Hey Neukom! My Giants Business Plan: Great Starting Rotation

As shown in my last post, preventing runs are very important and who has the biggest influence on that? The starting pitchers. That is another pillar in the strategy of creating the best team for success in the playoffs, and ultimately in the World Series.

That is the magic sauce that fans have been missing in baseball, the starting pitchers. In other sports, you can have a player dominate the game and take it other. In football, you got the right quarterback, the right running back, the team will be boosted over other teams. In basketball, you got the Jordans, the Abdul-Jabbars, the Magic Johnsons, the Shaq, who can take over a game and lead the team to victory. In hockey, you got the Gretzky's, the Lemieux's, who transcends the game.

In baseball, it is the pitcher's who has such control over a game. He pitches the most pitches in a game. He sets the tone for the game, both defensively and offensively. The former is obvious but the latter is clear from the games where the starter gives up a crooked number to start, in the first inning. A kick in the gut, when you are suddenly behind 2, 3, 4, 5 runs to start, no?

However, unlike other sports, the starting pitcher only pitches one game in five during the regular season, one game in three or four in the playoffs, and thus most people, including experts, downplay the importance of starting pitching relative to the hitters. That is partly why the hitters have been given more importance to the success of a team (another part is the home run is an offensive weapon that turns on the fans; a great pitching performance hasn't). But even the best offensive teams can face a mediocre starter and be shut down totally (see Met's Jones start against Giants in 2000's playoffs).

However, the best starting pitchers around ARE able to regularly shut down the other team. And if a team is able to put together a great pitching rotation overall, particularly on a 3-4 man basis, then the importance of the starting rotation is that much more important to the success of the team IN SHORT SERIES. They may not be relying on one particular pitcher but on one group of pitchers who altogether, if the talent level is high enough, can pitch as if they were one great pitcher, pitching every game. The key, obviously, is putting together such talent.