The Year After the Year of the Pitcher

Any criteria you want to set made last season the year of the pitcher. It’s hard to say what the reason for the sudden jolt in effectiveness was exactly. Ed Price from AOL Fan House highlighted the unusually high success rate of young pitchers, Time Magazine explained that the economics of the game made defense more of a priority for teams, and of course everyone wants to point to the testing and scrutiny baseball players now face when it comes to using performance enhancing drugs. Depending on what exactly the reasons are, it’s hard to say whether last year was a trend or not. The purpose of this article is not to answer that question exactly, but to acknowledge how it changes the perceived values of players on Draft Day this season.

To be clear I don’t think the year of the pitcher did much to change the value of relievers. Generally the perception with relievers (whether you subscribe to it or not) is that the job security is what drives the draft position. The widely held belief among people throughout fantasy baseball is that relief pitchers are good for one stat, so I wouldn’t expect the year of the pitcher to drive that up or down. The expectations for saves this year are no different than they were last year. If anything, relief pitchers can expect to be picked slightly further down because of higher turnover at the position in 2010 compared to 2009. That is reflected in the pre-ranks of Matthew Berry and Tristan Cockcroft of ESPN.com and John Halpin of Fox Sports:

Relief Pitcher Data for Berry 2010 vs. 2011

Relief Pitcher Data for Cockcroft 2010 vs. 2011

Relief Pitcher Data for Halpin 2010 vs. 2011

The perception on starting pitchers does change. Here is a look at Berry, Cockroft, and Halpin's outlooks on the starters in the pre-season of 2010 versus the preseason of 2011:

Starting Pitcher Data for Berry 2010 vs. 2011

Starting Pitcher Data for Cockcroft 2010 vs. 2011

Starting Pitcher Data for Halpin 2010 vs. 2011

In ranking Roy Halladay, Berry goes so far to say, “Pitching is so deep this year I can’t justify using a first round pick on him.” That is reflected in the way he ranks his Top 50 (mildly), but after the early round reluctance, Berry is very aggressive on pitchers. Halpin does not have a pitcher on his list until the 27^th pick, but also has more pitchers than he did last year in his Top 100 list. Whether you think the Matthew Berrys of the world are geniuses or they are idiots, every league is effected by what these guys say. Even if you don't buy most of what the media is saying, chances are there are people in your league that do. And more importantly than analysis from the so-called "experts," fantasy gamers rely on last year's statistics more than anything else. The numbers don't lie - pitching was king in 2010. Even if 2011 proves that 2010 was merely "The Year of the Pitcher" instead of the beginning of "The Era of the Pitcher", 2011 fantasy baseball drafts are going to be impacted by the gems of last season.