So one of the more common phrases that has been said this year amongst
Dodger fans has been: “Oh, wow.  That Billingsley was awesome,
tonight!” 

But just how awesome has he been, so far?  Let’s take a look… 

This
year, his record is 6-1, with those six wins leading the NL, through 9
starts and most of us know that already.  Of course, for anyone who has
watched most of his starts this year, we also know that his record
could arguably be 8-1, but nonetheless, this gives us a chance to
reinforce the classic MSTI mantra: wins don’t matter for pitchers, at
least pertinent to their performance.  In fact, when we say mantra, we
mean it in the purest sense and, since we here at MSTI like to promote
health, we’d like to enforce this mantra into your meditation.  Look
how happy this guy is… 

Let’s look a bit deeper, though.  Billingsley’s ERA so far is 2.51, which ranks 6th in the NL and 8th in MLB,
while his ERA+ is 175, also good enough for 6th in the NL, with a 2.97
FIP and a WHIP of 1.15, which is way down from his WHIP of 1.34 in
2008.  We’ve also seen a rise in his K/9 ratio, going from 9.01 in 2008
to 9.30 so far this season, which ranks 9th in the NL (Kershaw is 6th,
by the way), and ranks 5th in K’s at 63. 

His VORP of 21.3 is
also 6th in all of baseball amongst pitchers (and leads all Dodger
pitchers), while his nine quality starts means that, not only has every
start of his this year been a quality start, but he also leads all of
baseball in quality starts.  What’s also pretty cool is that he’s only
given up a whopping… 1 HR all year, which ranks 2nd in the NL, only
behind (everyone knows it’s) Wandy Rodriguez. 

The downsides
with Billingsley are that, while he’s been great, he still continues to
have a bit of control issues.  When MSTI reviewed him in our 2008 Year
In Review, last year, Billingsley’s BB/9 ratio was the 4th highest
amongst top 30 VORP pitchers.  So far in 2009, his BB/9 is 4.28, which
is second highest amongst top 30 VORPers, only behind Matt Cain’s BB/9
of 4.41.  We’ve also noted that while he was a bit unlucky with a BABIP
of .320 last year, it is so far .268, so perhaps we could see a slight
rise in some of the numbers down the road. 

Still, though,
Billingsley has been incredible this year and only continues to improve
and he’s still barely 24 years old.  It’s not enough to say anymore
that he’s going to be one of the best pitchers in baseball.  He already
IS and can stand toe to toe with almost anyone.  What’s also been
impressive is that even during the games that Billingsley hasn’t had
his best stuff he has managed to pull through.  Last night was a great
example.  While he was throwing a ton of pitches and had trouble
locating his pitches, he still kept his team in the game and went a
very solid 7 IP.  The fact is, the Dodgers have their ace and he’s
cheap!  At least… for now.  Well done, Thunder Thighs! 

But
it’s not just Billingsley that’s putting together a stellar season so
far.  While he rightfully gets the most attention for it, it’s
interesting to note how Randy Wolf hasn’t been that far behind and let’s briefly take a look at that… 

Originally signed to fill out the bottom of our rotation, so far the early returns have been better than
expected, good enough to where Wolf has been our #2 starter.  Thus far,
Wolf has put together a 2.72 ERA, enough to put him 9th in the NL and
13th in all of MLB with a 161 ERA+ and is VORPing at 16.3, which places
him 16th in MLB (CC is 15th, by the way), and so far is putting up a
career low WHIP at 1.07, while also not royally sucking as much in the
1st inning as in years past. 

Although Wolf has been
incredibly screwed if we’re talking about his record.  In his 9 starts
this year, his record is only 2-1!  Either way, for a guy who I wasn’t
thrilled about signing this offseason and was only happy to sign him
because he was the lesser of the evils, he has surpassed expectations
by quite a bit.  Of course, do I expect Wolf to continue to put up
these great numbers?  No, because he’s never been this good over the
course of a full season throughout his career and, of course, the
downsides of his season so far are that his FIP is 3.73 and his BABIP
is pretty low (.242), and he’s always a short trip away from the DL,
but, either way, even if we got a Randy Wolf at a high 3/low 4 ERA, who
wouldn’t take that from him? 

So, in the end, all these
numbers are very nice and all, but, of course, it’s definitely still
early and the final tally could end up being very different and, again,
certainly there are always health concerns with Randy Wolf.  However,
if the first month and a half are a good indicator of things, then our
pitching has, for the most part, held its own and Billingsley and Wolf
have managed to form quite a formidable tandem, while the rotation
should only further solidify itself once Kuroda returns (yeah, remember
him?).  So I’m not too worried about the starting rotation, or at least
my fears have tempered somewhat as the season has gone on.  Now the
bullpen and seeing Guillermo Mota in there, on the other hand…