“Mentally, I was very calm, but my body felt like it wanted to go and go and go,” Darvish said through his translator. “At the beginning of the game, my mind and my body kind of weren’t on the same page.” — Yu Darvish after his first MLB start

On Monday, I watched with imprisoned eyes as Yu Darvish made his major league debut and did that which many had thought impossible — he walked Chone Figgins.

To say the least, I studied Yu Darvish quite a bit this offseason and was surprised at this seemingly immediate loss of control and command. Some of the hits that followed in that four-run first inning were bloops and seers, but even in the pitches preceding the bad luck, Darvish looked wild — nothing like he looked in Japan or even in the 2012 Spring Training season.

By the third inning, a different man was pitching, a steadier, stronger Darvish. He mowed through the Mariners lineup — while the Mariners pitchers got mowed over by the Rangers — and ended up “winning” the game with 5 ER, 6.2 IP, and raucous applause. Watching the game, I could not help but suspect something more than a rusty start was at hand. Maybe my studies of Darvish and likewise high expectations for him tainted my perception? Maybe the psychological framing of it being his first start in the MLB pushed me to think this, but for my money, Darvish looked nervous.
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Fernando Rodney has three saves and a win so far this season. Fernando Rodney has gotten eight outs so far this season. As strange as it may first seem for a late-inning reliever to have four decisions with so few batters faced, it’s business as usual in Tampa Bay. Here’s a box score that is fairly typical for the Rays:

It certainly appears that the Rays are micro-managing their bullpen. Perhaps the aim is to gain the platoon advantage in as many situations as possible — teams do that all the time. But which ones are doing it most often?

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Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of Daily Notes.

1. Brief Previews for Select Games
2. Three Scouting Reports on Drew Smyly
3. Crowdsourcing Broadcasters: Los Angeles (AL) Radio

Brief Previews for Select Games
Here are brief previews for three of today’s games — each including the preferred television feed of FanGraphs readers, per the results of our offseason crowdsourcing project. (Information on probable pitchers from MLB.com.)

Cincinnati at Washington | 13:05 ET ***MLB.TV Free Game***
Mat Latos and Gio Gonzalez each make their second starts, respectively, for their new clubs… Here are their respective Steamer projections. Latos: 163.0 IP, 8.29 K/9, 3.12 BB/9, 1.20 HR/9, 4.02 FIP. Gonzalez: 172.0 IP, 8.94 K/9, 4.07 BB/9, 0.78 HR/9, 3.63 FIP… Through Wednesday, here’s how Dusty Baker has split up playing time between his catchers. Ryan Hanigan: 4 GS, 15 PA. Devin Mesoraco: 2 GS, 6 PA.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Cincinnati.

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Something is wrong with Tim Lincecum. After giving up five runs in his first start this year, things got worse for him last night. In just 2.1 innings, Lincecum allowed six runs on nine hits while walking two and striking out only one batter. While it’s usually not smart to make conclusions based on just 7.2 innings, Lincecum has already shown some reasons for folks to be concerned. And unless something changes, Lincecum could be in for a rough season.

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Last week, I missed out on Dylan Bundy’s pro debut, as I just couldn’t make the two-hour drive to Asheville work with my schedule. But, tonight, Bundy was even closer, pitching just over an hour away in Kannapolis, and I wasn’t going to miss him twice in a span of six days. So, I jumped on I-85 and took in a game with the other 100 or so people who decided to brave the sudden cold front that rolled into NC today.

It took me about an hour to get there. Due to his three-inning limit, Bundy was only in the game for about 30 minutes, and he was actually on the mound for less than 10. It was still well worth the drive.

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Episode 163
In this edition of FanGraphs Audio, we ask the question “Is Dayn Perry 100% useless?” And also: “So what if he is?”

Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio after the jump. (Approximately 42 min. play time.)

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Aroldis Chapman steamrolled the Cardinals this afternoon, striking out five of the seven batters he was asked to face. He’s now struck out 10 of the 17 batters who have come up to hit against him this year, and perhaps more importantly, he hasn’t walked any of them. Chapman’s improved command in spring training doesn’t look like it’s showing any signs of going away, and right now, he’s among the most feared relievers in baseball.

But, he’s not the only setup man off to a fantastic start in 2012. While obviously everything at this point in the year is SMALL SAMPLE SIZE, there are a few eighth inning arms that have opened my eyes over the last few days.

Bryan Shaw, Arizona

I’ll be honest – before seeing him pitch for the Diamondbacks in the postseason last year, I’d never heard of Bryan Shaw. Considering that I write about baseball for a living, I try to keep up on every team’s roster and have a decent understanding of their key guys, but Shaw was new to me in October. His nasty sinker cutter and pretty good breaking ball were eye-opening, and I put him on my “guy to watch in 2012” list. So far, he’s picking up essentially where he left off last year.

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I have been toying around with an idea for pitcher-hitter match-ups based not on prior head-to-head performance or platoon splits, but rather pitch type linear weights.

For those that are unfamiliar, pitch type linear weights basically takes a batter or pitcher’s performance on each type of pitch they throw or face during the year (e.g. four-seam fastball, slider, etc.) and converts that performance into runs created or runs saved relative to average. At FanGraphs, we show both the total runs created or saved for each pitch (e.g. wFB) and a normalized version for the value per 100 pitches thrown (e.g. wFB/C).

I thought it would be interesting to compare the starting pitcher’s pitch type linear weight performance against the lineup he is facing. To do this, I calculated the difference in run value between each pitch type for each starting pitcher and the hitters they might face. The difference is shown in the tables below. Green coding denotes an advantage to the pitcher, while red indicates an advantage for the hitter. I used the normalized version of each pitch type (i.e. run value per 100 pitches thrown/faced) to control for playing time, pitches seen, etc.

The tables below show the match-ups for tonight’s game between the Marlins and Phillies (7:05pm EST) for both Josh Johnson and Roy Halladay:

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Every year it seems there’s a new reclamation project looking to get his career restarted in PETCO Park. This year, it’s Edinson Volquez. The former Reds hurler is looking to recapture the magic of his 2008 season, in which he struck out 206 batters in 196 innings and recorded a 3.21 ERA and a 3.60 FIP.

Nobody expects quite that much out of Volquez in 2012 as a member of the Padres, but his first two starts in San Diego have gone quite well. The 28-year-old rightyhas racked up 15 strikeouts in just 12 innings. His trademark wildness is still there — he’s already walked seven batters — but he’s done enough to limit the damage, allowing five total runs (four earned) in the two starts. In the final six innings of last night’s start he shut out the Diamondbacks while allowing just two hits — a three-hit first inning brought about the only runs Arizona would muster until extras.

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