Tuesday, February 06, 2007

Starting Pitchers to Watch in 2007: Scott Kazmir

Only 55 more days until opening day.

Continuing on a theme of left-handed pitchers who could (hopefully) give the New York Yankees a lot of grief in the season ahead I'll take a look at an obvious choice: Scott Kazmir of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. The undisputed ace of the staff.

In 24 starts in 2006 he had a record of 10-8 with an ERA of 3.24 and an incredible 163 strikeouts in 144 and two-thirds innings of work - that's 10.14 K's per 9 innings! The Bill James, CHONE, Marcel and ZiPS projections forecast more of the same with a slight erosion of the ERA and K/9 ratio. With the unbalanced schedules being what they are he'll be fanning a lot of pinstripes.

This guy's an absolute keeper if you're lucky enough to draft him in your fantasy league.

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