What of Carlos Beltran? Didn't cost $150M but certainly an elite player?

Since you're more willing to pay for a hitter, shouldn't you then keep the cheap pitchers you develop?

He didn't throw it a lot, but of his eight strikeouts that night, two came on the fastball, three on the curve -- and three on the change up.

I charted Tim's pitches in many of his starts, and while it took him a while to throw as many strikes with the pitch as I would like, batters didn't hit it much.

In Tim's second start, Todd Helton hit a high, inside change up out to right field.  I believe that was the only homer Tim gave up on the change (with just two -- one of which was the first he gave up -- coming on the curve and 9 on the fastball if I am remembering correctly).  Batters don't do a great job of hitting Tim's fastball, but they do hit it better than the curve or change.  Tim has lots of swing-throughs and called strikes with both his off-speed pitches.

My belief is that if you truly think that Tim has only a fastball and curve, either you couldn't tell his change from his fastball (the change averages about 10 mph slower and has more left-to-right movement -- from Tim's perspective, the opposite for us from behind the plate -- and more drop) or you just weren't paying attention.

Early on Tim was missing low and outside a lot to lefthanded hitters with his change -- in part because the catchers weren't calling for it often enough when Tim as ahead in the count or with two strikes IMO -- but he improved his control of the pitch fairly quickly.  I felt he should use the change to righthanded hitters as well as lefties, and eventually the Giants catchers came around to calling for it against righthanders as well (although Tim still uses the pitch primarily against lefthanders).

The catchers tend to call for mostly curves as Tim's off-speed pitch against righthanded hitters and for mostly change ups against lefthanded hitters.  While I agree with that ordering, I would call for more change ups against righthanded hitters and more curves against lefthanded hitters.

I believe Tim threw at least 70% fastballs last season, which doesn't make sense to me when it is only his third-most effective pitch. Part of that occurred because his fastball IS a good pitch, particularly early in the game a la Josh Beckett tonight.  Part of it is because Tim throws his fastball in the strike zone more consistently than either the curve of the change.

But I think Tim should throw about 60% fastballs, 20% curves and 20% change ups. And until Tim's effectiveness of the offspeed pitches goes down, I might even tend toward a 50/25/25 split.

Let me give you arguably Tim's best start this season as an example -- the one on August 21st where he had yielded no runs on just two hits through eight innings.

Tim probably had his best fastball of the season that night -- in great part because he had excellent control of it, either keeping it down, or getting it above the hands.  So Tim threw a TON of fastballs that night.  As I recall, 55 of his first 72 pitches were strikes, and he threw fewer than 80 pitches through seven innings (actually, 72 if I recall correctly).

But in the eighth, Tim suddenly lost control of his fastball, often getting it up.  He got out of the eighth inning by striking out Ward on back-to-back change ups after issuing his only walk of the game (on a fastball).

One would have thought that SOMEONE would have noticed that Tim was a much different pitcher in the eighth than he had been over the first seven innings.  One would have thought that someone would have realized Tim was starting to get his fastball up, making it hittable.

One would have thought that a mix of fastballs, curves and change ups was called for in the ninth inning.  Instead, the Giants called for all fastballs -- and five pitches later, four of them up, Tim had yielded one more hit on those five pitches than he had yielded over the first eight innings, and was gone from the game.

Anyway, sorry about the diatribe, but didn't you notice Tim struck out the dangerous Ward on back-to-back change ups after getting into a bit of trouble with his suddenly uncontrolled fastball?

If you didn't, you weren't alone.  Unfortunately the Giants didn't seem to catch it, either.

To think we have actual bona fide young players now. We're actually arguing which is more likely to be a  hall of fame pitcher.  

I might give Matt the edge on his fastball, since he seems to have a "hop" that induces both swing-throughs and a lot of popups. But I would have to disagree with you on the change -- or state that if you are correct, Matt should throw the change up MORE.

I don't chart Matt's pitches, but I often do so with Tim -- a habit I began the first time I watched him pitch in San Jose.  I can tell that while Tim's control could have improved with the pitch (and indeed did as the season went on, perhaps in part because the Giants catchers became a bit smarter about when to call for it), opposing batters didn't make much contact with it.

A lot of Tim's change ups were taken for strikes.  A lot of others were swung at and missed. Not a lot were even put into play, and those that were were seldom hit well.

So my point is that if Matt's change up is indeed light years ahead of Tim's, Matt should be throwing it a lot more often.  I think TIM should be throwing the pitch more, so if Matt's is even better -- and Matt's curve isn't as good -- Matt should really be loading up on the pitch.

To be honest, I think that not only are Tim and Matt exceptional pitchers (and an extraordinary pair), each is less likely to break down than the average pitcher.  I think Tim has the healthier mechanics, but I think Matt's are quite healthy, as well -- and Matt just seems like a HORSE.

But what throws Tim over the top for me is that his mechanics are similar to his dad's.  And his dad was clocked at 88 mph AT THE AGE OF 55!  Those mechanics WORK!

So, you're probably asking, why didn't we hear of Tim's dad a generation before we heard of Tim?  Tim's dad WAS a very fine pitcher -- until his career was gravely interrupted by a fall from a significant height that injured his back.

Tim's dad says that Tim's older brother Sean had it too.  But Sean injured his shoulder playing football.

There is a lot of luck that goes into a long pitching career.  But I think Tim's mechanics make him a much better bet than most to have such a long career -- and possibly even a VERY long one.

And I think that is why Will Carroll -- medical baseball writer for SI and BP -- said last winter when Tim had yet to pitch above A ball that he would choose Tim as his pitcher around whom to build a franchise over the next 10 years.

Certainly Will doesn't seem worried about Tim's durability or longevity.  And having written the fine book "Saving the Pitcher," he likely knows more about it than you and I put together.

I think control is the key to Tim's success.  Few if any pitchers have more stuff than he -- but many have better control.

I mentioned that early on Tim had control problems with his change up (as well as his fastball at time).  Late in the season he struggled with control of his curve ball.

I really see no reason why Tim would have tired near the end of the season, but his results indicate that he might have.  It may be that he was more mentally tired than physically tired.  He himself said this past season was by far his toughest mentally.

He was exposed to a lot of new things, and I suspect that baseball suddenly became a job after years of mostly being a lot of fun.  

I'll never forget 20 years ago Chris Speier's saying as he left his house, "Well, I'm off to work."  I had never thought of his career as work before -- merely as PLAYING ball.  But suddenly I realized that it WAS work -- and that while he was home a whole lot during the winter, he wasn't around the house much for his family during the spring and summer.