Counting Pitches

             

 

  If you are a father, or ever plan on being one, you always dream of taking your children to a baseball game. My father did that with my sister and me growing up. On Wednesday, my father and I were supposed to go to Washington D.C. and catch a Nationals game, instead we saw Yankees-Red Sox game. It was the highly anticipated debut of Luis Serevino, the Yankees top overall prospect. When I found out that he was pitching the game we were attending I was very excited. This was the future of the Yankees. He honestly did not have a bad pitching line: 5 IP, 2 H, 2R/1ER 0 BB and 7K. The Yankees are moving in the right direction.

     When we sat down at our seats last night, we were very excited to see this kid pitch. My dad grew up watching likes of Whitey Ford, Tom Seaver, and Ron Guidry take the mound. Those were pitchers that would always go the distance. Bullpens were rarely used through the late 1970's. Pitchers, managers, and owners barely ever worried about a pitchers pitch count. Whitey Ford pitched 14 seasons with no injuries. The only interruption he had was service time during the Korean War. Ron Guidry and Tom Seaver both had nice and lengthy careers with barely any problems. My dad did not seem to to understand why Luis Serevino was taken out after 5 innings and 94 pitches. I tried explaining to him that it was about "protecting" the pitchers arm.

   If you want my honest opinion, why do you need to "protect" a pitchers arm with innings limits and pitch counts if they may need to fix it regardless. Many pitchers have Tommy John surgery and come back stronger, but you can't prevent that from happening. If you look at the Mets, they have fantastic young starting pitching. Matt Harvey and Zack Wheeler already have had TJ surgery. Innings limits already messed up Stephen Strausburg's and forced him out for a season. Masahiro Tanaka did the right thing. He pitched until he couldn't anymore and rehabbed his arm. He came back in the same season.

   I understand that people want to "protect" their investments, short term or long term, but what's the point of investing if you don't get their full potential. Do you think Whitey Ford, Sandy Koufax, or Bob Gibson ever let their managers give them an innings limit or pitch count? People have to understand that thinking for the present and the future is about tapping your potential. You can't get oil unless you drill all the way to the bottom right? Same concept with pitchers. Let's give them another shot. If Major League Baseball wants to "pretend" the steroid era never happened, this is a good start.