Ryan's Strong Start versus Astros Addressed his Main Weakness

I really like Ryan and I believe he'll develop into a very good SP. But his win against HOU was against a below .500 team.

4 earned runs in 6 innings is dominant now? 

1 hour ago, Doctor Gast said:

I really like Ryan and I believe he'll develop into a very good SP. But his win against HOU was against a below .500 team.

That just won the World Series

2 hours ago, KirbyDome89 said:

4 earned runs in 6 innings is dominant now? 

 

My issue isn't that it wasn't a very good start. I thought it definitely was. 5 of the 6 innings were perfect, save for an error on a squib. Got through the meat 3 times, 3rd time being maybe the strongest, etc. But, yeah, I don't know if I would have gone with 'dominant'.

On the other hand, that was not an elite, top-end lineup without Altuve and Brantley. Good still, but not currently the standard to be used for 'great' or 'top' or 'best'.

Yeah...I don't think that Houston is what we can use as the standard for 'top' right now...not until the get Altuve and Brantley back, Bregman warmed up, etc. They're barely in the top half of the league in R/G...for context, the White Sox offense has been a good step better than Houston's so far.

But, I'm not sure I care as long as Ryan keeps doing what he's doing. Maybe he'll take that next step, maybe he won't. Signs are encouraging.

In the meantime, I have no problem with Ryan's quality as a #3, regardless of the terms we use to describe him. Barring injury and regression, it seems like a decent matchup against playoff-level teams' #3s.

It was very encouraging to see the quotes from Ryan after his start against the Astros as to how he followed Vázquez’s lead with regard to pitch mix. 

19 hours ago, KirbyDome89 said:

4 earned runs in 6 innings is dominant now? 

 

The writer addressed the 1 inning.  All other innings were dominate. It was the one inning where he gave up a solid single, then a weak grounder that found a hole, a walk, then a very bad pitch for the GS.  Outside of that he shut them down. The GS was solid hit, but only went out by a foot, could have been a long 2 run single.  Outside of that inning he gave up no hits or walks.  So he was dominate for 5 out of his 6 innings.  Yes, that inning counts.  He got the win and hopefully he will not give up meat ball next time in that situation. 

It's a marathon season  and Ryan will get plenty of starts for the season , I'm not reading anything into this start other than he did his job ...

At the start of a season they say the pitcher has the advantage over the hitter as the hitters are still adjusting their timing   ...

Lots of slow starts in lineups , low BA , OPS and failing to score with runners in scoring position  ...

The starting pitchers have kept us in the small sample size of the season  , the rotation is much better than last year and the year before that and the year before that season  , etc. , etc . , etc .  ...

4 hours ago, Trov said:

The writer addressed the 1 inning.  All other innings were dominate. It was the one inning where he gave up a solid single, then a weak grounder that found a hole, a walk, then a very bad pitch for the GS.  Outside of that he shut them down. The GS was solid hit, but only went out by a foot, could have been a long 2 run single.  Outside of that inning he gave up no hits or walks.  So he was dominate for 5 out of his 6 innings.  Yes, that inning counts.  He got the win and hopefully he will not give up meat ball next time in that situation. 

If you're going to say that Ryan has addressed his woes against better teams, maybe don't stake that case on a game in which he posted an ERA eerily similar to the aforementioned "struggle," portion of last season. I'll take 6 innings over 4 though. 

Parsing single events is a sword that cuts both ways. It's also not a road worth traveling.