The Larry Rothschild Effect

Larry Rothschild has seen a lot. He's been through the Prior and Wood Fiasco, he's survived the Dusty Era, and well he's been based a lot.  The man is just not respected enough. The thing is he has a great effect on his pitchers. 

To keep things current I'll run down the current starting rotation under Larry.

Let's first start with Ted Lilly. After coming out of a pretty mediocre 2005 Jim Hendry signed Lilly to a 40MM deal. Lilly was (and still is) a extreme fly ball pitcher. A fly ball pitcher and Wrigley seemed like a match made in hell. But under Larry Ted has had the most success of his career. Take a look at this.

via www.fangraphs.com

And This 

via www.fangraphs.com

Lilly has decreased his walk rate ever since 05. He now is only walking about 2 a game. Lilly gives up a lot of home runs but the reason he's been successful with the Cubs is because he doesn't walk anybody. With no one on base that leads to a solo home run and little damage done.

Now let's take a look at the former closer turned starter Ryan Dempster. It seemed like it was a controversial thing when he moved into the rotation. Dempster was terrible as a reliever, walking almost 5 batters sometimes but look at his numbers now.

via www.fangraphs.com

Dempster has cut down on the walks and is maintaing a high K level . He's on pace for over 170 innings pitched and a ERA under 4. This again at the time looked like a bad signing.

Now on to the largest member of the cubs rotation. Big fat Carlos Silva. Carlos Silva has alway had the ability to not walk people. While in Minnesota and Seattle the big righty posted a BB per 9 of 1.5 which is ridiculous. But the problem was Silva's strikeout rate. It was only at three per game. People were putting the ball in play against him and doing it hard.

But have no fear Larry is here!

via www.fangraphs.com

As you can see Silva is striking out 6 per game. Not great but it will get the job done. As noted in this article Silva is throwing less fastball and throwing more changeups and sliders. This is the reason for the higher strikeout totals. But Silva couldn't have just changed his style by himself. Somebody must have told him to stop throwing his terrible 88MPH fastball. I think it's pretty safe to assume Larry told him that.

Now on to the weird looking Tom Gorzelanny. Gorzy was acquired in a trade from pissburgh in 09 and has been all the Cubs could have hoped for. Like all the other pitchers the results have been the same.

via www.fangraphs.com

Gorzy has increased his K rate to about 9 per game. He still has trouble walking people. But for a guy who was acquired in exchange for next to nothing he's been pretty good.

Now the last member of the Cubs (current rotation) Randy Wells. Randy had a great rookie year and its been the same this year. Randy Wells' baseball card numbers don't look all that impressive. But those are decieving. Randy is like every Rothschild pitcher striking out more while continuing his excellent control. As a result is xFIP is 3.71 which is the best in the rotation.

As you can See Larry has a profound effect on pitchers. For some reason he's poked fun at. He's never mentioned as a great pitching coach by broadcasters, fans, and even players. I don't get it. Some pitchers have failed under Larry (Zambrano) but most of the see an uptick in their current performance. The k rate usually goes up and the walks go down. Hopefully whoever the new manager is appreciates what Larry does and keeps him around.