McCovey Chronicles

SBN Awards: NL Manager of the Year

2009-11-10T00:22:57Z

Rk	Manager	Team	1st	2nd	3rd	Pts
1	Jim Tracy	Colorado Rockies	24	1	2	125
2	Tony LaRussa	St. Louis Cardinals	3	7	10	46
3	Fredi Gonzalez	Florida Marlins	2	6	5	33
4	Joe Torre	Los Angeles Dodgers	-	9	2	29
5	Charlie Manuel	Philadelphia Phillies	-	3	5	14
6	Bruce Bochy	San Francisco Giants	1	1	1	9
7	Bobby Cox	Atlanta Braves	-	1	4	7
8	Bud Black	San Diego Padres	-	1	1	4
9	John Russell	Pittsburgh Pirates	-	1	-	3

Go ahead. Ask me if that's my first-place vote for Bochy. The answer is after the jump!

No.

Scouring the free agent market

2009-11-09T22:38:17Z

One player you want. Cull the free agent list, and name your guy.

It’s a rosterbation sensation!

Nick Johnson is my guy, and I know it might not be especially rational. If Nick Johnson were a regular reader, he would probably raise his eyebrows at the suggestion that the Giants should spend a lot of money on an oft-injured, 30-year-old who plays a position at which the Giants have a decent option.

Per Rotoworld: Nick Johnson is going on the 60-day DL after raising, then straining, his eyebrows. The condition, incredulitis, is believed to be chronic.

But I’m an on-base percentage slut. Can’t get enough. Guy’s gotta have it. Mmmmm, on-base percentage: you got what I need. Mmm.

Johnson had a fantastic on-base percentage last year. He always does when he’s in the lineup. He isn’t much of a power guy – heck, he only had eight home runs last year, which is Ishikawa territory – but that’s easy to ignore when he’s putting up sweet, sweet on-base percentages. Mmmmm. And as weird as it sounds, I still think Johnson is learning how to hit. Sure, he’s 30 already, and he’s been around for eight seasons, but he’s only been healthy for, oh, 12 games or so.

"Gee, Grant," you say, "isn’t it a bad idea to sign over-30 guys who rarely stay healthy?" To which I respond, "lalalalalalalalala" with my fingers in my ears. On-base percentage, you punishing-yet-fair dominatrix: what are you about to get me into?

I don’t mind Ryan Garko on a roster, but with an organization that has Jesus Guzman, I’m not sure that there’s a good reason to pay Garko what he’s going to get in arbitration. He doesn’t run, and he doesn’t field, which is all pretty discouraging for a .280/.350/.470 guy (in the best-case scenario, even). FanGraphs says the difference between Garko and Johnson has been anywhere between one to four wins, depending on the season you pick. That’s pretty substantial, especially for a team with only one hitter who is a decent bet to be above average next season.

I’ll probably delete this post in three years, when Johnson is in the last year of a 3/$24M deal that provided his team with a total of 200 combined plate appearances. For now, though, Johnson is the only name-brand free agent in whom I have any interest.

I have a problem.

Your one guy, if you please. Don't do that thing where you post the whole lineup after your 156 moves are made. One guy, dang it.

Star Pitcher Pinched

2009-11-06T20:11:39Z

by Grant on Nov 5, 1923 2:00 PM PST

Star Pitcher Sullies Team, Caught With Hooch

Teammates View Art Nehf Askance, Mindful of Series Loss

With the hopes and year-long dreams of post-championship attaboys dashed by the cross-town behemoth Yankees, whose steadfastness in the face of worthy competition proved too daunting for even our nifty boys, star pitcher Art Nehf was caught with a hip flask full of hooch, besmirching his name and reputation as well as that of his fair team.

Though Nehf's doggy, Joe Brooks appearance has always led this observer to believe that he partook of a belt of giggle water whenever convenient, the official pinch only confirms our suspicions. Nehf proved to be quite the sap by carrying the skee on the hip; though he was not zozzled at the time of his arrest, there is every indication that he was planning on going hoary-eyed through the streets of New York, stumbling from speakeasy to speakeasy.

Far be it from this observer to be the town killjoy, but Nehf's predilection for getting owled or fried to the hat whenever the opportunity arose quite possibly could be the reason for the Giants' crushing defeat in the Contest of Contests this solemn autumn. For no Yankees player has yet to be popped for panther sweat in the past year, which just might account for their uncanny ability to hit on all sixes when their backs were against the Polo Grounds center field wall. No impartial party has yet reported that fellas like Wally Pipp, Whitey Witt, or "Babe" Ruth have besotted themselves in a quest to get canned from whatever bathtub skee dribbled into their cup, so we can only assume that their gumption, discipline, and fortitude served them well.

The youth of today deserve more from Art Nehf, whose swanky glad rags prove a tell-tale sign of the gin-mill gadfly who lost the final game of a grueling Fall contest, possibly while splifficated. For shame, Mr. Nehf. For shame.

Hate the Yankees, not baseball.

2009-11-05T22:00:50Z

So it begins. I’ll bold the following, just so you know that I’m not crazy.

The Yankees have an inherent advantage. They committed hundreds of millions in one offseason to bring in C.C. Sabathia, Mark Teixeira, and A.J. Burnett, which is something that no other team can do. Signing those players is a big reason why the Yankees won a championship. The Yankees have an inherent advantage.

So I’ll never argue that payroll doesn’t matter. But I was listening to KNBR, and the hosts were going off on baseball’s lack of competitive balance. (If a KNBR intern can leave the following on a post-it note on Bob Fitzgerald’s desk, that’d be just peachy: according to the USA Today, the Cardinals were 17th among MLB teams in payroll, the Rockies were 18th, and the Twins were 24th. So please retire the "seven out of the top eight payrolls made the playoffs" line. Thank you.) Yes, the Yankees had an advantage. It was a substantial advantage. But, like every single championship team, they needed a little luck to go along with their spending, drafting, and trading.

The Yankees featured a starting lineup with four players who were 35 or older: Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada, Johnny Damon, and Hideki Matsui. Not only did all four stay healthy, but all four each had some of the best seasons of their respective careers. The Yankees deserve credit for developing Jeter and Posada, and they deserve credit for being able to separate the Damons from the Rowands, but having all four elder statesmen produce at the level they did is insane. And it wasn’t just the ballpark inflating their numbers; they all had legitimately fantastic seasons.

The Yankees outperformed their Pythagorean projection by eight games, which is also pretty danged lucky. The bullpen was anchored by a 40-year-old, a homegrown prospect, a 17th-round pick, a minor league free agent, and a guy who put up a 5.9 K/9 in the Mexican League two years ago. That’s a testament to solid scouting and player evaluation; it’s also a big grab-bag of luck and fortuitous circumstances.

Factor in some expected declines for any of the over-30 set, throw a couple of gas cans in the place of David Robertson and Alfredo Aceves, and the Yankees have a tougher road. You could do those kinds of hypotheticals until it gets ridiculous – "If Alex Rodriguez found a power ring on Ryxxl-4, he’d be a new Green Lantern, and he wouldn’t even play baseball." – but the larger point remains: Money, and money alone, isn’t all it takes to win a championship. There has to be a series of astute maneuvers – picking up Nick Swisher for a sack of doorknobs, not trading Melky Cabrera for Alan Embree, sticking with Robinson Cano after a down year – and a bunch of luck to go along with the money.

So, yes, the Yankees had an advantage. They’re able to brush off contracts like Carl Pavano and Jaret Wright like no other team can. When something that was legitimately unlucky happened – Chien-Ming Wang going Scott Munter on the AL – it’s more than luck that the Yankees had $500B in offseason acquisitions to help round out the rotation. The, uh, Royals don’t have that luxury.

But the Yankees didn’t win the championship last offseason. They haven’t already won the 2010 championship. Pretending anything differently is a disservice to baseball. The sport is fine, dammit.

Congratulations, Yankees. Now go eat a bowl of scorpions and break your ankles while tripping over a pile of champagne bottles because you can all screw yourselves. You and your spoiled fans can all screw yourselves. Winning a single championship would warm my heart for decades. Decades. I just want one. Can you please just give us one of your 27, you greedy, imperialistic bastards?

Great. Now I want to stab something.

Open World Series GameThread

2009-11-05T00:30:31Z

You know what are awesome? Game sevens. C'mon, Phillies.

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - Pedro Martinez	5-1	9	9	0	0	0	0	44.2	48	18	18	7	8	37	3.63	1.25

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - Andy Pettitte	14-8	32	32	0	0	0	0	194.2	193	101	90	20	76	148	4.16	1.38

Rowand for Bradley: The idea that just won't die

2009-11-04T19:50:34Z

I've worked with some real freaks. I've trained a woman who, when the mouse reached the bottom of the mousepad, could not continue working until someone helped her figure out what to do. I worked with a person who ate peanuts constantly, chewed with her mouth open, and did it while asking you a question from six inches away. Just yesterday, my boss microwaved a hodgepodge of Halloween candy until it melted, froze it in a cup, and left the weird, gross, frozen mess in my desk drawer. Then he called me from the next office and said, "I can't wait any longer. Open your desk drawer!" Why did he do that? Because it amused him, that's why.

But I'd wager that if you tallied up my output -- the number of envelopes stuffed, pizzas cooked, reports filed, or whatever -- it would be the same with or without these people. They just made me hate certain aspects of my life a little bit more.

When Ryan Theriot was stepping into the batter's box to face Adam Wainwright with two outs and a runner at second, I'm pretty sure this wasn't going through his head:

Okay. Come on, Ryan. Think. He's going to set you up with a fastball just off the plate. Don't bite. Sit on a fastball in, and only a fastball in, just in case he misses badly with his location. He's not expecting you to try to pull the ball for power; he's thinking I'll be content slapping the ball into right field. Right field. Where that jerk Milton Bradley plays. Oh, man, that guy is a real jerk. He's always dipping his fingers into the salsa. I swear, if he counts cards when we're playing blackjack one more time, I'm going to kil...DAMMIT, I GROUNDED OUT TO SECOND. Arrgh. That one's on Milton.

If Bradley was really a drag in the clubhouse, he probably just made everyone enjoy their job a little less. Maybe a lot less. That might have a small effect on production. You know what else might make a ballplayer enjoy his job a little less? Falling out of a playoff race because his team is unspeakably awful at hitting a baseball. Let's call it a wash.

(Aaron) Rowand is the life of a clubhouse and would restore the chemistry lost by the forced departures of Mark DeRosa and Kerry Wood. His hustle and nose for the baseball in center field are unquestioned, allowing Fukudome to move back to right field. A reprise of his Giants offensive numbers would be acceptable with all the other hitters in the Cubs lineup.

That's from a Cub perspective on a possible Rowand-for-Bradley swap. My response:

Year	OBP
2000	.288
2001	.288
2001	.288
2001	.300
2002	.317
2003	.421
2004	.362
2005	.350
2006	.370
2007	.402
2007	.373
2007	.414
2008	.436
2009	.378
10 Seasons	.371
162 Game Avg.	.371

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 11/4/2009.

Add in the $16M less that Bradley would cost compared to Rowand, the shorter contract, and I don't see how people can seriously think a Rowand-for-Bradley swap is anything but a positive for the Giants. I mean, it was awful when the Giants were so distracted by Barry Bonds that they were contending every year. I still wake up with cold sweats over that era.

In case you missed it, here's Extra Baggs last month:

But for what it’s worth, I asked someone on the Giants’ side — someone with veto power — whether he’d approve a straight-up Bradley-for-Rowand deal. And he said yeah, he would.

Of course he would. I'm filing the Rowand-for-Bradley scenario under wishful thinking and moving on.

Open World Series GameThread, Game Five

2009-11-03T01:22:57Z

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - A.J. Burnett	13-9	33	33	1	0	0	0	207.0	193	99	93	25	97	195	4.04	1.40

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - Cliff Lee	7-4	12	12	3	1	0	0	79.2	80	35	30	7	10	74	3.39	1.13

Hensley Meulens hired as new hitting coach

2009-11-02T23:44:34Z

Here's a Velez. Now make him a good hitter.

...taps foot impatiently...

Like, now. We're in this thing next year.

(The press release is after the jump, if you're so inclined. I'll just leave this link here so you don't have to ask.)

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - The San Francisco Giants have announced that Hensley Meulens has been named the club's major league hitting coach, club Senior Vice President and General Manager Brian Sabean announced today.

             Hensley "Bam Bam" Meulens spent the past season as the triple-A hitting coach for the Fresno Grizzlies, guiding the team to the sixth-highest batting avg. in the Pacific Coast League with a .275 mark. Two of the Grizzlies' batters placed in the top 10 for highest batting avg. in the PCL with John Bowker leading the league with a .342 clip and Jesus Guzman placing fifth with a .321 mark. After the minor league season concluded, he joined the Giants and worked as an assistant during September.

             "We are excited to promote someone of Hensley's baseball background to the big league club," Sabean said. "He will be a great asset to the team as we look to improve our run scoring production with both our existing major league hitters as well as the young talent we have coming up from our minor league system. Hensley brings a unique perspective to the game with his playing time in the majors, Latin America and Japan as well as his coaching work with a number of major league organizations. He distinguished himself as a coach this past season in spring training, with Fresno and here with the big league club in September, and we look for him to get underway immediately with our hitters this off-season."

             "I'm excited to add a person of Hensley's professionalism to our hardworking coaching staff," Giants manager Bruce Bochy stated. "He had a chance to assist with us before and during the season and he displayed to everyone a tremendous ability to work with all of our hitters and to relate to them on various levels."

             Prior to joining the Giants' organization, the Curacao native was the triple-A hitting instructor for the Indianapolis Indians of the Pittsburgh Pirates' organization from 2005-08. He was also a coach at Bluefield, Baltimore's advanced rookie team in the Appalachian League from 2003-04. The 42-year-old made his professional debut with the New York Yankees organization in 1986 and spent eight years in their system. He played parts of five seasons with the Yankees (1989-93) before spending three seasons in Japan (1994-96). Upon returning to the U.S., Meulens had brief stints with Montreal (1997) and Arizona (1998) before concluding a 17-year playing career in 2002 with Puebla in the Mexican League. The former utility man batted .220 (109-for-496) with 15 home runs and 53 RBI in 182 major league contests. Meulens was the first major leaguer to come from Curacao, which has since produced a number of other players, including Andruw Jones, Randall Simon and Jair Jurrjens. He has the rare ability of speaking five languages: English, Spanish, Dutch, Papiamento and Japanese.

Evaluating the Freddy Sanchez extension

2009-11-02T21:15:08Z

More photos » by Eric Risberg - ASSOCIATED PRESS

San Francisco Giants' Freddy Sanchez during a game against the San Diego Padres in San Francisco, Monday, Sept. 7, 2009. Not pictured: various appendages, digits, and other body parts falling off.

Browse more photos »

It’s hard to get worked up about the Freddy Sanchez deal. The trade was a debacle, and it’s not an insignificant amount of money to pay an oft-injured, middle-of-the-pack second baseman. But if I’m going to spend the rest of the offseason arguing that the Giants would be nuts to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on name-brand free agents like Jason Bay and Matt Holliday, it would be disingenuous to claim that Sanchez’s $8M is going to prevent the Giants from getting a better player. I don’t want them to get a better player. Better players will cost more money or Bumgarners than they should this offseason. Keep the money and prospects; one player isn’t going to fix the team for the $8M we’re giving to Sanchez.

So that leaves two schools of thought on Sanchez’s deal:

Continue reading this post

He’s a good player, especially when you factor in defense, and he’s a measurable improvement over the roster litter that’s been starting for the Giants since Ray Durham left.
The Giants need help getting on base and hitting for power, which are two things that Sanchez doesn’t do well.

I lean toward the former, with a definite caveat. The 2010 Giants will have a better starting baseman on Opening Day than the 2009 Giants did. I like that thought. It’s discouraging to judge a roster move based on how awful the previous roster construction was. Would I prefer to sleep with a dead goat or a live goat? Well, the real answer is "no," but if I had to choose one with a gun to my head, I go with the live goat. Maybe dress it up with a wig, some nice pearls, and fishnet goat stockings, but that doesn’t mean that I like sleeping with live goats. It’s just a better option than dead goats. You’d need, like, two strings of pearls to make that viable, and then you’re spending more money than you’d like, what with the price of pearls these days, and it’s silly to think that faux pearls are an acceptable substitute, because c’mon.

But I digress…

It’s still fair to look at Sanchez, though, and say he’s better than what we had. The Giants sure had a lot of players who weren’t qualified to start in a major league lineup last year. Sanchez doesn’t belong in that group. Baby steps.

The biggest problem with Sanchez is that it’s another option down. The Giants have one less lineup spot that isn’t going to feature a hitter with an above-average on-base percentage or slugging percentage. That doesn’t make Sanchez a bad option. It’s just one less option.

If the Giants are going to get creative, they’re going to have to take the Southern California approach to roster construction. Both the Dodgers and the Angels made the playoffs. Neither Juan Pierre nor Gary Matthews, Jr. started a playoff game, even though they were given close to a combined $100M in ill-advised contracts. If the Giants are serious about scoring more runs, they can’t just say, "Well, Renteria (or Rowand, for that matter) is penciled into the lineup. I mean, he’s penciled in. Look, right there: a name written in pencil." They’re going to need to keep their options open if they’re going to fill spots with players like Sanchez – good players who aren’t going to help an offense a whole lot.

I’m doubtful that’s how they’re looking at it, though. I’m think they’ve just dusted off their hands, beaming with the knowledge that the Giants re-signed a man who once led the entire league in batting average. You know, like Al Oliver. That’s the first step to fixing the offense: get that batting average up!

So if you want to know why "meh" is the overwhelming response, there it is. Good player, but the overall problems haven’t really been addressed.

Poll

Reaction to the Freddy Sanchez extension?

Open World Series GameThread, Game Four

2009-11-02T00:00:35Z

There's only one November.

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - CC Sabathia	19-8	34	34	2	1	0	0	230.0	197	96	86	18	67	197	3.37	1.15

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - Joe Blanton	12-8	31	31	0	0	0	0	195.1	198	89	88	30	59	163	4.05	1.32

Open World Series GameThread, Game Three

2009-10-31T23:00:36Z

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - Cole Hamels	10-11	32	32	2	2	0	0	193.2	206	95	93	24	43	168	4.32	1.29

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - Andy Pettitte	14-8	32	32	0	0	0	0	194.2	193	101	90	20	76	148	4.16	1.38

Giants Re-Sign Freddy Sanchez

2009-10-30T22:26:32Z

Two years. No word on the money yet. (edit: Word on the street is 2 years/$12M.)

The press release is after the jump.

The San Francisco Giants have re-signed infielder Freddy Sanchez to a two-year contract extension, club Senior Vice President and General Manager Brian Sabean announced today.
Sanchez, a three-time National League All-Star (2006-07, 2009) and former NL batting champion in 2006 was acquired by San Francisco from Pittsburgh this past season on July 29 in exchange for minor league right-handed pitcher Tim Alderson. The 31-year-old combined to hit .293 (134-for-457) with seven home runs and 41 RBI in 111 games overall with the Pirates and Giants in 2009, including a .284 (29-for-102) mark with one home run and seven RBI in 25 games for San Francisco. He was selected to his second-straight NL All-Star team this past season, and for the third time in the last four campaigns.

"We are pleased to have Freddy in a Giants uniform for at least the next two years as we continue to improve our club", said Sabean. "We saw a glimpse of him this past season and will look forward to his All-Star caliber play at the top of our lineup and in the middle of our infield. He provides a steady veteran presence and professional approach."

Since becoming an everyday second baseman in 2005, Sanchez has fashioned a .989 fielding percentage over the last five seasons (2005-09), which is the highest fielding mark among all National League second basemen during that span. He has also committed the seventh-fewest amount of errors (23) and has helped turn the fourth-most double-plays (355).

The Hollywood, CA native owns a lifetime average of .299 (817-for-2,732) with 178 doubles, 38 home runs and 300 RBI in 733 major league games with Boston (2002-03), Pittsburgh (2004-09) and San Francisco (2009). He became the 11th player in Pirates franchise history and the first since Bill Madlock in 1983 to capture a batting crown when he finished five points ahead of Florida’s Miguel Cabrera (.339) with a .344 mark in 2006.

Off day off topic: What are you reading?

2009-10-30T20:03:15Z

Off day off topic: What are you reading?

I just got In Defense of Food and 2666 in the mail, and I"m halfway through the former. Good stuff, so far. Michael Pollan is pretty close to the kind of writer I aspire to be -- informative, creative, funny, and concise.

These books are welcome additions to my queue after I unsuccessfully tried to find some good science fiction. I'm not a big SF/Fantasy guy -- as in, hardly any -- so I went for the ones on the Kindle that seemed to get the best reviews, which were Perdido Street Station and Night Watch. I couldn't make it past 20 pages in either, which probably says more about my tastes than it does about those specific books.

What are you reading?

Open World Series GameThread, Game Two

2009-10-29T23:30:38Z

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - Pedro Martinez	5-1	9	9	0	0	0	0	44.2	48	18	18	7	8	37	3.63	1.25

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - A.J. Burnett	13-9	33	33	1	0	0	0	207.0	193	99	93	25	97	195	4.04	1.40

Yet Another Modest Proposal

2009-10-29T21:03:14Z

It's silly season for baseball. Without any games of note, the idle mind turns to rosterbation. As the offseason progresses, it becomes more complex and convoluted. It moves from "sign six players for a combined $100B," to a four-way deal that uses obscure passages from the collective bargaining agreement to get Hanley Ramirez for Dan Runzler and 19th-century promissory notes from the Bank of New Amsterdam.

I'm as guilty as anyone. I'm just itching to write my "sign Nick Johnson" post. Today, though, should be reserved for wacky roster ideas. Try Ryan Garko at catcher. Move Sergio Romo to the rotation. Mike McBryde to the mound. Buster Posey to shortstop! Stuff like that. Is there anything you've been ruminating on for a while -- maybe last year you wondered if Eugenio Velez could be a left fielder, and, by gum, you wish you had spoken up -- but you've been too scared to acknowledge publicly?

This comes up because I'm convinced that Nate Schierholtz can become a major league center fielder. Heck, he can become a very good one. His UZR was off the charts in a small sample this season in right field, and he certainly passes the eyeball test. He's fast, has a very good arm, and seems to take good routes to the ball. Well, I think he takes good routes in right field; it might be a different story when the level of competition is being set by guys like Matt Kemp and Andrew McCutchen.

But if Schierholtz can be an average defender in center, he doesn't have to de-Giants his bat in order to succeed. If he plateaus at .290/.330/.440 -- not too wild-eyed of a projection -- he'd still be a viable starter. Not that any non-Rowand will start for the Giants in center until 2013, but it'd be a way to make Schierholtz a pretty dandy fourth outfielder. If he's limited to a corner spot, he's not nearly as impressive of a young player.

You can comment on the Schierholtz-to-center idea, throw in your own Thomas Neal-to-third idea, or you can just talk about what vegetables you find delicious or disgusting, which is probably why you even checked in with the site today.

And I think I've figured out a way to get Ian Kinsler for Merkin Valdez and Scott Barnes. I'll wait until right before the Winter Meetings to post it so the Giants' Brass keeps it fresh in their minds.

Open World Series GameThread, Game One

2009-10-29T00:04:14Z

Cliff Lee and C.C. Sabathia. I'm thinking tonight's a tough night to be an Indians fan.

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - CC Sabathia	19-8	34	34	2	1	0	0	230.0	197	96	86	18	67	197	3.37	1.15

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - Cliff Lee	7-4	12	12	3	1	0	0	79.2	80	35	30	7	10	74	3.39	1.13

Bill James 2010 Projections -- Part Two: Pitchers

2009-10-28T17:36:59Z

Hitting? That's the bad news. That's opening up the pantry after not eating for a week and finding nothing put potted meat ("Now with partially defatted beef fatty tissue!").

Pitching? That's the good news. That's after you take the potted meat and put it on a delicious, flaky Ritz cracker and swallow it whole, trying to ignore the gag reflex that comes immediately after smelling the unholy processed chum, plugging your nose as the smooth puree slides down the back of your throat, but, oh god, some of is still stuck to the back of your throat, and you can't hold back as you retch violently before passing out. You wake up three days later with an IV sticking out of your arm. A nurse offers you a delicious, flaky Ritz cracker without potted meat on it. You take it. Hey, it's pretty good. It's all buttery. That's the pitching.

But it isn't likely to be as good next year. There was a little bit of luck running with some of the pitchers. Like, oh...

The clutchest pitcher in the world until he poops out the horseshoe. Affedt had a fantastic year getting the dealer to bust when he was standing on 11. That's probably not going to keep happening, but he's still a fine pitcher. He almost made up for Renteria. Almost.

The cluchest p...hey. Cain wil probably have another Cain year, complete with an ample supply of blown saves by his relievers, mathematically impossible run support, and diplomatic post-game quotes. Prince Fielder's projection has him at a .967 OPS, which gets me thinking, but I'll hold on to that kernel of thought until my week-long series on Cain-for-Fielder.

Both sides are right. Howry is still a worthwhile reliever with a good strikeout/walk ratio, but he was absolute murder on close games last season. Did he tense up in crucial situations, or did he just have an odd distribution of poor performances? Yes. But it isn't much of a gamble to bring him back if he wants to return.

That looks like a worthwhile addition to the bullpen, but I'm not sure the Giants need Randy Johnson on a roster with Jeremy Affeldt and Dan Runzler. If that reads like a familiar sentence, it's probably because I wrote that sentence over and over in 2001.

If it makes the Reds feel better, Drew Stubbs is projected to be something like Aaron Rowand but $12M cheaper next year. That's something.

Aaaaaand suddenly I'm a little suspicious of these projections. I mean, I love Joe Martinez. Everyone does. Your mom thinks he's nice. He'd probably hold a door open for you if you were carrying groceries. And he might be a good long man, or even a back-of-the-rotation starter, with the ability to put up league-average ERAs. Heck, that might start next year. But I wouldn't predict it just yet.

Another reliever who is likely to poop out a horseshoe. Heckuva year, and another astute bullpen signing by Sabean, but he isn't a 3.00 ERA kind of pitcher. Did you know he was second on the team in relief innings? Weird.

Another reliever who is likely to poop out a horseshoe. Heckuva year, and another astute bullpen signing by Sabean, but he isn't a 3.00 ERA kind of pitcher. Did you know he was sixth on the team in relief innings? Not so weird.

A starter with an ERA over 4.00? How brutish and gauche. Lost in the Penny madness of the last month was the fact that he wasn't striking out a whole bunch of hitters. Small sample sizes are in play a little, but he wasn't exactly Lincecum in Boston, either. At the right price, he'd be a fantastic option. I'm thinking he's going to get three years and much millions, though. That's probably not a good buy.

Uh, okay. I'm as big of a Romo fan as anyone, but this seems pretty danged optimistic (assuming the innings pitched is too low). Then I remember Romo's PECOTA comps before last season: Keith Foulke, John Wetteland, and Jeff Reardon. Just pulling this from my nether regions, but I'd wager that those are three of the 100 best relievers in the modern era. Romo doesn't allow a lot of homers, he throws strikes, and he gets a fair amount of swing throughs, so that seems to be a recipe for projection convection. Still, this seems pretty optimistic. The top four relievers for 2010 by ERA, according to these projections: Joe Nathan, Mariano Rivera, Jonathan Papelbon, and Sergio Romo.

By now it's probably clear that these projections are in the context of a low-run universe, so there are a lot of semi-shiny ERAs. Still, I'd take this season by Sanchez. It would be measurable progress.

Maybe we could get Russ Ortiz back. Valdez is like Felix Rodriguez without the command, which is to say, not much of a reliever until he develops good command.

Wilson's second half: 33 innings, 38 strikeouts, 12 walks, one very unfortunate home run allowed, and a 1.64 ERA. I'm usually not a big seasonal splits guy, but he really seemed like a different pitcher after the All-Star break. For the BABIP wonks, it's comforting to note that he wasn't very lucky at all (.301 in the second half). This is probably the most pessimistic projection of the bunch.

Maybe the reason we can't sign Jermaine Dye to an eight-year deal is because we have Zito. So let's enjoy Zito's league-average stylings, and forget about the contract. Besides, complaining about Zito's contract is so '08. It's all about Rowand these days.

Yankees or Phillies?

2009-10-26T20:19:23Z

Swear to Bonds, I was thinking about writing a book about baseball economics this offseason. I had parts of an outline worked up, even. The last attempt at something like it was Bob Costas’s book, in which he claimed the Minnesota Twins had no shot at winning more than two games ever season, and they should just give up because they can’t compete. A few Twins division titles later, the argument doesn’t quite hold up.

The thesis of my "Lords of the Realm" and "Garfield Weighs In" hybrid would be something about how baseball’s indentured servitude (six years before free agency) allowed for competitive balance. Sure, the Yankees had a financial advantage, but it wasn’t as great as folks made it out to be. And, heck, I think there’s some benefit to the largest market and fanbase in baseball having a perennial contender – that’s good for the financial health for all of baseball. Something like that.

Then I look at this year’s Yankees. They have C.C. Sabathia, Mark Teixeira, and Alex Rodriguez leading the charge – that’s $500,000,000,000,000 in contracts if my math is correct. There are only a handful of teams that could absorb just one of those players. The Yankees have all three because they can, and it’s a big reason why they’re so successful this season. It’s freaking annoying. I can see myself writing some 70,000-word missive on the subject, and having someone say, "Good points. But it’s annoying to watch the Yankees buy whichever good players they want." Then they’d throw the book down, do a little goat dance as they metaphorically urinate on the last year of my life, and punch me in the face.

So my book will be about owls. Their heads spin around and everything.

It’s obvious, then, that I should root for the Phillies, right? Kind of. I’d like to think, though, that in an alternate dimension, Pablo Sandoval hit a three-run home run in this year’s All-Star Game, which would have led to the Phillies having home field advantage during this series. During a tense seventh game in the alternate dimension, the Phillies will use support from a raucous crowd on the way to a walk-off win in the bottom of the ninth inning. It will make up for Joe Carter in Phillies’ lore in the alternate dimension.

So if there’s any possibility that the technology to travel between dimensions will ever exist, I would like the Yankees to win the Series in this dimension in their last at-bat, in the seventh game, and in New York. And as Charlie Manuel sits in his dark hotel room thinking about what might have been, I would like someone from the alternate dimension to bring Manuel a copy of a newspaper with "Phillies Repeat!" on the front, with a Post-It note reading, "Here’s what would have happened if you had selected Pablo Sandoval for the All-Star Game, you idiot." And then Manuel would totally cry.

Until the days of trans-dimensional travel, then: Go Phillies.

Open Rooting Interests Thread. And go ahead and throw a prediction in there, too. Phillies in six, says I.

Open GameThread, ALCS Game Six

2009-10-24T23:00:17Z

Current Series

Yankees win the series 3-2

Fri 10/16	WP: CC Sabathia (2 - 0) SV: Mariano Rivera LP: John Lackey (1 - 1)	1 - 4 loss
Sat 10/17	WP: David Robertson (2 - 0) LP: Ervin Santana (0 - 1)	3 - 4 loss
Mon 10/19	WP: Ervin Santana (1 - 1) LP: Alfredo Aceves (0 - 1)	5 - 4 win
Tue 10/20	WP: CC Sabathia (3 - 0) LP: Scott Kazmir (0 - 1)	1 - 10 loss
Thu 10/22	WP: Kevin Jepsen (1 - 0) SV: Brian Fuentes LP: Phil Hughes (0 - 1)	7 - 6 win
Los Angeles Angels Halos Heaven @ New York Yankees Pinstripe Alley Sunday, Oct 25, 2009, 5:07 PM PDT. Maybe. Yankee Stadium Joe Saunders vs Andy Pettitte Mostly cloudy,rain. Winds blowing from right to left field at 15-20 m.p.h. Game time temperature around 65. Complete Coverage >

Bill James 2010 Projections - Part One: Hitters

2009-10-23T19:13:36Z

It's always tricky to forecast hitting performances. Well, usually. Luckily for us, we follow the Giants. Take the league average hitter, decrease the rate stats by about 10%, lop off a bunch of extra base hits, and poof! Now you have Giants projections that work for almost every non-panda on the roster. Magic!

If you want science instead of magic, you can take a gander at the Bill James 2010 projections. Last year, these hitter projections were really, really optimistic. Either they've fixed that this year, or the Giants are even worse than we imagine. It's probably the latter, but I'm choosing to believe the former. After the jump, I have all of the 2010 hitter projections for the Giants. They aren't for children or people with heart conditions.

Note that these all come from this book, which you can also order directly from the publisher. The FEC or FDA or some crap is requiring that bloggers disclose any freebies they get for putting up post. So I'd like to disclose that I got a free book for putting up a post that I would have put up without a free book. I also got Bill James to appear at my daughter's first birthday party, but that was because I also paid him a nominal fee. Sure, laugh about it now, but you won't be laughing once I can rank a bunch of babies by "Slobber Created/24".

Going alphabetically, obviously. Burriss couldn't really hit last year, but that's okay because everyone expected that. Everyone. Me, you, my cats, Burriss's family members. Everyone except Brian Sabean and Bruce Bochy, who were just tickled by Burriss's spring stats. I'm sure they have big plans for him this year, too.

Here he is: the second-best hitter on the 2010 Giants. But I'm sure that Mr. James didn't know that Garko struggled in his first 80 at-bats as a Giant. Maybe I should e-mail him. The revised prediction would be something like .250/.300/.300, I'm sure. Nothing is a better predictor of future success than a random sampling of 80 at-bats.

The book makes it clear that they err on the side of more playing time rather than less playing time, so on a team with miserable first base production, they're gambling that Guzman gets a shot. I'd rather have Guzman and Scott Barnes, but you knew that.

As a lefty option off the bench and a late-inning replacement for Garko, he has his place on the team. He shouldn't be a factor, though, if the Giants want to upgrade.

Maybe the dream really is over, though it should be noted that most of the Lewis love 'n' optimism on this site comes in the comments section. I've never really been a believer. As a fourth outfielder, he's pretty danged nice to have. Of course, on a team planning to start Eugenio Velez, he should probably start, but you knew that.

I'm not sure what's more depressing, the idea that Posey might not be a top-o'-the-order force right away, or the idea that he'd still be a clear offensive upgrade from the last guy, who also happened to be the cleanup hitter.

Hmm. Maybe James didn't know that Renteria was injured for most of the year. And these projections certainly don't include any Magic Mentor Points, a category in which Renteria led the league. So this projection is obviously junk science.

I can't believe this contract isn't going to work out. It just seemed so logical at the time. Everyone here was just crazy about the deal.

What's important is that all of those hits will be acquired professionally. I still want Sanchez back for his combination of defense and positional average offense, not to mention that he wouldn't cost a draft pick, but I'm terrified that he's going to get a three-year deal.

The ladies' man in the chess club. We don't know how you got here, but maybe there's something you can teach everyone around you.

Another year, another quasi-optimistic prediction for Nate. He's a heckuva fourth outfielder on a good team.

That's a pretty nice center fielder, once defense is taken into account. I mean, just because guys like this are floating around in the minors doesn't mean that it's a bad thing that Rowand is still due $36M. He ran into a wall, people.

And this is just the beginning. Usually phenoms have a little bit of an adjustment period. I mean, Willie Mays only hit .274/.356/.472 in his first full season. Mickey Mantle only hit .267/.349/.443. And those guys weren't fast like Velez. Well, maybe they were, and maybe they combined their speed with an advanced sense of how to run the bases, but VRRRRROOOOOM!, Velez will take the eyebrows right off your face! And he's totally a good hitter now.

Pending free agents:

Whoops. How did Eliezer sneak in there? What a strange mistake. No matter. We all know that the offense will sputter without key cog Bengie Molina.

Maybe he isn't an obvious upgrade over Renteria. I'd still take the chance that he is, though.

Gee, with a power surge like that, maybe he should move from the third spot in the lineup to cleanup hitter. Get it done, Boch.

Not in the team picture: Kevin Frandsen and John Bowker. I'm not sure why, but I'll just guess that Bowker's projection is something like .350/.450/.650.