Game 30, Mariners at Tigers
Jeff Weaver gets a chance to start in a flyball-friendly park against Justin Verlander. 10:05 am. No TV.
The Mariners are a half-game out of first place. They’ve been outscored by opponents by some amount of runs, yet there they are. The margins for the others? A’s +13, the Angels +5, Rangers -36. So it’s not as if the competition’s been particularly fierce.
Part of the reason it feels weird is that the team’s played, well, check this out.
Number of times the offense scored that many runs as “.”
Number of times the pitching allowed that many runs as “+”
0 - ..+++
1 - ..+
2 - ...+++++
3 - .....+
4 - ....+++
5 - ....+++
6 - .+++
7 - ...+
8 - ..++++
9 - .++
10
11 ++
12
13
14 .+
15 .
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Your information is out of date. The Mariners are not in first place, and none of those runs scored margins is correct.
1/2 game out, close enough.
I’m going to call that chart the Ho-Ram Jeff Weaver effect. And witht that effect RS vs. RA cannot have a great correlation to wins.
Patches welcome, Mike.
Sure, Angels +5, Mariners -12, A’s +13, Rangers -36. It seems your information wasn’t updated to include last night’s games, but I have no idea how you got the Mariners in first place. Also, the chart is missing a + in the 14 row.
Cool thanks.
The M’s were in first for a couple hours last night until the Angels game ended.
Can anyone remind me how well team OBP correlates with RS? The M’s are third to last in the league in OBP, yet 5th in RS. My initial thought is that they can’t keep scoring at this pace with that bad of OBP.
You’re welcome, still ought to change one thing, a dozen is not the same as “almost twenty” in my mind.
Not to be a nit-picker, but that’s an odd spelling of Justin.
Go M’s!
For all the Sexson haters, our day has come… Yahoo sports lineup.
Ich
Turbo
Rauuuul
Guillen
Brossard
Beltre
Yuni
Lopez
Burke
FYI, Anyone who missed that Torii Hunter catch last night is missing out on life
Glad to see Burke in the lineup. I was surprised he didn’t play the 8th and 9th last night to give Joh a break.
Lopez or Yuni should be batting second today. Turbo just doesn’t fit the two hole. Ever.
Those “+” and “.” are showing a lot of negativity. They must want the M’s to lose.
I find it funny that whenever Weaver gets a start Hargrove decides to give some of our daily position players a day off.
He did the same thing for Weaver’s last start. It’s a direct corellation!!!!
I hope Weaver doesn’t decide to defy everybody and pitch 8 innings of shutout baseball. That would really piss me off.
Other than Sexson I don’t see any big deal, and by putting Brossard in there, arguably you have a better lineup than when Sexson is in there. It’s not uncommon to sit a catcher on a day game after a night game…
I hope Weaver doesn’t decide to defy everybody and pitch 8 innings of shutout baseball.
His ERA would still be safely above 10 if he did.
GO M’s!
#7
I’m not sure about OBP, but team OPS correlates remarkably well with RS over the length of a season.
OBP correlates at about .5, while OPS correlates at .97.
TURBO!!!
Thanks for the numbers, Dave.
lets go Beltre, we need some runs here
Come on Beltre..bases loaded
22-I think we need 11 runs here
ARGH! dang it Beltre, at least hit the ball
All aboard the pain train!!
We should be allowed to use our bench to field for us during Weavers starts. I think it would make things more even we are at a real disadvantage every 5th day.
Oh dear…Mariners bats…build our expectations up..then crush our hopes…probably a ‘low and away’ pitch to Beltre..no doubt.
If Weaver is allowed to make his next start his most recent three starts will have been against the three AL teams for whom he’s previously pitched. (Sorry, I couldn’t come up with a more clear way to state this. And apologies if someone’s already pointed this out; I just noticed it and thought it was interesting.)
well, last time we scored a ton of runs, we couldn’t do shit for two games…here we go again…
here we go! isn’t it comical?
lets get out of this inning only one run down please!!
The announcer just called Palonco clutch, last time I checked a hit and run single in the first inning with zero outs against the worst starter in baseball, not clutch.
Get the hook….
Weaver – exit…. stage left eveeeen.
“Once again, it looks like Jeff Weaver’s throwing batting practice.”
-Dave Niehaus
Indeed.
“Once again, it looks like Jeff Weaver is throwing batting practice.”
Good call, Mr. Niehaus.
wow…hahahahaha..this is so bad
here we go
Can we take him out now? And should the announcers really be surprised when they hit the ball 400+ feet?
Niehaus made the call that he’s throwing BP (again)…. Come on Weaver, throw some more gas on the fire so we can get rid of your useless butt…
bye-bye weaver. Thanks for throwing batting practice again. Time for you to leave the rotation!
Batting practice has been extended into the first inning.
Cut this schmuck.
You missed the contraction, Thom.
Really, how much longer do we as Mariner fans have to see this pieve of crap pitch? I would laugh at how brutally bad Weaver is, but I am now into anger mode.
42- It is extended until Grover wakes up and sees the score.
In the words of Krusty the Clown: “It’s all right, kid. You’re just finished.”
There’s no way Weaver starts again. With Baek rolling and Felix back, he’s either bullpen bound or we could see an 8 million dollar sunk cost get the old Bavasi “Dee-Eff-Aye”.
Wow… three runs in the first third of an inning hardly changed his ERA.
I was just watching my Season One DVDs of “WKRP In Cincinnati,” and had just paused the famous “Turkey Drop” episode for the start of the game:
“Oh, the humanity! The turkeys are hitting the ground like sacks of wet cement! Not since the Hindenburg has there been a tragedy like this!”
Les Nessman should have been a play-by-play announcer.
Weaver makes Neihaus sound so tired.
Can we DFA him between innings?
DFA Weaver… and please, please, please can Bavasi with him before he has a chance to get a PBTNL for Ichiro in July…
Rejoice, M’s fans!!
We have seen the last of Jeff Weaver as a starting pitcher!!
I mean, this HAS to be it…right?
The fact that the Mariners have run Weaver out to start these last 2 games is ridiculous. It’s not like it’s hard to anticipate what will happen. Why give the game away in advance?
Do we have any fans in Detroit we can suit up throw out there?
53- We thought it had to be it about 3 starts ago. Starting Jeff Weaver is like wearing sweatpants on a first date, you’re not even trying.
In a really really twisted thought….Would Grover keep running Weaver out there in a measure of revenge against Bavasi for sticking him with a bunch of has-beens? A baseball version of a scorched earth doctrine?
How well hit was that ball by Lopez? Looked like it might have been gone in some parks on Gameday…
Grover likes has-beens. Remember, he’s the one who agitated for Carl Everett.
How can you people defame a World Series Hero?
In a really really twisted thought….Would Grover keep running Weaver out there in a measure of revenge against Bavasi for sticking him with a bunch of has-beens? A baseball version of a scorched earth doctrine?
I suppose if Hargrove doesn’t really WANT his job…
#56
I absolutely love the wearing sweatpants on a first date comparison.
Or sweatpants on the sixth date, when not are are you not trying, but your date should know better than to keep accepting dates.
You’re assuming Grover could recognize that he’s got has-beens. That might be overestimating him…
not only are you not trying
Some of this sounds like 20/20 hindsight to be honest. I mean, nobody thought Weaver was worth $8 million, but after his WS performance and last year’s numbers during the regular season there was no reason to think he would be an 18+ ERA guy either. I expected Weaver, Batista and Ramirez to give us roughly the same sub-par level of performance. Did anyone forsee Weaver being completely washed up?
What questions do we have for “Ask The Skipper” this week?
66. The Angels
I thought signing Weaver was a decent idea given the circumstances. I’m not surprised it didn’t work. Given Felix’s injury, I’m not sure it is entirely fair for us to blame Hargrove/Bavasi for not pulling the plug yet. But he does suck, and I do hate him, and I’m going to keep complaining about him.
I see six innings of pitching by guys named Sean today ….
Steve Kelley sez:
Jeff Weaver not good.
I’d buy the hindsight argument, up until right after the KC game. It was foresight after that.
66- Little bit, the Angels kicked him off the team for a ERA around 8 if I remember correctly. Figured we would do the same since his ERA is twice that.
Junior belts another. 9th place now.
I hate Weaver more than any other Mariner ever. And that includes the members of the 90′s gas can bullpen.
You know what, I can’t help but find Weaver’s outing amusing. BTW, the first inning took him 17 pitches for 6 batters so at least he’s sucking efficiently.
I would also say that we should probably know by now that when a pitcher appears to be at the twilight of his career, moves to the NL, and all of the sudden looks like he might have something left in the tank, that we should probably be nervous.
Jason Verlander? Brad Inge? Wow…that Doug Niehaus just isn’t on his game today!
Anyone have Weaver’s whip? His ERA is pretty comical, but I’d love to see his WHIP. Also, 17 pitches in the first inning..he is efficiently bad, at least.
70. Sean Penn > Weaver ??
72: Good point!
Wha??? Weaver struck out someone?
Actually, if Weaver only gives up a 3 run homer every second inning, he’ll lower his ERA.
By showing improvement in this way, maybe he’ll earn himself another start.
We almost had to give Rabelo a raise, just missed him.
There is a picture on my desk of my wife and I at Angels Stadium last year watching the M’s tee off on Jeff Weaver. We look so happy. I ridiculed the Angeles fans brutally for their $10m flop. ahhh…poetic justice. Thank you Mr. Bavasi.
#79
His WHIP was at 2.76 coming into the game…I think his BABIP is even more comical: .487 entering today.
Watching Weaver pitch is like a living in a Salvador Dali painting with melting bases and a blurry baseball diamond landscape that stretches on for eternity. Please take us out of this surreal nightmare. How many other teams would allow such damnation?
It really sounds like Dave N. hates Weaver too… hehe
87–Anaheim let it go for half the season.
From the preview on Yahoo sports on Weaver:
“opponents are batting a robust .465 when facing him”
I laughed out loud.
Polanco is sooooooo clutch! These Detroit announcers have to be ranked up there with the ChiSox clowns.
You know how when a horse turned up lame they used to bring it out to pasture and deal with it?
How long until they do this with Weaver?
WHIP sat alone in a boggy marsh … totally motionless except for its heart ….
pull Weaver Already!
So how bad should we root for Weaver to blow this game to make sure they DFA him!
Calvin had the G.R.O.S.S. club (Get Rid Of Slimy girlS.)
M’s fans have G.R.O.W. (Get Rid Of Weaver.)
M’s management has G.R.I.T. (Gentlemen Revealing Idiotic Thinking.)
re 93: He’s lump!!!
I wish we could balloon Weaver’s teammates thoughts.
What is going through Ichiro’s head right now?
98- No way I don’t win a gold glove chasing down all these long fly balls.
Jose Guillen is thinking……I wish Jeff Weaver was still an angel so I can hate him even more!
Ichiro is thinking every guaranteed loss by Weaver equals more contract dollars in my pocket.
On the radio, they are talking about the Mariners Long Ball lounge…now I am here in Ontario, Canada….was this lounge made just for Weaver?
Weaver’s ERA is currently higher than it was at the start of the game.
Still think his BABIP will regress to the mean, Dave?
Jeff lingered last in line for stuff … and the stuff he got was sorta rotten and pure fluff ….
Why does anyone ever swing at the first pitch following a walk?
Still think his BABIP will regress to the mean, Dave?
Probably not, because I doubt he gets a chance to pitch long enough to watch it come down. But yes, if we gave him 30 starts, he’d end the year with a BABIP under .400. No one, not even Weaver and his suckitude, has a true talent level BABIP of .500.
the detroit commentators aren’t just homers, but DUMB…in game one, they said that rodney had “good numbers” even though he had an ERA over 5 and his record was 1-4…then when morrow came in they said he was “pretty good for only spending one FULL season in the minors last year” complete jackasses…although that can probably be said by anyone watching their team with the opposing commentators…
Why does anyone ever swing at the first pitch following a walk?
Well, it’s a good question in general. I do make a bit of an exception for Sexson because the four balls to the previous guy might be borderline strikes in the ginormous zone between his knees and letters.
Jim, I gotta go but I expect a full rewrite of that song when I check in after the game.
Has there ever been a pitcher who compiled six starts in a row that were as bad as Nightmare’s? His (hopefully) short-lived M’s career just might be historically awfully.
Crap… that 1-2-3 inning probably just guaranteed Weaver another start….
Something odd just happened. It was like a reverberation through the Force, n shit.
A one, two, three inning, he just earned another start!
You know, this Farmer’s commercial really bugs me. An airforce? People parachuting? If I make a claim, and they don’t have people parachute in and rebuild, can I sue them for false advertising?
That ERA is creeping lower…Hargrove and Bavasi will feel thats a sign he is turning it around! Give him an extension!
4 runs through 3…and Weaver has lowered his ERA during this start.
Maybe here ERA is an indication of true talent level!
#50 (The WKRP comment)
The “Oh the humanity!” and “Everyone get out of the way!” are an homage to the audio of the Hindenberg disaster…
My favorite part of that episode:
(A shaken Les Nessman) “With God as my witness, I thought turkeys could fly!”
Evidently Bavasi could say the same about Weaver. “I thought he was a major-league pitcher!”
Just checking in, so I don’t know if anyone has commented on this, but…Sexson shows signs of coming out of his slump and possibly getting hot and then Grover benches him the next game? Genius.
Verlander is death to RH hitters, and Sexson needed a day off eventually. Nothing wrong with it.
Given the Mariner’s luck, Jeff Weaver will pitch shut out ball the rest of the game for as long as he’s in there, and the Mariners score some runs and rally to win the game in a stirring comeback.
End result: the Jeff Weaver Era continues for one more start.
So, does Weaver keep his ERA under 15 in this inning?
114: I work for Farmers and I agree the commercial is lame, but not as lame as the “master of destruction” one where the adjusters are playing video games with their claims…very embarrassing.
To the commenter who said that Less Nessman should have been a play-by-play guy: Remember the Chi Chi Rodriguez incident.
mln- could weaver really be pitching shut out ball if he wasn’t in there?
From Diamond Mind’s FAQ (scroll down to 2.13), in 1997 position players collectively had this line
22.3 innings, 15 hits, 26 BB, 5 K, 6.34 ERA
Or, in other words
93 PA, 10 BB/G, 2 K/G, .250 BABIP
Even random outfielders don’t have a .500 BABIP.
124, just meant that he wouldn’t go 9 innings.
Inge!
Way to give up a homer to the guy hitting under .200, Weaver.
120 – This is Jeff Weaver we’re talking about, don’t be ridicoolos cousin Larry.
Yup. Weaver’s done.
Got Inge above the Mendoza Line…with a HR..haha..comical
Haven’t heard “Masters of Destruction” — guess I’ve just been lucky.
From what Hargrove said last night in the after-game press conference, it sounds like he was already planning to have Sexson sit today even before last night’s game — whether that was due to the matchup, or just “day game after night game and he needs a rest” I have no idea. But maybe Sexson hit so well last night because he knew he had a day off today (no, I’m only half serious).
just remembered all the shit talking spezio did about seattle after they cut his ass…what do you think weaver, his buddy, will say?
114: I’d settle for Farmer’s making any sort of timely settlement at all. Some good friends of mine had a house fire. Farmer’s was their insurance company. It took them over two years to rebuild the house, and they stopped paying the re-settlement payments they were legally obligated to make.
My friends had to take them to court to get them to pay out anything at all.
Basically, Farmer’s tried to break my friends financially so they could short them on the settlement when they were desperate. I find their business practices to be despicable.
after all, he did pick Carl off the list of possible bats last year.
so, the Cardinals are pretty desperate — think we could convince them that they could ‘fix’ Jeff once more?
132. What can he say? Spezio can gripe that he rode the pine for several weeks before he was finally cut and didn’t get a chance to bring his game around. Weaver can’t say he wasn’t given every opportunity.
While I am aware of Weaver’s poor aptitude at pitching, are either of his last two starts, including this one, any worse than HoRam’s previous two starts? Out of the two, is Weaver that much worse than Ho
TURRRRRBOOOOO
or, he gives him much needed rest after a feel-good success.
hmm. oddly enough, Weaver isn’t on Stark’s “Pitchers you’d pay to watch pitch” list
Turbo has twice as many infield hits as extra base hits. That’s just mind blowing.
If the Mariners get within 3 runs here I hope Grover pulls Weaver.
Again, the Tigers BP is not good, especially with Zumaya out.
Dave, I assume you feel that Turbo’s infield hit rate is not sustainable or repeatable.
Turbo’s like the version of Spike Owen who hits .300 and wears concrete overshoes.
turbo just does enough so far this year where i don’t like him or hate him
There’s no way Turbo keeps getting infield hits at this rate. He’s on pace for 35 infield hits. For comparison, Ichiro got 41 last year and 31 the year before. Ichiro is fast. Turbo is not.
How could any GM think that Weaver and Turbo and Ramirez were valuable players and better than players that the M’s already had?
I know Bavasi had some justifications for it that made sense to him at the time, but… wow.
In Weaver’s defense, while he costs 8+ million, he did not come at the cost of Soriano, Fruto, or Snelling. That is the reason that I dislike Ho more than Weaver.
Sheffield is the best thing that has happened to Weaver…Sheffield has been a bum today (he’s on my fantasy team and disappointing)
Fruto is probably a better starting pitcher right now than Weaver is.
Verlander is closing in on 100 pitches. We could pull this out.
Weaver’s closing in on 100 pitches; maybe there is hope.
Don’t look now, but 5 runs in 5 innings has Weaver’s ERA down to 14.12. He’s trying to make this decision to demote him tough on the m’s.
Don’t let the door hit you on your way out, Jeff.
Don’t look now, but 6 runs in 5 innings has Weaver’s ERA down to 14.54. He’s trying to make this decision to demote him tough on the m’s.
You know, pulling Weaver BEFORE this inning started would’ve been the best course of action and Grover refused to do this why? Weaver shouldn’t be getting another start whether or not he pitches another couple innings of shutout baseball.
There is no God. Doyle got thrown off balance running through first, trying to avoid colliding with the pitcher, started stumbling, slowed down and started hobbling, stopped, went into a crouch and stayed there for a minute or two, coaches and trainers come out, put in a pinch runner for him. Injury could involve any part of either leg. It looked very awkward.
Weaver lowers his ERA yet again!
Whats wrong with carlos zambrano? 3 runs to the pirates in the first inning. his era is at 6.31 now. he’s a free agent next year, if not resigned by the cubs would you take him? if so how many years and at what $$$?
Weaver your gone now, no way he stays in the rotation.
Rally time!
157: 6.31 really doesn’t sound too bad when 14.32 is what we’re dealing with!
Send in the Seans.
Fans should take a moritorium on purchasing any tickets for games started by Weaver (any maybe Ramirez), because it is just an exercise in futility. You just can not score enough runs to keep up with the pinball-type scores these guys rack up. When these guys pitch,it just isn’t quality major league baseball that is on display.
There have to be Seans
And here comes the lefty to face Ichiro. MLB managers will never learn.
Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but if you take out Weavers starts, the M’s have outscored their opponents by ~30 runs (I think I’m missing a game, however). In Weaver’s starts, the M’s have been outscored by 37 (and counting). I wonder what the numbers would look like if I isolated HoRam’s starts. I’m sure there isn’t a full correlation here, as Weaver isn’t the only pitcher in those games, but it gives me some hope that the M’s aren’t as bad as I was thinking earlier.
The Tigers are averaging two hits an inning.
Do you think Grover is instinctively calling for Mateo right now in the bullpen?
Luckily, my moratorium on purchasing any Mariners tickets at all will nicely cover the Weaver/Ramirez issue.
What contender will the M’s trade me to in July?
Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but if you take out Weavers starts, the M’s have outscored their opponents by ~30 runs (I think I’m missing a game, however). In Weaver’s starts, the M’s have been outscored by 37 (and counting). I wonder what the numbers would look like if I isolated HoRam’s starts. I’m sure there isn’t a full correlation here, as Weaver isn’t the only pitcher in those games, but it gives me some hope that the M’s aren’t as bad as I was thinking earlier.
I’m sure you could do this for just about every team in baseball, though. Everyone looks better if you eliminate the games pitched by their worst pitcher.
Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but if you take out Weavers starts…
Every team looks better when you take out the results from their worst starter.
Best #2 hitter in the league
That was anticlimactic. At least we knocked Verlander out.
That seemed kind of predictable
Vidro now 6-32 with runners in scoring position. OUCH.
Vidro now 6-32 with runners in scoring position. OUCH.
Hey, he’s doing his job as a DH- hitting useless infield singles. Quit being a hater.
Joser – that Farmers’ Helpoint commercial has been driving me off the hinge for the last two seasons. It’s such hogwash.
But what sets my teeth on edge is the daytime soap opera emoting that the actor puts into saying “There’s been a fire in our house”. If there’d been a fire in my bloody house I wouldn’t be gushing like some love-struck intern on General Hospital.
Off topic insurance tip of the day. Find a veteran in the family and join USAA.
Maybe the M’s could buy a policy to compensate them if Weaver is healthy enough to make 28 more starts this season.
Why does it feel that every time the Mariners put Weaver out on the mound that they are telling the other team they’re forfeiting the game?
Dave – That is true, taking out the results of the worst pitch on a team skews the information. And I certainly didn’t mean to imply that the M’s are a good team, if only Weaver wasn’t on it. I was actually thinking that the M’s had been outscored in their other games as well, and that the season was more bleak than it actually was. However, I’m sure it was a misuse of the RS-RA statistic.
could we have Mr. Pink or Mr. Blonde instead of Mr. Green?
Hmm, if we start Green instead of Weaver, is that likely to be any better?
Anyone else find it very difficult to root for the Mariners on a day when Weaver pitches? I sometimes get disappointed when the other teams strands the bases loaded or strikeout with runners in scoring position..weird
178. There is White, but he is worse. As we will likely see in later innings.
Joser
That Farmers’ Helpoint commercial has been driving me off the hinge for years now. It’s such hogwash.
If my house had burned down I wouldn’t be gushing “There’s been a fire in our house” like some dewy-eyed intern on General Hospital.
Again, Doyle got injured, I described what I saw in 155. I think this time it’s being a member of the Athletics, rather than his own personal curse.
This isn’t unlike Gillick’s justification of the Phranklin signing.
“If you take out those four starts, his ERA wouldn’t be over 5.”
But it’s the only thing that I know!
MESA!
Here’s our chance. His ERA has the same number of digits as Weaver’s.
I predict Weaver goes to the pen after this, ready to come in after on days when the Ho starts and we are trailing 7-0 after 4.
That’s 2 HR’s we have been robbed of today. Any other park and we’d be right in this thing.
Holy crap Jose Mesa! When was the last time two pitchers this bad got into the same game? Jose Lima isn’t on the bench anywhere, is he?
atkeast Beltre hit the ball hard this time. he’s in for his best season as a mariner. Well thats my prediction anyways
fricking Comerica.
Gameday actually shows it going past the 420 mark. I hate uncontrollable outcomes.
A’s say Doyle has a “contusion to the left knee” Anyone know what that usually means?
Does that make the Snelling trade look better from our end — when a historically injured player gets injured again?
193- Contusion is just a fancy name for a bruise. Depends on how severe the bruise is. Is there’s a lot of swelling with the bruise, he could be out 3-5 days, I’d say. If there’s no swelling, he could be back out there with a bit of a limp tomorrow.
um, a knee bruise?
No. You judge the trade on the talent swapped at the time of the trade, not what happens to the players afterwards.
Yeah, Safeco is 405 in center, right? So it’s either a catch at the top of the wall or all the way out there.
164 – I agree completely. I also think this is an extreme case, so it doesn’t apply to any other team in the majors.
Mariners are a better team than their record shows and it’s because they have the worst #5 pitcher in the majors, and it’s not even close.
I’m strictly talking about ERA here, and ERA doesn’t lie. It tells people whether you suck or not.
194: 6 million less to throw at Zambrano or whomever…the trade was so bad that any outcome that makes it more balanced is not noticable.
197 – we all knew Snelling would get hurt again it was only a matter of a month or three.
Thinking otherwise is silly because of Snelling’s history.
Therefore the trade is either justified, or doesn’t mean anything. Probably more towards the latter.
That’s no ordinary knee, man. God knows what’s in there to hold things together.
Well, normally a bruise is the result of some kind of collision. If he’s got swelling because of how the joint moved, not as a result of an impact, (ie internal vs surface swelling) it could be significantly worse.
I’m strictly talking about ERA here, and ERA doesn’t lie. It tells people whether you suck or not.
Well, that’s just not true.
Okay, if it’s only a bruise, a day to week sort of thing, it seem’s he’ll be okay. Looking at the replay, he might have actually been kicked by the heel of the pitcher as he ran in front of him covering first.
ERA doesn’t lie? Brad Penny is far and away the best pitcher in MLB?
Weaver is probably the worst pitcher in any starting rotation now. You don’t need ERA to see that, though.
Along with bases on balls, innings pitched, and other intangable crap.
ERA is the most telling out of the 3 though.
187. That’ll be just great. Weaver can widen the RS-RA gap.
Oh, well, all that’ll do is give a false Pythagorean winning percentage. WE’LL know the M’s are better than their current 75-87 Pythagorean winning percentage.
That UPS “spitball” commercial is especially humorous if you’ve read the “Cheater’s Guide” chapter on ball doctoring.
A guy has pitched a month and a half in the majors and he has a 15 ERA vs a guy in the majors that has pitched a month and a half and has a 5 era. I’ll take the second option 95% of the time. There is no arguement for this.
Therefore the trade is either justified, or doesn’t mean anything. Probably more towards the latter.
It does mean something. By the fact that it took place it must have some ramifications.
In this case, it means that the Mariners took on $6m for the next three years, and a horrible DH that Hargrove will just have to fill the #2/#3 spots in the lineup. It also means they gave up Fruto.
ERA is the most telling out of the 3 though.
You really need to read this article.
Along with bases on balls, innings pitched, and other intangable crap.
ERA is the most telling out of the 3 though.
Are you saying bases on balls and innings pitched are also intangible?
Are you saying ERA, BB and IP are the three measures of a pitcher’s quality?
197, others,
While I agree the trade was terrible and would love to have Doyle back, and while I agree that you can’t take random events into consideration, I sort of have to disagree.
I think that in Snelling’s case, particularly, because how likely he is to get injured is and was such an unknown quantity, how able he is to stay healthy is relevant. It wouldn’t make trading for Vidro a good idea, for all the reasons already specified. But I think as huge Snelling fans — and I consider myself one — we should be open to realizing on some level that people who were just too worried about his ability to stay healthy may have been right.
Obviously, a knee contusion doesn’t say anything at all, and here’s hoping he’ll be back soon (though a friend of mine in college got a severe knee contusion that resulted in massive swelling for months). But I think we need to be thoughtful about it before we just say, “nope, the only way it can be evaluated is at the time of the trade.”
In the same vein, if Vidro had come in and torn the cover off the ball last year, I don’t think it would have been fair for us to say, “well, we still shouldn’t have traded for him because he was likely to decline.” We would have to make room for the possibility that people with greater access to him personally knew more than we did about the nature of his injuries and how they were affecting his game. As it turns out, there will be no mea culpa, but I don’t think we should be so sure that we can get all the information through the news/blogs/stats/etc.
I’m strictly talking about ERA here, and ERA doesn’t lie. It tells people whether you suck or not.
Wow, just… wow. And “intangible” crap? I don’t think you understand the meaning of that word. There are some very tangible numbers that tell the truth about a pitcher far better than ERA. Have you tried reading that article over in “Features” box called Evaluating Pitcher Talent?
164:
Dave’s right, if you pull every team in baseball’s worst starter, then their RS/RA looks better. However, we have hope that Weaver’s going to get yanked and replaced with Felix. If that happens, then you can rely on that RS/RA without Weaver to talk about the M’s future chances.
Sure, every team looks better without their worst pitcher, but Weaver gives up enough runs to make the Pythagorean calculations make his losses count double. Yet, in the standings they count for only one loss. See, he really is a good deal!
Seriously, extremely bad pitchers, especially when given a large number of starts, skew the calculations enough to be worth considering an adjustment.
OK, you take the pitcher that has a 5-6 ERA and I’ll take the one that has a 3-4 ERA, with the same player lineups for both teams.
I’ll win 7 times out of 10.
There are many things that go into the ERA and there is no doubt about that. ERA is just a bottom line number, and it’s very simple to understand.
Also, a contusion means that he probably did get kicked by the pitcher’s heel as it looked like, and that doesn’t seem to have to do with how prone the body is too injury, unless you consider trying to beat the pitcher to first unnecessary carelessness that a more careful and less injury prone player would avoid
Guys there’s no need to flip out at MWSB. I’m not even convinced he doesn’t understand FIP/BABIP and the like yet. He’s using Weaver’s 14+ ERA to say he sucks, which he does. And no matter how much luck there is in all this, good pitchers never run ERAs like Weaver’s. ERA’s not particularly exact, but it can still be pretty telling, especially in this case.
Years ago Bill James called “The ability to stay healthy” a skill, just like a good outfield arm, or speed, or anything else.
Btw, I don’t mean to imply that an injury to Snelling makes the trade equal or anything of the sort — it just makes the trade look a little more even than all the hyperventilating around here at the time made it seem.
But you won’t necessarily. Those ERAs tell me how many runs the pitchers have allowed in the past, but that’s not entirely based on their talent. It’s entirely possible the 5-6 ERA guy is the better pitcher, and will outperform the 3-4 ERA going forward.
But you can’t tell that just from ERA.
In 2006 Ichiro at .786 had the 45th best OPS in AL, now its .751 and still about the same at 46th best. Runs scored 6th in league for whole year last year at 110, with 19 he’s 22nd this year. OBPCT last year .370 and 26th and .341 and 36th, so far.
Bad for him 29 games, or is it a settling of skills? Does either level of production warrant the money he seeks this year?
Mariners_World_Series_Bound, re: ERA
You are barking up the wrong tree here…Not only are you wrong, you are trying to convince a group of knowledgeable baseball analysts that they are wrong.
The equivalent of sellling ice cubes to Eskimos.
hope this helps
First of all, holy small sample size, batman. Ichiro actually outperformed both 2006 and his career averages in April this year. He’s doing pretty much what he always does.
Whether Ichiro stays will not be based on money. If we suck, Ichiro will leave (and probably go play for Boston).
What makes these Weaver abortions even harder to be subjected to, is that the M’s have scored just 12 runs in his six starts.
I guess they figure, what’s the bother?
Roy Halladay and his 10.64 ERA over 67.2 IP in 2000 say hello.
Oh pardon me…THIRTEEN runs now.
With that double, Guillen’s OPS crosses .800.
224 – I’m not trying to convince anyone that they’re wrong. I’m just stating simple fact that career ERA is an indication of how good a pitcher is whether anyone likes it or not. It’s a little behind the times now that people have developed newer statistical evaluations, but it doesn’t mean that ERA has no meaning.
It’s also a more accessable stat, and one that 99 percent of fans look at when evaultating a pitcher. This blog obviously wants to teach those 99 percent of fans a better way to evaluate pitching talent, but that doesn’t mean we can’t still bring it up now and again. It’s still a fun stat, and it always will be.
Also, just for fun, here are the pitchers I recommended the Mariners acquire this past offseason, followed by their 2006 ERA, and then their 2007 ERA.
Tim Hudson – 4.86, 1.70
Rodrigo Lopez – 5.90, 1.59 (though, to be fair, he is currently on the DL)
Claudio Vargas – 4.83, 2.65
Angel Guzman – 7.39, 2.19
The collective ERA of the guys I wanted to bring to Seattle was about 5.50 last year. Their collective ERA this year? About 2.25.
Maybe we know something about evaluating pitchers that ERA does not…
Horse and buggies are also a more accessable mode of transportation, and one that 99 percent of people look to when commuting. These “car people” obviously wants to teach those 99 percent of commuters a better way to get around town, but that doesn’t mean we can’t take our carriages. It’s still a great way to get around, and it always will be.
Your comment, re-written to fit into early 20th century history.
I’m just stating simple fact that career ERA is an indication of how good a pitcher is whether anyone likes it or not.
And finally:
Horacio Ramirez, career ERA: 4.29
Jeremy Bonderman, career ERA: 4.69
I tend to look at career ERA as oppposed to single-season ERA. Also, those low ERA’s will eventually….
regress
to
the
mean
of their true ERA.
If you throw out Innings 1, 2, 4, and 5, Jeff Weaver’s ERA today was 0.00. Clearly, ERA sez that he should only pitch in the third inning.
“…one that 99 percent of fans look at when evaultating a pitcher.”
Dave – Maybe it’s time to put up that link to the list of logical fallacies again. I don’t have it handy at the moment, otherwise I’d do the honors myself.
Roy Halladay and his 10.64 ERA over 67.2 IP in 2000 say hello.
To be fair, Halladay was sent down to single-A and completely reinvented his mechanics after that.
Who’s to say Ramirez won’t regress to his career ERA eventually this season?
Ramirez sucks, but Bonderman isn’t exactly a world beater himself.
Dave,
do you think there will be a time when stats like xFIP become the stats that people casually reference? Do you think that one day you’ll be able to open a newspaper (or a futuristic holographic newspaper) and see the AL leaders for xFIP, VORP, etc., instead of wins, ERA, BA?
On a slightly different measure of performance, excluding Boone and Olerude, out of Bavasi’s free agents, how many millions has he DFA’d? This may be a new stat, Earned Dollars Wasted. (Am foolishly assuming that Weaver is not long for the M’s)
#238
Bonderman’s one of the better pitchers in the majors.
Who’s to say Ramirez won’t regress to his career ERA eventually this season?
Well, he’s obviously not going to post a 7.50 ERA all year, but he won’t get near 4.29 either. His career ERA isn’t even close to his actual talent level.
Ramirez sucks, but Bonderman isn’t exactly a world beater himself.
See, this is why your slavish devotion to ERA is a bad thing. Jeremy Bonderman is one of the five best pitchers in the A.L., but you don’t know it yet.
240 – Good idea; stats for management! I like Earned Dollars Wasted, and would suggest Salary Per Win as another metric that our beloved M’s might show poorly at.
Well, I certainly hope that this $8.3M experiment with Weaver as a starter has come to a close. He has to be sent to the pen after this. Perhaps the best result would be Weaver refusing to pitch out of the pen, and the M’s suspending him without pay. Its a possible way to get our money back. Out of curiosity, are there any other options for starters in the minors?
do you think there will be a time when stats like xFIP become the stats that people casually reference? Do you think that one day you’ll be able to open a newspaper (or a futuristic holographic newspaper) and see the AL leaders for xFIP, VORP, etc., instead of wins, ERA, BA?
No, I don’t. But I do think we’re on the cusp of a statistical revolution, and that things like xFIP are going to be overtaken in usefulness within 5 years. Once we start getting advanced ball-tracking data, we’re going to have some incredible resources at our disposal that will totally reinvent the way we understand how to evaluate players.
I think we’ll see a future where it’s not uncommon to see the average speed of a batted ball of a pitcher listed, or the average distance of a flyball by a certain hitter. Who needs slugging percentage when we know that Willie Bloomquist’s flyballs only travel 138 feet, while Ryan Howards travel 384 feet? Who needs BABIP when we know that hitters can only hit the ball 34 MPH off of Felix Hernandez but are hitting it 108 MPH off of Jeff Weaver?
So I think we will see a mainstream revolution in which statistics are given credibility, but they will be tangibly measured things that happen during games, and not statistical formulas that have to be calculated in a database.
240 – Good idea; stats for management! I like Earned Dollars Wasted, and would suggest Salary Per Win as another metric that our beloved M’s might show poorly at.
This has already been done, pioneered by the late Doug Pappas. It’s called Marginal Dollars/Marginal Wins. If you google for Pappas’ work, you’ll find some really interesting stuff.
#245
Do you think that such advanced batted ball data could eliminate the need for scouting at the major league level?
Do you think that such advanced batted ball data could eliminate the need for scouting at the major league level?
Scouting will never be eliminated, because their reports serve a totally different role than statistics do. They can see physical changes in players immediately, while stats have to wait for an adequate sample size to pile up before any firm conclusions can be drawn. If you want to know if a pitcher’s healthy, you want a recent scouting report. If you want to know how to pitch to a certain hitter, you want a scouting report.
There are a lot of things that scouts can do that simply can’t be automated. Scouts are here to stay.
Is there any chance of salvaging the Weaver fiasco by trading Nightmare to a team (back to the pitching-starved Cards perhaps), eating most his salary and getting back a very mediocre prospect?
Yeah, I guess I got ahead of myself a bit. It’ll be interesting to see what people are able to do with all that data once it becomes a reality. It pretty amazing to see the advances in the evaluation of fielding due to what Baseball Info Solutions is doing.
So’s pressing your finger to the metal to see how hot it is. Think I prefer to keep my fingers and use a thermometer, at least….
You’re using a very gross and blunt instrument to determine finer gradations than warranted (moreover, you’re not recognizing those finer gradations as existing).
236 – here it is:
http://www.csun.edu/~dgw61315/fallacies.html
I think the one you were looking for is argumentum ad numerum…
hjw
226 First of all, holy small sample size, batman. Ichiro actually outperformed both 2006 and his career averages in April this year.
Not.
His 05 numbers were a significant drop from 04…06 the same as 05 and so far in 07 he’s below 06…
Contrasted to other cf in the league, he is average offensively. There are seven center fielders in AL who have a superior OPS. Tori Hunter, Johnny Damon, Grady Sizemore, Curtis Granderson, Vernon Wells, David Dejesus and Gary Matthews Jr..
Let him go or trade him, where ever the leverage best happens. Hugely over-rated. If Randy Johnson and Junior can be traded and Alex Rodriguez let go, certainly he can as his talent level does not approach any of them at the stage they were released.
Just waiting for the day that we don’t have to hear about the injury prone, career .240 hitter that is Christopher Doyle Snelling. Who is, by the way, once again, injured. I am quite sure he was a sweetheart of a young man… but PLEASE. Give it up.
What are the Mariner options with Weaver that have the least financial impact. i.e. I belive trading him and his contract would have the least impact and thus be the biggest bonus. Next would be to trade him and have to pay just some of his salary? What would it take for the M’s to be free of his contract? If they just release him, someone would have to pick him up off waivers for the M’s to be off the hook. Right?
I’ve seen more sophisticated statistics get gradually but eventually widely adopted within my lifetime. To take two examples, in the 1970s you never saw On Base Average or Yards Per Pass Attempt so much as mentioned in the paper or on TV, let alone routinely listed and casually discussed as they are now.
When did ERA become widely accepted? Wins and losses must have come first, right?
Just waiting for the day that we don’t have to hear about the injury prone, career .240 hitter that is Christopher Doyle Snelling. Who is, by the way, once again, injured. I am quite sure he was a sweetheart of a young man… but PLEASE. Give it up.
You should probably just go away then.
255: I’ll bet you’re a conversational hit wherever you go.
But garhof, he’s got a good eye at the plate and he walks sometimes! He’s also all of what’s wrong with the Mariners, and represents all the good things about the game!
Unless Doyle can suit up as our 5th starter and be dependable, he’d be pretty much worthless on this team. Not to mention any other team in the majors.
Unwarranted Doyle hating! Deal with it!
Weaver’s double in Mariner history:
In 1986, the Mariners signed free agent pitcher Milt Wilcox, the No. 2 starter on the 1984 World Champion Tigers (17-8, 4.00 ERA).
The M’s, often citing that World Series grit and his experience, stuck with an obviously finished Wilcox for 10 stars, during which he went 0-8.
His ERA was “just” 5.50, but it was obviously to one and all that he was getting his brains beaten out — he gave up 74 hits in 55 2/3 innings, 11 home runs, walked 28 and struck out just 26.
TEN starts of this. It was a big part of an awful start to an awful year, one which saw the M’s make a terrible midseason trade to Boston (Dave Henderson and Spike Owen for Rey Quinones, Mike Brown and Mike Trujillo) just to wash out the aftertaste.
Maybe they can fit Doyle with a special wheelchair that he can use to hit with. It’s the only way he’ll ever play a full season in the majors.
If you want to be a troll, you can go elsewhere. Otherwise, you’ve made your opinion known, so now, you can move on to talking about something else.
One of the top five ways to say I Am Being a Jerk.
Cueing: You Guys Only Want To Hear Opinions You Agree With.
In defense of that trade, Jim, Quinones looked like he had a chance to be something special, and Henderson and Owen were career mediocrities. Even though Henderson had some big-stage moments later in his career, the trade was defensible at the time it was made.
So, you’re saying I should remove the pin needles I constantly stick into my voodoo Doyle dolls?
Never.
*wait for it*
This is a late coming question, but in the intro to this post are those . and + indicative of when the team(s) scored EXACTLY that many runs or AT LEAST that many runs. Also, despite the run differentials in the league, for what it’s worth (maybe nothing) I thought these runs/game were interesting:
Texas 4.79 r/g
Seattle 4.77 r/g
Anaheim 4.06 r/g
Oakland 3.88 r/g
We’re saying don’t be a jerk and respect the fact that people around here have an emotional attachment to the guy.
Not.
His 05 numbers were a significant drop from 04…06 the same as 05 and so far in 07 he’s below 06…
His April numbers. He performed as well in April 2007 as he did in April 2006 (better, actually), and as well a he always has in April, consistently his worst month.
Ichiro’s Aprils are always about what we saw this April.
How hard is this?
If Weaver is moved into the bullpen, how useful is he going to be? Even with the usual improvements a pitcher gains from going from starting to relieving, Weaver honestly looks so bad at this point that even then I can’t imagine him being much better than mop-up.
Or is he so bad the Mariners won’t even give him that chance?
To Mariners_World_Series_Bound, Please read or re-read the comment guidelines.
Scraps, what bugged me most about 1986 is the the M’s made lip service to a significant youth movement, but never really gave a full and fair shot to Danny Tartabull (wrongly playing him at second base, where he was horrible), Ivan Calderon and especially Mickey Brantley (who I still think is owed a HUGE apology for the way his whole career was handled; her’s the Roberto Petagine of his generation). Donell Nixon was dumped too quickly, too. The M’s didn’t have the courage to back up the vision, and pretty much threw the rest of the 1980s under the bus as a result — cashing in promising youngsters for mediocrities like Mike Kingery and Glenn Wilson and Steve Trout.
Jim Presley was on his way to being the Sexson of his time.
And meanwhile, Edgar Martinez was vainly waving his hands from Calgary, shouting: “Hello? Bueller? Bueller?”
Jim, yeah, you bring the memory of all that frustration back vividly.
I am enjoying imagining Edgar saying ‘Bueller’.
Sorry … sometimes you just just can’t choke back 30 years of frustration any longer, and it comes back up in big impolitic belches of verbalized memory.
Danny Tartabull was the dry run for Gary Sheffield.
Jim, the reason why the 00′s are survivable for me was I was reading Bill James AND a Mariners fan in the 1980′s. One of his essays was growing up an A’s fan in the 1960′s under the reign of error of Charlie Finley- but at least he had the innocence of relative ignoance of advanced baseball statistics helping out. It was pretty terrible to love a team, see talented young players come up, while knowing they were being horribly, HORRIBLY mismanaged in an awful, mostly empty ballpark.
At least now the ballpark doesn’t suck.
Oh, and Presley was more like the slow, white version of Adrian Beltre, if he was never coached for ANY plate discipline. The guy was for all intents and purposes washed up at age 26.
So, we signed Weaver basically because he heroically beat Detroit last October. Will Hargrove and Bavasi now conclude it’s not a repeatable skill?
270
His April numbers. He performed as well in April 2007 as he did in April 2006 (better, actually), and as well a he always has in April, consistently his worst month.
Ichiro’s Aprils are always about what we saw this April.
How hard is this?
That’s not what you wrote…be precise and his May sucks too and he’s not the long term answwer. How hard is that?
Eight cfs are better than him now…just about the same as the whole of 2006…that’s average by definition.
If lighting a match to multiple years for Sexson or Batista is a waste, why do the same thing for Ichiro? He’s not going to get better.
Bye Weaver!
Don’t let the frickin’ door hit you on the way out.
sigh. KJR. Vidro is a good signing because he is hitting .306.
more entertaining– a nice ramble on age & ballplayers from Caple with some fine Rickey quotes.
Is anyone else excited by the offense’s performance the past three days? That sure was a welcome sight, even if they could only scratch out three runs today. Now, I’d like to see Hargrove move Guillen up to that No. 3 hole — someone who gives them a little pop who’s swinging a hot bat.
Didn’t someone mention a while back that they should/could move Weaver to the bullpen?
His May has been 10 days long. I don’t think it’s a good idea to assume he’s going to suck all month based on 10 days. Ichiro’s a streaky hitter; you have to live with it.
286: Sure, you could, which seems like the logical move when Felix comes back. But you’re still stuck with HoRam, because the cupboard is absolutely bare at Tacoma, in terms of starting pitchers.
Not to beat a dead horse, but man it would be nice to have Emiliano Fruto right about now …
285
I said in last night’s game thread that this is a fun offense to watch when they’re hitting. They’ve done it against good pitching this series, too, which is good to see. I’ve been really happy with the Guillen signing. Raul’s power outage is concerning, though.
Ichiro finished sixth in VORP among major league centerfielders last year. There are thirty major leagues teams. How is that average?
288. I just don’t see this guy being all that great out of the bullpen either. He can’t even get out of the 1st inning of the game with out getting smacked around like a stepchild.
‘ Cause it ain’t superblindingly obviously superior…
(And he brings some value as a fielder, too, I’d say…)
284
Thanks for the link. Its probably a sign of me feeling older every passing day as I’m in my mid 30′s, but I really enjoy seeing guys like Franco, Moyer, Omar, Johnson, etc have success well past their contemporaries.
Pretty soon, one of them will lay claim as the last player from the 1980′s. (Like Cliff Robinson in the NBA fwiw)
#291
I think Weaver could still be alright out of the bullpen. The difference between ok Weaver and war-crime atrocious Weaver seems to be the velocity on his fastball. If he’s put in the bullpen and doesn’t have to consider pacing himself, he may pick up a couple MPH on his fastball, and regain some effectiveness.
It would be nice to still have Soriano in the pen, and Morrow learning to be a starter in Tacoma while we’re at it. In fact, it would be nice to undo pretty much all the offseason transactions right about now. Though I don’t mind Guillen — no talent was given up to get him, and assuming his legs don’t give out on him (Drayer on the radio said last night he’s hurt both his ankles so far this season) so far he’s been a reasonable return for the money. Guys trying to reset their careers after a serious injury are often a bargain (see Frank Thomas, Jim Thome, Jermaine Dye, etc) though the risk of them being absolutely useless is far higher too, of course.
Somebody mentioned opening those holographic newspapers to read advanced stats (actually, it’s far more likely you’ll just be reading your customized internet newstream on a retinal display fed by your phone, but anyway). And Pappas’ marginal wins came up for evaluating GMs. What I’d like to know is whether anyone has used the leverage stats as a way to evaluate and compare managers’ use of their bullpens? Bullpen management is probably the biggest contribution a manager makes towards whether his team wins or loses a particular game, and given how a by-the-book manager (ie “role” and “save stat” driven) can be strongly at odds with the information LI gives us (or a good manager feels “in his gut”), good vs bad management should stand out fairly clearly. It would take some work to put the data together, however, because to do it right you’d have to take into account who was available (vs worn out by recent appearances) and factor in matchups, LOOGYs, etc. So I guess I’m asking if anyone has done anything like that?
I thought I remembered this, and I found the story from January 6 of this year:
I bet he’s rethinking that decision, but it may have helped Bavasi dodge a bullet. At least by next year this will all just be another painful memory.
I don’t think a pitcher has a true ERA, assuming you mean true ERA as an inherent talent/skill level for the guy. ERA is a lot like RBI – it’s not so much a measure of talent as it is of luck intersected with talent. Likewise ERA, as the article Dave constantly links to explains.
But I think ERA and RBI hold sway over people who believe in clutchness, because “clutch” only comes into play when runs are on the line. Ergo, ERA and RBIs are not measures of skill+luck, they are measures of skill+grit.
So I propose we start calling them Grit-RA and Grit-BI’s. Weaver’s grit-RA indicates he doesn’t have enough grit to be on the team.
Weaver has had poor-to-awful beginnings, which is not a good talent in someone coming out of the bullpen. Unless he has a good L/R split to allow him to be used as a situational reliever, I assume he’ll be tossed into games that are already lost. Of course, Grover may appoint him to be the new Guy-To-Get-A-Groundball now that Mateo is (temporarily?) out of the picture.
Weaver should start throwing side armed knuckle eephus’. That’d be better for the team than his “2 seamer”.
weaver is terrible
Can Weaver even COUNT to his era?
#294 So you’d be pretty confident with him coming out of the bullpen with let’s say a 1 run lead?
I wanna see Terry name out the eight center fielders that are better than Ichiro.
I know the ERA validity argument has been beaten to death in this post, and I 100% agree with Dave and the other 99% of the ussmariner nation that believe ERA is useless for accurate pitcher evaulation. I read the evaluating a pitcher post just last week and think it should be required reading for all Baseball announcers and writers.
So how about this middle ground:
From baseball-reference.com
Mariners’ W-L
GmSc => 50 11-0
GmSc
the last should have been GmScr below 50 4-15
Game score is fun, like quality starts, but it’s nothing more than that.
Game score is fun, like quality starts, but it’s nothing more than that. (See # 306.)
And it’s quite subjective. Suppose Bill had valued economy of pitches as much as he did strikeouts, giving a point for each pitch below 100? Then KERRY WOOD would no longer hold the distinction of having pitched the best game in MLB history It would be Red Barrett.
http://tinyurl.com/cgjay
The only thing I think that it shows is that the M’s bullpen and the batters haven’t blown a well pitched game by the pitcher, and they have managed to overcome 4 poorly pitched games.
New template looks great, good job DMZ&Company.
I am succumbing to the “ERA is not a great way to evalutate pitcher talent” arguement.
I’m also dropping the Doyle comments, wasn’t aware so many dug him so much around here.
that Brandon Inge, sharp as a tack–
“It’s an easy difference,” said Inge, who saw Weaver last season when the right-hander helped the Cardinals win the World Series. “He pitched well then, not so well today.”
what you said.
#302
First I’d like to see him in mop up work, just to see if the move to the bullpen does help him out. I wouldn’t immediately throw him into high-leverage situations, as he’s never been a reliever.
How terrible a pitcher are you when you throw 5 1/3, you give up 6 runs, and your ERA actually goes down?
Weaver’s now 0-6, and he’s not getting better…when Felix comes back, is Weaver done? I’d rather the M’s simply cut him loose and pay him his salary than give this guy any more chances to lose games. And bullpen work? Please, he’s obviously not cut out to be a MLB pitcher.
I like the new look as well. Great work fellas.
Great template, I love it. Good job.
#313 – Hopefully they can convince him to play for the Angels so he gives them negative contribution. Maybe that’s worth a few million.
Hey Derek, what about the enhanced post buttons? Are they coming back?
Also, would it be difficult to put a year on the date for your posts? When I go check out previous year posts the date is there but I can’t tell which year it’s from. Not a huge thing, but it would be nice.
Like the look, hate the blockquote (can’t read ‘em; the contrast is often very wonky).
AT MOST….mop up work for Weaver. He shouldn’t even get near the start of a game.
But, of course….there’s a world of difference between “should” and “will”…
Agreed, the blockquote is weak. It’s almost impossible to read. Perhaps just making the font darker. not sure about all that though.
Stop complaining. Especially if it’s on the to-do list. Seriously, it’s really annoying.
I think you should move everything a little over to the left, and then a little back over to the right.
LET’S DO THE TIME WARP AGAIN!
I think that rather than conveying contagious and sunny optimism, your theme should be conveying gritty intangibles. Call it the “Willie Bloomquist” theme.
Can we add that to the to-do list?
Hmmm. Another to add to the “Theme To Do Items” list:
There’s not enough beer. Need more beer.
kthxbye!
In the meantime, you can highlight the blockquote with your mouse, which makes it look dark blue.
Thanks for all the work on the site, Derek.
Also, we should be upping the quota of Unjustified Vidro Hatred in the theme.
cowbell?
Also, shouldn’t there be a couple hundred units of snark built into the template…
Plus a minor temple or two for Doyle worship…
I’d be very surprised NOT to see Weaver in the rotation again. Pleasantly surprised, but surprised nonetheless…
“Stop complaining. Especially if it’s on the to-do list. Seriously, it’s really annoying.”
Sorry, I thought that I read the To Do list and didn’t see those in there. I apologize about the “complaining”.
From DMZ’s post:
“Please don’t just complain – I need help a lot more than I need to hear that we suck or whatever.
Also, and I can’t stress this enough: this is not my strong point. I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t have to. So help, or leave me and the people who are helping alone.”