Aroldis Chapman SP or RP???

[nomo17k]

Quote: Originally Posted by seanjeezy

He cut down on his walks and overall threw more strikes... but his command was pretty much the same as last year which is why I expect him to be good but not amazing. I doubt he challenges hitters with the same frequency since he'll probably be sitting in the mid 90's like he did in Spring Training (he was sitting around 93-96 and topping out at 98) so his walk rate might regress some too.

So perhaps his great performance in 2012 partly was due to luck, unless he really improved his command.

Pitchers like him are interesting. While he could turn into the next Randy Johnson, he'd start having trouble when hitters learn to lay off pitches... that is, if he never learn to pitch with better command. Once he tries to throw more strikes by sacrificing some zip in his hard stuff, he turns into a mediocre pitcher throwing in mid-90s.


Personally I find Craig Kimbrel much more intriguing than Chapman... I kind of want to see him start, to see if he can maintain the level of dominance that he has shown.

[MrOldboy]

Quote: Originally Posted by ParisB

I don't know, I could also get hit by a snowball walking down the street...I just think the positives outweigh the "potential" negatives. You're assuming triple negatives. Not only does he fail as a starter, but the replacement closer fails and so does Chapman as a reliever again. Kenny lofton played college basketball and Tom Glavine played college hockey. They should have stayed at the other sport because they could have failed in baseball. Injury is an equal risk to every player. Not just to players switching positions.

What I said was if Chapman fails, Broxton succeeds and then the Reds have to decide what to do with that situation. Sure a triple negative could occur as well, so could a double positive (Broxton and Chapman succeed)

On the topic of injuries, there are vast differences between the injury rates of athletes. This is something to keep in mind, not just for Chapman but for any athlete. I'll refrain from posting it though since it would be long. In short according to a few papers, there are differences in injury rate for not only a RP vs SP, but also pitcher vs position player, different sports, and even between practice and games. Lofton and Glavine made good decisions to go with baseball as it offers a lower injury risk, in fact the lowest injury risk of all Male collegiate sports.

Again I am not arguing to keep Chapman in the bullpen, I think they should use him more as he is potentially a very valuable player. His value is much less as a closer compared to a starter. But there are risks and injury is one to consider. That is all I want to get across. The risks are real, but like you said there is also a risk of losing out on the extra production you could get from Chapman as a starter.

The numbers posted by Nomo are a bit underwhelming, hopefully him finding himself last year will result in him moving forward as a starter.

Between 2011 and 2012 his control did improve. Zone% from 44.4% to 49%. He also had a higher swing% and lower contact%.
http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx...latediscipline