Ex-Ranger pitchers pitching like All-Stars

[MFFL]

Posted on Sun, Jul. 13, 2003
MLB INSIDER
By T.R. Sullivan
Star-Telegram Staff Writer

Rangers pitchers who got away are enjoying an exceptional year

Angels manager Mike Scioscia has a decision to make.

Should he go with White Sox pitcher Esteban Loaiza, an 11-game winner who would be the obvious hometown favorite, or should he go with Mariners pitcher Jamie Moyer, who has 12 wins and is making his first All-Star appearance despite having the highest winning percentage of any pitcher over the past 7 1/2 years?

Either one would be a good choice for the starting pitcher for the American League in Tuesday's All-Star Game in Chicago. It's too bad that an injury will keep Dodgers pitcher Kevin Brown from starting for the National League.

Brown against Loaiza or Moyer would finish off what has been an amazing first half for former Rangers starting pitchers.

While the current Rangers rotation has the highest earned-run average in baseball, eight who used to pitch in that rotation -- Brown, Moyer, Loaiza, Kenny Rogers, Darren Oliver, Rick Helling, John Burkett and Aaron Sele -- have a combined record of 66-40 with a 4.06 ERA.

Call it the Year of the ex-Rangers Pitcher.

What's even more amazing is that Brown and Sele were coming off injuries last year; Loaiza, Oliver and Helling all went to spring training on minor-league contracts; and Rogers didn't have a job until midway through spring training. Moyer was also a free agent but, even though the Rangers were interested, it was pretty much understood from the beginning he was going back to Seattle.

Brown is in the fifth season of that seven-year, $105 million contract that had all of baseball stirred up back at the 1998 winter meetings. Back and arm injuries limited him to 29 starts the past two years, but he has come back strong this season with a record of 10-4 and a 2.30 ERA to earn a spot on the All-Star team before going on the disabled list Friday.

"The first [All-Star Game] you make is always special," Brown said. "The second one proves it wasn't a fluke. They all have significance. This one, so many people thought I had one foot in the grave. There's no doubt about it that starting off the year, to consider the chance to be on the All-Star team was pretty far-fetched."

Moyer made the All-Star team at the age of 40 years and eight months, the second-oldest pitcher ever to be selected for the first time. Only Satchel Paige was older than Moyer.

"This guy is pitching as well as he ever has," Mariners manager Bob Melvin said.

The one that boggles everybody's minds is Loaiza suddenly developing into a Cy Young candidate in Chicago. But what Oliver has done with the Rockies is also eye-opening.

He allowed two runs in seven innings to beat the Giants 11-3 Thursday to improve his record to 7-5 with a 4.67 ERA. He also had a home run. The victory left him 5-0 with a 3.18 ERA in eight starts at Coors Field.

"There really is no explanation," Oliver said. "I wish I knew the score, but I just go out there and pitch."

Sele was coming off rotator-cuff surgery, an injury that prevented him from pitching for the Angels in the playoffs last year. He also started off this season losing six of his first nine decisions.

Then Scioscia and Angels pitching coach Bud Black came up with the idea of limiting Sele to five innings per start, hoping it would make him pitch more efficiently. The results have been terrific so far, as Sele has won three straight starts, holding opponents to one run on nine hits in 15 innings.

"He's been pitching better," Scioscia said. "That's not to say that he wouldn't have the same results if we weren't limiting him to five innings. But I do think that with him being able to go harder until he builds up his stamina, we'll definitely try to see when a good time is to let him go out there and go as far as he can."

Said Sele: "I'm the kind of guy who likes to throw a lot of innings. In the long haul, maybe this has been the best thing. We'll see by the end of the season how this thing shakes out."

Not all ex-Rangers pitchers have been enjoying such wonderful seasons. Mike Venafro was released by the Devil Rays; Todd Van Poppel has been designated for assignment by the Reds; Doug Davis has been designated for assignment by the Blue Jays; and Jonathan Johnson, their No. 1 draft pick who was pitching in the Astros' organization, has retired.

But there is a reason the Rangers had eight winning seasons and won three division titles in the 11-year stretch from 1989-99. There used to be some pretty good pitchers around here.

[MFFL]

Rangers are tough on pitchers
07/13/2003


When Seattle southpaw Jamie Moyer pitched here the other day with an 11-5 record and en route to the All-Star Game, I thought of Tom Henke, Dave Stewart and even Esteban Loaiza. Doug Davis crept sideways into the metal huddle.

Everyone who has read this far will have thought, this fellow's mind wanders. Or maybe there's a loose connection.

Aha, there is a connection. It's fastened to the background of these pitchers, with the exception of Davis. The others worked for the Rangers, couldn't retire the groundskeeper with their best stuff, got passed to one or more teams and flourished elsewhere. Davis is elsewhere and yet to flourish, but the nag about his future is that he might become another Moyer.

Moyer pitched here from 1989-90 and left with a 6-15 record because at the rate of three wins per year, it'd take him seven seasons to become a 20-game winner. By which time, he'd also be a 100-game loser. Moyer later appeared in Seattle as the oldest (38) first-time 20-game winner in major league history. This season, he is taking a 2.99 ERA to his first All-Star Game at age 40.

It'd be fashionable to scold the Rangers for failing to see Moyer's potential when no one else did either. The list includes St. Louis and Baltimore, followed by Boston, which traded him to Seattle.

For expert solution to these mysteries, I turned to the man who has seen them in various capacities with the Rangers over a 32-year period. That would be Tom Grieve, present-day TV analyst.

"Maybe he just learned to pitch," mused Grieve, referring to tidy control, pitch sequence and nuances of the art that don't register on a radar gun. Grieve can't explain it, either.

He's definite about Stewart, who rang up a 12-22 mark in three seasons ('83-'85) here. Stewart would reverse that record by learning to throw a forkball but didn't master it until after he left Texas. Manager Doug Rader ordered him to stop working on the pitch when opponents crushed it during an exhibition.

"He bawled me out on the mound," Stewart recalled. "He told me, 'Quit throwing that pitch. Work on your fastball, work on your breaking ball. Just don't throw that pitch.' "

Three years and two teams later – Philadelphia released him next – that pitch made Stewart a 20-game winner for Oakland. Grieve disputes accepted history that A's pitching coach Dave Duncan taught Stewart the forkball. His memory is of Rangers aide Tom House working to refine the pitch before owner Eddie Chiles ordered Grieve to get rid of Stewart.

"One of the few times ownership forced a move," Grieve said.

An incident where police found Stewart parked in the company of a man dressed as a woman factored into his exile.

Henke is the same story, minus the cross-dressing part. He also learned a new pitch.

"Henke had a 95 mile-per-hour fastball and slider. But nothing off speed," Grieve recounted. "He went to Toronto, Al Widmar taught him the split-finger, and he saved about 300 games."

Then there's Loaiza, 17-17 with the Rangers ('98-'00) but an 11-5 All Star this season with the Chicago White Sox. How to explain him? Likely he got serious and stored the night crawler habits that kept him careless and carefree here.

Loaiza served a purpose. He's responsible for slick second baseman Michael Young, the return when former GM Doug Melvin dealt Loaiza to Toronto. Every franchise has stories where pitching got away. The point is, the only time it really matters is when it happens here.