Doesn't look like Webb will be winning #20 today
The Dbacks can't score a run to save Eric Byrnes's TV show

only 23 have tried and failed more than once including a handful that had some shots in relief to pick up their 20th victory.

Nine players [...] failed to notch a win in two starts after picking up their 19th win

Does a handful = 14, do these two sentences not fit together, or do I need still more coffee?

3-run HR by Manny.

Maybe he should stop taking the hill against the D-Backs.

Webb might have lost the Cy Young today. His ERA has risen for 2.74 to 3.41 in just 3 starts. Lincecum might be the fruntrunner now.

Lincecum or Sabathia, though I'm not saying he deserves it.

Sabathia might get it, since apparently he melded with Sandy Koufax on his way to Milwaukee for the first time.

Paging Mr. Lincecum, you have a Cy Young at the front desk.

The last three shitty starts knocked Webb off the Cy Young race. At this point, he's probably already out of the top 10 starters in the NL in VORP and ERA. I like Webb, but it'll be a bad call if he gets the Cy Young this year.

Anyhow, I think Webb has an injury of some sort. He's been dropping his elbow on his fastball and can't get the same sink on it. Instead, it just flattens over the plate. He claims it's just a mechanical problem, and that he's not hurt.

Whatever it is, the Dbacks coaches (BoMel and Price) seem to have disagreements with Haren and Webb on what exactly is wrong and what needs to be done to fix it. Personally, I think Brian Price is overrated, and so is Bob Melvin.

Half-a-season can't match Lincecum's full season in the NL, but despite his horrible first month, Sabathia is just a notch below TL in ERA+ for the season. But there should be some kind of award for a 9-0 record and 305 ERA+ in 12 starts with the Brewers.

A World Series ring?

Or $150,000,000 from the Yankees?

Meh, Webb hasn't lost it yet, although he's not looking good. If he

a) can win 20 on his fourth try
b) keeps his ERA in the 3 to 3.50 range
c) gets the D-backs to the playoffs

... I think he still wins it. Even after his problems, he's still projected to finish 22-8; that's not as great as he looked like he was going to be, but I think it's good enough.

Of course, if he really is hurt, and he keeps sucking, then I think Sabathia wins it. Lincecum probably deserves it, but I can't see the writers passing up the story of C. C. coming over from the AL and ending the 26-year playoff drought.

Regardless of the win total, I don't think he's going to win if his ERA is more than half a run higher than Sabathia or Lincecum.

i think levski is right - i watched the game this afternoon and webb gave up SIX walks.

SIX!!!!

he looks all wrong and the only pitch he could throw was the changeup. i would be real surprised if he ISN'T hurt

Webb dropping his slot and struggling is not unique to 2008. He's looked similar to this for stretches in each of the last couple of years, but he wasn't hit this hard.

Anyhow, I think Webb has an injury of some sort. He's been dropping his elbow on his fastball and can't get the same sink on it. Instead, it just flattens over the plate. He claims it's just a mechanical problem, and that he's not hurt.

I've watched the last two games and if ever there was evidence that DIPS was full of crap it was those two starts. He's been a completely different pitcher than normal with pitch after pitch being left up. Now why this is happening I have no idea but it sure isn't normal variation.

I've watched the last two games and if ever there was evidence that DIPS was full of crap it was those two starts.

Not sure what this is supposed to mean. But in the last start, he gave up 4 hits on 15 BIP. Only 2 of the 15 BIP were line drives. The problem in the last start was the 6 walks and the HR.

Fair enough, in the start before that, he gave up 6 hits in 15 BIP with 3 line drives. But again the main problem was the 5 BB and the 2 HR. Anyway, 10 hits in 30 BIP is just 1 more than you'd expect and 5 LDs in 30 BIP I believe is pretty much dead-on average. Of course applying DIPS on a game-by-game basis is just silly as I'm sure Gaelan knows.

Brandon Webb with 11 walks and 3 HR in his last 9 innings is a sign that something is amiss.

And, sigh ... all these years out, folks still can't separate the claim about BABIP vs. what DIPS actually "says". What DIPS actually "says" is that, after controlling for BB rates, K rates and HR rates, BABIP has little/no predictive value for future ERA (on a season-to-season basis). That might still be wrong, although JC Bradbury's analysis supported it for the group of qualifying pitchers (which is a fairly small %age of the population, so not an ideal analysis).

Anyway, saying that A does not impact on Y after controlling for B, C and D is not the same thing as saying that A does not vary.

In other words, one might expect that pitchers who get hit hard give up lots of HRs; one might expect that pitchers who strike out a lot of guys (often by throwing really hard) might be difficult to hit; one might expect that pitchers who walk lots of guys pitch more often with guys on base (situations in which, on average, batters hit better). None of those possibilities necessarily violate DIPS.

That's not to say DIPS is right, especially not exactly right. I believe ZiPS gets some improvement in its projections by adding BABIP for example. But that's the sort of evidence that shows that DIPS is "wrong", not the fact that some pitchers have higher BABIPs than others.

(Also of course my standard point that it's not clear we should care about BABIP anyway. It would seem SLGBIP is what we'd really want -- flyballs are more likely to be outs but also more likely to be doubles/triples. So a 310 BABIP pitcher who gives up fewer than his share of doubles is not necessarily getting hit harder or giving up more runs than the 290 BABIP pitcher who gives up more than his share of doubles. But nobody ever seems to pay attention to this point.)

Nothing Webb's going through can match what poor Early Wynn had to do to get his 300th win.

He got #299 on September 8, 1962, then lost his last three starts of the season and got cut by the White Sox. Nobody showed any interest in him, since he was 42 years old and coming off a year with an 88 ERA+.

He then went around trying to catch on with some team---any team---with no luck, when the Indians finally signed him on June 21st of the next year.

In his first start he pitched a complete game and gave up two runs, and lost.

In his second start he gave up three runs in six innings, and got no decision.

In his third start he pitched six shutout innings, and got no decision.

In his fourth start he came in and pitched two scoreless innings in relief, and got no decision. His ERA was now down to 1.96, but still no win. At this point he wasn't just throwing at batters, he was firing bats at the batboys.

And then in his fifth start, he gave up four runs in five innings, and his ERA shot up to 2.89---but he finally won. He pitched in fifteen games after that, never won another, but wound up with a 2.28 ERA and an ERA+ of 159. What some people will do for those milestones.