Jumping back on the Banda Bandwagon!

[Brandon]

Anthony Banda was acquired from the Dodgers for very little and with great fanfare since he was low cost and has talent with results the last few seasons.  This year he got off to a good start in his first 6 games giving up 1 earned run in 5.33 innings.  Then the wheels came off as he gave up 10 earned runs over his next 5 outings and 4.67 innings.  I think in one of those outings he was asked to pitch a second inning and got hit hard that one.  since then, he has 14 more outings with 1 implosion and that was 10 appearances ago.  in his last 14 appearances he has 12.67 innings giving up only 6 hits and 5 walks with still a low 9 K's and 4 earned runs including 3 in one outing for a 2.84 ERA which is more in line with expectations and hopes.  It seems the ship has been righted and moving forward we can expect to see his ERA continue to go down as he is now back under 6.00 overall after today's game. 

[Bangkok Twins Fan]

Yes, he appears to have settled down and is pitching better in recent outings. Certainly no need to dump him just yet like we did with Topa. Hopefully, patience and maybe a few tweaks or encouragement from Hawkins might help to make him a useful bullpen piece. 

[Riverbrian]

Banda has hung enough zeroes that I don't worry about him that much. 

9 of his 15 earned runs occurred in a 3 game stretch over the span of a week. April 8 to April 15. Giving up 9 runs over 3.33 Innings is a 24.32 ERA. If he hung zeroes for his next five appearances he could get it back down to an unsightly 9.00. 5 appearances could be two weeks time. It is going to take quite a few innings to bring that sky high ERA back down. 5.96 is actually good considering how bad a stretch that was. 

He had another bad outing against the Blue Jays on May 2nd... those 4 appearances make up 12 of his 15 earned runs. 

4 real bad appearances out of 25. Zeroes hung in 18 out of 25.

I've seen worse. I don't worry about him much. 

 

[amjgt]

I mean "Bandawagon" is just sitting there.