Billy Beane has great success in finding under-valued talent. However, why is Jesse Hahn being used as a starting pitcher? Shown below are his pitching data, including college, the minors and majors.

What we see is that Hahn has been a starter for almost his entire career. However, his career high for innings pitched in 8 years was last year, totaling 115 innings. Do the A’s intend to get 150 innings out of Hahn as their #5 starter? That seems to be a best case scenario. Including college, Hahn has averaged 57 innings per year, including missing all of 2011. Take out 2011 and his yearly average is still only 66.3 innings! In a worst case scenario, Hahn may not last the full year. Based on these data, Hahn may be best suited for a relief role.

https://twitter.com/mike_lustgarten

Stats via thebaseballcube.com