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BP Annual Player Comments

Year		Comment
2015		Wilson would be an amazing used car salesman. He'd show you all the good stuff (sweet stereo, beautiful purr of the engine, super cool ground effects lighting), then you'd drive it off the lot and three months later you'd be left with a heap of metal that makes a nasty *chu-chunk* noise when you turn the key. Wilson was signed in late 2013, put on a good show for the Dodgers and earned himself a two-year contract. In 2014, the wheels came off, to torture a metaphor. Wilson started it off by hurting himself in San Diego in the team's third game. He spent time on the disabled list, came back and couldn't get hitters out. He didn't have the zip on his fastball he once had, his cutter was flat and he couldn't command his pitches. All of this is great news! For the opponents. For some reason, Don Mattingly continued to use Wilson in high-leverage situations; the subpar results, shockingly, also continued. The new Dodgers regime decided not to toss good innings after bad and designated him for assignment in December.
2014		After 16 months spent recovering from Tommy John surgery, Blackbeard returned to pillage the villages of the NL West. The casualties from Wilson's fall siege at Chavez Ravine were reminiscent of his glory days, and earned him a pivotal role at the back of the Dodger bullpen in the postseason—indeed, it seemed by the end that he was the only pitcher Don Mattingly trusted between his starters and Kenley Jansen. The velocity returned to 2011 levels, if not his peak form of 2009-10, but the anecdotal evidence suggests a different type of pitcher came out of surgery. He stuck to the cutter on almost 70 percent of his deliveries, and nearly every pitch that he threw was forced away from opposing batters, either glove-side to right-handed hitters or arm-side to lefties. He'll have to dig deeper to succeed over a full season, but the Dodgers had enough faith in the old dog’s new tricks to sign him to a $10 million deal.
2013		The former Giants eccentric closer pitched just two times before undergoing Tommy John surgery on April 19. Wilson began his throwing program in late October and it's unclear whether he'll be ready for Opening Day. He was paid $8.5 million last year, and when he and the Giants couldn't come to an agreement, they deemed him too expensive to tender. Wilson flirted with danger in 2011, seeing his walk rate balloon and his strikeout rate dip below a batter per inning for the first time since 2007. His slip in effectiveness combined with recovery from surgery makes him a dicey gamble in 2013.
2012		Boy, that Brian Wilson character, isn't he wild! Like, wild, man. No, really, he's wild—he walked five batters per nine, giving Giants fans more heartburn than, say, a XXL Chalupa. Wilson dealt with an oblique injury in spring training and never did pitch with full velocity, his four-seam fastball coming in a mile-and-a-half slower than in 2010, his swinging strike rate dropping to Chad Durbin levels. He compensated by leaning ever more heavily on his slider—nearly half the pitches he threw had a wrinkle—and toying with a two-seamer. His public act has worn thin on some baseball fans; his performance has him walking a thin line with the San Francisco faithful, too.
2011		The third-most valuable relief pitcher in the majors last season according to WXRL, Wilson not only converted 91 percent of his major-league-leading 53 save opportunities, but also led the majors in saves of four or more outs (10) and was second to Milwaukee rookie John Axford with six five-out saves. After allowing a game-tying double in his first inning of post-season work, he was nearly flawless, picking up the final five outs of Game Six of the NLCS to clinch the pennant and striking out two in a 1-2-3 ninth inning to wrap up the Giants’ first Bay-area championship. That he did all of that with a mohawk, a bushy beard that he inexplicably dyed jet black (which made it look fake), and a flair for interviews simply made a great season a strangely iconic one.
2010		In most respects, Wilson enjoyed a better second season than his first full year wearing the closer's cape, at least as far as his rate stats. Combine that with reliable mid-90s velocity, the durability to come into games earlier than the ninth, and a slightly better ground-ball rate than most of his save-generating peers, and he's a fine fireman. That said, a slightly higher ratio of blown save opportunities kept all of that goodness from showing up in either his saves tally or the WXRL data.
2009		The Giants only won 72 games last year, but Wilson saved 41 of them. That’s not all that unusual—he’s just 17th on the list of percentage of team wins saved in a single season (Bryan Harvey’s 45 saves for the 64-win expansion Marlins in 1993 tops the list)—but it’s evidence that at least one San Francisco hurler actually benefited from his team’s impotent offense. Wilson finished fourth in the NL in WXRL behind Brad Lidge, Carlos Marmol, and Brian Fuentes, and likely deserves an assist for Lincecum’s Cy Young award given the voters’ focus on win totals and the fact that Wilson saved 12 of Lincecum’s 18 wins. Wouldn’t it be nice if he did it all again this year?
2008		It has to be frustrating for a pitcher like Sanchez to see Wilson get promoted from Triple-A and slotted right into a defined role. Wilson became the set-up man just three outings after joining the big club and was made the closer a month later. The power righty with a big-time fastball and good slider still hasn't conquered his control problems, so despite a low ERA and good walk rate in his seven weeks in the majors, skepticism is warranted. God only knows what he'll do this year.
2007		Wilson is a flamethrower with an upper-90s fastball and a hard slider. He has fought control problems his entire career, and has usually lost. The Giants sent him to winter ball to work on closing, and, aside from more control problems (nine walks in 14 innings through Christmas-time in Puerto Rico), he was spectacular, allowing just five hits, no runs, and earning 11 saves in those 14 innings. With Benitez`s future in doubt, Wilson may emerge as the default closer candidate, but anticipate some ugly lines in the box score as a result.

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PITCHf/x Pitcher Profile

A Collaboration between BrooksBaseball.net and Baseball Prospectus - Pitch classifications provided by Pitch Info LLC

Although he has not thrown an MLB pitch in 2024, Brian Wilson threw 6,669 pitches that were tracked by the PITCHf/x system between 2007 and 2014, all of them occuring in Spring Training. In 2014, he relied primarily on his Cutter (89mph) and Fourseam Fastball (94mph), also mixing in a Sinker (92mph) and Curve (77mph). He also rarely threw a Change (86mph), Slider (89mph) and Knuckleball (66mph).