Importance of a Pitcher Throwing a First Pitch Strike in Baseball

I found some statistics on first pitch strikes that I think everyone will find interesting.  How important is it to throw strike one as a pitcher?  Should a batter always take a strike?  Before the arguments start let me post some of the statistics from the majors.

I found these stats in Craig Burley's study in the Hardball Times.  In the study the stats from the 2003 MLB season were used. 

If you have two pitchers that are otherwise perfectly average (as far as statistics show) but one always throws a strike on the first pitch and the other throws a ball on the first pitch. The pitcher who threw the strike has an expected ERA of 3.60 and the pitcher who threw a ball would have an expected ERA of 5.50.  In addition once the pitcher gets to a 0-1 count hitters hit just .239 against the pitcher.  If the first pitch is a ball the hitters average moves up to .280.

In 2009 of the starting pitchers with the 20 lowest ERA's 16 of them had above average first-pitch strike percentages.  In 2010 the three starting pitchers with the highest first-pitch strike percentages were Cliff Lee (70.8%), Carl Pavano (68%) and Roy Halladay.