Livan Hernandez broke into the majors in 1996 with the Florida Marlins. In his rookie season (officially speaking, his rookie season was '97, although he made one appearance during the '96 season), Livan was the runner-up National League Rookie of the Year and helped lead the Marlins to their first World Series championship. Since, Livan has established a reputation as a durable "innings eater", pitching 200+ innings in every season since 1997, with the exception of '99 when he pitched "just" 199 innings. Prior to this season, he pitched for 4 other teams (Florida, San Francisco, Montreal/Washington, and Arizona) and was a two-time NL All Star. As Livan has gotten older, he has lost a lot of velocity on his pitches, resulting in declining effectiveness. His ERA and WHIP have increased steadily every year since 2003, while his K/9 has drastically decreased. Essentially, as he's aged, Livan has been missing fewer bats and become very hittable, resulting in him giving up a lot more runs.With the trades of staff ace Johan Santana and the promising, young Matt Garza, the Twins were looking for pitching to solidify a very young staff. More specifically, the Twins hoped to find a veteran to step in as the new (if only temporary) staff ace. Enter Livan Hernandez, who signed a one-year, $5 million contract with the Twins. In addition to Livan's ability to "eat innings", the Twins also loved that he would bring a "veteran presence" to the rotation.
So far this season: Livan has continued his trend of the last few years, by having an ERA and WHIP higher than the previous season, while striking out fewer batters. He has a terrible 5.39 ERA and a 75 ERA+, making him a well below-average pitcher. He has the 7th-lowest WHIP in the majors, giving up 1.5 walks and hits per inning. He has struck out a league-worst 3.31 batters per 9 innings. True to form for Twins pitchers, Livan has walked just 1.69 batters per 9 innings, good enough for 11th-best in the big leagues. However, the fact that he has walked so few batters makes his high WHIP that much more concerning, as it means that he has been giving up a ridiculous number of hits.
If you want to look at the "positive" side, Livan is once again on pace to pitch 200+ innings, thus living up to the "innings eater" tag. Plus his VPIOYPI (Veteran Presence Impact on Young Pitchers Index) is through the roof, at an astounding 8.92. OK, I made that stat up. But the Twins believe that Livan is teaching the young pitchers on the team (Slowey, Perkins, Baker, and Blackburn) how to pitch the right way and is having a very positive influence.
Outlook for the rest of the season: If you were to ask a Magic 8-Ball about the outlook for the rest of Livan Hernandez's season, I'm fairly certain the response would be "Outlook not so good". Livan will continue to "eat innings", just like the Twins want. Ultimately though, I think his overall numbers will remain approximately the same, meaning that he will pitch another 100 way below sub-par innings in the season half of the season. There have been rumblings (mostly just wishful thinking I guess) that Livan could be traded to a contending team who wants his "veteran presence" down the stretch. However, I don't really see that happening. Given what a bad year he has had, I don't really believe there are any teams that would be willing to take on his salary, his bad innings, and given the Twins something in return. Therefore, Livan will remain in the Twins rotation (I also see no chance of him being moved to the bullpen) and the Twins offense will need to continue to score a lot of runs when he starts, in order to win any games when he pitches.
Synopsis: During a recent Twins broadcast, Bert Blyleven said one of the most ridiculous things I've ever heard in my life. He and Dick Bremer were discussing Francisco Liriano possibly returning to the rotation and Bert said something to the extent of "there is nobody that deserves to be taken out of the rotation to make room for Liriano". Now, I realize that the local broadcasters see things through rose-colored glasses, but honestly, there isn't anybody who deserves any consideration for being removed from the rotation? Let's just say I disagree. People like to point out that he has 10 wins this season. He's winning games, what more do you want? Well, actually, I would argue that Livan Hernandez isn't winning those games so much as the offense is carrying him on their backs and getting him those wins. Regardless, wins are a meaningless stat for pitchers. Livan, on average, gives up about 5 runs a game and gives up 1.5 hits and walks every inning. Compare that to Liriano's 3.30 ERA and 1.13 WHIP so far this season (admittedly that's against minor league talent, but its impressive nonetheless, considering he's coming off of major surgery on his throwing arm). Tell me that Livan doesn't deserve to be removed from the rotation.
The there's the whole topic of "veteran presence". Honestly, I can't say whether or not Livan's presence in the dugout and in the locker room is having a positive influence on the other pitchers. That is an intangible thing that cannot possibly be measured or even proven to be a factor at all. Therefore, due to lack of evidence, I must dismiss this concept as not increasing Livan's value. It sounds nice, but I'm just not buying it.
However, in a surprise twist, I'm going to end on a positive note by arguing that the signing of Livan Hernandez was not the worst signing in Twins history. In fact, despite his horrible performance this year, he has been essentially as good (bad) as Carlos Silva has been this year. Consider the following stats (Hernandez/Silva):
IP: 127.7 / 121.7
ERA: 5.29 / 5.62
ERA+: 75 / 71
WHIP: 1.58 / 1.46
K/9: 3.31 / 3.92
BB/9: 1.69 / 1.48
HR Allowed: 16 / 14
As you can see, Hernandez and Silva have been essentially the same pitcher this year. But here's the big difference and the reason I don't think that Hernandez was a terrible signing: Hernandez was signed by the Twins for 1 year at $5 million, while Carlos Silva was signed by the Mariners as a free agent for 4 years at $12 million per year. That's a $7 million difference for essentially equivalently bad pitching. Plus, the Twins can easily allow Hernandez to leave as a free agent at the end of the season, while the Mariners are stuck with Silva (and the likelihood that they could trade him with his bad performance and such an inflated salary is pretty low). I'm not saying that Livan Hernandez was a great signing, not even close. In fact, the Twins should have just trusted their young pitching talent in the minor league system. However, considering that the Twins had quite a bit of money to spend after Santana left, $5 million for one year of bad pitching isn't the worst move the Twins have ever made. It could have been much worse: they could have resigned Carlos Silva.
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