All Things Bubba

The pride of Rice University, Paul Janish, had another stint as a relief pitcher last Monday. Once again, it was because the game was a hopeless blowout, and Dusty Baker wanted to spare his bullpen. Janish was hoping to lower his 45 ERA; instead he increased it. He did get through the inning, though, and that's all Dusty wanted. He called Janish a hero for keeping the pen fresh.

Driveline Mechanics analyzed Janish's pitching, and think he's good enough that he should be moved from SS to relief pitcher. He did break 90 mph, which is pretty impressive for a non-pitcher.

And I love this interview with Janish.

Being the magnanimous guy he is, Janish was cool enough to review his pitching exploits with Half-Year in Review.

• On roaring into the books alongside Johnny Lindell: "You know, records are made to be broken. And I'm definitely breaking records. They're just the wrong damn records."

• On his picturesque delivery (as a former college closer): "Yeah, it's smooth, all right. But apparently, 88-89 [mph] on a string is not going to work."

• On his ERA (45.00 after his first outing, 49.50 after his second): "When I came in there, I figured, well, the good thing is, at least I'll bring my ERA down. It started at 45.00, so it would be tough to go up -- but I found a way."

• On whether he thought he could now pitch 31 straight shutout innings and get his ERA down into the 3.00s: "I think I'm out of luck. … What I really need to do is talk to my agent to see if we can bring this up in arbitration: multi-faceted player."

• On his proudest achievement as a pitcher: "Well, I did get a standing O in Philly. And not many visiting players can say that."

Labels: Paul Janish