Jarrod Washburn’s success is sustainable and he should command a high price
It’s the splitter! What better way to increase a pitcher’s value than spread the word that they’ve learned a new pitch? What’s more –there’s a kernel of truth in it. From this July 2nd story:
Washburn is throwing a split-fingered fastball again. He does it about 6 to 8 times per game, when he really needs it. Tonight, he used it to strike out Rod Barajas on a 2-2 pitch with the bases loaded and two out in the fifth inning.Called it the best splitter he’s ever thrown. Came in at about 86 mph.
All we need to do is clean that up a little. Sayyyyy:
JJ had a lot of spare time while he was injured, and you know how Jarrod’s constantly looking to improve his game. Well, when Washburn was being shelled in May, he decided to take the splitter seriously and that’s why we’ve seen him get such great results even when batters are still making contact. He’s mixing it in well with his other breaking stuff and because he’s less familiar with it, he’s only using it when he’s ahead in the count. And that works well, because when it drops down out of the zone hitters may still swing and miss trying to protect.
Whoever picks him up gets this new, splitter-throwing Washburn, who is really an entirely different pitcher than the one we saw earlier in the season.
There’s our story. Doesn’t that sound like a pitcher contending teams should trade for? Striving for improvement, learning from teammates, using his tools effectively… that’s worth a blue chip prospect or two.
Here’s the great part about this: there’s no easy refutation of this. You’d have to back through a ton of film to try and distinguish the break on different pitches to make any kind of conclusions about how often he’s throwing it if he’s throwing it at all and how effective it’s been. and really, who’s going to put that kind of effort into this? Heck, it worked for Silva — how much of that $48m came from people biting on the “he’s learned a splitter” story? And then later on, everyone can point to the other reports as the source.
So go forth everyone — spread the news anywhere you can about Jarrod’s success being due to the splitter he learned from Putz. Post on forums, send emails to NY writers. Call into KJR. Do what you have to do. We’ve seen this tactic work before, and it’s up to us to replicate its success.
Game 104, Mariners at Blue Jays
Washburn v Marcum… supposedly. As I write this.
There may have been no better time for Washburn’s little streak of good results — the team’s finally shopping people, and he’s been turning in good performances for long enough that his ill start to the season and just horrible May seem forgotten. If it helps the team move him, well, good work all around.
Congratulations, Dave
Mr. Niehaus,
I could write thousands of words about how much you deserve this day, but it would still fall short of expressing how glad I am that you’re going into the Baseball Hall of Fame today. You are the reason I’m a baseball fan, and I can’t imagine growing up with anyone else welcoming me to a beautiful day out for baseball.
Enjoy Cooperstown. Enjoy the entire experience.
Congratulations, Dave. You’ve earned it.
Washburn to Yanks
Jarrod Washburn has been was almost traded to the Yankees and still will be – this deal was contingent upon the Yankees completing the Nady/Marte deal to get themselves an outfielder, which they did last night.
No official word on who will be coming to Seattle in exchange for Washburn, but it sounds like it’s an outfielder. If the M’s got either Melky Cabrera or Brett Gardner, do back flips.
Actually, Washburn’s gone – do back flips anyway.
The Most Obvious Trade Ever
So, the Brewers have a scout following the Mariners, presumably looking for relief help that won’t cost an arm and a leg. If the rumored interest in Arthur Rhodes is real, and the Brewers maintain their stance that they want to add a bullpen arm without giving up any highly valued young talent, then there’s one deal between the two teams that couldn’t make any more sense.
Arthur Rhodes for Brad Nelson, straight up.
I covered Nelson last month, but here’s the long and short of it – he’s a 25 year old left-handed hitting first baseman with a patient approach at the plate and a bit of power. He’s stuck behind Prince Fielder, which means he has no future in Milwaukee, and his frame rules out his future anywhere besides 1B/DH.
His upside is as a .270/.350/.450 first baseman, so he’s never going to be a star, but he’d instantly become the best first baseman in the organization. The M’s have a line-up spot with his name on it, and with a solid finish to the year, they could have a cheap answer at first base for 2009.
Rhodes for Nelson. Lee, Doug, make it happen. It makes so much sense.
Game 103, Mariners at Blue Jays
Dickey vs Purcey, 10:05 am.
Ichiro RF
Bloomquist CF
Ibanez LF
Beltre 3B
Lopez 2B
Vidro DH
Cairo 1B
Burke C
Betancourt SS
In a season where the entire point is now to build for the future, the Mariners are starting players who won’t be with the organization next year in CF, LF, DH, 1B, and likely C.
In better news, the Dodgers acquired Casey Blake from the Indians today, so if the Mets are going to make a deal for a hitter, Ibanez is the last guy left. Let’s hope for a classic Minaya freakout overpay.
Game 102, Mariners at Blue Jays
Batista vs. Parrish.
Sorry for the late game thread; then again, it might not be that fun to talk about.
Have at it, though.
The Washburn Rumors
You have probably read by now that the M’s reportedly asked for both Melky Cabrera and Brett Gardner from the Yankees for Jarrod Washburn. There’s just no way that’s true – asking for either one is crazy enough, but both? Cashman would hang up on the phone and put call block on any number from 206 if Pelekoudas actually asked for Cabrera and Gardner.
Don’t worry about the no-trade clause – the M’s or Yankees will just pay him to make that go away.
2009 Position Players
One of the first tasks the new GM will have to do when taking over is do a real analysis of what he can expect going forward from the players already here. Since I’m a helpful kind of guy, I figured I’d just do it for him, using win values (as explained here) to gauge the true talent levels of each player on the roster and their relative value to the club. Also included is a comparison of their free market value compared to their current salary. Let’s just go right to the spreadsheet, with a tip of the hat to Colin Wyers for making this process much easier than the last time I did it.
To answer what should be the most popular questions ahead of time:
1. I included Ibanez in order to give context to whether the team should re-sign him or not. The answer is clearly no.
2. If you didn’t read the explanation in the linked post, here’s the short version: WAR is “Wins Above Replacement”, and tells how many wins that player would add over a theoretical league minimum Triple-A guy who could be acquired for free. A 25 man roster that equaled 0 WAR would finish something like 50-112, so you need about 40-45 WAR to be competitive.
3. WAR$ is our estimate of how much a player would get per season if he were a free agent and all 30 MLB teams valued him correctly, given that MLB as a whole is paying about $5 million per win in the free agent market right now. Actual is his real 2009 salary (or our estimate of that number) and the difference column is how much underpaid or overpaid he is relative to his free agent value. Obviously, guys who haven’t gotten to free agency yet will be underpaid – that’s how the system works.
4. Johjima and Morse work well enough as proxies for the bench players. This isn’t meant to be exact, and reserves don’t matter enough for anyone to flip out about the fact that I don’t have a full 13 or 14 player group here.
Okay, now, on to the Mariner specific points.
This group of position players is unbelievably horrible. As a group, they total about 11.5 wins above replacement. Beltre, Ichiro, and Clement are the only guys on the roster who would be starters for most contending clubs, and the Clement projection is pretty optimistic, honestly. LaHair doesn’t belong in the majors, so you can pick up ground by replacing him with a real first baseman, but there’s serious problems everywhere besides 3B and RF.
This team won’t win anything while hoping to get offense from all four of Lopez/Betancourt/Reed/Balentien. You might be able to get away with having one in your line-up, two if you surround them with a few all-stars. But if you give all four regular jobs, you might as well just punt the season.
Realistically, this team needs to replace one (or both) of Lopez and Betancourt with a +3 win infielder(s), acquire a +3 win outfielder, and find a +3 win first baseman, plus find a DH who doesn’t totally suck. Or, to put another way, the team needs about four more position players of Beltre/Ichiro quality.
I’ll do the pitching staff next. The news is a lot better there, thankfully, but it doesn’t make up for the fact that this group of position players is awful.
MLB.com takes different approach to covering team
Okay, okay, if I put this in a post, will everyone stop trying to hijack threads and emailing us?
The money quote:
“I’m astonished to tell you the truth when I look up and I see Vidro’s average is what it is, because I feel like every time he goes up there I’m very confident that he’s going to give us a good at-bat,” Riggleman said. “And for the at-bats that he has, he’s knocked in quite a few runs … he’s been fairly effective in the way we want to use him.
Generally speaking, I try not to post links to MLB.com inanity or Kelley’s occasional forays into baseball commentary (or inaccuracies in beat writer stories) — we’ve really gotten away from that since Finnigan took his leave. MLB.com is to baseball coverage what the game broadcasts are to the team — it’s a PR arm to promote the product. I just accept it at that. But for whatever reason, everyone loves this story, soo… have at it.