2K6 Aaron Harang
 

Reds agreed to terms with RHP Aaron Harang on a one-year, $2.35 million contract.
Harang should have done a little better in his first year of arbitration after going 11-13 with a 3.83 ERA in 211 2/3 innings last season. He'll probably be the Reds' Opening Day starter this year. Jan. 17 - 3:04 pm et

Had his best year.Was a top prospect a couple of years ago. Last year could have been his coming out party. Finally pitched the innings.
220innings
13 wins
3.75 era
Could be a nice value pick

I'm on the other side of the fence for Harang in 06.

4.50-4.85 ERA
11 W
1.30-1.37 WHIP
140 K

What's to like:

• Dropped BB/IP rate notably
• Pitched well in the GABP, a park that favored hitters
• Looks like he's solved his long running problem with release point

What's not to like:

• Pitches in GABP. That park scares me almost as much as Coors.
• BAA is still a little high
• NL Central should continue to improve

All in all, though, he's probably a WYSIWYG pitcher, say:

12-13 wins, 215 IP, 4.00 ERA, 1.3 WHIP, 165 Ks.

I just read in the TSN roto mag that GABP ranked #18 in 2005 and is preranked to be #12 in 2006. Dont have it handy, but they cited Stats Inc as the source.


When is the fallacy of this ballpark going to end? There are a lot of homers hit there but it isnt close to being Coors and was below average last year.


Reds pitching still stinks though :)

I'd love to see how they calculated this, sorting out bad pitching from park effects. Here's what I have:

GABP - Cinci scored 450 runs at home and hit 126 HR. Cinci opponents scored 460 runs at GABP and hit 120 HR.

Coors - Colorado scored 451 runs at home and hit 86 HR. Colorado opponents scored 447 runs at Coors and hit 84 HR.

And it's not like Colorado is trotting out Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte, and Roy Oswalt, either. They had Joe Kennedy, BH Kim, Jason Jennings, and Jamey Wright as four of their primary SPs. Cinci's pitching isn't pretty, but it simply can't be much worse than that.

So, given those numbers, why shouldn't the GABP scare me?

Park Factors are calculated by comparing home stats vs. road stats. This basically takes the quality of the team's offense and pitching out of the equation. Last year, both the Reds and their opponents did a little better in GABP than away, so in 2005 GABP did somewhat favor hitters. But in 2004, it was a decent pitcher's park, and in 2003, it was almost perfectly neutral.

Using Baseball-Reference.com's numbers, the park factor was 106 in 2005, 92 in 2004, and 100 in 2003, where 100 is neutral.

I feel good about Harang.

Pro's

Age (27)

90k in 96ip 1st half last year

Consistent WHIP (1.27 both halves)

Lowered ERA in 2nd half despite fewer K's and more IP

1.5 BB / game 2nd half last year

7k / game last season

3.2 k/bb last season

Increased quality start % from 27% in 2003, 43% in 2004, to 50% in 2005 (and reduced disasters from 40% to 14% to 3%)

Con's

GABP. Take these BPI's and put them in Detroit or Seattle, and we're talking about a bonafide stud.

Run/Bullpen support. Seems silly, but he's tossing dominant starts every other game, and he wins less than half. When the offense's on, the bullpen implodes. When the bullpen's on, the offense can't score. No real improvements were made to the Reds pen, so I just can't expect much more than we had this year.

12-15 wins
3.80 ERA
1.25 WHIP
175 K

Chancellor hit it on the head--He's a WYSIWYG pitcher. Nothing fancy, no great numbers, just gets the job done more often than not. Probably the best Reds SP, FWIW. :D I liked him when he was with Oakland, too. Just don't expect a true ace's numbers.

Also in the "You are correct, sir!" category is steveclever. Mother Teresa would tell that bullpen to get f---ed if she weren't dead. What a bunch of arsonists. Even with that offense, Harang won only 11 last year, thanks to the pen; compare his numbers with, say, Dan Haren, who won 14 with the anemic Oakland offense behind him.

Harang only allowed 3 unearned runs last year. Generous scoring (for the fielders) at home? Total lack of range in the field? He's a neutral G/F pitcher (1.05 in 2004, 0.95 in 2005) so it's not like he's not giving up any grounders.

Aside from the bullpen issues I think he should continue to improve a little bit. Evil Empire seems relatively optimistic and I think I'll join that club.

33 GS, 215 IP, 13-9, 3.60/1.26, 165 Ks

The bullpen is a mess again and thats what will do Harang in this season, barring the pen pitching over their heads. The defense should be slightly improved with EE/Lopez/Freel (I hope)/Dunn as the steady infield but I dont see it being much better. Harang is a good end game pick up but for 2006 I like Claussen better.

Damn! Based on these figures, he should be a solid middle-round pick in most mixed leagues.

You really think he'll be this good? If so, I better go grab him in the mock drafts quick!!!

Looks like someone is enjoying his Forecaster!

The problem is that a SP's reduced ERA with a falling K/9 rate is that it's generally not able to be maintained.

1st half BAA: 248
2nd half BAA: .287

Hitters were hitting him hard in Aug (.295 BAA) and Sep (.325 BAA) he was getting raked in Sep (7 HR in 40 IP) but his ERA was 3.09 and 4.46. I'm just not sure that his improvement in 05 will carry over.

It's a question of whether he wore down in the second half, changed his approach, or got figured out. And was he just hit-lucky in the first half, or is he really that good? Even a normal percentage of unearned runs would have put him down around a 3.50 ERA last year (let's see... 93 unearned runs, take off 9, that leaves 84 and an ERA of 3.57)

And the fact that they own Harang for $1 in PONY... :)

Shoot, I'd love him for $1 too.

You betcha. Goodwilly and I have him in PONY for a buck, I've nearly memorized every BPI he, Haren, and Garcia have. :D

Bingo!

Harang is also on my roster for 1$ and his ballpark is terrible. That being said
after losing 5$ Burnett Im counting on him to be similar to last year as I go in
with him ,a 10$ Carpenter and a 8$ Zach Duke(I am the most curious to see if he can be a mid 3 era guy and 1.25 whip for full season. I had planned on dangling Duke for some offense but with Burnetts defection(thanks STL) I cant afford the loss of starting pitching

We got made fun of last year for taking Harang for $1 as our last pick, but he definitely earned that $1, and I'm very excited to have him this year. I'm happy Steve accepted my "gut" theory on him last year!

He was certainly a better pick than my $1 Luke Hudson. :)

Do you realize that Harang was better at home than on the road?

GABP
.244 BAA
.298 OBPA
3.31 ERA

Road
.287 BAA
.330 OBPA
4.31 ERA