Bob Ryan wrote an article, and Rob Neyer blogged about it.
And now I am blogging about it.
The article suggests that Daisuke Matsuzaka has not been worth the money. It is hard to argue with that early-drawn conclusion.
But a few things…
1) There are still three more seasons on the contract. And although it doesn’t look too good right now, it may get better. Things must play out before a definite conclusion can be drawn.
2) Matsuzaka has pitched fairly well thus far in his Major League Baseball career. Sure, there may be some luck involved there. But close to league-average in 2007, very good in 08,’ and then poor in only a few starts this season is well worth the base salary that Matsuzaka earns.
Neyer does touch up on the fact that Dice-K’s stuff may not have been as advertised. His stuff has never seemed great to me, but he has so many pitches, that command is the real issue. He doesn’t have a great fastball, and all his secondary stuff seems solid enough, albeit unspectacular.
But command. He just cannot command it. When he pounds the strike zone, he makes too many mistakes. When he strays away, not as many mistakes are made. But walks galore occur.
There is not a pitcher that I’ve seen in recent years that misses his spots as much as Matsuzaka. When Varitek sets up on the outer half, the ball often ends up on the inner half. And that my friends seems to be a reoccuring theme.
So his stuff may not be as great as initially thought, but many of us heard he had control of five or six pitches to go along with pretty good stuff. That is not the case.
There are a few things that I feel Dice-K can do to improve. And both involve left-handed hitters, since he tends to pound them away.
The two-seamer that he has worked on the past couple of seasons needs to be used more often against left-handers. He can use the inner half of the plate, and have the ball break back into the strike zone, catching some lefties off guard.
This would allow Matsuzaka to both have an out-pitch, and to utilize the part of the strike zone that he seems hesitant to use.
And the second pitch is the obvious one. The change-up. It needs to be used more effectively against lefties. It is good enough to get hitters out in front. But it just hasn’t been used properly. Matsuzaka only throws it between 4-5 percent of the time, which doesn’t seem often enough, at least not to this observer.
The slider however, has been great–and should be used often–as that is Dice-K’s most effective pitch.
But really, again, the issue is with both control and command. And until that becomes less of an issue, then Dice K will either be a five inning pitcher with some success, or a 5 inning pitcher that gets hammered pounding the strike zone.
Find the “happy medium,” Dice. Please, find it.
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Good points about pitching to lefties, but I totally, absolutely, completely and emphatically disagree on the value of Daisuke to the Red Sox pitching staff, as well as to the value of that $103MM. Here go the talking heads looking for something or someone to tear down to validate their own elevated sense of worth. Recently it was Papi, Green, J.D., Mike, Ells, Beckett, Papelbon, MDC, Rocco, Tek and now, in their wisdom, it’s Daisuke. Shameful.
I repeat the fact that the $52M posting fee was Boras & Yankee driven. It took place at a time when the ownership group were still trying to go toe-to-toe with the Steinbrenner approach to developing talent (buying it). The JD Drew/Boras and Julio Lugo contracts were part of this. Daisuke was an attempt at finding a necessary and viable alternative to the struggling Clement, Snyder, Tavares, Gabbard, others.
In other words, that fee can not be taken out of its historical context of the collapse of 2006, or his role in the WS of 2007. It can’t.
Historically, Daisuke was to work with a good but under-performing rotation: 40 year old Schill, (6-11, 3.97), newbie Beckett, (5-11, 5.01), 40 year old Wake (7-11, 4.63), and rookie Lester (7-2, 4.76). The FO was well aware of the potential of Lester, Buchholz, Hagadone and others. Daisuke was not brought in as a savior, but as one of Japan’s still young top pitchers who should fit into, and possibly improve this potentially strong rotation. Forget the media hype. We know this is what the Sox expected, and he did exactly that.
That posting fee kept Daisuke and his first 33W off the Yankees, helped us win the WS in ‘07, and get to postseason in ‘08. You may not like the method, or the stats surrounding the results, but the results are real and can not be denied. Whether bapip or angels in the outfield, 2008’s 18-3, 3rd in Cy Young, deep into October, MVP of the WBC happened. So did his tired arm.
That posting fee also opened the door of Japan to the Red Sox. Without that fee we would have no Oki, no Saito, no Tazawa, no 2007WS (see Oki), no playoffs in 2008, and not much depth in the 2009 Pen. For Ryan not to understand this is inexplicable.
In addition, the Sox are getting that posting fee back quickly in terms of merchandise, media and events sold throughout Asia as fan favorites.
The Sox have already gotten their money’s worth out of that $52M in merchandise sales, the arrival of Oki, Saito and Tazawa so far, Daisuke’s 33 W, the Asian Market, the 2007WS and 2008 postseason, and so many other benefits. It’s a bargain compared with nearly a half-billion $$ for 3 new Yankees.
The question remains, however, how will he pitch after he recovers from the WBC in 2009 or 2010. IMO, quite well, and very much in a way that will drive you crazy. I believe he is well worth his modest $8+MM annual salary, an amount which includes his staff; and that his 18W put him in the league of pitchers making twice as much. He will pitch for two more years of his contract, again try for 20W, and be a bargain.
You make good points, Gerry. I actually like Dice-K. But as you mentioned, the Red Sox getting him rather than the Yankees does play a role in this. One large point is that the contract must be played out in full before an accurate conclusion can be taken away from this. Ryan seems to be jumping on the bandwagon while Dice-K is struggling.
Dice-K was a very good gamble at the moment. And I still think it was a great move. Because he has planted the Red Sox Nation flag in Japan, where the Yanks ruled supreme. That’s a huge markett. And that presence benefit the team not just economically, but he gave us a prestige that help us sign future players. Tazawa has signed with Boston for a fraction of the money offered by the Rangers.
On the other hand, probably Dice-K plays under more pressure than any other player. Not only because he plays in Boston, but because he comes from a very patriotic culture where he is considered a “national treasure”. It must be hard to live up to that expectations.
I still hope Matsuzaka is gonna improve. I have seen him in the WBC, and I think he is better than what we have seen. In the worst case scenario, I still think he should be a more than solid 3rd starter.
Calling Dice-K a solid signing at this point is absurd.
Whatever the context, the Red Sox are paying him roughly $18m/year. You can make up any excuse you want. The fact is they made a poor investment.
Sure he helped in 2008 and it’s wonderful that his wins were counting towards the BoSox and not the Yankees. Yet, that ignores the fact that the Red Sox would have had TONS more available capital to either trade for another pitcher or sign a FA. That $50m debit in 2007 plus the other $8-10m annually hurts, even if they are the Red Sox.
Given his control problems, which then leads to his inability to log any serious innings (career avg of less than 6 IP per start), leads to a situation where under the best of circumstances he is a #3 starter. And as this year has shown, he can be much, much worse.
So tell me again why this was a good signing? Certainly there were better ways to spend $100m over 6 years.
i really do agree about the merchandising and opening up japan to the redsox. i think these alone could be considered a large part of why he was worth signing. plus, if he can win 10 games a year for the next 3… then worth it.
however, wasn’t the way that tazawa was handled a possible closing of boston getting any more chances with japanese teams? or will they be quick to forget that the redsox took a prospect that probably should have gone to the japanese leagues first, right out from under them?
Gotta call out this line “Sure, there may be some luck involved there. ”
There is a lot more than a little luck in his 2008 season. He had a low BABIP, a high left on base rate and his predicted ERA using xFIP was 4.82.
Any pitcher who walks 5 hitters every nine innings will not be successful in a large sample of games.
Troy, Everyone here I think realizes there was luck involved. But he still had a pretty good year. I kept that loose because we were all aware :) Thanks for commenting.
Kidding right,
I do like how you include the posting fee in the annual salary. I remember some Yankees fans adding it on to the 2007 payroll to try and make up some of the ground. I guess one could go either way…But Dice-K isn’t a “bust,” not to me. He is just overpaid…
Great article, I aggree. Your point about opening the market in the far east is important. In a discussion with a prominent high school football coach I asked why a big time college took one of our good players but obviously not a great player. He explained once you get a youngster the recruiting in future years from his high school opens up doors. Our high school year after year has over 3000 students and I believe what you have pointed out is similar only on a much greater scale. The proof is the Red Sox have more pitching talent than they can handle and part of the job now must be how to make assignments without losing them. Come September the Sox will have an army of arms ready to chose for the playoffs. Somewhere down the line we will get back the shortstop from Florida though I think a catcher like Teagarten(not sure of spelling) would be helpful when we play the Rays. They sure can run. As far as the negative comments on Matsuzaka’s signing, I recall a Col. Egan who lived off of knocking Ted Williams. The controvery sells papers. Its a great time for sports in New England. I have loved the Sox since I was 12 and was one of those nuts who asked the Doctor to keep me alive until they took the series. Now I want more.