Last Player Picked

Here are CHONE’s 2010 projections for three very similar-looking starting pitchers:

Pitcher A – 3.96 ERA, 1.20 WHIP, 150 K, 168 IP
Pitcher B – 3.89 ERA, 1.23 WHIP, 165 K, 183 IP
Pitcher C – 3.85 ERA, 1.23 WHIP, 174 K, 187 IP

Pitcher C is World Series hero and fantasy mainstay Josh Beckett. Pitcher B is two-time Cy Young winner Johan Santana. Pitcher A, of course, is Colby Lewis.

Colby Lewis? Really?

Lewis has spent the last two years playing for the Hiroshima Toyo Carp in Japan’s NPB league. He was recently inked by the Texas Rangers to fill out their rotation. Before his time in NPB, he was a top prospect for Texas who managed some unimpressive MLB stats from 2004-2007. In Japan, however, he became a new pitcher:

2008 – 15 W, 2.68 ERA, 1.00 WHIP, 183 K, 173 IP
2009 – 11 W, 2.96 ERA, 0.92 WHIP, 186 K, 176.3 IP

CHONE takes those awesome Japanese stats and tempers them considerably; the sub-3.00 ERA and sub-1.00 WHIP are lost in the translation. Even taking quite a bit off of his NPB stats, Lewis looks like a very good player in MLB.

Before you get too excited abut Colby Lewis, though, I’ll make a few cautionary observations:

1. CHONE hates Santana as much as it loves Lewis.

The comparison of Colby Lewis to Johan Santana is not just a statement about Lewis, but also about Santana. CHONE is projecting a 3.89 ERA for Santana, and he hasn’t topped 3.33 in the past eight years.

Apparently there needs to be a separate post to examine what to expect from Johan Santana in 2010. So that comparison is more for shock-value than for balanced analysis. Guys like Matt Garza and James Shields are the sorts of guys we really expect to have a 3.90 ERA with lots of strikeouts, and they are probably a better benchmark for Lewis.

2. Not all projections love Colby Lewis.

ZiPS isn’t on this site for 2010, but it is considerably less optimistic for Lewis:

11 W, 4.39 ERA, 1.30 WHIP, 128 K, 176.3 IP

That’s still above replacement level, on par with end-game picks like Gavin Floyd and Andy Pettitte. ZiPS appears to be putting less weight on his Japanese stats and more on his undistinguished MLB-career.

This raises an important question: Which is more indicative — recent stats in a non-MLB context or MLB stats from three or four years ago? Colby Lewis in 2010 could be an important data point in this discussion.

3. Translating Japanese stats is an imperfect exercise.

While MLB-NPB translations are based on how the switch impacted other players, it is still hit-or-miss. The Japanese game is simply different than what is played in North America, and skills that were valuable in one league might not help in the other.

However, the track record for CHONE has been pretty good on recent imports Hiroki Kuroda, Kenshin Kawakami, and Koji Uehara. These were pitchers who looked like decent-not-great fantasy pitchers based on the projections, and who basically lived up to those expectations. The fact that a 2.90 pitcher like Lewis would be a 3.90 pitcher in MLB seems to indicate that the translation is being fairly conservative.

The bottom line: Lewis could come very cheapily in 2010 drafts, as long as the hype on him doesn’t build. Magazines that have an early print date probably won’t be aware of him, and that means that there are probably several people in your league who won’t be aware of him, either. There’s also no $51 million posting fee to create the buzz like what surrounded Daisuke Matsuzaka.

Even using the more pessimistic ZiPS, I feel pretty good about paying at least $5-6 for Colby Lewis. At that price, it’s not a big deal to cut him if he doesn’t work out. If it turns out CHONE is right, then that’s a cheap bet that could pay huge dividends.

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• A Look at Javier Vazquez
• Rick Porcello Takes the Next Step
• Where Would You Draft Stephen Strasburg for 2010?
• Interesting Catcher Prospects
• Greinke & Ibanez