Game 63, Yankees at Mariners
Joe Saunders vs. Andy Pettitte, 1:10pm
First it was Blake Beavan who absolutely dominated the Yankees on Thursday. Last night, it was Jeremy Bonderman’s turn, in what would’ve been the most unlikely pitching line of the year had Aaron Harang not thrown a complete game shutout recently. At home, this is…and I hesitate to say it…a decent match-up for the M’s.
As I mentioned when the M’s faced him in the Bronx, this late-career version of Pettitte seems to have larger platoon splits thanks to his outpitch, a slider-like cutter. It’s an effective pitch to both righties and lefties, but he tends to go to it against righties only when he’s ahead (he’ll throw it in any count to lefties). That means he’ll use his fastball (four- and two-seam varieties) to righties early or when he’s behind, and that pitch hasn’t fared as well. They’re slugging well over .500 this year on both fastball types, and he’s not getting them to swing and miss.
Having Morse back in the line-up helps, but it’s countered by the team’s lack of OF depth (sigh, Franklin Gutierrez) and turning Nick Franklin around to his weaker right-side. We’ll see.
1: Bay, RF
2: Seager, 3B
3: Morales, 1B
4: Morse, DH
5: Ibanez, LF
6: Franklin, 2B
7: Saunders, CF
8: Ryan, SS
9: Bantz, C
SP: Joe Saunders
I used to think absolutely nothing would get Brendan Ryan out of the #9 spot in the line-up. If he wouldn’t move up for Robert Andino or Jesus Sucre, then he was basically #9 in perpetuity, right? Today we get the answer to that question: Brandon Bantz can push Ryan up to #8. It’s Bantz’s major league debut, and this ensures he won’t Yepez his way into being on a MLB roster without ever cracking a major league game. Congratulations to him.
Speaking of depth and injury woes, the M’s put Jesus Sucre on the 15 DL with his finger injury and brought back Carlos Triunfel.
Assorted Draft Notes
The M’s have gone through several rounds of the 2013 amateur draft thus far, and pace Jeff Sullivan, it’s time for instantaneous outrage/hyperbolic praise!
Ok, not really. For my own benefit, here are some notes on the guys the M’s have selected. We can all point and laugh at this years from now as players make a mockery of their pre-draft reports by doing things like practicing a lot, focusing on baseball full-time, developing new skills, or getting burned out on baseball and walking away. Hope it’s helpful for you too.
1: The M’s drafted DJ Peterson once before, in the 33rd round in 2010, but Peterson opted for college. In a roundabout way, that draft pick set off a bizarre chain of events that saw Peterson’s scholarship offer from Arizona revoked, and a last-minute move to New Mexico. Once there, the 3B flourished, hitting .419 with 17 HRs as a sophomore, and following that up with a .408 average and another 18 HRs this year. The gaudy numbers with the Lobos, coupled with an eye-opening showing with the US Collegiate National Team in the summer, led many to deem him the top college bat in the draft (in, to be fair, a down year for college bats). As it happened, another defensively-challenged 3B, Kris Bryant grabbed the headlines by hitting an insane 31 HRs in 62 games this year with the neutered BBCOR bats and shot to the top 3 on everyone’s draft board. But most would still argue that Peterson’s got the superior hit tool, even if some questions remain about his ability to hit for plus power as a pro.
There are still some questions about where he’ll ultimately play, with 1B seeming like the leading candidate right now. I love players who can hit *and* play up-the-middle positions, and I completely understand why some see him as a reach at 12 if he’s limited to 1B. But a bat’s a bat, as we saw with high school 1B Dominic Smith going one pick ahead of Peterson, and, to a lesser degree, with Bryant, who many see as a 1B/RF in the future. The M’s see a guy with solid command of the zone, gap power at minimum, and a preternatural ability to get the barrel of the bat on pitches. Hard to argue with that, position be damned. The one nagging fear in a lot of people’s minds may be that the overall package sounds a bit like Justin Smoak, who hit 23 HRs in his senior year and had better walk and strikeout rates. Given the massive change in collegiate bats since 2008, I think it’s fair to say that Peterson’s shown more in-game power than Smoak did, though Smoak did show the superior eye. Ultimately, Peterson’s his own guy, and he’s certainly got a chance to move quickly in a system that’s suddenly bereft of elite, bat-first corner defenders. If he signs in time, he could start with Everett relatively soon.
Here’s some video of Peterson via Nick Faleris of BP/Perfect Game, and a good overview of Peterson at Amazin’ Avenue here.
Bonus pool slot value: $2,759,100
2: Austin Wilson played RF for Stanford, hitting .288/.387/.475 while battling through injuries. At an athletic 6’5″, 245lbs, Wilson’s a scout’s dream corner OF. He shows big power in batting practice, which makes his collegiate statline a bit harder to understand: why hasn’t this highly-touted, massive prospect slugged over .500? Some, like Chris Crawford, fault the Stanford coaches for tweaking his swing. Others may argue that it’s a response to good college arms, who K’d in 56 times to only 8 walks in 2011. His status as a top hitter in the draft ultimately comes from his performance both in high school and in the wood-bat Cape Cod league, where he was named a top 5 prospect by Perfect Game and Baseball America. He hit .312 for the Harwich Mariners with 6 homers in 23 games. This is an interesting pick, and he could conceivably be a hard sign; despite the so-so college stats, he was seen by many as a first-rounder, and as a junior whose season was interrupted by injuries, he could improve his stock quite a bit. On the other hand, he was hurt in 2013, and if he’s hurt again, his stock could tumble.
Bonus pool slot value: $1,110,000
3: Tyler O’Neill was a catcher who moved to SS following hernia surgery last year, but was announced today as a RF. It’ll be interesting to see where the M’s play him. He’s the first local kid drafted, as he’s from British Columbia and played on the same Langley traveling team as Brett Lawrie, to whom the stocky 6′, 200lb O’Neill is often compared. He’s projected to develop solid power down the road, and despite growing up playing hockey and in a cold-weather state (er, province), he’s got plenty of experience playing with the Canadian junior national team.
Bonus pool slot value: $631,100
4: Ryan Horstman is a rare draft-eligible freshman who pitched for St. Johns this season. He was a promising HS arm in Massachusetts, but didn’t graduate in his senior year due to poor grades. Thus, he had to return to high school for another year, but he wasn’t able to pitch having exhausted his eligibility. The lefthander excelled in nine starts for the Red Storm this year, but many saw him as a 6-10th round pick. He’d also played in a collegiate league before starting up with St. Johns in the northeast, so he’s a bit more experienced than his resume may suggest at first glance. This sets up something of an interesting question: Horstman theoretically has a ton of leverage, as he can go back to school and be draft eligible several more times. But he may not have anticipated going in the fourth round, where his slot value is $437,600. If they sign him, and the M’s have been excellent at signing their picks, it’ll be interesting to see where they assign him and how they use him.
Bonus pool slot value: $437,600
5: Jack Reinheimer is a shortstop from East Carolina University, who hit about .300 with little power but a solid eye. He’s supposed to be a good defender who can stick at shortstop in the pros, and it’s possible that some mechanical tweaks can help unlock some offensive ability. That sounds like a longshot, but the M’s signed another solid defender/great make-up shortstop who didn’t hit much in 2010 (Chris Taylor) and he’s turned into a contributor with the bat. At the top of the draft, McNamara and the M’s seem to look for guys with present skills, as Dave mentioned. But the other preference that shows up again and again is getting ‘baseball rats’ – guys without flashy tools, but who love the game. That and leadership/personality seem to be traits the M’s prize above most other teams (in contrast with tools/promise-favoring teams like Texas, or like the last M’s regime). It’ll be interesting to see where he goes – Everett with the other college picks, or extended spring training if they have something specific they want him to work on.
Bonus pool slot value: $327,600
6: Corey Simpson was a HS catcher from Texas, but it looks like the M’s are moving the 6’3″ 220-pounder off the position to RF. His catching wasn’t seen as pro-quality by scouts, but he shows great raw power at the plate. On the other hand, his swing’s a bit longer and he may be a high strikeout guy in the minors. Still, the M’s took a break from college-trained players to get a high school bat with an eye opening tool. The M’s did this last year in the 8th round, when they tabbed California HS 1B Nick Halamandaris, who ultimately didn’t sign and played for Cal this season. Simpson’s committed to the University of Houston (as an OF, by the way).
Bonus pool slot value: $245,300
7: Tyler Olson is a Spokane native who stayed in-town to play college ball for Gonzaga. He flew under the radar a bit, as first-rounder Marco Gonzalez was the clear ace of the staff, but the senior left-hander put up some great numbers of his own for the Zags: 9-4, 2.48 ERA, with 91 Ks and 31 BBs in 101 innings. He doesn’t have top-shelf velocity, but he’s well-regarded for his command and intelligence. He’s a senior, having spurned the A’s last year who drafted him in the 17th round – and this marks the first of four consecutive college seniors taken. You wonder if they’re trying to conserve bonus pool money for someone (Wilson?). As a fifth-year senior, Olson’s much older than the college players who were drafted before him. And as others have said, it’s possible he could open the short-season Northwest League season in his hometown where Everett faces the Spokane Indians.
Bonus pool slot value: $183,800
8: Tyler Smith played SS for the Oregon State Beavers, where he hit .343/.434/.427 as a junior. He stuck around for his senior season, but saw his stats dip a bit; he ended this season hitting .301/.386/.389. Like Reinheimer, Smith’s best tool may be his defense, but he’s also a solid runner.
Bonus pool slot value: $156,100
9: Jacob Zokan is a lefty starting pitcher from the College of Charleston who struck out 80 hitters (against only 15 walks) in 79 innings this season. He barely pitched at all in 2012 due to injury, but he was a solid reliever for the Cougars in 2011. He shows a good breaking ball in this video, and what looks like solid velo for a lefty.
Bonus pool slot value: $145,900
10: Emilio Pagan is a senior at Belmont Abbey, a division II school that plays in the same conference as Mount Olive, where the M’s found catcher-turned-pitcher Carter Capps a few years ago. Pagan played 3B and pitched at Belmont (in North Carolina), but the M’s picked him as a right-handed reliever. Working as the closer in his two seasons at Belmont Abbey, he racked up 51 Ks to 16 BBs in 54 innings. In 2012, he made some (minor) headlines when he finished the year without giving up a run (to be fair, in less than 20 innings) and was a 2nd team all-american closer. This year, the runs-allowed stats look much worse (how could they not?) but his K:BB is much improved. He’s now the highest-drafted player from Belmont Abbey, taken a few spots before current Dodger farmhand Alex Castellanos.
Bonus pool slot value: $136,200
The draft continues today, but that’s it for me.
[Edited to add: the M’s just drafted Justin Seager, Kyle’s younger brother, in Round 12. Corey, another younger brother, went in the first round to the Dodgers last year, so this could make three Seagers in pro ball.]
Game 62, Yankees at Mariners
Jeremy Bonderman vs. Hiroki Kuroda, 7:10pm
OK, on paper, this game looks like the mismatch of the year. But that’s why they don’t play the games in a spreadsheet. Did WAR predict Blake Beavan would shut down the Yankees, facing the minimum over 6 2/3 IP last night? Ha! Did your “spreadsheet” predict Aaron Harang would get outpitched by Phil Hughes? Huh? Oh, it did? Carry on then.
Line-up:
1: Chavez, CF
2: Bay, RF
3: Seager, 3B
4: Morales, 1B
5: Ibanez, LF
6: Morse, DH
7: Franklin, 2B
8: Shoppach, C
9: Ryan, SS
SP: Bonderman
C’mon, be a heartwarming comeback story, Jeremy. Not one of those, “Well, I guess he just didn’t want to believe it was over” stories or a “Does this tarnish his legacy?” comeback stories. Raul took some time to get going this year, but I imagine Bonderman’s got a pretty short leash.
More on the draft later tonight/tomorrow.
If you’re in the south sound, I’d head to Cheney and check out the Rainiers/Las Vegas 51s game. Mike Curto’s post has the details, but the pitching match-up looks great. James Paxton tries to keep himself in the running to possibly succeed Jeremy Bonderman while the 51s send out Zack Wheeler, the Mets prospect who routinely sits in the 96-97mph range with his fastball. He started off slowly, but came on in May and is coming off an excellent start against Fresno. Still, he’s definitely more about potential, as he’s just been more hittable than anyone with that kind of velocity should be. Still, if/when he puts it together, he could move extremely fast. Shelby Miller was terrible for most of the year in the PCL last year, but the switch flipped and he’s now a dominant ace-like pitcher for the Cardinals. Wheeler’s breaking balls still aren’t as advanced as Miller’s were, even last year, so it’s not a great comp, but he’s a great talent.
Funky Fresh Baseball Themed Podcast with Jeff and Matthew
Jeff was free again and Jay was otherwise occupied so we went back to the normal format of Jeff and myself swapping whatever Mariners and baseball stuff come to mind. Our apologies for the lack of focus in this edition, we sort of running low on specific targets so instead tried a more scatter shot approach.
Podcast with Jeff and Matthew: Direct link! || iTunes link! || RSS/XML link!
Just Find This Interesting
If you ask Tom McNamara, he’ll tell you he doesn’t have a philosophy on the draft. He just takes whoever he thinks is the best player on the board. Every scouting director says this.
But, of course, the best player on your board is determined in part by your philosophy. These aren’t mutually exclusive things. If you believe that pitching is 90% of the game, you’re going to have the best pitchers higher on your draft board than a guy who thinks that you win by hitting home runs. The best player available to each team is, to some extent, determined by how they evaluate various abilities and what kind of risk tolerance they have.
Mac has now been the Mariners scouting director for five drafts. In 2010, they didn’t really have a first round pick, as their first selection came 43rd overall, the pick they used to take Taijuan Walker. However, in 2009 (#2), 2011 (#2), 2012 (#3), and now 2013 (#12), Mac and his staff have been in a position to pick fairly high in the draft. And all four picks seem to have one trait in common; proximity to the Majors.
At #2 overall in 2009, they took Dustin Ackley, a polished college bat who was considered the safest bet to become a big leaguer in the entire draft. He wasn’t ever a super high upside guy, but the floor was supposed to be very high. It hasn’t quite worked out that way yet, but Ackley was a premium draft prospect because he was a pretty sure bet to make the big leagues.
At #2 overall in 2011, they took Danny Hultzen, a polished college arm who was considered the safest bet to become a big leaguer in the entire draft. Baseball America even used this exact term — “safest bet” — in their write-up on him heading into that draft. Like with Ackley, Hultzen has proven to be a little further away than first thought, but he was drafted on the idea that he would get to the majors quickly, with his high floor canceling out his lower ceiling.
At #3 overall in 2012, they took Mike Zunino, a polished college bat who was considered the safest bet to become a big leaguer in the entire draft. In their write-up on Zunino, BA said he projected to be “above average”, noting that he wasn’t as exciting as recent first round college players like Buster Posey or Matt Wieters, but was a really good prospect even without that upside. While catchers often take a bit longer to get to the big leagues, the Mariners have been very aggressive with Zunino, and he’s probably going to make his big league debut at some point later this year.
A #12 overall today, they took D.J. Peterson, a polished college bat who was considered one of the safest bets to become a big leaguer in the entire draft. That title probably belongs to Colin Moran, who went #6 overall, but Moran had been tied to the Mariners earlier in the draft season before it became clear he wouldn’t fall that far. In Peterson, the Mariners drafted another guy with a mature approach and good hitting skills but a bit less upside than other picks in that same range, as he isn’t considered a defensive asset and there is some question as to how much power he’ll hit for outside of the hitter’s haven of his college park in New Mexico.
This isn’t to say that McNamara only likes these kinds of players. After all, he’s also drafted Nick Franklin, Steve Baron, and Taijuan Walker fairly high, and the team has taken their fair share of shots on raw toolsy guys in later rounds. But, four times McNamara has had a fairly high first round pick, and four times McNamara has taken a high floor/moderate upside college guy.
Based on an n of four, it seems like Mac might like these kinds of players more than most other scouting directors in baseball. There are certainly teams that prioritize upside over all else, and some scouts much prefer to go for the home run even if it means they’ll end up with more busts overall. So far, it seems like the Mariners draft board under McNamara has been pushed a bit more by polish and proximity to the big leagues than it has been by pure upside. Or, maybe a better way of saying it is that at the top of the draft board — and relative to other current scouting directors — Mac may place a larger emphasis on present skills over potential.
Despite Ackley’s current problems and Hultzen’s command issues and now shoulder tenderness, I think I’m probably in agreement with this philosophy to a large degree. At the top of the draft, I think it’s more important to not screw up than it is to get a slightly better long term reward. For me, I think it might make sense to be a little more present value oriented with the high picks and save the lottery picks for later, which is basically what the Mariners have done under McNamara. None of this should read as a criticism, and Mac’s overall draft track record is quite strong, even if the top picks aren’t necessarily helping the Mariners win games right now.
But, as we look back at his five drafts, I do think the evidence is starting to lean towards a trend. You can only draft so many polished college guys in a row before you admit that you have a preference for polished college guys.
Game 61, Yankees at Mariners
Aaron Harang vs. Phil Hughes, 7:10pm
By the time the game starts, we’ll know the first round (and probably their second round) draft pick. We’ll have some reactions to the selection, with the caveat that we won’t know much about what pick was a reach and what pick was a steal for many, many years. Hopefully, we can dream about the future while watching the M’s destroy Phil Hughes and the Yankees again. Hughes didn’t make it out of the first inning the last time he faced the murderer’s row that is the Seattle Mariners.
No one was helped by that road trip more than Raul Ibanez, who went from a .653 OPS to near .800 in his first two days in the Bronx. Phil Hughes served up a grand slam to Ibanez in the game on 5/15, and Raul added another HR later, giving him three HRs in his first two games back in New York. Perhaps Hughes would like to apply the defibrillator to Michael Saunders today? Just a thought.
Aaron Harang’s on a very nice two game run, giving up two runs in 15 innings with 12 strikeouts and only four walks. Of course, those games pitted him against below-average opponents, but they still happened. The Angels have a similar wRC+ to the Padres, and Harang’s outings against LA have not gone well. So we’ll hope for another quality outing; we’ll hope he buys the team more time for Erasmo Ramirez to get healthy or for Danny Hultzen to get his shoulder right. The M’s can muddle through with a gaping hole in their rotation, but they can’t do so with three of them. Saunders has stepped up a bit, and Harang needs to keep it up.
The M’s will have someone new in the bullpen today, as Hector Noesi was sent to Tacoma following yesterday’s 16-inning loss. The M’s recalled him for bullpen help, and having burned through their bullpen, they’ve grabbed someone who can actually pitch tonight: Blake Beavan, who was scheduled to start tonight in Tacoma. The M’s obviously feel they have enough situational arms in the ‘pen (sorry Lucas Luetge/Bobby LaFromboise), and need someone capable of throwing 4-5 innings in case the game goes long again, or in case Harang has one of…those games. I feel a bit bad for Tacoma, who had a 14-inning game of their own this week and will need to scramble through a bullpen day today.*
Line-up:
1: Bay, RF
2: Seager, 3B
3: Ibanez, LF
4: Morales, 1B
5: Morse, DH
6: Franklin, 2B
7: Saunders, CF
8: Shoppach, C
9: Ryan, SS
SP: Harang
Here are some mock drafts to read in conjunction with JY’s piece below. Chris Crawford’s is here, and John Sickels’ is here. It’ll be fun watching which picks totally blow up the predictions; Peter Gammons tweeted last night about HS 1B Dominic Smith potentially going #3, for example. It’ll also be fun to see what rumors may have been about draft strategy and negotiations than anything player-related.
As a reminder, the bonus pool caps apply to the first ten rounds, and teams lose the slot money if they fail to sign one of the drafted players in those rounds. At this point, players are floating high bonus demands, and teams may feign interest in lower-rated prospects to get kids to give them leverage against those demands. Mark Appel did fine for himself, and very well may go 1-1, but it’ll be interesting to see what teams, players and agents take from his failure to sign last year. At some level, it gives players some leverage by showing that their demands can be more than wishful thinking – Appel proved that the threat to say ‘no thanks’ is real, even in the new system. But obviously Appel took a tremendous amount of risk in doing so, and teams know it. They also know that the risks are even greater for high-school kids, who would need to shoulder not one but three years of injury risk. It’s worked out for Ryne Stanek, but not so much for Karsten Whitson.
We haven’t talked much about the M’s *other* pick today, the #49 selection. It’s near impossible to forecast the first 12 picks, so predictions about #49 are worthless, but some names of note include Dustin Driver, a RHP from Wenatchee, who’s got a low-90s fastball and who’s dominated competition in central Washington this year. Ryan Boldt was a potential 5-tool OF from Minnesota who went from a first-rounder this spring to a second rounder after an injury essentially wiped out his senior season. Cavan Biggio (Craig’s son) is a 2B from a Texas HS with a commitment to Notre Dame, but may be around at #49. There’s also Chad Pinder, a 3B for Virginia Tech (and you know how the M’s have drafted from ACC school recently), who had something of a down senior season for the Hokies, and C Andrew Knapp of Cal who posted a big season after two so-so ones (and scout quibbles about his ceiling/tools).
* This is the real organizational value of Brian Sweeney, who, whether he starts or not, will probably pitch several innings today. He’s a remarkably versatile pitcher – from Team Italy in the WBC to giving the M’s 30 or so solid innings in 2010, to playing in Japan, to the Rainiers, he works well with young prospects and helps a manager get through a week like this one, where the AAA roster is changing from hour to hour.
The Utility Of Shrugging
A few days ago, someone on Twitter asked me if I thought the Nationals had any chance of signing Bryce Harper to a long-term contract. It’s not like I’d just written about Harper, and it’s not like there have been contract rumors, and the Twitterer in question had spent the previous few days suggesting that Harper’s a princess for sitting out injured. But I answered and answered honestly, saying I had no idea. I’m not a Nationals expert, and I don’t have insight on any potential negotiations. The guy responded, just asking for an opinion, any opinion. He wanted me to say something. So, again, I answered as honestly as I could, saying it’s possible but Harper probably wouldn’t give the Nationals a discount. Essentially, insight without being insight. My answer said nothing.
People want opinions. They want strong, certain, oftentimes provocative opinions. This is not a desire to give in to. This is a desire to fight. It’s good to have opinions. It’s great to have opinions! But it’s critically important to recognize when you don’t have an opinion, or when you’re not sufficiently informed. It’s important to not always declare a position on something. It’s important to not be afraid of uncertainty. In this way, trust can be established and built. In this way, actual strong opinions can carry actual weight, standing out from the ordinary baseline.
It seemed like draft day was the right day for this post, because draft day brings out a whole host of strong opinions. Let’s make one thing clear: when it comes to roster construction, drafts are the thing you know about the least. You’re not out there scouting draft-eligible players. Scouting itself is in large part a subjective exercise, which is why so many scouts differ on so many players. There are statistics, but they’re empty, and no one really cares about numbers in high school or college. Numbers matter a lot in the majors, and a little in the minors. Draft-eligible players don’t have a meaningful, statistical track record. If there’s one time to just defer to the organization, it’s when it’s conducting a draft. They know more than you do, by a lot.
But people care, and people care so much. People select favorites, based on their own preferences, and they celebrate when the favorites are taken and flip out when they’re missed or passed up. It’s not sensible behavior. You know how you think college players are better investments than high schoolers? They’re not. You know how you’d probably rather have a position player than a pitcher? Just because a lot of pitchers have flamed out doesn’t mean a specific one will. There are so many opinions on draft day, and so many of them are way too strong.
Okay, so it usually seems like a mistake to use a high pick on a reliever. That’s infrequent, and it’s not always the wrong thing to do. Let’s think about a team’s draft position. Let’s think about that team’s highest pick. They’ll be selecting from a pool of the best available players. There’s no one right choice. They’re all going to be projected for some career WAR, and many of the WARs are going to be pretty similar. Maybe there’s a Strasburg or Harper standout, but that’s rare, and those guys don’t make it past first. Maybe you want Player X, and maybe the team instead drafts Player Y. The difference in their projections is probably small. They might pan out very differently, but only so much is known at the time of the draft. Every player taken early has an expectation, and every player taken early is good. Teams might blow it on draft day, but odds are you’re not going to know.
In 2005, the Mariners took Jeff Clement instead of Troy Tulowitzki. Tulowitzki is one of the best players in baseball, and Clement has been worth negative WAR. The Mariners are said to have audibled to Clement at the last second, and he proved to be a tremendous disappointment. This is considered one of the worst draft decisions the Mariners have ever made. But Tulo has exceeded his projections. Clement has undershot them. Clement was widely considered a top draft-eligible prospect, and remember that he was a patient, powerful, lefty-hitting catcher. The way things have gone is the way things have gone once. What if the same thing were repeated a hundred times? Maybe, in a different universe, Clement stays healthy and hits, and Tulo struggles. Maybe Clement would’ve turned out were he drafted by another team. At the time of the draft, Clement and Tulo were similar in outlook. So it wouldn’t have made sense to strongly prefer one over the other. There’s a lot of luck that goes into how draft picks turn out. The best ones have great stories about how they were scouted and about how the scouts really believed in them deeply, but the scouts believed in all the busts, too. Clement went third overall in a draft. He didn’t suck, then.
I’ve gotten into talking about the draft specifically, but this is also a bigger-picture principle. Have strong opinions only when they’re warranted, and only when they’re informed. Seldom are they warranted and sufficiently informed on draft day. I get a little self-conscious about the fact that so few of my baseball posts have strong conclusions, but that’s the way I like it, because if I took more positions, I’d be wrong more. The fact of the matter is that we don’t know much. We don’t know a lot about how things happen, and we don’t know a lot about how they will happen later. One can’t be afraid of that, and one can’t pretend like it isn’t true. Predictions can be fun, but they’re a waste of time. The important life skill isn’t arriving at a concrete conclusion — it’s developing the right thought processes. Often, those processes will lead to educated uncertainty. Present and recognize evidence, but don’t make more of the evidence than you should. Assume that everything’s in the gray area between the black and the white.
If you’re expressing yourself, control yourself, and use a volume level you feel is appropriate. There’s a reason there are dynamics in music. People will pay attention to your strong opinions if you arrive at them appropriately and sparingly. If you always sound certain of yourself, people will start to tune you out or point out when you’ve been wrong. If you’re reading or listening, meanwhile, accept and appreciate evidence presented for evidence’s sake. Don’t expect the author to conclude with an authoritative position, and don’t be disappointed if the presentation ends with something soft. That’s for your benefit. To be disappointed by the absence of a strong conclusion is often to be disappointed to not have been misled.
Sometimes, of course, you do just need to make a decision. If you’re dealing with something minor, it doesn’t matter. If you’re in a group and you can’t decide where to go for dinner, just go somewhere for dinner and it’s going to be fine. You don’t need to obsess over making precisely the right choice. And I suppose you could argue that baseball is minor, so you might as well have strong opinions, since ultimately isn’t it just a game? That’s up to you, but personally the way I handle baseball is the way I try to handle my life in general. It’s important to be able to think through things critically, it’s important to say only as much as can be said, and it’s important to accept the uncertainty that’s everywhere, just everywhere you look. Certainty makes you feel safer. That’s temporary.
This has meandered, because I’m writing it off the top of my head and I didn’t prepare an outline. And, ironically, this post about strong opinions contains a strong opinion. You probably have a strong opinion about my use of “ironically.” Let’s move past that. Always be looking for answers. Always understand when an answer isn’t within reach, or when the answer is “I don’t know.” The answer to most questions is “I don’t know.” The fun and the real truth is in the exploration.
Mariners and Yankees in Seattle for Only Time until Playoffs
| MARINERS (26-34) | ΔMs | YANKEES (34-25) | EDGE | |
| HITTING (wOBA*) | -6.6 (18th) | 3.2 | -33.4 (27th) | Mariners |
| FIELDING (RBBIP) | -5.9 (19th) | -2.0 | -10.0 (22nd) | Mariners |
| ROTATION (xRA) | 13.4 (9th) | 2.3 | 9.2 (10th) | Mariners |
| BULLPEN (xRA) | 3.5 (8th) | -0.4 | 21.2 (1st) | Yankees |
| OVERALL (RAA) | 4.4 (15th) | 3.2 | -13.0 (18th) | MARINERS |
It’s draft day. Rather, it’s the first of what is now three draft days. It’s a bit of a futile pursuit since the returns typically take a long time and are notoriously unpredictable. However, since it happens only once a year and offers a bit of respite from the present and allow people to dream of the future. Go read Jay’s post below.
The last time Seattle faced the Yankees, in New York, the Mariners came away looking pretty good and sidled up next to that elusive and spooky .500 figure. Since then the Yankees have gone 9-9, but the Mariners have stumbled to 6-13 and yet the two teams still seem to produce odd ratings above. However, I’ll quote myself from that previous preview.
It seems far-fetched for the Mariners to actually be rated a better team than the Yankees here. I don’t think it is… Secondly, other systems agree that the Mariners have slightly under performed their record while the Yankees have over performed theirs. The gap between the two teams in actual standings is six games. Baseball Prospectus’ third-order standings, which uses expected runs scored and allowed adjusted for opponents has the two team just two games apart.
It’s three weeks later and though the team’s records continued along their respective paths, the two teams still have separated themselves in their underlying metrics. Those B-Pro third-order standings have the Yankees at 29-29 and the Mariners at 29-31. Call the difference between 3rd-order wins and actual wins whatever you want, I’ll use luck. Of teams, the Yankees are the “luckiest” team in all of baseball. The Mariners are the second “unluckiest” in the American League and fifth most in baseball. Get those games back, Mariners!
Names for the First-Round, 2013 Edition
Since I started blogging about this possibly-not-stupid stuff, I’ve been able to set aside draft day to sit down, analyze, and more often than not wait for a rather long time between picks because the Mariners are disinclined towards acquiring supplemental round selections and the early part of the draft is unbearably long. This year, however, the first day of the draft coincides with my most recent graduation (UW, MFA, poetry), and if the process starts up at 4 pm PDT and the ceremonies start at 5 pm, it’s hard to see me sticking around to cover any of this. [I also might not be at my cognitive best the next morning, when more draft happens.]
What I’ve tried to do here is profile some of the names I see floating around. Picking twelfth is in some respects easier and some respects more taxing: easier because the investment is not quite so large, more taxing in that there are more names that should be known, what with the vagaries of the draft. Something weird could easily happen and one of the two top prep outfielders, Austin Meadows and Clint Frazier, could land in our hands simply because other teams think they need pitching more. Or we could see the Mariners pick someone not on the public radar, as they did when they picked Taijuan Walker [after being rumored to the end to be looking at Marcus Littlewood with the same pick]. A not-infinite number of things could happen and undoubtedly one of them will.
I won’t take it personally if anything I say here does not come to fruition. I’m not really in the business of casting baseballs into the fire and then reading how they pop along their seams. I’m only here to apprise you of certain possibilities and leave the rest the results-based analysis. Certainly, someone will come in posting after me once the pick actually happens. Here are ten names in no particular order, not even the one that they were written in.
Read more
Game 60, White Sox at Mariners
Hisashi Iwakuma vs. Dylan Axelrod, 12:40pm
The M’s go for the three-game sweep this afternoon behind Hisashi Iwakuma. The White Sox have hit a bit better than we thought coming in, but they’ve pitched worse – long may this continue. Righthander Dylan Axelrod shut the M’s down for 5+ innings in early April this year, and was tough against them in the cactus league as well. Back then, I talked about his slider being his outpitch and that he may struggle against lefties. : Pulls at collar and laughs nervously : So uh, forget that. It’s absolutely true that he’s gotten more whiffs and more strikeouts on the slider than any other pitch (he also throws a four- and two-seam fastball, a curve, and a change-up). But as a guy who doesn’t strike many batters out, that only tells us so much.
This year, Axelrod’s best pitch has been his change-up, a pitch he throws less than 20% of the time, and pretty much solely to lefties. He’s faced a lot of lefthanders (61% of opposing baters), so in part he’s *had* to develop something besides his slider. But his change-up isn’t used to get strikeouts or swinging strikes – or rather, if that’s what he’s trying to do, it’s not working. Instead, he uses it to get ground balls and weak contact. If *that’s* what he’s trying to do, so far so good. He’s not given up a home run on his change-up in his brief career, and while judging pitches based solely on their results with a guy who hasn’t pitched a full season is dicey, he’s given up two doubles on his 200+ change-ups. And he’s done it without making anyone miss. He’s recorded three strikeouts ending with a change, but giving batters something else to think about and having a pitch that generates choppers and fly-outs isn’t bad.
It would sound horribly unsustainable (look at that BABIP!) if we haven’t watched Hisashi Iwakuma and his amazing splitter. Iwakuma’s pitched a bit more, so he’s thrown three times as many splitters, and like Axelrod, he’s yet to give up a HR on one,* and has a career ISO-against on splitters of .037, which looks like Axelrod’s .039. Let’s be clear, here: Iwakuma’s splitter is miles better than Axelrod’s change. It gets whiffs AND grounders. It’s been tested much more, and it’s passed each test. It also helps to explain why both have reverse platoon splits. Again, these should be regressed severely, so maybe the best we can say is that they’re unlikely to have extreme platoon splits, with opposite-handed hitters crushing them. But we have some reason to think that their reverse splits aren’t just dumb luck.
Today’s big story is the apparent promotion of Tacoma back-up catcher Brandon Bantz to Seattle to replace Jesus Sucre who was struck in the finger by a batter’s follow-through in last night’s game and had to be replaced by Kelly Shoppach. With Jesus Montero injured (he’s apparently having surgery today), that left the M’s with only one catcher on the roster. Their options seemed to be to have 41-year old Raul Ibanez as the emergency catcher or to make a move. Bantz is essentially a paler version of Sucre. He hasn’t hit at all in the minors, but the organization loves his arm (he made probably the best throw I’ve seen all year in Monday’s game to catch Jemile Weeks) and he’s been a solid defensive back-up for years after the M’s drafted him out of Dallas Baptist University in 2009. Mike Curto noted the similarities to 2011, when the M’s brought up Jose Yepez to essentially be the emergency back-up for a week; Yepez unfortunately never got into a game. Yepez could hit, sort of, with a good K:BB ratio making up for a lack of power. But he clearly wasn’t around to hit, and everyone knew it. Same thing with Sucre, of course. Bantz is now the second catcher that essentially no one thought would ever sniff the majors to make the 30-mile trip north from Tacoma, and I’m hoping that Sucre essentially taking the starting job from Shoppach means the club will think about getting Brandon into a game. He’s not going to hit worse than Sucre. And while we think of ballplayers being impossibly rich, spoiled jocks, it’s probably worth noting that guys like Bantz (and Sucre) make very, very little money playing year to year without being on the 40-man roster. Unlike high draft picks, Bantz went in the 30th round, so his bonus probably went towards rent for a fraction of one minor league season. Just being on the active roster for a week or so will get Bantz more money than he’d earn in an entire minor league season, even at the AAA level.
The corresponding move? The M’s abandoned their plan to get Franklin Gutierrez another 20-day rehab assignment and instead moved him to the 60-day DL. That got a 40-man spot, and to make room on the 25, they’ve optioned Carlos Triunfel to Tacoma. Sure, they could’ve done that a week ago when they brought up Bonderman, but they didn’t. I know some fans are miffed that they had to lose a player (Catricala in that case) to bring in Bonderman for one or two starts, but at some point, they’ve got to start culling their 40-man. They’ve moved off Catricala and Francisco Martinez, but more decisions loom with Erasmo Ramirez and, hopefully, Danny Hultzen on the mend. I’m somewhat sympathetic to them, as needing to clear a roster spot to bring in Brandon Bantz (because Jesus freaking Sucre was hurt) just wasn’t something they could’ve anticipated in April. Franklin Gutierrez getting hurt, well, that IS something that could’ve been anticipated.
The line-up:
1: Chavez, RF
2: Bay, LF
3: Seager, 3B
4: Morales, 1B
5: Ibanez, DH
6: Franklin, 2B
7: Saunders, CF
8: Shoppach, C
9: Ryan, SS
SP: Iwakuma
Rainiers are off today, but they’ll host Las Vegas from Thursday-Sunday. Friday’s game looks like the prospecty-est, as Vegas may go with Mets’ top prospect Zach Wheeler. Tomorrow’s game features DJ Mitchell starting for Las Vegas; he opened the year in Tacoma’s rotation.
AA Jackson’s off too, but open a series tomorrow with an early game against Tennessee. Er, they’re scheduled to play tonight at Tennessee, with Anthony Fernandez starting, but it’s raining heavily. Tomorrow’s game may be a double-header.
* With Iwakuma’s velo down a bit in early April, it was a bit tough to separate out the splits and two-seamers. BrooksBaseball has the most questionable pitch, the long HR he gave up to Adam Dunn in Chicago, as a two-seamer. MLBAM had it as a splitter. We’ll go with Brooks, but if you thought that pitch looked like a bad splitter, well, you weren’t alone.