Phil's Future Is Bright

Although I don't expect Phil Hughes to be a future ace, as many thought he could be while in the minors, I believe he can be a fine starting pitcher.

While people point to outings like his last one against the Mariners (I'm going to refrain from repeating the horrible numbers from that outing, but if you want to see them then click here), I like to remind them that this same guy has also had some brilliant starts (see his May 4th start against Oakland) as well.

Throughout his 6+ year career, opponent's batting average against Phil is .257. Mind you, that's not a number that one should start with in their argument for winning the Cy Young Award, but it's not horrible either. For comparison, so far this season, out of the 62 pitchers in the American League that have thrown 30 or more innings, that .257 BAA would be good for 31st. If you click here you'll see the top 30 pitchers in BAA, and that list is made up of mostly #1 and #2 starters for their respective teams.

The same can be said for Hughes' on-base percentage against for his career, which currently stands at .315. I can imagine some readers yelling at their computer screens, saying "who cares what he did 2009!? What matters now is that opponent's are hitting .314/.355/.533 against Phil in 2013!" Well, I wholeheartedly agree. What a player or team did even a week ago is meaningless to their ability to win, or help their team win, from here on out.

But that's the point.

"Ah ha!"

Not since his sophomore season of 2008 have Phil's opponents hit better than .283, let alone the .314 they are hitting so far this season. Hughes' OPS against is currently .888, which is nearly 100 points higher than any of his seasons since 2008. For those that believe in luck, then you'll be interested to know that his batting average on balls in play so far this year is .357, against a career mark of .292.

Another encouraging statistic with Hughes has to do with the velocity of his fastball. Looking at his four-seam fastball, Phil's thrown it an average of 92.98 mph throughout his career, and this season it's almost exactly that (92.95). This shows us that his strength is still there. As for his slider, which he's using nearly 4x as much in 2013 than he did in 2012 (5.13% in 2012, 19.5% in 2013), the vertical movement is almost exactly the same, while it's moving a bit more horizontally (thanks to Brooks Baseball for the following information). By the way, I'm looking at Phil's 2012 due to his fWAR of 2.3 that season, which was good for 18th among American League starters that season.

Going by the eye test, it's simply a matter of Phil Hughes having better command. He has a line drive percentage of 27% this year, while he's striking out and walking a respectable number of hitters. Phil is just leaving too many pitches up this season, and professional hitters are going to take advantage of that. It's not a matter of him throwing his pitchers harder or better, it's a matter of locating them better. I have faith he can do that.

I've said this a number of times before, but you have to take into account that Phil Hughes is not the "ace" of the Yankee pitching staff. Nor is he even the #2 or #3 starter. As the #4 starter on the team, there is little pressure on him to be "lights out" night in and night out. His role is to basically give his team a chance to win a third of his starts (based on the fact that getting 9 wins a year, out of around 27 starts, from the #4 spot in the rotation is good), as opposed to somebody like CC Sabathia who is expected to give the Yankees a chance to win basically all of his starts.

"That's too much pressure."

If you go by "Quality Starts", which means a pitcher would throw 6 or more innings while giving up 3 or less runs, then Phil more than meets the demands of his role on the team. Especially with a bullpen that's been killing it lately, a "quality" start should certainly be enough to give the Yankees a chance to win. Even if you throw out his Quality Start percentage of 47% in his career, this season it's at 50%. If that's the only statistic I saw, then I'd be very happy with the Yankees' #4 so far this season.

I got into it a bit with somebody on Twitter over Phil being the #4 starter for the Yankees, and whether that fact really means something. I argued that it does, and I stand by that still today. The reason for that is because I'm looking at what Phil can do for the Yankees. If we were simply trying to determine if he was good or not, then his place in the rotation wouldn't matter. Nor would it matter if I was comparing Hughes to another pitcher. But being the best pitcher in baseball, or even being the worst pitcher in baseball, does not matter when it comes to the team's ability to win. After all, a team's ERA, WHIP, Batting Average Against, OPS against, and so on is meaningless. It's all about wins and losses.

Of course, it's much easier for a team with the best pitcher to win, but I digress...

So while Phil Hughes has given the Yankees a chance to win in half of his starts this season, which is more than you can ask for from a bottom of the rotation starter, I fully expect him to get better. And that, my friends, is pretty darn encouraging.