Is there a more desirable young hitter/pitcher combination in the majors than Matt Kemp and Clayton Kershaw?
You might not have heard of many members of the horde of pitchers competing for the last spot in the rotation. And, like me, you might be skeptical of Jason Repko’s existence. Kershaw and Kemp do not enjoy such anonymity. The pair—Kemp will be 25 this season and Kershaw just 23—has everything you might want in a young duo. Kemp is on the cusp of MVP candidacy already, coming off a .297/.352/.490 (plus good defense) effort in 2009. And all Kershaw has done is strike out 285 batters in his first 278.2 innings. Kershaw, with just two seasons under his belt and susceptible to pitchers’ generally more unpredictable career trajectories, has the more significant warts. He still walks too many batters—4.79 per nine innings last year. Unsurprisingly, he has difficulty going deep into games, averaging just under 5.2 innings per start in 2009. But man, oh man, his stuff. Despite the ugly walk figure,he carried just a 3.90 xFIP last season. And while his innings did rise from 107.2 to 171 over the
