Felix! With him as DH, every day could be Felix day!

Brad Wilkerson’s SB/CS since 2005: 18/18. Also, there’s a fair amount of evidence that he’s just done: his road OPS’s in TX in 2006-2007 were .719 and .679. Plus his OPS splits are higher in the first half (.801) than the second (.776) for his career.

That being said, it’s pretty sad when the corpse of Brad Wilkerson is outhitting your DH/occasional 4th place hitter, and the C you just resigned for three years.

He’s a patient guy who WILL NOT swing at pitches until he has figured out whether the pitch is a ball or a strike, (of course, sometimes he figures wrong).

This TYPE of player is one who is particularly horrible when played in a PART-TIME role. He is a player who MUST play regularly to keep his particular skill set sharp.

Interesting points there. My impression was that at a macro level there wasn’t much evidence to support the “plays well as a starter, struggles as a part-timer” thesis – though it is certain a frequent anecdote. That said, I could certainly see how some skill sets would not be covered by the macro data. Is there any data out there to suggest that this type of skill set is more adversely affected by platooning than others? I did some google skimming but didn’t turn anything up on point.

Except the starts slow thing, which is just not true. Go look up his splits: he hits .260/.357/.420 in April-May, a hair shy of his career line. He hits a lot worse in July, for example.

He’s a patient guy who WILL NOT swing at pitches until he has figured out whether the pitch is a ball or a strike, (of course, sometimes he figures wrong).

This TYPE of player is one who is particularly horrible when played in a PART-TIME role. He is a player who MUST play regularly to keep his particular skill set sharp.

He’s tends to start slowly, get in a groove, but will lose that groove at different times during the season.

He also has a fairly neutral split vs. lefties and righties. This makes him a bad hitter to platoon. It makes him a bad hitter to play part-time. And it makes a particularly horrid player off the bench. His CAREER OPS as a sub is .442.

After getting to Toronto, (he had a 10-day lay-off before getting snagged), he had a fairly predictable initial slump. BUT, after about a 10-game spell where he struggled, he proceeded to hit at an .870 clip for several weeks. THEN, the decision was made to make Lind the primary – and Wilky ended up as a sub.

The generic sequence: .652 OPS leaving Seattle.

9 game slump lowered OPS for season to .554, (May 18).

He was a regular for the next month.
On June 18, his OPS for the season was up to .690.

He lost his full-time job, and his OPS has plunged since then to .643.

Is he a great hitter? No.

He’s an adequate low part of the order OF with a lot of patience, some speed, who can hit the occasional dinger. As a full-time 7th or 8th spot hitter, he’d probably be posting a .750+ OPS. But he’s likely one of the absolute worst hitters in all of baseball coming off the bench.

He’s the begger’s version of Mike Cameron. He was utilized completely wrong by MacLaren. He was being utilized well, (with fair results), with Toronto, but only while injuries had managed to make him a full-time player. As a bench player, however, he makes Vidro and Joh look good.

Some players, you maximize their production by platoon. Wilky was NEVER one of them. He was terribly managed in Seattle, and while reasonably effective for a month in Toronto, he’s now a major detriment to them.

So what does it matter, they could dump 2/3 of the position player on the roster and replace them with a flock of geese. It wouldn’t make much difference.

It’s so bad, even Steve Kelley has noticed.

I thought it was nice he’d managed to wander out to the ballpark