A question For J.Sickels in regards to David Hernandez

by orioole26 on Jun 23, 2008 1:07 PM EDT

Now that we are approaching the half way point of the season, how would you grade David Hernandez at this point. In your Baltimore Orioles Top 20 you have numerous pitchers ahead of Hernandez such as Spoone(injury should get a mulligan), Hoey, Beato, Bascom, Erbe(even though it seems he is back on track with his last 2 performances), Bierd, Bergeson(who has been holding his own with a team leading ERA at Bowie) and McCrory ahead of DHernandez. In David's last 2 starts he has gone 12 innings and has allowed only 1 hit, with 9 K's and has lowered his ERA to 2.83 for the season. He also has 87 k's and is bouncing back and forth in leading the Eastern League in strikeouts. In my eyes it looks like he has held his own in AA ball and his status should improve from being a sleeper to high prospect.

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hernandez

I think I’ll do a piece on Hernandez tomorrow.

by John Sickels on Jun 23, 2008 2:01 PM EDT reply actions

I'm a big Hernandez fan

But you should probably also note that he’s had like 9 walks in these back-to-back starts; one hit and nine k’s IS really impressive tho.

He’s having a hell of a year—I don’t think he’s quite ready for AAA yet. I’d like him to put together a string of three or four starts where his k/bb rate and his hit/run rate square up with his average numbers for the season. That is, he seems to have games where his k/bb is really nice, but those may end up being games that his era takes a little hit, but then there’ll also be games like the last two where his k/bb rate sucks, but the ER and H totals are smacktacular.

I leaned towards giving him a B- coming into this season, and would now bump him up to a B, top 100 (but not top 50) sort of guy. I’m a little concerned about the bump up in his walk rate—everything else has stayed pretty even, except his hit rate has gone down some (.249 to .219 BA against), and he’s already had more unearned runs than all of last year. So I think he’s still the same guy last year, but at a higher level, and luck seems to be tilting for him for a change.

by gogotabata on Jun 23, 2008 2:18 PM EDT reply actions

Here’s a big difference from this year from last year. Hernandez last year’s problem was when he had runners on base they tend to score on him. This year he’s a different pitcher. Everthing is down from last year except his walks so I really don’t think he’s the same guy.

Entire Season ERA IP H R ER HR BB SO GO/AO AVG
Bases Empty 1.38 39.0 33 6 6 6 25 43 0.48 .220
Runners On 4.34 37.1 28 25 18 1 13 44 0.76 .217
Scoring Position 6.00 24.0 14 23 16 1 8 30 0.86 .173

by orioole26 on Jun 23, 2008 9:00 PM EDT up reply actions