OK, I Take it Back on Zito: Pass on Him

I can eat humble pie as well as anyone, I've known I wasn't perfect since an early age (didn't stop me from trying :^), and I admit that I was wrong for pushing Barry Zito for the rotation. Here are the facts, which I admit I didn't look at, but thought that he was surely doing pretty well since he was a former Cy Young winner and doing well with the A's:

• PQS is horrible for a top pitcher wannabe: 41% DOM in 2006. That's what good pitchers do, not great ones hoping to get a 6 year contract at somewhere in the high teens of millions. Not only that, but he deteriorated as the year progressed. He went from a 47% DOM/ 5% DIS in the first half to 33% DOM/ 20% DIS. That's Jamey Wright type of pitching.
• Not only that, but his K/9 was only 6.2, his second straight year of decline, whereas his BB/9 was his highest since his rookie season, at a untolerable 4.0 BB/9, where 3.0 is the highest you want to go, ideally, unless you can strike them out at a 2.2 K/BB ratio - his ratio was only 1.5 K/BB, way below the ratio you ideally want from one of the best pitchers on your staff.
• And looking at his K/BB for his career, it has basically fallen from his first full season ratio of 2.6, which is very good, to basically at or much below the minimal 2.0 you want out of your starting pitchers (that is, if you want to win a lot of games): 1.7, 2.0, 1.9, 1.5; that is pretty sad for a pitcher who is probably hoping to be paid the most money ever paid to a pitcher in a contract.
• Furthermore, you want your pitchers to have a HR/9 rate of below 1.0 ideally. His last three seasons: 1.2, 1.0, 1.1.
• And if you believe in FIP (I'm not sure whether to or not but here it is for those who do), Zito has basically been doing it with mirrors his whole career, FIPs for the past 5 seasons: 4.11, 4.22, 4.65, 4.52, 4.94. Boy! Is that bad for a pitcher who has won a Cy Young award and is considered by some to be a top line pitcher.

That's some Tomko-tastic numbers there and all for the price of a modern day Christy Mathewson. Mea culpa, forgive me for I did not know what I was saying: pass on Barry Zito, please Giants, dodge another bulwet, pwease, we dodged Pierre, Soriano, Matthews Jr, and Lee, plus all those crappy pitchers thus far, please don't overbid for Zito just to make Bonds happy.

Making Bonds Happy

That's the other thing I thought I would bring up. Today's Mercury stated that the Giants have promised Barry that they will spend whatever they need to spend to get him to the World Series this season. That is why they are still pursuing Zito, among other higher priced free agents, that is why they pursued all those other top free agents, to make Barry happy, to convince him that they are serious about winning it all.

All I can say is: why didn't they do this a few years back? I brought this up with an article I wrote for another site a few years back, plus repeated it on my blogs, but I implored the Giants to spend more money while Bonds is still productive, because you don't know when he is going to go bad. Get Vlad or any other Next Gen starter to pair with Bonds, to get the team over the hump. Especially when they had their Maddux money and could have picked up an extra player the past few off-seasons. Instead the Giants have been limping along, hampered by their contracts with Alfonzo and Durham, then Bonds, Alou, and Benitez.

All I can say is too little, and definitely too late. Too little, that is, in terms of talent. Where was this money when Carlos Beltran was on the market? Even Vlad? Or any of the other true talents that have been available on the free agent market the past few off seasons. Instead, they wait until now. Sad....