Verlander: A Man Worth the Money.

The discussion as of late is Justin Verlander and the contract offer being made to him.  Of what's happening I'll just link over to Kurt's post.

I'm of the opinion that Verlander deserves this money.  To explain, why I'm going to break this post into two parts:  Tangibles and intangibles.  Tangibles are the things we can see and/or measure such as mechanics or pitch velocity.  Intangibles are those other things that a player does, more of the feeling you get when you see them out there.  Basically attitude if you will.

Analysis after the jump.

Tangibles:  What, in terms of pitching ability, separates Verlander from the other guys in the league.  Having three above average pitches helps his case.  But what does our staff ace throw?  According to Fangraphs Verlander throws a fastball, curveball, slider, and changeup.

Percentage wise Justin loves his fastball.  An understandable love at that.  He throws it around 65% of the time with a velocity averaging about 95mph.  Very nice.  Add in the fact that all the appropriate movement is there (tailing in on RH hitters), you have a very formidable pitch.  Heres the best part of the great fastball, a really good fastball always makes for a really good changeup.  And that is what Verlander has.

His changeup technically is his best pitch, scoring a better pitch type value than Justin's fastball per 100 pitches thrown.  But there is a trick to change-ups because if they were easy to throw than every guy in this league with an above average fastball would have just as effective of a change-up as Verlander.  The key to a good change-up lies within being able to have it come out of the hand at the same arm angle and the same arm speed as the fastball, but approach the batter at a lower velocity.  A change-up is a deception pitch created by skill and of course having a really good fastball to back it all up.

Now fastballs and change-ups are nice, but if you only ever throw the two of them your going to get predictable and location of each pitch all of a sudden needs to be perfect.  Gotta have a good ol' knee buckler to throw every once in a while.  For Justin, that pitch is his curveball.  It's a breaking pitch and the very nature of the breaking pitch is to keep hitters on their toes.  Again Justin has an above average breaking pitch.

Now in terms of tangibles we've talked about what he currently has.  None of us are really worried about tomorrow yet.  It's two or three or four years down the line that we are worried about.  I'll give my evidence that Verlander's future is very bright indeed.

I'm going to talk about one more pitch that Justin has, and that is a slider.  It's a new pitch for him to throw on a semi regular basis.  And while right now it might not be a great pitch for him it lends us insight into his future.  It's just a fact that as our ace gets older he'll lose velocity on his fastball.  It's inevitable.  So as that velocity fades he'll have to do what all long lasting pitchers do and that is deceive that batter instead of over powering him.  This accomplished through pitch location, adding and removing velocity on pitches, and having a variety of pitches to throw.  The fact that he's adding pitches to his repertoire at this stage in his career means that in five years Justin is going to have at least 4 pretty effective pitches.  I'd say that's a pretty good amount to mix and match with.

The last tangible item I'd like to talk about is of course Verlanders mechanics.  Now I've essentially wrote one piece in a fanpost about how good his mechanics are.  I'm not going to go step by step through all that again.  What I will reiterate is how his good mechanics translate into injury risk.  Essentially, given how good his mechanics are, Justin has no injury risk.  Not now and (in my opinion) not in the foreseeable future.  They're that sound.  Now it's not like risk isn't there, but if I was gonna sign a pitcher to long term contract Verlander would be near the top of the list because of his good mechanics.

So tangibly he's good.  Very very good.  But what about that other stuff?

Intangibles:  What did we see from Verlander every 5th day as a starter in 2009?  We saw a guy not wanting to win, but expecting to win.  It's an attitude necessary for any team looking to add young talent not only to a pitching staff but to the lineup as well.  Having a guy on your team saying through his words and actions "we are going to win" is an attitude that is infectious.  It gives confidence and confidence lets players use their abilities to the fullest.  Really, this attitude is the one intangible that matters.

Verlander wants to win.  Five years down the line I don't see Verlander not wanting to win.  10 years from now I don't see Verlander not wanting to win.  It's an attitude that isn't necessarily taught but passed along to those around.  It's an attitude that I want around my team for the next five years because it's effect that can last longer than the length of the contract itself.

Summary:  Verlander has what it takes to be a pitcher on a long term contract.  His actions on the field tell me that he will not get hurt because of the nature of his mechanics.  His attitude tells me that he will inspire his teammates to always play nine innings of baseball.  And the nature of his pitches tells me that in his time here in Detroit and beyond umpires will be saying "out" more than "safe" when Justin Verlander is on the mound.