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NATE KARNS - THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY

The Good in tonight's game is subjective, we'll admit.  But it is rooted in a newfangled (ca. 1977) theory that raw W, L, ERA, and RBI totals are not quite as important as the ... um, what's the term ... "component skills" that result in W, L, ERA, and RBI.  There is a small but shrill group of us that prefer to look at 10 strikeouts per game rather than to look at 1 run or 5 runs in a single game.

Friday, Karns got 7 garbage swings and misses on his curve alone, and another 5 bad whiffs off his eye-popping swerve changeup.  This leaves his lifetime strikeout total at 182 against his lifetime innings total of 181.  Granted, that doesn't exactly guarantee wins, but go find another pitcher with more K than IP.  When you do come up with a name or two, it won't be Chris Young.

I liked Karns before, but in this game he definitely evoked images of Mike Mussina.  The Yankees went up there searching for fastballs, and Karns flung one vicious curve/change after another (27 strikes not in play, 6 in play).  Then, after four or five deadly offspeed pitches, BURRRNNN there was a 92 fastball on the paint that had to have looked 96.

That changeup.  Wow.  It was going to be the key to a real plateau leap if there was one, and Karns threw a good half-dozen true wipeout changeups Friday.  Who knew he was capable of making it do that.

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The Bad was that Karns pitched just like Mike Mussina --- > if you subtract the little matter of being able throw his fastball for strikes.  Everything perfectly Moose, except Karns would go to paint the fastball and it would be 8" outside.

True, they were almost all "good misses" as Curt Schilling would call them, misses off the plate to the side of the catcher's mitt.  But it's also true that the early solo HR chased him off the plate.  Not good.  Am sure they'll discuss it.  Karns is an adjustment kinda guy.

Karns went in with the idea of keeping the ball away from the short NYY porch, and it put him in one 3-1 hole after another.  Amazing to me that you can go 54-47 in ball strike count and win a game.  But as badly as he kept painting himself into corners, he kept frenzying himself out of them, head ripping side to side, with double rows of Megalodon sawtooth curves and changeups.

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The Ugly, to listen to Sims, was that Karns had a catastrophic outing.  (?!)  He is! a High! Volume! Pitcher!, he shook his head at the 6th inning graphic ... with the Mariners ahead 4 to 1.

1.  Any pitcher who fans 9 men, and walks 3-4 men, per game is going to throw more pitches than Chris Young, yes.  Take the good with the bad.

2.  Karns is averaging 3.97 pitches per batter, compared to the ML average of 3.83.  That's, let's see, :: counting on fingers :: 14 extra pitches per 100 batters.  Four more per start than perfectly average.

You could put Mel Stottlemyre out there next turn and the pitches per batter would be 1.05.  But if you're going to try to find a starter who is roughly equal to Brian McCann in size and strength, we vote Nathan Karns and savor the battles.

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:: shrug :: Two games in, the Mainframe is more bullish on Karns than two games ago.  Drive home safely.  :- /

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MIKE MONTGOMERY

Had no idea he could sustain 94-96 MPH out of the bullpen.  (95.1 average, per Brooks, on 15 heaters Friday.)  And his offspeed was the whole reason we thought the 2015 Montgomery was intriguing.  The curve is -18 MPH to his heater, by the way.

Much to Dr. D's surprise, this kid is looking like a real threat to become Matt Thornton.  Seeing as he is a secondary consideration out of the bullpen, we'd say he is "raising the floor" relative to J.C. Ramirez.

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TONY ZYCH

Has the head jerk back, so is throwing harder and wilder.  Right now he is Jeff Nelson 2000-2002, back when Nellie used to fan 12 and walk 6.  That didn't make Nellie useless; it made him a dice roll when the big guns came up.  Didn't matter who was hitting; mattered whether Nelson could get three pitches over the plate.  The 2001 Mariners survived Nelson's chaos all right.  

But if Zych is going to throw like this, with the volume knobs that go up to 11, then Dr. D would recycle him as a ROOGY.   The stats don't yet support it, but at the moment he looks more comfortable against righties - he can fire the slider low-away and it's more natural for him when he's not quite synch'ed up.

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BULLPEN AT LARGE

Moyer used to give batters a "comfortable 0-for-4."  As Grizzly points out, Peralta and Cishek and Nuno give M's fans an UNcomfortable 0-for-4.  Yep.  And that's the way it's gonna be.

"Celebration saves" where a $14M closer comes in and blasts away the opposition to frost a 5-2 cake are not part of this year's Mariner experience.  But hey.  There are two aspects to the Stars & Scrubs story board.

BABVA,

Dr D