I’m going to go ahead and guess “no.”
Big Pelf’s been awesome this season, no doubt, and it’s entirely likely that there are real reasons for his success beyond a still very small sample in isolation.
Pelfrey is striking out more batters, something that’s been attributed in part to his increased confidence in his secondary stuff and a new splitter that dives out of the strike zone. He’s hardly whiffing batters at Tim Lincecum-like rates, but his K/9 has ticked up from 5.22 last season to 6.86 this year.
And Pelfrey has likely benefited from better defense behind him, as well. He’s still yielding a high rate of ground balls — 47.3% according to Fangraphs, a bit below his career mark — but he’s yet to pitch in front of the Alex Cora/Luis Castillo middle infield he suffered from all too frequently last season. Indeed, Pelfrey’s 2009 FIP (Fielding Independent Pitching) was well below his ERA — indicating either bad luck or bad defense — and his 2010 FIP is well above.
Pelfrey’s 2.63 FIP is well below his career rates in part because he hasn’t allowed a home run yet, something that’s not likely to continue. When Pelfrey’s going well he’s not at all prone to the gopherball, but it’s obviously silly to expect that he’ll never allow any, just as it’s silly to expect he’ll continue to allow so few hits.
Since even with the increased strikeout totals, Pelfrey still lets batters put the ball in play a good deal, at some point soon someone will knock one over the fence and a few more balls will sneak through the infield. Though it’s reasonable to hope Pelfrey’s enhanced arsenal will help him continue to induce weak contact, it’s not reasonable to expect a guy who has yielded a lifetime .312 batting average on balls in play to suddenly maintain a .231 mark.
And it’s important to remember the whims of the sample size. Though it probably does mean something that this stretch is coming at the beginning of the season, when we know Pelfrey has made an adjustment, this is not really even the best three-start stretch of Pelfrey’s career. That came back in July of 2008, when he struck out 16 batters while walking only two and allowed just one earned run over 22 innings.
Of course, this is all pointless, because I can’t imagine any reasonable human expects Mike Pelfrey to maintain a 0.86 ERA over the course of a full season.
The important thing is that what Pelfrey has done so far is fantastic, and there are some decent indicators that he’s made real improvements beyond just pitching in front of a better defense.
It’s baseball, though, and things have a way of evening out. It will be interesting to see how Pelfrey fares once opposing teams are better prepared for his new offerings, if he maintains confidence in his secondary stuff when he hits rough stretches, and if it takes any toll on his arm over the course of a long season.
Tedquarters 
K increase despite his usual contact-rate is suspect
I really don’t think it’s that suspect, most of the really effective ground ball pitchers k 7-8 batters an inning still. I think it’s more that the splitter gave him a reliable off-speed pitch to keep batters off balance, where as before it was pretty obvious they were going to either see a 4 seamer or a sinker and if he tried anything else it wasn’t coming near the plate. Where as now, according to fangraphs he’s throwing 8% fewer fastballs.
Also his xFIP, which corrects for the unsustainable hr rate, is still well below his career mark.
What I’m saying is that if your Ks go up but you’re not missing more bats, that doesn’t exactly sound sustainable.
This year so far, Pelf has an 86% contact rate on swings against him which is both perfectly normal for him and really high.
Here are all the qualifying starters who had 86% or more in 2009 along with their K/9.
Lannan 3.88
Blackburn 4.29
Pineiro 4.42
Livan 5.00
Guthrie 4.95
Pelf 5.22
Penny 5.60
Buehrle 4.43
So yeah, Pelf’s 6.86K/9 this year is really suspect and unlikely to continue unless he misses more bats.
That’s a good, interesting note. I wonder if he’s getting more called strikes early this season because of the new stuff, if hitters are frozen by it or aren’t looking for it.
Mark me impressed. His splitter looks real good, and he’s throwing strikes, which is most important for sinker-ballers who really can’t afford to walk hitters because they allow too many hits. As long has he continues to display this control, I see no reason why he can’t step forward and become that elusive number 2 behind Santana.
My only concern is that hitters might learn to lay off the splitter the second time around the league this year. Indeed, I don’t think his old secondary pitches have improved that much. Its just that his new splitter has been quite effective and has quickly become the swing and miss pitch he lacked.
And, as reasons for optimism mount, bad news has surfaced on Beltran. That put a real damper on last night’s otherwise excellent win.
Increased k rate for Pelf is so critical, missing bats keeps hitters off balance
Good analysis of all the hardcore stats Ted, as usual, but this is one instance where you dont need any stats to explain what is going on. The guy is just flat out pitching better.
He looks more comfortable on the mound, hes throwing harder, hes throwing strikes, and hes throwing more secondary pitches, for strikes as well. All thats adds up to good results.
Of course no one is expecting him to carry this crazy good stretch on forever, but if he continues to picth like this, hes going to have a nice season.
Every year he fell short, but he said something that would be good, when he was sooo bad in ST, as the fans and the media blasted him. He did not pay attention to them and said that he was working on getting different types of pitchers that effected his bad ST this year.
And now we know that he is doing good by using it when it counts.
Since he has improved this much this season, I feel that he is now on the verge of improving even more to become an ace, in time.
For I feel that he still needs more time to improve upon what he has already picked up.
Not trying to take anything away from what Pelf has done so far, he looks great, confident, in control and looks like he has a plan.
i want to see how hitters see and adjust to him and his new splitter before I make any real judgments.