Athletics 15, Red Sox 3
There was no bright spot, nothing to take away from this one. The Red Sox got beat bad and it’s exactly the sort of defeat that gets the sports radio airwarves buzzing and the short-sighted clamoring. But it was one game, one of 60-75 losses that we all knew back in March the Red Sox would suffer this season. It was another awful start for Josh Beckett, however, and as such I think it would be worthwhile to take a look at what we have in Beckett. Mike Lowell’s performance thus far makes it difficult to knock the rationale for the off-season deal with the Fish – it was a good one at the time and I am still unconvinced that it won’t be seen in retrospect as a good deal too. That said, it sure was difficult to watch Beckett get knocked all over Fenway Park on the same evening that Anibal Sanchez, aided by a sparkling play from Hanley Ramirez (having a fine season in his own right), outclassed Roger Clemens and the Houston Astros down in Miami.
Josh Beckett ranks 76th amongst qualified Major League starting pitchers with a 5.12 ERA. His peripherals make him look a tad better, but his 2.38 K/BB ranks him just 38th and his 7.48 K/9IP is 22nd in baseball. So his strikeout numbers are good and his K/BB figure is acceptable, why has he been so bad? The short answer is that his mistakes get absolutely hammered. He ranks 70th amongst the qualified starting pitchers list with a .798 OPS against, a remarkable figure for someone who strikes so many out. Only nine qualified starters have yielded a higher slugging percentage than Beckett’s .482 figure and he is the leader by a longshot when it comes to home runs allowed. In terms of overall value contributed, Beckett is tied with Chad Bradford (34 IP), Anthony Reyes (35 IP) and Fausto Carmona (42 IP), ranking 163rd of all MLB pitchers with an 8.8 VORP.
The numbers and some observations I have made seem to coincide. Beckett is 6’5″ and has more or less been dominant at every level up to the Major Leagues. While he has had his ups and downs as a Major League starter, he has had way more ups, and was carried off of Yankee Stadium after a World Series MVP performance at the age of 23. I think he’s developed a stubborn sense of infallibility. He can get it up to the high-90′s and has a hook that any pitcher would kill for. And yet, he gets pounded on a pretty regular basis. His last outing before this one in Chicago didn’t really bother me. Giving up home runs to Jermaine Dye and Jim Thome can happen to anybody. But Beckett tends to be done in by lesser players with some regularity as well. A quintessential example of the sort of concentration lapses that I think Beckett suffers from as a result of his raw ability came in last night’s first inning. With Mark Kotsay on at first and Nick Swisher at third with one out, Jay Payton came to the plate. Payton is an exceptional raw athlete and a decent hitter but he lacks a very mature approach. He is a hacker and should be had easily by a pitcher with Beckett’s stuff. Payton singled hard up the middle on a first pitch fastball that was a tad up and over the heart of the plate. I would submit that only that pitch could have hurt Beckett there. If you are going to start Payton with a fastball, you had better spot it. But Beckett carries himself almost as though he isn’t in the business of spotting pitches – as though his stuff is good enough to circumvent having to locate.
Beckett is learning a couple of hard lessons this year. One, that there are way better hitters in the American League than the National League, largely because one lineup spot is usually occupied by one of a team’s best hitters instead of its very worst and partly because the AL is just a lot better these days. Two, when guys hit balls hard and they travel a long way and you are still fortunate to get outs, those outs may not be at other ballparks. They may be home runs or some other form of extra base hit. Finally, the biggest lesson is simply that Major League hitters can hit anybody’s stuff. Big League pitchers disinterested in, or otherwise incapable of developing command fail. It’s that simple.
I am not sure what to make of Beckett. I know he has the ability to consistently succeed, and I think he one day will again. It may be next month, it may be in a few years but one thing I am confident of is that it will not be until he decides to show the requisite respect for the oppostion’s abilities and concentrate on sharpening his command.
Good analysis, Sully. My money is still on Beckett. League and ballpark adjustments may mean he won’t have the same stats as in Florida, but I think he will contribute to the Red Sox down the stretch.
It’d be foolish to give up on someone with so much obvious talent when he’s still south of 30. Consistency is the bane of young pitchers, even the really good ones, and Beckett’s short career has also been hampered by a lot of DL stints. He’s at least stayed healthy this year, which is a step in the right direction.
Unless Beckett proves to be totally uncoachable or turns in starts like that most recent debacle against Oakland 20 times in a row, he’s worthy of some rope. He’s great when he’s right–it’s just a matter of his staying right.
Josh Beckett is alternately an incredibly gifted young man, and… it seems, incredibly stubborn. It has routinely been noted that he tries too hard to blow people away with his stuff and not enough time fooling people with his stuff. If someone (anyone…PLEASE!)can get it in Beckett’s noggin that he will be FAR MORE effective (not to mention make batters look silly) if he picks his spots carefully as to when and where he throws in the upper 90′s, instead of flinging heater after heater up there, then and only then , will Beckett become an Ace. Oddly enough, near the start of the season, after Beckett’s fifth or sixth start, the Boston Globe asked the question: How many wins will Josh Beckett have for the Red Sox this season?
I believe Josh was 3 and 0 with two no descisions to that point, but the overwhelming majority answer to that question was 20+ wins… I answered 17+ wins, a goal I hope Beckett reaches… Not that I’m tooting my own horn here, just that even then I saw enough inconsistency in Josh to be more than a little wary of bestowing the mantle of 20+ game winner. Josh Beckett can be an Ace that anchors the Red Sox staff for a long time to come, but he needs to lose the untouchable World Series hero mentallity he currently trots to the mound with and PITCH the ball to hitters, Instead of trying to blaze the ball past practically everyone.
Saw the Yanks score over 20 runs on the Sox at Fenway.