Bleeding Blue and Teal looks at Stephen Strasburg's mechanics and wonders how much teams should consider this in drafting players. He gives Tim Lincecum as an example:

Teams do indeed pass guys up because of durability concerns. I was talking to BBT commentor/sometimes writer Dustin Shires about this and he immediately brought up Tim Lincecum, who produced insane numbers with the University of Washington and had possibly the best pure stuff of anyone in the draft class, but was passed up by several teams because of his slight build and unorthodox delivery. Now, Lincecum's mechanics have since been proved to be sound and even revolutionary, but that's not the point. Teams didn't know how he would hold up so they passed up on him.

I'm not sure Tim's mechanics are proved sound just yet. He threw a lot of innings in 2008. If he holds up in 2009, then I'd say there's pretty good proof that he's sound, and I suspect young pitchers will start beating a path to the door of Tim's father.

Please donate to the Baseball Musings Pledge Drive.