Edwin Jackson Is Not the Next Bob Gibson

I know you read the title and say "Well of course not. Who would ever say something so ridiculous." I can point you to them, and they write for Yahoo. So he thinks looking at Edwin Jackson's second season with more than 160 IP is a good comparison to Bob Gibson's second season where he totaled 86.7 IP. I know they were both 24 in these seasons, but Edwin actually has more major league experience at 24 and it isn't that good.

I know everyone reading at this site should know this is a ridiculous comparison, but for fun let's review why. Here is the stats he used to make his comparison:

Pitcher A: 183.3 innings, 77 walks, 108 Ks, 101 ERA+
Pitcher B: 86.7 innings, 48 walks, 69 Ks, 73 ERA+

So Edwin Jackson has a better ERA+, but as you can tell when you look through the article, the writer has no idea to look further into what that means. He does admit that this doesn't mean Jackson will be a Hall of Famer some day, but the comparison is there.

Before we move on to more good reasons why Jackson is a good pick, let us review this comparison. ERA+ doesn't remove luck, it just makes a better comparison in the time the pitcher plays. So Jackson was better in 2008 than Bob Gibson in 1960, but before we look at other rates let's just say that Bob Gibson had ERA+ over 106 every season after that until he was 38.

Let's compare their peripherals:
Age 24 K/9

• Jackson - 5.30


• Gibson - 7.17

Age 24 BB/9

• Jackson - 3.78
  


• Gibson - 4.98
  

Age 24 K/BB

• Jackson - 1.40
  


• Gibson - 1.44

Well after that you might say that Jackson looks a lot like Gibson, but let's look at two things. Gibson went on to get better each season as his K/BB peaked in 1968 at 4.32. If Jackson did this he would be a good pitcher, but still never match Gibson. The reason is groundball rate. Unfortunately I can't get groundball rates for Gibson, but I can identify his GB% by looking at his HR/9. Only once did Gibson give a HR/9 at or above 1.00, and his career rate is 0.60. Jackson on the other hand has had a HR/9 over 1.00 both full seasons in the majors.

Comparing players by a stat like ERA+ is very dangerous. In the comments I made, the observation that this would be equal to me calling Zach Duke the next Pedro Martinez because he threw a ERA+ of 234 in his rookie year. That is very close to Pedro's best season at 243, but Duke's was 84.7.

Not to drag more on this article, but he also assumed Jackson would improve because of the speed of his fastball.

Here are the only starters with a faster average fastball last year than Jackson’s 93.9 MPH (in order of velocity):

Ubaldo Jimenez, Felix Hernandez, Ervin Santana, Josh Beckett, A.J. Burnett and Tim Lincecum.

Again it's simple that a pitcher can throw 100 MPH, but if his pitch selection is poor and his fastball is straight he will get hit and hit hard. Then with all this information he labels Edwin Jackson as the next Cliff Lee. I covered before who I think might be the next Cliff Lee, but there is a common factor between my choices and Cliff Lee. They all have had success previously. Everyone forgets that Cliff Lee was a very good pitcher in 2005 and just struggled with control for a few years.

Has Jackson ever shown success in the majors? Has he ever shown the ability to post a K/BB over 2.50?

My last comment will be on his other choices to be the next Cliff Lee: Jeremy Guthrie, Ian Snell, Mike Pelfrey, Daniel Cabrera (yes that Cabrera), Vicente Padilla and Joe Saunders.

I won't cover each of these guys, but I have yet to have one of them on any of my teams. Snell and Guthrie are OK choices, but the rest shouldn't be considered for your team this year.