Beyond the Box Score's Peter Bendix, has an excellent look at Joe Blanton's career, and career numbers, and explains how Blanton is not even a league average pitcher.
Joe Blanton has been a very consistent pitcher in his big league career. Every year since 2005, Blanton’s average fastball has been almost exactly 89 MPH. He’s thrown his fastball right around 55% of the time, and he’s thrown his slider, changeup, and curveball approximately 15% of the time each, respectively. His ability to throw his pitches has not changed from year to year.
In 760 career innings, Joe Blanton’s career ERA of 4.25 is exactly the same as the league’s ERA during that time. Blanton has, in other words, been incredibly average. And, considering the fact that he’s been durable as well, his “averageness” is very valuable. But if we look closer, we see that Blanton can thank luck and/or the Oakland Coliseum for some of his success
