Number 9

You know what it is? It's that ninth pitcher. We have have him. Anybody can put together an eight man collection consisting of a handful of decent starters, a solid setup guy and a pair of closers. But that ninth guy just cannot be avoided.

Professional baseball teams have them too. The fifth starter. The guy the skip every few weeks because he's the fifth starter.

I'm not sure how to solve the problem. When it's a bonus closer, it's Todd Jones or Joe Borowski. When it's a setup guy, I get Joey Devine and he's terrible. And when Phil Hughes mercifully goes down, Jorge Campillo turns back into what you'd expect in a 31 year old Mexican independent league phenom. No matter who that number 9 pitcher is, it won't matter.

Is the wins category tight enough to risk the hit on ERA and WHIP? I looked at my stats and deducted the pitching stats from BBannister and JCueto -- two guys that aren't number 9 products but I wanted to test the results from players that had contributed more innings.

Anyway, because of these pitchers in my lineup, they've gained me 12 points in wins and lost me 8 pts in ERA/WHIP combined. So they've actually contributed 4 pts to my point total.

So to prove my point about the number 9 pitcher not contributing points, I would need to figure out my point value without them. But I've lost interest and will just always have to wonder instead.