Pitch Labor Day

Today is labor day and no baseball blog is true of itself without making a post full of puns given the special occasion. With such, here are some pitchers who could use a day or nine off at this point in the season.

Justin Verlander
As I wrote elsewhere, Verlander leads baseball in starts in which he threw 120 or more pitches. This has occurred seven times this season. The two next highest pitchers in the American League have three of these games apiece. Averaging 111 pitches per game with a little over 3,200 on the season, there is a chance he will hit the 4,000 pitch mark with another seven-to-eight starts this year.

Tim Lincecum
Unlike Detroit, San Francisco won’t appear to have a chance for Lincecum to skip a start between now and season’s end. The Giants will need the live wire to maintain pace in the wild card standings. Like Verlander, Lincecum leads his respective league in games with 120 or more pitches thrown. Unlike Verlander, 4,000 pitches seems like a reach.

Roy Halladay
Did you know Halladay threw 133 pitches in one game this season? He’ll top the 200 innings mark once more, but Toronto could probably stand to pull the reins in as the season ends, if for no other reason to prevent potential injury. Yes, this is Doc, but Toronto fielded one of the best teams in baseball last year and finished fourth in their division – Lady Luck must be American.

Ubaldo Jimenez
The National League leader in pitches per game started. Same kayak as Lincecum.

Braden Looper
Oh, I’m not concerned about his workload and neither should you. He’s just not very good right now.