Tom Tango estimates Cliff Lee’s chances of winning 300 games at 10%. That strikes me as generous, as The Favorite Toy puts he chances at 0%. For the probability to be greater than zero, Lee will eventually need to morph into Jamie Moyer, a soft tossing lefty with great control and great command of a number of pitches. That’s quite possible.

FanGraphs posts data about Cliff Lee’s pitch selection and pitch speed back to 2002. Notice that Lee is constantly evolving as a pitcher. He starts out mostly as a fastball/curve ball/change up pitcher, but introduces a slider and a cutter along the way. He now throws fewer fastballs in a game, but throws them harder. The slider almost disappered in favor of the cutter. He goes up and down in the use of his change and curve. In other words, if you think you know Cliff Lee‘s pattern, you’re in trouble. Lee seems very open to change, so as age finally takes a toll on his fastball, he’ll be able to change his mix of pitches to stay competitive. He just needs to average a little over 12 wins a season for 15 years to reach 300. That seems doable to me.