Adam Eaton this year's Ben Sheets?

[LumberJack5]

Yea, my bad. Sheets never had surgery. But he did gain velocity last year like im talking about. Im not sure how he gained that extra gas but he did and that attributed to his breakout.

[LBJackal]

Sheets gained velocity last season by working out more. He'd never worked out his upper body before, so it added a lot of velocity to his fastball. Here's an interview with him about his improvements in 2004: Click for audio

Credit to Jason Grey of MastersBall.com for the interview.

[WittyC]

The sad thing is even if Eaton doesn't break out this year, he'll still beat Sheets in W's!

[Scooter1027]

The sad thing is even if Eaton doesn't break out this year, he'll still beat Sheets in W's!

Why are you so sure of this? Eaton had 11 wins to Sheet's 12 last year, and I can almost promise you he'll get more than 12 this year. The team has nowhere to go but up. I'm not saying that there's no way Eaton won't win more, but there really isn't a great precedent saying he will. In fact there's no precedent at all.

[Yoda]

Why are you so sure of this? Eaton had 11 wins to Sheet's 12 last year, and I can almost promise you he'll get more than 12 this year. The team has nowhere to go but up. I'm not saying that there's no way Eaton won't win more, but there really isn't a great precedent saying he will. In fact there's no precedent at all.

What is so impressive about Sheets is that he is one of few that pitches at a hitter's park. He should have more support this season and if their young corp of players like Weeks, Fielder, Hardy become what they are supposed to, the Brewers should be pretty fun to watch in 05 and 06.

One thing that bothers me is that they traded their closer AND set up man.

As far as Eaton goes, I don't think he is near the talent Sheets is but I predict he will post an ERA around 3.50 with a very good WHIP and plenty of Ws and Ks.

[Drdobs]

I agree...

The thing is... Sheets was arguably a top 5 pitcher last year... For Eaton to accomplish the same thing, he'd have to basically beat out the following pitchers

Pedro Martinez
Ben Sheets (the man himself)
Carlos Zambrano
Kerry Wood
Roy Oswalt
Jake Peavy
Rich Harden
Oliver Perez
Jason Schmidt
Curt Schilling...

I agree with the previous posts that Eaton is due for a year in which he improves upon his past and could move himself into that top 25 category of pitchers, but I highly doubt he'll put up sheets dominating stats...

Jon