class A last season, so Giants manager Bruce Bochy isn’t expecting either of them to knock around Major League pitchers from the start.

What Burriss needs is steady playing time to help him develop and hopefully, hone his hitting abilities which at this point, are Bocockian. Consider that he’s only hitting (.258/.281/.306) in AAA right now. That’s over a small sample size of 60-some AB’s but it’s most likely the case that he has miles to go as a hitter and it’s hard to work on hitting, well, if you know, if you can’t actually get into the game and hit.

And if the Giants need SS depth, why not call up someone like Ochoa and let Burriss continue to play regularly in AAA? The other thing that drives me crazy about this scenario is Rich Aurilia. Sure, he’s not a SS anymore, but if Bocock needs a rest, he could most likely start 1-2 games a week at short. He played 12 games at short last year and I can’t remember them being particularly horrific. And furthermore, is there a more useless player on any major league roster than Rich Aurilia? He’s yet to hit a extra base hit in 55 AB’s. Yet, he still makes his way into the lineup a few times a week. If you ranked XHB’s by players with at least 50 minimum PA’s in the NL, only Brian Schneider and Rich Aurilia have zero XBH’s. It’s amazing that he hasn’t been cut yet.

I’m getting the feeling that the theme of this year is: “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should”. Just because you can promote Bocock/Burriss to the majors, doesn’t mean you actually should. Both players are obviously not ready for this level of play. It’s like for all the years that fans griped about the abundance of veterans on this roster, Sabean is trying to reverse it all in one season. “See! I’m calling up all sorts of youngsters to play! Are you happy now!?” It almost feels bipolar. Part of this season is to nurture what prospects we have and I’m not sure sending them directly into the fire is the best way to help them progress. Sure, you could say “Either you hit, or you don’t” but you just don’t see teams call up players who are woefully unprepared for this level of play. The moves made to fill shortstop, if anything, have shown how unprepared this team was for that position. Omar was only 1,000 years-old and players do eventually break down, you would think that the Giants would have a better contingency plan than a couple of A-ball shortstops who might hit as well as Noah Lowry over a full season.

Pure Speculation edit: I forgot to add this the first time through, I’ve heard some speculation that because Burriss got called up, it’s possible that Omar’s rehab is going worse than expected. He’s already had mobility concerns, could this mean that Omar might retire before he ever gets back to the majors? It’s something to chew on and I would dislike this move less if it means that Burriss could get more starting time in the bigs.

Losing Davis to this whole situation isn’t the worst thing because the Giants have a ton of OF’s, so while his time was brief with the Giants, it’s ultimately unimportant if he stays or goes. He made some dynamite catches last year and played quite well, so I hope he catches on somewhere else. If Juan Pierre can carve out a major league career, I’m sure Davis can too.

Comment Starter: Burriss time? Yay or Nay? Too soon, or just riiiight. Help convince me that this isn’t as stupid as I might think it is.