April 10, 2008

Still Questioning Santana's Ability To Dominate NL

John Donovan at SI.com writes about Johan Santana and after just two starts asks if Johan Santana will make the NL “A League of His Own”:


Taking a young, two-time AL Cy Young winner, not-too arguably the best pitcher in the game, and dropping him into a so-so division in a league where they actually let lame-swinging pitchers try to hit, lends itself to that kind of hyperbole. The next coming, supposedly, of Sandy Koufax. Or Steve Carlton.

"He was so dominating in a hitter's league. So you would hypothesize that he would probably be better here," says Chipper Jones, the Braves' third baseman. "But so much of this is about run support and defense. He could pitch like he did over there and go 15-13.

"Or," Jones adds with a slight smile, "he could go 24-8."

Clearly Santana should be 2-0 in these first two starts, but the baseball gods aren’t always in a giving mood. So far he hasn’t shown any reason to not believe that he will absolutely dominate in this league. Going 7 innings in each of his first 2 starts, fanning 11 hitters, his batting and spectacular made defensive plays that he has made this season already should make us Met fans giddy to know that we get to enjoy him for the next 6 years.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

i cant believe people are still debating this topic...i would have thought those first two starts would have quieted the critics

Anonymous said...

SANTANA IS AWASOME!!!!!!