TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Not A Perfect 10, But Enough For A Win

ADVERTISEMENT

By MARC LANCASTER

The Tampa Tribune

Published: July 6, 2008

Updated: 07/06/2008 12:22 am

ST. PETERSBURG - In analyzing the deeper meaning of baseball's myriad statistics, many will insist wins aren't a true measure of a pitcher's worth.

As the argument goes, too many other factors go into determining whether or not a pitcher is credited with a victory. So is a guy who has a knack for allowing four or five runs over five or six innings in games his team eventually wins better or more valuable than someone who allows a couple of runs over seven innings and keeps incurring tough losses when he doesn't get any run support?
Andy Sonnanstine has demonstrated over the course of 40 big-league starts that he belongs in the first category of pitchers. There's nothing flashy about what he does on the mound and he rarely dominates an opposing lineup, but he just keeps finding a way to win.

Saturday night, Sonnanstine had one of his more impressive outings of the season as he shut out the Royals for seven innings in a 3-0 Rays victory. He was rewarded with his 10th victory of the season, becoming just the fifth American League pitcher to reach that plateau this year, and he is one of only three Rays ever to reach double-digit wins before the All-Star break.

Only two Rays pitchers have reached 10 wins earlier in a season - Rolando Arrojo on June 27, 1998, and Scott Kazmir on July 3, 2006 (Kazmir's final victory in that injury-shortened campaign). For a guy who was on the bubble to make the rotation toward the end of spring training, that's quite an accomplishment.

But the Rays have grown accustomed to being pleasantly surprised by the 25-year-old.

"If you ask our players, I know we always feel we have a really good chance to win on the night that he pitches, so you get this extra feeling about you," Manager Joe Maddon said. "There's certain pitchers that players play behind and they feel that this guy's going to win somehow, and that matters, and he's one of those guys. He's always been that guy."

Sonnanstine pitched with efficiency Saturday night, picking apart Kansas City's lineup as he scattered five hits and walked one in seven innings that saw him deliver only 85 pitches. And a two-out, two-run double by Akinori Iwamura and a solo homer by Ben Zobrist provided all the offense he needed.

Sonnanstine could have gone deeper into the game, but Maddon liked the match-up of J.P. Howell against a series of lefties due up in the eighth, so Howell and Grant Balfour closed it out by striking out five of the last six Royals to come to the plate. Balfour locked down his third save with his usual mid-90s heat, pitching in a way Sonnanstine will never be able to match. Nor does he need to throw that hard to be successful.

Never one to knock the socks off a radar gun, Sonnanstine has been a winner throughout his career. After going 11-4 as a junior at Kent State in 2004, he tallied a 5-1 record the rest of the summer once he signed with the Rays. In all, Sonnanstine was 40-18 in the minors and was named the Rays' pitcher of the year for his minor-league level in each of his first three professional seasons.

"There's so much to be said for a guy who wins like that," Rays pitching coach Jim Hickey said Saturday night. "That kind of stuff has a tendency to carry over."

And it has, once Sonnanstine settled in after dropping eight of his first nine major-league decisions last summer. Since last Aug. 15, only one pitcher has more wins than Sonnanstine's 15 - Arizona's Brandon Webb with 18.

They're completely different pitchers, and Sonnanstine's 4.31 ERA, which is still the highest among Rays starters, shows he hasn't been lights-out every time. But he hasn't had to be.

"A lot of times I've been just pitching on the right day," he said. "I mean, James Shields has been putting up solid starts pretty much every time he goes out and he could very easily have the same record that I do."

Instead, Shields will take the mound today gunning for his seventh win, which would tie him with Kazmir and Matt Garza but still put him well behind the guy no one seems to notice.

That, too, has been a motivator for Sonnanstine as he has moved through the ranks.

"I just think I'm a very competitive person and I've had to prove myself at every level," said Sonnanstine, "so I kind of have a chip on my shoulder going into every year, trying to prove to myself that I can be successful."

The Rays are 14-4 when Sonnanstine starts, including victories the last seven times he has taken the mound. It would appear he has made his point.

Reporter Marc Lancaster can be reached at (813) 259-7227 or mlancaster@tampatrib.com.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT