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Monday, February 01, 2010Umm… for serious?J.J. Putz (from CSNChicago, h/t Metsblog): When the trade went down last year, I never really had a physical with the Mets. I had the bone spur (in the right elbow). It was discovered the previous year in Seattle, and it never got checked out by any other doctors until I got to spring training... I knew that I wasn’t right. I wasn’t healthy. The toughest part was having to face the media and tell them that you feel fine, even though you know there’s something wrong and they don’t want you telling them that you’re banged up. How can an MLB team be run so poorly? This is a guy who spent 64 days on the DL the year before (three separate stints) and walked 5.44 batters per nine. How do you not make sure you're thorough with his injury analysis? Moral of the story: don't take anything for granted with the Mets, guys. Posted by Derek Carty at 4:24pm Clone Wars: Matt Wieters and Mark Teixeira
Wieters didn't quite have his power going in his first year as he totaled only a .124 ISO. That was much lower than expected after his PECOTA number was .244. I think expecting that much power in his first season and after starting at Triple-A is a lot to ask. Teixeira did not have trouble in his first year, hitting 26 homers with a .221 ISO. While Teixeira had a quicker start to his career, they had more similarities from their minor league numbers. They each spent a first season split between High-A and Double-A to start their careers with Wieters spending 39 games at Triple-A in his second season. During that first season they totaled the following stat lines. Teixeria: .318/.413/.592 Wieters: .355/.454/.600 Wieters compiled that line in 530 plate appearances and Teixeira only had 375. That is quite a line for Wieters and gives reason to believe the hype. At the plate both players have a similar approach. O-Swing% Z-Swing% Swing% O-Contact% Z-Contact% Contact% Zone% F-Strike% Wieters 25.4 % 70.2 % 47.1 % 61.2 % 83.7 % 77.5 % 48.5 % 53.0 % Teixeira 23.8 % 74.6 % 49.2 % 37.7 % 87.8 % 75.6 % 49.9 % 57.6 % This is rookie season numbers for both, and show how close they are in plate discipline and contact skills. Wieters is better in this sample at contact on pitches out of the zone and slightly better in overall contact. They both had walk rates around 7 percent and strikeout rates around 22-24 percent. Obviously Teixeira has had some different numbers since, but in everything but power they were very close in their rookie years. Heading into 2010, the projections systems don't like Wieters to reach the second season numbers of Teixeira. The power again seems to be a concern with Bill James giving him the highest SLG at .484 where Teixeira posted a .560 SLG in his second season. Being only 24 this season Wieters has plenty of improvement headed his way as he continues to grow. Hitting only 20 homers this year would seem to be low for him after the power he showed in the minors. The projection systems seem to weight the rookie season more and place his power closer to the 2009 numbers. Perhaps the comparison will lose some basis going forward, but the only failing of Wieters in year No. 1 was his power swing. His home park shouldn't hurt him at all and of course his power will come as he grows. For fantasy purposes this all makes Wieters an extreme value again. He should be one of the top catchers off the board in 2010 and with a comparable like Teixeira it makes sense to value him there. Posted by Troy Patterson at 4:42am Moving Middle Infielders Pt. 2: Melvin Mora Signs With RockiesThe second part of this middle infield tango is Melvin Mora. Spurned by Orlando Cabrera, the Rockies turned their attention to Mora, who agreed to a one-year deal worth just over $1.3 million dollars. Essentially filling the vacated role by Ian Stewart, who now is a full-time starter, Mora will be asked to play second base, short stop, third base and some outfield; a super-utility player. The role is something Mora is familiar with especially during the early stages of his career. However, for the past six seasons he has almost exclusively held down the hot corner for the Baltimore Orioles. A career .344 wOBA hitter, he saw that number drop all the way down to .302 in 2009. After crushing some numbers, I think Mora is a bounce back candidate and here's the man reason why. Throughout the course of his career, Mora has shown pretty decent pop from his bat. However, that pop was almost non-existent in 2009. His slugging dipped down to .358 (career low min. 50 PA) while his ISO of 0.98 was also a career worse. Not surprisingly, his HR/FB went from 11% career to just 5.4% in 2009. Add in his new home of Coors Field and we have some potential for a bounce back in power. In a smaller possible regression note, his BABIP of .285 was 25 points lower than his career total. In his new role, Mora will see likely see less at-bats than the 500 plus he has become accustomed to. Nonetheless, there should still be enough playing time to get him 300+ plate appearances. If the Rockies should have a major injury on the infield, Mora’s stock will rise. However, like Cabrera, Mora is limited to a deeper NL-only league at this point, but is definitely one to watch if his role is increased. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
