More photos » by Mike Carlson - AP

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With just a few minutes before first pitch in Game 6, let's take a look at how the two starting pitchers (neither a stranger to the postseason) have performed by age.

By seasonal age, each is as old as the other. However, Pedro, born 10/25/71, is eight months older than Pettitte, born 6/15/72.

Note: all WAR data taken from Rally's database, except 2009, which is not yet available from Rally and so comes from FanGraphs.

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More photos » by David J. Phillip - AP

9 days ago: New York Yankees pitcher A.J. Burnett, left, talks to Derek Jeter giving up a run on a single by Philadelphia Phillies' Matt Stairs during the second inning of Game 2 of the Major League Baseball World Series Thursday, Oct. 29, 2009, in New York. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

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The 2003 Florida Marlins featured a sensational group of young starting pitchers. The attention-grabbing youngsters were Josh Beckett, Carl Pavano, Brad Penny, and Dontrelle Willis. Their ace from the year before, the also-young A.J. Burnett, was sidelined in the spring with Tommy John surgery, and did not participate in the pennant run or successful World Series bid.

After the major parts of the 2003 Marlins were shipped off, these five young pitchers were scattered at different ends of the Earth. As A.J. Burnett finally gets to show off his stuff in the World Series, I have search high and low for tales of these star-crossed hurlers, doomed to wander the countryside.

Here is a composite chart featuring the WAR stories of each of the five pitchers since 2002 (beyond that, there be monsters!).

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More photos » by Jae C. Hong - AP

Andy Pettitte will toe the rubber for the Yankees in Game 3 of the 2009 World Series. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

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Andy Pettitte is, at this point in his career, a slightly above average pitcher. That, of course, is quite valuable. Much of his value is tied up in his ability to throw lots of innings at an above-average, but not elite, rate. Let's take a brief look at his career so far.

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Kevin Millwood

#33 / Pitcher / Texas Rangers

Height: 6-4

Weight: 230

Bats: R

Throws: R

Born: Dec 24, 1974

Thanks to Monday night's solid but unspectacular seven-inning performance, Kevin Millwood passed the 180-inning mark for the season. This is pertinent of course because this guarantees his $12M option for next season. In light of this development, I was reminded of the early season brouhaha regarding Millwood's numbers prior to the All-Star Break.

After 112 2/3 innings pitched (469 batters faced), Millwood was sporting a nifty 2.64 ERA, had won eight games for the Rangers, and was being touted as an All-Star candidate. But over at FanGraphs, R.J. Anderson disagreed, then Rob Neyer concurred, then Evan Grant vehemently denied, and even Adam Morris jumped in on the fun. Just by looking at the comments over at Lone Star Ball and Neyer's blog, you could tell the discussion was, shall we say, heated.

At the time, I too was a "Kevin Millwood hater," and I thought my suspicions were confirmed when I saw that Millwood's ERA since then was a more ghastly 5.66 in 70 innings pitched (315 batters faced). But when I looked at the numbers, I found I was only mostly right.

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More photos » by Jim Prisching - AP

6 months ago: Chicago Cubs' Milton Bradley flexes his injured leg during a stop in play in the fourth inning of a baseball game against the Milwaukee Brewers, Sunday, April 12, 2009, in Milwaukee. Bradley left the game with an injury. (AP Photo/Jim Prisching)

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It's another down year in the North Side.  The Cubs are barely above .500, and Murphy's Law appears to be in full effect once again.  Perhaps the biggest disappointment of this season for the Cubs has been the inability of Milton Bradley to adjust to life in Chicago.  The Cubs knew they were taking a risk with Bradley, as the slugger's long list of injuries and attitude problems hardly needs to be listed here.  Now, Bradley's season is over after the Cubs suspended him for the season on Sunday. 

It's not injuries that have brought Bradley crashing down to earth after a remarkable season with Texas last year.  Bradley's played in 124 games so far, 2 fewer than last year.  Bradley's wOBA fell 78 points from last year, a difference of over 30 runs in a similar sample size.  His traditional statistics look especially poor, as Bradley's .257 batting average, 12 HRs, and 40 RBIs have drawn the ire of Cubs fans.

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Seth Smith

#7 / Left Field / Colorado Rockies

Height: 6-3

Weight: 215

Bats: L

Throws: L

Born: Sep 30, 1982

Once again, the Colorado Rockies success is the major story of the National League playoff race.  At the time of this writing, the Rockies currently sit 2.5 games in front of the San Francisco Giants for the NL Wild Card lead, with a record of 82-64 after opening up 18-28, with playoff odds below 1%.

A big part of the Rockies' good fortune this year has been the emergence of Seth Smith.  At 27, Smith has emerged as a producer at the big league level after two insignificant major league stints in the previous two seasons.  Smith's impressive stats above have impressed both traditionalists and sabermetricians alike. His .402 wOBA currently ranks 13th in the entire major leagues among players with 345 or more PAs (the amount Smith has as of Tuesday night)

Smith's contributions haven't been limited to the batter's box.   In 75 games as a LF, Smith has posted a remarkable +7.5 UZR (+18.4 UZR/15).  Smith's .913 RZR ranks favorably as well, and would tie for third in the league if he were qualified.  However, these numbers should be taken with a pound of salt, due to a small sample size and the fact that Smith did not have anything more than an average COF defensive reputation coming into the league.

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Since the news has come out that Alfonso Soriano will undergo season-ending knee surgery today, I figured this would be as good a time as any to do a quick overview of his disastrous 2009 season.

Alfonso Soriano

#12 / Left Field / Chicago Cubs

Height: 6-1

Weight: 180

Bats: R

Throws: R

Born: Jan 07, 1978

Soriano's 2009 season has been a horror anyway you slice it, and it's about to get a whole lot worse from here. There is a great deal of distress in Cubs nation regarding Soriano, especially as he is about to be paid $18M annually for the next five seasons. But I'm not here to talk about the ridiculousness of that deal; instead, I'll talk a little bit about the ridiculousness of Soriano's year.

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Nick Johnson

#20 / First Base / Florida Marlins

Height: 6-3

Weight: 235

Bats: L

Throws: L

Born: Sep 19, 1978

Nick Johnson's career has become one of the major oddities of professional baseball over the last decade.  Johnson debuted in 2001 with the New York Yankees, and after mediocre seasons in 2001 and 2002, Johnson broke out in 2003.  He became more selective and made more contact, resulting in a much higher walk rate (17.8% vs. 11.3% in 2002) and a much lower strikeout rate (17.6% vs. 25.9%).  We see the impact of these rates in his slash line statistics, as a .243/.347/.402 season in 2002 became a .284/.422/.472 line in 2003.

Fast forward to 2009.  Johnson's walk rates have remained fantastic since that 2003 season with New York, bottoming out in 2004 at 13.7% (vs. a league average of 8.7%) with Montreal after an offseason trade.  High OBPs and above average fielding (+3.3 UZR/150 career) carried Johnson to seasons of 4.6 and 5.3 wins respectively in 2005 and 2006.  Johnson's career never jumped to superstardom because of injuries, which forced him to miss siginificant time in both 2004 and 2008, and all of 2007.

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