I also don't get the Justin Verlander love. I'm guessing it's because there's a lot of Detroit Tiger faithful on these boards.
According to a survey of major league players conducted by Sports Illustrated, Verlander, 27, was named the No. 1 fastball pitcher by 30 percent of the 339 players who participated in the survey. His average fastball velocity is second in the league this year at 95.8 mph, according to fangraphs.com.
Jonathan Broxton was second with 11% of the vote. If you don't get the love, you don't watch him. He is a top ten pitcher for sure, top five a lot of the time and on any given night he's the best pitcher in baseball.
Sure he has a dominant fastball, but there's more to pitching than that. One major weakness to his game is he basically only uses 3 pitches, whereas most people on these lists are using 4 or 5. Also, i find survey's like that to be pointless and full of confounds; it's impossible to determine anything form a survey by reading just 1 sentence, but that's what ESPN, etc. want us to. What does the "No. 1 Fastball pitcher" even mean? There's just as good of a chance that it means he's the pitcher who relies most on his fastball as it does that he has the best fastball in the league.
Of course you find the survey pointless, it doesn't support your argument. I'll take the word of 339 surveyed players, they play the game. As for Verlander he has three pitches, two that are among the best in the game. He throws four pitches, the four seam and curve which are dominant (Verlander, Strasberg and Jimenez have the best 4 seamers) and the two seam and the change-up which are good. He's used the change a lot this year, and since his fastball is 98/99 just about every time an 88 mph change-up can be devastating. And most pitchers don't throw 4 or 5 pitches well, only a handful do and I'm not sure any throw five well. Jimenez throws three pitches effectively, the 4 seam, change and curve. Johnson is the same, 4 seam, change, slider. Halliday, Lester, Wainwright and Sabathia all throw 4 pitches well but there aren't many others. Liriano three, Carpenter three and Price three. In fact if you look at scouting material Verlander is one of the few pitchers who they list as having five pitches (slider the 5th) and they list three as being above average (change) to superior. I voted Lincecum in this poll because I think he might be the only guy in the game with three dominant pitches, as most of the rest have 1-2 dominant pitches and then maybe a third and fourth they can effectively employ. I know I'm a Tigers fan and I do love me some Verlander, but it doesn't take homer glasses to realize how good he really is. His only real issue has always been his Rich Harden-like innings that he has once a game, long innings with a walk, lots of long counts and maybe a couple of runs. If you don't take advantage of that one inning though you are gonna have trouble getting to him. He also led the league not only in Ks last year, but in K/9 and his career K/9 numbers are 8.4/9. Only Peavy, Santana and Beckett have better career numbers of active starters to this point and those guys have been three of the best pitchers over the past decade. K/9 is a pretty good ratio in demonstrating dominance, and Verlander's numbers support the players saying he has the league's best fastball. The guy can throw his first pitch at 99 with great movement, and his 120th pitch at 99 with great movement. That isn't just impressive for today's game, it's impressive period. He's the best pitcher the Tigers have had in my lifetime and he has a chance to be the best pitcher in franchise history. He's a superior talent, I think most fans regardless of affiliation would agree with me.
Id take Halladay over Verlander but my reasoning is the same as yours...Strasburg shouldnt be running away with this like he is since he wont be at his best yet 3 years from now, most likely
They're gonna retire that number soon, no way they give it to this kid.
