The backup outfielders on the other hand are anything but. The club re-signed Jason “Tarter Sauce” Michaels fairly early in the off-season for reasons that escape most of us. Michaels produced a .700+ OPS in limited duty and proved equally adept at playing all three outfield positions (read: can’t really play any of them well.) So, he’s not a terrible choice, but not a horribly inspired one either. Furthermore, it wasn’t like anyone was beating down his door to sign him.

Of course, I feel is if I’m a record with a scratch on that issue. Unfortunately, I’m not in position to pick up the needle and move it past that point. Suffice it to say, it looks like Jason Michaels will be manning one of those two outfield spots. The other one is wide open after Darin Erstad rode off into the sunset and signed a minor league deal with Las Angeles.

Several folks are lined up to take the fifth spot, but none of them are really inspired candidates. The clubhouse leader is Cory Sullivan. He is formerly of the Mets and Rockies and appears to offer the left-handed option. Sullivan has experience, but that’s about all he has. Jason Bourgeois is a rule five pick from the Brewers organization. He’s really fast, but we’re still not sure if he can steal first base. That being said, he offers the club a late inning defensive replacement or pinch runner.

Alex Romero and Yordany Ramirez offer similar skills. Ramirez has a little more power than the other two speedsters and he might be superior on the defensive end as well. Ramirez has proven to be one of those AAAA players. He always seems to perform well in AAA, but he has been there so long he is no longer a prospect. Still, if I had to pick someone skills wise, he would probably be my first choice.

The most intriguing candidate is Brian Bogusevic. The former first round pick played his first full season as a position player last year with mixed results. In 2008, he looked as if he could become the second coming of Rick Ankiel. The former pitcher tore it up in AA to close out the last month and a half as a hitter. Last season, he was very pedestrian .271/.342/.365. He just turned 26 years old, so he is probably not a prospect anymore. Could he improve with another full season at AAA? I suppose it is possible. It’s also possible that he will never be a great hitter.

These decisions usually come down to philosophy. Some people want players on their bench that are capable of being regulars if the main guy goes down. Others want players that are capable of filling specific roles in certain game situations. Sometimes you get both in the same player, but this rarely ever works out. You can choose a speedy defender for late game roles or you can choose someone that is pretty good, but not quite as good as your regulars.

A Jason Bourgeois, Yordany Ramirez, or Alex Romero would fill the role of speciality player. All three would offer good defense in left field late in the game or a key substitution on the bases late in the game. None of those guys would be good regulars. Jason Michaels might be more appropriate for that situation. So, look for the Astros to choose one of the speedsters to accompany Michaels on the bench.
]]> http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/09/spring-battles-part-iv/feed/ 0 http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/07/more-erosion-factor/ http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/07/more-erosion-factor/#comments Sun, 07 Mar 2010 22:28:28 +0000 scottbarzilla http://kissmyastros.com/?p=297 I introduced the “erosion factor” a couple of weeks ago and thought it would be a good idea to flush this out to see where the Astros rank among all of the big leagues. Currently, there are three National League teams lower than the Astros and two American League teams. It would be easy to say the Astros rank 25^th and just leave it at that, but we want to make sure we know the trends. Four of those teams were playoff teams with the Washington Nationals finishing below the Astros. So, we will split the big leagues in four categories: playoff teams, close to the playoffs, below .500, and cellar dwellers.

For those of you just tuning in, we are looking at the 2009 VORP for all of the teams and comparing it to the projected VORPs from Baseball Prospectus. The general idea is that the projected VORPs are usually lower because players lose effectiveness with age. Of course, sometimes they are projected to get better because younger players get better and players coming off on injury are due to improve.

I’m not a mathematician, but I stayed at a Holiday Express once. This is what mathematicians call “regression to the mean.” Bill James talked about this years ago. He estimated that teams would regress to the mean (81 wins) by half of the difference between their previous year’s total and 81. In other words, a 90 win team would naturally expect to win 85 the next year without any changes. Naturally, all of these teams made changes, but part of their plan involved them thinking the players that had career years would continue their performance. You don’t change what worked even if you should know that it won’t work again.

When you are evaluating general managers and the off-season they had you should evaluate them within this kind of framework. Terry Ryan always comes out looking good because he has a sense. The other teams all fit within a comfortable range. The Dodgers are a bit younger than the other squads, so they are slightly better. The Cardinals and Phillies relied on some out of context seasons, so they finish at the bottom of heap.

These numbers also make sense. Teams that are just out of the playoffs are more motivated to make those key moves to get over the top. However, there can be some pitfalls and we see that with the Mariners. The Mariners did this a couple of years ago. They had players that had unusually good seasons and acquired players that had unusually good seasons and went in the toilet. They didn’t do as bad this time, but their rate shows that adding the likes of Chone Figgins, Milton Bradley, and Cliff Lee might not give them the rate of return they expect. Meanwhile, the Atlanta Braves are in position to make some serious noise in the NL East.

As we move to the teams between 70 and 80 wins we see some different things going on. In some cases, they had players that really had down years and in other cases they had young players that are due to grow. Given James original idea, we would expect the erosion rate for these teams to be higher as we go. Lower rates would indicate there is something wrong with management.

As you can see, the Astros are not only last in erosion, but a distant last in this group. They fell 0.100 below the average. If we remove them from the group the average erosion rate for the rest was 0.863. In other words, the Astros haven’t had a very good off-season. Supposedly, a team at 74 wins wants to either rebuild (which means younger players that are supposed to get better) or veterans to get better. The Astros saved money, but did not add any good young players. The Pittsburgh Pirates are the only team in baseball with fewer projected VORP than the Astros.

As you can see, these teams have the best erosion rates because they are due to improve the most. However, you can see the Washington Nationals and Baltimore Orioles with very low rates. Teams that are usually bad are bad for a reason. In the case of these teams, they have bought into mediocre veterans that had 2009 seasons that were well outside their norm. Miguel Tejada and Kevin Millwood torpedoed the Orioles numbers while the likes of Jason Marquis did it for the Nationals. Take those two teams out and the other five are set to see net improvement.

While these numbers might not be earth shattering, they do help us evaluate each team within the context they exist. It also helps us predict the future with a little more ease. As for your hometown nine, I don’t know how many different ways I can say it, but it doesn’t look good this year. Of course, they don’t play the season on paper and this team has already won more games in the spring than they did throughout most of last spring. So, hope springs eternal.

The problem is that a typical closer will get somewhere between 40 and 50 closing opportunities in a season. He may work 20 to 30 other odd innings along the way. So, a closer will work between 60 to 80 innings in a typical season. He is asked to get as many as three outs with as much as a three run lead. I’m still not sure why this is such a difficult or important position, but I suppose the conventional experts can shed some light on that.

This is one of those rare instances where the Astros seem to agree. On two consecutive occasions, they have developed a superb closer only to deal him to the Phillies when he was getting too expensive. Ten million dollars seems to be their threshold on the position. Jose Valverde left via free agency to create the third such void in the position. Funny, but the Astros seem to land on their feet every time.

Closing games is just not as difficult as people make it out to be. Most closers exist somewhere between the 75 and 95 percent success rate. I grant that it is hard to sustain a 75 percent success rate and be successful as a club, but it isn’t impossible. The Phillies made it to the World Series while Brad Lidge was having maybe the worst season a closer could have. It’s just going to be hard to convince me that the closer’s role is either that crucial to a ball club or that difficult to do.

Some in the stats world agree with conventional wisdom. The concept of leverage was developed to account for this. The concept of leverage dictates that some outs are more difficult to get than others. Therefore, added weight is applied to the last three outs of the game. The concept of leverage is easy enough to agree with, but I don’t agree that the last three outs are automatically more difficult. In many instances, the hardest outs occur before the ninth inning. When you think about it, the closer’s role is completely fabricated. It was a stat created in the 1960s and the role has followed the stat.

Once the role followed the stat then the money followed the role. Now, it is not uncommon for closers to get ten million a year. This is to work an average of 60-70 innings a season. It’s just nuts. Look up Baseball Prospectus or any other sabermetric site and notice how often a team’s best reliever was not the closer. Yet, the closer always makes the most money. It’s high time that teams make sure the best reliever makes the most money and make sure he is in there to get the most difficult outs. That could be in the 7th or 8th inning.

I seem to have this rant on a yearly basis and now that it is out of that system we can move onto looking at Matt Lindstrom and Brandon Lyon. Since relievers pitch so few innings it is instructive to look at multiple seasons to get a good idea of who will end up giving us the most help. I will use some BP stats to compare both players over the last three seasons.

. . . . . . . . . . .VORP. . . .ERA. . . .SIERA. . . .SV

Brandon Lyon. ..53.0. . . .3.46. . . ..4.19. . . ..31

Matt Lindstrom..26.1. . . .4.04. . . ..4.16. . . ..20

SIERA is a new BP metric that is meant to be a better predictor of future ERA than FIP. As you can see, both Lyon and Lindstrom have a similar SIERA over the past three seasons, but Lyon has had much more success. Lyon’s success has been build on very favorable BABIP rates. For those looking for an English translation, that means that the fielders behind him have gotten to more balls than normal. VORP stands for value over replacement player. Simply put, Lyon has been more valuable over the past three seasons. So, let’s look at what the future holds for these two (according to BP).

. . . . . . . . . . . .INN. . . .ERA. . . .VORP

Lyon. . . . . . . . .66.2. . ..4.00. . . .8.9

Lindstrom. . . . . .58.1. . ..4.33. . . .6.1

So, if we are following conventional wisdom, then Brandon Lyon should be the closer. He is higher paid and due to be a better pitcher than Matt Lindstrom. Furthermore, when a pitcher consistently outperforms his peripherals, you have to consider the possibility that he will always do that. Certainly, some of you have pointed out the same with Tim Byrdak. So, nominally it appears as if Lyon should be the closer, but paint me as someone that is just not that concerned.
]]> http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/07/spring-battles-part-iii/feed/ 0 http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/05/spring-battles-part-ii/ http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/05/spring-battles-part-ii/#comments Fri, 05 Mar 2010 17:27:45 +0000 scottbarzilla http://kissmyastros.com/?p=292 As you will see, we are moving in order from greatest to least significant in position battles. Catcher appears to be the only position up for grabs, but that could change at second base or shortstop. We will get to those if a change arises. The most important pitching battle comes down to the fifth starter’s spot. Usually, I don’t put that much emphasis on this spot, but this battle is a signal of the organization’s approach from here on out.

Some people will point to the battle for the closer’s spot as more significance. I will get to that one next. If you parcel out rotation spots, you see that each spot gets between 32 and 33 stars during a season. Therefore, those spots will average anywhere between 224 (7 innings per start) and 160 innings (5 innings per start). There hasn’t been a relief pitcher in recent memory that has put up anywhere close to that in innings. So, when you gravitate in importance you go to the position with the most innings. That would be the fifth starter.

Normally, I wouldn’t pay too much attention because every team is almost guaranteed to use eight or nine starters (on average) in any given season. So, if you don’t make the team out of Spring Training you are probably guaranteed a chance somewhere along the line. However, this time around, the fifth starter battle is a symbolic battle that mirrors the overall direction of the franchise. Will they go with mediocre to sub mediocre veterans or will they go with prospects that might be more?

Anyone that watched Felipe Paulino pitch last year is fully aware of the highs and lows a young pitcher will go through. His first few starts were brilliant and better than anything Brian Moehler could muster. Later in the season Paulino was yo-yoed between the rotation and pen. The back to back to back to back home runs against the Nationals was probably the proverbial low. Yet, like any work of art, when you take a step back and look at all of the numbers there is reason to be optimistic.

BABIP: .368

FIP: 5.11

HR/G: 1.84

SO/BB: 2.51

If we take these numbers in order we see why people might be optimistic. A .368 BABIP is extremely high (.300-.310 is average) and an indication of considerable improvement. Pitchers rarely repeat good or bad BABIPs. So, even if he returns to league average, his ERA is due to improve considerably by inertia alone. The FIP (Fielding Independent Pitching) shows where he would be with just average defense behind him. All four of the 2010 projections at Fangraphs reflect this idea. The aggregate projection has him at a 5.04 ERA for this season.

The home runs per nine innings are terrible, but that is actually another reason for hope. An abnormally number of flyballs turned into home runs for Paulino last year. So, if you couple a normal flyball to home run rate with average defense behind him and you already get a remarkable improvement. On the flip side, when we look at Brian Moehler we see an entirely different picture. In seasons where he has been a starter, Moehler hasn’t produced an ERA under 4.50 since 1998. Look all the fancy numbers you want, but someone with that kind of track record isn’t going to produce a sub 4.50 ERA.

BABIP: .325

FIP: 4.75

HR/9: 1.22

SO/BB: 1.78

I did show the numbers for intellectual honesty. He did outproduce his pitching numbers slightly. If he performs the same he should improve. However, he will be a year older and not a year better. He shares the same birthday as my father, but he was born a few decades before. He will turn 39 this December. Sorry, that doesn’t bode well for future improvement.

The fangraph projections say he will improve, but also say he will be roughly the same pitcher as Moehler in terms of projected ERA. So, do you go with the prospect in his mid twenties or the veteran in his later thirties? This decision will tell you what you need to know about where the Astros head is. Personally, I go with the pitcher in his mid twenties. He likely will be below average, but there is the chance he puts it all together. Moehler will be what he has always been.

In years past, having someone like Moehler around would have been a good thing. The Astros haven’t had a pair of starting pitching prospects like Bud Norris and Felipe Paulino for quite some time. In fact, Moehler will be very serviceable in the pen. You typically don’t want pitchers to work more than 150 or 160 innings in their first full season in the big leagues. Brian Moehler is a professional. He is a mediocre professional, but he is a professional. You can slip him in and skip a turn for Norris or Paulino once every month each. If you limit them to five starts a month instead of six then you achieve their innings limit without having to shut them down. So, Moehler will get about a dozen starts that way anyway.
]]> http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/05/spring-battles-part-ii/feed/ 0 http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/04/spring-battles-part-1/ http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/04/spring-battles-part-1/#comments Thu, 04 Mar 2010 17:37:44 +0000 scottbarzilla http://kissmyastros.com/?p=290 Today marks the beginning of Spring Training games. Last year’s spring was an indication of two undeniable facts. First, people make way too much of spring records. Spring Training has never been about winning or losing. It is about finding out who is going to be on the team. Secondly, spring records are not a good indicator of regular season records. Those of us that remember last spring are thankful for that.

So, if we can’t pay attention to the outcome of the games we can pay attention to the outcomes for particular players. Again, that isn’t the case for all players. Roy Oswalt and Lance Berkman can care less about their spring numbers. Heck, Carlos Lee is so unconcerned, he is skipping the spring opener to go the Houston Livestock Show and rodeo. I suppose we could dedicate an entire blog to his dedication (or lackthereof).

In point of fact, we need to focus on those specific battles where jobs are on the line. The first place we focus on is the catcher position. The Astros are in a place most teams find themselves in from time to time. It is unique for the Astros because they simply don’t have a lot of good prospects. Jason Castro is the catcher of the future. The question is how soon the future needs to come. For some it is opening day, for others it is 2011. A majority seem to think it is sometime this season.

The dilemma is that most experts agree that Castro will be a solid major league catcher, but no one is throwing the Johnny Bench tag on him. Still, when you add in his high draft status with the fact that the current crop of catchers is either below par or unproven, it makes the mystique surrounding him that much more difficult to overlook. Furthermore, Castro has the one thing that all great prospects have: he has a clean record at the big league level.

It seems counterintuitive, but prospects without big league experience are sometimes more valuable than those with minimal experience. If that minimal experience is bad then that player often sees a dip in his value even if he is more prepared than the prospect without big league experience. This is where J.R. Towles comes to the forefront.

Ask most casual fans who has the better minor league numbers between Towles and Castro and you would expect people to say Castro. The numbers actually go to Towles at each level. Furthermore, Towles has the better defensive pedigree even if the general public believes he doesn’t. In his only extended time in the big leagues, Towles was off the charts at blocking the plate and was surprisingly adept at calling a game for a rookie. He may not have the cannon that Humberto Quintero has, but he isn’t a slouch at that either.

Funny, but the perception is also that Towles has been a flop as a hitter. When you compare him to the expectations and the minor league numbers that is true, but he actually has a higher career OPS than Humberto Quintero. Yet, Quintero is the odds on favorite to win the job for opening day. Thus, this is what spring training is all about. The question is where perception and reality meet. Will they meet? That is a question we always must ask of this organization.

The Astros best chance to compete is with a healthy and productive J.R. Towles catching most of the games. If he can produce even close to what he did in the minors then we will have no need for Jason Castro until 2011. If he continues to struggle then Castro may need to make an appearance by the time the kids are out of school. If Humberto Quintero is catching a majority of the games then this team will not finish any higher than fourth place.

I hate to put that much pressure on Towles considering how he has handled the pressure the last two years. However, he represents the best chance of getting anything good out of the catcher’s position this year. Matt Wieters was more ready than Jason Castro is now (plus he is considerably better) and he struggled last year. Castro likely will face the same problems if he is pressed into duty. So, if you are looking for one thing to watch you can watch J.R. Towles. I know I’m rooting for him.
]]> http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/04/spring-battles-part-1/feed/ 0 http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/01/the-berkman-debate/ http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/01/the-berkman-debate/#comments Mon, 01 Mar 2010 17:16:28 +0000 scottbarzilla http://kissmyastros.com/?p=288 I’d like to thank Jason Collette again for contributing in the last piece about Ed Wade. It just goes to show that those of us that have been devoted Astros fans for years have gotten use to the way the Astros do things. It must be hard to have divided loyalties. This is especially true when an organization does it right like Tampa Bay and the Astros seem to struggle with how they do things.

As usual, I am coming to this particular discussion a little late, but hopefully I can add some substance to what has already been thrown around. Unless you have been living under a rock, you know this is Lance Berkman’s final year of his contract. Sort of. There is a club option for 2011 at $13 million ($2 million buyout). So, the debate comes in whether the club should exercise the option or let him walk and pocket the what would in essence be $11 million dollars.

Of course, doing the quick math shows the club will be saving only $11 million. I never thought I would see the day when I would say “only” eleven million. As the saying goes, I would love to have that much and make a go of it. Yet, in baseball terms, that kind of money would only afford you a good starting pitcher or good (but not great) position player. Which category is Berkman in? Let’s go back five seasons and take a look.

. . . . . .AVG. . .OBP. . .SLG. . .OPS+

2005. . .293. . ..411. . .524. . .143

2006. . .315. . ..420. . .621. . .163

2007. . .278. . ..386. . .510. . .130

2008. . .312. . ..420. . .567. . .159

2009. . .274. . ..399. . .509. . .139

Unless he completely falls off the table, Berkman should probably produce an OBP around .400 (he has been there four of the last five seasons) and a slugging percentage of at least .500. His power numbers have been disappointing (for him) in two out of the last three seasons. There is no getting around that. However, the Astros must consider how many guys they have that can produce a .900 OPS season for them. Other than Berkman the answer is none.

However, the key with Berkman goes beyond the numbers. At $13 million in 2011 he is a relative bargain. Furthermore, no one knows how much longer he intends to play. Right now he sits at 313 home runs, 1041 RBIs, and 969 runs scored. Two more seasons in Houston will drive him over 360 home runs, 1200 RBIs, and 1150 runs scored if he is healthy two years. At that point, you start to look at what needs to happen to punch the ticket to Cooperstown. For Berkman, that might mean signing a three year deal for 40-50 million dollars.

Again, I promised no numbers. Yet, you have to consider the synergy that comes from having a Hall of Famer manning first base for nearly a quarter century. Jeff Bagwell and Lance Berkman could create the same kind of tradition that Ted Williams and Carl Yastrzemski did in Boston. Yes, they were collectively better, but you have to start somewhere. One of the main reasons why fans in St. Louis, Chicago, New York, and Philadelphia draw is because they have a connection with their past. When you start adding in the likes of Berkman, Bagwell, Biggio to a Mount Rushmore that includes Nolan Ryan, Joe Morgan, Jimmy Wynn, and Larry Dierker you begin to see a real tradition forming in Houston.

That kind of tradition is worth preserving. The 11 million coming back would not even compare to what Berkman could provide with another four or five years in town. As long as Roy Oswalt and Lance Berkman price themselves reasonably they should stay as long as they like. Carlos Lee does not have a reasonable contract. His contract is the one keeping the club from being competitive. He also does bring back the kind of good feelings that Roy Oswalt and Lance Berkman bring back.

Jason Collette quoted many people that said that the Astros are a backwards organization. In many ways they are. Seamheads were screaming from their computer screens for years at the club retaining Craig Biggio and Brad Ausmus for so long. I was one of them for part of that time (Ausmus and not Biggio). At the end of the day, baseball is a people business. Those people should be informed of the latest developments and they should use whatever tools are that their disposal, but it is still a people business.

When people feel good about the place they work they usually work better. When people feel good about the place they work they usually tell others they know about the good things going on. That means that good people want to come in and be a part of something good. If people feel as if they will be cast aside as soon as they are of marginal use then they may not want to be a part of something like that.

Naturally, the flip side is the notion that you may be forever sacrificing your ability to compete so players can ride off into the sunset on their own terms. You always have to balance the desire to let players leave on their own terms with a desire to be as competitive as humanly possible. The dividing line is determined by the player’s importance to the fans and to the community. Berkman comes in well over that line and the team is still more competitive with him than without him.
]]> http://kissmyastros.com/2010/03/01/the-berkman-debate/feed/ 2 http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/28/collette-says-justice-is-wrong/ http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/28/collette-says-justice-is-wrong/#comments Sun, 28 Feb 2010 15:09:18 +0000 scottbarzilla http://kissmyastros.com/?p=285 Guest blogger Jason Collette joins us from the Rays fanball page. He is a former Astros fan and wanted to send a special rebuttal to Richard Justice’s defense of Ed Wade.

Many might know that before the Devil Rays came to be, I lived and breathed Houston Astros baseball. You want proof?

Here come the Astros burning with desire

Here come the Astros breathing orange fire

Here come the Astros with winning on their mind

Here come the Astros number one every time!

Yes, I still remember the words to that cheesy fight song that would blare from the Astrodome speaker suspended way above my head in a territory only Andre Dawson could reach. I have watched games from the old standing room only section of the Astrodome through the chain link fence area. I once bought a pretzel for Dutch Rennert while he umpired third base and I was sitting in the first seat next to the visitor dugout in the early 80s when the crowds were like Devil Rays crowds in 2005. I was a proud 6 year member of the Astros Buddy club and wore that hideous polyester rainbow-themed jersey with pride around the neighborhood as we played pickup games in my Spring, Texas neighborhood. I remember huddling around a TV at Spring High School to watch Mike Scott pitch the no-hitter to clinch the division title in 1986.

I moved to Orlando in 1987 and leaving the Astros was the tough but at least I had Kissimmee for Spring Training and the Florida State League Kissimmee Kobras to follow the Astros because mlb.tv, MLB Extra Innings, or mlb radio were just the dream of a baseball-starved fan living in a state without major league baseball. The Marlins came along first but since they were a National League team, I wanted no part of them as they were direct competitors of the Astros so I waited, patiently, for another Florida city to get an American League baseball team. While I have passionately followed the Rays since the expansion draft (and no, I have never gotten over Stocker for Abreu), the Astros have remained close to my heart. My XM radio subscription was started in 2005 because the AM radio signals on my drive between Jacksonville and Tampa were too weak to hold the game signals for the NLCS so I pulled into a Best Buy and bought and installed a portable unit in my car within one inning. That 2005 team was stewarded by first year GM Tim Purpura but the entire nucleus of that squad was done by the former GM Gerry Hunsicker who is now, thankfully, under the employment of the Rays. This topic has been under my skin for six days now, ever since I first heard the news that Drayton McLane had extended Ed Wade’s current deal for two years. In an interview on Grant Paulsen’s great “Minors and Majors” show on XM 175 this past Sunday morning, McLane went on to praise Wade’s work stating, “he is the best GM we’ve had here in my 18 years.” Not only do I think that is a distasteful slap in the face of the work Hunsicker did with the club but proof at just how out of touch McLane is with what it takes to be a successful baseball club in this century. It was rough enough when Hunsicker was replaced by Tim Purpura, but that was only made worse when Ed Wade was brought on board.

If you flash back to 2007, you could have had quite a battle royale between Astros fans and Phillies fans as they debated the worst GM in the National League since 2000. It would have been two years past the date that Wade had been terminated by the Phillies and yet they were still just as angry as Astros fans who had to put up with three years of Tim Purpura rapidly undoing what Hunsicker had done. Purpura was given three years on the job and McLane sent him packing for essentially doing the same thing Ed Wade has done over the past two seasons. Let’s take a look at some of the major moves of the Purpura years and compare them to the Wade years:

Tim Purpura:

Signs Carlos Lee to a 6yr/$100m deal with a no trade clause that is backloaded

Trades Ben Zobrist and Mitch Talbot to rent Aubrey Huff

Trades Taylor Buchholz, Jason Hirsh, and Willy Taveras to get Jason Jennings who ends up with a bad shoulder, wins 2 games, and has a 6.45 ERA in his only season.

Signs Woody Williams to a 2 year/$12.5m deal – a heavy flyball pitcher moving from Petco to Minute Maid with an already rapidly declining skill set. Williams only pitches one season and goes 8-15 with a 5.27 ERA.

Hangs onto Jason Lane, Morgan Ensberg, and Chris Burke for too long despite skills going in rapid decline. Burke was given time in center over promoting Hunter Pence.

Ed Wade:

Traded away current major leaguers Chad Qualls, Juan Gutierrez, Luke Scott, Dennis Sarfate, and Josh Anderson and none of the players received in return are still with the Astros.

Signed Ivan Rodriguez, Mike Hampton, Darin Erstad, and Russ Ortiz when nobody else wanted them.

Gave Kaz Matsui a 3 year/$16.5m deal to play second base despite his injury-marred history (Ben Zobrist could have had this job)
Gave Brandon Lyon a 3 year deal for $15m. Lyon has been a 2.9 WAR player over the past three years and not even produced $15m of open market value in his past three seasons while in Arizona and Detroit.

These two men have taken a World Series team down to a second division team in just five seasons and yet one of them is considered, by his owner, to be the best GM in the past 18 years in Houston? In Wade’s defense he has done two things well. One, he has helped do a better job with the farm system as the club has actually managed to sign their last two draft picks in Jason Castro and Jiovanni Mier – something Purpura was not able to do with McLane’s hamstringing of the draft. Secondly, he has also done the one thing Purpura did well – say yes to whatever McLane wanted them to do.

Ben Badler of Baseball America said it best in his Houston Astros Farm System Preview:

At the July 31 trading deadline, the Astros had a .500 record and ranked sixth in the National League wild-card race. Despite having the oldest roster in baseball and a run differential that suggested the team was due for regression, Houston stood pat rather than seizing an opportunity to trade big leaguers and rebuild a farm system that ranked dead last entering 2009.

Badler also raises some other solid points:

Since winning the National League Pennant in 2005, the Astros are 17 games below .500

Despite the 8th highest payroll in 2009, the club ranked 27th in overall offense and 23rd in runs allowed.

No U.S.-based Astros minor league affiliate has had a winning record in the past three seasons.

The club has not traded for a significant prospect in years.

The club has actually signed veteran free agents that have cost them draft picks while dealing other prospects for veterans as pseudo-competitors.

What has this led to? Baseball America now grades the Astros farm system as the worst farm system in all of baseball.

A look at the active roster shows a left side of the infield that consists of Pedro Feliz who the Phillies were more than happy to let go and a 27 year old rookie shortstop in Tommy Manzella who is all glove and little stick. With Matsui manning second base, it leaves Big Puma Lance Berkman to show any talent on the infield. The outfield has promise with Bourn and Pence but Lee and his bloated contract are plodding around in left field possibly for another three seasons at the tune of $55.5m as his no-trade clause does not expire until the end of this season. The catching situation is a disaster with all glove and no-hit Humberto Quintero and no glove and lost bat J.R. Towles. The starting pitching staff is led by Oswalt and Rodriguez but then has Brett Myers, Bud Norris, and Felipe Paulino – 3 guys that profile better as relievers as they do starting pitching. The bullpen has the overpaid Lyon, the recently acquired Matt Lindstrom and then a collection of names such as Alberto Arias, Yorman Bazardo, Tim Byrdak, Sam Gervacio, Brian Moehler, Chris Sampson, and Wesley Wright that do little to inspire confidence. It is no wonder that Baseball Prospectus’s PECOTA system calls for a 76-86 season.

Houston has 53% of its payroll sunken into 3 players: Carlos Lee, Lance Berkman, and Roy Oswalt. Currently there are six other teams in the majors that find themselves in a similar payroll situation: Cleveland, Oakland, St. Louis, Florida, Cincinnati, and San Diego. Those teams, including Houston, averaged 78 wins last season. If you take out the Cardinals and the Marlins, you get 73 wins. The Cardinals and Marlins have two of the best players in this game in Albert Pujols and Hanley Ramirez and while the Cardinals also have Matt Holliday, the Marlins have been infused with their excellent minor league talent in recent years who are still relatively cheap including Josh Johnson, Ricky Nolasco, and Chris Coghlan. The other clubs either lack the star power or the farm system to remain competitive with so much payroll tied up into a select group of players. To point out how it can work at the other end, the seven organizations that have less than 40% of their payroll tied up into three players averaged 89 wins last season and four of them made the playoffs. Simply put, the current payroll plan Ed Wade has set up is destined to fail as it combines a high amount of risk should one of those three players going down with a farm system that is completely ill-equipped to assist the team this season.

If I had advice for Mr. McLane, I’d move Wade down to managing the farm system because McLane needs a GM in place that will stand up to him and tell him he’s driving this franchise down into the drain and back to the doldrums of the pre Biggio and Bagwell era. Wade has done well to get the draft picks to at least sign again but his tenure in Philadelphia and his yes-sir approach so far in Houston has done little to inspire confidence for me, despite what Richard Justice wants us to believe. Maybe Mr. McLane thinks Wade is the best GM in his 18 year tenure because he does not disagree with him as much as Hunsicker did toward the end but the results speak for themselves.

In the Hunsicker era, the Astros went 869-733 – a .540 winning percentage, 136 games above .500 and went to the playoffs five times. Under Tim Purpura and Ed Wade, the Astros have gone 404-405 and made the playoffs in the first year with the club Hunsicker handed over. R.J. Anderson of Fangraphs and Bloomberg Sports points out that even though Rays’ GM Andrew Friedman was 127-197 in his first two seasons, the club continued to develop the farm system AND acquired young talent in deals such as Ben Zobrist, Carlos Pena, Dioner Navarro, Matt Garza, and Jason Bartlett. Wade has started to build the farm system but the contracts of the current players the club should be trading make them rather unmovable even if Mr. McClan were to approve deals involving Berkman or Oswalt. For me, Wade earns the new two-year extension if he can convince Mr. McLane this team is not a contender and they need to trade off declining talent for future building block as that is the only way the Astros will improve as a team in the next five years. The status quo in Houston will relegate them to the bottom half of the NL Central for the foreseeable future.

Will Leitch of Deadspin it up nicely:

To believe the Astros are on the cusp of something, to believe they are still of the Biggio/Bagwell age, to give Ed Wade a two-year extension, you have to not look very closely. The rest of us look closely now. The Astros, bless their heart, don’t. The Reds are starting to get it, the freaking Pirates are starting to get it. It’s nice that the Astros exist. When Billy Beane was thriving in Moneyball, it was because he had so many GMs to play off who didn’t get it. A lot more people get it now. We must enjoy the Astros while we can. They are reading their newspaper in the morning and buying compact discs and checking their answering machine and signing up for AOL accounts. They won’t be around forever. Appreciate them now, before they, finally, disappear. I’ll miss them. I really will.

]]> http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/28/collette-says-justice-is-wrong/feed/ 5 http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/26/correspondents-pick-the-central/ http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/26/correspondents-pick-the-central/#comments Sat, 27 Feb 2010 04:05:40 +0000 scottbarzilla http://kissmyastros.com/?p=281 As promised, the NL Central correspondents got together to predict the order of the standings, award winners from the division, and best players at each position. Since this is the Astros page, we will look specifically at the implications for the Astros, but I invite you to go to their pages to see how it impacts their club.

If you can read my table then I have somehow successfully learned HTML. As you can see from the Astros perspective, they were picked for either fifth or last by everyone. You think I’m a little debbie downer then you should consider I was one of the ones picking them for fifth. While not everyone could agree on the exact order, you see pretty universal agreement on the top three and bottom three.

The Pirates and Astros finished in fifth and sixth among all of the correspondents. The Cardinals finished first or second among all of the voters. Remember, these are people that know their teams better than most experts and know the Central collectively than just about anyone. In other words, I haven’t been dogging the team for my health.

The term MVPNP may be escaping you at the moment. One of the things we did agree on is that it would have been boring to have six people tell you that Albert Pujols was the best player in the division. Yeah, and tell you something you don’t know. I didn’t expect it to turn out the way it did. Maybe we should figure out who the third best player in the division is.

We did get one vote for Roy Oswalt for best pitcher in the division and if that comes anywhere close to being true it will be a fun season for the Astros. I picked Chris Carpenter, but could have gone with Adam Wainwright just as easily. Both were finalists for the Cy Young award a year ago. If there had been a final divisional vote last year, Wandy Rodriguez would have been third. No one picked him, but I imagine that is because he has had the one good season. He needs more to get more support.

Alcides Escobar was a nearly consensus pick for Rookie of the Year and if that holds true, the Brewers might take second in the division. Their lineup is clearly the best in the division despite the presence of Pujols and Holliday in St. Louis. The newcomers were all across the board and the winner of that will have an impact on the division as well.

You will notice I did not vote for any Astros as the best player at his respective position. I gave long consideration to Michael Bourn and Hunter Pence. I could have justified a vote for both, but I think McCutchen will be more dynamic than Bourn and I think Ludwick will be more productive than Pence. However, it could just as easily go the other way.

Not having players as the best in the division is not necessarily the kiss of death. If we went the other way and picked the worst regular we might see more than one Astro up there. That is when the problems occur. However, more than anything, these charts simply show you what I have been saying all winter.
]]> http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/26/correspondents-pick-the-central/feed/ 0 http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/22/ed-wade-is-extended/ http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/22/ed-wade-is-extended/#comments Mon, 22 Feb 2010 17:45:11 +0000 scottbarzilla http://kissmyastros.com/?p=279 For those that read the Chronicle or pay attention to the news, you already know Ed Wade was extended through 2012. Obviously, you know I will not beat the news cycle here at Kissmyastros. However, as the news has settled, there has been some discussion on both ends of the spectrum. The simple question remains: did he deserve the extension?

Most people’s thoughts (that I have encountered) have been no. The logic is simple enough. Cecil Cooper and Wade were hired at the same time. Cooper was fired for what appeared to be gross incompetence, but when you look at Pythagorean projection and other projections, he accomplished about how he could. In parlance, it was as if Food Lion gave him the ingredients to cook his meal. So, why does he get the axe and Wade does not?

To answer that question we must realize the triangular nature of building a team. On one corner, you have the present talent on the roster. Coming in that talent wasn’t good. On another corner you have the talent available in the farm system. That was the worst farm system in baseball. On the third corner you have the money available to you in free agency. Drayton wasn’t going to spend much more than 100 million dollars even though 50+ million was committed to three players before Wade arrived.

In other words, there wasn’t a whole lot that was going to be squeezed out of that rock. Granted, Wade has made some questionable decisions since he has been general manager. The decision to trade for Tejada now seems a little questionable. Even if Tejada had produced at 2003-2005 totals we still wouldn’t have made the playoffs in 2009, but we may have in 2008. Meanwhile, at least Luke Scott and maybe even Matt Albers are producing something for the Orioles.

However, the decision to trade Scott was made in part by his predecessor. When Purpura (and Drayton) committed 100+ million to Carlos Lee it meant Luke Scott didn’t have a spot. The Brad Lidge for Michael Bourn trade can be chalked up as a huge success. Bourn appears to be a frontline player while Lidge is going through his second injury riddled year. Even if bounces back, we never were going to be able to afford him.

Giving Chad Qualls and Juan Guitterez might seem steep for a guy that is now gone, but we will get a first rounder for him. So, you get two years of Valverde and a first rounder for what has been Chad Qualls and little else. The major deals have turned out in Wade’s favor to this point except for the Tejada deal. If you go through your tenure 2 to 1 on major trades you are a pretty good general manager.

The issues that people have are the same as when he was in Philadelphia. Wade seems to love mediocre veterans on the bench and mediocre arms in the bullpen. He has a history of overpaying for both. It’s hard to justify a 15 million dollar deal for Brandon Lyon. It’s harder to justify a spot for Jason Michaels at anything over minimum. Defenders will point to this stat or that stat, but the bottom line is that Michaels is a replacement level player and Lyon is a solid, but not spectacular reliever. The same could be said about saving roster spots for Geoff Blum and Brian Moehler.

On my end, it is an organizational wide repudiation of analytical thinking and strategy. It’s like the old medieval barber sketches on Saturday Night Live. They seem to revel in their ignorance. Seemingly, every time someone points this out to them they become more indignant as if being the last on the bandwagon gives them some kind of advantage. All that being said, the time to fire Wade is not even close. Branch Rickey couldn’t turn the team around in the scant three years that Wade has had.

2012 is really a perfect time to look at the Wade era. He will have had five drafts and every big contract currently on the team will have left the books (unless he gives any himself). This year’s draft will be huge for him. He has two first round picks and a sandwich pick. If he and Bobby Heck have a similar level of success then they will likely start getting out of the basement on those Baseball America rankings. If he can get into the middle of the pack on those by 2012 then he should stick around. The young talent is going to make this team go.

I’ve always maintained that Ed Wade would not have been my hire. I always have preferred guys like Paul Lepodesta or the many in the Cleveland organization. Now, that he is here, he deserves the opportunity to do what he does best (build farm systems). We’ll just have to hold our nose every time they sign a mediocre reliever or old veteran for the bench.
]]> http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/22/ed-wade-is-extended/feed/ 2 http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/21/the-issue-of-erosion/ http://kissmyastros.com/2010/02/21/the-issue-of-erosion/#comments Mon, 22 Feb 2010 04:27:47 +0000 scottbarzilla http://kissmyastros.com/?p=277 I don’t remember a whole lot from the Geology course I took in college, but I do remember the discussion of the whole weathering process. From what I remember, the earth is in a constant state of change. Mountains are wearing down and then sand is compacting to start the process over. Of course, now you know why I’m not a Geologist.

Baseball works much the same way. People like to wax poetic about how teams used to return the same team year after year and go to war again. The implication was that everything remained stagnant. This never happens. Even when a team remains the same it is constantly changing. Teams are either on the way up or on the way down. Statisticians call this “regression to the mean.” I like to call it the erosion factor.

One of the prime mistakes general managers make is that they base their decisions on the past and not on the future. The Yankees are famous for it. They make sure to get the best from the previous season. The problem is that the best from last season likely won’t be the best this season. Teams can fool themselves into thinking they will compete because they got a guy that had a career year last year. On the flip side, good teams surprise you by getting players that are due to improve.

Baseball Prospectus has a lot of great numbers that we will look at in some detail. We will look at Value Over Replacement Player (VORP). It is measured in runs and combines offensive and fielding contributions for position players and pitching numbers for pitching. We will be looking at three categories: position players, pitchers, and totals. Each team will have eight regulars and five bench players for position players. Then, we will look at thirteen pitchers as well.

Total VORP is important, but the big feature will be the erosion rate. Essentially, that is taking the projected VORP and dividing it by the 2009 VORP. Current rosters will be used. We will take a look at the position player rates, pitcher rates, and total rates. Naturally, we can also get a good idea of where the Central will go this year.

. . . . . . . . . .2009. . . ..Proj. . . .Erosion

Cardinals. . . .253.5. . ..262.5. . ..1.036

Cubs. . . . . ..191.6. . . .186.3. . ..0.972

Brewers. . . ..228.5. . . .255.3. . ..1.117

Reds. . . . . . .222.9. . ..175.1. . ..0.786

Astros. . . . . .174.0. . ..142.3. . ..0.818

Pirates. . . . ..120.1. . ..119.4. . . .0.994

When you have an erosion rate over one it means you are actually due to improve. These are the teams to look out for. In particular, the Brewers offense is set to surprise a lot of people in a positive way. The Reds are due to surprise the other way. The Astros were a bad offense last year and they are due to erode at a pretty quick rate. That’s what happens when a majority of your hitters are over the age of thirty.

. . . . . . . . . .2009. . . . .Proj. . . .Erosion

Cardinals. . . .206.6. . . …64.0. . . .0.310

Cubs. . . . . ..180.3. . . ..118.1. . . .0.655

Brewers. . . ..123.9. . . .. .62.8. . . .0.507

Reds. . . . . ..143.9. . . …116.1. . . .0.807

Astros. . . . ..132.2. . . . ..86.3. . . .0.653

Pirates. . . . …91.3. . . . ..52.6. . . .0.576

Pitchers have a higher rate of erosion than hitters. This is why signing free agent pitchers is often a fool’s errand. The Cardinals were hit horribly on their pen. Their 2009 VORP was 76.6 versus a minus 10.0 2010 projection. They are returning every guy in the bullpen. Relievers rarely repeat great performances unless they are great relievers. There aren’t that many of those around and probably none in the Central.

The Astros stand in the middle of the pack in that regard, but that is because their staff is a little younger and Brett Myers is due to improve some. The Reds appear to be in the best shape in this department. As for the Cardinals, a lot of their success last season was based on pitchers performing better than expected. It shouldn’t be a surprise if they see a steep decline.

. . . . . . . . .2009. . . ..Proj. . . .Erosion

Cardinals. . .460.1. . ..326.5. . . .0.710

Cubs. . . . ..371.9. . . .304.4. . ..0.818

Brewers. . ..352.4. . . .318.1. . ..0.903

Reds. . . . ..366.8. . . .291.2. . ..0.794

Astros. . . ..306.2. . . .228.6. . ..0.747

Pirates. . . ..211.4. . ..172.0. . . .0.814

The Astros overall erosion rate doesn’t look bad on its face. It is the second worst rate in the division. The Cardinals rate is to be expected. Division winners almost always see a regression. The Cardinals had a pretty big advantage in 2009, so they likely will win the division again, but they will have a pretty big fight from the Cubs and Brewers. As for the Astros, it doesn’t look good to have a big erosion rate for a fifth place team. It’s one thing to be bad, it’s another to be old and bad.
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