Game 51, Mariners at Angels
Olson vs Santana.
I’m still looking forward to seeing Ichiro’s season spun into a negative story about him. Suggestions:
– Ichiro’s consistent hitting puts undue pressure on other players to perform, and they’re pressing at the plate, causing the team’s offensive woes, and he refuses to go 0-fer to let them relax.
– Ichiro’s speed and smart baserunning makes other players look comparatively worse, forcing them to worry about getting good leads and not being thrown out, distracting them and causing them to take bad leads and get thrown out.
– Ichiro’s (and the outfield’s, for that matter) consistent fielding are making the pitchers concentrate on trying to get fly balls, which takes them away from pitching to their strengths and makes them more prone to giving up home runs.
Good luck with that!
Griffey done and an anchor of the lineup
(and that’s your 09 lineup for you)
The bait we were supposed to bite on this off-season, fixed to hook by Griffey’s agent, was that Griffey’s hitting struggles of late came from his (possibly un- or semi-)disclosed knee injury, but he’d be great now that the knee was better.
I was pretty skeptical. A lot of people were skeptical. And here’s where we are now:
He’s taking a ton of walks. 16% of his plate appearances. More walks than any time in his career except the shortened 1995 season. And he’s got no power.
Now, he’s not in Vidro territory…
Griffey 09: .213/.336/.369
Vidro 08: .234/.274/.338
… though it’s a little depressing to think the husk of Vidro’s career was a better contact hitter than Griffey is now.
While we’re looking at lines
Griffey 09: .213/.336/.369
AL 09: .268/.339/.428
But here’s his batting average on balls in play, a good measure of how hard he’s hitting the ball, from Fangraphs:
And here’s his raw power for a second look at that:
Yeah, Griffey’s been injured on and off, but that’s the normal curve of a player getting old. They take more pitches, both from experience and because they can’t make swing and make good contact on more pitches than before.
Here’s the problem, though: this version of Griffey, a patient low-contact hitter with minimal power against right-handers, who we’re really pulling to finish the season hitting .250/.360/.420… he’s the third-best hitter on the team.
Behind Ichiro! who is awesome and Branyan, who as Dave notes has had his share of luck so far. And Branyan might still get traded. And Endy Chavez, not far behind, is another likely trade candidate. Wlad’s not hitting lately. Beltre should start hitting any minute. Like now would be good. No rush. Please? Seriously, Adrian, we’ve been manning the barricades for you for years, and our resolve is waning.
The good thing is DH is pretty easy to solve. You want a LH bat? Call up Clement. If the M’s want to hang in the race, they’re going to have to figure out how to get production out of that position for the fourth time since Ibanez moved back to left field after 2005 (though the 07 Vidro was at least above league average).
Saturday
Game 50, Mariners at Angels
Felix v Palmer. Betancourt’s at #2 again, Rob Johnson is… playing and despite being so bad you might plausibly DH for him instead of Felix if you were allowed, he’s batting #7 ahead of Chavez and Gutierrez. I don’t get it, but whatever, right? Go team!
USSM get-together in NC – last reminder
Sunday, May 31 in Durham at Champps Sports. You can watch the Mariners game at 3:35 in the private dining area. Dave says he’ll be there an hour or so before, and apparently there’s been a Jeff Shaw sighting. No admission fee, just whatever you eat and drink (tip generously, your server’s in a recession too).
What with all the USS Mariner folks in North Carolina, it’s a shame the move of two teams from the California League to the Carolina League didn’t work out, or they could see the Mariners’ Class-A squad all the time and let us know how Aumont’s doing. That, plus anything to get us out of High Desert.
Game 49, Mariners at Angels
Vargas v Lackey. Sorry for terseness.
Who’s the real Jose Lopez?
Yuniesky Betancourt has been a frequent target for criticism this year, but in terms of wins, Jose Lopez is hurting us even more. The M’s are 1.7 wins below replacement level in the middle infield so far (-1.0 for Lopez, -0.7 for Betancourt). Even with Betancourt’s terrible defense and complete lack of clue at the plate, Lopez has been the worst player on the team so far.
Last year, Lopez made significant progress offensively, encouraging many of us who’ve believed in his potential. While he wasn’t going to be more than average defensively, he was still relatively young and cheap, an above-average hitter for his position, and maybe he could still add some power as he matured. This year, he’s fallen off a cliff. So what’s happened?
There are a lot of ways to look at this, each of which is just one part of the puzzle. But put together, they suggest why replacing Lopez needs to be just as much a priority as replacing Betancourt.
Let’s start with the “Lopez came into his own in 2008” theory. As Dave has frequently pointed out, you can’t just ignore his performance in previous years. A lot of people have wanted to excuse his horrible second half of 2007 because his brother died in June and he had a hard time concentrating on baseball after that. That wasn’t the real Jose Lopez, we thought. I admit to believing that myself a bit. Well, we’re far enough into the season that sample sizes aren’t quite so small anymore, and this Jose Lopez is a lot like that one:
Jose Lopez, post-ASB 2007: .213/.238/.281
Jose Lopez, 2009: .216/.259/.307
Pretty close, and if you added in his slightly-better-but-still-bad performance from mid-June (when his brother was killed) to mid-July 2007, the two are virtually the same. Some of that’s bad luck (identical .232 BABIP), but even allowing for some regression, it’s the real Lopez now and it was the real Lopez then. I’m not saying 2008 wasn’t real too, but it’s increasingly looking like Lopez’s peak, not something we can count on him to repeat year after year.
Other things are going on that are new this year, though. Here are some batted ball numbers for Lopez as a full-time player:
| Season | LD% | GB% | FB% | HR/FB |
| 2006 | 18.2% | 48.6% | 33.2% | 5.7% |
| 2007 | 17.0% | 45.7% | 37.4% | 6.4% |
| 2008 | 20.3% | 44.1% | 35.6% | 8.2% |
| 2009 | 19.9% | 34.0% | 46.2% | 4.2% |
He’s hitting line drives the same as always, but his groundball and flyball percentages have completely flipped. Meanwhile, those flyballs are turning into home runs at the lowest rate of his career. I’m not sure what’s going on here, but it’s as if last year convinced him to change his swing to go for more power, while at the same time the power itself has disappeared. We may still see some drift back to Lopez’s career norms, but in general these percentages tend to stabilize pretty quickly, and we’re approaching the point where we have to look at this as a meaningful change. I’m not saying the way for him to be successful is to beat the ball into the ground like Ichiro, but Lopez will never be a big power hitter. If he thinks he is, we’re in for a lot more fly balls to the warning track.
Meanwhile, there’s the question of his defense. His UZR/150 at second base:
2006: 5.0
2007: 1.4
2008: -4.8
2009: -11.8
You have to consider fielding metrics over multiple years, so we can’t just conclude that he’s as bad as it looks this year, but he’s certainly no better than average. And you definitely have to be worried about the appearance of a trend here (much like Betancourt). The real Jose Lopez is a below-average second baseman, and the sooner we can upgrade at that position, the better.
Zduriencik Speaks
Former Seattle P-I writer Jon Paul Morosi got some quotes from Jack Zduriencik about the team and what his feelings are on the roster. Here’s the important quotes.
“We’re not in any hurry to do anything,” Zduriencik said earlier this week. “You talk to GMs all the time, just casual conversations. Most of the time, it doesn’t go anywhere. There haven’t been any offers on the table yet.”
“Erik’s been good — really good. I’ve been very happy with Erik Bedard. His stuff’s been really good, really crisp. … I wasn’t here (last year), so I don’t really know anything about that firsthand. He was in an organization (Baltimore) for a long period of time, had to switch, go all the way across the country, and then he wasn’t healthy. Those things worked against him. … But he’s real happy now. He’s got a smile on his face.”
“Right now, my investment is in this season,” he said. “We’re doing everything we can to keep ourselves in this race.”
Nothing overly surprising yet. The M’s aren’t going to publicly pull the plug on the team right as they head into Anaheim for a three game series. But, assuming this weekend doesn’t go perfectly for the M’s, Jack knows that he’ll wake up on Monday with a team that has a less than 10% chance of making the playoffs, and there are some teams out there getting antsy to make a deal for pitching. The first GM to agree to trade a starting pitcher is probably going to be the guy who wins this summer. Let’s hope Zduriencik is that guy.
Oh, and one other note on the article. Morosi throws this comment out there:
When the time comes, Seattle will probably look to acquire a young, power-hitting outfielder. Endy Chavez and Wladimir Balentien have formed the least productive left-field platoon in the majors by OPS, so that would be the obvious place to add a big bat.
This incorrect sentiment is echoed by John McGrath in his “blow up the M’s” piece for the News Tribune today, and will be repeated over and over all summer long, I’m sure. The last thing the M’s need to be trading for is an outfielder. As we mentioned this morning, Saunders is knocking on the door down in Triple-A, and the team is extremely likely to be drafting Dustin Ackley in two weeks. Beyond those two, Balentien’s still got some fans in the organization, and the team has outfielders coming out their ears at Double-A and below. It is the position of the most depth in the entire system.
The M’s do not need any more outfielders. They need infielders, specifically 2B/SS/3B, and pitchers. The team has more outfielders than they know what to do with.
The 2010 Rookies
As we look towards 2010, we can be fairly sure that the roster is going to look significantly different than it does today. Bedard, Beltre, Washburn, Branyan, Griffey, Sweeney, Chavez, and Batista are all free agents at the end of the year, and we’re pretty sure that the team won’t be bringing back both of Lopez/Betancourt as their middle infield. It’s quite feasible that both could go away. Johjima’s future in Seattle is in question as well.
In all, we’re looking at around ten players being replaced for next year’s team. That’s a lot of turnover, and those open positions create opportunities for guys in the organization to step up and grab a spot on the team. While the M’s farm system is short on upper level pitching, there are five guys in Triple-A who could each make a pretty good case for a spot on next year’s team: Jeff Clement, Mike Carp, Michael Saunders, Adam Moore, and Matt Tuiasosopo.
However, there’s basically no chance that the team goes with five rookies in the line-up at the same time next year. They aren’t doing the tear-down style of rebuild, and the goal will certainly be to contend for the division title next year. Despite all five having pretty decent cases for being major league ready, Wak isn’t going to want to break in five rookies while trying to win the AL West. I would suspect that the team will probably limit themselves to two or three rookies, at most, in the line-up next year.
However, you can make a pretty good case that none of these guys should spend 2010 in Triple-A.
Clement obviously has nothing left to prove in the PCL – another trip through Tacoma won’t do him any good, and it’s hard to see the M’s actually sending him back there again.
Carp has cooled off after a monstrous April, but he’s still showing both power and patience, as a left-handed first baseman, he fits one of the things the team will need next year. His bat isn’t as good as Clement’s, but he’s ahead of him defensively as a 1B, and we know that Wak highly values defense.
Saunders has shown significant improvement in improving his contact, which was the big knock on him coming into the season. As a left-handed hitting outfielder with good athleticism and gap power, he’s a perfect fit for LF in Safeco.
Moore’s move up to the PCL hasn’t slowed him down at all, as his numbers in Triple-A are basically a dead ringer for his numbers in Double-A. While he doesn’t have the defensive reputation of Rob Johnson, his offense is significantly better, as he actually has a pretty solid approach at the plate.
Finally, there’s Tui, who is on the DL with elbow problems but opened a lot of eyes with a strong spring training. His defense at third is never going to be Beltre level, but given his improvement over the last year and the way that he impressed Wak, he’d seemingly have an inside edge on the open third base position for next year.
From a micro level, there’s a pretty decent case to be made for all five of these guys grabbing jobs next year. However, there’s just no way the M’s go into the year with Tui at third, Saunders in left, Carp at first, Clement at DH, and Moore behind the plate. The club will consider those guys for jobs on an individual basis, but they’re not handing all of those jobs over to the Triple-A brigade next year.
So, if you don’t want to give them major league jobs at the same time, but you also don’t want to make them languish in Tacoma for no reason, there’s just one solution – trades. As the July 31st deadline approaches, the M’s will certainly be more focused on making deals for their free agents to be, but don’t rule out the chance that Zduriencik takes advantage of the trading season to shift some parts around.
Be More Encouraged
In Tacoma tonight:
Ryan Rowland-Smith – 5 innings, 3 hits, 0 runs, 1 walk, 3 strikeouts, 81 pitches. They’ll probably give him another rehab start, but it doesn’t look like he really needs it. If the team wants to trade Bedard or Washburn after this weekend, the rotation replacement is ready.
Adam Moore – 2 for 3 with a home run. It was his first longball since joining the Rainiers.
In West Tennessee tonight:
Josh Fields – 1 inning, 0 hits, 0 runs, 2 walks, 1 strikeout. It was the first time he’d pitched since May 5th, after the team shut him down with “dead arm”. He wasn’t exactly sharp, as he only threw seven strikes in 19 pitches, but he miraculously got three outs anyway.
By the way, High Desert and Lancaster are currently tied at 0 in the 7th inning. This might not be encouraging, as I think scoreless games between those two teams are a sign of the apocalypse.