Game Eleven Recap
Yay, 5-6.
After four close wins that all demanded David Aardsma to preserve a lead in the ninth inning, that was a nice change.
Let’s start with Felix. For the first three innings, he pitched as well as is humanly possible. This wasn’t the Felix we saw in years past, where he’d just pound the zone with fastballs and take a beating early. He went after Austin Jackson with two sinkers, then a curve and a change-up for the strikeout. He setup Johnny Damon with a couple of sinkers, then threw him an 0-2 curve before blowing him away with a four seam fastball up and away. He established his fastball, but he didn’t make it the only pitch in his repertoire.
Even in the fourth, he didn’t pitch badly despite giving up two runs. Jackson hit a flare up the middle for an infield single, and then Damon hit a groundball that’s an easy out if Kotchman isn’t holding the runner on. Miguel Cabrera took a fastball at the knees into the gap for a double, but that’s why he’s one of the best hitters in baseball. With the tying run at second base, Felix busted out the nasty stuff, and stranded Cabrera in scoring position.
He wasn’t as efficient as he could have been, especially with the big lead, but this was one of those nights where the other team didn’t stand much of a chance. He was overpowering, racking up nine strikeouts and simply looking unhittable for long stretches. The Tigers weren’t winning tonight. Not with that version of Felix on the mound.
Of course, the M’s didn’t need Felix to pitch a shutout tonight, because the offense busted out for 11 runs, which didn’t seem possible for the first ten games of the season. The top of the order showed how this team is going to create runs this year, as Ichiro, Figgins, and Gutierrez combined to go 5 for 11 with 3 walks and a couple of stolen bases. You don’t need Adrian Gonzalez to drive in runs when your top three hitters get on base eight times. The M’s still didn’t show any power, with only the one extra base hit, but six walks and 11 singles work too. The M’s won’t always find this many holes, but neither will they always hit every ball right at someone like they did the first week of the season. Regression to the mean can be fun when you’ve been running overly cold, and that’s basically what we saw tonight.
Of all the hitters to single out, I’m going to go with Rob Johnson. A year ago, he combined a lack of power and contact ability with a frustratingly terrible approach at the plate. He chased pitches out of the zone and regularly got himself out, rarely worked counts, and was generally useless at the plate. He’s shown significantly more selectivity this year, and tonight, drew his fourth and fifth walks of the season, despite having just 23 plate appearances. He still can’t hit, but it seems like he may have learned that he can’t hit, and he’s now willing to adopt the Chone Figgins approach, rarely swinging unless he has to. Given his skillset, that’s not a bad idea. He’s still going to find new and creative ways to frustrate us with passed balls and easy drops, but if he’s willing to take the free pass when its offered, he might yet turn out to be moderately useful.
M’s go for .500 tomorrow, but they do it against Justin Verlander, who is the Tigers version of Felix. He has knockout stuff, but also can run up high pitch counts and get himself out of the game in the 6th inning against teams who are willing to make him work. Be nice to see the M’s steal one and even up the record, which should finally silence the last of the crazies who were freaking out a few days ago.
Game 11, Tigers at Mariners
Bonderman vs Hernandez, 7:10 pm.
In better news, Happy Felix Day.
Griffey ahead of Bradley – blech. At some point, Wak’s going to have to decide that the “moving Bradley down to take pressure off of him” thing worked and put him back in the clean-up spot where he belongs.
Ichiro, RF
Figgins, 2B
Gutierrez, CF
Lopez, 3B
Griffey, DH
Bradley, LF
Kotchman, 1B
Johnson, C
Wilson, SS
On my semi-retirement
A night off seems like an appropriate time to talk a little about what’s been happening at USSM, why I’ve been increasingly scarce, and what’s next.
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ESPN710 Weekly Radio Hit
I’ll be on with Brock and Salk at 12:30 pm today, and every Thursday going forward during the baseball season. Tune in, won’t you?
Here’s the audio of my interview with Salk – I come on at the half hour mark:
Also, I was on KJR’s “Baseball’s Best Podcast” with Andy Bunker today, which you can listen to here.
Jason Vargas’ New Pitch
In his post-game conversation with Geoff Baker, Jason Vargas noted that he started throwing a cutter last night, after shelving it last year to work on his breaking ball. Over the last few years, we’ve heard a lot of stories about Mariner pitchers making changes to their mechanics (remember Miguel Batista’s eureka moment?) or adding a new pitch to their repertoire (hello, Dolphin), but it usually has amounted to a big ball of nothing.
This might be different.
Below are two graphs from Brooks Baseball, showing Vargas’ pitch selection in his first start against Texas and then last night’s performance against the A’s. 
As you can see in the first graph, he was a three pitch guy in Texas – fastball, curveball, change-up. Last night, however, you see a new blob of pitches, the one between 83-86 MPH with negative horizontal movement. The Pitch F/x algorithm calls it a slider, but that’s pretty normal; it’s tough for the system to distinguish between a cut fastball and a slider in a lot of cases.
He only threw 8 of these cut fastballs, but all eight were strikes, and he mostly worked them in when the count was even. Rather than having to go to his hit-me fastball on a 1-1 pitch, Vargas was able to use his cutter to get ahead in the count, at which point he could then throw a fastball out of the zone or a change-up to get a strikeout. Adding a pitch he can throw for strikes to keep himself in pitchers counts can do wonders for him, since he doesn’t have the dominating stuff to constantly pound the zone and get away with it.
Now, don’t go getting too carried away with this. It’s just eight pitches in one start, and it was the A’s offense in Safeco Field, so we’ll have to see how confident he is throwing at a good offense in a hitters park, but adding a cut fastball to his repertoire could be a significant boost for Vargas. It’s certainly something worth keeping an eye on, and if he gains confidence in the pitch, he may be able to perform better than expected.
Game Ten Recap
Yay, 4-6.
Jason Vargas is no longer wearing a hat, because it has officially been thrown into the leave-me-in-the-rotation-even-after-Lee-returns ring. Like Fister last night, he pounded the strike zone with mediocre stuff, but changed speeds and hit spots well enough to keep the A’s off balance. Unlike Fister, he actually missed bats, racking up another six strikeouts, giving him 11 in 11 1/3 innings pitched in his first two starts. He won’t keep that up, but his change-up is a plus pitch and he moves his fastball around well, so he has the ability to get a swinging strike when he needs one. I know Fister pitched well last night, but I’d rather have Vargas in the rotation after Cliff Lee returns, for various reasons that we’ll discuss in a future post.
The offense is showing signs of life, which was both inevitable and still nice to see. Figgins is swinging the bat well and still drawing walks, so once Ichiro comes around, there will be plenty of RBI opportunities for the 3-4-5 hitters. Gutierrez continues to make a strong case for one of those spots, and Bradley’s swinging the bat well enough that he should be back in the cleanup spot in no time. The bottom of this line-up is really poor, no doubt, but the top of the order is coming into focus.
While the hitting was better, the baserunning was atrocious. I think we’re all beyond being surprised when Lopez makes a mental mistake, but Bradley getting caught between third and home on Moore’s infield single was rough. This offense isn’t good enough to afford to give up outs, and the Mariners made three running the bases tonight. We’ve seen too many outs made from guys on base so far this year. While I know that the idea of being aggressive is appealing, the chance at advancing an extra base is generally not worth giving up an out, so the Mariners will simply have to be smarter on the bases the rest of the year.
The M’s saw the Brandon League they traded for tonight, as he just owned the A’s hitters in the 7th inning. That two seam fastball with tailing action in on right-handers, coming in at 94-96 MPH, is just ridiculous. When he’s throwing it near the strike zone, he’s going to be nearly impossible to hit. The pitch has so much horizontal movement that it almost breaks the pitch f/x charts. Given how Brandon Morrow’s season is going up in Toronto so far, I doubt the M’s are having too many second thoughts about that deal.
One of the problems with this roster reared its head in the 5th inning today. Right now, Tui is both the only backup infielder on the team and Casey Kotchman’s pseudo-platoon partner, so when he starts at first base, you can’t really pinch hit for him, no matter what the situation is. In the 5th inning, he came up with the bases loaded after the team had chased the lefty starter from the game, so he had to face Chad Gaudin, who is death to RHBs. Sending Kotchman or Griffey up to take advantage of Gaudin’s huge splits was out, however, because otherwise the team would have had to play the rest of the game without any backups for Lopez, Wilson, or Figgins. These are the effects of having a 12 man pitching staff and two designated hitters on the bench.
But, overall, a nice win heading into an off-day. Felix goes on Friday, so the M’s have a pretty decent shot at a three game winning streak, and may be playing to get back to .500 on Saturday.
Game 10, A’s at Mariners
Vargas vs Gonzalez, 7:05 pm.
After pitching really well and not having much to show for it down in Texas last week, Vargas gets a much better match-up tonight. If he can pound the strike zone like Fister did last night, the M’s have a good chance of winning two in a row. Gio Gonzalez has a good breaking ball, but his command comes and goes, and the M’s should be able to get him out early with a patient approach.
Ichiro, RF
Figgins, 2B
Gutierrez, CF
Lopez, 3B
Bradley, DH
Byrnes, LF
Tuiasosopo, 1B
Moore, C
Wilson, SS
Game Nine Recap
Yay, 3-6. So this is what it feels like to win on a non-Felix day.
Milton needed that. The team needed that. Everyone needed that. Welcome to Seattle, Mr. Bradley. Do that more often and you can make a nice little home for yourself here.
Brett Anderson is tremendous. If I had to start a franchise with any pitcher in baseball, Brett Anderson would be in the discussion for the guy I would take. I’d probably end up with Felix or Lincecum or Greinke, but I’d seriously consider Anderson. He’s that good. For all the problems the offense has had, facing him twice in the last five days hasn’t helped.
Doug Fister showed what can happen when you throw strikes in a pitchers park, especially when facing a bad offense. He challenged the A’s, commanded his change-up, and generally pitched pretty well. He won’t be able to do that regularly, but it was a nice performance anyway.
Nice to see Figgins hitting the ball hard three times off of left-handed pitchers, who have traditionally given him problems, but that caught stealing in the 7th inning was bad. Yes, Kurt Suzuki made a remarkable play to catch the ball and get back in position to throw him out, but there’s no reason for Figgins to take off until he’s sure the ball got away from Suzuki. There’s no chance that Suzuki’s going to be able to track the ball down and throw him out once it gets by him and goes to the backstop, so getting a good jump doesn’t matter. On that play, you’re either going to be out by a couple of steps if he caught it or safe without a throw if he didn’t. Already in scoring position, wisdom is the better part of valor, and that was not a wise play by Figgins.
I’ve given Mike Sweeney a lot of crap the first week, so let me just say this – he had two really good, important at-bats tonight. In his first nine trips to the plate this year, he saw a total of 23 pitches, and hacked his way into a lot of easy outs. In his last two at-bats tonight, he saw 12 pitches, drawing a couple of walks, and giving the team chances to score runs. The second walk came against Brad Ziegler, a side-arming right-hander who just destroys right-handed hitters. It’s obvious that I don’t think Sweeney brings enough to the table to be worth the roster spot on this team, but when you hear announcers talk about professional at-bats, those two trips to the plate were what they mean. I tip my hat to Sweeney to him for those last two walks.
Game 9, A’s at Mariners
Fister vs Anderson, 7:05 pm.
Round two of the mismatch of doom, as the A’s ace faces the M’s seventh starter. I wouldn’t bet the farm on the M’s tonight.
Ichiro, RF
Figgins, 2B
Gutierrez, CF
Lopez, 3B
Mascot, DH
Bradley, LF
Kotchman, 1B
Johnson, C
Wilson, SS
A Quick Jermaine Dye Post
Mike Salk spoke with Jermaine Dye‘s agent today, who told him that his client would like to play for the Mariners, and was disappointed that the M’s never showed any interest. Dye will likely continue to be disappointed, because he’s not what this team needs.
Dye is 36, and he hasn’t aged all that well. Never a great defender, the years have taken a toll on his legs, and now he’s essentially a designated hitter. His UZRs the last four years: -22.5, -21.6, -19.4, -20.0. Four years of data with the same conclusion – he’s bad enough defensively that he simply shouldn’t play the outfield anymore. Not enjoying Milton Bradley as a left fielder? He’s way better than Dye with the glove.
But, this team needs offense, you say, and Dye can hit. Well, kind of. Dye can hit left-handed pitching. Righties, not so much. If you look at his splits page on FanGraphs, the trend is obvious: since 2002, he’s a .283/.374/.516 hitter against lefties, and .262/.322/.486 against righties. He hits for power against both sides, but RHPs don’t have many problems getting him out. A .322 on base percentage from a bat-only player is simply not acceptable. And remember, he’s spent the last five years in Chicago, one of the better parks for home run hitters in baseball. The ball flies out of there in the summer. Safeco would not treat him nearly as well.
So, at this point, Dye is a DH against left-handed pitching, or essentially, he’s Mike Sweeney without the hugging. Is he better than Sweeney? Sure, but having him at DH keeps Milton Bradley in left, and the team wouldn’t be significantly improved with that alignment over playing Byrnes against LHPs and moving Bradley to DH. Dye doesn’t really make this team better at all, and yet he still wants $3 or $4 million for the right to be a mediocre platoon player.
In reality, Dye isn’t much different than Ryan Garko at this point. The M’s had this player type for $550,000 and gave it away. They aren’t going to spend $3 or $4 million to buy it back.
Sorry Jermaine, but if you want to keep playing this game, you’ll need to be more realistic about your abilities, and find somewhere else to do it.