tyler clippard

by phiago on Jun 15, 2006 2:56 AM EDT

At the beginning of this year I had such high hopes for mr. clippard. I remember someone posting a diary about how well he would do, also that he was a better prospect than Wade Davis (who's last 2 starts should be the subject of another diary altogether).

He's put in some good games, but he's not looking like he's very comfortable. I'm interested to know what you all are hearing/thinking.

What's the deal with this kid? He started off the year great in AA. After a bad first outing, he went the next 6 games getting stuck with 4 losses, but putting up a 3.09 ERA, with 33K/11W in 32 innings.

A trend I see by his gb/fb rate is in his games where he gets rocked he's getting more groundball outs than flyball outs...not sure what the heck that means.

For example in these 6 games, he has a 27/35 gb/fb ratio. for the whole seasons he has a 73/62 rate.

It's not always the case that if he gets a lot of gb outs he gets rocked, but here's the lines from those games:
IP H R ER W K HR GB/FB
6/14 5.0 8 6 6 1 3 1 8/3
6/9 1.0 5 8 8 3 0 1 3/0
5/19 6.1 8 6 6 4 6 2 9/3
4/7 4.0 5 6 5 2 2 0 7/1

Could it be defense? He's actually hit the wall everyone thought he would hit in AA?

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Everything?

As with any player terribly underperforming for a little while its probably a combination of things.

Clippard is the type that needs longer to adjust to levels so the performance we're seeing now is probably a combination of adjustments and bad luck.

Pulling numbers out of the air here but...if at the top of his game he'd put up a, say, 3.50 AA era while adjusting he might struggle some at it would be a 4.50 ERA or if he was fine and just getting bad D/luck his ERA would go to 4.50. Its probably both regular adjustment struggles compounded by bad luck to bring on the slump, so his era now is 5.30

Since they weren't mentioned above his numbers on the year are

http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/stats/player.php?id=461325

IP H R ER HR BB K
2-8 5.29 ERA 63 52 43 37 9 25 59

6 HBP 2 Wild pitches .225 avg against

The h/ip and k/ip are fine. The walk and homer rates aren't good but aren't glaringly bad either.
Seems like he can't dominate the strike zone with advanced hitters and is learning to adapt.
The era will come down soon but this should temper the declarations of acedom some were foolishly piping

by nms on Jun 15, 2006 3:35 AM EDT reply actions

i dont remember anyone calling him an ace

that being said, his defense behind him in his blowouts have been absolutely horrid. Justin Christian is good in center, but Sardinha in the corner, Shelley Duncan at 1B, and JT Stotts at SS are horrifying. Especially in the last two starts he was hurt by that defense. Unlike last year when he had big fly ball tendancies, this year his numbers are on the other side, yet his HR rate is much higher. There's alot of stuff in his numbers that just doesnt make sense, and i think they will smooth out by the time August comes around.

by PooNani on Jun 15, 2006 9:10 AM EDT reply actions