The VandySports 100: No. 4, David Price

Vanderbilt baseball great David Price cracks the VandySports 100 at No. 4. Here's a link to our complete list as we approach No. 1.

Honors and awards: 2005 Freshman All-American (Collegiate Baseball; second-team by Baseball America)

2005 Team USA

2006 third-team All-American (NCBWA)

2006 second-team All-Southeastern Conference

2006 SEC Pitcher of the Week (four times)

2006 Team USA

2007 first-team All-American (consensus)

2007 Golden Spikes Award (National Player of the Year)

2007 Dick Howser Trophy (National Player of the Year)

2007 Brooks Wallace Award (National Player of the Year)

2007 Roger Clemens Award (National Pitcher of the Year)

2007 first-team All-Southeastern Conference

2007 SEC Pitcher of the Year

2007 SEC Pitcher of the Week (twice)

2007 All-Nashville Regional

In the VU record book: Single-season wins: tied-10th (11 in 2007)

Single-season innings pitched: first (133.1 in 2007)

Single-season strikeouts: first, third (194 in 2007, 155 in 2006)

Career strikeouts: first (4410

Career innings: third (313)

Before VU: Had an 0.43 ERA with 151 strikeouts at Blackman High in Murfreesboro, Tenn. Was the two-time Rutherford County Pitching MVP was the county's Male Athlete of the Year for 2002, 2003 and 2004. Played in the High School All-American game. Also starred in basketball. The Dodgers picked him in Round 19 of the 2004 MLB Draft.

Freshman (2005): Pitched in 16 games, making 10 starts, for a 34-21 (13-17 SEC) team that missed the NCAA Tournament. Opponents hit .207 against him for the season. Pitched in 11 SEC regular-season games, making nine starts, throwing 56 2/3 innings with a 3.34 ERA 71 strikeouts, 25 walks and a .207 average against. His wins came against Lipscomb and Ole Miss. He struck out 11 hitters against both Tennessee and Florida, and added nine strikeouts vs. Lipscomb, Alabama and Ole Miss.

Sophomore (2006): Made 19 starts and 17 appearances for a 38-27 (16-14) team that finished second in the Atlanta Regional. In 10 SEC appearances--all starts--Price had a 4.41 ERA in 67 1/3 innings, giving up a .230 average, 28 walks and seven homers while striking out 91. Took the loss against Georgia Tech in the NCAA Tournament, allowing seven runs in 6 1/3 innings. Pitched a seven-inning complete game, allowing one run, to beat South Carolina in the SEC Tournament. Also beat the Gamecocks with a nine-strikeout, seven-inning performance, allowing four runs on four hits. Defeated LSU with seven innings of two-run, eight-strikeout baseball. Allowed five runs, (four earned) in six innings to beat Kentucky, while striking out nine. Allowed eight runs on 10 hits in a loss to Aabama. Allowed five runs in 5 2/3 innings, with eight strikeouts, vs. Georgia. Struck out 17 to beat Arkansas, allowing one run on three hits and four walks. Pitched eight scoreless innings with 13 strikeouts to defeat Florida. Threw a compete-game, 11-strikeout, one-walk outing to beat Auburn. Allowed one earned run with 10 strikeouts to pick up a win vs. Ole Miss. Fanned 15 in seven innings, allowing one run in a win over Brown. Struck out 10 and gave up two earned runs over eight innings in a loss to Ball State. Struck out nine over six innings in a no-decision vs. Pitt. Had a 10-pitch, three-strikeout relief outing vs. Tennessee Tech. Gave up five earned runs in 4 2/3 innings in a season-opening loss to San Diego.

Junior (2007): Was the Friday night starter for a 54-13 (22-8) squad that won the SEC and the SEC Tournament titles and finished second in the Nashville Regional. Made 18 appearances, with 17 starts. Pitched 78 1/3 SEC innings spanning 10 starts, with a 6-0 record, 107 strikeouts, 22 walks, no homers allowed and a 2.87 ERA. Pitched nine innings vs. Austin Peay in VU's NCAA Tournament opener, with 17 strikeouts and one run allowed. Pitched 5 2/3 innings, allowing three earned runs and striking out six, in a no-decision vs. Rice in the season opener. Threw 6 1/3 innings vs. Ohio, allowing one run with 12 strikeouts while getting the win. Beat Pitt with 5 2/3 innings of three-run, 10-strikeout baseball. Threw a 13-strikeout complete game in a 3-2 win over Xavier. Threw a complete-game four-hitter with 16 strikeouts in a 2-1 win over Illinois-Chicago. Pitched a 10-inning complete game in a 3-2 win over Ole Miss, striking out 14 and allowing two runs. Allowed six runs in six innings vs. Arkansas. Struck out 10 and allowed three runs in a no-decision vs. top-ranked South Carolina. Pitched a complete-game, 10-strikeout, three-hit shutout vs. Alabama. Carried a no-hitter into the sixth, but allowed six runs on six hits with nine strikeouts vs. Kentucky after he didn't get an out in that inning. Took a perfect game into the seventh, beating Tennessee with an eight-inning, 14-strikeout performance in a 3-1 win. Allowed one run in eight innings in a 13-strikeout victory over Florida. Allowed five runs on 12 singles with eight strikeouts in seven innings in a no-decision at Georgia. Allowed four runs in eight innings of work, striking out six and picking up a win at Auburn. Gave up one run in 8 2/3 innings against LSU, striking out 15 and picking up a win in the game that clinched the SEC regular-season title. Carried a perfect game into the seventh inning vs. Mississippi St. in the SEC Tournament; wound up with a complete-game, 3-2 win with 11 strikeouts.

Post-VU: Price was the first pick in the 2007 MLB Draft, going to Tampa. By the end of 2008, Price was throwing key postseason innings, picking up a win and a save in the ALCS. He won the Cy Young Award with Tampa in 2012, while finishing runner-up for the same honor in 2010 and 2015. Price, who turns 35 on August 26, is 150-80 for his career and will pitch this season for the Dodgers after Boston traded him in February. Price also donated $2.5 million to the baseball program to fund the construction of the baseball building behind the left-field wall.

Final thoughts, and why I ranked him where I did: With apologies to Kumar Rocker (who may share this honor by the time he's done at VU), there was no Vanderbilt player in any sport that I enjoyed watching more than David Price. During his Vintage David Price days (which spanned half his sophomore year, and basically all his junior year), a sense of awe settled in over the park as Price threw, in anticipation that something historic could happen every time he took the mound. He might be the most talented athlete to ever play at VU.

Price did things that we may not see again. Among them are the five complete games he pitched as a junior (he also had two as a sophomore) and (by my count), twelve double-digit strikeout games that same year. That season, at least as far as major sports go, is probably the most decorated individual season by a VU athlete in history.

So, why isn't Price No. 1?

Mostly, it's his sophomore season. While Price was flat-out dominant in the beginning, he got hit hard just about every time out for the last six weeks of SEC regular-season play, and that carried over into the NCAA Tournament.

Secondly, there's also an interesting dynamic to Price's 2007 campaign: As great as that season was, his 2.63 ERA that year doesn't come close to being one of the top 10 ERA seasons in school history. (Tyler Beede, at 2.32, checks in at 10th on that list.)

Let's deconstruct both those seasons, because there's context and a commonality I think are important.

In 2006, 31 percent of the runners who reached base against Price scored. At the MLB level, anything over 30 percent is considered high. I don't know how much of that was the bullpen or how much was "bad luck" in clustering hits, but it was a factor. Teams hit .330 on balls in play against Price that year. It's not an exorbitantly high number, but it's probably more than you'd expect to see against a pitcher of his caliber.

Certainly, Price owns some of that--he allowed nine homers, 24 doubles and a triple in 110 1/3 innings that year,. My vague memory of some of those starts is that the damage was done more by hard-hit balls than dinks and bloopers that found a patch of grass. On the other hand, Bill James's "component ERA" formula predicts his ERA to be 3.26 given the nature and type of runners he allowed. So Price was probably beset by some bad luck that year.

Maybe not coincidentally, Price also had poor "cluster luck" in 2007, when his component ERA was 1.82.

Is there a reason for this?

I think so.

Read the season recaps above. They're littered with starts during which Price carried a no-hitter or a perfect game into the middle or late innings before things often fell apart to a medium or large degree. Coach Tim Corbin has always tended to ride his aces late into games until things came apart (this happened frequently with Drake Fellows) and this was absolutely a factor with Price, though for reasons that can be understood. And with Price, it was more pronounced, because he struck out a tremendous number of hitters (he, Casey Weathers and Hayden Stone are the only three pitchers in the VS 100 with career strikeout rates over 30 percent) and didn't have Thomas Eshelman control, which led to high pitch counts.

As revered as that 2007 team was--it was sometimes called "a team without a weakness"), but in hindsight there was a bullpen hole there. Yes, VU had an elite closer in Weathers, and I'd forgotten how good Ty Davis (1.42 ERA in 25 1/3 SEC innings that year) was, but there wasn't much behind those two. The remaining options were whoever of Cody Crowell or Nick Christiani wasn't the third starter at the moment; Crowell had a 4.29 ERA in the league, and Christiani, a 5.46, and their availability was further hindered because Christiani sometimes made mid-week starts. (Brett Jacobson also took a turn for two SEC starts.)

In addition, No. 2 starter Mike Minor only threw 46 2/3 SEC innings, and that included two relief appearances in his 10 times on the hill. Behind that, the last real option was Stephen Shao, who had a 12.41 ERA in 12 1/3 league innings that season.

On top of that, the hyper-competitive Price was probably going to fight either Corbin or pitching coach Derek Johnson if they tried to take the ball from his hand.

I'll spare you the details, but the bullpen was far worse in 2006, which explains a lot of that season as well.

And it didn't occur to me until writing this, but it all came full-circle in how Price's career ended .

Obviously, Price gave up the well-chronicled home run to Alan Oaks that earned Michigan the Nashville Regional title. That was a product of VU not having any arms left in the bullpen. The alternative was burning Mark Lamm's redshirt. Price, even with the MLB Draft looming two days later, lobbied to take the ball though it put him at personal risk. That says a lot about both he and the situation. (Incidentally, Corbin's going with Price there bought Lamm 27 innings of a 2.00 ERA in that 2011 College World Series season)

Despite popular belief, Price didn't have the most productive career in Vanderbilt baseball history. Not to belabor the point, but Price's career 3.22 ERA places him well outside the school's top 10 list. (Kevin ZIomek, at 3.03, ranks 10th*). But it was a tremendously good one that could have easily landed him the top spot on the list with some breaks or different circumstances, and I doubt anyone's going to argue that I have him too high.

* For what it's worth: Ziomek pitched in a more pitching-friendly era; Adjust ERAs for run-scoring environment across college baseball, and Price is at 3.11 while Ziomek registers a 3.35.