With all the hype surrounding Justin Verlander it is easy to forget that he wasn't highly regarded out of high-school. In fact his senior year he was topping out in the mid-80s. Old Dominion University gave him a shot, and within a year Justin was topping the high-90s. Now ten years later another Verlander is climbing atop the mound in Norfolk. Ben Verlander was drafted by the Tigers in the late rounds of the 2010 draft, but ultimately decided to attend ODU, where his brother has a strangle-hold on the majority of the pitching records. Size-wise there is some good projection on Ben, he is 6'4" and only weighs 180 pounds, and the bloodlines certainly point to Ben having some growth.
His first season at ODU was actually semi-successful, he made 21 appearances, and posted a 4.83 ERA 31.2 IP. That said the numbers aren't that pretty. 23 walks to only 18 K's, though he only allowed 30 hits. Opponents only hit .254 against him, and he only gave up 7 XB hits, which is impressive for a freshman with little to no velocity. He was second on the team in one category, hit batsman, with 7 (aka a little over 2 a game...) So let's take a look at his "true" value in terms of potential threats. In 31.2 IP Ben put 30 baserunners on via Walk or Hit Batsmen, he also allowed 30 hits. That's 60 baserunners in 31.2 IP, adjusted BRPIP (Baserunners per IP, WHIP with HBP included) is 1.90, UGLY. Especially when you compare it to his statistical WHIP, which was only 1.67). Other disturbing trends. Of his 95 outs, only 18 (18.9% came via K). The reason I find this disturbing is the fact that this means 81.1% of his outs he does record come on balls-in-play. The fact that he only allowed 18 runs (17 earned) shows that he definitely had some luck, especially when you consider nearly two baserunners per inning reached base.
Opponent's hit .276 against ODU meaning that taking this as the "baseline" for every 100 AB, 27.6 will be hits, futhermore, including Ben's K numbers, of the 72.4 "non" hits, 18.9 will be K's, meaning 53.5 balls will be put into play but result in outs. So on balls in play opponents should be hitting .340. When in reality against Verlander they were hitting, .313.
More fun, created on the spot numbers for you... ODU this season allowed 303 runs in 497.2 IP, they also allowed a total of 804 baserunners (via BB+HBP+base hit). So 1,493 outs were recorded by ODU. As a team they struck out 26.8% of those outs. The teams BRPIP was 1.62, so Ben was allowing baserunners at a rate of 2.52 more PER GAME than his teammates, yet his ERA, 4.83, was only slightly above his teams ERA of 4.58 (.35 more per game). So Ben was getting lucky.
Overall his Mid-80s fastball, and mid-range secondary pitch will get him by, but he isn't to be considered a serious prospect... At least yet. If there is one thing I wouldn't count out is him growing, gaining velocity, and becoming a stronger pitcher... That said, if it doesn't happen, I expect him to regress in 2012.
*Please note, all these numbers and my analysis is more for the fun of it. I'm not a sabermetrician, nor a mathematician, so I bet some of these are WAY off...but that said, I will say that as I expand this, i'll get more into the numbers.
I've captured some pretty low quality footage of Ben, but I might as well post it.
http://www.vimeo.com/20264123
No comments:
Post a Comment