Comments on: An Opportunity Arises

By: joser

joser — Fri, 08 May 2009 23:47:01 +0000

I think Citizen’s Bank park, with its much smaller left field, is helping the perception of Raul’s defense a lot. That doesn’t mean he’s a better defender than we’ve given him credit for, but it does mean his limitations don’t hurt the Phillies as much as they hurt the M’s.

In other news: the A’s picked up Adam Kennedy on a minor league contract for a PTBNL. So he’s stashed away in Sacramento, out of the reach of Zduriencik.

By: SonOfZavaras

SonOfZavaras — Thu, 07 May 2009 05:13:14 +0000

Jeff Passan has an article on Raul Ibanez out, with a healthy amount of it dedicated to his defensive “perception”.

I won’t go into opinions espoused around here to death, but I will say that while I liked him as a player, I think it’s a pretty good thing Ruben Amaro, Jr. isn’t our GM.

By: Sinking Away

Sinking Away — Thu, 07 May 2009 04:56:28 +0000

I watched Alexi Casilla play just before he was cut and it was clear why he was cut (both defensively and offensively he is lacking a bit of they expected from him). The Twins think they have someone better in the minors. That might be true, but I agree, they might also find value in Yuni and there aren’t any other teams that I can think of who might feel the same same way. Given that, let’s hope Z can get this done before the Twins see Yuni the way we do. He’s good against the AL Central, grab him before no one else does.

By: DAMellen

DAMellen — Thu, 07 May 2009 04:18:15 +0000

I was afraid you’d say that. Teams really need to be more willing to trade the exact players we need. It would make everything a lot easier. For us.

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 07 May 2009 03:43:56 +0000

Good you saw the light on Cameron. Yea, he strikes out a lot. But he does so many other things well – draws walks, hits for power, runs the bases, plays great defense. He’s been a terrific player for a long time, but because people grew up worshiping batting average, home runs, RBIs, and avoiding strikeouts, he never got the recognition he deserved.

And yes, I played HS ball. Caught for most of my career. And yes, I drew a lot of walks.

By: SonOfZavaras

SonOfZavaras — Thu, 07 May 2009 03:25:10 +0000

Thanks, DMZ. Living next to a Borders Books comes in downright handy sometimes…

By: DMZ

DMZ — Thu, 07 May 2009 03:20:03 +0000

If you get two, get Tango’s “The Book” and BP’s “Baseball Between the Numbers” edited by Jonah Keri — it’ll be as close to an accelerated catch-up to current thinking as you can get for $20 or so.

By: SonOfZavaras

SonOfZavaras — Thu, 07 May 2009 03:07:15 +0000

I’ve had my disagreements with you, Dave, but one thing I’ll never say is you avoid issues or fluff an argument.

Broadcast James had a real interesting idea- is there any veteran from the Pacific Rim that could be posted, signed and play SS for us over the next couple of years? Or from anywhere else, for that matter…

And, BTW, Dave, it’s, um….apology time.

For me.

Regarding that Mike Cameron debate. I went ahead and joined FanGraphs yesterday and ran a few graphs on Cameron.

The numbers don’t support me, overall.

In terms of K%, yes they do. But no one in their right mind would just take K% as a sole basis for judging a player’s worth. And, I maintain that in and of itself, 1,600+ SO in a 14-year career would be an eyesore.

Until you dig deeper on what a player’s doing. Like with wOBA. Slg.%. And OBP.

Mike Cameron is well over the norm in all of this, and for a career, his line is right on top of the mean on most of those. As a matter of fact, he’s had very few years where’s he’s ever been in the “poor” range of any of those stats.

I didn’t even bother trying to get a graph on 300-300 players (past and projected future) to see how he stacks up once I was done with those.

Put it this way: anybody from the Athletics or Diamondbacks’ (among others) front office would have looked at my statement and told me “you’re nuts”.

Mike Cameron is underrated. The numbers are clear. You were right. I’m wrong, wrong, wrong.

(Yuniesky Betancourt is my new poster-boy for unrealized potential at the ML level. And he stands to be there for a good, long time.)

That being so said, I agree with you 100% and from the get-go on Betancourt.

Trade his butt. For anything approximating more value to the team.

I have two questions for you, Dave. One: did you play baseball in high school, college? I don’t know, honestly. Strictly out of curiousity.

And two: Are there any good books that have come out on SABRmetrics that you haven’t already endorsed on this site, and would recommend picking up? I’m all good on Bill James publications and getting more versed on The Hardball Times.

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 07 May 2009 02:43:54 +0000

There’s no reason for their teams to trade them.

By: DAMellen

DAMellen — Thu, 07 May 2009 02:36:36 +0000

I agree, Dave. You always avoid the issue. For example, you never said what you think of Alberto Callaspo and Jed Lowrie. How much would they cost? It seems like both teams could have an interest in Clement so that seems like a solid place to start. What do you think it would take?

In all seriousness, you do a fine job of taking issues head on, but I am curious what you think of those two players.