Game 11, Rangers at Mariners
Felix Hernandez vs. Justin Grimm, 7:10pm
The Astros series offered something of a no-win bargain: if the M’s won the series, or even swept it, eh, who cares? They were playing the Astros. If they lost it, oh my god, you just lost to the ASTROS? Today’s match-up isn’t no-win. Anytime you get to see Felix Hernandez, you’ve won. But if Felix pitches the M’s past Justin Grimm, eh, of course you won *that* game. And if he doesn’t, more and more fans will start to watch from home, or maybe give a Sounders game a go. I don’t envy the M’s here. The Supreme Court promotion tonight is great, and it shows that sometimes, rarely, the right ballplayer actually can put a dent in attendance numbers all by himself.
The context for the game is troubling, as it always is when these two teams face off. The Rangers are, in my opinion, one of the best-run franchises in sports. The M’s are…struggling, as they have been for several years now. Jack Zduriencik and crew clearly faced tremendous obstacles when they began their work in Seattle, and I don’t mean to minimize them in any way, but Bill Bavasi left in 2008, and it’s not impolite to point out that the obstacles the franchise faces now are largely self-imposed.
Everyone – every team in baseball -makes dumb trades. Jaso for Lueke comes to mind. So I’m not going to argue that Jon Daniels is a miracle-worker who out-thinks his rivals. He’s good, but that’s not enough. Where they seem to shine is in player development. They extract value from more players, and more *types* of players, than anyone. Justin Grimm is a decent example. The year he was drafted (in the 5th round in 2010, a few picks after Stephen Pryor), he pitched for the University of Georgia. He went 7-12 over three years with the Bulldogs, and gave up 138 runs in a bit over 180 total innings. He had a live arm, so-so control and zero command. In the Rangers system, he’s been excellent at every stop, coming out of nowhere to land in the top 10 of the Rangers top prospect list at Fangraphs (and the Rangers had a great system). I’m not sure what the Rangers have done with Grimm, and if asked, they probably wouldn’t say. But the Rangers took a talented kid who was quite obviously doing something, or several things, wrong and they fixed it well enough to get to the majors.
They’re not infallible. They’re still working on 2010 1st rounder Kellin Deglan, and Julio Borbon just got DFA’d as he never learned to hit. And every system has its successes – the M’s tweaks to Brad Miller’s swing mechanics appear to have paid off so far, and their work with Taijuan Walker has been excellent. But it seems like every time these series pop up, the Rangers are sloughing off some adversity by pulling up some nobody that they developed. Meanwhile, every time these series pop up, Mariner fans are worrying about their struggling blue-chip franchise-core players. Colby Lewis went from a joke of an acquisition to an extremely important starter to injured, but the Rangers had depth in someone like Alexi Ogando that they could move between the pen and the rotation. Borbon sucked, but they acquired Leonys Martin and developed defensive whiz Craig Gentry.
OK, enough meta-gloom (metancholy?). Justin Grimm is a fastball/curveball righthander with low-mid 90s velocity. He’ll mix in a change-up to lefties, but he’ll use the curve to both lefties/righties, especially once he’s ahead in the count. He had average-ish ground ball rates in the minors, but I’d expect they’d be lower in the big leagues, especially as he hardly ever throws his sinker. The M’s still aren’t a great on-base team, so as usual, they’re going to need a long ball or two this year (man, that’s still weird to type). Grimm hasn’t shown much in the way of exceptional splits, so the M’s aren’t loading up with as many lefties as they could. So of that is by choice (see below), and some of that has to do with Michael Saunders’ shoulder.
In 2010-2011, the idea of Dustin Ackley facing a guy like this would’ve made us excited. Now, while I’m definitely leaning a little closer when Ackley’s up, it’s for slightly different reasons. Tonight, he’s got the day off, against a righty. Gotta be flexible. Gotta get everyone out there.
Line-up:
1: Gutierrez, CF
2: Seager, 3B
3: Morales, DH
4: Morse, RF
5: Ibanez, LF
6: Smoak, 1B
7: Montero, C
8: Andino, 2B
9: Ryan, SS
SP: King Felix
Saunders shoulder injury was severe enough that he’ll head to the DL for 15 days. Saunders himself said it wasn’t too bad, and described it as ‘day to day’ but the M’s wanted to bring in some help: they have apparently called up Endy Chavez who was off to a red-hot start in Tacoma (though several guys down there can say the same). They’ll need a 40-man move to do that, but I haven’t heard what it is.
The Tacoma Rainiers home opener is tomorrow night. You should probably go. All the dingers of the big club, with none of the ennui! Tonight though, they finish off their series in Sacramento, with Jeremy Bonderman on the hill, trying to keep himself in the discussion for pitching depth.
Two other M’s affiliates faced one of the most dreaded occurrences in the minors: rain-outs on home opening days. Jackson’s home opener’s off, and Clinton’s was scratched due to a water-logged field. Teams can count on great attendance only a few times a year, and so they do a collective rain dance around opening day, and generally try to get the game in unless the rain’s torrential. If you went to the first game in the redesigned Cheney Stadium, you know the phenomenon. The wind and rain that night were awful, and it had chased 60-70% of the fans by the 6th inning or so, but they were not going to suspend the park’s grand opening. I always wonder how many rain-out teams have on their big mid-summer games – the 4th of July in some parks, the 3rd of July in Tacoma. From what Mike Curto says, calling off one of those games can have huge financial ramifications.
That Old Time Feeling Returns
| MARINERS (4-6) | ΔMs | RANGERS (6-3) | EDGE | |
| HITTING (wOBA*) | -6.0 (23rd) | -1.2 | -2.2 (20th) | Rangers |
| FIELDING (RBBIP) | 2.1 (13th) | -10.1 | 6.8 (3rd) | Rangers |
| ROTATION (xRA) | -0.7 (17th) | 0 | 9.5 (1st) | Rangers |
| BULLPEN (xRA) | -1.5 (22nd) | 1.0 | 0.4 (15th) | Rangers |
| OVERALL (RAA) | -6.1 (20th) | -10.4 | 14.4 (4th) | RANGERS |
Well that was an unpleasant series. Both for those of us at home and for the very few that sought out attending in person. After not selling out the home opener, the Mariners saw consecutive record low numbers of visitors on Tuesday and Wednesday. The performances on those days probably didn’t do much to convince those that did attend to consider it time well spent. Not only were the games lopsided, but they also dragged on to nearly four hours each.
And now we have some fallout from it as Kameron Loe goes away and Aaron Harang enters, probably displacing someone out of the rotation, I’m assuming Blake Beavan. The implosion on Tuesday made the Mariners wary about who was going to handle innings, but that’s not the only way the roster was exposed during the series. A serious lack of bench depth and proper pinch hitting options manifested itself and now they have Michael Saunders’ injury to contend with and the possibility of some truly horrendous outfield defense arrangements.
Speaking of the bullpen, it appears not so stellar thus far, but there are some encouraging fundamentals lurking under the surface level stats. Despite only an average-ish walk rate as a unit, the Mariners’ pen has been throwing pitches in the strike zone at the second highest clip in baseball. And unlike the team that’s best at that, the Rockies, the Mariners’ pen doesn’t also suffer from the league’s highest contact rate. In fact, the Mariners are league average there. So as far as throwing strikes and missing bats, the pen seems fine.
What they have been struggling with is when contact is made, it’s been rock hard. Hitters are getting lots of fly balls and lots of those fly balls have been pulled. They’ll need to improve on that a lot or else Kameron Loe won’t be the only home run-induced casualty.
Mariners to Acquire Aaron Harang
I mentioned this as a pretty strong possibility yesterday, as Aaron Harang was hanging out in limbo after being DFA’d by the Rockies after they acquired him from the Dodgers in a cost savings maneuver. Harang was a pitcher without a team, and the Mariners are a team without good pitchers. The fit seemed fairly obvious. And so, today, Ken Rosenthal is reporting that the Mariners and Rockies are working through a deal that will bring Aaron Harang to Seattle, in exchange for an unnamed minor league reliever. You shouldn’t expect it to be anyone special — Harang is basically a salary dump.
So why would two teams dump a Proven Veteran (TM) that threw 180 innings with a 3.61 ERA last year? Especially after he threw 170 innings with a 3.64 ERA the year before?
Well, if you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you probably know that ERA isn’t a very good way to evaluate pitching talent. And, so, while Harang has posted decent ERAs in pitcher friendly parks in the National League the last two years, the underlying data that projects his performance going forward is, well, not very good.
Here’s his career in a table of data that tells a more accurate story.
| Season | IP | BB% | K% | GB% | HR/FB | LOB% | BABIP | ERA- | FIP- | xFIP- |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2002 | 78.1 | 13% | 18% | 31% | 6% | 71% | 0.302 | 110 | 101 | 116 |
| 2003 | 76.1 | 6% | 13% | 41% | 12% | 66% | 0.307 | 120 | 104 | 102 |
| 2004 | 161 | 8% | 18% | 42% | 13% | 73% | 0.301 | 111 | 105 | 97 |
| 2005 | 211.2 | 6% | 18% | 39% | 9% | 75% | 0.303 | 89 | 85 | 92 |
| 2006 | 234.1 | 6% | 22% | 39% | 11% | 74% | 0.312 | 82 | 79 | 82 |
| 2007 | 231.2 | 6% | 23% | 40% | 10% | 74% | 0.288 | 81 | 79 | 80 |
| 2008 | 184.1 | 6% | 19% | 34% | 14% | 74% | 0.307 | 109 | 108 | 95 |
| 2009 | 162.1 | 6% | 20% | 35% | 12% | 76% | 0.331 | 98 | 96 | 92 |
| 2010 | 111.2 | 8% | 16% | 37% | 10% | 69% | 0.338 | 130 | 113 | 111 |
| 2011 | 170.2 | 8% | 17% | 41% | 9% | 78% | 0.302 | 103 | 118 | 109 |
| 2012 | 179.2 | 11% | 17% | 39% | 6% | 72% | 0.277 | 96 | 111 | 126 |
And here’s a graph of the two most important numbers in that table, and Harang’s career trend in those two rates:
Aaron Harang was once very good. He didn’t walk anyone and he struck a lot of guys out, so his HR problem wasn’t too big of an issue. But, then, in 2010, he stopped striking people out, and now he’s turned into a guy who nibbles at the corners of the strike zone. His walk rate is up, his strikeout rate is down, and his success the last two years was almost entirely due to low HR rates. His career HR/FB rate is 10.3%, but last year, it was 6.3%, which allowed him to put runners on but not let too many score.
Unfortunately, HR/FB rate isn’t particularly predictive, and is nowhere near as predictive as BB% and K%, both of which suggest that Harang isn’t particularly good anymore. Mixed in with Harang’s below average ground ball rate, that put his xFIP-, which is park adjusted and relative to league average, at 126 last year. That’s basically replacement level. For context, Blake Beavan‘s career xFIP- is 117.
Now, that’s just one year, and Harang has been much better than he was last year before, so there’s a pretty good chance that Harang is better than Beavan. But, don’t be fooled by the ERA. Harang isn’t good, which is why the Dodgers dumped him and the Rockies had no interest in keeping him. He’s an innings eater trying to hang on to the remains of his career. As a #5 starter, he might be okay for a while, but he’s certainly not any kind of salvation. He’ll be better than Beavan, most likely, but not particularly good. If Erasmo Ramirez ever gets healthy, then Harang will also have to be better than Brandon Maurer to stay in the rotation. Harang might be better than Maurer too, the kid can’t figure out how to get his breaking balls to stop hanging in the middle of the strike zone, so maybe Harang sticks around for a while.
But, Harang is basically a worse version of Jon Garland, the guy who the M’s let go a few weeks ago. It’s the same idea, just without the same ability to throw strikes. Hooray veteran mediocrity.
In terms of the trade, I’ll withhold judgment until we know the financial aspects of the deal. Harang’s contract includes a $2 million buyout for 2014, which the Dodgers got the Rockies to be on the hook for in the initial swap. Hopefully, the Mariners got the Rockies to chip in on part of that, or else this move will end up reducing their payroll next year so that they can pay Harang to not pitch for them.
Update: The M’s gave up RHP Steven Hensley, a fringe prospect at best, who started the year in Tacoma’s bullpen. Because he wasn’t on the 40 man roster, they had to create a spot for Aaron Harang, so Kameron Loe was designated for assignment. That strongly suggests that a starter will be moving into Loe’s long relief role, and it makes far more sense for that guy to be Beavan than Maurer, given their development paths.
Podcast: Mariners Upset Us
Welcome back, few internet listeners!
Jeff and I are here with another podcast. This one is more along the lines of our previous incarnations in that it’s quite a bit longer and meanders a bit from baseball. Surprisingly, we did not end up discussing volcanoes in any form or fashion. We did record this prior to last night’s game so that’s why there’s no discussion of Michael Saunders’ injury. If you’d like to imagine what the segment about Casper Wells would be like if we had waited a couple hours, just turn up the volume to 18 or something and insert a lot more curses.
Which is to say, there are already some curses in case you weren’t aware and were exposing your own or your children’s delicate sensibilities to these podcasts for some reason. Then again, you’re also probably exposing them to the Seattle Mariners so you have no right to complain about anything.
Podcast with Jeff and Matthew: Direct link! || iTunes link! || RSS/XML link!
Game 10, Astros at Mariners
Blake Beavan vs. Brad Peacock, 7:10pm
Well, it’s almost certainly going to be better than last night’s game. Blake Beavan is going to try and spare the bullpen, and newly minted Mariner Bobby LaFromboise is on hand if he can’t.
Brad Peacock was traded from Oakland in the Jed Lowrie deal, a year after being acquired from Washington in the Gio Gonzalez trade. He’d posted great results in AA with the Nats organization, but hit a wall in the hitter-friendly PCL last year, posting a full-season ERA over 6. He’s an over-the-top right-hander with an extremely straight fastball – it’s almost a cutter. He throws that four-seamer around 93, and mixes in a curveball and a change-up. Thanks to his delivery and arsenal, he never showed much in the way of platoon splits, so if Mike Morse would like to continue hitting homers, he should go right ahead and feel free..wait, he’s not in the line-up?
Blake Beavan’s transformation into a ground-ball pitcher didn’t really work in his first start. Second time’s the charm?
Line-up:
1: Saunders, RF
2: Gutierrez, CF
3: Morales, DH
4: Ibanez, LF
5: Seager, 3B
6: Smoak, 1B
7: Ackley, 2B
8: Shoppach, C
9: Ryan, SS
SP: Beavan
Nick Franklin’s in the line-up today for Tacoma. He’d been out the first week with the flu or something.
Taijuan Walker’s pitching right now for AA Jackson, and Andrew Carraway goes tonight for Tacoma in Sacramento.
And The Moves Are…
Casper Wells was claimed on waivers by the Blue Jays. So he’s gone and the M’s get nothing. I’m happy for Casper, though – Toronto is a great fit for him, as a park that really rewards right-handed pull power, and they’ve got an organization that will use him the right way. He’s probably going to top out as a good fourth outfielder who should play mostly against lefties, but he’s got value in that role, and he can help the Blue Jays. Glad to see him land in a spot where he has a chance to succeed.
Also, according to Ryan Divish, the organization is staying in-house for their pitching help today. Lucas Luetge will get optioned to Tacoma and be replaced by Bobby LaFromboise, so they’re swapping out one lefty for another. Luetge had a nice run as a LOOGY last year, but he’s not really much of a big league reliever, and he might not be back any time soon. Whether LaFromboise sticks around long term or they make another move to get a more legitimate long relief type guy on the roster — perhaps by acquiring a starter and moving Beavan back to the bullpen — remains to be seen.
One Move Coming, Maybe Two
After asking the bullpen to throw nearly 200 pitches tonight, the Mariners are probably going to have to make a roster move before Wednesday’s game. Blake Beavan can’t be counted on to give the weary group a rest and the team doesn’t have an off day until Monday, so they’re likely going to need to bring in an arm who can work multiple innings in case things get out of hand again tomorrow. There aren’t any great internal candidates, unfortunately, so while we know one move is coming tomorrow, it might turn out to be two, or one larger move.
The one we know is happening is the finality of Casper Wells‘ new home. His 10 day DFA period ends on Wednesday, so the organization has to either trade him or lose him on waivers. The expectation has been that they’d end up trading him for some non-roster fringe prospect, but if they want a big league arm instead, the Rockies just acquired and then DFA’d Aaron Harang in a cost savings maneuver, so the M’s could potentially try to interest Colorado in some kind of Wells for Harang swap. The Rockies don’t need another outfielder, but they could probably get more for Wells than they could for Harang, and Harang is the most available Major League pitcher on the market right now.
Of course, he got moved by the Dodgers because he didn’t want to work out of the bullpen, so if the Mariners were going to bring him in, he’d probably have to take someone’s rotation spot. They might not be so inclined to kick Brandon Maurer back to the minors after just two starts, but they could potentially dump Kameron Loe and shift Beavan to long relief, a role which the organization hopefully learned is still needed given the lack of quality pitchers in the rotation.
Of course, the M’s could do something entirely different with Wells and still acquire Harang. Or they might not acquire anyone, and just choose to bring Hector Noesi back from Double-A for a few days for a just-in-case situation. Noesi’s not the only internal candidate, but he’s the guy on the 40 man who is already stretched out to pitch multiple innings and hasn’t started a game in the last few days. If they decided to go with a more traditional reliever rather than a long guy, Yoervis Medina hasn’t pitched in a few days for Tacoma. They do have non-trade options; they just aren’t very good.
Anyway, long story short, Casper Wells officially goes away tomorrow, and he might not be the only one. I wouldn’t be shocked if Kameron Loe’s days on the roster were over. We’ll find out soon enough.
Game 9, Astros vs Mariners
Brandon Maurer vs. Erik Bedard, 7:10pm
Quick one while I attempt to cook some dinner.
Game two of the series, and the M’s face the second SP who was DFA’d at some point in 2012. So far, so Astros.
Brandon Maurer’s pitch selection in his first game was Madison Bumgarner-like. Pitching at home, and facing a team who’s striking out like Mark Reynolds in an eye patch, I don’t expect that pattern to change. I do expect better results, though.
Line-up:
1: Gutierrez, CF
2: Saunders, RF
3: Morales, DH
4: Morse, LF
5: Smoak, 1B
6: Montero, C
7: Ackley, 2B
8: Andino, 3B
9: Ryan, SS
SP: Maurer
The minor league rotations have turned over, so Danny Hultzen starts tonight in Sacramento. And I can report that Reds lefty Tony Cingrani is now up to 12 1/3 IP with no runs allowed on three hits, one walk and 21 Ks. Not too bad. Would love to see him face Mike Zunino right now.
Fall In Love With Carter Capps, Right Now
I’m not gonna lie to you: as much as I’m ashamed to admit this, I kind of took Carter Capps for granted.
Ordinarily, when you take for granted someone drafted out of that small a school, what you take for granted is that he’s going to suck. But the Mariners have long been high on Capps, and I have been, too. Once I heard the reports, I was interested. Once I saw the numbers, I was captivated. Once I saw the pitching with my own eyes, I was hooked. I’ve allowed myself to get ahead of myself, to the point where for a while now I haven’t really considered Capps to be a developing prospect. I’ve counted him as a good relief pitcher, with a promising present and a promising future.
I hate the behavior of assuming prospects. It’s always been a gamble to assume Jesus Montero and Justin Smoak, and we’re paying the price for having assumed Dustin Ackley. I’d chuckle at people who assumed Stephen Pryor, just because he threw a hard, straight fastball. But I can’t help myself with Capps, I’ve never been able to help myself with Capps, and it might be time that we all fall in love.
Here’s a fun fact: Capps’ velocity is down in 2013. Whatever. It’s early and he had velocity to lose. Here’s another fun fact: against Capps in 2013, batters have attempted 41 swings, and just 24 of those swings have made contact. I can’t overstate that it’s only April flipping ninth, but Capps has come right out of the gate and been unhittable. And he’s also been a little different.
I noted the velocity, and Capps is down from about 99 miles per hour to about 95 miles per hour. But he’s topped out above that, and it’s still the first half of April, whereas last year we saw Capps down the stretch. And there are other things, where I’ll try to keep from getting too technical.
In the early days of PITCHf/x, everything could be turned into a blog post. Everything was turned into a blog post, because everything was interesting, because everything was new. Look at this, we have charts of release points and pitch movements and pitch locations and pitch trajectories. So many of us did it. So many continue to do it, but to me it sort of feels stale, so just trust me on the statements I’m going to make. They’re going to save you some data interpretation.
Capps has always had an extreme arm angle, throwing from way over by third base. I don’t think it’s fair to call him a side-armer, but he isn’t too far away. In the early going this season, Capps has gotten even more extreme, dropping a little lower and shifting a little further to the side. We’ll have to stay tuned to see whether this keeps up, but for the time being it’s both subtle and noticeable. Perhaps Capps made a tweak.
But the bigger tweak is to the breaking ball. According to Ryan Divish’s twitter from last night, Capps has thrown both a slider and a curve. Last year, he threw a fastball at 99 and a breaking ball at 84, with sink and sweeping horizontal movement. This year he’s thrown a fastball at 95 and a breaking ball at 84, with less sink and less sweeping horizontal movement. In the spring he showed some breaking balls in the high 70s. What seems to be the case is that, last year with the Mariners, Capps was throwing a curve, and this year with the Mariners, Capps has thrown a slider. Between his fastball and his breaking ball, there’s been a smaller difference in speed, lateral movement, and vertical movement. It’s not subtle, and it’s noticeable.
Capps talked in the spring about falling in love with his slider, like he had himself a new and newly reliable weapon. Now, when you have a fastball/slider righty reliever, usually you plan on there being extreme platoon splits. And Capps might end up having extreme platoon splits, but here’s the thing about a slider released from Capps’ arm angle: it behaves kind of more like a cutter. At least, that’s what this taught me. From a Geoff Baker article in March:
Capps has also been honing his slider into what he calls a “slider/cutter” because it has elements of a cut fastball to it. He’ll throw it even when he’s behind in a count and “steal a strike” from both right-handed and left-handed batters.
Cutters are effective against opposite-handed hitters. That’s the whole Mariano Rivera thing, and they offer an alternative to learning a quality changeup. Relative to last season, Carter Capps has been throwing a different breaking ball, and he’s fond of it. Hitters are decidedly less fond of it, probably.
Now, things aren’t all that simple. With Capps’ breaking ball, it’s not always easy to tell whether he’s throwing a slider or a curve. When there’s inconsistency in movement, we don’t know if that’s deliberate or a mistake, a form of user error. Last night, Capps threw consecutive breaking balls to Chris Carter, completing a strikeout. Here’s one of them. It was 84 miles per hour. Here’s the second one. It was 86 miles per hour, with four more inches of sink, and more than two more inches of run. Was the second one a curve? If so, why was it harder? Did Capps just throw different sliders? Did Capps mean to throw different sliders?
Capps is generating some movement I might consider unpredictable. I don’t know if that’s accidental or intentional, and it’s got to be hell for his catchers. But it’s also got to be hell for the hitters, and the early numbers bear that out. Capps was untouchable in spring, when he was leaning on his new-ish slider. He’s been untouchable through a measly four regular-season appearances, but he’s looked different, and difference makes you think about sustainability. Carter Capps might have already arrived.
I almost didn’t write this post, because I didn’t go in with a prepared conclusion. I don’t have a singular “point”. Capps’ breaking ball is different, but I don’t know how much to make of that. I guess we’ll see. And I guess my point is that Carter Capps is so very exciting, so very watchable. Every team has electrifying young relievers somewhere in the system, because there are a lot of that player type. But not every team has a Carter Capps somewhere in the system, because there’s less of that player type. Capps might already be one of the most unhittable relievers in the major leagues. He’s a good weapon with a new weapon.
Questions for a New Minor League Season
Marc posted his own minor league introduction last week while I was busily filling out paperwork that had nothing to do with baseball, but that certainly doesn’t mean that I can’t also post something of my own that I will actively tell myself won’t go on for too long, but then will totally go on for way too long, you guys. Editor’s note: oh it went on all right
Here are some narratives that I’m looking at in the upcoming minor league season, translated as three questions for each team. Some of the questions are related to the development of actual prospects, but some are just things of general minor league interest. I’ve tried throughout to avoid certain things like “If Zunino wants to continue catching then he should improve on the things that the catching job entails”-type analyses, but in some cases it seemed pertinent to address some specifics. I write a lot, but prefer not to be wasteful, or to fail at being somewhat thorough. Here come nearly five thousand words written mostly yesterday.
JUMP CUT
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