Looking at fastballs only and the percentage of them that a pitcher gets a swing and a miss on, there’s some names in interesting places. It’s probably no surprise that Scott Kazmir and Rich Harden were at or near the league best in 2008, but would you have guessed John Danks and Micah Owings would be right with them?

It’s probably not surprising that Dallas Braden had the lowest rate of fastball swinging strikes amongst starting pitchers last year given his typical 87-88 mph velocity, but would you thought Bobby Jenks and his mid-90s fastball would be near the bottom for relievers at a rate roughly half that of Ramon Ramirez? In fact, Bobby Jenks saw a significant decline in the amount of swings and misses he managed across all pitches in 2008, something to watch out for in 2009.