Bullpen Chart - Sept. 8

Posted by Max Marchi
Keep track of the available arms with the bullpen usage chart.

At the end of the post you will find the link to the PDF containing all the match-ups of Sept. 8. The charts show the number of pitches thrown by each team's pitchers each of the last seven days.

How to read them:
Above the thick line in each chart you see the starters, sorted by their WAR; below the thick line are the relievers, again best to worst according to WAR. Darkest colored cells indicate highest workloads. The probable starting pitchers are listed at the bottom of each chart.

You can read about the bullpen usage chart in this introductory article; some tweaks are still needed.

Bullpen usage chart - Sept. 8 (PDF ~ 530K)

Max has been writing about baseball for six years to an Italian audience. He can be reached via e-mail.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Phillies 8, Marlins 7: First place. Homers from Howard, Ibanez and Victorino and a go-ahead single from Placido Polanco in the eighth put the Phillies in the catbird seat for the first time since May 30th.

Pirates 5, Braves 0: The Pirates have allowed more runs than any team in baseball this year, yet the Braves have scored just one run in eighteen innings this series. No offense to the Pirates intended, but if you get your ass handed to you by the Pirates pitching staff the way the Braves have these past two games, you don't deserve to sniff the playoffs, let alone contend for them.

Orioles 6, Yankees 2: And while it's nowhere near as bad getting beat by the resurgent Orioles, Yankees fans have to be feeling much the same as Braves fans this week. Jake Arrieta (6.1 IP, 8 H, 2 ER) stifles the Bombers as CC Sabathia is denied his 20th win as the Orioles take another from New York.

Rays 14, Red Sox 5: Five homers for the Rays, who break their losing streak and pull to within one and a half of the Yankees. The bad Dice-K showed up and nibbled. David Price did his usual "walk a lot of guys and pitch relatively inefficiently yet still get the win" thing.

Tigers 9, White Sox 1: The winning streak ends, and how. Freddy Garcia -- who has been a Tiger killer lately -- had to leave the game early with a bad back. Someone should have told him that when you go out tiger hunting -- in case of accidents -- you should always bring your mum.

Twins 10, Royals 3: That's the thing about the Twins: no matter how much the Sox have surged, Minnesota has surged right along with them and have always seemed to take advantage of Chicago's missteps. Delmon Young and J.J. Hardy combined to drive in seven.

Rockies 4, Reds 3: A three-run bomb from Carlos Gonzalez helps the Rockies win their fifth straight. I had previously all but handed the MVP to Joey Votto, but Gonzalez has thrust himself into the conversation with his -- and his team's -- white-hot run of late.

Padres 2, Dodgers 1: But the Rockies are going to have to catch the Padres for that to happen, I think, and that's hard when Mat Latos pitches like this (7 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 10K). The Dodgers, by the way, are snoozing their way towards the end of the season. Nice career and everything, Joe Torre, and we'll see you in Cooperstown soon, but you need to go.

Giants 6, Diamondbacks 3: Tim Lincecum helps the Giants keep pace, mowing down 11 batters while giving up three runs through six and two-thirds. Homers from Huff, Sanchez and Burrell.

Brewers 4, Cardinals 2: Trevor Hoffman gets his 600th save. Great for Hoffman, who has definitely seen some bad times this season. Oh, and home plate umpire Bob Davidson ejected a fan in this one, which is something you don't see every day. I'd be inclined to rip Davidson because he's almost always wrong about everything, but word buzzing around the Internets last night was that the fan who was ejected was being abusive to Yadier Molina all night and was probably drunk. It's a shame that the ump had to take care of his good-for-nothin' ass instead of an usher or other ballpark personnel.

Astros 7, Cubs 3: Carlos Silva's return didn't go too swimmingly (5 IP, 9 H, 6 ER). Nelson Figueroa gets the win. Why don't I remember him coming to Houston, though? I mean, I know I saw him in Mets camp down in Port St. Lucie, and I remember the Phillies picking him up briefly, but the Astros? In some ways it's been a very long season.

Blue Jays 8, Rangers 5: Two homers for Vernon Wells, as the Jays take it to the reeling Rangers. The way all the other first place teams are playing lately, I should probably just call a Twins-Phillies World Series right now.

Mets 4, Nationals 1: Mets starter Dillon Gee took a no-hitter into the sixth in his major league debut. It's been eight hours since this game ended and I've already heard too many "Gee!" puns. Next person who does it is gonna get fined.

Indians 6, Angels 1: The Angels look so lifelike lying in that box. Still, when I go, I'd prefer to be cremated, because ceremonies like this are so awkward. Oh well. Let's go to the widow's house. I hear there will be cold cuts and casseroles.

Mariners 7, Athletics 5: Compared to how they've been going, a seven run night for Seattle is equivalent to [tapping calculator keys while wearing green eye-shade . . .] 125 runs.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Tuesday, September 07, 2010

A half-century ago today (9/8/10)

Posted by Chris Jaffe
Fifty years ago today, the Braves signed a future Hall of Famer to his first professional contract: Joe Torre.

Man, he's been around a while, hasn't he? Given what a good player he was, I'm surprised he didn't sign his first pro contract until he was 20 years old. That's doubly surprising given that his brother was already a major league ballplayer; it ain't like Torre should've been under anyone's radar.

He isn't the only famous baseball name signed on this day. On September 8, 1953, the Cubs signed Ernie Banks.

History instructor by day, statnerd by night, Chris Jaffe leads one of the most exciting double lives imaginable; with the exception of every other double life possible to imagine. Despite his lack of comic-book-hero-worthiness, Chris enjoys farting around with this stuff. His new book, Evaluating Baseball's Managers is available for order. Chris welcomes responses to his articles via e-mail.

Bullpen Chart - Sept. 7

Posted by Max Marchi
Keep track of the available arms with the bullpen usage chart.

At the end of the post you will find the link to the PDF containing all the match-ups of Sept. 7. The charts show the number of pitches thrown by each team's pitchers each of the last seven days.

How to read them:
Above the thick line in each chart you see the starters, sorted by their WAR; below the thick line are the relievers, again best to worst according to WAR. Darkest colored cells indicate highest workloads. The probable starting pitchers are listed at the bottom of each chart.

You can read about the bullpen usage chart in this introductory article; some tweaks are still needed.

Bullpen usage chart - Sept. 7 (PDF ~ 600K)

Max has been writing about baseball for six years to an Italian audience. He can be reached via e-mail.

Climbing the prospect ladder

Posted by Jeff Moore
With seasons wrapping up across the minor leagues and many top prospects either already exhausting their rookie eligibility in the majors or taking their first sips of their cup of coffee, today felt like a good time to look back on the 2010 season at the prospects who did the most to improve their prospect status.

Some prospects enter the professional ranks with a pedigree that affords them every chance to succeed, while others have to work their way up on their own. Some come in with assumed potential, then exceed expectations and catapult themselves to another level. Some have flopped, and must break out to regain their once-heralded potential. And some are unknowns who simply have too much success to ignore.

One season a prospect does not make, but after the 2010 seasons these prospects had, they've made themselves worth watching into next season.

Atlanta Braves: Brandon Beachy was undrafted out of college and has yet to even be a starter full time, but the former NAIA player is creating opportunities for himself by posting absurd K/BB ratios (5:1 this season between Double and Triple-A) and striking out more than 11 batters per nine innings. He finally had a chance to start regularly for the second half of the season in Triple-A and impressed with a 2.50 ERA in just under 40 innings of work. In a Braves system loaded with hard-throwing power arms, Beachy might still end up in the bullpen, but he's established himself as someone the Braves have to consider as a part of their future.

Florida Marlins: Kyle Skipworth had bust written all over him after back-to-back seasons of .208 hitting as a professional. The Marlins' first-round pick in 2008 (sixth overall) had shown neither the hitting acumen nor power potential that made him such a high selection, and was striking out almost four-and-a-half times for every walk he drew.

A repeat of of Low-A ball appears to be just what Skipworth needed (and did nothing to hurt his development, as he is still just 20). He finally displayed at least the power that the Marlins knew was there. His .250 batting average still doesn't scream major league hitter, nor does his 129:32 K/BB ratio, but 17 home runs and a slugging percentage that begins with a four are good signs that Skipworth may yet recover some of his status as an eventual major leaguer.

How much of his development was due to repeating a level will be seen next year when he presumably will move to the Florida State League (a notorious pitchers league), but for now, it appears Skipworth does, at the very least, possess some of the tools eighth-hat can help the Marlins sometime after they open their new stadium.

New York Mets: The Mets did not have a great season either in the majors or on the farm, so there wasn't a lot of breaking out to report, but Cory Vaughn, the son of former major leaguer Greg Vaughn and the Mets' fourth-round draft pick this year, did enough damage and displayed enough tools that he merits following closely next year.

It's important to remain wary of a college player dominating short-season ball right after being drafted. College players, hitters and pitchers alike, are often able to feast on the inexperience of young players who are in the league getting their first taste of professional ball. But regardless of the reason, when a a player posts a .239 ISO, steals 11 bases, and throws out six runners from right field in a half season the year he gets drafted, you have to look at him closely next season. The biggest knock on Vaughn from scouts was his tendency to swing and miss, and thus rack up huge strikeout totals, but given his power production and adequate walk totals, 60 strikeouts in 300 plate appearances wasn't a concern this season. What remains to be seen is how this number fluctuates when he gets to a league with pitchers who throw better breaking pitches.

Philadelphia Phillies: Jonathan Singleton was one of the hottest hitters in the minors for the first half of the season, and despite coming back down to earth in the second half, he still remained consistent and put up a great first full season of professional baseball. An eighth-round pick in 2009 by the Phillies, the 6-foot-2 first baseman was actually held back in extended spring training rather than join the team's Low-A affiliate in Lakewood right away.

Whatever the reasoning, the move worked, as Singleton showed a polished approach at the plate upon arrival, displaying good power for a young hitter and even better plate discipline (70 K/58 BB). The Phillies are determined to take it slow with Singleton, and with good reason as they have Ryan Howard locked up well into the future. But Singleton should move to the Florida State League next season; his power will be tested by the league's unforgiving parks.

Washington Nationals: If it looks like a fluke, and it smells like a fluke... I don't want to automatically dismiss Tyler Moore's season as an aberration, but how often do 23-year-old 16th-round picks just "figure it out?" All the signs scream that this will be the best season of Moore's life at any level, including his ridiculous 120:37 K/BB ratio, and the fact that his production is coming in a league he's too old for.

But at some point, 75 extra-base hits in one season are just too much to ignore, especially when they are in no part inflated by an unsustainable BABIP (.287 on the season). Moore's aggressive approach will certainly be tested next season in Harrisburg, but if his power remains, then perhaps he figured out just enough to turn himself into a major league role player of some sort down the road in Washington.

Chicago Cubs: The Cubs knew they had something in Kenneth McNutt when they give him $115,000 as a 32nd-round pick in 2009, but the 6-foot-4 righty (who goes by Trey) has already given the team more return on its investment than expected. McNutt put on a show this season, splitting time between both levels of A ball before two rough starts at the end of the season in Double-A. The two-promotion year should tell you what the Cubs think of him, but if not, his 10.2 career K/9 rate should do the trick. Drafted out of community college, McNutt turned 21 just last month, and should start next season in Double-A, just a phone call away from Wrigley.

Cincinnati Reds: Welcome back, Devin Mesoraco. After a disappointing 2008 season and a worse 2009 campaign, almost all of the luster had come off of the former first-round pick. But then, boom goes the Devin Mesoraco dynamite to the tune of 26 home runs over three levels in 2010.

Spending most of the season in High-A and Double-A ball, Mesoraco totaled 56 extra-base hits and a .312 batting average, while also improving his walk totals. He's even dropped a .987 OPS and three home runs in a brief (10 game) stint in Triple-A, where he will likely begin next season. The Reds will need catching help next season, but given Mesoraco's sudden turnaround, they could be looking at a one-year stopgap before turning over the reins.

Houston Astros: At what point does an unsustainable BABIP become somehow sustainable? The answer to that question will tell you the legitimacy of what J.D. Martinez has done in the Astros organization over the past year and a half.

Partly because of a career batting average of .344, and no BA lower than .303 at any level, the former 20th-round pick has established himself as a prospect mainly based on his power. Martinez has 100 extra-base hits in 206 games over four levels in the past season-and-a-half. But his .344 BA is due largely in part to BABIP's of .448, .353, .398 and .369 at each level respectively, which is clearly unsustainable, especially for a power hitter who doesn't run particularly well. Typically 879 plate appearances should be enough for things like this to correct themselves, but luck is unpredictable and Martinez appears to be on a heater. And you never walk away from the table when you're on a heater.

Milwaukee Brewers: In an all-around uninspiring farm system, especially when it comes to position players, second- round D-II senior signee Nick Shaw was a pleasant surprise in 2010. Known for his exceptional eye at the plate, and a number of other extremely average tools, Shaw made the most of his abilities by posting a .337/.467/.479 line in his first professional season.

Of course, he did this large in part to a ridiculous .410 BABIP, but the positives are that he walked more than he struck out and stole 14 bases, which are both attributes that should continue. He's almost certainly not a potential .337 hitter down the road, and there's no chance he ever slugs .479 again, but if he continues to handle the bat effectively and control the strike zone, he could eventually serve a role on a major league team.

Pittsburgh Pirates: Rudy Owens could have made this list last year after a break outseason, making this the year to watch to see if he backed it up. Not only did he back it up, but he raised the bar for himself once again, demonstrating impeccable control and an advanced knowledge of how to pitch. Never a flame-thrower, Owens is the classic "make the most out of what you have to work with" pitcher. Owens will never be a big strikeout pitcher, but by limiting the fly balls he allows and surrendering virtually no extra base runners, Owens has established himself as an integral part of the Pirates' future pitching rotation.

St. Louis Cardinals: Numbers from the Dominican Summer League and Gulf Coast League don't always mean much, but 19-year-old RHP Bryan Martinez has done nothing but produce in either league, so in a farm system devoid of young talent like the Cardinals', he's worth following to see what he does when he joins a travel league. Martinez has posted low ERAs at every stop, thanks in part to unsustainably low BABIPs, but he has also shown solid strikeout rates and low walk rates, which are good indications for the future.

Martinez may start next season in the GCL once again, but should move to short-season ball over the summer, and if he really impresses, the Cardinals could push him aggressively into full-season ball in Low-A.

Arizona Diamondbacks: Paul Goldschmidt is all bat and little else, but luckily for the Diamondbacks, there's plenty of bat there to make him worthwhile. Goldschmidt is challenging for the minor league lead in home runs (currently at 34) while also knocking 40 doubles.

Unfortunately, cases can be made for why his impressive performances, both this year and last, may not hold up. Last season, Goldschmidt posted a .303 ISO in the Pioneer League as a 21-year-old college hitter feasting on inferior competition. This season, his numbers have to be taken in the context of the hitters' haven that is the California League. Also, in both seasons, Goldschmidt has posted his numbers due at least in small part to high BABIPs of .390 and .378. This, of course, doesn't mean Goldschmidt won't continue to be a productive hitter as he progresses through the minors. It's simply the grain of salt that must be served when discussing his ridiculous production.

Colorado Rockies: Unfortunately for the Rockies, the player in their system that established himself the most is no longer in their system. But we're going to talk about him anyway. Chris Balcom-Miller was recently sent to Boston for Manny Delcarman, a strange move for a Rockies team that will always be in need of potential starting pitchers. Balcom-Miller, a 6th round pick in 2009 established himself as a reliable starter in his first full season of professional baseball, posting a phenomenal 6.16 K/BB rate. He's not overpowering, but has an good change-up for his age that should allow him to eventually become a back-of-the-rotation starter or reliever, depending on the development of his slider.

Los Angeles Dodgers: 2010 was the first season playing domestically for Rubby de la Rosa, who not only established himself as a prospect in the Dodgers organization, but also established himself as a potential starter and jumped as high as Double-A. While his 1.37 ERA at Chattanooga is not likely to hold up over time, de la Rosa has done enough to put himself in the same discussion as Ethan Martin and Aaron Miller as potential future members of the Dodgers rotation.

San Diego Padres: After a dominant season in High-A ball in 2009, Simon Castro backed up his performance with a good 2010 season in Double-A, effectively putting him on watch in San Diego. The sheer dominance of hitters wasn't there as the competition got a little stiffer for Castro, but the fact that he sustained his success at a higher level for a second straight season says more about his potential than simply dominating hitters might. He should start 2011 in Triple-A with his sights set on PetCo Park sometime next summer.

San Francisco Giants: Brandon Belt is in the discussion for Minor League Player of the Year, which should say something about how far he's come since being a 5th round pick by the Giants just last season. Ignore Belt's .383 batting average in the California League, but focus on the power numbers, which also include double-digit triples. Belt has good speed to go with his bat, and could allow him to play left field in San Francisco. He jumped three levels this season, and is currently wrapping up his monster season in Triple-A, just a phone call from the majors. And while I wouldn't expect .357/.461/.624 ever again, Belt's plate discipline (91 BB/93 K) and power/speed combination should play quite well in the expansive AT&T Park outfield. And it should play there soon.

Next Friday, we'll take a look at the American League.

Jeff Moore is the creator of MLBProspectWatch.com, your one-stop site for all the information you need about minor league prospects. He can be reached via e-mail at mlbprospectwatch AT gmail DOT com.

Monday, September 06, 2010

Bullpen Chart - Sept. 6

Posted by Max Marchi
Keep track of the available arms with the bullpen usage chart.

At the end of the post you will find the link to the PDF containing all the match-ups of Sept. 6. The charts show the number of pitches thrown by each team's pitchers each of the last seven days.

How to read them:
Above the thick line in each chart you see the starters, sorted by their WAR; below the thick line are the relievers, again best to worst according to WAR. Darkest colored cells indicate highest workloads. The probable starting pitchers are listed at the bottom of each chart.

You can read about the bullpen usage chart in this introductory article; some tweaks are still needed.

Bullpen usage chart - Sept. 6 (PDF ~ 600K)

Note: Some changes have been made to the charts since the first version.

Pitchers now appear only on their current team;
only pitchers with appearences in the last thirty days are listed;
starters are identified using the last thirty days rather than the full season.

Max has been writing about baseball for six years to an Italian audience. He can be reached via e-mail.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Twins 6, Rangers 5: The coach-touching-the-runner interference call which ended this one is kind of nuts. Mostly because I can't remember this even being talked about during a ballgame let alone ever having seen it. But it happened, Michael Young was out and the Rangers lost a game it looked like they were poised to at least tie up. My initial thought: even if there was contact here it was nothing of consequence, and did not "physically assist the runner in returning to or leaving third base," which is what the contact needs to do per the rule in order to justify calling the runner out. In other words, it's a judgment call, and the ump here, I think, judged it poorly.

All that said, how hilarious was it that third base coach Dave Anderson first yanked his hands back and then busted ass to get back inside the third base coach box as Young was running back to third? He knew they touched, and was trying his best to sell it that they didn't. I still don't think Young should have been called out, but maybe there's a reason they have coaches boxes in the first place, huh?

White Sox 7, Red Sox 5: This is the game that sealed Papelbon's non-tender this winter, right? Yeah, I realize that Richardson and Manuel walked in the go-ahead run and one to grow on, but they were Papelbon's guys and the first rule of closing is not to put dudes on, right? Oh, and I'm guessing the White Sox are even angrier at that coach's interference call in the Rangers-Twins game than the Rangers are. I mean, Texas basically has its playoff spot locked up. The Sox needed Minnesota to lose that one.

Cardinals 4, Reds 2: St. Louis took two of three, but is even that enough at this juncture? Chris Carpenter struck out 11. Matt Holliday hit the three-run bomb to put the Cards up for good. Future Braves centerfielder Colby Rasmus was 2 for 3.

Rockies 4, Padres 2: This is getting really hard to watch. Ten straight down, now the Giants are on the Padres' heels and the Rockies -- 4.5 back -- aren't far behind.

Giants 3, Dodgers 0: How close are the Giants? One game now thanks to a gem from Jonathan Sanchez (7 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 9K). A two run homer for Juan Uribe -- his second of the series -- but he had to leave the game because, right before his bomb, he fouled one off his leg. Check in with lar and the Tater Trot Tracker to see if Uribe's trot was negatively impacted.

Mets 18, Cubs 5: An eighteen run outburst on getaway day. How fun do you suppose that flight to D.C. was for the Mets yesterday? Courtesy of the Crank: the Mets have scored 18 or more runs in games seven times in their glorious history. Four of those games were in Wrigley Field.

Marlins 7, Braves 6: I'm happy I spent my afternoon toiling in our basement crawlspace rather than going from angry (Marlins take 6-0 lead) to happy (Braves tie it up) to angry again (Marlins win it in the 10th). Although the crawlspace toiling sucks on several levels too. For one thing my legs are in flaming pain today from all of the crouching and lugging of stuff. For another, most of the lugging was of baseball cards, getting them out of the main part of the basement and into storage so I can make room for a treadmill and weight setup, which will put me in even more pain. Hell, maybe I should have just had a few beers and watched this mess of a game to begin with? In other news, I have way too many damn baseball cards.

Brewers 6, Phillies 2: Philly couldn't take advantage of Atlanta's stumble as Kyle Kendrick gave up a three-run bomb to Prince Fielder in the first inning and the Brewers never gave up the lead. Philly remains one behind the Braves.

Mariners 3, Indians 0: I felt pretty confident that Zack Greinke was going to win the Cy Young last year because his ERA and peripherals were so damn good that they had to overcome a lackluster win total that wasn't his fault. I'm less confident in Felix Hernandez pulling the same trick this year. Not because he's not the best starter in the AL -- he clearly is in my mind -- but because the writers just ain't gonna do the right thing twice in a row. Anyway, King Felix shut out the Tribe over eight and struck out nine dudes. He's now 11-10 on the season, but he has 209Ks, has an ERA of 2.30, a WHIP of 1.09 and is going to finish with something like 250 innings pitched and fewer than 20 homers allowed.

Nationals 8, Pirates 1: Not all last place teams are created equal. Pirates starter Charlie Morton did lower his ERA from 10.03 to 9.66, though, so that's a moral victory, right? Jason Marquis refereed to himself in the third person after today's game, describing his recent struggles thusly: "That wasn't Jason Marquis; it was Jason Marquis but pitching hurt, trying to battle through." Craig doesn't feel comfortable with a guy like Marquis doing that.

Blue Jays 7, Yankees 3: Haven't scanned the tabloids yet, so someone tell me if any of them have blamed the return of A-Rod for the Yanks' winning streak getting snapped. I wouldn't bet a pair of fetid dingo's kidneys that no one went there. I'd probably bet the pink slip to my car that they did.

Orioles 8, Rays 7: Rocco Baldelli hit a two-run homer in his first at bat of the season and three other Rays had dingers too, but they weren't enough to stop Buck Showalter from snagging his 900th career win.

Royals 2, Tigers 1: Jim Leyland: "You're not going to win any games normally with three hits." That's why he makes the big bucks, folks.

Angels 7, Athletics 4: Anaheim salvages one after getting shut down on Friday and Saturday. Ervin Santana lowers ran his career ERA against Oakland to 1.80 ERA and improved to 12-3 against them lifetime.

Astros 3, Diamondbacks 2: From the AP recap: "Get rid of the first eight games of the season and the Houston Astros would be a .500 team." Yeah, and if a frog had wings he wouldn't bump his ass a-hoppin'. OK, that was harsh. I get the point -- the Astros have been pretty good in recent weeks -- but I like to whip out that "if a frog had wings" thing once or twice a year and I don't think I've done it yet. I got another one about how my auntie would be me uncle if certain things were different, but this is a family blog so I'll save that for when I usually use it: in conversations with my children.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Sunday, September 05, 2010

Bullpen chart - Sept. 5

Posted by Max Marchi
Keep track of the available arms with to the bullpen usage chart.

At the end of the post you will find the link to the PDF containing all the match-ups of Sept. 5. The charts show the number of pitches thrown by each team's pitchers each of the last seven days.

How to read them:
Above the thick line in each chart you see the starters, sorted by their WAR; below the thick line are the relievers, again best to worst according to WAR. Darkest colored cells indicate highest workloads. The probable starting pitchers are listed at the bottom of each chart.

You can read about the bullpen usage chart in this introductory article; some tweaks are still needed.

Bullpen usage chart - Sept. 5 (PDF ~ 600K)

Max has been writing about baseball for six years to an Italian audience. He can be reached via e-mail.

The good face, the halo, and projectability

Posted by David Wade
Not long ago, Ken Funck got it on, and then went on to earn a spot contributing at Baseball Prospectus due in part to his entry in the "BP Idol Contest" about one of the subjective measures that baseball scouts use. While I'm not going down the same avenue Ken chose, I do find myself interested in the same topic.

Like many a young (or not so young, as in my case) baseball blogger, Michael Lewis' Moneyball nudged me toward a more cold and calculating approach to baseball analysis and strategy. With conventional strategy questioned, I started to look at the game of baseball a little differently and felt I could learn a lot more about it than I already knew. Due to that belief, and with sabremetric writings as my bible, my contempt for most sacrifice bunts and intentional walks sprang forth like the Temperance Movement's hatred of alcohol. It's likely that it grew in some part from the statistical approach to baseball glorified in Moneyball. But, one thing that I also took from the book was something the author portrayed in a negative light and that served as the antithesis to statistical analysis. And, even if there wasn't a backdrop of statistical analysis, the absurdity this topic would have still stuck with me.

That was 'The Good Face'.

The primary theme in Moneyball is the identification of market inefficiencies in Major League Baseball and it makes sense that the author would analyze economic differences and strategies between baseball organizations. Lewis is a former big market trader that turned writing talent into his first book, Liar's Poker, which highlighted his experiences on Wall Street during the 1980s. With his economic eye on the market of baseball, Lewis focused in on Oakland G.M. Billy Beane's willingness to value some statistical analysis over traditional scouting. As almost everyone knows by now, Beane's inner circle felt most organizations undervalued On Base Percentage and chose to target less expensive players that did well in that category as one way to build up his team in a cost effective manner.

In the narrative, Lewis wanted his readers to understand why his main character chose to turn away from conventional scouting methods. He used Beane's personal backstory to demonstrate. Beane, a highly regarded player as a youth, had held all the traits that old-school baseball scouts loved. His speed and build jumped out at them and promised unlimited potential. However, despite his abundant tools, he failed as a professional. This, as the story goes, prompted him to lose faith in the idea that traditional tools are the true indicators of future baseball success. So, when Beane found himself evaluating other young players as General Manager of the A's, he downplayed scouting and opened his mind to something more tangible.

One of the old-school physical traits that Lewis wrote about Beane possessing as a youth, and presumably despising due to a bit of self-loathing, was 'the Good Face'. From the book-

"Beneath an unruly mop of dark brown hair the boy had the sharp features the scouts loved. Some of the scouts still believed they could tell by the structure of a young man's face not only his character but his future in pro ball. They had a phrase they used: "the Good Face." Billy had the Good Face."

'Not only his character, but future as a ballplayer'? Because he had a certain look? A certain 'structure' to his face? I knew scouts looked beyond traits such as arm strength and bat speed. I knew they looked at a player's build and that tall lanky pitchers were the ideal. A kid that looked like he could put on 20 pounds of muscle pretty quick held more future promise than a kid that had already filled out. I knew that. But I had no idea they thought they could predict baseball abilities and character just by looking at a kid's face.

Is it absolutely ridiculous to propose a certain look could portend future baseball success? Given the incredible amount of statistical studies in baseball, it certainly seems that something like the 'Good Face' would be as antiquated as a geocentric view of the universe. But then I thought about it a little more. Just like "Moneyball" prompted me to think about stats a little more, lately it's had me thinking about something Lewis dismissed. And, I'm wondering if that was a mistake.

Scouts have to identify players before they accumulate enough at-bats to use statistics to properly project a player's career. That's the nature of their job. They are in a constant race to discover a kid before someone else does. They go from school to school and watch kid after kid and cast judgments that could be worth millions of dollars on observational evidence gathered an hour at a time.

That's not to mention that having mounds of statistical data does not guarantee accurate projections for a coming year, even in established players. Statistical anomalies abound in proven players just this year. From an over performing Jose Bautista, to an under performing Carlos Lee. For scouts looking for someone that could become a proven player, projections are obviously harder. Sufficient data, which is not in itself infallible, is simply not available; therefore they must rely at least in part on subjective measurements.

So, I do wonder if guys with a 'look' of confidence somehow correlate to future baseball abilities and if that somehow drove scouts to look for such a 'look'. Even if there is correlation, does that mean masculine features somehow cause success on the field? As in, is there something about a confident self-image, brought about by societal cues, that makes a player more in line for success in a game that requires a certain level of confidence that may border on arrogance? In other words, do you get a look in your eye because you're good at sports? Or, are people with that look in their eye often better at sports? Even if we could ever prove that it is an identifiable trait, it seems like a chicken or egg scenario at best.

At what point do we wonder if these facial features scouts look for are simply the features of good-looking kids?

You could argue that scouts may fall victim to something supervisors supposedly suffer from called the halo effect? The halo effect occurs, theoretically, when those in charge rate overall performance of subordinates highly, but are subconsciously basing their assessment on the total package by focusing on just one outstanding quality. (Schultz and Schultz "Psychology and Work Today") The one outstanding quality doesn't necessarily have to be good looks (although that one is a fairly famous example). For instance, many people often assume that someone attractive, without knowing any other thing about them, will be outgoing and have a lot of friends. It's human nature to assume attractive people are self-confident even though many of us probably have experienced at least some anecdotal evidence to the contrary.

I doubt many scouts- at least none with long careers- would let 'the Good Face' carry a kid with no bat, no glove, and no arm to a high overall grade. But, when combined with a decent arm, decent glove, and a decent bat, I wonder if the halo effect may help push a kid a little further along. Or at least prompt another visit from a scout. That second visit, given the small sample sizes that scouts fight as part of their everyday job, may be enough to showcase a previously unknown level of play that a second short look may reveal.

Malcom Gladwell claims, in his book Blink, that certain people, so learned are they in their particular profession, may actually have the ability to make more accurate assessments of people in a fraction of the time and with far less data than it takes others to make a reliable assessment. Gladwell's proof is often anecdotal or based on cherry-picked studies, but it is also just as often interesting, in my opinion. From art experts that spot forgeries to top automotive salesmen that spot serious buyers, Gladwell wrote about people that seem to have a gift when it comes to making snap judgments. Since scouts don't often have the luxury of watching a player throughout an entire season of high school or college ball (there are too many kids to invest so much time into one), I wonder if maybe the best scouts develop some innate ability to see beyond obvious abilities that others can pick up on, like speed or arm strength.

Perhaps scouts are subconsciously drawn to attractive players due to the halo effect. Or, perhaps they are conditioned to be drawn to them because they've seen self-confident attractive ballplayers succeed over the years. I don't know and I don't believe there's a way to tell. There's probably no real way to test the 'Good Face', despite Ken Funck's entertaining results in the article linked in the first paragraph. So, we're left knowing that even if we could prove a certain look does lend itself to baseball success, we'd still have issues such as confirmation bias or illusory correlation. Put simply, we'd never know if good looking guys are better at baseball, or if good looking guys simply get more chances to move up in baseball.

Either way, I hope it's a trait scouts continue to give credence to, as 'the Good Face' is the only projectable baseball trait I have to offer to my two sons.

David Wade also contributes to http://www.baseballdailydigest.com and welcomes comments at david DOT wade AT insightbb DOT com.

Saturday, September 04, 2010

Moving Manny

Posted by Jeffrey Gross
Though I had some harsh words for White Sox management earlier this week over the Jim Thome/Manny Ramirez situation (said words seem to be mostly aimed at Ozzie Guillen, the brainchild of the rotating DH, but I still hold the GM ultimately responsible for giving such deference to his manager), I nonetheless noted that " [w]ithout question, the Manny move is an upgrade for the White Sox."

The question I seek to answer today is how much value Manny should prospectively provide the Pale Hose. Dave Cameron saw the difference between Manny and Mark Kotsay as worth about 8.0 runs per about 100 plate appearances. What I am going to do is take Manny’s numbers at Dodgers Stadium and attempt to translate them over into the AL for the White Sox.

As a preemptive disclaimer (given past experiences), these translations tend to be more theoretical than actual, forming a baseline around which statistical noise and random luck oscillate around. Over a meager 30 game sample, anything is possible.

For the Dodgers, Manny hit .312/.407/.508 (.915 OPS) with 15 doubles, no triples and 8 homers over 196 AB/232 PA. His NL BABIP of .348 is .028 points ahead of what his expected BABIP (xBABIP) is, a mark of .320, given his batted ball profile playing for Los Angeles. This xBABIP-BABIP split represents a difference of four hits for Manny. If we adjust Manny’s 2010 triple slash line for the Dodgers, optimistically assuming all four subtracted hits would have only been of the singles variety, Manny’s theoretical luck-neutral line for the Dodgers "falls" to .291/.390/.490 (.880 OPS). That line would represent 57.0 hits over 196 AB, distributed as 34.0 singles, 15.0 doubles and 8.0 home runs.

Now that we have a neutralized Dodgers line to work with, we need to translate Manny's triple-slash components from the Dodgers to the White Sox. First, we need to translate the BABIP, again assuming that all hits added/subtracted would have only been of the singles variety. Next, we will need to translate the walk and hit-by-pitch
rate between parks (case studies, such as this one, shows that certain factors, such as temperature and humidity, affect control rates between ballparks). Finally, we will need to translate the hits-type rates between ballparks.

According to THT's "top secret" park factor data (henceforth referred to generically as "park factor data"), Dodgers Stadium has a four-year BABIP index of 1.00265724. Likewise, U.S. Cellular Field has a BABIP index of 0.97111976. That may seem strange at first glance, given that Dodgers Stadium is more of a pitcher's park (-10% effect on runs production, per Baseball-Reference) and U.S. Cellular Field is more of a hitter's park (+8.0% effect on runs production, per Baseball-Reference). However, a glance at the park factor data indicates that the dimensions of U.S. Cellular Field only tend to exaggerate home run (+21.3% HR/FB% index) production at the expense of all other hit outcomes (-0.7% 1B index, -5.6% 2B index, -18.3% 3B index). U.S. Cellular Field's flyball oriented park dimensions come paired with higher-than-average flyball and pop-up rates, two ball-in-play (BIP) types with low expected hit outcomes (xH). Dodgers Stadium, meanwhile tend to yield more groundballs (.237 xH) and less pop-ups (.008 xH)).

Taking Manny's luck-neutral xBABIP of .320 for the Dodgers and multiplying it by one-half of the U.S. Cellular Field BABIP index and dividing it by one-half of the Dodgers Stadium index reveals a translated xBABIP of .315. This additional .005 point drop in BABIP would result in the loss of another hit from Manny's season (again, keeping the PA rate constant). Optimistically assuming this subtracted hit would have only been a single, Manny's expected triple-slash line for the White Sox only takes a slight tumble: .287/.384/.486 (.870 OPS).

Park factors also reveal that a move from Dodgers Stadium to U.S. Cellular Field would have a favorable impact on Manny's already elite on-base percentage. According to the park factor data, the half-country move would result in a +2.51% impact on a hitter's walk total while simultaneously making that hitter 12.45% more likely to be hit by a pitch. Applying these numbers to Manny's walk totals (32) and hit-by-pitch totals (1) with the Dodgers gives us a new, translated total of 32.8 and 1.1. Applying these numbers to Manny's AB total and OBP, we get a new adjusted triple-slash line of .287/.387/.486 (.873 OPS) -- not too much of a difference with on-base factors considered, but a slight OBP bump nonetheless.

Finally, in a translation from Los Angeles to Chicago, we need to adjust Manny's prospective power output to account for park factor differences. For the Dodgers, Manny posted a HR/FB% of 14.0% (57 FB) over 236 PA. Technically, the statistically significant HR/FB rate threshold for hitters is 300 PA, but for the sake of simplicity, let's pretend that the 14.0% mark represents what Manny is capable of on the season. Before we translate the home run numbers, we must consider weighted play time effects. A hitter only plays one-half of his games at home, assuming he plays all 162 games his team plays in a season. Manny was no exception in Los Angeles, accruing 50.5% of his total at-bats at home. For the sake of simplicity, I am going to weight the park factors for both parks by a 1/2 step.

A move from Dodgers Stadium to U.S. Cellular Field (PF_USCF/PF_DS) would first have the following impacts on Manny's numbers:
*No impact on Manny's flyball rate
*A 0.978029562 singles index (0.989014781 impact)
*A 0.964803037 doubles index (0.982401519 impact)
*A 1.031384918 triples index (1.015692459 impact)
*A 1.19796759 HR/FB% index (1.098983795 impact)

Applying the half-step of these indicies, as indicated in parenthesis above, to Manny's adjusted numbers, we find that over a 232 PA/195 AB (recall, the AB total had to be modified slightly to reflect the minor change in walk rates and HBP rates between parks) Manny would be expected to produce 32.8 singles, 14.7 doubles, 0.0 triples, and 8.8 home runs.

All of the above considered, Manny would have an expected triple-slash line of .289/.389/.499 (.888 OPS) playing for the White Sox.

Those numbers are quite good, albeit a down-step from Manny's career OPS of exactly 1.000, and represent a substantial upgrade over Mark Kotsay's line of .237/.311/.385 (.695 OPS) for the White Sox. Manny should post around 100 or so PA for the White Sox in his brief tenure on the South Side of Chicago, so cutting Manny's total expected numbers, above, in half should yield a reasonable forecast of what White Sox fans should expect in September (in terms of absolutes): about 4-5 home runs, 16-17 walks, 56-57 hits and plenty of Manny-being-Manny moments.

Jeffrey Gross is a 23-year old law student (and Cubs fan) who currently resides in Madison, WI. In addition to writing for The Hardball Times, he currently writes baseball analysis for the Game Of Inches blog under the pseudonym David "MVP" Eckstein and has previously worked for The Daily Illini and Northern Star newspapers as a film critic and sportswriter (respectively). You can reach him by email at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or by comment at http://www.gameofinches.blogspot.com

Friday, September 03, 2010

Pitchers nowadays are on speed

Posted by Mike Fast
A certain young Cincinnati pitcher named Aroldis Chapman has generated some buzz over the past week by throwing the fastest pitch ever thrown in the history of the world. Or did he?

It turns out that's not an easy question to answer either simply or accurately, even though we have a lot more and better data than they did in the days when Walter Johnson's fastball was measured against, variously, a gravity drop interval recorder in a laboratory and a speeding motorcycle on Aberdeen Proving Grounds.

I'll try to explain how one would go about answering that question using pitch tracking data collected over the last few years. Most notably that involves the PITCHf/x camera system installed by Sportvision beginning in the 2006 playoffs and progressively installed throughout major league ballparks during the 2007 season. PITCHf/x systems have been in place in all major league ballparks since the start of the 2008 season, and well over 95% of the pitches thrown since then have been tracked by the system. PITCHf/x data is notable because it is used in Major League Baseball's online Gameday application, and it is available freely on the web for use by analysts. There are other pitch tracking systems using different technology, such as the TrackMan doppler radar system, but the data from these systems has not been made public.

Of course, there is also radar gun data, which I don't mean to dismiss. However, I'm not going to cover that in this article since the data has not been made public in any systematic fashion and I am not an expert on the use of radar guns.

There are two important things to understand about pitch speed data. The first is that a baseball thrown through air slows down during its travel due to the force of drag. PITCHf/x data tells us that fastballs lose about nine percent of their speed from the pitcher's hand to home plate. This means that where the speed measurement is made on the trajectory of the pitch is very important.

The drag force and measurement distances

Pitchers release the ball about 54 or 55 feet from the point of home plate. Radar guns attempt to measure the peak speed right out of the pitcher's hand, although there is evidence that they don't really pick up the speed until a few feet later. That evidence comes by way of comparison to PITCHf/x.

To explain why requires a little detour into how PITCHf/x works. If you want to skip this part, you can pick back up at the next paragraph. PITCHf/x measures the pitch trajectory using two video cameras, each capturing images at 30 frames per second. It tracks the ball across the area of green grass between the mound and the home plate area. These 15 or 20 images of the baseball are used to compute a smooth trajectory for the baseball, assuming constant acceleration. Such a trajectory can be fully described by nine parameters: an initial position, an initial velocity, and the acceleration, each in three dimensions. From these parameters we can calculate the position of the baseball at any point along the trajectory. For example, we could calculate where the baseball was when it was 10 feet from home plate or 50 feet from home plate. These nine parameters are reported on the MLB Gameday website for every pitch.

The values reported on Gameday are from a point on the trajectory that is 50 feet from home plate. This means that the speed that Gameday reports from PITCHf/x is not the speed at which the pitch left the pitcher's hand. In fact, it is a little slower than the release speed, by about 0.6 to 0.8 mph, depending on the speed of the pitch and the exact release point of the pitcher.

Sportvision and MLBAM experimented with reporting values at different distances from home plate before settling on the 50-foot reporting distance for the 2008 season. During the 2006 playoffs and 2007 season, PITCHf/x pitch speeds were reported at distances of 40, 45, 50 and 55 feet from home plate. PITCHf/x data from 2008, 2009 and 2010 is all from a 50-foot reporting distance (except for a brief period of time in August 2009 when 45 feet was used).

Ultimately, Sportvision and MLB Advanced Media (MLBAM) settled on the 50-foot distance for calculating pitch speeds because they believed this matched up best with the radar gun measurements that the baseball community was already familiar with. When they had reported from 55 feet, they were criticized for inflating the speeds. I have not done a detailed comparison between PITCHf/x data from 2007 and the BIS pitch speeds for 2007 available on Fangraphs, which presumably would have come from stadium radar guns. However, my impression from working with both data sets is that the 50-foot PITCHf/x speeds do generally agree pretty well with the BIS speed data. Making the same comparison after 2007 is problematic because stadium and TV speed displays began increasingly to use PITCHf/x data rather than radar gun data.

So, we see that the distance at which the speed is measured matters. There's also a bit of a philosophical question here. If we want to measure how fast the ball was going at its fastest, we want to know the speed out of the pitcher's hand. However, if we want to know how fast it seemed to the batter, we can find ourselves examining all sorts of other things. We could simply look at plate crossing speed, but that's not all that matters to the batter. Probably more closely related to the batter's perception of speed is the time from release to plate crossing. That time is affected by where the ball is released, where it crosses the plate, the speed of the baseball itself, and even the density of the air. I'm not sure there is one right answer for true pitch speed.

Once we agree on a standard for how to measure speed, if in fact we can agree, we come to our second important concept. Every measurement has an uncertainty attached to it. When we say that Aroldis Chapman's pitch was moving 103.9 mph when it was 50 feet from home plate, what does that mean? How do we know it wasn't really 102 mph or 105 mph, and how confident are we in that?

Error in the PITCHf/x measurement

There are at least two sources of possible error to consider. The first is the measurement error inherent in a well-calibrated PITCHf/x camera system. Remember that PITCHf/x determines pitch speeds by measuring the position of the baseball 15 or 20 times during its flight and turning this information into a smooth, constant-acceleration trajectory. Based on the accuracy with which PITCHf/x is able to determine the location of the ball and based on the algorithm and assumptions they use to produce the trajectory, the measurement accuracy we can expect from PITCHf/x for the speed of a single pitch is 0.4 mph.

Since we expect that this type of measurement error is random, though we can only get within 0.4 mph on a single pitch, we can do much better for a large sample of pitches. For example, if we wanted to determine a pitcher's average fastball velocity, we would only need 100 pitches to reduce the random measurement error to 0.04 mph. (Average error = sqrt (0.4^2 * 100) / 100 = 0.04.) After 1000 pitches, the random measurement error would be only 0.013 mph. So you see that we can basically reduce the effect of random measurement error to an arbitrarily small value by collecting additional data.

However, there is another source of error that is more difficult to deal with. If the PITCHf/x camera system is not well calibrated, systematic errors will be introduced. The effect of this systematic error is unlikely to decrease as the sample size increases.

What do I mean when I say that a PITCHf/x camera system is well calibrated? I mean that it does an accurate job of translating the pixel locations of the baseball in the images captured by the cameras into real-world, three-dimensional locations on the baseball diamond. Sportvision has calibration procedures o ensure that this translation is an accurate one.

Generally speaking, the calibration process seems to work pretty well, well enough that we have a large pitch data set that is trustworthy for analysis. We can identify pitch types, and what a pitcher throws on one day in one park matches up quite well with what he throws on another day in another park where his tosses are measured by a different PITCHf/x camera system.

But exactly how accurate is it? I have developed a process to measure the accuracy of the PITCHf/x system in each park over time. The process involves comparing a pitcher who pitches in one park with how he pitches in another park and assuming that certain things about his pitches should remain about the same from game to game. This kind of information is then collated for all the pitchers in the league. The result is a gauge of the accuracy of each PITCHf/x system. This gauge can also be applied to parameters other than speed, but here's my assessment of the speed accuracy of the PITCHf/x systems in the 30 major league stadiums in 2010.

Park Code  Error (mph)
KCA          1.1
COL          1.1
CHA          0.7
CLE          0.6
BOS          0.5
SEA          0.2
ATL          0.2
SDN          0.2
MIN          0.2
TOR          0.2
WAS          0.1
ARI          0.1
DET          0.1
SLN          0.0
MIL          0.0
CHN          0.0
PHI          0.0
HOU          0.0
OAK         -0.1
CIN         -0.2
PIT         -0.3
ANA         -0.3
BAL         -0.4
TBA         -0.4
FLO         -0.5
SFN         -0.7
NYA         -0.7
LAN         -0.8
NYN         -1.0
TEX         -1.3

That is the systematic measurement error for pitch speed reported at 50 feet, averaged over the 2010 season. If you want to know the true speed of a pitch thrown in Kansas City this year, you should subtract about 1.1 mph. The calibration of a particular PITCHf/x system changes more often than once a season, so those numbers may not apply to a specific game, but they should give a general idea of the size of errors that may be observed.

(You may notice the numbers for all the parks don't average to exactly zero. I believe that's due to a seasonal effect that I am still trying to understand. The systems are baselined against the period 2008-2010. Pitchers seem to throw a little harder in the last half of the season than in the first half, even after accounting for temperature differences.)

Fastest ever?

We see that Cincinnati's PITCHf/x system has been pretty accurate for pitch speeds this year. This also seems to be true for the specific games in which Chapman pitched this week. So we can believe that he pitched a ball that was traveling 103.9 mph plus or minus 0.5 mph or so when it was 50 feet from home plate. It was probably going nearly 105 mph when it left his hand.

Is this the fastest ever? As far as I know, it's the fastest pitch recorded by PITCHf/x. Some people have mentioned the 104.8 mph pitch that Joel Zumaya threw to Frank Thomas on Oct. 10, 2006. That was the pitch speed calculated by PITCHf/x at a distance of 55 feet from home plate. Translated to the 50-foot distance that is used by PITCHf/x today, that would be a 103.8-mph pitch, slower than the Chapman's reported 103.9 mph, but the difference between the two is well within the margin of measurement error. I don't have the data at hand to determine how well the Oakland PITCHf/x system was calibrated that day in 2006.

Chapman's average fastball speed of 101.4 mph after two games is certainly higher than Zumaya's average fastball speed of 98.8 mph from 2008 to 2010. We'll see if he can keep up that velocity as the month of September unfolds, and hopefully, into next year as well.

Mike Fast is a Royals fan who enjoys investigating baseball questions using data of many sorts. He is a member of Complete Game Consulting. He welcomes comments via e-mail.

120 years ago today: the first 100-HR hitter

Posted by Chris Jaffe
On Sept. 3, 1890, a bit of baseball history was made: the 100-homer club, currently 754 members strong, came into existence as the first player to ever crack triple digits knocked one out of the park.

I'd love to say it's a famous name everyone's heard of, but that's not the case. It was Harry Stovey. See? You never heard of him, did you?

He was a heckuva player. He led the league in homers five times, which ain't bad. In one of those seasons, he tied the all-time single season HR high in the long-defunct American Association with 19. (The current minor league of that name is a different league that emerged later). Stovey was also the all-time career home run king before Roger Connor, who was the all-time HR king before Ruth. Stovey nearly became the only man to lead three leagues in homers. He paced the NL twice and the American Association thrice, and finished two behind Players Leaguer Connor in 1890.

Yet despite all that, he's not in Cooperstown. Not only did he peak a half-century before the Hall of Fame's creation, but he did so in the wrong league. Though the American Association was a major league from 1882-91, it was the second of the two major leagues. No one who spent most of his career in that league has been enshrined in Cooperstown. Stovey has to settle for enshrinement in the Hall of Merit.

For a modern spin, three active players are sitting on 99 homers: Jack Cust, Garrett Atkins and Jeff Francoeur. If one of them goes deep today, he'll have a rather well timed 100th.

History instructor by day, statnerd by night, Chris Jaffe leads one of the most exciting double lives imaginable; with the exception of every other double life possible to imagine. Despite his lack of comic-book-hero-worthiness, Chris enjoys farting around with this stuff. His new book, Evaluating Baseball's Managers is available for order. Chris welcomes responses to his articles via e-mail.

Visual Baseball: Yankees vs. Rays Smackdown

Posted by Kevin Dame
Here's a version of Rankometer I'm experimenting with, designed to compare 2 teams head to head. Let's compare the Yankee and Rays on hitting (OPS), pitching (FIP), defense (UZR), and base running (Fangraphs Speed Score).

HITTING: The Rays are disadvantaged at almost every position, and at their strongest positions (3B and LF) they only have a slight advantage.

PITCHING: The teams look very similar, with both teams' starting rotations surprisingly average, and their top relievers closing out games in dominant fashion.

DEFENSE: The Rays are better than the Yankees, but not as much as you'd think.

BASE RUNNING: Not surprisingly, the Rays are superior base runners, although they grind to a halt at the DH position. The Yankees are surprisingly good base runners, although Cano and Swisher can really clog up the base paths, and Arod seems to be slowing by the day.

"The commonality between science and art is in trying to see profoundly - to develop strategies of seeing and showing." - Edward Tufte.

Feel free to send comments, questions, and suggestions to Kevin via email.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Phillies 12, Rockies 11: I went to the Ohio State-Marshall game last night and for what it's worth, each of these teams had more offense than the Thundering Herd. Heck, Chase Utley himself almost drove in as many, um, points as the Herd did. Six RBI including a grand slam in a nine-run seventh inning. Colorado and Philly used 14 pitchers between them. The Rockies had 20 hits and still lost. Just ugly.

Tigers 10, Twins 9: Another ugly one, but a wild ugly one. Quoting the AP is probably the most expedient thing here: "six lead changes, five ties, four errors, two blown saves, 25 runners left on base and at least four botched double plays." And it lasted close to five hour too.

Indians 6, Mariners 3: It was the Shin-Soo Choo Show: five RBI, courtesy of a bases-clearing double and a two-run homer. The Mariners' bats went to sleep late, with 18 of the final 19 going quietly. That takes some real doin' against Cleveland's staff.

Yankees 5, Athletics 0: Hit this one up yesterday. As I said then, Dallas Braden left early with cramps on a hot and steamy day. CC Sabathia doesn't know what the fuss was all about: "I've always enjoyed pitching in hot weather. Keep the sweat going, keep my arm loose." I still wonder if guys who play their home games in 68 degree weather have a harder time adjusting to heat wave conditions than others. They'd have to, right?

Mets 4, Braves 2: It's been so long since Tim Hudson lost a game that I think both he and I still had hair when it happened. The Mets figured him out, though, at least to the tune of four runs in eight innings, which was enough given the Braves' quiet bats.

Red Sox 6, Orioles 4: A big second inning -- five runs, led by Adrian Beltre's homer -- put the Sox up early. Dice-K gave four of them back in the sixth, but the pen bailed him out. Back home for Boston tonight to face Manny and the White Sox. I'm sure this will not be noted by the Boston media at all these next few days.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Thursday, September 02, 2010

2010: If we still had pennant races

Posted by Joe Dimino
Let's take a gander at how good the "pennant races," 1969-93 style, would look this year. Obviously the schedules would be slightly different, but the impact of the unbalanced schedule is generally much less than most think anyway.

The Yankees and Devil Rays would be neck and neck with no safety net. 1993 Braves-Giants or 1980 Yankees-Orioles anyone? This would be one of the classic pennant races for the ages.

We'd have the Twins, Rangers and White Sox in an excellent three-team race.

The Phillies would be pulling away. Wow, the Cardinals really have fallen apart—five games back from Philly at the start of play today (Thursday). I didn't realize this one was turning into a clunker. Think about how the Phillies' season would look from this perspective.

Finally, check out the NL West: 1982 all over again . . . Atlanta and Cincy tied, San Diego a game and a half back and the Giants lurking 4 1/2 back.

The tension that would have been building over this season with these races would have been phenomenal. Instead I've barely paid attention to the season, knowing eight of these 11 teams are going to be in the tournament anyway.

And what has the wild-card and three division set-up given us?

A safety net for the Rays/Yankees. Boston would be just as far out, and there are no additional contenders (which is the whole point of the wild card) in the AL. Texas has no pennant race; the Rangers just get to cruise. The Twins have an extra cushion as well. Again, this completely sucks the life out of the regular season.

In the NL there are no additional contenders either. This alignment has made the Phillies' season more exciting, but really they've just swapped spots with the Rangers. The Phightins are a game and a half up on SF as opposed to five up on St. Louis. SF is a couple of games closer to the playoffs also, but the Giants are still a contender in either scenario.

So instead of three great month-long races, we get a week of manufactured playoffs where everyone starts even again. We also risk losing both of the two best teams in the AL from the final four, instead of guaranteeing one will be there in addition to the great final month of the season they'd provide.

I do follow the "old school" standings all season long every year. Generally in the first round, aside from the Yankees, I root for whatever the LCS would have been in that format. As a fan, I would gladly sacrifice the Yankees making the playoffs as often if it meant getting my pennant races back.

Almost every year the old pennant races would have made for a much more exciting September than the current one, and it's amazing how generally very few "extra contenders" are created, which was the whole point of the thing: to boost September attendance around the league. The extra week of playoffs was secondary in the motivation for changing the alignment.

There is so much public clamor for those games, that they've landed on cable: The networks don't even care about them. They'd rather show soap operas. Major League Baseball has devalued the regular season much like the NCAA Tournament has for college basketball (don't get me wrong, I love the NCAA Tournament, but I don't pay much attention to the sport before the conference tournaments). I'm obviously a serious baseball fan, but each year I find myself more and more focused on October and less and less on April-September, which is a shame.

Joe Dimino was an author with The Hardball Times who stopped writing several years ago due to real life taking up too much time, as well as the longest case of writer's block on record. He founded the The Hall of Merit. You can contact Joe by clicking here.

Twenty years ago today (9/2/10)

Posted by Chris Jaffe
Twenty years ago today, on September 2, 1990, Dave Stieb finally did it. After years of painful teasing, he finally threw a complete game no-hitter. Rarely had a pitcher gone such torture to achieve this goal.

Prior to that day, Stieb had five separate complete game one-hitters. As an added bonus: all five one-hitters had come in a fairly rapid sequence, in a 15-month sequence from May 1988 to August 1989.

The first one, on May 31, 1988, wasn’t too bad. B. J. Surhoff singled with one out in the fourth inning. Eh, that’s too early to get too anxious about a no-hitter.

The next one was quite different. Against the Cleveland Indians on September 24, 1988 – Stieb’s next-to-last start of the season – he went quite a bit deeper into the game without allowing a hit. He made it all the way to the ninth inning without allowing a hit. He retired the first two batters, putting him only one out away from history.

At this point, Cleveland’s star second baseman – the already veteran Julio Franco – stepped to the plate. He fought Stieb mightily, fouling off three straights pitches after falling into a 1-2 hole, but Stieb couldn’t seem to put him away. Finally, on the eighth pitch of the battle, Franco put the ball into play – and it looked like Stieb had won. An easy grounder went to Toronto’s second baseman Manuel Lee.

As everyone got up, expecting Stieb to get his no-hitter, the inexplicable happened. As the ball approached Lee, it took this bizarre hop well over Lee’s head, catapulting into centerfield for a mother of all flukes single. I believe the ball hit the boundary between Toronto’s turf and the dirt around second. Whatever, Stieb had been denied. He had to settle for a hard-fought 1-0 win, but not a no-hitter.

Well, he shrugged it off well and came out firing in his next start on September 30, 1988. In fact, wouldn’t you know it – for the second straight start he took a no-hitter into the ninth inning. For the second straight start, he retired the first two batters in the ninth, putting him within one out of a no-hitter. For the second straight game, the potential last out (pinch hitter Jim Traber) fought Stieb hard, this time running the at bat for six pitches. And yes, for the second straight game, would-be out #27 became hit #1 with a single. Dave Stieb was a cursed version of Johnny Vander Meer.

Stieb came back the next year and on April 10, 1989 – only his second start of the new year – threw yet another complete game one-hitter. This time the Fates were less malicious: the single came in the fifth inning with one out by Yankee catcher Jaime Quirk. But overall, it was entirely ridiculous. Stieb had now thrown four complete game one-hitters in less than 12 months – including three in his last four starts.

On August 26, 1989, it happened one more time. Stieb threw a no-hitter for five and two-thirds innings – long enough into the game to make everyone aware of what was possible – before Robin Yount singled for what would be the Brewers’ only hit on the day. It was an infield single to third. Ouch. Again, God had forsaken Dave Stieb.

Which brings us to today’s anniversary: September 2, 1990, Stieb finally did it. For the third time, he took a no-hitter into the ninth inning. For the second time, it was against the Cleveland Indians. Fortunately, Julio Franco now played for Texas.

That said, the ninth inning was no picnic for Stieb. Leading off the inning, pinch hitter Chris James fought Stieb for six pitches before flying out deep to left field. Next up, Candy Maldanado fought Stieb for another six pitches before Stieb – rallying from a 2-1 count, fanned him.

OK, now Stieb, for the third time, was one out away from his long-sought no-hitter. Was the pressure getting to him? Well, I’ll tell you this much – he walked the next batter (Alex Cole) on four pitches. Yeah, I think he felt some butterflies. Now Jerry Browne came to the plate. Like Franco two years before, he was Cleveland’s second baseman and represented their last chance to break up yet another possible Dave Stieb no-hitter.

Ball one. That was Stieb’s fifth straight pitch to miss the strike zone. That’s one way to stop them from getting a hit. Next pitch Browne took, and it finally caught the strike zone, evening up the count. Meanwhile, Cole advanced to second on defensive interference. (The game was only 2-0 and the final itself was still in doubt). Stieb tossed another ball, and then evened the count up again, 2-2. It was another called strike – Browne hadn’t moved his bat yet. No one had for eight straight pitches.

Stieb threw his next pitch – number five in this appearance and #123 for the game and this time Browne liked it – and finally swung. The shot had its chances – it was a liner beyond the infield – but towards right, where Junior Felix caught it. Game over – Dave Stieb had FINALLY done it.

It’s a damn good thing he did it that day, too, because his days as an effective starter were pretty much done. That win put Stieb at 17-5 for the year. He won one more game that year, and then only four in each of the next two years – and he never won multiple games in a season after that.

Though long overdue, Stieb finally did it, twenty years ago today.

B-ref's Play Index came in handy lookiing up all the CG 1-hitters for Stieb.

History instructor by day, statnerd by night, Chris Jaffe leads one of the most exciting double lives imaginable; with the exception of every other double life possible to imagine. Despite his lack of comic-book-hero-worthiness, Chris enjoys farting around with this stuff. His new book, Evaluating Baseball's Managers is available for order. Chris welcomes responses to his articles via e-mail.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Marlins 16, Nationals 10: Fisticuffsmanship! Nyjer Morgan's mound-charge was pretty good until he whiffed on that punch, but the star of this show was Gabby Sanchez, who came over from first base with a move that put me in mind of Manny Fernandez's flying burrito. Wait, you're not telling me you don't know who Manny Fernandez is, do you? He teamed with the Boogie Woogie Man Jimmy Valiant for cryin' out loud! They took the tag team belt from the Rock 'n' Roll Express! Really, you don't know him? Philistines.

Reds 6, Brewers 1: Aroldis Chapman faced six batters, struck out three and hit 103.9 mph on the radar gun. Only Joel Zumaya has thrown a faster pitch in the few short years Pitch f/x has been around. Yikes.

Diamondbacks 5, Padres 2: Brandon Allen's first major league action this year was occasioned by a home run and a couple of nice plays in the outfield. Not bad for a guy who has never played left field in the bigs before. Oh, and the Padres are just happy that the Cardinals' late-season implosion is getting more attention than theirs is. For now.

Giants 2, Rockies 1: Welcome back to the land of the living, Tim Lincecum (8 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 9K). Three games are now all that separate the Giants and the Padres.

Twins 2, Tigers 1: Max Scherzer deserved better (9 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 9K), but so too did Francisco Liriano who threw seven shutout innings and got a no decision as well. Danny Valencia won it with an RBI single in the 10th.

Braves 4, Mets 1: Freddie Freeman's debut isn't going to do anything to keep Derrek Lee on the bench (0 for 3 with a K), but old men like Jason Heyward and Tommy Hanson were able to carry the load. Pretty sure I own underwear older than all three of 'em.

Rangers 4, Royals 3: I'm crestfallen that Francoeur didn't report to the Rangers in time to make it into this one. The Royals probably are too, because that's one fewer game they have to scout Frenchy before their as-inevitable-as-the-sun-rising-tomorrow signing of him this winter.

Yankees 4, Athletics 3: A.J. Burnett returns from the land of the living dead to get his first win in a long damn time (6 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, 8K). The Yankees maintain their one-game lead in the East.

Rays 2, Blue Jays 1: Sean Rodriguez was a double short of the cycle (take THAT Gleeman!) and David Price picked up his 16th win. Which, as you can see from the Tigers-Twins game, is a totally useful statistic.

Phillies 5, Dodgers 1: Roy Oswalt walked six dudes in six innings, but he got away with it because he only allowed one hit. Clayton Kershaw struck out 11 dudes but didn't have a win to show for it in part because he gave up two homers. Oh, and because the Dodgers bullpen kind of sucks these days. There's probably some kind of lesson in there somewhere.

Red Sox 9, Orioles 6: Again, wins don't mean anything, but Jon Lester is now 13-0 lifetime against Baltimore, and that's pretty cool. Well, not for Baltimore, but you know what I mean.

Astros 5, Cardinals 2: I hit this one up yesterday, but suffice it to say that Jeff Suppan is not who I think of when I think of the term "stopper."

Cubs 5, Pirates 3: Tom Gorzelanny got knocked out of the game when a comebacker hit his right hand in the third, but the bullpen kept the Cubbies safe and dry for six innings. Fukudome was 3 for 3 with a couple of doubles an RBI and a walk. Dude had an outstanding August and looks to be continuing his tear.

Angels 4, Mariners 2: Matsui's two-run homer won the game for Anaheim, but Franklin Gutierrez had the snag of the game.

White Sox 6, Indians 4: Alex Rios hit a solo shot and Paul Konerko hit a three-run homer in the eighth to bring the Sox back from a 4-1 deficit. Manny's debut only amounted to a single, but if you're really starving for Manny news, you can read this inside report about how he really got to the White Sox. Shocking, I know, but I believe that's what really happened.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Wednesday, September 01, 2010

The THT Graphical Report

Posted by Dave Studeman
Time for the latest in baseball pictures. I've created the latest Hardball Times Graphical Report, featuring pennant race graphs and hitting/pitching/fielding breakdowns for each team. Stats are through the end of August. You can download it here.

Dave was called a "national treasure" by Rob Neyer. Seriously. Comments about this article can be sent to him through the miracle of e-mail.

Welcome to Chapmania

Posted by Jeff Moore
Can we please come up with a new nickname? It reminds me too much of Newmanium.

Aroldis Champan's debut was the talk of not just the prospect world, but the entire baseball world as well, and the Reds' Cuban prodigy did not disappoint.

The outing was as brief as his fastball's trip to the plate, but it was just as exhilarating. Between the excitement in the stadium and the transparent helplessness of the Brewers' hitters, Chapman's debut was everything that both Reds' fans and baseball fans could have hoped for.

But gushing aside, it's time to see exactly how Chapman performed. We know he threw hard. We know he dominated Jonathan Lucroy, Craig Counsell and Carlos Gomez, which may say more about the Brewers' ineptitude this season than anything about Chapman. And Pitch f/X data is as wonderful of a baseball invention as we've had in decades, but it alone doesn't tell the entire story.

Watching Chapman (and part of me wishes he had to work a little harder just so he would have thrown more than 8 pitches), I was looking for one thing and one thing only - was Chapman hitting his target? Throwing strikes is one thing, but throwing the right strikes is another all together. Chapman, more than almost any other pitcher, will be able to get away with missing his target over the plate, simply because of his velocity. But the main difference between big league hitters and minor league hitters is their ability to punish mistakes, no matter how fast they're coming in. Even at first, Chapman will be able to get away with fastballs over the middle, but once the league gets a book on him (which may not be this year if he's only relieving), hitters will know if he's compensating for a lack of control by throwing it down the middle, and will be able to tee off (relatively speaking) even on 105 mph.

But 8 pitches into his major league career, Chapman showed no intention of falling into this trap.* Of his 6 fastballs, Chapman his his catcher's target with 3 of them (which is plenty when you throw 100+ mph), and two of his misses were triple-digit offerings down the middle to Counsell, which, given Counsell's complete lack of power, may have actually been the plan. Both of the sliders Chapman threw (which were both to Lucroy, a righty) were exactly where his catcher called for them - down and in - and the final one on which Lucroy swung through was buried at the hitter's feet, which is exactly where an 0-2 slider should be.

It's way to early to make any sort of conclusion about Chapman's command based on our extremely small sample size, but when compared to the scouting report I wrote up on him after his first minor league start, I found some consistencies and some improvements.

In his first minor league start (on April 10 against Toledo in Double-A), Chapman threw 63 fastballs (of 85 pitches) and hit his location with 37 of them (59%). When he missed, he missed up in the zone. This was consistent with his brief outing on Tuesday. His slider, however, was another story, as the two he threw to Lucroy were two of the better sliders I've seen him throw. In April, he hit his target with just 5 of 17 pitches (29%), repeatedly missing up and over the plate. These are the pitches that major leaguers will hit. The best sign of Chapman's improvement was the fact that he kept both sliders down, especially given that his off-speed offerings were the biggest question mark surrounding him when he signed.

Chapman should get multiple opportunities over the next month to put his arsenal on display, and I'll continue to monitor the movement of his catcher's mitt as it happens. It may be early, but what's wrong with getting a little excited over some dominant prospect action?

*Yes, I'm jumping the gun and giving a knee-jerk reaction. Get over it.

Notable September Call-Ups

Some notable prospects that have already promoted thanks to today's roster expansion are Jenrry Mejia (Mets), Freddie Freeman (Braves), Carlos Carrasco (Indians), and Yonder Alonso (Reds), with reports claiming that Jeremy Jeffress and Mat Gamel (Brewers), J.P. Arencibia (Blue Jays), and Brandon Snyder (Orioles) are also slated to get the call. There are sure to be more on the way, but the day is young.

Arizona Fall League Rosters Announced

As if there wasn't enough going on today, the rosters for the 2010 Arizona Fall League were announced today as well. You can view the full rosters here, but the most notable prospects include Dustin Ackley (Mariners), Josh Vitters and Brett Jackson (Cubs), Tony Sanchez and Andrew Lambo (Pirates), Koby Clemens (Astros), Adeiny Hechavarria (Blue Jays), Jose Iglesias (Red Sox), Jared Mitchell (White Sox), Grant Green and Michael Taylor (A's), Danny Duffy, Mike Montgomery, Eric Hosmer, and Derrick Robinson (Royals), Brett Lawrie (Brewers), Chance Ruffin (Tigers), and Brandon Belt (Giants).

Jeff Moore is the creator of MLBProspectWatch.com, your one-stop site for all the information you need about minor league prospects. He can be reached via e-mail at mlbprospectwatch AT gmail DOT com.

The White Sox owe their fans an apology

Posted by Jeffrey Gross
The White Sox decided to experiment with their DH spot in 2010. Instead of re-signing a prodigious slugger with great on base skills (Jim Thome), general manager Kenny Williams instead decided Mark Kotsay was awesome (he is not) and that the DH should exist for the alternative purposes of resting the fielders (some of whom—specifically Carlos Quentin—should not be playing defense in the first place).

Comically enough, Manager Ozzie Guillen blames Thome for no longer being a White Sox. Quoth Guillen:

Jim Thome made the decision to leave to the Dodgers," Guillen said initially about the August 2009 deal. "He made that decision to himself, all right."

Though Guillen has sarcastically accepted the blame for the Thome non-signing, he and Williams owe a genuine apology to White Sox fans. Here is why:

The White Sox, after Tuesday night's win against Cleveland, sit four games behind the Minnesota Twins in the AL Central standings. Thome, who makes a measly $1.5 million this season, has accrued +2.4 WAR for the Twins while Kotsay, who has the same salary, has produced -0.6 WAR for the White Sox.

In a vacuum, a re-signing of Thome by the White Sox would give the South Siders a +3.0 WAR swing in the AL Central Standings. Note, however, that Thome has only 279 plate appearances this season while splitting DH duties with Jason Kubel. Of course, Thome's been platooned, which may exaggerate his bottom line, but any potential non-platoon "regression" would surely be offset by the additional playing time he would have seen with the White Sox. Let's just leave the WAR at +2.4 and call it even.

The White Sox do not play in a vacuum, however. Thome, in not re-signing with the White Sox, signed a deal with the Twins. Hence, in a Thome-on-the-Sox-over-Kotsay theoretical situation, you have to not only add +3.0 WAR to the White Sox 2010 win total, but also subtract 2.4 WAR from the Twins' 2010 win total. That turns a 4.0 game lead by the Twins in the AL Central into a 1.5 game lead by the White Sox.

Still think it is okay to be sarcastic, Ozzie? It gets worse.

Not only are the White Sox sitting 4.0 games behind the Twins, but they are in need of a hitting DH. (Turns out burning Mark Kotsay's bat was not enough of a move at the July trade deadline. Maybe the White Sox should have tried burning Kotsay's contract (and Mark Teahen's, while they were at it) instead.

Unable to procure either Adam Dunn or Lance Berkman, the White Sox claimed Manny Ramirez from the Dodgers in exchange for salary relief. Without question, the Manny move is an upgrade for the White Sox. Whereas Ramirez is projected by ZiPS to hit .290/.398/.533 (.399 wOBA) for the rest of the season, Kotsay was pegged at only .244/.313/.384 (.305 wOBA) down the stretch. Dave Cameron sees this difference as worth around +1.0 WAR for the White Sox. Unfortunately for the White Sox, however, they are four games behind the Twins (thus, they have three more wins to make up somehow) and Thome has a wOBA of .413 on the season (with a projected wOBA of .370 down the stretch).

Per MLB Trade Rumors, 31 games of "salary relief" means $3.8 million. That figure is more than 2.5 times what Thome will make all season and almost $1 million more than Kotsay and Thome's salaries combined.

Then, of course, you need to consider that Manny is Manny and you never know quite what you are going to get with him. He might try to get pregnant again or invoke his alleged "do not play" clause during day games. In another chapter in the "Manny Being Manny" saga, he took the early flight to Cleveland from L.A. Tuesday morning and was at Progressive Field in time to play ball, but was not in the White Sox starting lineup. He told reporters that he felt like he was 25 again, but he could not play because, as TBO speculates, he woke up to early that day. Guillen's comments after the game seem to confirm this speculation.

To summarize, the White Sox are not in first place this year because they decided that subpar offensive production from the DH position was acceptable so long as they could rest Alex Rios' and Juan Pierre's knees every so often and find a way to work Mark Kotsay's mighty bat into the lineup. Had the White Sox just not give Kotsay a bat to burn to begin with, the Sox would be at least a half game closer in the AL Central Standings.

Because the White Sox gave Kotsay said bat, they are now paying 2.5 times the money it would have cost them to keep Thome all season for just 31 games (scratch that, 30 games, as Manny did not play Tuesday) of Mannywood. Talk about "fail."

I wonder if the White Sox will sell re-branded Manny dreadlock caps left over from his time in L.A.

Jeffrey Gross is a 23-year old law student (and Cubs fan) who currently resides in Madison, WI. In addition to writing for The Hardball Times, he currently writes baseball analysis for the Game Of Inches blog under the pseudonym David "MVP" Eckstein and has previously worked for The Daily Illini and Northern Star newspapers as a film critic and sportswriter (respectively). You can reach him by email at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or by comment at http://www.gameofinches.blogspot.com

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Yankees 9, Athletics 3: I suppose it's inevitable that the Yankees will soon start getting burned by their starters only going four or five innings, but right now it's working. And hey: they're all alone in first place. Why?

Blue Jays 13, Rays 5: Because the Rays got annihilated when the Jays put up a 10-spot in the sixth inning. I was going to make that "Gashouse Gorillas doing a conga line around the bases" joke I do a few times a year here, but I did it just a month ago! And it involved the Blue Jays then too! I'm starting to worry that I'm not as clever and original as I like to think I am.

Astros 3, Cardinals 0: Land sakes, this is getting ugly. That's four straight in the crapper for St. Louis, seven of eight and, of course, two straight listless shutouts in a row to the Astros, who are the spoilingest spoilers this side of Spoilsburg.

Reds 8, Brewers 4: And that makes for a seven game lead for the Redlegs. Aroldis Chapman made his major league debut. And see, I told you that 105 miles per hour business was totally fraudulent. He only hit [gulp] 102. Joey Votto got "MVP!" chants. I think those Cincy fans got a point.

Marlins 1, Nationals 0: I didn't see any highlights from this as I was convinced by the missus that I needed to watch "True Blood." I dunno. Ask me after I've seen more than the first two episodes. Anyway, it seems that Nyjer Morgan could have scored a run for the Nats in the 10th inning, but he decided he'd rather try to plow over catcher Brett Hayes than slide like a normal human being.

Pirates 14, Cubs 7: The Pirates were cruising and then Sean Gallagher came in and allowed five quick runs. The outcome was never really in doubt, but the Pirates can't even rest when they're up 14-2.

Twins 4, Tigers 2: Detroit clung to a 3-2 lead into the seventh but then Phil Coke walked one dude and then plunked two more to load the bases. Ryan Perry came in and walked in a run, and then he gave up an RBI single to Delmon Young. That's teamwork!

White Sox 4, Indians 3: Manny's White Sox debut will wait another day. He was on deck, though, waiting to pinch hit in the ninth when A.J. Pierzynski hit a three-run homer to break the 1-1 tie. I just hope that trip to the on deck circle didn't gas poor Manny, thus making him unavailable for this afternoon's game.

Braves 9, Mets 2: Luis Castillo bobbled what could have been a double play ball in the fifth and after that the floodgates opened. I'm guessing there will be a lot of folks who want to kill Castillo over that, but (a) there still would have only been two outs in the inning, and the Braves scored a couple of runs before what would have been out number three; and (b) Jon Niese still had to serve up that fat pitch David Ross deposited in the seats for a grand slam.

Orioles 5, Red Sox 2: The O's just keep rolling along. Baltimore went 17-11 in August (17-10) with Buck Showalter. This season is always going to look ugly in the standings, but there is some serious hope for 2011 being built here.

Phillies 8, Dodgers 4: Ryan Howard and Brian Schneider each had three-run homers as the Phillies find some of that long lost offense. Carlos Monasterios, the Dodgers starter, said this through his translator after the game: "I was trying to pitch my game, but they were able to read all my pitches." Gentlemen: there's a spy among us. Sitting in this very room!

Diamondbacks 7, Padres 4: Six straight losses for the Padres. The losses to Philly I get. These to the Dbacks I don't.

Giants 5, Rockies 2: Andres Torres led off the eighth inning with what proved to be the winning home run. Only four back of San Diego now.

Mariners 3, Angels 1: KIng Felix allowed only three hits and no runs through seven while striking out eight. No decision, though, because he got no run support while he was in the game. That's the story of his season.

Royals 10, Rangers 9: Ties 9-9 in the ninth, Willie Bloomquist stole third with one out and then came home with the winning run when Alexi Ogando threw a wild pitch. Wait . . . what's that? Um, I'm sorry everyone. The guild just informed me that I am obligated to say that Ogando "uncorked" a wild pitch. If you have any questions about this please consult the rulebook you've all been provided. The wild pitch stuff comes right after the chapter on "ensuing kickoffs."

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Relievers compared to Strasburg

Posted by Sean Smith
Not too long ago on The Book Blog, Tango Tiger posed the question of whether you can use closers as statistical comps for Stephen Strasburg. There just haven't been many starting pitchers who threw as hard, had such a variety of dominant pitches, and control to boot. The few who are statistical comps in the rate of strikeouts, homeruns, and walks allowed are Pedro Martinez, Curt Schilling, and Randy Johnson. It's not really appropriate to compare him to guys who had well over 200 innings per year. If I want to use historical comps to estimate a range of performance for a guy with 68 MLB innings, who better than hard throwing relievers to look at?

I looked at pitchers who had between 50 and 100 innings, walked between 1.8 and 3.0 batters per 9 innings, allowed between 0.4 and 1.1 homers per 9, and struck out over 11. I found 21 pitchers, and they averaged .7 homers, 2.6 walks, and 12.4 strikeouts in 73 innings for a 2.37 FIP. Strasburg had .7 homers, 2.3 walks, and 12.2 strikeouts and a 2.20 FIP.

His closer comps are:

Tom Henke, 1987 and 1989
Brian Harvey, 1991
Rob Dibble, 1991
Mark Wohlers, 1996
Trever Hoffman, 1997
Billy Wagner, 1999, 2001, 2006
Rob Nen, 2000
Troy Percival, 2001
Matt Mantei, 2003
Eric Gagne, 2004
Brad Lidge, 2004
Francisco Cordero, 2007
Jon Papelbon, 2007
Joakim Soria, 2009
Mike Wuertz, 2009
Joe Nathan, 2009

The following season these guys allowed 0.8 homers, 3.2 walks, and 11.0 strikeouts, not too far off from my useless projection of 0.6 homers, 2.9 walks, and 10.7 strikeouts. Useless since he's set for Tommy John surgery.

Of the 21 comps, 5 suffered serious injuries the following season. Joe Nathan has missed the entire 2010 season after his Tommy John surgery. Mantei and Gagne pitched less than 15 innings, and Wagner (2000) and Harvey less than 30.

Among those who were healthy, Here are the FIPs by quartile:

1-4 1.69 to 2.07
5-8 2.18 to 2.94
9-12 2.95 to 3.35
13-16 3.46 to 4.50

I think I'd be comfortable with those quartile ranges if he was going to pitch another 68 innings in 2011. If he were healthy enough to pitch 150, then the median projection should stay the same but the extremes would be closer to the mean. It's a moot point though, since we won't see him pitch much, if at all.

Sean Smith is a lifelong Angels fan despite never visiting the west coast until April 2006. His work can also be found at baseballprojection.com and Anaheim Angels All the Way and he can be contacted by email.

I’m behind the numbers

Posted by Dave Studeman
I was interviewed by Bloomberg Sports the other day, and you can listen to it here. We mostly talk about the Hardball Times and the work I've done here for the past six years, along with some baseball topics thrown in. I refuse to listen to it cause I can't stand the sound of my own voice, but I'm told that it's not half bad.

Dave was called a "national treasure" by Rob Neyer. Seriously. Comments about this article can be sent to him through the miracle of e-mail.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Astros 3, Cardinals 0: J.A. Happ beat Roy Halladay on his last outing and absolutely dominated the Cards this time out, so yeah, it's been a good week for him. Two hits and a walk in this one, with two of those base runners erased on double plays. This says a lot about Happ's potential and maybe a bit about what the change of scenery has done for him. It also says a lot about the awful rut in which the Cardinals find themselves. It's not crazy to ask at this point whether St. Louis has played their way out of the playoff picture.

Reds 5, Brewers 4: And the reason it's not crazy is that the Reds keep winning and now find themselves up six games, their largest lead since 1995.

Dodgers 3, Phillies 0: Shane Victorino broke up Hiroki Kuroda's no-hit bid with a one-out single in the eighth inning, but that was all the Phillies would get. Halladay was quite hittable, but he
kept the damage to a minimum by allowing only three runs. I was talking to Chris from The Fightins yesterday and he said he was having a hard time getting his brain around following a team that gets great pitching but zero offense, because that's really nothing the Phillies have ever done in recent years. It was all the Braves did for several years. And while it was obviously their key to success back in the day, it takes a long damn time to get used to it, and it lends itself to occasional frustration like this.

Braves 9, Mets 3: Jason Heyward led the charge by going 4 for 5 with four RBI. And hey: an Ollie Perez sighting! He saw his first action since (I think) the Carter Administration last night, walked a dude and gave up a dinger to Brian McCann. So no, the rust hasn't affected him in any material way.

Rockies 2, Giants 1: Carlos Gonzalez drove in the tying run with a broken bat triple (how does that happen?), and then came in from third to score on the play when Freddy Sanchez committed his second throwing error of the game. Tough loss for the Giants as both the Phillies and Padres lost too and thus the chance to gain some ground was squandered.

Diamondbacks 7, Padres 2: Five straight losses for San Diego. The Padres scored all the runs they would score in the first inning and gave up all the runs they would need to give up to ensure the loss in the first as well.

Rangers 3 Royals 0: C.J. Wilson continues his second half roll, winning his seventh game since the All-Star break. Two hits in just under eight innings for Wilson, though he did walk four.

Cubs 14, Pirates 2: The Pirates spent the first part of the year getting blown the hell out when they lost and squeaking by when they won. This made me think that they weren't as bad as their run differential made them look. Know what? They probably are that bad and have been all along.

Rays 6, Blue Jays 2: Wade Davis won his sixth straight decision. Carlos Pena drove in four. The game lasted a mere two hours and fourteen minutes.

Yankees 11, Athletics 5: The Rays and Yankees seem like they've been tied at the top of the division forever, and tied they will remain for another day after the Bombers shelled the heretofore unshellable Trevor Cahill. Javier Vazquez gets the win in relief, though he pitched a third of an inning longer than starter Dustin Mosely did, so the pitching box score kind of looks upside down.

White Sox 10, Indians 6: Bobby Jenks blew a three-run lead sending this one to extras, but then the Cleveland pen blew up, allowing a homer, a couple of RBI doubles and an RBI single in the 11th. Sadly, with Manny showing up today most of the press will be diverted from their usual "quote Ozzie Guillen threatening to ship Jenks to Siberia and then walking it back and keeping him as the team's closer" beat. Sad, really.

Angels 5, Mariners 3: Sixth inning homers from Bourjos, Abreu and Matsui power the Angels.

Nationals 9, Marlins 3: A three hour and ten minute rain delay followed by a three hour+ game with the last place team in town. I haven't looked yet, but I'm willing to bet the number of people who actually stayed to watch the end of this one could fit in my Honda. And we'd still have room leftover for the dog.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Monday, August 30, 2010

With a month to go, who are this year’s Cy Youngs and MVPs?

Posted by David Gassko
It’s been awhile since I took a look at who Oliver projected to win the big year-end awards, so I figured I’d check-in with some numbers. Last time, we saw Albert Pujols and Miguel Cabrera winning their leagues’ MVP awards with Roy Halladay and Shaun Marcum as the Cy Youngs. Needless to say, three months later things have changed.

To be clear, I am using Oliver’s projected end-of-season numbers as of today (August 30), and plugging them into my MVP and Cy Young model, as described in The Hardball Times Annual 2010. Listed below are each player’s triple-crown stats and his projected points on a 1,000 point scale, as per the model. Remember that the model is exponential, meaning that small differences can sometimes be magnified, as they often are in actual award voting.

AL MVP
Josh Hamilton | .348 | 36 | 112 | 621
Miguel Cabrera | .338 | 41 | 132 | 377
Robinson Cano | .317 | 29 | 106 | 202

In the American League, Josh Hamilton looks like the clear leader as we enter September. It’s incredible how great an effect making the postseason has on MVP voting—if we projected the Tigers to come back and make the playoffs, Cabrera would easily be in the lead with 927 points.

NL MVP
Joey Votto | .320 | 38 | 114 | 320
Albert Pujols | .320 | 42 | 117 | 228
Adrian Gonzalez | .296 | 33 | 106 | 117

Here again it is the playoffs which make all the difference. Votto and Pujols have just about the same exact projections, and yet Votto is comfortably ahead because we expect the Reds to make the playoffs, while the Cardinals miss the postseason. Another point working in Votto’s favor is that the writers are probably itching to give the MVP to anyone but Pujols after voting for him each of the past two years.

AL Cy Young
CC Sabathia | 20-6 | 3.16 | 194 | 312
David Price | 17-7 | 3.10 | 184 | 109
Clay Buchholz | 16-6 | 2.51 | 128 | 103

The American League has not had any great pitching performances this year, so a 20-win season from Sabathia should easily clinch the Cy Young.

NL Cy Young
Roy Halladay | 19-10 | 2.33 | 222 | 574
Adam Wainwright | 20-10 | 2.41 | 212 | 471
Ubaldo Jimenez | 20-6 | 2.80 | 197 | 468

Halladay may not win 30 games this season, or even 20, but he’s still put together a pretty incredible year, and should win on the strength of all his quality innings. Wainwright has been almost as good, but might have to settle for another top-three finish for the second straight year. Meanwhile, Ubaldo Jimenez has slowed down quite a bit in the second half, and now looks like a clearly inferior candidate. For those wondering Josh Johnson is, he gets hurt by his projected 13-6 year-end record and 0 year-to-date shutouts (Oliver doesn’t project shutouts so I just used year-to-date numbers). He has just 83 Cy Young points as it stands.

David Gassko is a former consultant to a major league team. He welcomes comments via e-mail.

The longing

Posted by Dave Studeman
Bill James has just posted a tremendous piece of new research and thinking on his website (subscription only, unfortunately). It's called "The Longing," and this is the opening paragraph:

Major league baseball has been substantially re-created and re-invented, over the last hundred years, by the desire of major league managers to create more stable workloads for their pitchers. This desire has overridden and thus essentially eliminated platooning, has sharply limited pinch hitting, has done away with third catchers, has virtually eliminated complete games, has re-defined normalcy in roster construction, pushing us gradually from 7 pitchers per team to 13, has added dozens of new statistical measurements to the game, and has caused games to get substantially longer and slower, as managers change pitchers every more frequently.

Quite an opening statement. Bill then quantifies how much more regular pitcher use has gotten since 1900 and then talks about the "whys" and "wherefores." As usual with Bill's writing, it's his thinking and writing, even more than his actual research, that is so insightful and entertaining.

A special shoutout goes to our own Chris Jaffe, whose book about managers is cited a couple of times and quoted directly.

Dave was called a "national treasure" by Rob Neyer. Seriously. Comments about this article can be sent to him through the miracle of e-mail.

Moving the prospect meter

Posted by Jeff Moore
As a new segment for THT, I will be posting a piece every Monday called Moving the Prospect Meter. My goal is to keep you up to speed on the on the prospects who "move the meter" the most. I'll be discussing prospect news, important transactions and prospect promotions, and any notable performances from the past week. I'll also be posting on Wednesday and Friday, with topics to be determined. This is my first post on THT Live, and I'm thrilled to be here.

Okay, enough with the introduction. On to the good stuff...

—Michael Pineda has been shut down for the season, but not because of an injury. Larry Stone tells us that the Mariners have said that their top pitching prospect has reached his innings limit for the season.

The move isn't terribly surprising considering Pineda missed significant time last season with an elbow injury, and, according to Seattle GM Jack Zdurienick, the 21-year-old has a "great chance" to make the Mariners rotation next season. After dominating Double-A during the first half of the season, posting a 2.40 FIP while striking out a batter per inning, Pineda held his own despite a little bad luck with the long ball (surrendering nine home runs in 62.1 innings), managing a 3.83 FIP as a 21-year-old in the Pacific Coast Leauge while striking out 11 batters per nine.

—Brandon Belt has continued his ascent through the Giants organization and is now in Triple-A, but that's likely where he is going to stay for the remainder of this season. As Henry Schulman explains, the Giants' 40-man roster doesn't have any room right now for Belt, who began the year (and his professional career, for that matter) in High-A ball.

It's difficult to figure where the Giants would be able to get Belt at-bats anyway, as the team already has a stock of first baseman and left fielders among Aubrey Huff, Travis Ishikawa and Pat Burrell.

—Jenrry Mejia is back in Triple-A, this time as a starter, and will almost certainly get a call-up in September. it's amazing he is still effective at all considering the way the Mets have messed with his development.

—Kyle Gibson is out with an ankle sprain, and is done for the season, but the move to shut him down for good, much like Pineda's, was based mainly on his innings total, says Kelly Thesier. The ankle injury simply served as an excuse to make the decision now.

Gibson had an excellent first professional season, spanning three levels and ending up in Triple-A, where he will likely open the 2011 season. Combining the Florida State, Eastern and International Leagues, Gibson posted a combined FIP of 3.15 in 154.1 innings.

—Unlike the top two picks in this year's draft, who will wait until next year to make their professional debuts, the Orioles are letting third overall pick Manny Machado get his feet wet before this season is finished. Machado has played in two Gulf Coast League games and homered once, and has now been assigned to Aberdeen in the New York-Penn League. He is scheduled to make his debut for Aberdeen this evening.

Jeff Moore is the creator of MLBProspectWatch.com, your one-stop site for all the information you need about minor league prospects. He can be reached via e-mail at mlbprospectwatch AT gmail DOT com.

Today is not the day for satire

Posted by Anna McDonald
Until now, I have dealt with the steroid era by way of omission. Just like papers at the bottom of a "to do" pile, I have filed all the issues that revolve around baseball and the steroid years in the back of my mind. Over the weekend, as I was reading through Roger Clemens indictment, the simple court stamp, AUG 19 2010, changed everything.

The issue of steroids and everything that comes barreling along with it is no longer just fuel for discussions, it's real life. One in which Roger Clemens will appear today before the federal government on a six-count indictment in connection with his testimony before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Some may say, this sounds ridiculously simple for what is to be an analysis on the Clemens arraignment, but it's the simplicity that has cleared a very complicated issue for me.

You see, my childhood memories revolve around all those who played in the steroid era. I'm one of the kids who grew up watching steroid* players. In my backyard my brothers would try to pitch like Roger Clemens. We would all hope to blast a home run over the back fence of the ballpark and into the adjoining Pizza Hut lot, just like Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire. Some of my most beloved memories are from family times together in Busch Stadium during McGwire's record breaking* year.

Say all you want to about the things we've learned about not making athletes our heroes, but at the time these guys—Clemens, McGwire, Bonds, and so on—they were my heroes. Those of us who are kids of the steroid era watched baseball because we were young, loved the game and wanted to someday be like those giants. Call all our dreams, dreams of the steroid boomers, but as silly as it may sound now, so many of us made choices in life because we wanted what they had.

I don't write about baseball because I want a whole bunch of people to link to my posts. I don't write about baseball because I want to make a bunch of money from it (thank goodness for that). I'm passionate about baseball now, because of great memories from my past, and I hope in some small way, to keep the game alive and well for the next generation.

The problem for me with what's happening in a courtroom today is that regardless of what the ruling may end up being, and in spite of the fact so many are to blame for baseball being wrong for many years, is what am I to do with those baseball memories? They have made me much of who I am today, but this baseball-loving part of myself has been made by something that's probably not quite real, something akin to shadows on a cave wall.

My dad can say to me, to his grandkids, "Kids, to think I saw Willie Mays play. Just think, I watched Stan Musial. We waited for his every at bat to see what he would do at the plate." What am I going to say? "Kids, just think! I saw baseball players who were on steroids when I was young."

We might be able to put an asterisk in record books, on Hall of Fame credentials, and everything else that surrounds the steroid era, but I can't put an asterisk next to my childhood memories about baseball.

If what I love to do (and so many talented others) is to write about baseball, and if it's really about keeping the game alive and well, then children who are playing baseball in their backyards today, with bright hopes of a future tomorrow, need to be told the story of the steroid era.....

A story where we all wonder today,
"how could things end up this way?"
A story that starts with a ballplayer born in nineteen sixty-two,
of greatness and gods and superheroes too.
Children need to know, many remember is precisely,
because his career started off rather nicely.
Quickly he earned an MVP, no other pitcher has since achieved—
my anything is possible if you believe.
All the hope we had, his award, the fame; it all started piling in,
we didn't want to see a hidden sin.
Children everywhere wanted to be like this hero,
and no one asked if his integrity could be zero.
his career finished strong,
with very little that went wrong.
We grew up wanting all that he had,
without realizing his end might be sad.
When we were young just like you playing here,
we didn't know the truth was so near—
hero or not, we all have something to fear.
And while this story is still unfolding,
you today have much in your hand you're holding.
You have choices to make, keep a clean slate,
for someday they will affect your fate.
Work hard in all that you do,
without worrying about who's looking at you.
Whether it's a dream within sight, or one that seems far,
be who you are.
For pretending to be something you're not,
is the sure way to become something everyone forgot.
You'll be left all alone in a horrible place,
starring right into all you'd never face.
Regardless of what can be proven or not, today is a day, to remember with me,
the best path to travel is one where you're free.

Anna's family and friends tolerate her love for baseball only because she keeps providing them with homemade cookies. She started The Girlfriends Batters Eye to entice her girl friends to follow baseball and welcomes comments and questions.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
It's gonna take me a few hours to get back up to speed after a week off, so bear with me. Can't wait to fire up my DVR and check out those couple of Stephen Strasburg starts I missed! That kid is fantastic!

Braves 7, Marlins 6: If you thought that after a week off I wasn't going to come back leading with a Brian McCann walkoff jack to bring the Braves back from a 6-1 eighth inning deficit then you're just not familiar with my work.

Phillies 5, Padres 0: Swept by the Astros at home, sweep the Padres at home. I dunno man, you figure the Phillies out.

Brewers 8, Pirates 4: The Brewers have so thoroughly owned the Pirates at Miller Park the past couple of years (28-2) that they're considering taking out an equity loan on their asses and adding a deck. Or maybe a gazebo. Save number 599 for Trevor Hoffman. I hope he gets to an even 600 and shuts himself down for good so he can (a) have a nice round number next to his name in the books; and (b) end his career with a fist pump and a high five from his catcher after closing one out, because that's the only way it should be.

Mariners 2, Twins 1: Nice outing for Carl Pavano, but as people have been saying for years, there's just not a hell of a lot you can do when you're facing Luke French (7 IP, 3 H, 1 ER). Well, I'm guessing someone said that once or twice. Like, his mom or his Legion coach or someone like that.

Nationals 4, Cardinals 2: The Cards are 2-5 in their last seven. Those seven were against Washington and Pittsburgh. Gettin' your butt handed to you by last place teams is no way to win the NL Central, son.

Reds 7, Cubs 5: The Reds take advantage of the Cardinals' loss, extending their division lead to five games. They're now 11-4 since getting swept by the Cardinals at home. The lesson: trash talking and kicking dudes in the face = victory.

Rockies 10, Dodgers 5: For the first time in six starts since coming over to L.A. in the trade, Ted Lilly loses. In fact, he gets pummeled (4 IP, 9 H, 7 ER). Three of those seven runs came on a pair of Carlos Gonzalez bombs.

Orioles 1, Angels 0: The O's took all six this year from the defending AL West champs. And this series was your basic flogging: the Angels scored one run on Friday night and were shut out both yesterday and Saturday night. The O's will finish the month with a winning record and, in fact, will have the best August of any AL East team. Sadly, however, the Yankees' and Ray's victories yesterday eliminated them from playoff contention.

Athletics 8, Rangers 2: The A's take two of three to pull within seven and a half of Texas. Doesn't seem very doable for Oakland, especially with only one series left between these guys. Not impossible, I guess. In 2002 the A's were down four and a half at the beginning of that 20-game win streak and found themselves up three and a half when they lost their next game. Now, if Oakland can find that extra run or so a game that 2002 team had over the 2010 team, they'll be in business.

Giants 9, Diamondbacks 7: San Francisco avoids the sweep at the hands of Arizona. They did their best to lose it, though. Adam LaRoche hit a two-run RBI double to right in the seventh inning. The time it took Jose Guillen to get to that ball is best measured in epochs. Guillen got the two runs back on his own RBI single, but really, no team that considers itself a contender should be playing that guy in right every day.

Yankees 2, White Sox 1: Frank Thomas Day, as The Big Hurt gets his number retired. The Sox could have used him in the lineup, though, as Ivan Nova allowed one run and five hits and struck out seven.

Tigers 10, Blue Jays 4: Dave Stieb Day, as the Blue Jays honor Sir David. The Jays could have used him the rotation, though, as Ryan Raburn hit two homers and the Tigers rattled off 12 hits. By the way, Dave Stieb was better than Jack Morris, and no one ever goes all crazy making his Hall of Fame case.

Royals 6, Indians 2: You can't stop Bruce Chen and Kila Ka'aihue, you can only hope to contain them.

Mets 5, Astros 1: As of 7:30 P.M. last night, the little AP game story headline was "Dickey Handcuffs Astros." Heh heh, "Dickey handcuffs." Heh heh heh heh.

Rays 5, Red Sox 3: The season is growing short for Boston. Um, wait, that's kind of an oxymoron. But you know what I mean. They're 6.5 back. Carlos Pena and Carl Crawford hit dingers off John Lackey.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Saturday, August 28, 2010

The Jeff Loria problem

Posted by Jeffrey Gross
Thank you to everyone for the well wishes this week as I am recovering from a bad case of bacterial pneumonia. 104.5 degree fevers are very scary, but doctors say I'll survive to complain about my nemesis Jeff Loria long into the future.

For some time now, I've ranted about the Marlins' ownership situation. Jeff Loria is a smart businessman and shrewd owner in a unique, fan-fueled market. He's lining his pockets with the money of the few fans the Marlins have at the expense of what should be a very competitive franchise (see this "Why the Marlins Need Matt Holliday" post), while simultaneously bleeding Miami and Miami-Dade County, whose citizens are starving for work, dry for every tax dollar they can milk.

Late last week, Yahoo sportswriter Jeff Passan put some numbers behind the many problems we've noted about Loria (courtesy of a financial statement leak). As Passan points out:

On Page 34 of the documents, under the heading Note Y, is a transaction called “Management Fee.” A corporation named Double Play Company is listed as the Marlins’ managing general partner. The partner is paid a yearly sum. For the two years the documents cover, the fees were $2.6 million and $2.8 million. In 2009, the documents say, the fee was raised to $3.2 million.

Records from the Florida Division of Corporations show Double Play’s CEO is Jeffrey Loria. Its president is (Florida Marlins' president) David Samson.

Of the six teams whose documents were leaked, only the Marlins have a management fee listed in their operating expenses.

As Passan also observes,

For years, the Marlins cried poverty. Loria threatened to move the team from Florida. Despite several sources claiming the Marlins raked in money—Forbes’ annual valuations for the Marlins have proven extremely close to reality, and Miami-area accountant Jorge Costales has written incisively about Marlins finances—the county commissioners voted in December 2007 to pay for more than three-quarters of the stadium due open in 2012.

The poor, poor Marlins had an operating profit of $48.9 million in 2008 and 2009, including $11.1 million last year, when they increased payroll and started paying off their stadium debt. Loria has already doubled his money on the Marlins—he bought the team for $158.5 million, including a $38.5 million interest-free loan, and it’s now worth $317 million, according to Forbes’ valuations—and the revenue streams from the new stadium should only increase that figure. A county hemorrhaging jobs funneled tax money to fund a stadium for a team with a reckless disregard for its community’s welfare.

The whole article by Passan is very revealing and a must-read from beginning to end.

I want to supplement Passan's article with a few compiled numbers of my own, using Forbes' estimates of the Marlins' finances from 2002-2008 (Passan called these figures "extremely close to reality," so I feel no need to personally skim through the leak financial documents for the Marlins at the moment). Below (click to enlarge), I compare the payroll numbers of the Marlins year to year and to "the league average." Loria took over the team (in a shady Expos trade with Bud Selig) in 2003:

By comparison, here is a look at the Chicago Cubs franchise (click to enlarge):

As Kristi Dosh wrote here week, the time for transparency is now. It is essentially to the health, integrity and future of major league baseball.

I'm not a hippie who believes in free love and free baseball. As someone with an economics degree, I understand the importance of profit and profit motive in building talented organizations. However, this is not the case here. This is a case of excessive economic profit with no competitive stabilization.

In simplified terms, economic profit is the amount of money one can make in a given venture compared to the "next best alternative" (the opportunity cost). In the long run, firms enter and exit free markets and economic profits zero out. This is not to say that no profits are made. Rather, it means that on average, investment opportunities yield long-term annual returns that are not much in excess of risks and costs.

Baseball is a special case because it is a tight-knit oligopoly with 30 owners who choose who can get in and who cannot. For example, Mark Cuban, who likes to spend money, cannot have a team. Major league baseball is not a free market and hence there tends to be opportunity for economic profit. That would be okat with me if such "economic profit" weren't so grossly in excess of the average rate of return in other industries (historically, for example, the stock market has an annual rate of return of approximately 8.5 percent). As noted above, Loria's been able to more than double his money in less than seven years. The Rule of 72 pegs the stock market's estimated "doubling rate" at about 8.5 years. A year and a half or so difference may not seem like much, but investments have compounding return rates, so every interest period truly matters when all is considered.

As should be obvious, something needs to be done, and something more than a move that saves face for Loria. He needs to be made an example of. Baseball is not a traditional business market, despite the trends towards teams with smarter business models. This is not the tech wars, not dueling computer manufactures, but rather a game of tradition watched and beloved by millions.

Jeffrey Gross is a 23-year old law student (and Cubs fan) who currently resides in Madison, WI. In addition to writing for The Hardball Times, he currently writes baseball analysis for the Game Of Inches blog under the pseudonym David "MVP" Eckstein and has previously worked for The Daily Illini and Northern Star newspapers as a film critic and sportswriter (respectively). You can reach him by email at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or by comment at http://www.gameofinches.blogspot.com

Friday, August 27, 2010

How Much Should Joey Votto Make in 2011?

Posted by JT Jordan
Cincinnati Reds first baseman Joey Votto is having a pretty good year.

Okay, well…maybe that’s a bit of an understatement. The 26-year-old (soon to be 27) first baseman is hitting .326/.423/.603 with 31 homers and a 13.0% unintentional walk rate. His .440 wOBA is currently tops in the National League and his home run per fly ball percentage is 27.0%, a full 3.9% higher than runner-up slugger Carlos Pena. In other words, he’s having a monster season. As MLBTR’s Ben Nicholson-Smith points out, Votto’s headed for his first year of arbitration—and he’s putting himself in line for a pretty nice raise.

The question is, how much should he make? Nicholson-Smith compared Votto’s production to that of Albert Pujols, Miguel Cabrera, Justin Morneau, Ryan Howard, Prince Fielder, and Mark Teixeira—pretty elite company. Looking solely at the player’s offensive performance in terms of the basic rates and counting statistics gives us a rather limited view of a player’s “true” production, however, as we’re looking at a medley of figures rather than a clean, single number. So for the purposes of this little exercise, I’ll measure the player’s total contribution through Wins Above Replacement (WAR).*

Rather than using the player’s most recent season or the sum of all seasons before he’s eligible for arbitration, I feel that using a 5/4/3 weight is the best way of estimating the player’s “true” value. This way, we place more emphasis on his most recent season—but also account for previous seasons, to help avoid over or under paying the player for his most recent season. Also, I am not considering seasons in which the player only played half a season—so, Ryan Howard’s 2005 season and Justin Morneau’s 2004 season are not considered in estimating the player’s weighted performance. I feel that this is appropriate under these circumstances, because both players spent half of their respective seasons in the Minor Leagues before tearing it up in the Majors. Naturally, if any of these players had injury issues, this would have to be accounted for. But I don’t want to dock a player for circumstances beyond his control (Howard, for example, was blocked by Jim Thome; The Twins opted to keep Morneau in the Minors until late May in 2004 before calling him up for good).

First, a look at Votto’s comparables (listed by descending WAR):

The important thing to track is the “$WAR” figure shown on the far right—this is simply the rate (expressed in millions of dollars) per Win Above Replacement. The first year of arbitration yields a range from $4.5 million to $10 million, with the average being right at $7.1 million. The average raise per player—excluding Teixeira, who had a multi-million dollar commitment when he began his Major League career—sits at $6.5 million. This alone suggests that Votto, who is making $525,000 in 2010, could be in line to see roughly $7 million in arbitration. Of course, this depends on where Votto ranks among those players.

If we exclude his 2010 season altogether, Votto’s estimated level of production is right around 4.4 WAR, meaning that his closest initial comparables are Mark Teixeira and Ryan Howard. So, there’s really no question that he falls under the category of “elite first baseman.” If the season were to end today, Votto’s weighted WAR would be 5.2, which actually vaults him past Teixeira and Howard and into the upper echelon of Pujols and Cabrera. What makes this even more impressive is the fact that Pujols and Cabrera spent a great deal of time at other positions other than first base, increasing their values (as you’ll see under “position”). I would venture to say that leading up to his first year of arbitration, Votto has outperformed all pure prominent first basemen in the past decade. But since the Reds have 35 games remaining, Votto still has some plate appearances left. So, we’re not done here.

Using ZiPS’ Rest of Season projections, in addition to adjusting his other components (defense, baserunning, playing time, etc.) gives us the following projected weighted line:

Of course, we obviously can’t take his rest of season projection as gospel. But it certainly works well as a tool for estimating where he’ll wind up—and as of today, Votto’s projected to finish with a .321/.416/.585 line with 37 home runs, a .432 wOBA and a spectacular 7.1 WAR. His overall weighted WAR stands at a massive 5.8, well above Teixeira and even surpassing Cabrera. We’re talking about a truly elite player.

What obfuscates matters (I’ve been looking for an excuse to throw that word around for a while now) is that we’re not looking at a static dollar per win rate. In fact, I’m sure you’ve already noticed that the player with the highest WAR received the lowest dollar per win rate (Pujols) and the player with the lowest WAR received the highest dollar per win rate (Fielder). So using his closest comparable, Cabrera, isn’t exactly the best way of determining his dollar value. If we use the overall average $WAR ($1.8MM) and apply this to Votto, this suggests he should make around $10.2 million.

I italicized “should” because I’m not convinced that is the likely salary Votto will wind up with—after all, it sounds like most arbitration cases look at the traditional trifecta—batting average, home runs and runs batted in. Votto’s hit .314 and averaged 27 home runs and 86 RBI over the past three years (unweighted). While this looks pretty, I doubt it would convince an arbitration panel that he’s deserving of the same salary as Ryan Howard, who went in with a .292/52/142 line and an MVP Award under his name.

Seven million in my eyes would be the absolute bare minimum—a starting point. But it probably won’t play out that way. Eight million doesn’t seem particularly likely- although possible, nine million seems to be a reach, and ten million is presumably out of the question. And that’s really too bad for Votto, because he’s most likely going to wind up being vastly underpaid.

*I’m the type of guy that likes to calculate most things on my own, even if it takes a lot more time—so the WAR listed is not from Rally’s WAR listed on Baseball-Reference.com (rWAR) or from Fangraphs.com (fWAR). Hitting is expressed as runs above/below the league average through Linear Weights, are park-adjusted, and an adjustment is made for “situational hitting,” i.e. hitting into or avoiding the double play and generating “productive outs.” Defense is an average of UZR and Plus/Minus. Baserunning Runs are measured through Baseball Prospectus’ Equivalent Baserunning Runs. The positional adjustment is the same as Fangraphs’, but the Replacement level is 20 runs per 650 PA in the National League and 25 runs per 650 for the American League. Runs are converted to Wins via PythagenPat.

JT Jordan is an avid Giants fan and runs a blog at Triples Alley. He can be reached at triplesalley@gmail.com.

What happened?

Posted by James Clarkin-Breslin
Indians 3, As 2: Justin Masterson pitched well on Puppypalooza night, which drew 269 dogs according to the game report. I don't get it.

Tigers 7, Blue Jays 1: Max Scherzer struck out 8 over 8 IP, walking only 1. When Scherzer can command his fastball, he can be really, really good. I don't think I'll ever understand that trade for the Diamondbacks. Jose Bautista hit his 41st home run, which is about 20% more home runs than the next closest to him.

Twins 6, Rangers 4: Craig kind of has a schtick where he points out that premier pitching matchups didn't live up to their billing. This was the case for Lee-Liriano last night, as Cliff Lee had some trouble with balls in play. Rangers fans hope Vlad is finally breaking out of his mighty, mighty slump.

White Sox 8, Orioles 0: Edwin Jackson was utterly dominant in blanking the Os—as the four Hardball Times writers in attendance tell me. Thanks, Harry, Chris, Max and Studes. The White Sox stay 3.5 GB of the Twins in the Central.

Astros 5, Phillies 1: The Phillies were swept by the Astros in Philadelphia, in a 4-game series no less. This would be more of a catastrophe if the Braves were playing well. But it still isn't good.

Dodgers 7, Brewers 1: Carlos Monasterios was pulled in the 5th and the bullpen didn't allow a hit as the Dodgers completed a sweep of the Brewers on the road.

Diamondbacks 11, Padres 5: Ian Kennedy was untouchable, striking out 12 through 7 and giving up only 1 hit and 2 walks. Stephen Drew continues to swing a hot bat.

Nationals 11, Cardinals 10: The Nats won in the 13th on Ian Desmond's walkoff single. Albert Pujols hit his 400th home run, but really, he'll always be playing second fiddle to Jose Bautista, so I'm not even sure why he bothers.

Marlins 11, Mets 4: Jonathan Niese got absolutely lit up in the 6th despite striking out 8 through only 5 2/3. Hanley Ramirez homered and was 10-15 in the series, which is, you know, pretty good.

James works at a law firm while he isn't writing inane game recaps; feel free to email him at jpcbreslinATgmailDOTcom with any questions or comments (but please, no concerns).

Visual Baseball: Josh Hamilton, AL MVP?

Posted by Kevin Dame
Happy Friday. Here's a combo pack for Josh Hamilton, using Bat Slicer and 5 Tool Analyzer. Pretty impressive season any way you look at it. Hamilton is about average in his walk and strikeout rates, and his speed and range are slightly above average. But in all other areas he's flat out dominant.

I was hoping to make this a three pack, including a BatCode for Hamilton, but ran out of time. Maybe another Friday down the line...

Get the vote out

Posted by Dave Studeman
Would you like to vote for the best defenders in the league? Want to add your expert baseball opinion to a group that is having a real impact on things? Then head on over—right now—to Tango's 2010 Scouting Report.

Here's the deal: Tango collects as much input as possible from as many baseball fans as he can to publish his (our!) unique fielding scouting reports. You only have to vote on the team you follow regularly. You're only asked to vote on a player if you've seen him play at least 10 games. But rest assured, your input is critical. If enough fans contribute their input, the output is an insightful list of the best fielders in the majors.

Really, the Internet should be full of this kind of thing, and Tango is to be congratulated for his willingness to put the time and effort into collecting our opinions. The results are viewed by many media folk to help them determine their Gold Glove choices, or at least confirm them. And the results are also included in the panel of judges for John Dewan's annual Fielding Awards (published in the Bill James Handbook).

So head on over and help the cause. Tell 'em Studes sent ya.

Dave was called a "national treasure" by Rob Neyer. Seriously. Comments about this article can be sent to him through the miracle of e-mail.

Weird history: 1987 San Jose Bees

Posted by Brandon Isleib
In doing research for the 2011 Annual's trivia section, I came across this gem of a team:

http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/team.cgi?id=32072

One of the many unaffiliated teams that the low minors had in this era, the 1987 San Jose Bees had names but only scattered talent. It was a part Japanese farm team, part independent league, and part...well, I don't know what the third part was, but it was fun. Daryl Sconiers was their hitting star. Ken Reitz was a reserve infielder and mop-up reliever. Dan Meyer, Charlie Moore, Elias Sosa, Roger Erickson, and Warren Brusstar all showed up at one point. But the most fun was in the Carltonesque way two starters held the fort for this wretched team.

Did I mention that the Bees went 33-109 on the season? No misprint—33-109. They scored 423 runs and allowed 816. Their Pythagorean record: 33-109. Believe it or not, the team actually had two competent starting pitchers: Taketo Kamei and Steve McCatty. Kamei, a 19-year-old lower draft pick from the Seibu Lions, paced the league in ERA (2.42) and had a 10-14 record to show for it. McCatty, now 33 and in his last stint in affiliated baseball, wasn't too far behind at 2.95, his 8-13 record helped by allowing only three homers in 174 innings.

This means that when Kamei (who apparently also is transliterated as Kamei Takashi Doo) and McCatty weren't getting the decisions, the team was 15-82, or a .155 winning percentage. Not quite Cleveland Spiders territory (.130), but quite close. Like the Spiders, the Bees folded after the season.

The 1972 Phillies, excluding Steve Carlton (27-10) and Darrell Brandon (7-7) from the record, were 25-82 (.234). That's awful for the majors, of course, but the Bees were doing their best impression.

There's no real point behind this entry, but that team was one of the strangest bunches I'd ever seen, and I thought somebody might want to know.

Brandon Isleib is a stat geek in all his endeavours, which makes him naturally inclined to baseball. He can be reached via the electronic mails.

Thursday, August 26, 2010

An underrated fastball

Posted by Ricky Zanker
According to the BIS scouting data, San Diego Padres closer Heath Bell has the highest total run value for a fastball during the past three calendar years out of all qualified relievers in the majors. He's ahead of the likes of Matt Thornton and Jonathan Papelbon. So naturally, having access to the PITCHf/x data, I wanted to know a little more about it.

Off the bat, the velocity already makes it an exceptional pitch averaging about 94 miles per hour, although hitters may say it seem to be going much faster because Bell has a deceptive pitching motion. The movement of the fastball is nothing exceptional, though. It just has a good amount of "rise" caused by an overhand delivery and possible slight cut (very slight) on some of his fastballs.

A good rising fastball is best used up in the strike zone, which Bell does an exceptional job of hitting. So here is a plot of all his fastballs since 2008 in the form of a "heat map" and split by batter handedness.

Jeremy Greenhouse discussed pitchers with bimodal distribution a couple months ago, and Bell fits that bill: He throws the fastball up and away to both left-handed and right-handed hitters. And it has to be a successful philosophy as its whiff rate is about 5 percent higher than the average fastball and is getting hitters to swing at it more outside the strike zone.

Recently, Baseball America rated Bell as the best reliever pitching in the NL this season. This subjective opinion matches well with an objective rating like FIP; his is the lowest out of all qualified relievers this season. Being with the Padres, Bell doesn't likely get the recognition he deserves (as with the Padres in general apparently).

If he continues this performance, Bell may garner some serious attention in this year's NL Cy Young voting. Even more attention will come for Bell while the Padres fight to keep first-place in the NL West and a their spot in the postseason.

Ricky Zanker also writes for Draysbay and can be contacted by email.

What happened?

Posted by James Clarkin-Breslin
My apologies for posting this so late in the day. It's Dave Studemans' fault.

Reds 12, Giants 11: The Reds blew a 10-1 lead because Joey Votto gathered his teammates and told them he needed a few extra frames to drive in more runs. He delivered in the 12th. Quite a comeback for the Giants, although they made it ugly, using pretty much everybody in the pen plus Barry Zito, and making 5 errors. Surely this was the biggest deficit erased last night!

Rockies 12, Braves 10: Nope—the Braves also blew a 10-1 lead last night. Whether or not they make a serious run this year, since 2007 the Rockies have consistently been able to plant that "improbable comeback?" seed in their fans' minds this time of year. That begs the question: Do I need to train my mental projections to keep Jim Tracy et al. out of my dreams?

Astros 3, Phillies 2: J.A. Happ handled his former team without much trouble, and the Phillies will try to avoid the sweep against a resurgent Wandy Rodriguez this afternoon. If the Philles fancy themselves a playoff team, they probably shouldn’t get swept by the Astros. But then again I’m no expert.

Pirates 5, Cardinals 2: Daniel McCutchen stymied the Cards, although he doesn’t look to be much more than replacement level unless he can figure out how to strike hitters out at the ML level. Jose Tabata and Neil Walker led the offense.

Red Sox 5, Mariners 3: The Sox and Josh Beckett got the best of the Mariners in the soggy first game of a doubleheader.

Mariners 4, Red Sox 2: Felix had it going all night. It's not that the Red Sox are playing poorly right now; it's just that overcoming a 6-games-in-the-loss-column deficit to one of two .600+ true-talent teams with a month to play isn't going to happen even if the trailing team is healthy. It just isn't.

Rangers 4, Twins 3: Josh Hamilton homered again, and C.J. Wilson's impressive season as a starter continues. Wilson's 2005 through 2009 seasons were an exercise in flushing WAR down the toilet. The Rangers really could've used those WAR, but they slipped off the bathroom counter and just splashed right in, and really, nobody wants to go fishing in there.

Angels 12, Rays 3: "Once they got all those points, it takes the wind out of your sails," said Joe Maddon after the game, the word “points” referring to Mike Napoli's improbable 4-yard touchdown run.

Padres 9, Diamondbacks 3: The Padres pounded the D’Backs behind Wade LeBlanc, and increased their NL West lead when the Giants lost their heartbreaker earlier in the day. Stephen Drew hit two home runs, the first thanks to an instant replay reversal in the first inning. The original call took 47 minutes to reverse because the replay computer evolved, took the ball from LeBlanc, and started firing baseballs into the stands. Baseball purists everywhere expressed smug concern.

As 6, Indians 1: Trevor Cahill ensured that the As’ starters' ridiculous streak of not allowing more than 3 ER continued. Henry Rodriguez struck out the side in the 9th. If you haven't watched Rodriguez throw a baseball toward home plate yet, I highly recommend doing so whenever you can.

Blue Jays 6, Yankees 3: Brett Cecil and the Jays improved to 7-5 against the Yankees this season. Vernon Wells homered and drove in 4 and Aaron Hill broke out of a serious slump and homered himself. Brett Gardner called the Blue Jays “overlooked” this season, and he’s right: this team hits a ton of home runs and has a wildly underrated SP core of Marcum, Romero, and Cecil. With a balanced schedule or in a different division, this team would be a contender. Such is life.

Orioles 4, White Sox 2: Brian Matusz was very good for 7 innings and Matt Wieters carried the Bawlmer offense. That's a recap Os fans wished they had read a few more times this year. Lost in the excitement about Posey/Santana/Arencibia is that that "Mauer with Power" guy has been dreadful with the bat this year. He's still fairly early in the development cycle for catchers, and he’s managed to improve his BB and K rates, but it'd be hard not to call his 2010 a serious disappointment.

Cubs 4, Nationals 0: Ryan Dempster dominated the Nats’ lineup for 7 innings (on 79 pitches!) and Jason Marquis got a tough-luck L, giving up 1 ER on 4 hits over 7.1. Although he probably deserves his 0-7 record with an ERA approaching 9 (and a FIP approaching 7). Mike Quade is now 4-0 as the Cubs manager. Sweet Lou’s gotta be pissed.

Marlins 5, Mets 4: The Mets made it interesting in the final frame after David Wright led off with a home run against Leo Nunez, who eventually managed to shut the door very slowly and shakily. Hanley Ramirez collected 4 hits. I wonder if the Marlins are finally going to feel some serious pressure to spend the cash they get from MLB due to revenue sharing, after getting yelled at by MLB earlier in the year and having their balance sheet leaked.

Royals 4, Tigers 3: The Royals beat the Tigers in 12, thanks in no small part to a HR and 2 RBI for the Kila Monster (as Kila Ka'aihue is affectionately known to those who can't pronounce his surname). Willie Bloomquist, batting third (yup, third), provided the game-winner in the 12th.

Dodgers 5, Brewers 4: The Dodgers placed Manny Ramirez on waivers yesterday, with the White Sox expected to be the most serious suitor. That’s assuming, of course, that no NL team claims him. LA won, and instrumental deadline pickup Octavio Dotel picked up the save. What is going on with Jonathan Broxton?

James works at a law firm while he isn't writing inane game recaps; feel free to email him at jpcbreslinATgmailDOTcom with any questions or comments (but please, no concerns).

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Baseball’s secret star

Posted by Steve Treder
What would you say about a fine-fielding, switch-hitting center fielder who put up the following stat line:

  AB     R     H    2B    3B    HR   RBI    BB    SO    SB    CS     BA    OBP    SLG  OPS+
 566   103   160    46    13    19    78    68   145    29     8   .283   .363   .511   127

If you'd be inclined to consider such a player a major star, I'd be inclined to agree.

Such a player exists, but his performance has come as such a late-blooming surprise that the mainstream media hasn't discovered him, and few fans outside of his home ballpark have even heard of him.

That stat line is what Andres Torres has produced in his almost-two seasons since joining the San Francisco Giants. It comprises 643 plate appearances through yesterday, or pretty close to what a regular player would garner in one full season.

Torres is no kid; he's 32 years old. And until 2009, he'd managed to scrape together just 89 major league games in parts of four years with the Tigers and Rangers, and truly struggled with the bat, to the tune of 210/258/276, for an OPS+ of 46. He'd never hit with much pop in the minors, either; it was only his blazing speed and defensive chops that were keeping his meager career alive.

But suddenly in 2007 Torres turned his entire game around, whacking 20 triples in a combined double-A-and-triple-A season. Last year he made the Giants' roster as a utility outfielder, and this year he's played his way into first-string center fielder status.

Torres is just 5'10", but his power is a function of his robustly muscled condition (and, yes, his is the sort of story that tends to create suspicion about steroids). Apparently the most intriguing backstory regarding Torres is that it wasn't until a few years ago that he was diagnosed with an attention-deficit disorder, and it was upon getting that affliction under control through medication that he's been able to channel his energy, and his career has taken off.

I don't recall seeing Torres play until he came to the Giants, so I can't offer first-hand observation on a changed plate approach. But apparently that's also part of the story; in the past he was a slap hitter, but with his newfound strength Torres now takes a very full rip. He also exercises first-rate strike zone judgment, nicely working the count. All in all he is one extremely tough out.

It's obviously unclear how long Torres can keep this up, as he's blossomed at an age that many players are beginning to decline. But for the time being, at any rate, the Giants are enjoying the performance of a remarkably potent secret weapon.

Steve Treder can often be found spending way too much time talking baseball at Baseball Primer. He welcomes your questions and comments via e-mail.

What happened?

Posted by Dave Studeman
While Craig Calcaterra is on vacation, pinch hitter James Clarkin Breslin is filling in for our daily game recaps:

Mets 6, Marlins 5: Luis Castillo plates the game-winning run with a walkoff bloop to right. Mike Stanton has a strong arm, but unfortunately he was trying to throw it to his buddy sitting behind the third base dugout - his second wild throw home in 2 innings. Gaby Sanchez was bemused when asked about R.A. Dickey's signature pitch: "What's so tough about it? It doesn't even spin."

Pirates 4, Cardinals 3: By his standards, Adam Wainwright got shelled, and the Cards lost to the Bucs 4-3. Neil Walker drove in three. Don't look now, but the Pirates seem to have the beginnings of a very solid, young core. If you're a Neal Huntington believer, there could be a decent squad in Pittsburgh a few years away.

Cubs 5, Nationals 4: Carlos Zambrano (7.1 IP, 8K, 1BB) and Alfonso Soriano (3-R HR) provided the firepower in a game that ended up close thanks to Crazy Old Carlos Marmol. Marmol has now walked 40 batters in 57.2 IP; he's also struck out 105. Seriously.

Giants 16, Reds 5: Travis Wood gets knocked around, pretty much for the first time in his career. Fortunately, he won't have to worry about that too much more given that he plays his home games in the cavernous Great American Ballpark. Brandon Phillips hit two bombs.

Padres 5, Dbacks 0: Clayton Richard struck out eight D'Backs and didn't allow an ER, although he did walk five. The Padres have the best record in the National League, and, wait for it... the San Diego Padres are the best team in the National League with a month to go in the 2010 season.

Rockies 5, Braves 2: Carlos Gonzalez went deep for the 26th time this year and the Rockies won 5-2. CarGo currently sports a 4.9% BB rate and a .248 ISO. The guy can mash, but at some point he either has to learn how to take a walk, or pitchers will never throw him another strike again.

Dodgers 5, Brewers 3: Rod the Bat hit a three-run blast in his blue debut. Mets fans told you Minaya shouldn't have let him go. Even though you don't remember it, they told you, and now look, see, they were right. Before the game, the Brewers unveiled a new statue of Bud Selig. To cement his legacy, the franchise employed a talented Milwaukee-based sketch artist to draw Selig's likeness before the iron was cast. Unfortunately, the artist drew his inspiration from a freeze-frame of Bud in the stands at the 2002 All Star Game in the 11th inning.

Astros 4, Phillies 2: The Astros won in a wild one that lasted 16. Roy Oswalt played left field for the Phillies in the 14th after Ryan Howard was ejected for throwing his bat and helmet after striking out. Oswalt also grounded out to end the game, but given that Howard was 0-7 with 5Ks to that point, it was sort of a personal victory for Oswalt.

Mariners v. Red Sox (postponed): No baseball in Beantown. They'll try to get in 2 today.

White Sox 7, Orioles 5: Gordon Beckham hit a 3-R HR in the 7th to put it out of reach. The White Sox, though, took a hit to their playoff hopes when they placed J.J. Putz and Matt Thornton on the DL. We can once again refer to the Orioles as "lowly," as Buck Showalter's magic seems to have worn off.

Rays 10, Angels 3: Evan Longoria and the Rays beat the Angels into submission. The Angels haven't been able to find that Pythag-defying magic this year, but hey, at least they have that really weird Monster Energy Drink thing in center field (can someone tell me what that is please?).

A's 5, Indians 0: Gio Gonzalez and the As rode the larger-than-life bats of Jeff Larish and Coco Crisp to victory.

Tigers 9, Royals 1: On Monday, the Red Sox claimed Johnny Damon off waivers, but he had the right to waive a trade to Boston in his contract. So before the game, Johnny Damon said that he, quote unquote, loves Detroit, as justification for his wanting to stay with the Tigers. Something's up with that: any verb that goes beyond "tolerate" when talking about the city of Detroit just sounds contrived (either that or Johnny is just confused—not impossible). Re: the game: Kyle Davis started for the Royals (that'll do, right?).

Yankees 11, Blue Jays 5: The Yankees jumped all over Rzep. (etc.) and stayed tied atop the AL East with an 11-5 win. Curtis Granderson is swinging a hot bat after taking a few days off a couple weeks ago to retool his swing.

Rangers 4, Twins 3: The Rangers win a tight one in which Josh Hamilton homers. Hamilton currently has a .356/.406/.631 triple slash, which, frankly, is a little ridiculous. I'd like to think that we've reached the point where we can talk about Josh Hamilton sans the "comeback from crippling addiction" rhetoric, and just talk about him as probably the best hitter in 2010.

Dave was called a "national treasure" by Rob Neyer. Seriously. Comments about this article can be sent to him through the miracle of e-mail.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Porcello’s lack of progression

Posted by David Golebiewski
Detroit Tigers starter Rick Porcello took the express route to the big leagues. The New Jersey prep product, given a $7 million major league contract as the 27th pick in the 2007 draft, tossed all of 125 innings in the High-A Florida State League in 2008 before reaching Detroit the following year. Porcello was impressive in the FSL (5.2 K/9, 2.4 BB/9, 64.1 GB%, 3.83 FIP), but keeping his head above water in the show while not yet being able to buy a cold one at the local watering hole figured to be a monumental task. With scarce pro experience, Porcello rode his sinker for all its worth as a rookie. He induced grounders and limited the walks enough to turn in a quality season. In 2010, however, Porcello has taken a step backward.

Last season, Porcello struck out 4.69 batters per nine innings, walked 2.74 per nine and had a 54.2% ground ball rate. His expected FIP (xFIP), based on his rate of K's, walks and a normalized home run per fly ball rate, was 4.32. This year, Porcello's got 4.5 K/9, 2.76 BB/9 and a 49.6 GB%. Fewer whiffs and grounders means his xFIP has climbed to 4.76. His ERA is a full run higher, due to a .333 batting average on balls in play (.281 in '09) and a strand rate that has fallen from 75.5% in '09 to 62.4% in 2010.

Given Rick's ground ball tendencies (grounders have a higher BABIP than fly balls), it's not surprising that his BABIP has risen. But that .333 mark is likely indicative of some inauspicious bounces -- his BABIP on grounders (.238) is 10 points higher than the AL average, and his BABIP on fly balls (.174) is nearly 40 points higher than the Junior Circuit average. Porcello has legitimately struggled with runners on base (5.41 xFIP), particularly with his control. With the bases empty, he has walked 4.5% of batters faced (7.7% AL average). With men on, he's issuing a free pass 9.9% of the time (9.3% AL average). His K rate is below-average in both situations.

According to Pitch F/X data from TexasLeaguers.com, Porcello is going to his fastball slightly less often this year. We're speaking in relative terms, though, as hitters are still getting a heater more than 70% of the time. Porcello has also thrown his slider more at the expense of his curveball. He's getting a lot of strikes with his fastball, but that's about the only kind thing that can be said. His secondary stuff is missing the mark and garnering few whiffs, and the whiff rate on the fastball has fallen as well:

Using Pitch F/X data from Joe Lefkowitz's website, I found Porcello's batted ball distribution by pitch type. The ground ball rate on his fastball has is 53.4%. That's still well above the 42% overall average for four-seamers and two-seamers, but down from his 57.3% mark last year. He's also getting fewer grounders with his changeup (53.9% in '09, 43.5% in 2010, 50% MLB average). Rick's getting a few more grounders with his slider (25% in '09, 35.4% in 2010), but that's still below the 45% big league average. The sample size for curveballs is too tiny to matter.

Porcello's slugging percentage on contact with his fastball has increased from .463 in 2009 to .500 this season. It's likely that number is influenced by the aforementioned BABIP increase, and that 2010 total is under the .540 MLB average regardless. His slider's still getting slaughtered, if not quite as much (.714 last year, .604 in 2010, .505 MLB average), while his changeup has been about average in terms of SLGCON this season (.500 in '09, .457 in 2010, .452 MLB average).

Perhaps Porcello will one day flourish as an ace-caliber starter -- he's certainly got time on his side. But at the moment, he's got a fastball that he can throw for strikes and little else. One has to wonder if the 21-year-old would have been better off plying his trade in the minors, developing his secondary stuff, than burning two years of cheap service time in the majors.

A journalism student at Duquesne University, David Golebiewski is a contributing writer for The Hardball Times, Fan Graphs, Inside Edge, Rotoworld, Baseball Daily Digest and Heater Magazine. He is seeking full-time employment as a baseball writer. Feel free to e-mail him with any questions or comments.

Monday, August 23, 2010

If you give Roger Clemens a steroid

Posted by Anna McDonald
In 1985, Laura Joffe Numeroff wrote a wonderful children's book, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie. The simple act of giving a mouse a cookie took a young boy on many adventures, which have entertained millions of children. Had she known about Roger Clemens in 1985, her now classic tale might have gone like this:

If you give Roger Clemens a steroid,
he's going to ask you to understand.
When you tell him you understand,
he'll probably ask you to keep quiet.
When he's finished, he'll ask you to clean it up.
Then he'll want to look in the mirror
to make sure he has fame.
When he looks in the mirror,
he might notice he needs more power.
So he'll probably ask you for a different vitamin supplement.
When he's finished giving himself the new steroids,
he'll want a broom to sweep it up.
He'll start sweeping.
He might get carried away and sweep every aspect of his life.
He may end up lying under oath as well.
When he's done,
he'll probably want to hide.
You'll have to fix up the mess he's brought you into, with lies and cover ups.
He'll ignore you,
make himself comfortable and try to come back a few times.
He'll probably ask you to keep lying.
So you'll read some statements to important people,
and he'll ask you one day to show the proof.
When he looks at the proof,
he'll get so upset he'll want to harm you any way he can.
So he'll ask for paper and lawyers.
He'll pay the lawyers to draw a picture.
When the picture is finished, he'll want to make sure his name is cleared.
With a pen.
Then he'll want to hang his triumph on your refrigerator.
Which means he'll need you to fall.
Looking at the refrigerator will remind him that
He can get away with anything.
So...
he'll ask for everyone to understand.
And chances are if he asks everyone to understand,
he's going to want forgetting about the steroids to go with it.

Anna's family and friends tolerate her love for baseball only because she keeps providing them with homemade cookies. She started The Girlfriends Batters Eye to entice her girl friends to follow baseball and welcomes comments and questions.

Friday, August 20, 2010

Visual Baseball: Introducing Bat Slicer

Posted by Kevin Dame
Happy Friday. Here's something new that I've been working on. It's called Bat Slicer and the idea is to visually represent a hitters' bat. I'm hoping the visuals are fairly self explanatory, but just in case: We start with strikeouts (represented by a hole in the bat, and then show walks, singles, doubles & triples, and home runs in successive rings. These stats are based on production per plate appearance, with a minimum of 200 PA's, and then converted into percentile rankings, with 100% being the best, 0% the worst. The legend on the bottom right of the visual gives you a sense of scale. Click here to see a slide show of lots more players.

Let's start with a player who's bat we'd expect to look pretty fearsome.

In contrast, here's a guy who carries a pretty light stick.

Here's a guy who is doing some serious damage, albeit with a lot of strikeouts.

And here's an "all or nothing guy." Lots of home runs and strikeouts. He also enjoys a nice walk down to first base.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
White Sox 11, Twins 0: Paul Konerko was a triple short of a cycle. (Oh crap; now I'm in trouble!).

Angels 7, Red Sox 2: Anaheim finally wins one against Boston. A three-run homer from Hideki Matsui in the 6th opened things up for the Angels. Know what ain't lookin' good right now? Josh Beckett's contract extension (6 IP, 7 H, 6 ER).

Orioles 4, Rangers 0: Brian Matusz shut the Rangers out over eight. He had struggled mightily against them in two previous starts this year so maybe our children is learning. Texas is 2-5 since Greenberg and Ryan took over, by the way. I think I'm gonna try and get some sort of curse started. By the time it gains cultural purchase, people will have forgotten that I invented it from whole cloth.

Giants 5, Phillies 2: Jonathan Sanchez shut the Phillies down until tiring in the ninth. Bruce Bochy removed Sanchez from the game in the
middle of Placido Polanco's at bat in the ninth while he had a five run lead. At the time he had exactly 100 pitches. Someone want to give Bochy the pitch count lecture again? I mean, yeah, monitor it, but no one is gonna die if they get to 101.

Astros 3, Mets 2: Hard to expect a hell of a lot more from Pat Misch than three runs in six innings. The Mets just couldn't get it done with the bats.

Padres 5, Cubs 3: I'm beginning to think that this Mat Latos character can pitch a little bit (7 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 10K). And this was fun. Pro tip: when you call time out, make sure time out is granted before you lollygag around the infield.

Nationals 6, Braves 2: Atlanta pop-fouled and ran its way out of potential rallies in both the sixth and eighth innings and the Nats pen shut the Braves down in the final innings, preventing one of their increasingly common late game comebacks.

Yankees 11, Tigers 5: When the sixth inning began it was 2-2. when it ended it was 11-2. Robinson Cano hit a two-run bomb and an RBI double that inning. He also finished a triple short of the cycle! (Damn!)

Dodgers 2, Rockies 0: The season hasn't gone the way the Dodgers want it to, but you can't blame their main trade deadline pickup. Ted Lilly was masterful, throwing a two-hit shutout with a 11 strikeouts.

Reds 9, Diamondbacks 5: The Reds are on their longest winning streak of the year -- six games -- and now have their largest lead over the Cardinals all year as well: three and a half games.

Athletics 4, Rays 3: Most of Trevor Cahill's recent starts have been dominant. This one was less so -- he was in a bit of trouble -- but he fought through it and got some timely offensive support and some great defensive behind him. Included in that was a couple of double plays and this spiffy catch from Coco Crisp.

Indians 7, Royals 3: The winning team had five errors. There were 23 hits in the game. It lasted 3:24. The stands were basically empty. Gametime temperature was 90. I love baseball with a passion, but being at this game would seriously test it.

Marlins 4, Pirates 2: Susan Sontag once said that "the life of the creative man is led, directed and controlled by boredom. Avoiding boredom is one of our most important purposes." While I believe that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap, there's something to that quote. It's something that inspired me not to spend any time reading the box score or dwelling too deeply on the specifics of a mid-to-late August, midweek Marlins-Pirates game. Life is too damn short. I'm sorry.

I'm goin' on vacation next week. Based on the fact that I punted those last two recaps I probably need it.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Thursday, August 19, 2010

THT’s latest Graphical Report

Posted by Dave Studeman
It's been two weeks since our last Graphical Report, and I apologize for that. But better late than never, and here is the Hardball Time's latest Graphical Report, laying out how well each team has been doing, or not doing, and why. It's a PDF file, so you'll need Adobe Acrobat to read it.

Happy Baseball!

Dave was called a "national treasure" by Rob Neyer. Seriously. Comments about this article can be sent to him through the miracle of e-mail.

The True Cost of Adrian Beltre

Posted by Brad Johnson
Lest anyone takes this seriously, let it be known that the following analysis is tongue-in-cheek.

Today, Fangraph's fulltimer and known Mariners lover David Cameron posted on a topic titled "Free Agent Signings That Worked." The comments section immediately devolved into a "you missed that guy" and/or "this guy is the best" and/or "this guy doesn't belong" type of affair. I missed the boat on that.

One of the players on the list was Adrian Beltre who for the sum of $10 million with a mutual option designed never to be accepted, has provided the Red Sox with 5.7 WAR. What I wondered aloud was, what happens if we deduct the intrinsic costs. By now you might be on the same page as me and realize I'm calling Jacoby Ellsbury's lost season and Jeremy Hermida's summary dismissal as the intrinsic costs of employing Adrian Beltre. I call this an intrinsic cost because if we accept (again let me remind you, tongue-in-cheek) that owning Beltre was the necessary condition that caused the injuries to Ellsbury and Hermida, then Beltre's actual value is not adequately captured by his WAR.

I'm going to use CHONE pre-season projections as my baseline for measuring the value of Ellsbury and Hermida.

Let's start with the obviously better player, the once injured, thrice DL'd Jacoby Ellsbury. Jacoby has managed just 18 games this season and a pitiful .237 wOBA, but CHONE projected a healthy .353 wOBA over 142 games. Depending on how you weigh his defense, that leaves you with a 3.5-4 WAR player.

Then there's Jeremy Hermida, who was ostensibly Ellsbury's top backup. CHONE projected a .340 wOBA in 130 games. The games estimate immediately strikes me as a little too high so if we adjust that downwards we get a player worth about 1 WAR. But then there's the consideration of how he actually did. In 52 games, Hermida managed a paltry .269 wOBA, which led to his dismissal. His actual -.7 WAR may have at least in part been due to his early June collision with Beltre. Or perhaps Beltre recognized an under-performing player and dealt with him the best way he knew how.

So what's the final tally here? The author of two collisions, Adrian Beltre seems to have eliminated 4.5-5 WAR of projected value from the roster, although the actual production of the players in question is closer to -1 WAR. Further obscuring the final tally is the competence of the Red Sox backups. While Ellsbury(-.3 WAR), Hermida (-.7), Mike Cameron (-.3), and Eric Patterson(-.3) have provided negative value to the roster the back up quintet of Jonathan Van Every (.1), Ryan Kalish (.1), Josh Reddick (.2), Daniel Nava (.6), and Darnell McDonald (1.2) have done a decent job of keeping the outfield afloat. Still you have to figure that at the very least, a healthy Ellsbury adds 3.5 wins to the roster. Ultimately, that's what I'm comfortable deducting from Beltre, 3.5 wins. Yes, a lot of fudging just happened in that paragraph.

Final score
Beltre WAR (5.7) - damages (3.5) = Net Wins (2.2)
Dollars ($10)/Net Value (2.2) = Dollars per Net Win (4.54)

Suddenly Adrian Beltre is an average free agent signing, eh?

Brad Johnson appreciates any critiques of his work, both positive and negative. If you have any questions you can reach him at pitchin432 AT yahoo.com. You can follow him on twitter @baseballATeam

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Yankees 9, Tigers 5: The play in this one was defined by the six home runs that were hit (two by Miguel Cabrera), but the game was defined by chin music. Or at least leg and back music. After last night's hard slide by Brett Gardner knocked Carlos Guillen out indefinitely, Gardner was plunked in the first. Warnings issued. Fine. But then Chad Gaudin hit Cabrera in the eighth. No ejections, though, because umpires have a lot on their minds and can't be bothered with remembering warnings they issued a mere two hours earlier. Leyland got ejected complaining about that. Then Jeter got one thrown behind his back by Enrique Gonzalez and both Cano and Teixeira got some inside pitches. Still no ejections.

Depending on how you value inside pitches (does three of them = one plunking?) the Tigers and Yankees are either even on the Great Manhood Ledger or else the Yankees are up 2-1 (slide into Guillen + Cabrera plunking vs.the Gardner plunking). Of course, given that the umps aren't going to do anything to anyone over all of this I fully expect the scores to be settled via someone swinging a pillow case full of soda cans at an opposing player, "Bad Boys"-style. I'll call it now: Ryan Raburn will play the Sean Penn role and Nick Swisher's will be Esai Morales.

Twins 7, White Sox 6: Gavin Floyd vs. Francisco Liriano was just the latest cracker jack on-paper pitching matchup that fizzled out when both guys proved mortal. Floyd was mortaler, though, allowing all seven Twins runs on ten hits. Bright side for the Sox: the bullpen didn't blow this one! The Sox are now five games back.

Braves 3, Nationals 2: Once again Atlanta hitters couldn't do anything against a Nats' starter for the first few innings, but once again they came through late. They didn't come through as big as they did on Tuesday night, though, so this one was tied heading into the bottom of the ninth, when Jason Heyward won it for Atlanta with an RBI single. I haven't mentioned my man crush on Heyward for some time, but I assure you, it still burns.

Marlins 3, Pirates 2: Josh Johnson goes eight, striking out six and allowing only two runs to snag his first win in six starts. Meanwhile, Dan Uggla continues to chug along in what is turning out to be the best season of his career. He hit another bomb in this one, and now has 28 on the season and a quite spiffy .294/.381/.532 line, all three of which would be career highs if the season ended today.

Red Sox 7, Angels 5: The Sox are now 9-0 against the Angels this year. I guess that atones for the 3-0 sweep in last year's ALDS, huh?

Phillies 8, Giants 2: Can I go back and re-declare the Giants dead? I won't claim I was 100% right the first time I did it. I'll just say that I was ahead of my time.

Padres 5, Cubs 1: A double and a couple of RBI for Matt Stairs who, no matter who he plays for and no matter how he's doing, always makes me happy. Dude has worked for 12 teams in 18 years. Until this year he's just about always hit pretty well. He's never complained or been a problem that I can recall. He's always just taken his suitcase wherever he was wanted and has done what was asked of him. This is probably his last year. This could have been one of his last starts. Glad to see him going out and gettin' it.

Mariners 6, Orioles 5: Matt Tuiasosopo homers again. Then he scored on a keeper from the four yard line, putting the Huskies up for good. If they hold on here and then beat the Cougars next week, there's a potential Sun Bowl berth in it for them.

Brewers 3, Cardinals 2: As Aaron noted, the Brewers were lucky to hold on, but Trevor Hoffman still has enough fumes in the tank to make it a few more miles. Adam Wainwright certainly did enough to win on most days, but the Cards just couldn't break through against Randy Wolf. Four straight losses for St. Louis.

Royals 9, Indians 7: Cleveland attempted a bit of a late comeback, but it fell short. Let's face it, though: if you knock 11 hits off Bruce Chen, you should probably win that game. The Tribe, alas, did not.

Athletics 5, Blue Jays 4: Gio Gonzalez was robbed. He gave up only one run on two hits in seven innings, but his pen let him down, allowing Toronto to tie it up in the ninth. In the bottom half the A's strung together a Steve Tolleson single, a passed ball allowing him to make it to second and then a Cliff Pennington single to knock him in for the game winner.

Rays 8, Rangers 6: As far as playoff previews go, this one was pretty yawn-inducing. Evan Longoria was a stud: his 3 for 4 day, with two doubles, a homer and four RBI led the charge for the Rays.

Mets 3, Astros 2: R.A. Dickey and Brett Myers pitched well, but Dickey ran out of gas in the ninth, allowing the Astros to tie it on a Geoff Blum bomb. The pens each pitched well too, pushing this one into the fourteenth inning when Jose Reyes walked, advanced to second on a sacrifice, stole third and then came in on a sac fly for what what proved to be the winning run. And they say the manufacturing sector is dead in this country.

Reds 11, Diamondbacks 7: Just yesterday I read something about how Arizona's bullpen had finally settled down a bit under Kirk Gibson's deft management. Guess they're still working out the kinks, because Cincy put up eight runs between the eighth and ninth innings, coming back from being down 7-3 to win it going away. The run that put them over the top came on a squeeze play with Jim Edmonds running at third base. I'll admit it: if I was the D-backs, I wouldn't have been expecting that one.

Rockies 3, Dodgers 2: A wild one! Wait, make that a wild three! Octavio Dotel got two strikeouts in the tenth inning, but he allowed Melvin Mora to advance to second on a wild pitch and then come home on a second wild pitch with the winning run. He had a third wild pitch that inning, but it ended up not doing him any additional harm. For what it's worth, the Dodgers scored their first run of the game on a wild pitch too.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Ms. Satire finds the SI vault

Posted by Anna McDonald
Bank vaults hold cash. Fort Knox's vault holds gold. Film vaults hold old reels of "The Pride of the Yankees." Burial vaults presumably hold deceased Yankees.

For years now, Chris Armstrong has been wondering what, exactly, is kept in the Sports Illustrated vault. "I totally want to go down to the office and tour the real thing," Chris said. "How cool would that be?" Chris spends about two weeks every year going on private tours of vaults around the country. He loves seeing how different companies store and organize all their really valuable outdated stuff.

The Sports Illustrated vault would be a dream come true for Chris. "There's so many urban legends that surround the SI vault. What else besides all those prized articles could be in there?" he said. "I've heard people saying things like, maybe there's top secret story ideas, old swimming suits, vitamin supplements for athletes."

Chris finally had the opportunity. Last week, when a local talk show was auctioning off a chance to tour the vault, Chris sold his motorcycle and offered $8,300 for the tour. The next highest bidder was Trey Wingo, from the ESPN studio at $275. He had left a pair of cufflinks somewhere in New York and wanted them back—he figured they were worth about that much and would give it a shot.

"When I got the call that I won the bidding, I couldn't believe it!" Chris said, amazed, "I really didn't think my bid was high enough. I know a lot of people want to see how SI fits all those old magazines in there."

Chris soon found something that most baseball fans don't even know is missing—a defensive metric that measures defense appropriately. "Yeah, it was pretty crazy," he said. "The tour guide was showing me how interns have to dig through all these piles to find an article that everyone has forgotten about, and I slipped and fell on the mid-August stack. That's when out from under the heap came this piece of paper. Apparently there's a bunch of really important numbers on it."

Even though Chris doesn't know who Bill James is, he's glad he helped find the long lost defensive metric that's going to eliminate a lot of posts on the Internet. Chris knows that for some reason relating to baseball he is famous now, but his new-found fame isn't a big deal to him. He said, "I know I fell on something important buried in the vault. But what really matters to me was seeing the piles and piles of faded old magazines. The musty smell, all the non-paid journalism students digging through dusty magazines, those are the memories I will cherish forever."

Chris says he doesn't need to tour any more vaults. The Sports Illustrated opportunity fulfilled all his dreams. He hasn't given up his longing to see how people store valuable stuff, though. Next week he's going to start visiting the backyards of great aunt Hildegards and Bettys around the country to see what's in the ground next to the third tree on the left.

Anna's family and friends tolerate her love for baseball only because she keeps providing them with homemade cookies. She started The Girlfriends Batters Eye to entice her girl friends to follow baseball and welcomes comments and questions.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Twins 7, White Sox 6: The Twins jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the first, couldn't hold it and the Sox hung tight with them for most of the game. Then, down a run in the bottom of the 10th, Jim Thome hit a two-run walkoff bomb that in no way made Ozzie Guillen regret the fact that he lobbied hard all winter to be able to avoid having to carry a dedicated DH on his roster, thereby sending Thome in Minnesota's direction rather than come back to the Sox where he said he wanted to go in the first place.

Rays 10, Rangers 1: We all talked about how this was a division series preview. If so, the Rangers have their backs up against the wall, previewly-speaking. The AP story said that Matt Garza "scattered five hits over seven innings." I'd like to read one that says Rangers pitchers "scattered 15 hits over eight innings." I mean, the act of scattering is always used to refer to hits that don't amount to many runs, but there's nothing inherent in the term that requires it. The Rangers scattered the hits. The Rays scored following an inordinate amount of them.

Braves 10, Nationals 3: The Braves' bats snoozed for five innings and then woke up just in time to give Mike Minor some run support after his night was over but while he was still the pitcher of record, thereby handing him his first career win. Martin Prado returned and got three hits. Adam Dunn threw a ball away like a quarterback on the five yard line who couldn't find an open receiver in the end zone. Melky Cabrera got a clutch hit and made a nice catch in left. It was a really entertaining final few innings if you weren't a Nats fan.

Phillies 9, Giants 3: Chase Utley returned and put up an 0 for 5, but it didn't matter because Oswalt was dealing and the rest of the Philly bats broke it open late. The Phillies take a one game lead in the wild card race.

Red Sox 6, Angels 0: Clay Buchholz shuts the Halos down for seven innings and Ryan Kalish hits a grand slam. Darnell McDonald hit a solo homer that crashed through the rear window of a Toyota parked on the top floor of the garage across Lansdowne Street. While Kalish got more RBIs for his, McDonald received 10 more points for style in the big ledger I keep next to my TV. Dustin Pedroia returned and went 0 for 4 despite the fact that we were led to believe that there would be laser shows.

Padres 1, Cubs 0: Garland, Adams and Bell combine for the six-hit shutout. Randy Wells deserved a better fate (7 IP, 3 H, 1 ER), but we all do, don't we?

Astros 4, Mets 3: For weeks all we've been hearing in the media is constant hype about how Nelson Figueroa was going to get his chance to exact his revenge on the Mets for cutting him. So, like millions of others, I'm happy this is finally behind us. Oh -- and I think it was the cutest thing in the world was how that, during the Braves-Nats game, FOX Sports South flashed this score up on the screen along with the Phillies-Giants score in its little "playoff race roundup" feature. It's as if we can't tell the Mets that they don't matter anymore and have to keep up appearances or something.

Brewers 3, Cardinals 2: Three losses in a row for St. Louis, two to the Cubs and this one to the Brewers. I can't recall a more yo-yoing contender in some time.

Royals 2, Indians 1: The usual power display from Yuniesky Betancourt and Wilson Betemit provide enough to give Zack Greinke the win. The Indians walked seven times. You probably need to score more than once when that happens.

Marlins 6, Pirates 0: Ricky Nolasco did it all. He won his fifth game in six starts, allowing only five singles, no extra base hits and a lone walk to go with nine strikeouts. He also went 2-for-3 and drove in two runs. No word as to whether he broke out his powerful, paralyzing, perfect pachydermous percussion pitch.

Yankees 6, Tigers 2: Walkin' five dudes and throwing 114 pitches in five innings is no way to go through life, Justin Verlander. In other news, the Yankees' success against pitchers they're facing for the eighth time continues.

Mariners 4, Orioles 0: Matt Tuiasosopo had four RBI and continued his streak of days on which I see his name in print and picture him playing quarterback for the Washington Huskies to about 67.

Dodgers 6, Rockies 0: Clayton Kershaw shuts the Rockies out over seven innings and the pen decides not to blow up this time.

Athletics 6, Blues Jays 2: Some early offense for the A's, who haven't had much of it lately. Dallas Braden outpitched Brandon Morrow in a battle of guys who might have been better off long term if they didn't have that one kickass start this year.

Reds 6, Diamondbacks 2: The Reds open a dreaded west coast swing with a win which bumps their division lead to two games. Given how poorly they usually do out west, they need to give themselves as much of a cushion in Arizona as they can before hitting San Diego, L.A. and San Francisco.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

A half-century ago today (8/18/10)

Posted by Chris Jaffe
On August 18, 1960, Milwaukee Braves starter Lew Burdette threw a game for the ages. On that day, Burdette's second-place Braves desperately tried to stay in the race (7.5 games behind the front-runner and eventual World Series champion Pirates) faced the perpetually pathetic Philadelphia Phillies. Though a chronic cellar dweller, the Phillies rarely looked as bad as they did that day.

Burdette won the game 1-0, tossing a complete game in the process. That's fitting, as he's perhaps best known for his 1-0 wins. More impressively, he also allowed no hitters. And no walks.

Yeah, those are the two most common ways of allowing base runners, and Burdette avoided them entirely. Still, the game is not listed in the annals of perfect games. No, it wasn't an error that did Burdette in. Instead, in the fifth inning he plunked CF Tony Gonzalez. That was Philly's only base runner. (He wasn't a base runner for long - a double play gobbled him up, allowing Burdette to face the minimum 27 batters on the day).

In the last 90 years, it's one of only five games a pitcher tossed a complete game no-hitter with no walks and only one HBP. In the other four, three times the winning team made at least one error putting a runner on base. Only Kevin Brown, whose June 10, 1997 attempted at perfection was foiled by a HBP after 23 outs was in the same situation as Burdette. (Bill Singer was close though - a HBP and error by the pitcher provided the only base runners in his game.

So Burdette's plunking of Taylor has to rank up there among the most unfortunate in baseball history.

History instructor by day, statnerd by night, Chris Jaffe leads one of the most exciting double lives imaginable; with the exception of every other double life possible to imagine. Despite his lack of comic-book-hero-worthiness, Chris enjoys farting around with this stuff. His new book, Evaluating Baseball's Managers is available for order. Chris welcomes responses to his articles via e-mail.

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Rays 6, Rangers 4: Once again, a highly touted pitching matchup fails to yield a great pitchers duel. David Price walked five guys, but only gave up two runs. Cliff Lee was cruising, striking out ten guys, but he hit a brick wall in the eighth, giving up a series of hits while watching his 4-2 led turn into a 6-4 deficit. Circumstances conspired to keep me from watching this game, but anyone who did: why did Ron Washington wait so long to pull Lee when he was apparently throwing batting practice by the time the eighth rolled around? It seems like Lee has gone really long quite often since coming over to Texas. Does anyone realize that, yes, they're going to need him come October, so maybe he could use a bit of a rest? Especially when he's in trouble?

Blue Jays 3, Athletics 1: Shaun Marcum is the latest to flirt with a no-no, losing his in the seventh on a Connor Jackson homer. That's all he'd give up, however, finishing with a complete game one-hitter. Jose Bautista hit what, at the time, was ruled an inside-the-park home run because my fellow New Albany, Ohio resident -- umpire Tim Timmons -- ruled the ball in play. After the game it was ruled that the ball actually left the park, making it a regular homer. Strange. People from my town never make mistakes.

Pirates 7, Marlins 1: Pittsburgh breaks its seven game losing streak. Garrett Jones and Pedro Alvarez each had three RBI and James McDonald gave up one run on three hits in seven innings. The Pirates are 13-48 on the road and 27-30 at home. Is this heaven? No, it's Pittsburgh.

Braves 4, Dodgers 3: If you would have told me last winter that Melky Carbrera and Rick Ankiel would be hitting back-to-back in the Braves lineup in August I would have killed myself. But there they are. On Sunday Ankiel took a couple of walks and was a key contributor to a 13-run outburst and last night Melky had a clutch two-run single to bring the Braves back from 3-1 deficit to win the game in the bottom of the ninth. I don't recommend counting on these guys to be heroes -- and I may still kill myself before this is all said and done -- but on those rare occasions they do come through it is, well, not satisfying really, but certainly something.

Orioles 5, Mariners 4: A walkoff bunt single for Adam Jones. That's something you don't see every day.

Mets 3, Astros 1: Taking the lead on a ninth inning wild pitch. That's something you don't see every day. You also don't see RBI triples from Jeff Francoeur that often, but he provided the insurance. And, introducing your new Mets closer: Hisanori Takahashi. I was hoping for Oliver Perez, but you can't always get what you want.

Padres 9, Cubs 5: Who went and woke up Miguel Tejada? Dude went 4 for 5 with a double and a couple of RBI. He's been a nice pickup for the Padres so far. Rare shaky night for the Padres' pen, though. It took five relievers to nail this one down.

Tigers 3, Yankees 1: Max Scherzer keeps the Yankees bats silent (6 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 6K). A-Rod and Nick Swisher left the game early with various ailments. Derek Jeter grounded out into a game-ending double play with the bases loaded. I'm sure the people who keep track of how clutch he is and inform the rest of us about it all the damn time missed the play while watering flowers or walking the dog of holding their hands over their ears, eyes closed, yelling "LA LA LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!!!" Oh, and expect Scherzer's performance to bring forth "The Yankees do poorly against guys they face for the first time" stuff we've been hearing so much of lately. Anyone have any numbers on this? It seems like fans of every team says this sort of thing.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Twenty years ago today (8/17/10)

Posted by Chris Jaffe
Twenty years ago today, Nolan Ryan had one of his most impressive and memorable outings.

On August 17, 2010, in the first game of a doubleheader, Nolan Ryan threw 10 shutout innings, allowing only three hits and walking none while fanning 15. The resulting Game Score of 101 was the highest by an AL pitcher was the highest by an AL pitcher since 1976, and we still haven't seen anyone top it since (though Ryan himself tied it the next year in a no-hitter). Among other things, it's the most innings he ever threw in a game in which the all-time walk leader didn't issue any free passes. (Despite his brilliance, he got a no-decision, though Texas won 1-0 in 13 innings).

That's what made it brilliant. It's not why I find it memorable, though.

There's a story with this game and it revolves around a fourth guy who got on base against Ryan that day. You see, aside from the trio of singles, Ryan hit a batter putting him on. In the top of the third, after retiring the first seven batters he faced, Ryan plunked little Craig Grebeck in the ribs with the first pitch. As a kid watching the game at home, I knew that was intentional - not a doubt on my mind.

You see, there's a back-story here. Exactly one week earlier, in Ryan's previous start (also against Chicago), the legendary hurler experienced perhaps the most humiliating inning of his life. In the second inning, with two runners on, the supposedly 5 foot 8 Grebeck hit his first career homer off of Ryan. Then Ozzie Guillen followed that up with a homer of his own. Yes, you read that right: Grebeck & Guillen hit back-to-back homers off the mighty Nolan Ryan. Their 4 RBIs was the difference, as Chicago bested Ryan and the Rangers, 5-1.

Fun fact: neither Grebeck nor Guillen hit any other homers all year.

So yeah, as a kid watching the August 17 game, I was sure that HBP was intentional. Cleary, Sox starting pitcher Greg Hibbard agreed. A couple innings later, he plunked Ranger third baseman Steve Buechele. Seemed appropriate - Grebeck played third for the Sox that day so this evened it out. Well, I suppose Buechele didn't think it seemed too appropriate, because he charged the mound. Benches cleared - except for Ryan, who walked onto the field after order was restored. He had to conserve his strength to fan those 15 White Sox after all.

In a sign of how the game's changed, Hibbard wasn't tossed. In a sign of how the game's the same, Buechele was tossed.

That was an interesting story and a great performance, all in one game - twenty years ago today.

History instructor by day, statnerd by night, Chris Jaffe leads one of the most exciting double lives imaginable; with the exception of every other double life possible to imagine. Despite his lack of comic-book-hero-worthiness, Chris enjoys farting around with this stuff. His new book, Evaluating Baseball's Managers is available for order. Chris welcomes responses to his articles via e-mail.

Monday, August 16, 2010

On Doug Glanville’s ‘The Game From Where I Stand’

Posted by Alec Rogers
Although misleadingly titled, Doug Glanville’s The Game from Where I Stand: A Ballplayer's Inside View is still an enjoyable book for a baseball fan seeking a comprehensive account of a baseball player’s existence. Rather than a searching analysis of the game and its current issues, it’s a memoir of a player who was "just good enough" to make a career playing professional baseball. While recounting his career, Glanville tells his reader about every detail about players' lives on and off the field.

Glanville played major league baseball for nine seasons, mostly with the Phillies and Cubs, and briefly for the Rangers. He also attended spring training with the Yankees but did not make the team. Glanville was a lifetime .277 hitter, but without much power or the ability to take a walk. He was also a clean player during the steroid era, and his 78 lifetime OPS+ is a partial reflection of that. Hard work, smart play, good defense and speed accounted for his ability to make a living playing the game.

Want to know what it's like to buy a car or rent an apartment as a big leaguer? It's different from what you and I know. What time do players arrive at the park before a game and what do they do there before or in between games? Glanville tells us. He even explains why Montreal was one of the players' very favorite cities to visit and why they were disappointed when that city lost its major league franchise after the 2004 season.

His career gave Glanville a good vantage point to "see it all." He was never at the center of the game, but was around it for a long time during an interesting period. He’s also very observant and reflective, which comes through in the book. Recounting his career, you’ll learn all the details about a player’s life from glove contracts to dealing with groupies. No detail is too small for Glanville’s eye.

Some things about the book grate a bit. Granville has an engineering degree from the University of Pennsylvania. Penn is an Ivy League school. If you don't know these two facts before, you certainly will by the time you're finished with the book. Because Granville didn't get a lot of big moments, those he did get are recounted in exhaustive detail that would take a thousand pages in a memoir of top-notch player. He even lists the pitchers off whom he hit a home run and the circumstances in an appendix. Still, Glanville is all too aware of his shortcomings, which he also faithfully catalogs, and his overall assessment of his playing career is balanced.

One of the most interesting threads that emerges from Glanville's account is how vulnerable players feel at all times, knowing the talented pool of younger players just waiting to take their roster spot. This was probably more warranted in Glanville's case; but no matter how talented, every player knows that he's a blown knee away from ending his career. Reaching free agency in good enough health to receive that big multi-year, multi-million-dollar contract is naturally of paramount importance—something to keep in mind when a home town favorite looks to ink the best deal he can.

Perhaps the most interesting question is why anyone would read the memoirs of a career OPS+ 78 player. The answer is that anyone who loves the game has wondered from time to time what it’s like to live the life of a ballplayer—not just at a given moment but the full experience. Glanville’s book provides a thoughtful and comprehensive picture.

Alec Rogers is a Washington, DC area attorney who retains an affinity for his hometown Detroit Tigers

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Padres 8, Giants 2: So much for Jonathan Sanchez's big prediction. The Padres take two of three from San Francisco and run their lead to 3.5 games. Another distressingly bad start from Tim Lincecum (3.2 IP, 8 H, 6 R, 5 ER). The scary question of the day: is he just lost, or is he attempting to pitch through an injury?

Twins 4, Athletics 2: David Pinto at Baseball Musings coined the term "short shutout" for a pitcher who didn't go the distance but who didn't allow any runs. I guess Kevin Slowey gets a "short no-hitter," then, after being pulled following seven innings of no-hit ball. The fans booed Ron Gardenhire when he pulled Slowey. Gardenhire: "I'd boo me too." But he made the right call.

Reds 2, Marlins 0: Homer Bailey with six shutout innings, but the star of this game was Reds' radio color man Jeff Brantley who, during the broadcast, was asked by a listener if he preferred Texas, Carolina, or Kansas City barbecue. I was on the road and missed it, but my good friend and former co-worker Mark was listening and he gives us a very close-to-verbatim transcript:

"Debate? The debate is I like all of them. How bout that. The thing that you have to realize is that if you're from Texas, or Kansas City,
or Carolina, well, obviously you think your barbecue is the best. If you are a barbecue connoisseur as I claim to be and I know that I am, they're all good. That's why you have different types of barbecue - so you don't have to eat the same thing every day. Monday you'll have Kansas City, Tuesday you'll have Carolina, Wednesday you'll have Texas. Then you go from those three days of ribs into the Boston Butt and into the pulled pork. Then you spend the weekend with the roasted chicken."

Jeff Brantley really brings the game to life.

Royals 1, Yankees 0: Brian Bullington, bitches, you better aks someone (8 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 5K).

Braves 13, Dodgers 1: No Chipper? No Heyward? No problem. Now, if Rick Ankiel will just walk twice a game and if Alex Gonzalez will just drive in four every day, the Bravos will be sitting pretty. OK, that's jocularity. The reality: for all the hand wringing over the injuries and the concerns over people going cold in the lineup, Atlanta is going to live or die based on the rotation. They can carry through if Jurrjens, Hanson and Hudson stay solid. If not, forget it.

Indians 9, Mariners 1: Improbable: Travis Hafner comes off the DL to hit a grand slam off King Felix. More improbable: Hernandez gave up six runs, but none of them were earned. Even more improbable: Justin Masterson gave up only one hit, but walked six dudes and threw six shutout innings.

Rays 3, Orioles 2: I think we can all agree that Jeremy Hellickson is pretty good (6 IP, 3 H 1 ER, 5K). The Rays move on to face the Rangers now, which should be fun.

Tigers 13, White Sox 8: Chicago came back from being down 5-1 to take the lead and then the Tigers stepped on the accelerator. The Chisox are spinning out of control.

Nationals 5, Diamondbacks 3: A better start than last time for Strasburg (5 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 1 ER, 7K), but a no-decision on the day. The two unearned runs were his fault, by the way, thanks to a throwing error. A bunch of dumbass fans ran onto the field to protest the Arizona immigration law. I don't care what your issue is. I don't care if I subscribe to it or not. Don't interrupt friggin' baseball games OK? Because if you do, I will totally change my view on one issue, and that's on whether or not trespassing fans should be tased.

Astros 8, Pirates 2: Seven straight losses for Pittsburgh. Which is good, because I had a September series at PNC in mind for a little road trip, and frankly, I didn't want to have to fight for tickets.

Cubs 9, Cardinals 7: The Cards follow up the big emotional sweep of the Reds by dropping two of three to the DOA Cubs at home, surrendering the division lead to Cincy. Derrek Lee hit two bombs, giving him four in three games. Too bad the whole "take a couple days off due to bereavement leave and come back and rake" thing isn't the kind of routine anyone wants to follow.

Rangers 7, Red Sox 3: Texas is now 3-2 in the eight game Yankees-Red Sox-Rays gauntlet through which they're running. Of course, I don't suppose it will be 103 degrees in Arlington in October, so we may only be able to learn so much from this test.

Rockies 6, Brewers 5: A walkoff RBI single for Troy Tulowitzki in the latest act of the "Trevor Hoffman is done" play.

Blue Jays 4, Angels 1: Rickey Romero celebrates his contract extension with a spiffy day on the mound (7 IP, 6 H, 1 ER). No homers for Jose Bautistia this series, which is a rarity these days.

Phillies 3, Mets 1: New York scored nine runs during their six game homestand. The only good thing that happened for them was when Angel Pagan thew out Kyle Kendrick out 9-3 on what should have been a single to right. By several steps. And that's less good than freaky and mercifully game-shortening.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

The young Starlin Castro

Posted by David Wade
Twenty-year-old shortstop Starlin Castro is providing hope amid the Chicago Cubs' disheartening 2010 season. While the Cubs play out the rest of Lou Piniella's last, increasingly lethargic season, Castro continues to live up to his hype after entering the season as the Cubs' top prospect. He dazzled in his debut by driving in six runs, and while that act has been hard to follow, he has still hit for a solid average since May. He's been so solid, in fact, that he got a shout-out from Tim McCarver during the Fox telecast of the Cubs-Cardinals game on Saturday.

McCarver pointed out that Castro is closing in on enough at-bats to qualify for the batting title, noting that his current average would put him in the top five in the National League, and if he finishes 2010 strong he could be the youngest player to win the batting title in either league.

While Castro's .362 BABIP is helping to boost his nice average, he's hit line drives at a 20 percent clip, which may suggest he can continue to be the kind of player who can hit north of .300. That would be helpful since he didn't hit many home runs in the minors. Still, it's not a completely empty average since he hits quite a few doubles, and his youth leaves open the possibility for developing power. That possibility is one of the few things Cubs fans may be able to take away from another lousy season.

David Wade also contributes to http://www.baseballdailydigest.com and welcomes comments at david DOT wade AT insightbb DOT com.

Friday, August 13, 2010

Visual Baseball: The injury-ravaged Boston Red Sox

Posted by Kevin Dame
Here's a look at the remarkable number of injuries the Red Sox have sustained this season. Red represents the number of "starters" missing games, with "starters" consisting of eight fielders, one DH, and one starting pitcher. The Red Sox fielded 10 starters only four times during the season (games 1-4), and then a rash of injuries commenced with a fateful collision between Jacoby Ellsbury and Adrian Beltre. (It's also worth nothing that Beltre subsequently took out Ellsbury's replacement— Jeremy Hermida—in similar fashion.) During a brutal stretch beginning in late June, the Red Sox lost Dustin Pedroia, Clay Buchholz, and Victor Martinez in successive games in San Francisco.

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Scouts, statisticians and wizards

Posted by Brad Johnson
I was about to leave a comment at The Book Blog in a thread titled When to go from the eyes to the numbers when I realized it was probably worth delving into here as well. It opened a philosophical door in my mind that occasionally opens and closes. It seemed a good time to take advantage of the open door and get my jumbled, innermost thoughts peer reviewed (or at least committed to paper for future reference)!

In post No. 8 of the thread I linked above, Nathan asked:

I guess the real question is, can anybody, just by watching 20 games, tell the difference between a .275 and a .300 hitter? I’m referring to batting average here which I know is lame, but the point is that the difference over 80 at-bats (roughly 20 games) is 2 hits! Can an observer notice 1 hit every 10 games?

Now, the fact that two hits separate .275 from .300 indicates that stats aren’t great in that small of a sample, but really, what can a scout see, can he see that this player is hit every 10 games good?

My response is No. 9 and you can view it for yourself if you like. In fact, I highly recommend taking a look at the whole thread. I'll hit the highlights a little later. Really, it's unfathomable to me how any person can divine the difference between a .275 and .300 major league hitter when he's in high school, rookie ball, or even Double-A. The rate of attrition among minor leaguers could mean that perhaps they can't, at least not with any real degree of accuracy . The problem I see with figuring it out is that there are so many different inputs that make up a good hitter. Coordination, reflexes, strength, eyesight, reaction time, mental toughness, intuition, temperament, focus, etc. all have some bearing on whether one player is one hit per 10 games better than another.

Numbers, with sufficient sample size, of course, allow us to proxy the net product of all the myriad inputs that make a player a player. But the sample size is the limiting factor. Beyond that, Cliff Lees abound in the baseball world, players whose skill sets undergo such massive changes that the previous data becomes nearly worthless. And anyone who watches the game knows that other difficult to explain phenomena occur. Raul Ibanez and Adam LaRoche come to mind.

It seems to me that scouts and statisticians are asking similar but ultimately different questions. The scout's job is to learn the player, to become familiar with his mechanics, his strengths, his flaws, how he handles himself under pressure, how he spends his time off the field, how he relates to his family and loved ones. By doing this, the scout tries to paint as detailed a picture of the player as humanly possible so he can convey to his employers how much that player is worth. He judges the quality of the player's skills. Knowing the quality of those skills and knowing which ones can be improved, he can estimate where a player is at now and where his ceiling is.

Statisticians do something else entirely. We ignore the majority of the inputs and focus on the measurable output. When we look at numbers (or at least when I look at numbers—maybe I'm being presumptuous in using "we"), we're trying to quantify a player's skill in a succinct and tidy manner. We don't care if Chris Coste has a godawful swing, that it's of poor quality and so very unlikely to stick at the major league level. We care that he produced a .316 and .326 wOBA in '07 and '08 respectively. And we care that he was a catcher, making him above average for his position. We don't care that Milton Bradley's temperament is at best questionable. We just care that he can mash the crap out of a baseball when healthy. (Yes, I'm simplifying.)

I must admit, that philosophical door in my mind that I mentioned earlier rarely stays open long and now it is closing quickly. I hope I got my views across clearly enough for some good dialogue. Oftentimes I've heard the work of saberists referred to as statiswizardry (which can be intended to compliment or disparage). Ultimately, I think it's the scouts who do the magic by divining the quality of a player's individual skills.

And I think that partially explains why some casual fans are resistant to openly accepting saberist ideas. All we have is charts and graphs and output from R and Stata. It's all very convincing and useful stuff to statistically oriented minds, but the scouts have something more popular with the masses: Magic.

Brad Johnson appreciates any critiques of his work, both positive and negative. If you have any questions you can reach him at pitchin432 AT yahoo.com. You can follow him on twitter @baseballATeam

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Rockies 6, Mets 2: Two outs, runners on second and third, a base open and Troy Tulowitzski at the plate. I hate intentional walks, but I understand that a lot of managers would walk Tulowtizki in that spot. Especially to bring up Melvin Mora. Boy did that ever bite Jerry Manuel in the ass! Grand slam for Mora, game basically over.

Padres 8, Pirates 5: Sometimes I wonder if, on a road trip, Pirates players ever consider walking away from the team hotel and defecting like they were Soviet ballet dancers or something. I'm pretty sure there's a U.N. resolution somewhere that covers the dire situation in which they find themselves and would counsel that the home team provide them asylum.

Diamondbacks 8, Brewers 2: Adam LaRoche, Miguel Montero, Mark Reynolds and Stephen Drew went back to back to back to back in the fourth inning. All four came off Dave Bush, by the way, who apparently is unaware of certain settled concepts.

Phillies 2, Dodgers 0: Matt Kemp was on the bench again because, according to Joe Torre, he wanted to run out the lineup that had scored 15 runs the night before. Maybe he would have been better off somehow finding a way to bench Roy Oswalt, because I think the opposing pitcher had a lot more to do with it.

Yankees 7, Rangers 6: The Yankees got to Cliff Lee enough to keep it close, but then they really got to Frank Francisco and Neftali Feliz to secure a comeback win after being down 6-1. Good to see Mariano Rivera close it down a day after a blown save. Fragile young closers like him need to get right back on that horse after falling off, you know, lest they get all erratic and nervous.

Marlins 9, Nationals 5: Mike Stanton went 5 for 5 with two doubles a homer and four RBI. OK, now that that's out of the way, allow me to observe that between Washington, Miami and Atlanta, the NL East has to be the most humid and disgusting division in baseball, weather-wise. I can't think of any division that—in the aggregate—plays in more oppressive, swampy heat. Baltimore gets ugly, of course, but it's offset by a couple of domes and northern teams in their division. Same with Kansas City. Texas sucks, but lovely Anaheim, Oakland and Seattle temperatures more than offset it. Philly and New York don't nearly outweigh the awfulness of D.C.-to-Miami weather. These are the things I think about when I'm on the 1,356th straight day of sitting in air conditioning.

Braves 8, Astros 2: My Mets and Phillies friends told me "beware of late-season Billy Wagner!" They kinda have a point. Still, the Braves gotta score more than two runs in regulation before they can really start worrying about their closer blowing one here or there. And hey, if Wagner had locked this one down then Brian McCann wouldn't have had that grand slam, and the grand slam was great fun.

Cardinals 6, Reds 1: Hit this one up as it ended yesterday. The Reds, ironically, were the ones who ended up gettin' told.

Athletics 5, Mariners 1: Dallas Braden turns in his second best performance of the year, going the distance and allowing a single run. Three doubles and three RBI for Mark Ellis, who hit into a triple play on Monday. This is important. This means something.

White Sox 6, Twins 1: John Danks has been pretty incredible lately. Last night: 8 IP, 6 H, 1 ER, 7K. The dogfight in the AL Central continues.

Red Sox 10, Blue Jays 1: Two homers for Bill Hall and bombs from J.D. Drew and Adrian Beltre as well.

Orioles 3, Indians 1: Buck Showalter is The Doormat Whisperer. Brad Bergesen with a complete game two-hitter. Only complaint: with 13 hits and three walks, the O's really should have scored more than three runs.

Angels 2, Royals 1: Bobby Abreu walks off with a bomb off Jesse Chavez who, for reasons known only to Ned Yost, was pitching in a critical situation. Great starts by both Zack Greinke and Jered Weaver, each allowing only one run on six hits in eight innings.

Tigers 3, Rays 2: Detroit salvages one as Matt Garza, sadly, does not no-hit the Tigers again.

Giants 5, Cubs 4: Pat Burrell had a couple of big hits and a nice defensive play on a relay throw from left field. At this point he should probably petition to have his time in Tampa Bay just expunged from his record, no?

Programming Note: I'm going to be gone tomorrow for what is, as far as you know, some important business. As such, there won't be any "And That Happened." Please try to find a way to muddle through the day . . . somehow.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

40 years ago today (8/12/10)

Posted by Chris Jaffe
40 years ago today, on August 12, 1970 - back when men were men and so were the pitchers - Bob Gibson threw one of his most impressive games.

It wasn't one of his best games. Heck, by Game Score it wasn't even one of his 50 best games. It was, however, a distinctive game.

Against the Padres, Bob Gibson on that day threw 14 innings, the longest outing of his career. In fact, it's the longest start by any Cardinal pitcher since September 24, 1944. Gibson faced 52 batters, also the most of his career. With 13 Ks and a pair of walks, a basic pitch count estimator places him at just under 200 pitches thrown. This marathon start came in the midst of 21 consecutive starts in which he made it into the ninth inning. Oh yeah - he picked up the win, as the Cards beat the Pads 5-4. This improved Gibson's record to 16-5 on the year.

In pointing this out my purpose isn't to upbraid the modern game for going soft on pitchers or anything quite like that. I'm just fascinated by how very different the game was then. My favorite part came in the eleventh inning. In the top of the inning, Gibson found himself in a big jam, with the bases loaded and only one out. After San Diego's Ed Spiezio hit into timely double play got Gibson out of the inning, Gibson came to the plate in the bottom of the inning. Even though there were two outs and a runner on (and in scoring position after a wild pitch), the team let Gibson bat. He was one of the best hitting pitchers of his day, but as I said - it was a very different game.

Much as I'd like to say this game had no immediate affect on him, it's worth noting he had one of his worst starts of the season in his next outing. He gave up eight earned runs (just one below his career worst earned runs mark) and tied his career-worst 14 hits allowed. That said, the effects were not lingering. On August 22 (again against the Padres), Gibson was back to his old self - throwing a CG 2-hit shutout. One San Diego player got both hits, and if it wasn't for him Gibson would've had a perfect game that day. The batter? Ed Spiezio, the same man who hit into the double play 40 years ago today.

History instructor by day, statnerd by night, Chris Jaffe leads one of the most exciting double lives imaginable; with the exception of every other double life possible to imagine. Despite his lack of comic-book-hero-worthiness, Chris enjoys farting around with this stuff. His new book, Evaluating Baseball's Managers is available for order. Chris welcomes responses to his articles via e-mail.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Panda month-by-month: What the fudge?

Posted by Steve Treder
I had the pleasure of taking in one of the Giants vs. Braves games in Atlanta last week sitting next to THT's own Studes. When Pablo Sandoval came to bat, Studes asked me the obvious question, to which I, as a close observer of the Giants, should have some manner of reasonable answer, namely: just what the heck is going on with The Panda?

After all, he hit 330/387/556 last year as a 22-year-old, and while one might expect that particular torrid pace a bit difficult to sustain, a thudding drop all the way to 268/325/382, which is where Sandoval is through yesterday's games, was hardly what anyone expected.

The answer I gave Studes, the stock answer I give to everyone who asks (and I get asked this question with increasing and depressing regularity), is that The Panda doesn't appear to have the tremendous bat speed he wielded last year. He's been especially vulnerable to the high fastball, fouling off pitches he used to be driving with power. And one look at this ballplayer will suggest the likely reason for the loss bat speed: his weight, which is egregious. It would seem awfully hard to get around on the high heat when you've got that kind of belly in your way.

But here's the thing: the weight explanation would be a lot more persuasive if Sandoval were noticeably heavier this year than he was last year. But he isn't.

Moreover, one would think that whatever it is about Sandoval that's different this year than last would have manifested itself at the very beginning of this year—or perhaps even toward the end of last year. But it didn't.

Let me show you some numbers to explain what I mean.

Here's Pablo Sandoval's batting performance month-by-month, ever since he arrived in the majors in mid-August of 2008, though July of this year:

Month          PA    H   2B   3B   HR   BB   SO    BA   OBP   SLG   OPS BAbip   ISO
Aug 08         58   22    4    1    1    1    6  .393  .397  .554  .950  .420  .161
Sep/Oct 08     96   28    6    0    2    3    8  .315  .333  .449  .783  .317  .134
Mar/Apr 09     80   23    5    1    1    3   12  .307  .350  .440  .790  .355  .133
May 09        100   29    9    1    2    5   12  .309  .350  .489  .839  .338  .180
Jun 09        109   37    9    0    8   13   16  .394  .459  .745 1.203  .403  .351
Jul 09        110   31    7    1    5    5   17  .298  .327  .529  .856  .313  .231
Aug 09        105   33    7    0    5   10   12  .355  .419  .591 1.010  .364  .236
Sep/Oct 09    129   36    7    2    4   16   14  .321  .403  .527  .930  .337  .206
Mar/Apr 10     97   32    7    1    3   10    8  .368  .433  .575 1.008  .382  .207
May 10        120   26    7    1    1    6   19  .234  .275  .342  .617  .269  .108
Jun 10        105   22    4    0    2   10   11  .234  .305  .340  .645  .244  .106
Jul 10        106   22    6    0    0   10   19  .232  .302  .295  .597  .286  .063

Here's what strikes me about this: The Panda's performance in the first month of 2010 was tremendous, right in line with his hottest hitting of 2009. It wasn't until May of this year when the bottom just suddenly dropped out, and he weirdly has sustained his lousy May 2010 performance with dreary consistency through June and July—a level of performance vastly lower than any he'd presented in any month of his prior career.

We see that when Sandoval arrived in the big leagues, he was immediately a very high-average hitter, but with limited power and virtually no strike zone discipline. But over 2009, he sustained the lofty batting average, while adding substantial power, and an increasingly healthy walk rate as well.

Through March/April of 2010, he was keeping up that across-the-board excellence. Only in May did he suddenly encounter a disastrous evaporation in both batting average and Isolated Power. The drop in BAbip has been particularly stunning. He's still drawing a few walks, but not nearly enough to make up for the complete loss in production when he swings the bat.

So, I don't know. His weight might very well be a significant problem, but the fact is that Sandoval didn't suddenly gain a ton of weight on May 1, 2010. But whatever his problem is, it seems to have arrived with extraordinary suddenness in May, and it doesn't seem to be in any mood to go away.

Steve Treder can often be found spending way too much time talking baseball at Baseball Primer. He welcomes your questions and comments via e-mail.

Cardinals and Reds offer tips on fighting like a man

Posted by Anna McDonald
The Cardinals and Reds have given their best efforts over the last two nights to ensure everyone understands the NL Central division is no longer a men's rec softball league. They wanted to establish themselves as a fight club instead. So, they are now giving tips on how to fight like a man.

1. Trash talk.
Rant about how much you hate the guys on other team. They need to know you would beat them playing on only one leg. Call them names. Then follow up your trash talk by going 0-for-5. Make sure the ball doesn't even leave the infield.

2. Pick on the guy from your own team who is having one of the worst years of his career.
Make sure the television cameras catch you dragging him down into the dugout tunnel. Berate and humiliate him in front of the cameras because there's really no other way to address something that's bothering you. Also, threaten him by informing him that if he blinks, speaks or moves you will show him all your tattoos.

3. Let issues carry over to the next day.
During the first inning of the game make sure the ballplayer who started everything in the first place gives a "friendly" tap on the shin guards of the opposing team's catcher. This will help everyone remember all the trash talk you said the day before.

4. Start one of the biggest bench-clearing brawls of the year.
Have every player, manager, coach and interpreter on the field. One of the starting pitchers should start kicking and using his metal spikes to really hurt someone. It should be mentioned at this point it will get confusing as to who is on your side. This can be especially challenging for a team like the Cardinals. When the opposing team signs any ex-Cardinal alive and you end up in an angry scrum you might not remember who you should be yelling at.

5. Crawl out of the scrum on your hands and knees.
If you start off in the scrum protecting one of your best pitchers from getting hurt and somehow you happen to end up on the bottom of the pile, crawl out quickly on your hands and knees. You started out real cool, so don't worry about what it will look like when you emerge from the pile through another teammate's legs. Just get the hell out of there, and when you do, grab your hat and pretend no one saw you crawling around.

Anna's family and friends tolerate her love for baseball only because she keeps providing them with homemade cookies. She started The Girlfriends Batters Eye to entice her girl friends to follow baseball and welcomes comments and questions.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Cardinals 8, Reds 4: Fisticuffsmanship! Or, Footsticuffsmanship, if you watched Johnny Cueto kicking people in the donnybrook. Look, I know that, depending on who ends up winning the division, either Reds fans or Cards fans are going to point to this series as some sort of turning point or inspiration or whatever, but the fact is that they're all kind of embarrassing themselves at this point. Phillips started it, but Yadier Molina's short fuse ignited it and then Cueto's crap was unreal. Dusty Baker and Tony La Russa are supposed to be two of the game's more respected managers. If they're worthy of the praise and press they get, they'll beat their teams upside the head today and this afternoon's game will go off without all of the baloney we saw last night.

Braves 4, Astros 2: The Superman exists -- and he's Brooks Conrad. OK, that's putting it a bit strongly. Dude's just had a couple of gigantic pinch-hit home runs this year, this one a two-run job that brought the Braves back from down 2-1 in the ninth. Troy Glaus added another for insurance. On the bad side, Chipper Jones left the game with what looked like a bad knee injury, though as of now they're calling it a sprain. Jason Heyward sat out with "a sore knee." It also happened to be the day after he turned 21, so there's a distinct possibility that flulike symptoms could have waylaid him as well.

Twins 12, White Sox 6: Minnesota takes sole possession of first place in the central. Five homers for Minnesota, including one from Joe Mauer who has been torrid in August. He ain't the MVP this year, but he's stepping up when the Twins need him to do so, and that's what they're paying the man to do.

Rangers 4, Yankees 3: Not a lot of managers would put their ace closer into a tie game in extra innings on the road. Joe Girardi did. And you know what? I don't care if the Rangers ended up scoring off him to win the game. It was -- and usually is -- the right freakin' choice. Put your best damn guy in there when the game could be lost and do your best not to lose it.
Girardi and Rivera got beat last night, but that's going to happen such a low percentage of the time I'd do it again whenever the situation presents itself. Screw the save statistic.

Marlins 8, Nationals 2: The return of Strasburg does not go well (4.1 IP, 6 H, 6 ER). Rust? Adrenaline? Some residual shoulder wonkiness? The fact that, for the first time, he faced a team who has seen his jazz before? I vote for a little bit of each of those things.

Mets 1, Rockies 0: If you had "Mike Pelfrey will outduel Ubaldo Jimenez" in the pool, please proceed to the cashier's cage and collect your winnings. Both starters were pretty fabulous, actually, but the Mets managed to string a walk, a double and a sacrifice off Jimenez in the seventh.

Dodgers 15, Phillies 9: Kyle Kendrick got beat around for three and a third innings and then he graciously allowed the bullpen to get beat around for five and two-thirds. Andre Ethier reached base six times and scored four times. Ross Gload had two two-run homers for the Phillies. Domonic Brown hit his first major league bomb. Just a hell of a lot going on in this game. Most of it bad for Philly, though.

Orioles 14, Indians 8: This is the American League version of the Phillies-Dodgers games, except done with suckier teams. Showalter's O's are now 7-1.

Diamondbacks 2, Brewers 1: A Miguel Montero homer puts Arizona ahead for good in the eighth. Sadly, however, the closeness of this game prevented Adam LaRoche from pitching.

Red Sox 7, Blue Jays 5: Mike Lowell homered in the eighth to break a 5-5 tie and Jed Lowrie hit an RBI double for insurance. In other news, with Lowell and Lowrie leading the charge it must be 2008.

Rays 8, Tigers 0: Things we know: (1) Jeremy Hellickson is a stud (7 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 7K); (2) The Detroit Tigers are deader than vaudeville.

Cubs 8, Giants 6: Who was that man wearing the number 55 Giants jersey and what has he done with Tim Lincecum? Because I know damn well that the real Tim Lincecum wouldn't give up six runs on eight hits in four innings to a team like the Cubs. That just doesn't happen.

Padres 4, Pirates 1: Ryan Ludwick hit two homers, one of which was his 100th home run. And you know what? He didn't need a ridiculous propaganda piece in a national newspaper to make a note of it.

Mariners 2, Athletics 0: King Felix struck out 13 and shutout the A's over eight innings. He basically had to, a Brett Anderson was pretty sharp himself (7 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 7K).

Angels 3, Royals 1: Dan Haren gets his first win since the trade that sent him to Anaheim. Peter Bourjos drove in the go-ahead run with a suicide squeeze. Those are always fun. Scioscia has a lot of confidence in the rookie, I presume.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

A Minor report

Posted by Mike Fast

Mike Minor throws a four-seam fastball against the Mets in Spring Training, March 3, 2010. (Icon/SMI)

Though I've always been interested in pitch grips, you may have recently noticed that fascination extending to my articles here at the Hardball Times. I don't have much substance to add to what has already been written about Mike Minor and his major league debut last night against the Houston Astros. He pitched six innings, allowing four runs on five hits and one walk, and striking out five.

However, I did want to take a quick look at Minor and see what images I could find of his various pitch types.

He used all four pitches in his repertoire last night. His four-seam fastball started the night 92-93 mph in the first two innings but was down to 90 mph by the sixth inning.

Minor throws a very good circle change-up. Last night he threw 25 of them, ranging from 80-84 mph, and garnered seven swings and misses from the Astros hitters. You can see some images of his change-up grip from the 2010 Futures Game, in Low-A ball in 2009, and from college at Vanderbilt in 2009.

Mike Minor throws a knuckle curveball against the Astros, August 9, 2010. (Icon/SMI)

His third pitch is a knuckle curveball that he threw nine times last night. It clocked in at 79-81 mph, and the batters mostly watched it go by. He threw four called balls, got four called strikes, and one curve was fouled off by Chris Johnson.

I'm fairly certain Minor has a fourth pitch in his arsenal, a two-seam fastball, even though I couldn't find any images of him throwing it. The PITCHf/x data from his major league debut as well as from the 2009 Arizona Fall League, both showed a few sinking fastballs.

My best estimate for his debut last night is that he threw about 37 four-seam fastballs and 23 two-seam sinking fastballs. His two-seamer was thrown at the same speed as his four-seam fastball, averaging about 92 mph. He tended to pitch up in the zone with the four-seamer and down in the zone with the two-seamer, which fact gives me some confidence that I'm getting the bulk of the classification between the two pitch types correct.

The most damage in the game was done against Minor's sinker. Carlos Lee doubled off the sinker to score Jeff Keppinger, and Brett Wallace doubled off of it to score Chris Johnson, both in the fourth inning.

One game is a small sample size, so we probably can't draw solid conclusions solely from that about the quality of his stuff, but Minor certainly looks to have a quality change-up based on the whiffs and his willingness to use the pitch frequently.

Mike Fast is a Royals fan who enjoys investigating baseball questions using data of many sorts. He is a member of Complete Game Consulting. He welcomes comments via e-mail.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Cardinals 7, Reds 3: Mike Leake got rocked and the Cardinals made a statement in game one of a big series. And it is only one game, Reds fans, even if it didn't feel like it. Jim Edmonds' Reds debut: 0 for 4. Theory: he's a deep cover agent sent out by the Cards three years ago with the express purpose of hiding his tracks in Chicago, San Diego and Milwaukee before submarining the Reds. Very clever, La Russa. Very clever.

Red Sox 2, Yankees 1: I stand by my real-time Bard gushing from yesterday, subsequent Teixeira homer notwithstanding. Dude announced his presence with authority.

Astros 10, Braves 4: I'm coming down with something nasty. Feels like a flu. Aches all over and just general blah. Because of this I went to bed really early last night, turning this game off when the Braves were up 4-3. I'm glad I did because I don't think I could have stood it to watch Kyle Farnsworth come into a close game, let alone blow the hell up like he did here. Single, throwing error, walk, single, wild pitch, and finally a walk for The Perfesser, and of course Peter Moylan came in and allowed basically everyone to score. If I was watching this I would have put a brick through my monitor. My guess: Farnsworth doesn't see for the rest of the year unless there's a minimum of a six-run spread at the time.

Orioles 3, White Sox 2: And the O's keep rolling. Walkoff blast for Brian Roberts in the 10th. The homer came off J.J. Putz, though, not Bobby Jenks so I suppose that kept Ozzie Guillen from committing homicide last night.

Rays 6, Tigers 3: It wasn't efficient -- 115 pitches in five innings -- but I suppose David Price's 9 Ks were effective enough. Eight losses in ten games for the Tigers. On the bright side, they can safely make October vacation plans now.

Diamondbacks 7, Brewers 4: Ken Macha has been putting Trevor Hoffman into games late again, probably as a means of getting him to 600 saves before the year is out. This wasn't a save situation -- it was a tie game in the tenth -- but it probably shows the folly of continuing to put Hoffman into anything close to critical spots anymore, as the Dbacks tag him for three runs.

Giants 4, Cubs 3: Carlos Zambrano returned to the rotation and, while he only allowed two runs in five innings, he walked seven dudes and one of those runs scored on a wild pitch. So yeah, there's more to work on than just anger management.

Angels 6, Royals 4: The Angels jumped out to a 5-0 lead and held on as the Royals charged late. Bobby Abreu had three hits and drove in four from the leadoff spot. And by the way, can I tell you how much I love seeing Bobby Abreu in the leadoff spot? He was born for it -- at least the latter-career, low power version of him was -- and it's nice to see Mike Scioscia finally get his mind around the fact that you don't need a fast dude to bat first.

Mariners 3, Athletics 1: Dude: Triple play. Around-the-horn style, too, which is way more awesome than those "second baseman gets a line drive and everyone stands around confused while he randomly tags people and makes an anticlimactic throw to first to double-off a dude" kind. And hey: let's just ignore the fact that it the throw to first was almost certainly late, shall we? The M's had a bad enough day without letting little old things like facts get in the way of a good story.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

FanGraphs Live

Posted by Brian Cartwright
Saturday morning FanGraphs held its first Live! event in New York City, and I had the honor of attending as the official THT delegate. Carson Cistulli has written his recap of the event and Mr. Studenmund has asked me to do the same here at THT. I really enjoyed the whole experience. I even took my wife, which in most circumstances might be a gamble, but she honestly said she enjoyed it very much as well. Of course, I did have to treat her to a horse drawn carriage ride around Central Park immediately after.

We had already planned a few days in New York to celebrate my and our son's birthday. Upon hearing about the FanGraphs event, I was pleased to discover that it was the same weekend and quickly paid online for two admissions. We arrived on Thursday, and I proceeded to eat and drink too much at a very nice Italian restaurant in the East Village. The next morning I didn't feel so well, but I had promised my wife we'd go to see "Fox & Friends," where she could get a free breakfast burrito. Unease turned to pain, and by 9 o'clock I was calling 911 from the bathroom floor of Wendy's. I then found myself inside the Fox News building, enjoying what I could while bent over, being led out by FDNY paramedics. The CAT scan at Bellevue revealed a small kidney stone. After a bag full of morphine, I was feeling much better, and we were on our way. My wife doesn't like heights (closes her eyes going over high bridges) and I have always teased her about the Empire State Building. I finally got her inside—to the basement to pick up my hydrocodone from Walgreens Pharmacy.

Finally Saturday morning arrived. We packed our belongings in the minivan and took the subway over to West 57th Street, walking the rest of the way to the theater on East 59th. The young man at the door asked me for our tickets, but I hadn't seen a place on the website to print tickets (I later found an email sent Thursday, after I was on the road, with a button to print said tickets). I was pulling out my credit card and photo ID when I heard "Brian!" from inside the doorway. It was David Appelman, who told the greeter we were good and led us in. After collecting our complimentary FanGraphs t-shirts at the sign in desk, David showed us the way to the seats and invited me backstage to meet the guys.

I was greeted by the very posh David Cameron, who quickly introduced me to maybe a dozen guys lounging around the room. My always fashion conscious wife had asked me several times how she should dress for the event, and I told her not to worry as mgl said he was buying some shorts in Bermuda to wear there. Much to my surprise, Mr. Lichtman was very dapper, the only panelist appearing in suit and tie. I found it hard to remember all the names, but soon was in a conversation with Craig Glaser, who would later do a demonstration for Bloomberg Sports.

Show time, and I was back to the front row seat beside my wife. Several of us had wondered if Tango would show up, but how would we know? No one, even mgl, has ever met him. He could have been hiding in plain sight, or doing his best Simon Templar impression.

The first panel was on the state of New York baseball, moderated by Carson Cistulli, with panelists Joe Pawlikowski, Mike Axisa and Benjamin Kabak from RiverAveBlues.com, Matthew Cerrone from MetsBlog.com and Mark Simon from ESPN. The audience was likely very heavy on New York residents, but even for the out-of-towners like me who likely cared little about the Mets or Yankees, it was very informative and entertaining, with the lowly standing of the Mets being compared to that of the Evil Empire. Even if the thought of Yankee fans fretting over losing five of six despite remaining in first place drew lots of chuckles. I thought that in a division with the Rays and Red Sox, it's likely the season could end with a gap of only a game or two among the leading teams. Therefore, any loss anytime during the season hurts and could potentially lose a division title. Pawlikowski (did I hear someone say Pavlovkowsky?) and Cerrone led the discussions and were both well spoken and entertaining.

Jonah Keri then moderated the second panel on baseball media, with Will Leitch, Michael Silverman, Alex Speier, David Biderman and again Matthew Cerrone. Keri was genuinely funny, introducing all the panelists and directing the discussions. He started it off listing the Twitter addresses of all the panelists, leading into a discussion of should sports writers be Twits? How does that mesh with their paid employment as sportswriters? And is number of followers just something to stroke your ego? Despite things I had previously read about him, I really enjoyed Will Leitch. Other than Keri, he commanded much of the discussion, and didn't seem interested in the BS we can get caught up with (although Silverman did several times utter the s-word).

Craig Glaser and Ben Lindberg did a video presentation of Bloomberg Sports' Pro Tool, which at this time is primarily a catalog of plays that teams and agents can use to organize stats or to call up video clips filtered by multiple criteria. For example, they showed how to select Jeff Francoeur, three-ball count, pitch is a ball to see a slide show of videos of every time he has drawn a base on balls this season (it only took about 30 seconds). The first two panels likely went long, and by this time Mr. Cameron was trying to quicken the pace (they had a check-out time) and this segment appeared rushed to an early conclusion.

Next up was the nerds of the baseball stats panel. Moderated again by Carson Cistulli, the panel included David Appelman, Sky Kalkman, Jon Sciambi of ESPN, Mitchel Lichtman and Dave Cameron. mgl started his introduction letting us know "I am not a prick!," but as reassuring as that was, and as much as I know and like these guys, the panel was dry. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt that probably "Boog" Sciambi was the only one to do much public speaking. He explained how, like us, he is interested in finding the truth, but has to decide how to package that for the mainstream audience. Instead of teaching xFIP, perhaps it's easier to just downplay RBI and not refer to batting average with runners in scoring position.

Another topic was on what to expect next. We've heard about HITf/x and FIELDf/x, but it seems likely the public won't be seeing that data. My thoughts were that especially with topics like fielding, we have identified what pieces of information we need to do the analysis, but not all that data is yet available. Perhaps if we can get our hands on the f/x products. But meantime, we have to estimate the missing information. Can we get to a time when we can have a dialogue with MLB, communicating our data needs?

Last up and running late was a panel of current FanGraphs authors. I'm a former one, as Dave Cameron asked "You were with us for what, five minutes?," but actually it was seven pieces in four months (but who's counting?). Still, that and $15 qualified me for a seat in the audience. By this time my kidney stone was flaring up and I was fumbling for my narcotics, so I honestly don't remember any topics as I write this.

Once the panel concluded, my wife and I headed to the floor to say hi to Sky Kalkman and Ben Lindberg, and I got a chance to again express my pleasure at meeting mgl. At this point Cameron was literally pushing Lichtman and me up the steps and out of the building as we discussed the finer points of measuring defense. Once on the sidewalk, it was my last chance to meet Jonah Keri, and I told him I felt "almost famous" when he said "Are you Brian? I thought I saw you...like your work".

The after party at 3:30 was already not doable, and then I had to turn down an offer to lunch with the gang as we were meeting our son Ben for a Korean lunch in the East Village (after the carriage ride). He was already in a lower Manhattan bar with some friends, but Donna's cousin Michael, who also came with us, couldn't be found on the cell phone. I said "We can't leave him in New York" to which she replied "He's an adult!"

Michael must have been in the subway, as he later showed up in the bar with Ben. Donna and I were the designated drivers so didn't indulge any of the so ju (Korean vodka) or a pitcher of Hite beer, but by time we and Ben's friends downed the kim chi, be bim bap, bul go gi, and other delicious entrees, it was 5 p.m., and an hour line to get into the Holland Tunnel awaited us. It was 1 a.m. when I finally hit the bed at home and could take another hydrocodone.

Scheduling inadvertently put this event at the same time as the SABR convention in Atlanta, and it was only one day, but I did feel like this was where the cool kids were hanging out. The hosts at FanGraphs have promised online audio of the panels as well as photos. I look forward to doing it again.

Brian got his start in amateur baseball way back in the 1970's as the statistician for his local college summer league in Johnstown, Pa, which also hosts the annual All-American Amateur Baseball Association. A longtime APBA and Strat-o-Matic player, he still tends to look at everything as a simulation. He has also written for StatSpeak and Fangraphs, was runnerup in the Baseball Prospectus Idol competition, and has consulted for a major league team. You can contact him at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Interview: Jack Clark, clutch hitter for life

Posted by Anna McDonald
It was the Little League World Series and his team had just lost the game. Instead of leaving the field with pride, because he was the only kid on his team to get a hit, he walked off uncertain of what he was capable of accomplishing. He had every right to be confident and cocky; he'd had a hit when no one else did, but his team had lost. That was all that mattered to him.

Years later, it was 1985. Like a lion waiting to pounce on his prey, he slowly walked to the on-deck circle. He was ready. This was the moment he loved. Again, this was his chance to rise to the occasion for his team. Now, he was paid for this. He took a deep breath and anticipated the strikes. He was powered by dreams and visions of coming through when the game was on the line. He knew what he was capable of doing and he was certain he could do it.

This major league ballplayer was Jack Clark. Many years after walking off the Little League field confused about how confident he should be, Clark found himself standing in Dodger Stadium with Game Six of the National League Championship Series on the line. It wasn't nerves that drove him, but a "deep level of excitement" in a clutch situation.

As he stood in the batter's box, his plan was to make the Dodgers work to get him. What Clark wanted as he faced Tom Niedenfuer was a base hit. What he got was a miss. He missed on the underneath side of the ball and it flew out of the park. The ninth inning home run propelled the Cardinals to the World Series.

Just like Jack Clark's in 1985, many clutch hits throughout baseball history have defined players, teams, franchises and cities. They change more than the player—they transform a team, and they're often the missing piece that pulls that team together down the stretch when nothing else will.

We know it's hard to define a clutch hitter. We know statistically that a player hits close to the same in a clutch situation as he would in a normal situation. But even with all the unknowns that revolve around clutch hitting, we know for certain that we love clutch hits. As the world of baseball looks forward to this season's hits that will turn wins into division leads, players into stars and teams into champions, we can learn from the past. We can see a glimpse of the unknown by learning from Jack Clark.

When Clark talks about the ninth inning at-bat that became one of the biggest hits in Cardinals history, he says simply, "it was just another home run."

"When they decided to pitch to me, they were saying, 'I don't think you're going to come through.' It was all in my mind: I knew I only needed one hit; it didn't matter if it was a house or a castle. It was in my mind to get a base hit. In the playoffs it was just another opportunity I had. I wasn't a kid, I was a grown player. I wanted to be up there. You have to take away the have to and say 'I'm going to.'"

Well before 1985, Clark had had years of preparation and hard work he knew he could trust to come through for him in clutch situations. He played the game using valuable lessons others taught him. Lessons about, "not letting the failures get you down," but learning from them. He always asked himself, "Did he get me out or did I get myself out?"

He was taught early on in his career not just the value of putting his team first, but the obligation to play day in and day out for others.

One of those lessons came when he was playing for San Francisco and Willie McCovey hit a walk-off home run. "He came around home plate and I picked him up. He said, 'Now, don't ever do that again.' He wasn't dissing me, he was just saying, 'Hey, you know what, this is not Little League. This is what I do. Get excited, but we didn't win anything yet. We didn't win the World Series, we just won one game.' Now, if it's the seventh game of the World Series, I'm picking him up and he can be mad at me for the rest of his life. You learn from guys like that."

Clutch hitting for Clark is, "an internal strength that you pull up, one you don't even know you have." The strength of a clutch hitter can often be found in the way he puts others first, he says.

"You never forget how you get to that point. You have to feel like you're lucky to be up there. You have to like to compete. That guy is trying to get you out; you're trying to help your team win any way you can. You're playing for your fans. You're playing for your city. You're playing for the name on the front of your jersey. Your name just happens to be on the back. When you're fortunate enough to get those clutch opportunities, you hope you do something damaging."

When it comes to clutch hitting, Clark says, you have to accept whatever happens. "If you're going to go down, go down in flames. If I'm going to go out, I'm going to go out because I swung three times in a row." He knows, "the percentages of failure in clutch situations are there," but still believes there's always a message a player can send in an at-bat: "Take your shot. Send a message—to the scouts, to the other manager, to the pitcher, to the team."

He knows, "there are pressures and anxieties, and everything else that goes into it. You have to be able to slow down. You just can't walk up there and say, 'I'm a clutch hitter.' You have to go in there with the psychological profile that you do on yourself ahead of time. This has to be done. You have to win the battle before you even get up there. You have to be in the on-deck circle and be a cool customer."

The Cardinals didn't bring home a World Series championship in 1985 but one clutch hit from a player in the National League Championship Series is still remembered by generations of baseball players and fans. It was in fact more than just one memorable hit. It was an extension of a player being himself and being prepared to carry out what he was meant to achieve.

Although he retired from the majors in 1992, Jack Clark is still delivering clutch hits today. He loves working with charities, such as the Taylor Hooton Foundation, which raises awareness about the dangers of steroid abuse. He also enjoys being a Cardinals analyst, he said—"I enjoy being able to be myself and speak my mind." His insights and commentary on the St. Louis Cardinals on pre- and postgame shows are a favorite of Cardinals fans.

Clark is still every bit the person he was when he played in the majors. If someone asks him a question, he is going to answer with the truth. Part of his legacy will always be delivering clutch hits of truth and passion to the game of baseball.

He said: "If someone showed me up, I had a fervor. Hell was coming and I was coming with it."

Anna's family and friends tolerate her love for baseball only because she keeps providing them with homemade cookies. She started The Girlfriends Batters Eye to entice her girl friends to follow baseball and welcomes comments and questions.

Monday, August 09, 2010

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Blue Jays 1, Rays 0: A single by Evan Longoria with two outs in the ninth saved the Rays from being no-hit for the third time this year. What can you say about Brandon Morrow? Seventeen Ks, a one-hitter and the highest game score by a pitcher since Randy Johnson's perfect game back in 2004. The only negative is that he threw 137 pitches in this one. Hopefully Cito Gaston gives him some extra rest in the coming weeks.

Braves 6, Giants 3: Atlanta threw out a JV lineup -- no Heyward, no Chipper, no McCann, and of course Prado is still hurt -- but it didn't matter as Derek Lowe and a cast of relievers kept the Giants' bats pretty darn quiet. Query: has anyone ever done a study of the Giants' and Athletics' won-loss record based on temperature? It was damn hot in Atlanta over the weekend. In San Francisco, however, the highs are only in the upper 60s at best this time of the summer. I watched a lot of the action over the weekend and can't say the Giants' looked gassed -- maybe Sandoval at times -- but I can't help but think an August series in Atlanta has to bug a team that hails from a place where there's virtually no weather.

Phillies 6, Mets 5: The R.A. Dickey Express was bound to hit a bump in the road at some point, and this was it. The Phillies scored six runs on eight hits against the knuckler, including a Raul Ibanez rocket shot to dead center in the third that scored three. Ibanez has been insanely hot lately, by the way.

Reds 11, Cubs 4: The Reds had an 8-0 lead in the seventh before the Cubs broke through for all four of their runs with the help of some bad Reds defense. Cincy got three of the four back though and won this one pretty easily. Reds pitchers needed only 107 pitches compared to the Cubs' 174. Jonny Gomes walked four times. The Reds have won nine of 11 and now head into a three-game series at home against the Cardinals.

Brewers 11, Astros 6: Milwaukee effectively ended this one quickly, scoring all 11 of its runs before the end of the fourth inning. Which was considerate of them inasmuch as it gave the citizens of Houston that much more time to attend to personal matters on Sunday afternoon.

Speaking of personal matters, I ordered a bunch of fun baseball shirts yesterday. A Columbus Jets number, and from the old PCL a Hollywood Stars t-shirt and a San Francisco Seals 3/4 length sleeve job. I was going to get a Portland Beavers one but I figured that would make me look like that guy who's trying to hard to be clever. Anyway, no reason for sharing this here other than that I'm quite excited about my new shirts and felt like sharing and no one in my house gives a crap about it.

Orioles 4, White Sox 3: The Orioles won't win their way out of the AL East cellar this year, but if Buck's boys keep winning like this they may give 2011's season tickets sales a boost. Baltimore has won five of six since Showalter took over. Mark Buehrle -- who took the loss -- said this after the game: "You're playing one of the worst teams in baseball. We should come in here and beat these guys." Any given Sunday, dude. Any given Sunday.

Twins 5, Indians 4: Jim Thome hit a two-run shot against his old team to help the Twins pull to a half game of another one of his old teams. The Phillies and Dodgers are safe for now, but there's a definite pattern here, so they best watch their backs.

Rockies 8, Pirates 4: Carlos Gonzalez went 4 for 5 with a homer and continues to be absolutely ridiculous this year. Dude's at .327/.355/.579, and I bet that unless you live in Denver, none of the casual fans you talk to at the office know who the hell he is.

Tigers 9, Angels 4: Detroit avoids a sweep. Will Rhymes had three hits and two RBI and was sent down right after the game. I'd like to think he spent last night in a bar in Toledo talking about "damn politics, man. That's all it is."

Mariners 3, Royals 2: Jason Vargas and Kyle Davies had a little pitchers duel that probably said more about the teams' respective offenses than it did about Vargas and Davies.

Athletics 3, Rangers 2: Trevor Cahill does it again: Only three strikeouts, but he (a) didn't walk anyone; (b) got more grounders than fly balls; and (c) kept the ball in the yard.

Padres 10, Diamondbacks 1: San Diego averts a sweep at the hands of the lowly Dbacks and does so in impressive fashion. Jerry Hairston had three hits, one of which was a homer, scored four times and drove in two. Mat Latos threw six shutout innings and combined with the pen to throw a three hitter.

Dodgers 8, Nationals 3: Jason Marquis made his triumphant return, going four innings, allowing five hits and five runs, but only two of them were earned. OK, I guess that's not terribly triumphant, but he's back for whatever that's worth. Ted Lilly gets his second win in a row in a Dodgers uniform. Jamey Carroll went 3 for 3 with a walk and drove in a couple.

Yankees 7, Red Sox 2: I'm not gonna lie to you: I didn't watch this one. I watched "Hot Tub Time Machine" instead. I'm not sure if I made the right choice. "Hot Tub Time Machine" wasn't good, but at times it had some so-bad-it's-good elements. And the more I think about it, a three hour Yankees-Red Sox game whose outcome wasn't in doubt after the fifth inning and in which there was a legitimate reason to compare Derek Jeter to Babe Ruth would have been way, way too much for me.

Cardinals vs. Marlins: POSTPONED: I opened my eyes and looked up at the rain, and it dripped in my head and flowed into my brain. And all that I hear as I lie in my bed is the slishity-slosh of the rain in my head. I step very softly, I walk very slow, I can't do a handstand-- I might overflow. So pardon the wild crazy thing I just said-- I'm just not the same since there's rain in my head.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Sunday, August 08, 2010

Marcus Stroman one to watch

Posted by Alex Pedicini
Duke's Marcus Stroman may be small in size (5'9 180 pounds) but he is a giant on the mound. The reigning ACC Freshman of the Year has breezed through the Cape League competition this summer to a tune of 25 innings, 0 runs, 32 strikeouts, 3 walks, and just 10 hits allowed.

Stroman was a two-way player his freshman year at Duke and has seen some brief action as a position player this summer, although at this point it is clear his future is on the mound. Stroman profiles best as a reliever in the long term. He has a quick arm and generates an easy 93-94 mph on his fastball with plenty of life. He tops out around 96 or 97. He will also feature a plus low-80s slider with good bite. His change-up is still a work in progress and he does not use it all that often. He works quickly and aggressively by attacking opposing hitters and pounding the strike zone.

He is a premium athlete and has the stuff of a potential closer in his future. His size will scare away some clubs but there is plenty to like about Stroman. He will be entering his sophomore year so he is not draft eligible until the 2011 draft but definitely keep an eye on him over the next two years.

Alex is a student in Boston. He welcomes all questions and comments here

Saturday, August 07, 2010

Dying 20,00 days ago as of today (8/7/10)

Posted by Chris Jaffe
20,000 days ago today, one of the most famous people in baseball history died: Cy Young. Obviously, he's most famous for winning 511 games, a record no one has ever challenged.

That said, his death itself had an impact on baseball. It was in response to his death that MLB began issuing an annual award to the man voted the game's best pitcher - the Cy Young Award. Thus it's not a coincidence he died in late 1955 and the first Cy Young Award came out in 1956.

History instructor by day, statnerd by night, Chris Jaffe leads one of the most exciting double lives imaginable; with the exception of every other double life possible to imagine. Despite his lack of comic-book-hero-worthiness, Chris enjoys farting around with this stuff. His new book, Evaluating Baseball's Managers is available for order. Chris welcomes responses to his articles via e-mail.

Friday, August 06, 2010

Visual Baseball: Five-tool analyzer Friday

Posted by Kevin Dame
Happy Friday. What better way to start your weekend than with a fresh sampling of five-tool analyzer visuals. Inquiring minds want to know who's:

All-World
All-Most
All-Muscle
All-Power & Speed
All-Feet
All-D

Let's start with All-World. No surprise here.

Here's a guy who could be All-World, but for one fatal flaw.

This guy is about raw, unbridled power, whether he's swinging the lumber or gunning down runners.

Your throwback all-glove infielder.

Classic combination of power and speed.

Well, the best you can saw about him is that he moves good.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Phillies 5, Marlins 4: Ugly game, with each team trying valiantly to lose throughout, but third base ump Bob Davidson was the ugliest part of all. He blew the call on what would have been the game-winning hit by Gaby Sanchez in the bottom of the ninth, calling it foul when it most clearly was not. Not that he'd know, because he was out of position to make the call. This crap is just inexcusable. You can institute replay to fix these mistakes or -- and this is even more nutty -- you can hire umpires who know their ass from their elbow. What you can't do is let bad calls like this stand in an age when it's possible to review and correct every single bad call almost immediately after it happens.

Twins 8, Rays 6: OK, this may have been an even bigger horsesh-- reason to lose a game than a bad call: Jason Kubel's pop to shallow left in the top of the ninth hit the catwalk at Tropicana Field and dropped for an RBI single, giving the Twins a 7-6 lead in a game they won 8-6. Joe Maddon freaked. As would I have. Then again, at least everyone knew this could happen beforehand because it's part of the ground rules of the place. No one, in contrast, would have expected that an extra-base hit would be called a foul ball for no good reason in that Philly-Florida game.

Orioles 5, Angels 4: The power of Buck compels you. The Angels have now lost all three Dan Haren starts since the big trade.

Pirates 5, Rockies 1: James McDonald shut out the Rockies over six while striking out eight. I guess that means he's still helping the Dodgers out, loosely speaking, but eventually they're going to realize that it was probably a mistake getting rid of him.

Braves 3, Giants 2: Both teams had tons of scoring chances that went by the wayside so in the end the dingers decided it. Two off Tim Lincecum -- one for Alex Gonzalez, one for Eric Hinske -- which doesn't happen very often. Jair Jurrjens wasn't anything special, allowing seven hits, five of which were doubles, and walking three. The Giants should have scored more runs off that, but that's where this recap started so we're just going around in circles now.

Red Sox 6, Indians 2: An Adrian Beltre homer and the good version of Dice-K (more valuable because it's rare!) take care of business.

White Sox 6, Tigers 4: Bobby Jenks did all he could do to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, but a two-run triple by Mark Kotsay in the 11th sealed the deal for the Chisox. There are too many good relievers in that Sox pen for Ozzie Guillen to keep using Jenks when he obviously doesn't trust him.

Padres 5, Dodgers 0: Five pitchers combine to blank L.A., and the Padres are now up two games up on the Giants. Starter Kevin Correia was rather lucky, actually, as he had no strikeouts and gave up a few warning track flies in his five and two-thirds innings.

Rangers 6, Mariners 0: Tommy Hunter bounces back from his first loss of the season to shut down the Mariners. Not that they were running at such a high velocity to begin with. The AP game story is the first time I've seen the word "embattled" applies to Don Wakamatsu's name. I don't expect it to be the last. And I presume by October it will change to "former."

Diamondbaks 8, Nationals 4: Sticking with AP game stories, this one contained a classic passage that I think says it all: "The few who showed up got to see a sometimes-stinky game filled with
four errors, a botched squeeze and a strikeout that scored a run." "Sometimes Stinky" sounds like the name of an album from some twee, overly-studied British folk duo from the mid-90s.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Thursday, August 05, 2010

SABR 2012: in Twin Cities

Posted by Chris Jaffe
News from this week's SABR convention, at the annual business convention, SABR big wigs decided that the 2012 convention will be in Minnesota. Start planning, people. We can all stay at Aaron Gleeman's House That Blog Built.

(Wait, 2012? What about 2011? They decided that last year - it'll be in LA. The annual meeting is the only time they can really decide these things, and it helps if they can do the very preliminary planning work with a bit more than a year. Or something like that - at any rate, they always pick convention site locales two years in advance).

So now you know. And any Minnesota readers have plenty of lead time to prepare to abandon the state in advance.

History instructor by day, statnerd by night, Chris Jaffe leads one of the most exciting double lives imaginable; with the exception of every other double life possible to imagine. Despite his lack of comic-book-hero-worthiness, Chris enjoys farting around with this stuff. His new book, Evaluating Baseball's Managers is available for order. Chris welcomes responses to his articles via e-mail.

Delmon Young should never walk

Posted by David Wade
There was a time, back in 2006, when Delmon Young was known as much for his temper as his talent. In April of that year, while in still the minors, he tossed his bat toward an umpire and struck him after disagreeing with a call. He served a 50 game suspension for his actions, starting the season in an embarrassing manner. Unfortunately, his actions followed a season in which terrific numbers in Double-A and Triple-A brought him the label of best prospect in baseball. It was not the way he wanted to follow up such a good showing the year before, but Young recovered from the incident, served his suspension, and made it to the big club in Tampa Bay by the end of the year. He followed his brief stint that year by playing every game with the Rays in 2007, batting .288.

After 2007, the Rays traded him to the Twins as part of a six player deal and Young's progress stalled. He still hit for nice average his first two seasons with Minnesota, but he rarely walked and his lack of power made that average a hollow number. His career stagnation brought whispers of bust, as often happens to former number 1 overall draft picks that take a while to develop. But, starting back in June, as David Golebiewski noticed, Young was starting to turn a corner.

Young hit .434 in 26 games during July. That high average included 12 doubles and 6 homers and gave him a robust .736 slugging percentage for the month. He also knocked in 30 runs in that stretch and kept moving up the Twins batting order, producing at an important time for the team with Justin Morneau recovering from a concussion.

As David noted in his article linked above, Young's BABIP sat well below his career average throughout the first couple of months of the season and he was due a bounce that would probably bring his batting average up as the year progressed. Well, the expected rebound occurred, and Young has done it by hacking at, and making contact with, nearly everything thrown his way.

During his hot July, Young only walked twice, and one of those was intentional. In fact, since June 1- about the time his season turned around- he has only drawn two unintentional walks. That's a stretch of 53 games with Young smacking balls all over the place as nearly his only means of reaching base. Young had actually began the season drawing more walks than his career average, but the low BABIP and only a little more power than his norm still had him playing at a similar level early on.

The main change for Delmon Young, and surely the cause for his success since the beginning of June, has come in his contact rate.

Sure, he's hitting balls on the ground a little less (43.8% instead of his career 48.9%) in 2010, but some of those extra balls in the air are catalogued at Fangraphs as infield flies, so it's not a staggering improvement. Similarly, his line drive percentage is in line with what he's always posted. So, the big change appears to be in how well he's putting the bat on the ball.

There's no doubt his contact in the zone is improved and a cause for his success in 2010, as he's hitting 89.2% of those pitches. Young is swinging at pitches outside of the zone about as much as he always has (41.5% of the time). But, the key is he's making contact with them at a far higher clip than he's used to. After making contact on pitches off the plate only about half the time for his career, Young has improved to 75.2% this year.

More contact on those bad balls he's swinging at has his strikeouts down and average up. Young has supplemented the boost in average with a corresponding boost in power. That adds up to a big step forward at age 24 for a player that's always had loads of promise. The challenge will be sustaining this higher batting average and increase in extra base hits for the long haul.

I'm not sure the way to do that is to refuse walks and swing at nearly every pitch thrown his way, but it's seems to be working right now.

David Wade also contributes to http://www.baseballdailydigest.com and welcomes comments at david DOT wade AT insightbb DOT com.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Yankees 5, Blue Jays 1: I guess I owe Kevin Kernan an apology. Apparently the Yankees were waiting for A-Rod to get his 600th home run before the team would focus on winning baseball games again. He did it, they won, Kernan was right, Q.E.D.

Twins 2, Rays 1: And hey, the Yankees now own first place again thanks to the Rays loss. This one went 13 innings, though the Rays didn't score their first run until Dan Johnson hit an RBI single off Matt Capps in the bottom of the ninth to send it into extras, blowing an excellent start for Scott Baker. But a win, as they say, is a win. Well, except for Scott Baker. That dude just doesn't know how to win I guess.

Dodgers 9, Padres 0: Vicente Padilla with the two-hit shutout as the Dodgers take their second in a row from San Diego. This guy is turning into Livan Hernandez part deux: when he's hit hard you totally understand it and when he's hardly touched at all it almost drives you nuts.

Braves 8, Mets 3: The Mets throw the ball all over the field during what many Mets fans were saying on Twitter last night was the night they officially fell out of contention. I don't know about that, but it certainly feels like it. Not that (a) the Braves looked good either; or (b) the news was all good for them. But hey, Chipper hit another homer against the Mets, so a pretty strong sense of normalcy remains.

Phillies 7, Marlins 2: Three RBI for Domonic Brown, though they came in less than glamorous fashion: a single, a fielder's choice and a sacrifice. But hey, they're runs.

Cardinals 8, Astros 4: Single, double and a homer for Albert Pujols and seven and a third strong innings from Chris Carpenter. As for the Astros, J.A. Happ didn't exactly make anyone forget about Roy Oswalt last night (1 IP, 6 H, 7 ER, 3 BB). On the bright side, the Houston bullpen allowed only one run in the next eight innings.

Indians 9, Red Sox 1: The Indians are 12-8 since the All-Star break. This is good. It will cause people to once again make them their "frisky pick" next spring, however. This is bad. For the sake of prognosticators and spring training optimists everywhere, Manny Acta, tank the rest of the season! Cleveland sports fans can't afford to have their hopes -- however irrational they may be -- crushed again!

Orioles 9, Angels 7: Torii Hunter hit an RBI double in the ninth to bring the Angels to within two. Then, with no one out and the tying run at the plate, he tried to steal third and was thrown out. On what planet does a guy try to steal third base with nobody out in the ninth inning, down by two?

Cubs 15, Brewers 3: I'll stop saying that the NL Central is a rec softball league on a night when one of their teams doesn't put up a couple of touchdowns on an in-division opponent. Jesus, this is ugly baseball.

Rockies 6, Giants 1: Even if I don't think the Rockies have enough go-go to their game right now to get back into the race in the NL West, Ubaldo Jimenez's season has at least given Rockies fans something worth following. He picked up his 17th win, striking out nine and allowing only one run over seven innings. He also scored all the way from first base on a Ryan Spilborghs double in the second innings, so the kid's got stamina too. Must be all that good food his mama makes him.

White Sox 4, Tigers 1: Edwin Jackson was kind of the white elephant of the trade deadline. No matter what he says now, Kenny Williams did not intend to be stuck with him, but stuck he was after the Nationals decided that they only liked Jackson, not like-liked him. Having him paid off like crazy last night, though, as Jackson allowed only one run in seven innings. Only threw 95 pitches too, which is very un-Edwinlike.

Reds 9, Pirates 4: Heard this: Johnny Cueto owns a little shadowbox in which he stores and displays the Pirates' butts, which he so thoroughly owns. He's 3-0 against them this season, having allowed only four runs in 26 innings while striking out 27.

Athletics 4, Royals 3: Jose Guillen is 0 for his last 21. Which makes me wonder why in the hell I listed him in my little "guys who could be traded after clearing waivers" segment on HBT Daily yesterday. The lesson, as always, is that I'm an idiot.

Nationals 7, Diamondbacks 2: Two homers and four RBI for Adam Dunn, who (a) is now the sole home run leader in the NL; and (b) is making himself a lot of money in this next contract.

Rangers 11, Mariners 6: A win on the field and an even bigger win in the courthouse. Grand slams for Michael Young and Chuck Greenberg.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Wednesday, August 04, 2010

Leaders in kwERA

Posted by Mike Fast
I've been watching Joaquin Benoit's season as the set-up man for the Tampa Bay Rays. In case you haven't noticed, he's been putting up some pretty nice numbers: an ERA of 0.70 and a WHIP of 0.55. He has struck out 53, walked six, and allowed 15 hits and three runs, all on solo home runs, in 38 innings.

That's a pretty nifty strikeout-to-walk ratio, no?

A few years ago, Guy M and Tom Tango came up with a neat toy called kwERA that works a little bit like FIP, except that it ignores a pitcher's home run rate. It's a measure of strike zone dominance.

The formula is kwERA = 5.40 - 12 * (K-BB)/PA. Here are the leaders in kwERA in 2010 for all pitchers with at least 30 innnings.

Pitcher            ERA    IP    TBF   BB   SO  BB/PA   K/PA K-BB/PA kwERA
Joaquin Benoit     0.70  38.1   133    6   53   0.05   0.40   0.35   1.16
Luke Gregerson     2.41  52.1   190    9   66   0.05   0.35   0.30   1.80
Billy Wagner       1.77  45.2   178   14   66   0.08   0.37   0.29   1.89
Carlos Marmol      2.50  50.1   214   34   94   0.16   0.44   0.28   2.04
Joel Hanrahan      3.40  47.2   191   14   67   0.07   0.35   0.28   2.07
Stephen Strasburg  2.32  54.1   217   15   75   0.07   0.35   0.28   2.08
Rafael Betancourt  4.89  38.2   165    5   49   0.03   0.30   0.27   2.20
J.J. Putz          1.83  39.1   149    7   45   0.05   0.30   0.26   2.34
Matt Thornton      2.43  40.2   163   13   54   0.08   0.33   0.25   2.38
Edward Mujica      2.74  49.1   185    4   50   0.02   0.27   0.25   2.42

Jered Weaver leads the full-season starting pitchers with a kwERA of 2.86 on the strength of 162 strikeouts and 35 walks in 601 batters faced. Francisco Liriano and Cliff Lee are not far behind at 3.00 and 3.11, respectively.

I did a thorough but not completely exhaustive search for the best kwERA seasons of all time, and based on that, I'll hazard a guess that Eric Gagne in 2003 wins the prize. His 137 strikeouts and 20 walks in 306 batters faced produced a kwERA of 0.81.

Gagne's 2003 campaign is followed by Billy Wagner 1999 (1.16), Brad Lidge 2004 (1.27), Pedro Martinez 1999 (1.43), Eric Gagne 2002 (1.65), Pedro Martinez 2000 (1.70), Jonathan Papelbon 2007 (1.70), Randy Johnson 2001 (1.77), Pedro Martinez 2001 (1.77), and Joe Nathan 2006 (1.78).

Almost all the top seasons in this metric have occurred since 1990, with the exception of Tom Henke's 1987 season, wherein he notched 128 strikeouts against 25 walks in 363 batters faced, for a kwERA of 2.00. Reaching back a little further in baseball history, we find Bruce Sutter's 1977 season, with 129 strikeouts and 23 walks in 411 batters faced, for a kwERA of 2.31, and Sandy Koufax's 1965 season, with 382 strikeouts and 71 walks in 1297 batters faced, for a kwERA of 2.52.

To move back further in history, we go all the way back to Hugh "One Arm" Daily and his 1884 season with the Chicago Browns, Pittsburgh Stogies, and Washington Nationals. Daily recorded 483 strikeouts and 72 walks in an estimated 2076 batters faced. That computes to a kwERA of 3.02, though I doubt Tango constructed the formula to work for the Union Association days of yore.

Mike Fast is a Royals fan who enjoys investigating baseball questions using data of many sorts. He is a member of Complete Game Consulting. He welcomes comments via e-mail.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Mets 3, Braves 2: I get the sense that we'll be calling this one the "Francoeur Game" for some time. A bad route by Frenchie on what should have been a single to right led to the Braves' second run, but then (a) Kyle Farnsworth walked Francouer on four pitches in the seventh and he came around to score; and (b) Frenchie hit the winning home run off Billy Wagner in the ninth. I can't be mad at Francoeur. The guy's not evil and he used to be part of my baseball life. Good for him for doing something great in the course of such an awful season. That dinger probably made his year, and everyone should get that kind of joy in their lives once in a while, even if it pains some of us to have to watch it.

Rays 6, Twins 4: Three-run bombs by Sean Rodriguez and B.J. Upton and now the Rays are in first place. Why?

Blue Jays 8, Yankees 2: That's why. Rickey Romero tosses a complete game two-hitter. But New York writers can't be bothered to break down a great pitching performance by the opposition. No, they have to latch onto or create some narrative to explain the outcome in a way that creates a Yankee hero or a Yankee goat. To wit: I haven't seen the column yet, but after this game ended last night the New York Post's Kevin Kernan tweeted that his story for today would be that the Yankees are "letting 600 get in their heads." As if anyone on the team cares beyond what it means for dumb reporters' questions after the game. Nothing to do with Girardi penciling in a peculiar bottom of the order. Nothing to do with Romero throwing bullets. It's not even just an A-Rod story anymore. No, the whole damn team is infected by 600-itis! Brilliant!

Red Sox 3, Indians 1: Fisticuffsmanship! Well, pushing, shoving and jawing anyway. Josh Beckett hit a couple of dudes. So later Indians' relievers Justin Germano and Jensen Lewis threw behind the backs of Papi and Beltre, respectively, which led to he aforementioned shoving and jawing and then ejecting. As for the baseball, Mike Lowell smacked a two-run homer on the first pitch he saw.

White Sox 12, Tigers 2; Tigers 7, White Sox 1: Like I said a couple of weeks ago: split a double-header and it's like you wasted a day. Like you've ended on a note of ambiguity instead of being able to go to bed with the satisfaction of a win or the emptiness of a loss. With at least said emptiness being a resolved note, rather than a dissonant one. But a split? Runnin' to stand still, baby. Ha La La La De Day. Ha La La La De Day, ha La La De Day.

Phillies 6, Marlins 1: Roy Halladay struck out nine over seven innings and had a two-run single to boot. The Phillies have lost a ton of position players, but Halladay has been there all year, and there's no way to overstate how huge that has been.

Orioles 6, Angels 3: Buck Showalter's Orioles are undefeated.

Pirates 7, Reds 6: The Reds came close to fighting back from a 7-1 deficit but fell a tad short. Hard core Pirates fans and fantasy junkies will be interested to note that Joel Hanrahan appears to have been given closer's duties in Pittsburgh following the trade of Octavio Dotel. The rest of you can continue reading up on Steelers' camp.

Astros 18, Cardinals 4: I'm becoming convinced that the NL Central is really a rec softball league. Best part of this rout: Tony La Russa had infielder Aaron miles pitch the ninth inning yet somehow resisted the urge to play the matchups and yank Miles with a situational lefty infielder later in the inning.

Brewers 4, Cubs 3: When you strike out ten dudes in your major league debut you should probably win that game. Tough stuff for the Cubs' Thomas Diamond, I guess. The Cubs just couldn't get the timely hit to support the kid.

Dodgers 2, Padres 1: The Ted Lilly deal is a good one so far. Lilly allowed only one run on two hits over seven without walking a dude. The Padres' lone run came from one of their deadline pickups, Miguel Tejada, who hit a first inning dinger.

Mariners 3, Rangers 2: The M's not only scored their first run since Friday, but they snapped their seven game losing streak too. Not that they really brought out the lumber: "They singled us to death," Ron Washington said after the game. Hey, whatever gets the job done.

Diamondbacks 6, Nationals 1: Mark Reynolds hit a three-run homer in the fourth inning, then was beaned by a pitch in the sixth. Reynolds on the pitch from Colin Balester: "I guess the pitch just got away from him." I truly hope so. There's nothing uglier in baseball than pitchers hitting a dude on purpose simply because they hit a homer.

Royals 3, Athletics 2: Alex Gordon was 2 for 4 with a double and a home run, and came around to score the winning run on a fielder's choice by Gregor Blanco in the ninth. I wonder if they'd take Kyle Farnsworth for Gordon?

Giants 10, Rockies 0: Jonathan Sanchez strikes out nine Rockies in six shutout innings and Colorado does nothing to stop the Giants' bats (note: I'm still having trouble getting my mind around the Giants having bats). That sound you hear is all hope abandoning the few remaining riders of the Rockies' bandwagon.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Tuesday, August 03, 2010

Evaluating Defensive Projections

Posted by Sean Smith
I've started a project to evaluate the various defensive ratings based on how well they project future defensive efficiency. For more background, read part one here if you want, or feel free to skip ahead to the results.

Since part one I've upgraded the projection program, it now uses position adjustments to allow for players who play different positions than they had in the past. This probably makes the biggest difference for Franklin Gutierrez. He played right field, with spectacular ratings, prior to 2009. The Mariners put him in center and he was the best defender in the league. The system now takes his right field ratings, applies a position adjustment, and gives him a center field projection going into 2009.

The sum of player projections, prorated to innings, are then compared to DER runs, park adjusted and adjusted for the pitching staff's mix of batted balls allowed. The formula to find expected DER, based on hit types, is this: (GB*.265 + FB*.176 + LD*.726 + Pop*.023)/BIP. The park factors range from Colorado, which adds .021 to expected DER, and Fenway (.014) to San Diego (-.023).

I've added Dave Pinto's PMR to the group. I had to calculate runs saved from the data, and only have 2007 and 2008 numbers, so it may be at a bit of a disadvantage to the other systems using 3 years data, but does pretty well anyway. I have not added the Fan Scouting reports. I'm very interested in doing so, but getting it into the same format as the rest of the data looks like more work than I have time for. With 5 contenders, here are the results, by correlation coefficient and root mean squared error:

System, correlation, RMSE
UZR, 0.11, 46
Plus/Minus, 0.31, 43
TotalZone, 0.22, 44
Zone Rating, 0.18, 44
PMR, 0.28, 43

That is better than the initial results, which showed almost no correlation. This is only looking at one year of data, it is quite possible that if I did another year UZR would do as well or better than Plus/Minus. For now though, John Dewan's system can wear the crown as the best of the publicly available fielding systems. The RMSEs for all 5 systems are very close, if you were making decisions before the 2009 season on any one of these systems you would have done about as well as any other, and better than someone who ignores defense and just assumes everyone is about average. We do not know if you would have done better than a team that has no trust of the numbers, and bases all of their defensive decisions on their scouts opinions. And of course, just as defensive metrics can differ, so can the evaluations of scouts.

Averaging all 5 systems does slightly worse than PMR and PM alone. Averaging PMR and PM gives you a tiny improvement over using PM alone. The best correlation you could have gotten from a combination of these systems is .42, which predicts team runs using this equation:

-12.9 - UZR*1.06+ PM*1.39 + TZ *.686 - ZR *.458 + PMR *.86

I'll give you a warning, that equation is simply a best fit for the 2009 data. There is no reason to think it will give you decent results for next year, or any year other than 2009. But it does suggest, again, that Plus/Minus ratings projected 2009 better than the rest.

The systems used are UZR, which is available on Fangraphs, John Dewan's Plus/Minus, from Baseball-reference.com and Fangraphs, TotalZone, from Baseballprojection.com, Chris Dial's Defensive runs saved, based on STATS zone rating and available at Baseballthinkfactory.org, and PMR, from Baseballmusings.com.

Sean Smith is a lifelong Angels fan despite never visiting the west coast until April 2006. His work can also be found at baseballprojection.com and Anaheim Angels All the Way and he can be contacted by email.

THT Graphical Report—with more graphs!

Posted by Dave Studeman
Time for the latest Hardball Times Graphical Report, which you can download for free. In this latest Graphical Report, we capture some of the dynamics that have recently been fueling teams like the Rays, Twins, Giants and (gulp) Astros. And it also raises the vital question: what has happened to the Kansas City gloves?

I've also added a couple of graphs. Several years ago, in an article called How Teams Score: A Picturebook, I rolled out some graphs that highlighted the offensive strengths and weaknesses of each team. I've always liked those graphs, but never managed to put them into production.

Now they're included in the Graphical Report. For a sneak preview, take a gander at the American League:

Considering the Yankees, see how they've managed to get runners into scoring position more often than any team except Tampa Bay? That's the result of some mighty good hitting (and walking), but not necessarily home runs. They've also batted well with runners in scoring position—about as well as you'd expect given their prowess at getting runners in scoring position (that's the dotted gray line). And the Yankees hit home runs, which drives the size of the circle around their triangle.

Only the circles of the Red Sox and Blue Jays are larger (because they've hit more home runs) but those two teams haven't gotten runners into scoring position nearly as often as the Yankees have. In fact, the Blue Jays are last in the league at plate appearances with runners in scoring position.

Dave was called a "national treasure" by Rob Neyer. Seriously. Comments about this article can be sent to him through the miracle of e-mail.

Astros extend Brett Myers

Posted by David Golebiewski
The Houston Astros have finally embraced a rebuilding effort following years of stubbornly trying to compete with an aging, expensive roster and a deteriorating farm system. When the 'Stros finally did bid adieu to Roy Oswalt and Lance Berkman, the returns weren't phenomenal. With both making significant cash, there was little surplus value to be had and the team had to send a combined $15 million in salary relief as part of the trades.

July 10, 2010 - Houston, Texas, USA - 10 July 2010: Houston starting pitcher Brett Myers.

Another name bandied about in trade talks was Brett Myers. Houston picked Myers off the scrap heap this past winter with a one-year, $3.1 million contract that included an $8 million mutual option for the 2011 season ($2 million buyout). Myers was coming off a 2009 season in which he was sidelined from late May to early September following right hip surgery and was then shut down with a strained right shoulder in mid-September. In 70.2 innings split between the starting rotation and the bullpen, Myers had 6.37 K/9 and 2.93 BB/9. His FIP was a macabre 6.14, due to a 23.4% home run per fly ball rate. While Myers had long posted HR/FB rates above the league average (14.7% for his career), that mark was incredibly high.

This year, the 6-4 righty has more than justified the Astros' investment. Tossing 151 innings, Myers has 6.97 K/9, 2.74 BB/9 and a 3.62 FIP. He has been a little lucky in the homer department (8.7 HR/FB%), so his xFIP is 3.85. According to Fangraphs, Myers has racked up 2.7 WAR already. It seems puzzling that he's still in Houston, though. Given the Astros' focus on the future, Myers looked primed to be wearing new duds after the trade deadline.

Instead, the club just signed the soon-to-be-30-year-old to a brand spankin' new contract extension. Myers will make $7 million in 2011 and $11 million in 2012, with a $10 million club option for the 2013 season ($3 million buyout). The 2013 option could become vested based on his 2012 performance. The deal includes possible incentives that could push the total value of the contract to $29.5 million.

Let's just focus on the first two years. With those terms, Myers is guaranteed at least $21 million over the 2011-2012 seasons (his 2011 and 2012 salaries, plus the buyout). What does Oliver project for Myers over that time frame? In 2011, the long-time Phillie is projected to throw 185 innings with 7.3 K/9, 2.8 BB/9, 1.3 HR/9 and a 4.19 ERA. That work would be worth 2.5 WAR. For 2012, Myers is forecast for 7 K/9, 3 BB/9, 1.3 HR/9 and a 4.55 ERA in 182 IP. That's 1.8 WAR. Using those projections, the Astros are paying $21 million for 4.3 WAR, or about $4.9 million per win. It's not an outrageous sum, but it's probably somewhat above the market value of a win.

Of course, that's evaluating the contract in a vacuum. Does it make sense for Houston, a lock to vie for last-place finishes over the next few years, to pay a pitcher in his early 30's nearly five million per win? The marginal value of those wins would seemingly be lower in a situation in which Myers is the difference between claiming victory, say, 64 times or 66 times. I suppose the counter-argument would be that for the sake of maintaining franchise interest and not watching attendance figures plummet, it makes sense not to field a Bad News Bears-type team that totally alienates fans. I'm not sold, though. Count me among those who think the Astros would have been better off converting Myers into young talent.

A journalism student at Duquesne University, David Golebiewski is a contributing writer for The Hardball Times, Fan Graphs, Inside Edge, Rotoworld, Baseball Daily Digest and Heater Magazine. He is seeking full-time employment as a baseball writer. Feel free to e-mail him with any questions or comments.

What does Hellickson throw? I don’t know.

Posted by Mike Fast
I'm looking for a little scouting help here.

Jeremy Hellickson made his major league debut for the Tampa Bay Rays last night, tossing seven frames, striking out six and allowing only two runs on three hits to help his team pick up the victory over Carl Pavano and the Minnesota Twins. The win was an key one, pulling the Rays into a first-place tie with the New York Yankees for the first time since June 19.

The PITCHf/x data shows us that Hellickson threw a fastball, change-up, and curveball against Twins in his debut, so that much I know. However, not very many game pictures are available yet online of Hellickson pitching in his debut, and that's what I'm really curious about. I want to see Hellickson's pitch grips. I did find this nice shot of him throwing a four-seam fastball against the Twins.

So I decided to look through the record of his minor league days for photos of his other pitches. There are plenty more images of his four-seam fastball grip, but otherwise, I've run into some confusion. I did find a very nice description of Hellickson's repertoire and approach from his time at Durham in this article by Adam Sobsey. In the article Hellickson mentions adding a cut fastball this year and experimenting with a two-seam fastball.

July 11, 2010; Anaheim, CA, USA; USA pitcher Jeremy Hellickson throws a pitch during the 2010 Futures Game at Angel Stadium. Photo via Newscom

Jeremy Hellickson throws a change-up in the Futures Game, July 11, 2010. (Newscom)

I've not been able to find pictures of Hellickson throwing a cutter or a two-seamer, but I haven't been able to find many good pictures of him pitching at Durham, so that may explain that.

What I have found is a cornucopia of different pitches that look like change-ups to me. Either Hellickson throws or experiments with a lot of different change-up grips, or I'm missing something about his off-speed repertoire. There's the picture I've included here of what looks like a circle change-up from the Futures Game three weeks ago.

Then we have another picture of what looks like a circle change-up taken at Durham in 2009. So Hellickson throws the circle change, right?

Well, maybe. Because then there's this picture from Durham earlier this year where he's throwing what looks like a cross between a three-finger change-up and a circle change-up--it would be a circle change except that he's tucked his thumb under the baseball. There's another shot of a sort of hybrid change-up from his days with the Columbus Catfish in 2007.

Apparently, he learned his change-up from Rays minor league pitching instructor and former major leaguer Dick Bosman.

Then there's this pitch, with the picture taken in spring training in 2008. I think that might be his breaking ball, but frankly I'm not sure. It would appear that he also used that pitch last night against the Twins, if this picture from the Tampa Tribune is any indication. I could convince myself that's a change-up rather than a curveball, particularly looking at the 2008 image, but either way, it's a grip I don't think I've seen before.

So I don't know what to say about Hellickson's pitch grips. Rays fans and pitch grip experts, help me out here.

Mike Fast is a Royals fan who enjoys investigating baseball questions using data of many sorts. He is a member of Complete Game Consulting. He welcomes comments via e-mail.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Braves 4, Mets 1: Johan Santana struck out 11 Braves, but they nickled and dimed him for three runs in the first and then Chipper Jones knocked one out off him in the seventh. Chipper's career may be on death's door, but he could wake up in 2027 and hit a home run off the Mets. It's just what he does.

Rays 4, Twins 2: Jeremy Hellickson gets called up, makes his major league debut, allows two runs on three hits over seven innings while bearing one of the hottest teams in baseball and then is promptly sent right back down to Durham. I bet he'll be on a bus this afternoon, telling the other Durham Bulls about how you never handle your luggage in the show, somebody else carries your bags. About how you hit white balls for batting practice, the ballparks are like cathedrals, the hotels all have room service, and the women all have long legs and brains.

Indians 6, Red Sox 5: I'm not linking to video of Carlos Santana's knee injury, nor do I even want to think about it. I watched the play once -- won't watch it again -- and I couldn't tell based on my one viewing of it if Santana was out of position or messed up in the way he took that throw. All I can think is about how, as I watched him hit multiple times in Columbus this year and once in Cleveland, that the guy was born to have a bat in his hands but never looked quite right behind the plate. I hope he makes it back and proves me wrong next year.

Blue Jays 8, Yankees 6: An ineffective A.J. Burnett watched the Jays make like the Gashouse Gorillas and do a conga line around the bases in the fifth inning and Alex Rodriguez went 0 for 5, but I'm sure this was somehow Joba Chamberlain's fault. Six doubles for the Jays in that 5th inning, by the way, two of which came off the bat of Travis Snider.

Reds 4, Pirates 0: Travis Wood toyed with the Buccos, shutting them out on two hits over seven innings. Miguel Cairo continues to play decidedly un-Miguel Cairolike baseball, getting two RBI and keeping his average at a cool .300 on the season.

Brewers 18, Cubs 1: I accidentally closed out of the page with the box score so I can't be 100% certain, but I'm pretty sure this one ended with the mercy rule being applied in the fourth inning and Lou Piniella talking his players out for ice cream afterwards, telling them that the point of the game is to simply try your best.

Astros 9, Cardinals 4: I didn't watch any of this game, but based only on the box score I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that Tony La Russa overthought the matchups with his bullpen and once again pulled his best reliever out of the game in order to go with an inferior one that God Almighty himself wouldn't put into the game in that situation. If that's what happened, I'll take it one step further and guess that La Russa did not accept any responsibility over this afterward and instead said something like "God Almighty doesn't have access to my super secret pitching charts and assorted genius goodies." Welcome to St. Louis, Jake Westbrook (6 IP, 4 H, 2 ER, 7K).

Athletics 6, Royals 0: If you polled 100 casual baseball fans I wonder how many of them would be able to tell you the first thing about Trevor Cahill. Whether it's because he's on the west coast or because he's an Athletic I'm not sure, but I'm guessing the number is small. A shame too, because the kid is something else. He three-hit the Royals last night, moving to 11-4 on the season and lowering his ERA to 2.72.

Padres 10, Dodgers 5: Chase Headley had four hits including a three-run bomb and Will Venable homered and drove in four. The Dodgers matched the Padres in the hit department with 14, but hit into double plays, stranded runners and generally played like a team that looked like it's nine games out of first place. Which it is.

Nationals 3, Diamondbacks 1: I'm trying to think of anything more annoying for an opposing fanbase than to have the local nine get totally flummoxed by Livan Hernandez but I can't think of a thing. He just throws his slop up there and -- when the slop is working -- you just can't do anything with it despite it looking like you should be able to totally crush the guy. It was working last night (7.1 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 5K).

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Monday, August 02, 2010

The deadline deals that died

Posted by Anna McDonald
Died: The Texas Rangers drafting a mission statement about the value of good spending habits.

Major league baseball is filled with shining moments and valuable lessons. Some, we should pass onto our children. This is not one of them. People have talked about how major league baseball has allowed a team (ehm, mess) in bankruptcy to actually spend more. Having the approval by a major corporation to spend more than you can pay would be one reason to scratch a new company mission statement about wise spending habits.

Died: The Yankees proving (once again) that they can pay too much for whatever they want

David Letterman's Lebronesque plea last week to have Albert Pujols traded to the Yankees didn't pan out to be anything. Yeah, of course, Letterman's been trying to get him on the show forever AND it just never synced with Albert's schedule.

Well, that explanation makes sense. Because, what's exactly on Albert's schedule when he's visiting New York that he doesn't have time to appear on Letterman? After all the attention he was getting in New York right before the trade deadline, without actually being a Yankee, the management started panicking. Everyone needs to be reminded at least once a year (and trade deadlines are opportune times for this sort of reminding) that the Yankees can spend a ton of money. So, they quickly acquired a whole bunch of players with fancy names. Experts agree these were good acquisitions but they failed and severely disappoint many, in the "using large amounts of unending wealth and paying too much for a player" category this year.

Died: trade deadline surprises

There was a lot of dumping. Many deals matched needs, but gone are the days of those fascinating, secret, hard to pull off trades. Remember way back when, before the days of tweetatextablackberry people? Days long ago, when rumors would quietly start around the ballpark about a trade that no one saw coming? The kind of trades that propel media types running back to their desks because they needed to dig up more information? Maybe all our tweetatextablackberry gadgets aren't the best means to make baseball more exciting. There's nothing that gets both fans and players excited than a GM pulling off a (good) down to the wire surprise.

Died: switching uniform attire for a Nationals first pitch ceremony

Sources are saying that a major deal fell through in the Nationals organization. It would have sent Miss Iowa to the pitching mound in a Nationals jersey and Mr. Batista to home plate in his Speedo. Let's all take a minute and thank Mike Rizzo for not making this deal happen. I'm not qualified to judge what Miss Iowa should be wearing, but I'm certain no one wants to see Miguel Batista in a Speedo.

Anna's family and friends tolerate her love for baseball only because she keeps providing them with homemade cookies. She started The Girlfriends Batters Eye to entice her girl friends to follow baseball and welcomes comments and questions.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Diamondbacks 14, Mets 1: I was tempted to say that Adam LaRoche's two three-run home runs yesterday are just the latest example of second-half greatness from a great second-half player, but check out his month-by-month OPSeseses: April: .953; May: .787; June: .698; July: .669. Contrary to his reputation, he's gotten worse as the season has gone on. I wonder if those bombs are the opening salvo to a furious August and September to salvage that reputation. Jerry Manuel on the Mets' performance: "We didn't pitch, we didn't hit, we didn't play defense."

Rays 3, Yankees 0: That's eight of nine for the Rays, who pull to within one of the Bombers. Joe Girardi felt obligated to use all of his shiny new toys -- Kearns! Berkman! Wood! -- while giving A-Rod and Brett Gardner the day off. Made the box score look all Central Divisiony to me.

Reds 2, Braves 1: Some shaky defense and tons and tons of stranded runners by the Braves wastes an excellent performance by Tommy Hanson. Both Reds runs were the result of Braves' defensive miscues: if Jason Heyward didn't try to make a diving catch on Brandon Phillips' triple it would have at best been a double with no run scoring, and of course, Alex Gonzalez' error gave the Reds their second run. I'd rather they just get beat 14-1. When that happens I just let the game fall out of my head. These coulda-shoulda-woulda games stick with me all damn afternoon.

Phillies 6, Nationals 4: Philly had to come from behind and then get two RBI singles in the 11th to avoid a sweep by the Nats. Charlie Manuel had no problem giving Brad Lidge the ball to close this one despite him giving up the walkoff homer on Saturday night. Ryan Howard sprained his ankle in the first inning and was hobbling around the clubhouse in crutches after the game. For as bad as the Braves have been playing lately, if Lidge keeps closing and key players keep getting hurt for Philly, you have to like Atlanta's chances.

Angels 4, Rangers 1: Jered Weaver and Cliff Lee are probably the two best starters in the AL this year. The former outpitched the latter yesterday. The Angels are still way back, but taking two of three from Texas may be the start of something, right?

Padres 5, Marlins 4: Josh Johnson has his worst start of the year, giving up five earned runs. Indeed, it was the first time he had given up more than three since his first start back on April 5th. Ryan Ludwick gets a pinch hit and comes around to score in his Padre debut.

Rockies 8, Cubs 7: The Rockies are a streaky bunch. They take their fourth in a row after that big losing skid coming out of the break. Dexter Fowler saved the game with this awesome catch in the ninth, but he probably bought himself some time on the DL too. Way to take one for the team, Dex. Bad day medically all around, as Cubs' starter Carlos Silva left the game in the first with an irregular heartbeat.

Cardinals 9, Pirates 1: I know it's statistically impossible, but it at least seems like every single time Adam Wainwright pitches his line looks like this: 7 IP, 6 H, 1 ER, 5K.

Twins 4, Mariners 0: Francisco Liriano struck out 11 and gave up only two hits. The M's have lost seven in a row, three of which have been shutouts. Just terrible, terrible baseball. Who gets fired first: Wakamatsu or Manuel?

Astros 5, Brewers 2: See, all the Astros needed to do in order to go on a tear was trade away their best pitcher and best hitter. Seems obvious in hindsight. A pinch hit grand slam in the seventh by Jason Michaels was the big blast here.

Royals 5, Orioles 4: Bruce Chen was in a hell of a jam in the sixth -- bases loaded, no one out -- but reliever Kanekoa Texeira bailed him out. Texeira after the game: "I told Bruce today, 'Big guy, I got your back. Bruce, don't worry." Amazing. No, not Texeira's foresight, but rather that was the first time in his 33 years on Earth that anyone has ever called Bruce Chen "big guy." By the way: anyone know what ever happened to Jung Bong?

White Sox 4, Athletics 1: A complete game with 11 strikeouts for Gio Gonzalez, but it was not enough on a day when Gavin Floyd had a perfect game into the sixth inning. Dude's been on fire for basically two months and the Chisox simply don't lose anymore. Speaking of New Comiskey: I was chatting with my HBT Daily/Extra cohort Tiffany the other day, who just got back from a trip to Chicago. She contends that a day at Comiskey is way better than a day at Wrigley. I've not been there, but based on her and others' descriptions -- and based on my own experiences at Wrigley -- I think I can see that. I bet that, rooting interests notwithstanding, serious Chicago baseball fans would make a strong case for the South Side simply because you don't have all of that party atmosphere baloney going on down there. Thoughts?

Red Sox 4, Tigers 3: Nice vulture job by Papelbon, as he blows the save in the ninth yet was the pitcher of record when the Tigers threw the ball away to allow the winning run score on a bunt single in the bottom of the ninth. I wonder if some day Clay Buchholz will have 288 wins or something and some baseball writer will keep him off his Hall of Fame ballot because he "just didn't know how to win."

Indians 5, Blue Jays 4: If Cleveland could play Toronto 162 games a year they'd be, like, the best team ever. They've taken six of seven from the Jays, this one on the strength of a two-run homer from Asdrubal Cabrera.

Giants 2, Dodgers 0: Matt Cain threw shutout ball into the eighth, and both Giants runs came in on an Edgar Renteria triple in the sixth. I usually watch a good bit of the Sunday night game if not all of it, but I randomly picked up "Ball Four" last night and started thumbing through it. By the time I looked up I realized that the damn game was most of the way over. I certainly consider it time well spent, however.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Saturday, July 31, 2010

Measures of Qualls-ity

Posted by Harry Pavlidis
Arizona has shipped Chad Qualls to the Rays, eliciting responses ranging from anger to mockery to happiness.

Qualls is having an off year, his worst showing of the past four campaigns. It's just not as bad as his bloated ERA indicates. Using pitch-by-pitch linear weights to derive "ERA", both rvERAe (based on batted ball types) and rvERAa (based on actual hits and outs) have jumped for Qualls in 2010. This is along with an apparent downward trend in both whiff and ground ball rates.

Year	rvERAe	rvERAa	Whiff	GB%
2007	3.32	3.50	.293	61
2008	3.33	2.66	.247	58
2009	3.10	3.93	.214	59
2010	4.04	7.28	.180	56

Not a stud, not a dud. You may even expect Qualls to regress towards his career/recent levels—improve, in other words.

Harry Pavlidis admits he has a baseball problem. He is a member of Complete Game Consulting, a writer at Beyond the Boxscore and has his own blog, Cubs f/x. Feedback, questions and comments are appreciated - Email harrypav@gmail.com and Twitter @harrypav

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
I'm working on a Saturday, so why not do the recaps?.

Nationals 8, Phillies 1: Barely 10 AM, yet and all of the "see, I told you Roy Oswalt was no savior" people are coming out of the woodwork. Didn't hear any of that yesterday afternoon. Personally, I think the Phillies should never have traded away the ace they used to have. Of course I'm talking about Kevin Gross. Floyd Youmans is NOT the answer people!

Braves 6, Reds 4: Jason Heyward with a big two-run RBI in the 10th. When that happened I went "yay!" Then, when Martin Prado was writhing in pain due to injuring his finger I curled up into a fetal position. I'm still in that position actually, and won't be out of it until we hear that it's OK. Hell of a way to type, though.

Rays 3, Yankees 2: 0 for 4 for A-Rod. Man, that guy is just never gonna make it in New York.

Diamondbacks 9, Mets 6: This fall, as the Mets are watching the playoffs from their homes, they'll probably be thinking of just how badly they were abused by the Dbacks this year.

Tigers 6, Red Sox 5: Detroit takes the first game in the battle of the What Coulda Beens. Yes, that's the second time in three days I'm writing off the Red Sox. Wanna fight about it? Jose Valverde got a shaky as all hell save, throwing nearly 60 pitches. John Hiller nods approvingly.

Blue Jays 8, Indians 1: Jose Bautista hits a grand slam. I can't decide if his continued power display means that the Jays should keep him or be even more intent on trading him as his value peaks.

Astros 5, Brewers 0: J.A. Happ shuts out the Brewers on two hits over six innings in his Houston debut.

White Sox 6, Athletics 1: After learning what we learned last night about the Edwin Jackson thing I think the Twins should call Kenny Williams and tell him that they'd totally trade him Joe Mauer -- and send cash in the deal -- if only he could find some way to get Barry Zito or Carlos Lee or someone to flip back in a trade.

Royals 7, Orioles 5: FOX and TBS were seriously considering broadcasting this series nationally this weekend, but then those kill-joy human rights groups chimed in, putting the kibosh on the deal.

Cardinals 1, Pirates 0: The rain dealy (2:22) was almost as long as the game (2:38) as Chris Carpenter, Jeff Karstens and all of the relievers not named Javier Lopez kept the opposition scoreless.

Twins 5, Mariners 3: Matt Capps makes his debut for the Twinkies. He comes out to Europe's "The Final Countdown," by the way. He got the save! So maybe the Twins didn't make a huge mistake.

Rockies 17, Twins 2: Sometimes I miss the old Coors Field. Nice to see it come back once in a while.

Angels 9, Rangers 7: First loss of the year for Tommy Hunter, who got shelled.

Marlins 4, Padres 2: Miguel Tejada's presence somehow didn't will the Padres to victory. Huh.

Giants 6, Dodgers 5: Brian Wilson wasn't available due to back spasms, so Jonathan Sanchez, Chris Ray, Denny Bautista and Sergio Romo combine to handle the ninth inning and create/fend off a late Dodger rally.

Eh. This feature is way more fun to write at 11PM the night before while half-crocked on Maker's Mark.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

Friday, July 30, 2010

Is Brett Wallace still a prospect?

Posted by Brian Cartwright
Two years ago, the Cardinals selected Brett Wallace with the 13th pick in the first round, as a third baseman out of Arizona State. The word was that although he had a major league bat, his defense would necessitate an eventual move to first base.

Wallace did indeed rake in college, compiling .404/.481/.687 and .410/.525/.753 lines in his sophomore and junior seasons. He signed quickly, playing for the Cards' High-A and Double-A teams, and in the Arizona Fall League, posting 400+ wOBAs at each stop, with 14 homers and 60 RBI in 78 pro games.

Oliver translates his 2007 college season at .310/.382/.481, and his 2008 season split between college and the pros at .283/.370/.447. A 360-370 wOBA at third base would rank around sixth or seventh in the majors, in the neighborhood of Ryan Zimmerman, Mark Reynolds and Pablo Sandoval. Even with a reputation of a bad glove, he looked like a quality prospect.

He was such a good prospect that Oakland received him as part of the trade that sent Matt Holliday to the Cards in July of 2009. Then in November the A's flipped him to Toronto for Michael Taylor, whom they had just obtained from the Phillies in the Roy Halladay deal. Now yesterday, in another deadline deal, Wallace goes from the Blue Jays to Houston, which prompts the question on the THT listserve "Can anyone explain to me why the Jays traded Brett Wallace, who is doing quite well in the minors this season, for a guy who can't even post a .700 OPS in A-ball??"

Well, actually Anthony Gose has a .710 OPS in A-ball, but the point is made. What happened to Wallace?

In 2009, Wallace hit .293/.346/.423 at Memphis (S. Louis), ..302/365/.506 for Sacramento (Oakland) and so far in 2010 .301/.359/.509 for Las Vegas (Toronto). Those all look good, right? Except that all three teams are in the hit-happy Pacific Coast League, which features four teams (Colorado Springs, Salt Lake, Reno, Albuquerque) at Coors Field-like elevations of 4,000 feet or higher, three of those in the Pacific Conference with Sacramento and Las Vegas.

Running Wallace's last four season through Oliver's calculator gives us:

Year Level  wOBA  BA  OB  SA ISO BB% SO% Fld 
2007  Coll   376 310/382/481 171 095 165
2008    AA   361 283/370/447 164 095 210  -2 
2009   AAA   308 254/319/370 116 065 235 -14 
2010   AAA   289 231/284/372 141 051 251  -6

His 2010 walk rate is half what it was in 2008, while the strikeouts edge up and the power has fallen.

Not having completely forgotten his better years, and factoring in the Juice Box if he's promoted, Oliver gives Wallace's current projection at .265/.335/.428, for a 335 wOBA. If Wallace were still playing third base, this would put his bat in the range of Jorge Cantu, Casey Blake or Edwin Encarnacion. Okay not great, but middle range, 15th to 20th best. (To follow along at home, go to THT Forecasts Sortable Batting, highlight both "All Positions" for Pos and "MLB" for Class, submit, then select Oliver Forecast and click on the wOBA heading to sort by that column.)

The bad news is Wallace is no longer waving at balls at the hot corner (-14 runs in 2009), playing all of 2010 at first base. Oliver's Sortable Batting would rank Wallace among the 25th to 30th best at that position, similar to guys like Ty Wigginton and Lyle Overbay.

My advice to the Astros: You aren't playing for the pennant this year, so promote Wallace now and stick him back at third. He has to be better than Jeff Keppinger. Even though Oliver rates Wallace's defense at third at -14 runs in 2009, it was only -2 in 2008. I can live with that. Two major league players in return for Roy Oswalt might go down better with the fans.

Brian got his start in amateur baseball way back in the 1970's as the statistician for his local college summer league in Johnstown, Pa, which also hosts the annual All-American Amateur Baseball Association. A longtime APBA and Strat-o-Matic player, he still tends to look at everything as a simulation. He has also written for StatSpeak and Fangraphs, was runnerup in the Baseball Prospectus Idol competition, and has consulted for a major league team. You can contact him at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Visual Baseball: Introducing the Visual Box Score

Posted by Kevin Dame
I've always wanted to revolutionize the baseball box score to reveal more information at a glance. Here's a first stab, using an old box score from Game 3 of the 2009 ALDS between the Angels and Red Sox. You'll see a key in the lower right corner that explains everything. I'm still missing a lot of information I'd like to convey (most notably the performance of the pitchers in the game). And there are many aspects to this that I am not sure about. Still, I'm interested in seeing if this is a promising start.

One litmus test is to ask "what information does this convey about what happened in the game?" Here are a few:

For the Angels:

- After a slow start, Vlad Guerrero had a terrific game, getting on base 3 times and driving in 2.
- The Angels came to life in the 9th, putting 5 consecutive hitters on base and scoring 3 times.
- The middle of the Angels order was pretty productive, driving in 6 runs and generally wreaking havoc.
- Until the 9th, the Angels had only strung together consecutive hits once (in the 6th)
- 10 Angels batters stranded runners in scoring position.
- The Angels drove in 5 of their 7 runs without the benefit of an extra base hit

For the Red Sox:

- Lowell was on base 3 times and drove in 1.
- Drew had a mixed day. He drove in 2, but also ended two innings.
- The Red Sox never got a lead off man on base in any inning.
- No Red Sox batter stranded a runner in scoring position.
- The Red Sox scored 5 of their 6 runs in the second time up against Scott Kazmir.
- The Red Sox drove in all 6 of their runs via extra base hits

"The commonality between science and art is in trying to see profoundly - to develop strategies of seeing and showing." - Edward Tufte.

Feel free to send comments, questions, and suggestions to Kevin via email.

And That Happened

Posted by Craig Calcaterra
Padres 3, Dodgers 2: Oscar Salazar had a pinch-hit walkoff single. During the game they traded for Miguel Tejada and got $1 million in the deal from Baltimore. Tejada is "meh" but I hope they went out for a party on that million bucks after the game. I also hope they continued to wear the awesome throwback mustard and brown jerseys after the game ended, because that would make the party really hop.

Marlins 5, Giants 0: Anibal Sanchez was almost untouchable: CG, SHO 1 H, 1 BB, 8K. Buster Posey's hitting streak ends. The Giants should totally protest this one, though. Jorge Cantu reached twice and scored twice even though he was basically traded already as the game was going on. Let's create an unwritten rule about that, in fact, shall we?

Nationals 5, Braves 3: I only made up that rule above so we can somehow include Adam Dunn and Matt Capps in it. I mean, sure, I know they weren't traded during the game or anything, but Capps was traded a mere seven or eight hours after the game ended and there have been a moderate amount of rumors about Dunn, so the Nationals should have sat them out of an abundance of caution. Why no, it has nothing to do with the fact that Dunn hit a homer and Capps got the save in a game in which my rooting interest was on the losing end. Why do you ask?

Mets 4, Cardinals 0: R.A. Dickey shuts down the Cards. Where the hell has this season come from for this guy? He couldn't get anyone out in his previous big league stints and wasn't even all that sharp in the minors, and now he's 7-4 with a 2.32 ERA. I love guys like this.

Phillies 3, Diamondbacks 2: On a day they get Roy Oswalt for a song in terms of both talent and cash, they get a walkoff win in the 11th inning too. Phillies get everything they want [kicks at stuff, pouts]. For the Dbacks, Joe Saunders had a better start than any Dan Haren has had since July 4th.

Yankees 11, Indians 4: It's pretty telling when your most effective pitcher of the night is an infielder. That was the case for Cleveland, who pressed Andy Marte into service in ninth inning of a rout. Dude threw a scoreless inning, striking out Nick Swisher. He's had about 100 chances to stick as a third baseman in various places. Why not try to make a career out of being a mop-up man?

Rays 4, Tigers 2: The Tigers are skidding out of control. David Price gets his 14th win.

Rockies 9, Pirates 3: Ubaldo Jimenez gets his 16th win to help the Rockies snap their eight-game skid. One more win and he ties the Rockies' franchise record.

Orioles 6, Royals 5: Kansas City has lost 14 of 17. This bad stretch began at almost the exact moment everyone started talking about how Ned Yost had the team turned around and flying right and all that jazz. Damndest thing.

White Sox 9, Mariners 5: I was on 950 KJR in Seattle last night as this game was going on. Before they called me, I did a quick brushup on the Mariners because, hey, you never know. As soon as my spot started the host said "Mariners are playing the White Sox, but we are NOT going to talk about them because no one wants to hear anything that depressing," or words pretty close to that. I can see that. Two home runs for Raul Castro, by the way.

Rangers 7, Athletics 4: The Rangers complete a nice 5-2 homestand against the two teams who think they can challenge them. Only disappointment: Jorge Cantu didn't hop a flight and pull the "two games in one day for two different teams" stunt. Because that woulda been cool.

Craig writes the HardballTalk blog for NBC Sports.com

What Phils prospect May thinks about

Posted by Matt Himelfarb
If intelligence and introspection were a harbinger of success in baseball, Trevor May would be the closest thing to a slam dunk this side of Stephen Strasburg.

"I'm always over-thinking," the 20-year-old right hander says. "I'm very analytical. My favorite subject in school was math. I love sitting down and solving problems."

In the baseball universe, however, May befuddles nearly everyone. His coaches, his teammates, and scouts, are all at a loss to explain May's fall from grace, which recently culminated in a demotion from Clearwater in the Florida State League to Lakewood in the South Atlantic League. Coming into the season, May was ranked the fifth best prospect in the Phillies organization by Baseball America, following an impressive campaign with Lakewood in 2009, and begin 2010 in Advanced-A.

To say May struggled with his control in Clearwater would be an understatement. While he continued to strike out nearly a third of the hitters he faced (90 strikeouts in 70 innings), he also walked nearly one per frame (61).

When pressed on what adjustments May must make, Lakewood pitching coach Steve Schrenk spews some prototypical cliches: "We haven't really done a whole lot mechanically. A lot of it has to do with just making pitches, being able to have some confidence. He lost a little bit of it and I know he will, given a little change of scenery, a little bit something different to look at, hopefully he'll do last year what he did in this league."

May, however, begs to differ. "No. Confidence is not an issue. I have all the confidence in the world," he stresses in an almost sarcastic manner.

Schrenk is not the only one dumbfounded by May's struggles. May is baseball's ultimate enigma. He embodies the idiosyncrasies of Matt McCarthy and Brian Bannister, compounded by Nuke LaLoosh-esque talent. His repertoire starts with a four-seam fastball with sinking action, sitting from 91-94 mph. He has an 81-84 mph change-up and a 77-79 mph curveball, both of which flash plus potential.

Of course, May's struggles in Clearwater can be attributed to practical factors. Scouts note how he sometimes struggles repeating his delivery. In Clearwater, the letter-high fastballs that helped May induce 95 strikeouts in just 77.1 innings with Lakewood in 2009 were instead taken for balls. Hitters in the Florida State League proved more disciplined and less aggressive, in part due to the pitcher-friendly confines of the FSL. Often, May left pitches up in the zone, and paid the price. As a result, he is now focusing on locating his fastball down in the zone consistently.

In certain respects, May believes, if anything, he is making strides. He says he is throwing his fastball at a higher velocity with less effort. While he remains mostly incapable of commanding his secondary stuff, he nevertheless feels he has a better feel for his curveball and change-up. "I have not lost anything. You look at the box score and might not think I'm improving," he says. "But my secondary stuff has come a long way."

First and foremost, May must improve his fastball command. The enormousness of this challenge was reflected in his second start for Lakewood against Delmarva on July 11. Blueclaws catcher Sebastian Valle made several trips to the mound early in the game. Valle called for the minimum amount of off-speed stuff. May, however, stubbornly refused to give in, comically shaking him off, forcing more than one mound visit.

After the first inning, with May seemingly unable to hit the broad side of a barn, Valle decided he is going to try something new. On Thursday and Friday that week, Phillies catcher Carlos Ruiz was in town for a rehab stint in Lakewood. Ruiz gave Valle a short tutorial on catching with one-leg out; it was more an act of inspiration than a lesson. The rationale behind it is that it adds the illusion of a bigger target.

"Its' a bit uncomfortable for him," May says laughing. After surrendering three runs in the first, however, he threw four scoreless innings.

Yet these episodes are merely symptoms of the mental hurdles hounding May. "It's something I have work on," he says, alluding to his propensity to over-think.

"You have to almost be brain dead when you’re out there," Blueclaws manager and longtime catcher Mark Parent is fond of saying. "A lot of people have been too smart for baseball. It's a common sense sport. Being intelligent usually doesn't pay off."

While most of his teammates pass their time away from the ballpark watching movies and playing video games, May prefers reading and writing. "I know that’s kind of weird, around here, but that's what I do." He keeps a journal with him, logging what happens everyday and commenting on pitching. I ask him if he plans on writing a book, akin to Jim Bouton's Ball Four.

"I don't think anyone would read it," he responds. "It's basically just me saying, Is my leg too high? Am I bringing my arm back the right way. I hope I don't walk this guy."

May's latest literary obsession is Rhonda Byrne's best-selling 2006 self-help book, The Secret. You can tell the book has struck a chord with him; he is absolutely stoked to share his reaction with the only person who will listen (me). May now hopes he can use his positive mindset on the mind (a central tenet of the book).

Make no mistake, May is hardly any introvert. His gregariousness stands out among his teammates, most of whom are guarded during interviews. He elaborates on every point. How he abhors the sweltering heat in Clearwater, where it rains every day at four and throws in 100 degrees at seven. He talks to me about several of the prospects in the Futures Game, which is playing in the clubhouse while I am talking to him, particularly how much it sucks to be Domonic Brown, who injured his hamstring earlier in the ballgame. Talking with May is more a conversation than an interview, which really cannot be said of most ballplayers his age.

The Phillies will be patient with May, whom they were fortunate to sign out of Kelso High School, a Washington state baseball powerhouse. At his district championship game in 2008 a few weeks before the draft, May took the hill for the Hilanders. He had previously committed to the University of Washington, which was only a half-hour from his home. While apprehensive about leaving his family and friends behind, WU was not exactly a premier baseball program. "The three years I spent in college," he said, "I figured I could be pitching in the big leagues by then."

Scouts from numerous teams were in attendance that day, including the Phillies, Cubs, Athletics, Indians, Reds, Mariners and several other organizations. Except a funny thing happened along the way. May surrendered several runs in the first inning on a couple of hits and walks. Than, it started raining, and after an hour delay, only scouts from the Cubs and Phillies remained. May proceeded to finish the game without allowing another run in Kelso's victory. On draft day, the Cubs and Phillies called him every round, and with its last pick in the fourth round, Philadelphia selected May.

Now, May is hoping he can rebound similarly. "I wish I could be like everyone else and just go out there and not think about it. All I gotta do is live in the moment, and stop worrying."

Matt is a high school student in New Jersey. His work can be found at Metstoday.com, and he occasionally updates his blog.

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Roy Oswalt travels north

Posted by Brad Johnson
For the better part of the last 24 hours, the Astros, Phillies and Roy Oswalt have dominated the baseball blogosphere. It was initially (incorrectly) reported that the Phillies would be sending JA Happ, Vance Worley and two unknown prospects for Oswalt and cash. Over the course of this morning, speculation abounded with many sources suggesting the Phillies were including prized prospects Jonathan Singleton and/or Jarred Cosart as part of the deal. At times, Astros utility infielder Jeff Keppinger was also rumored to be included.

Finally, the dust appears to have settled. The early reports got part of the deal right. Oswalt and $11 million are headed to Philly and Happ will headsSouth to Houston. Also included in the deal are ultra-toolsy center fielder Anthony Gose and shortstop Jonathan Villar. The Toronto Blue Jays and Astros later agreed to swap Gose and first base prospect Brett Wallace.

First let’s look at the terms of Oswalt’s contract. Conflicting reports over the past two weeks indicated that Oswalt either wanted his 2012 option accepted as part of the deal or a restructuring of his contract. It seems that the Phillies will NOT be picking up the 2012 option but instead will be adding $1 million to the buyout. All told, the Phillies' financial commitment to Oswalt appears to be about $5 million for the remainder of 2010, $16 million for 2011, and $3 million for his buyout. After deducting the ‘Stros $11 million contribution, that leaves the Phillies paying a shade under $13 million for the next year and a half of Oswalt.

Moving along to the on-field impact of the trade, Oswalt’s addition to the Phillies roster provides an immediate boost. He’ll be replacing the recently reactivated Happ, who has spent the better part of the season on the DL with a strained left forearm. In his nine rehab appearances this season (eight starts), Happ has thrown 37.2 innings with 34 K, 19 BB and a 5.97 ERA. Due to his shaky recovery, it was very uncertain what Happ would add to the rotation. Oliver’s preseason projection called for 1 WAR in 110 IP. The Fans projection at Fangraphs called for 2.3 WAR and a healthy Happ probably could have been expected to deliver about 2 WAR in a 180-inning season.

Unfortunately, this makes direct analysis a little tricky due to his uncertain recovery. From what I’ve seen, there’s little reason to expect Happ to be better than replacement level this season. He could possibly be worse. Let’s put a range on it and say he’ll probably perform somewhere between -.5 WAR and .5 WAR.

Oswalt, on the other hand, has put together what looks like a solid bounceback season. He has continued to be stingy with the walks this year while his strikeout rate is the second highest of his career (2.37 BB/9, 8.37 K/9). His 3.42 ERA is perfectly in line with a 3.40 FIP and 3.45 xFIP, contributing to his 2.7 WAR to date. THT’s own Oliver system calls for 1.6 WAR over the balance of the season, which is similar to my own expectations. In 2011, Oliver calls for 3.8 WAR. Again, this seems to be a reasonable expectation.

Taken together, it appears that the Philllies have added at least one win and as many as two in 2010. If we charitably consider Happ a 2 WAR pitcher going forward, Oswalt is expected to provide an additional 1.8 WAR over the outgoing Happ in 2011. So for an expected 5.4 WAR and 2.8-3.8 WAH (Wins Above Happ), the Phillies' financial commitment is only about $13 million, which is close to $2.5 million per win and well below anything they could get in the market. Since these are critical wins, the Phillies have made out very well financially in this deal.

Of course, the Astros get something out of this deal too. While a far more uncertain option than Oswalt, Happ can hold his own on the hill; he put together a 1.8 WAR season in 2009 over 166 innings. There was much ado over the offseason as to whether Happ could continue to outpitch his sabermetric peripherals (2.93 ERA, 4.33 FIP, 4.49 xFIP). He will immediately slot into the Astros rotation, where he’ll hope to quickly recover from his early season injury and get back to proving he can outpitch his FIP. If all goes well, the Astros have acquired a pitcher who can put up about 2 WAR a season over the next four years before qualifying as a free agent. However, his past injury history and current slow recovery do make Happ a bit of a question mark.

Gose, who has already been shipped north of the border for Wallace, is probably the gem of the trade, although he’ll take quite a bit of polishing before he’s bright and shiny. He's a potential five-tool standout center fielder—scouts drool over his physical ability before moving on to the shortcomings.

At 6-foor-1, 190 pounds, the speedy 19-year-old is already in the high-A Florida State League. In the field, he flashes spectacular range and a good arm. At the plate, Gose has struggled with strikeouts in a way that reminds me of Dexter Fowler. His plate discipline is improving, although it’s still below average. He has just six homers in a little over 1,000 minor league plate appearances, but scouts hope he can develop at least 10-plus home run power.

It’s on the basepaths that Go

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Wednesday, September 08, 2010