Dan Brown of the Merc has a great interview with Bengie Molina that Alex Pavlovic kindly shared with his blogging audience early, which I've linked here. This is exactly what I've been saying here and other places, that Tim is fighting himself mentally. And Bengie provides a lot of good information about pitching, catching, and his thoughts on Timmy (mostly) plus some comments on Buster, and Hector Sanchez, catching in general. I highly recommend reading the article. It even noted the Chris Lincecum interview on USA Today, and Molina noted how cruel sports can be.
USA TODAY Out of Line Baiting Papa Lincecum
I would add here, like I added on the original USA Today article interview with Chris Lincecum, that it is the media that is crucifying Tim, specifically USA Today. Most fans I've seen are concerned, of course, but not "crucifying" Tim. Of course, there are whack jobs in any group, but the vast majority are still very supportive of Tim.
And they should be. As Papa Lincecum noted, Tim has given us two Cy Youngs and a Worlds Championship. We are indebted for life to Tim, is the way I see it. And his father expressed that rather forcefully in his article.
But it was not the fans bringing up that Tim could be sent to the minors, nor was it Giants management - in fact, just the day before that interview, Sabean was interviewed on CSN regarding Tim and he said, very clearly, that Lincecum is a part of our rotation, that there will be nobody will be coming in to take his spot in the rotation, and if the experts - Bochy, Righetti, and Gardner - think that Tim needs a break, then that will happen, but at that moment, they saw no need for one. Said that Tim's record "speaks for itself," that "he's our starting pitcher." As far as I can tell, it was USA Today who brought up the fact that Lincecum could be sent to the minors, to which, of course, Papa Lincecum exploded when it was brought up.
That's where the media toes the line between reporting news and making news. True, Timmy could be sent down. I've certainly been aware of that, so I'm sure others are, including Giants management. But nobody from the Giants have said that. And the Giants blogs I've been going to have not suggested that either, not even close.
What does USA Today think would happen if they brought up that fact to Chris Lincecum? What would be the logical, common sense reaction? It would be similar to asking a father what if a terrible thing happened to your child, of course you are going to get a strong negative reaction. Why put people through such a mental exercise when nobody remotely connected with the team had even intimated that something like that is possible? What purpose does it serve, other than to sell more newspapers (or in today's world, get more eyeballs reading)?
And I think USA Today generally does a very good job of reporting on baseball, so I'm disappointed in them that they took the low road in baiting Papa Lincecum with that loaded "what-if" scenario. I expect better from them. And I hope Tim knows that it was not fans nor Giants management who brought up the minors to his Dad, I hope it does not negatively affect his signing a long term deal with the Giants, as his father intimated. I'll be very angry with the USA Today if Lincecum leaves us because of their baiting of Tim's father in that interview.
Showing posts with label Bengie Molina. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bengie Molina. Show all posts
Monday, June 25, 2012
Thursday, July 01, 2010
Done Deal: Molina for Chris Ray and Michael Main
The final details on the trade is that for Molina and cash to make the deal cash neutral, we get Chris Ray and Michael Main, who will go to AA Richmond. RHP Main was their first round draft pick in 2007. He was ranked their 21st prospect by Baseball America for 2010.
Main's development and progress has been hampered by health problems, but he has a live arm that can get to 96-7 MPH at times and I'm sure the Giants are eager to work with that. He is doing very well (3.45 ERA) in Advnaced A right now, and the Giants must know him well because he's pitching in the California League that San Jose plays in. That is, a hitter's league.
However, his FIP is 5.05, so it appears he's a lot lucky this season. His BB/9 is low but his K/9 is low too, though K/BB is over 3, which is excellent. The odd thing is that someone with this type of velocity usually have problems with their control but then strikes out a lot, not the other way around. Hopefully, the Giants can help him increase his strikeout rate. I think his FIP is high because his HR/9 is high, and that is high because his flyball rate is high, 48% and ground ball low, 38%.
Giants Thoughts
Main's development and progress has been hampered by health problems, but he has a live arm that can get to 96-7 MPH at times and I'm sure the Giants are eager to work with that. He is doing very well (3.45 ERA) in Advnaced A right now, and the Giants must know him well because he's pitching in the California League that San Jose plays in. That is, a hitter's league.
However, his FIP is 5.05, so it appears he's a lot lucky this season. His BB/9 is low but his K/9 is low too, though K/BB is over 3, which is excellent. The odd thing is that someone with this type of velocity usually have problems with their control but then strikes out a lot, not the other way around. Hopefully, the Giants can help him increase his strikeout rate. I think his FIP is high because his HR/9 is high, and that is high because his flyball rate is high, 48% and ground ball low, 38%.
Giants Thoughts
This is a very good return for Molina, definitely better than what we would have gotten for him being a Type A free agent last season had we offered arbitration. We probably got him both because he's a prospect on the down side (due to injuries) plus because we gave up a lot of money in the deal too. We bought ourselves a former closer in Ray who could steady the set-up position for us and a good prospect in Main, who is only 21, and could be something for us in 2-3 years with further development.
Main is no sure thing, but with his velocity, if the Giants can get him to develop a breaking ball, like Lincecum's changeup or Runzler's slider or a nice cutter, then he could be pretty good. Certainly better prospect now than Alderson or Barnes, I think. BA notes that "he's still a premium athlete with a quick arm and good makeup, but he needs to get stronger and stay healthy for a full season."
This is a great deal for the Giants, someone to help now, someone to help maybe later, for someone who would be gone soon at some point. Main I would put in a category like Shawn Estes or Alfredo Simon, a failed or slow to develop prospect for the other team that we're going to take a look at and maybe make him useful. The Giants have a good history of taking other people's discards and making them useful. In addition, this opens up playing time at 1B as Posey will now mainly catch (though Baggarly noted that Whiteside will start catching more games too), which could open up playing time in the outfield when Huff is playing 1B plus allow Pablo to play 1B so that Uribe and Renteria can both start.
My reaction to Pending Molina Trade After Sleep
I rushed to get the original post regarding Molina trade out last night. Baggarly had the more extensive account of the trade with additional posts here and here, but the Merc's RSS feed has been slow to update on my iGoogle reader, while the Chron's is pretty fast.
And I should note here that the trade is still pending, and thus not official, because the MLB has to approve the deal given that Texas is in bankruptcy court. But that appears to be a formality because it appears that the Rangers might be taking on money due to Molina's larger contract, but since it appears that the Giants are sending money (though unclear if they are covering his bonus payments for games played or not). Hopefully that will get us a better class of prospect in the player to be named later.
Thank You Bengie
First, I neglected to thank Bengie Molina for his long and productive service to the Giants. People might not appreciate that he dealt with batting clean-up when he's not a clean-up hitter, but that's a tough job to do, not everybody takes to it when you don't have the classic skills to fill that position. On top of that, he's the catcher too, dealing with handling the staff as well.
I'm glad that they sent him to a contender plus a team that is doing much better than the Giants. The Rangers makes so much sense, as I've been following their catcher situation because both Salty then Ramirez got their chances to start after their original catcher fizzled out in some way (don't recall injury or performance related), and neither has been productive there. A trade made sense for them to get a catcher who can contribute offensively, they are so far ahead as it is, a productive catcher like Molina would keep them there considering how little production they had gotten so far from their catchers.
Roster Moves Depends
Second, I guess I didn't make it clear, but if the Giants keep Ray in the majors but decide to keep 13 position players, then that means that a position player like Bowker, Rohlinger, or Downs is coming up while a reliever needs to go down. They could also decide to send down Ray to the minors since he has an option left and bring up a position player. They could also decide to keep Ray and go with only 12 position players since they have so many players fighting for playing time as it is and the bullpen is kind of shot after all these short starts and particularly in Colorado, where pitchers tend to have bad and short starts regularly.
Since shoring up the bullpen appears to be an area that the Giants wanted to boost up, based on recent speculations by the Giants beat writers, one would think that Ray is kept up in the majors. He is a former closer for the Orioles, pretty good at it until TJS, but hasn't been back to his old form since.
Thoughts On Ray
Last season, his peripherals looked normal but he gave up a ton of hits. This season his strikeouts are way low but so is his hits given up, as his line drive percentage is seriously down, but he's also has been a bit lucky because his BABIP and HR/FB are very low. However, that offsets the bad luck of last season when both were very high.
Some players recover quickly from TJS (like Brian Wilson and Waldis Joaquin) and look as good as ever while others (don't recall example but know there is some) never recover what they did before. Ray looks like he still has the skills in there, but just needs to figure it out. Righetti and the Giants might be the final piece of the puzzle, we will see. Also, frankly, hard to tell what's up with relievers, they don't pitch enough innings to generate a big enough sample to determine if something has changed or not.
Still, he is a former closer and the Giants have been needing a better bridge to Wilson as the set-up men have been disappointing this season. Ray should be able to handle that job better and if he can return to some semblance of his prior form - you can see some of the pieces working together since he came back - that would be a huge boon to our bullpen.
Giants All In on Posey
Third, I'm glad the Giants made the deal but not because Molina is gone, as I considered him a safety net. None of us know how Posey will turn out. If he's like Weiters, our season is probably sunk if Posey is batting in more important batting positions in the lineup. However, it would be OK if the other hitters can hit like they have shown that they can this season, the main problem has been consistency. Only Huff has been consistently good all season, though Renteria has been good when healthy and in the lineup.
Because of that, I expect the Renteria to be the main beneficiary of the trade opening up ABs, for now. If he should cool down at some point, then it will become mix and match again for Bochy, which is all he can do when faced with hitters that slump so badly. Hopefully he can keep it up.
In any case, this means that the Giants are going All In on Posey now. He's the starting catcher, no question about it now. Given the Giants relatively cautious nature in handling their prospects, this suggests that they believe that the recent bad patch is the result of short term bad luck and that the balls will start falling back in at some point. Even during this bad stretch here, he is not striking out more than what good players do, which is 15% of his AB's, meaning that his contact rate is good, just that his BABIP has been bad.
Posey's Hitting in 2010
His hitting is neither as good as his start or as bad as his recent bad stretch. His BABIP during his bad stretch is .171, almost half what the average major leaguer hits, which is .300. Each batter has their own talent level of BABIP. His BABIP in the minors was high, but when translated to their MLE, it was about average, .293 for his career. However, his career numbers is dominated his San Jose numbers. And one of Shandler's rules is to look only at AA and AAA MLE production for truer clues to a player's possible MLB production. Looking strictly at his AAA numbers, his MLE BABIP is .328. So the answer probably lies in between those two numbers, as he has not even put in a year's worth of AAA AB's.
Thus, his .318 overall BABIP right now suggests that his bad stretch here was just the rebalancing ying-yang with his hot start to bring his BABIP more in line with his skill level. So his current batting line of .289/.314/.381/.695 appears to be his talent level right now. He's a good hitter, but when it comes to taking walks and hitting for power, he has been struggling at that, despite his success in the minors in doing both well. That should change as he acclimates himself to being in the majors.
Still, that's better than Molina right now, though as I noted before, I think he's more banged up than anyone has let on, which probably has sapped his power, which is where he shines better than Posey. Posey's overall batting line is good enough for the Giants going forward, as that is about what Molina has been delivering during his career with us (a bit lower, but close enough).
And this opens up opportunities to use Renteria and left-handed hitters like Schierholtz and Ishikawa (Sabean stated the need for more lefties in this article here) more in the starting lineup. Or if they decide to bring Bowker up.
Posey vs. Weiters
As I have pointed out here and on other blogs, Weiters is a stark reminder of what we might get with Posey. Both were well regarded hitters in the minors. The fear was that if you bring up Posey, what if he struggles like Weiters has? But now that we have some sample data, it appears that he should do better than Weiters (though that is not hard to do right now). This is a good example of how what I've been saying, even top draft picks fail at the major league level and the Orioles $6M investment isn't looking so good right now.
While they both have OPS in the 600's right now, I think Posey is on a better footing to do well going forward. Weiters, while walking, has been striking out a heck of a lot more, about 22% of his AB's. Meanwhile Posey, albeit in less AB's, has been striking out 12% of his AB's.
Being able to keep your strikeouts below 15% shows skill in handling the bat. Once Posey gets more comfortable, he should be able to start taking more walks (he's probably a bit anxious right now) and hitting for power (took Pablo about 4 months in the majors to figure that one out). Weiters hasn't figure that out yet and is striking out all over the place right now. And he is even worse this season than last, hard to tell if that is the league figuring him out or if he has been pressing.
But a near .700 OPS is not what we envisioned for Posey, so he's not a success now either, just closer, I believe, than Weiters. I think an OPS near .800 is the minimum of what we are looking for in Posey. A lot of that will be driven by a high batting average and plenty of walks leading to a high OBP. I would also expect to see some extra-base hit power, though not necessarily HR power. If he can deliver that to us after the All-Star break, that would help propel us to a playoff spot. If he continues to struggle overall, with a sub-700 OPS, we will need to rely on others to deliver offense.
And I should note here that the trade is still pending, and thus not official, because the MLB has to approve the deal given that Texas is in bankruptcy court. But that appears to be a formality because it appears that the Rangers might be taking on money due to Molina's larger contract, but since it appears that the Giants are sending money (though unclear if they are covering his bonus payments for games played or not). Hopefully that will get us a better class of prospect in the player to be named later.
Thank You Bengie
First, I neglected to thank Bengie Molina for his long and productive service to the Giants. People might not appreciate that he dealt with batting clean-up when he's not a clean-up hitter, but that's a tough job to do, not everybody takes to it when you don't have the classic skills to fill that position. On top of that, he's the catcher too, dealing with handling the staff as well.
I'm glad that they sent him to a contender plus a team that is doing much better than the Giants. The Rangers makes so much sense, as I've been following their catcher situation because both Salty then Ramirez got their chances to start after their original catcher fizzled out in some way (don't recall injury or performance related), and neither has been productive there. A trade made sense for them to get a catcher who can contribute offensively, they are so far ahead as it is, a productive catcher like Molina would keep them there considering how little production they had gotten so far from their catchers.
Roster Moves Depends
Second, I guess I didn't make it clear, but if the Giants keep Ray in the majors but decide to keep 13 position players, then that means that a position player like Bowker, Rohlinger, or Downs is coming up while a reliever needs to go down. They could also decide to send down Ray to the minors since he has an option left and bring up a position player. They could also decide to keep Ray and go with only 12 position players since they have so many players fighting for playing time as it is and the bullpen is kind of shot after all these short starts and particularly in Colorado, where pitchers tend to have bad and short starts regularly.
Since shoring up the bullpen appears to be an area that the Giants wanted to boost up, based on recent speculations by the Giants beat writers, one would think that Ray is kept up in the majors. He is a former closer for the Orioles, pretty good at it until TJS, but hasn't been back to his old form since.
Thoughts On Ray
Last season, his peripherals looked normal but he gave up a ton of hits. This season his strikeouts are way low but so is his hits given up, as his line drive percentage is seriously down, but he's also has been a bit lucky because his BABIP and HR/FB are very low. However, that offsets the bad luck of last season when both were very high.
Some players recover quickly from TJS (like Brian Wilson and Waldis Joaquin) and look as good as ever while others (don't recall example but know there is some) never recover what they did before. Ray looks like he still has the skills in there, but just needs to figure it out. Righetti and the Giants might be the final piece of the puzzle, we will see. Also, frankly, hard to tell what's up with relievers, they don't pitch enough innings to generate a big enough sample to determine if something has changed or not.
Still, he is a former closer and the Giants have been needing a better bridge to Wilson as the set-up men have been disappointing this season. Ray should be able to handle that job better and if he can return to some semblance of his prior form - you can see some of the pieces working together since he came back - that would be a huge boon to our bullpen.
Giants All In on Posey
Third, I'm glad the Giants made the deal but not because Molina is gone, as I considered him a safety net. None of us know how Posey will turn out. If he's like Weiters, our season is probably sunk if Posey is batting in more important batting positions in the lineup. However, it would be OK if the other hitters can hit like they have shown that they can this season, the main problem has been consistency. Only Huff has been consistently good all season, though Renteria has been good when healthy and in the lineup.
Because of that, I expect the Renteria to be the main beneficiary of the trade opening up ABs, for now. If he should cool down at some point, then it will become mix and match again for Bochy, which is all he can do when faced with hitters that slump so badly. Hopefully he can keep it up.
In any case, this means that the Giants are going All In on Posey now. He's the starting catcher, no question about it now. Given the Giants relatively cautious nature in handling their prospects, this suggests that they believe that the recent bad patch is the result of short term bad luck and that the balls will start falling back in at some point. Even during this bad stretch here, he is not striking out more than what good players do, which is 15% of his AB's, meaning that his contact rate is good, just that his BABIP has been bad.
Posey's Hitting in 2010
His hitting is neither as good as his start or as bad as his recent bad stretch. His BABIP during his bad stretch is .171, almost half what the average major leaguer hits, which is .300. Each batter has their own talent level of BABIP. His BABIP in the minors was high, but when translated to their MLE, it was about average, .293 for his career. However, his career numbers is dominated his San Jose numbers. And one of Shandler's rules is to look only at AA and AAA MLE production for truer clues to a player's possible MLB production. Looking strictly at his AAA numbers, his MLE BABIP is .328. So the answer probably lies in between those two numbers, as he has not even put in a year's worth of AAA AB's.
Thus, his .318 overall BABIP right now suggests that his bad stretch here was just the rebalancing ying-yang with his hot start to bring his BABIP more in line with his skill level. So his current batting line of .289/.314/.381/.695 appears to be his talent level right now. He's a good hitter, but when it comes to taking walks and hitting for power, he has been struggling at that, despite his success in the minors in doing both well. That should change as he acclimates himself to being in the majors.
Still, that's better than Molina right now, though as I noted before, I think he's more banged up than anyone has let on, which probably has sapped his power, which is where he shines better than Posey. Posey's overall batting line is good enough for the Giants going forward, as that is about what Molina has been delivering during his career with us (a bit lower, but close enough).
And this opens up opportunities to use Renteria and left-handed hitters like Schierholtz and Ishikawa (Sabean stated the need for more lefties in this article here) more in the starting lineup. Or if they decide to bring Bowker up.
Posey vs. Weiters
As I have pointed out here and on other blogs, Weiters is a stark reminder of what we might get with Posey. Both were well regarded hitters in the minors. The fear was that if you bring up Posey, what if he struggles like Weiters has? But now that we have some sample data, it appears that he should do better than Weiters (though that is not hard to do right now). This is a good example of how what I've been saying, even top draft picks fail at the major league level and the Orioles $6M investment isn't looking so good right now.
While they both have OPS in the 600's right now, I think Posey is on a better footing to do well going forward. Weiters, while walking, has been striking out a heck of a lot more, about 22% of his AB's. Meanwhile Posey, albeit in less AB's, has been striking out 12% of his AB's.
Being able to keep your strikeouts below 15% shows skill in handling the bat. Once Posey gets more comfortable, he should be able to start taking more walks (he's probably a bit anxious right now) and hitting for power (took Pablo about 4 months in the majors to figure that one out). Weiters hasn't figure that out yet and is striking out all over the place right now. And he is even worse this season than last, hard to tell if that is the league figuring him out or if he has been pressing.
But a near .700 OPS is not what we envisioned for Posey, so he's not a success now either, just closer, I believe, than Weiters. I think an OPS near .800 is the minimum of what we are looking for in Posey. A lot of that will be driven by a high batting average and plenty of walks leading to a high OBP. I would also expect to see some extra-base hit power, though not necessarily HR power. If he can deliver that to us after the All-Star break, that would help propel us to a playoff spot. If he continues to struggle overall, with a sub-700 OPS, we will need to rely on others to deliver offense.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Molina Traded to Rangers
Wow, the Molina era is over, long live the Posey era!
According to John Shea of the SF Chronicle, the Giants have traded Bengie Molina to the Texas Rangers for Chris Ray and a player to be named later. It was first reported by Foxsports possibly involving getting Chris Davis or Jarrod Saltalamacchia, and perhaps still involve them later as the Giants don't have a 40 man spot to accommodate either right now, so perhaps one of them might come over once the Giants figure out a spot. I wouldn't mind getting Saltalamacchia, who I consider a better prospect, but obviously Davis would provide power and that is something the Giants have been searching for. Molina is important for the Rangers as they lead the AL West and are many games over .500, and catcher has been a rotation among rookies and prospects, and a sore spot, so they wanted the vet.
Clearly, this has a few larger meaning for the team. Obviously, that means that Posey is now the starting catcher, for better or for worse. For worse, see how Matt Weiters has done for the Orioles in 2009 and 2010. Hopefully Posey can get untracked, apparently he was kept out of the lineup to showcase Molina for this trade. This might get him in the flow of things better, he'll be more comfortable and can start hitting again.
It also means that firstbase is now open. That could mean more Uribe at 3B and Sandoval at 1B. It would also mean more Huff at 1B, opening up an outfield position for Rowand or Schierholtz to play more, assuming that Torres and Burrell are the current starters. It could also give Ishikawa some starts, as Bochy noted that the Giants are having problems with RHP.
In addition, Chris Ray was the former closer for the Orioles once upon a time, until, I think, injuries held him back. He is not doing so well in striking out guys, so that is a negative, though, but his ERA is good.
I assume he's going into the bullpen to shore it up, but then who would go down? He's RHP so that would suggest one of Bautista, Romo, Moto, or Casilla would go down, but it could also mean Runzler, though he had a great appearance the last time he pitched, so I wouldn't think that.
Both Romo and Runzler have options, so even though Romo's ERA is good right now, I think he gets the short straw and get sent down, unless the team decides to carry an extra reliever right now in light of the poor outings by the starters lately, in which case there is no problem.
Update: Baggarly report other details. Ray still have an option so he can be sent down. The Giants are sending money to offset the difference between Molina and Ray's salary.
According to John Shea of the SF Chronicle, the Giants have traded Bengie Molina to the Texas Rangers for Chris Ray and a player to be named later. It was first reported by Foxsports possibly involving getting Chris Davis or Jarrod Saltalamacchia, and perhaps still involve them later as the Giants don't have a 40 man spot to accommodate either right now, so perhaps one of them might come over once the Giants figure out a spot. I wouldn't mind getting Saltalamacchia, who I consider a better prospect, but obviously Davis would provide power and that is something the Giants have been searching for. Molina is important for the Rangers as they lead the AL West and are many games over .500, and catcher has been a rotation among rookies and prospects, and a sore spot, so they wanted the vet.
Clearly, this has a few larger meaning for the team. Obviously, that means that Posey is now the starting catcher, for better or for worse. For worse, see how Matt Weiters has done for the Orioles in 2009 and 2010. Hopefully Posey can get untracked, apparently he was kept out of the lineup to showcase Molina for this trade. This might get him in the flow of things better, he'll be more comfortable and can start hitting again.
It also means that firstbase is now open. That could mean more Uribe at 3B and Sandoval at 1B. It would also mean more Huff at 1B, opening up an outfield position for Rowand or Schierholtz to play more, assuming that Torres and Burrell are the current starters. It could also give Ishikawa some starts, as Bochy noted that the Giants are having problems with RHP.
In addition, Chris Ray was the former closer for the Orioles once upon a time, until, I think, injuries held him back. He is not doing so well in striking out guys, so that is a negative, though, but his ERA is good.
I assume he's going into the bullpen to shore it up, but then who would go down? He's RHP so that would suggest one of Bautista, Romo, Moto, or Casilla would go down, but it could also mean Runzler, though he had a great appearance the last time he pitched, so I wouldn't think that.
Both Romo and Runzler have options, so even though Romo's ERA is good right now, I think he gets the short straw and get sent down, unless the team decides to carry an extra reliever right now in light of the poor outings by the starters lately, in which case there is no problem.
Update: Baggarly report other details. Ray still have an option so he can be sent down. The Giants are sending money to offset the difference between Molina and Ray's salary.
Monday, June 07, 2010
Your 2010 Giants are 30-25: Hot Reds Up Next
Four game series against the Reds in their homer-happy home park. Probably not good for the ERA of the Giants pitching staff, and yet got some good history on our side too. We miss Bronson Arroyo, who has been among their best starters in recent years, but this year he's scuffling and Mike Leake has a best ERA on the staff and Johnny Cueto is second. Harang has been scuffling too and LeCure, another young pitcher, is also pitching well so far, in terms of ERA, but - BOY - walks a lot, just two starts so far too.
Game 1: Johnny Cueto vs. Zito
Cueto has been getting better every season, and he has been particularly good at home with a 3.19 ERA. Zito has been beaten to a pulp in Cincinnati overall, but shut them down last season and just had a great start against the powerful Colorado lineup in his last start. That after scuffling for most of May. Should be a good even game, low scoring on both sides.
Game 2: Sam LeCure vs. Cain
LeCure has a nice ERA but that's only two starts and he's been walking guys all over the place and not paying for it. Part of it is only 1 HR in 11.1 IP (and it was at home). Cain, meanwhile, has been dominant wherever he pitches, last season and this. He has also been beaten by Cin overall, but dominated them in a start last season. Should be a win for the Giants but if LeCure can keep the magic going, it's going to be close.
Game 3: Aaron Harang vs. Sanchez
Harang had been the Reds best pitcher for the past few seasons, but one of their worse this season. He has been better at home, but not dominating so. He had a nice start in his last home game, but was bombed in his last start, which was on the road.
Sanchez has been having a breakout season, 2.90 ERA, been pretty consistently good except when he was reported to have a cold. He has had a number of nice recent starts, even with the bouts of wildness, though not dominating like he can. But his last start was a DOM start and he was one less walk or one more strikeout away from a DOM in his prior start. He had a great start against them in Cincinnati but 4 years ago, when players like Votto and Phillips were not around.
I would call this game pretty even, but leaning towards the Giants.
Game 4: Mike Leake vs. Todd Wellemeyer
As noted, Leake is their best pitcher this season, by far, and he has pitched well at home, so far, and Wellemeyer has been our worse starter on the road this season, by far. Looks like a recipe for a loss.
However, given how poorly he pitched again, I would have to think that Wellemeyer has pretty much used up all his rope. It could mean the Madison Bumgarner era could be starting soon. However, he has not been that dominating in AAA so far or recently, whereas Joe Martinez has been. So Joe could get the call.
Still, Leake has been so good and our starter probably so not so good, so it looks like a win for the Reds here.
Giants Thoughts
Tough series against a team that has been on a massive hot streak. Look likely to split the series with them, and yet it is not out of the realm of possibilities that we could sweep if the starters can continue their recent streak of good starts plus Bumgarner get the call in game 4 nor is it out of the realm to be swept either.
I would bet that Bumgarner not get the call, though. Cincinnati would be a very nasty place to get your first start of the season in. It is one of the most offensive oriented homes in the majors, up there with Colorado and Texas. Then again, Bumgarner has been drawing a lot of ground balls this season. However, if he cannot dominate AAA hitters, he's going to have a hard time striking out MLB hitters.
I think the Giants won't call him up into such a situation for his first start of the season. They would want to give him some confidence, have him pitch at home against a lousy team, say, June 15th, Baltimore Orioles, then June 22nd against Houston Astros (though in Houston). Two bad teams to prepare for the start against the Boston Red Sox then road games at two tough parks with two tough teams, Colorado and Milwaukee, before the All-Star break. Not as great an intro as Stephen Strasburg is getting (apparently he'll face a bunch of weaker teams to start off his MLB career.
The offense seems to be working a little better now that Rowand has been moved down to 8th and Torres and Sanchez been leading off the games. Sanchez has been getting on base in droves plus actually driving in runs too. They have been great together up top. Since May 25th, the offense has been averaging 4.6 runs per game.
Meanwhile, Sandoval has continued to heat up, .294/.324/.456/.780 since May 19th, .316/.317/.500/.817 since May 28th. He is roughly about where he was last season at the end of May, nice hitting overall, little power. But last season he suddenly picked it up big time in June. We can certainly use a repeat performance, though it has not come so far this season. Hopefully Cincinnati's great park for hitting homers will kick him off.
Also, Huff has been great since returning, for the most part, to hitting cleanup. Starting May 18, he has hit .339/.465/.554/1.018, with 3 HR in 56 AB, which is as Bondsian as we have gotten in the cleanup spot since Bonds hit there for us. He has been a great acquisition thus far and quite an asset to the offense, particularly since it forces Molina out of the cleanup spot. Uribe has heated up a bit as well recently, hitting .333/.341/.619/.960 since May 26th, and Posey has been consistently hitting as well.
Unfortunately, both Molina and Rowand have been automatic outs, no matter where they hit in the lineup. Both have been sinking slowly downward, after being unbelievably hot in April and early May. Why can't the hitting coach diagnose what changes between then and now is contributing to the slide and fix this?
And how long before we see Posey starting at catching? Molina has been cold for over a month now and Posey is clearly raking. Maybe when (not if) Bumgarner is brought up, that could be Posey's pitching buddy in starts at catcher, much like Whiteside is Sanchez's catcher right now. That would make a lot of sense as they have been a battery in Fresno this season and in San Jose last season. Then sprinkle him in for the other starting pitchers so that he eventually work with every starter at least 2-3 times the rest of the season.
They have already made a slight move, sitting Rowand down, put Torres in CF, Huff in RF, and Burrell into LF in that other game against a LHP. We could start to see a slight platoon with Burrell facing LHP and Rowand RHP, occassionally. And perhaps Schierholtz facing a few RHP as well, to give Rowand more rest and time to work on his hitting with the hitting coach. Supposedly he worked with Bam Bam this spring to shorten up his stroke, which worked like a charm at the start but he hasn't done much of anything since early May when he returned off the DL and was a hitting machine. Hopefully the Reds hitter's haven will charge him up as well as Pablo.
Game 1: Johnny Cueto vs. Zito
Cueto has been getting better every season, and he has been particularly good at home with a 3.19 ERA. Zito has been beaten to a pulp in Cincinnati overall, but shut them down last season and just had a great start against the powerful Colorado lineup in his last start. That after scuffling for most of May. Should be a good even game, low scoring on both sides.
Game 2: Sam LeCure vs. Cain
LeCure has a nice ERA but that's only two starts and he's been walking guys all over the place and not paying for it. Part of it is only 1 HR in 11.1 IP (and it was at home). Cain, meanwhile, has been dominant wherever he pitches, last season and this. He has also been beaten by Cin overall, but dominated them in a start last season. Should be a win for the Giants but if LeCure can keep the magic going, it's going to be close.
Game 3: Aaron Harang vs. Sanchez
Harang had been the Reds best pitcher for the past few seasons, but one of their worse this season. He has been better at home, but not dominating so. He had a nice start in his last home game, but was bombed in his last start, which was on the road.
Sanchez has been having a breakout season, 2.90 ERA, been pretty consistently good except when he was reported to have a cold. He has had a number of nice recent starts, even with the bouts of wildness, though not dominating like he can. But his last start was a DOM start and he was one less walk or one more strikeout away from a DOM in his prior start. He had a great start against them in Cincinnati but 4 years ago, when players like Votto and Phillips were not around.
I would call this game pretty even, but leaning towards the Giants.
Game 4: Mike Leake vs. Todd Wellemeyer
As noted, Leake is their best pitcher this season, by far, and he has pitched well at home, so far, and Wellemeyer has been our worse starter on the road this season, by far. Looks like a recipe for a loss.
However, given how poorly he pitched again, I would have to think that Wellemeyer has pretty much used up all his rope. It could mean the Madison Bumgarner era could be starting soon. However, he has not been that dominating in AAA so far or recently, whereas Joe Martinez has been. So Joe could get the call.
Still, Leake has been so good and our starter probably so not so good, so it looks like a win for the Reds here.
Giants Thoughts
Tough series against a team that has been on a massive hot streak. Look likely to split the series with them, and yet it is not out of the realm of possibilities that we could sweep if the starters can continue their recent streak of good starts plus Bumgarner get the call in game 4 nor is it out of the realm to be swept either.
I would bet that Bumgarner not get the call, though. Cincinnati would be a very nasty place to get your first start of the season in. It is one of the most offensive oriented homes in the majors, up there with Colorado and Texas. Then again, Bumgarner has been drawing a lot of ground balls this season. However, if he cannot dominate AAA hitters, he's going to have a hard time striking out MLB hitters.
I think the Giants won't call him up into such a situation for his first start of the season. They would want to give him some confidence, have him pitch at home against a lousy team, say, June 15th, Baltimore Orioles, then June 22nd against Houston Astros (though in Houston). Two bad teams to prepare for the start against the Boston Red Sox then road games at two tough parks with two tough teams, Colorado and Milwaukee, before the All-Star break. Not as great an intro as Stephen Strasburg is getting (apparently he'll face a bunch of weaker teams to start off his MLB career.
The offense seems to be working a little better now that Rowand has been moved down to 8th and Torres and Sanchez been leading off the games. Sanchez has been getting on base in droves plus actually driving in runs too. They have been great together up top. Since May 25th, the offense has been averaging 4.6 runs per game.
Meanwhile, Sandoval has continued to heat up, .294/.324/.456/.780 since May 19th, .316/.317/.500/.817 since May 28th. He is roughly about where he was last season at the end of May, nice hitting overall, little power. But last season he suddenly picked it up big time in June. We can certainly use a repeat performance, though it has not come so far this season. Hopefully Cincinnati's great park for hitting homers will kick him off.
Also, Huff has been great since returning, for the most part, to hitting cleanup. Starting May 18, he has hit .339/.465/.554/1.018, with 3 HR in 56 AB, which is as Bondsian as we have gotten in the cleanup spot since Bonds hit there for us. He has been a great acquisition thus far and quite an asset to the offense, particularly since it forces Molina out of the cleanup spot. Uribe has heated up a bit as well recently, hitting .333/.341/.619/.960 since May 26th, and Posey has been consistently hitting as well.
Unfortunately, both Molina and Rowand have been automatic outs, no matter where they hit in the lineup. Both have been sinking slowly downward, after being unbelievably hot in April and early May. Why can't the hitting coach diagnose what changes between then and now is contributing to the slide and fix this?
And how long before we see Posey starting at catching? Molina has been cold for over a month now and Posey is clearly raking. Maybe when (not if) Bumgarner is brought up, that could be Posey's pitching buddy in starts at catcher, much like Whiteside is Sanchez's catcher right now. That would make a lot of sense as they have been a battery in Fresno this season and in San Jose last season. Then sprinkle him in for the other starting pitchers so that he eventually work with every starter at least 2-3 times the rest of the season.
They have already made a slight move, sitting Rowand down, put Torres in CF, Huff in RF, and Burrell into LF in that other game against a LHP. We could start to see a slight platoon with Burrell facing LHP and Rowand RHP, occassionally. And perhaps Schierholtz facing a few RHP as well, to give Rowand more rest and time to work on his hitting with the hitting coach. Supposedly he worked with Bam Bam this spring to shorten up his stroke, which worked like a charm at the start but he hasn't done much of anything since early May when he returned off the DL and was a hitting machine. Hopefully the Reds hitter's haven will charge him up as well as Pablo.
Friday, June 04, 2010
Your 2010 Giants are 28-24: Capturing the Pirates
Not a great series, but at least we had a 4-2 homestand ultimately. We knew it was going to be tough to win the series going in with Ubaldo pitching the way he has been this season. Now, on to the Pirates, who has been scuffling. They are 22-31 but 13-12 at home.
The Pirates just took two from Chicago, but had a 5 game losing streak before that, and losers of 9 of 11 before that. They are still re-building, but their rotation from last season looked pretty good heading into this season. However, it has imploded this season, only Maholm and Ohlendorfer have done well. Unfortunately, the rainout of their game Wednesday pushed Duke into our series, followed by Maholm and Ohlendorfer. Originally it was those two followed by TBA (to be announced) so we most probably would have won that start (plus that's Lincecum's start) as they were probably going to pull some scrub from the minors to start.
Game 1: Zach Duke vs. Sanchez
Duke has had an up and down career, though mostly down. Prospect with potential but now looking like he's just a middle of the road guy. The problem is that he don't strike out too many batters, but at least he kept his walks low as well before. However, this season, he has been walking way too many batters.
But, he is much better at home: 3.57 ERA vs. 6.99 ERA on the road this season; 4.07 ERA for career vs. 4.66 ERA on the road for career. So Sanchez will have his hands full.
Sanchez also pitches better at home but will be on the road. Still, 3.67 ERA on the road is pretty good, in any case. It is pretty close but I would lean towards Sanchez as he has the stuff to shut down teams when he is on.
Game 2: Paul Maholm vs. Wellemeyer
Maholm started poorly but he's been very good the past three seasons. I would call him their ace of the staff, he has an ERA around 4 for the past 2 plus seasons and at age 28, should continue to shine for a few more seasons. He has also pitched much better at home (3.64 ERA) as well.
Wellemeyer is no ace nor has he pitched like one on the road. Pirates should win.
Game 3: Ross Ohlendorfer vs. Lincecum
Ohlendorfer also pitches much better at home (3.56 vs. 5.58 ERA career). He has pitched well as a Pirate and look like a great pickup in their trade away of Nady and Marte. Normally, I would say that the Giants should still win with Lincecum starting, but given his recent struggles, I would have to call this even.
Giants Thoughts
Had Duke not been pushed into this series, I would think that the Giants had a good chance to win the series. Now it looks like a coin toss at best. Which does not appear to be what the Giants should do based on the Pirates record overall, but which makes sense once you see that they play OK at home, horribly on the road. Still, dang rain, we would have avoided Duke and faced TBA instead, which probably would have been one of their poorer pitchers.
Still, I think the offense appears to be in better shape now. Sandoval appears to be heading out of his slump in May. I would declare his mojo is back once he starts homering with regularity. Torres has been doing OK in the leadoff spot since he took over and Sanchez has paired up nicely with him. Huff has been great since he was moved back to the cleanup spot. Uribe has been his steady goodness in the 5th spot, and been good since Posey became his wingman in the 6th spot.
And, of course, Posey has been good since he came up, for the most part, though it is too early to say whether he will continue or not. The good news is that he only has one strikeout with all the ABs he has had already, but the semi-bad news is that he hasn't drawn a walk yet and he has been very impatient, drawing only 3.63 pitches per PA.
Now, if either Molina or Rowand can join this conga line and start hitting like they can - I still think Molina can do it, but is losing hope that Rowand can - then we should be winning a lot of series going forward in June.
Plus, with Pat the Bat Burrell joining the team, the bench will be that much better, plus with spot starts, maybe he can power the ball out still. But he didn't hit that well in AAA, so don't expect miracles from him. Hopefully he will start out with spot starts vs. LHP for Huff plus provide right-handed HR power off the bench. If he starts hitting, then can think about more of a role in the lineup.
We still don't know what's happening on the 40 man to bring up Burrell (25 man move was to option Bowker to AAA). My best guess, which I tweeted, is that Medders gets moved to the 60-day DL list. He didn't do that well in his last rehab appearance, and since Santiago Casilla and Denny Bautista have done well, they could just leave him down there until he gets it all back together again.
Otherwise, they are out of easy moves, so the only other options would be DFAing someone. Many have said Ishikawa, but I still don't think that is happening, at least not yet. But the clock is ticking on that one, I think, particularly if Emmanuel Burriss does come off the DL in the second half, as speculated by Hank Schulman.
The Pirates just took two from Chicago, but had a 5 game losing streak before that, and losers of 9 of 11 before that. They are still re-building, but their rotation from last season looked pretty good heading into this season. However, it has imploded this season, only Maholm and Ohlendorfer have done well. Unfortunately, the rainout of their game Wednesday pushed Duke into our series, followed by Maholm and Ohlendorfer. Originally it was those two followed by TBA (to be announced) so we most probably would have won that start (plus that's Lincecum's start) as they were probably going to pull some scrub from the minors to start.
Game 1: Zach Duke vs. Sanchez
Duke has had an up and down career, though mostly down. Prospect with potential but now looking like he's just a middle of the road guy. The problem is that he don't strike out too many batters, but at least he kept his walks low as well before. However, this season, he has been walking way too many batters.
But, he is much better at home: 3.57 ERA vs. 6.99 ERA on the road this season; 4.07 ERA for career vs. 4.66 ERA on the road for career. So Sanchez will have his hands full.
Sanchez also pitches better at home but will be on the road. Still, 3.67 ERA on the road is pretty good, in any case. It is pretty close but I would lean towards Sanchez as he has the stuff to shut down teams when he is on.
Game 2: Paul Maholm vs. Wellemeyer
Maholm started poorly but he's been very good the past three seasons. I would call him their ace of the staff, he has an ERA around 4 for the past 2 plus seasons and at age 28, should continue to shine for a few more seasons. He has also pitched much better at home (3.64 ERA) as well.
Wellemeyer is no ace nor has he pitched like one on the road. Pirates should win.
Game 3: Ross Ohlendorfer vs. Lincecum
Ohlendorfer also pitches much better at home (3.56 vs. 5.58 ERA career). He has pitched well as a Pirate and look like a great pickup in their trade away of Nady and Marte. Normally, I would say that the Giants should still win with Lincecum starting, but given his recent struggles, I would have to call this even.
Giants Thoughts
Had Duke not been pushed into this series, I would think that the Giants had a good chance to win the series. Now it looks like a coin toss at best. Which does not appear to be what the Giants should do based on the Pirates record overall, but which makes sense once you see that they play OK at home, horribly on the road. Still, dang rain, we would have avoided Duke and faced TBA instead, which probably would have been one of their poorer pitchers.
Still, I think the offense appears to be in better shape now. Sandoval appears to be heading out of his slump in May. I would declare his mojo is back once he starts homering with regularity. Torres has been doing OK in the leadoff spot since he took over and Sanchez has paired up nicely with him. Huff has been great since he was moved back to the cleanup spot. Uribe has been his steady goodness in the 5th spot, and been good since Posey became his wingman in the 6th spot.
And, of course, Posey has been good since he came up, for the most part, though it is too early to say whether he will continue or not. The good news is that he only has one strikeout with all the ABs he has had already, but the semi-bad news is that he hasn't drawn a walk yet and he has been very impatient, drawing only 3.63 pitches per PA.
Now, if either Molina or Rowand can join this conga line and start hitting like they can - I still think Molina can do it, but is losing hope that Rowand can - then we should be winning a lot of series going forward in June.
Plus, with Pat the Bat Burrell joining the team, the bench will be that much better, plus with spot starts, maybe he can power the ball out still. But he didn't hit that well in AAA, so don't expect miracles from him. Hopefully he will start out with spot starts vs. LHP for Huff plus provide right-handed HR power off the bench. If he starts hitting, then can think about more of a role in the lineup.
We still don't know what's happening on the 40 man to bring up Burrell (25 man move was to option Bowker to AAA). My best guess, which I tweeted, is that Medders gets moved to the 60-day DL list. He didn't do that well in his last rehab appearance, and since Santiago Casilla and Denny Bautista have done well, they could just leave him down there until he gets it all back together again.
Otherwise, they are out of easy moves, so the only other options would be DFAing someone. Many have said Ishikawa, but I still don't think that is happening, at least not yet. But the clock is ticking on that one, I think, particularly if Emmanuel Burriss does come off the DL in the second half, as speculated by Hank Schulman.
Friday, January 22, 2010
Molina Teleconference and Sanchez Shoulder Surgery
Molina has been officially signed by the Giants and there was a press conference earlier today. Reports from Baggarly's blog (and his news account) and John Shea of the Chronicle. Here are key points covered, including the surprising news that came out of a KNBR interview last night with Bruce Bochy, where he casually noted that Freddy Sanchez had shoulder surgery about a month ago and is on the bubble for making the start of the season.
Unlike many others, I have no problem with the signing, particularly since it would give Posey more time to get more experience in the minors. It should also give us one more year of control over him, plus the learning he would have done in 2010 would have costed us one year of control, while now he will get some of that learning in AAA before hopefully getting called up in July or August (or even September), and getting to play a little backing up Bengie plus learning from Molina.
I'm upset about Sanchez but I'll get over it (unlike others). He should only be out for two weeks, and that should not kill our chances of winning while he is out, because Uribe is a good enough replacement. Hey, one year Schmidt was out until May, and we came back and started winning and had a good year. As long as we don't fall too far behind while he is out, we should be OK.
Still, something has got to be done about the training staff, we seem to have all these unknown medical conditions that creep up on us, starting around when Bonds knee that was suppose to keep him out for a little while instead kept him out almost all season.
Guzman: hey, thanks for the excitement you gave us for a little while, good luck.
- Molina is officially a Giant, signing a $4.5M contract. Bengie noted that the Mets never offered a multi-year contract, else he probably would have took it, and only offered him a $5.0M contract (my note: most reports had it at $5.5M), so he decided that he would rather be where he was comfortable than get $500K more (my note: but apparently did not mention the $1.5M option that he could earn that most sources reported). He also said that he expects the Giants to be making the playoffs, unlike the Mets. He believes the Giants are "very, very close" to making something special happen.
- Nice quote: "The plan is to move him down in the lineup, possibly sixth. "I never considered myself a fourth hitter. I thought I was doing them a favor," said Molina, adding he'll bat wherever manager Bruce Bochy wants him. "I can hit behind the pitcher if he wants me there."
- Molina said he texted Posey and assured him that he wasn't there to take his job (though probably he did, unless the Giants signed another starting catcher) and offered to be there for him for anything. Posey then called back and they chatted. Sabean reiterated that Posey needed more seasoning in the minors, though he didn't rule out Posey starting the season as the backup catcher. Bu the expectation is that he'll get to start everyday in AAA and continue his learning with Steve Decker (former Giants catcher) who is now Fresno's manager (moving up the farm system). Baggarly noted that it's possible he will receive a promotion at some point this season. Molina said, "I said I'm happy to help out with whatever he needs. If they want to bring him up and do their thing, hey, I understand."
- Sanchez had left shoulder surgery on December 23rd. The Giants Dr. Akizuki, who is on their staff, repaired a torn labrum and cleaned up an arthritic AC joint arthroscopically. Apparently the Giants did 4 MRIs on him before signing him, but like the medical shows, missed the torn labrum, which went unnoticed until Sanchez started swinging a bat again. He is expected to be out 10-12 weeks, meaning that Opening Day is in doubt, but the expectation is that he'll be 100% once he does take the field. I can understand the mistake, but when so many of them are being made, it makes you wonder what is going on with our training staff. The good news is that Sanchez is working his butt off to make opening day and it is encouraging thus far.
- Juan Uribe is our starting 2B until Sanchez gets back. That's why we signed him, insurance in case some regular is unable to start or needs a rest. I was hoping the Giants might play DeRosa there instead and let two young players start in the OF, but I can see the merits of keeping DeRosa out in LF since he doesn't have the most experience out there (though over a season's worth of games in the OF).
- They reported that both Burriss and Renteria were doing well. Renteria told the Giants that he's excited about where he's at. Hopefully that will translate to his hitting like he did when he was a plus hitter, that would be a boon to our offense.
- The Giants DFAed Jesus Guzman to clear space for Molina. Sabean noted that any other acquisitions would come on minor league contracts with invitations to spring training, including additional right-handed relievers.
Unlike many others, I have no problem with the signing, particularly since it would give Posey more time to get more experience in the minors. It should also give us one more year of control over him, plus the learning he would have done in 2010 would have costed us one year of control, while now he will get some of that learning in AAA before hopefully getting called up in July or August (or even September), and getting to play a little backing up Bengie plus learning from Molina.
I'm upset about Sanchez but I'll get over it (unlike others). He should only be out for two weeks, and that should not kill our chances of winning while he is out, because Uribe is a good enough replacement. Hey, one year Schmidt was out until May, and we came back and started winning and had a good year. As long as we don't fall too far behind while he is out, we should be OK.
Still, something has got to be done about the training staff, we seem to have all these unknown medical conditions that creep up on us, starting around when Bonds knee that was suppose to keep him out for a little while instead kept him out almost all season.
Guzman: hey, thanks for the excitement you gave us for a little while, good luck.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Report: Molina signs with Giants for $4.5M
Breaking news, here is the link, which I found on McCovey Chronicles. Quite a scoop for CBS-KPIX!
Giants Thoughts
Obviously, this means Buster Posey will be in AAA for most of the season, at least the early part, and Molina/Whiteside will be our backstops for the first half of 2010. Posey could then come up mid-season and Molina would be either sharing the starting position with him, or traded away with Posey taking over (probably not traded though, just noting the possibility).
This is exciting news, as I like Molina, but the caveat is that his OPS dipped a lot last season. Hopefully that is because he became a father for the first time and was missing a lot of sleep because he was kept busy taking care of the baby. If he can return to his former level of performance, plus provide a nice bat in the 6th spot (I think it'll be Huff 4th, DeRosa 5th, and Molina 6th), oh what the heck:
1) Rowand
2) Sanchez
3) Sandoval
4) Huff
5) DeRosa
6) Molina
7) Renteria
8) Schierholtz
They might swap Renteria and Schierholtz since Renteria is the vet and would be better able to handle batting 8th more than a prospect. Heck, if Renteria is healthy, he could bat 6th and Molina 7th or 8th.
This probably also means that the Giants are done signing hitters. Despite what people say about the Giants management, they have tried to give their young hitters a chance to prove themselves, and with this move, only RF is unspoken for, with Schierholtz the expected winner but battling with Bowker, who should give him a good run for the money, particularly if he can continue to get on base like he did in AAA.
However, that does not preclude picking up some hitters via a minor league contract. One hitter in particular I would hope the Giants kick the tires on is Eric Byrnes, who was recently let go by the D-backs, despite the $11M that they still owe him for 2010. He would be a much better backup than Andre Torres: while also playing all the OF positions and a RHH, Byrnes is a much better hitter, hits for more power, steals bases much better than Torres (much higher success rate in majors, 85%, than Torres compiled in minors, 75%), the only thing Torres is better is defense and at least Byrnes have been a good defensive outfielder when healthy.
And that is the key, whether he is healthy. But he should be willing to take a minor league contract so that the Giants don't have to clear a spot for him on the 40-man roster because he's getting $11M from the D-backs anyway. Plus, the Giants are his childhood team, it would be a dream come true for him to make the team.
And if healthy, he should be able to give Torres a run for the money in spring training for a backup position, which he acknowledged in a recent interview in the Chronicle is what he is now given the past two years, a backup. And if he made the Giants, he would be able to provide both power, speed, and defense off the bench, and across the OF, as he could play all three positions.
In addition, he could push Rowand in 2010. If healthy, he could take over starting in CF for long stretches if Rowand gets into one of his deep slumps again, like he did in 2008 and 2009. At minimum, Bochy could give Rowand the rest he said he wanted to give him more of in 2010 by starting Byrnes in CF.
And Torres, despite the fanboy love he has engendered with a subset of Giants fans, is not going to repeat his 2009 performance. He struck out like he was a power hitter and his BABIP was unsustainable even for the best hitters in MLB history, let alone a backup journeyman like Torres. Byrnes, if healthy, would be a better backup, by heads and shoulders over Torres.
But, if you haven't guessed yet, Byrnes has to prove to be healthy.
Giants Thoughts
Obviously, this means Buster Posey will be in AAA for most of the season, at least the early part, and Molina/Whiteside will be our backstops for the first half of 2010. Posey could then come up mid-season and Molina would be either sharing the starting position with him, or traded away with Posey taking over (probably not traded though, just noting the possibility).
This is exciting news, as I like Molina, but the caveat is that his OPS dipped a lot last season. Hopefully that is because he became a father for the first time and was missing a lot of sleep because he was kept busy taking care of the baby. If he can return to his former level of performance, plus provide a nice bat in the 6th spot (I think it'll be Huff 4th, DeRosa 5th, and Molina 6th), oh what the heck:
1) Rowand
2) Sanchez
3) Sandoval
4) Huff
5) DeRosa
6) Molina
7) Renteria
8) Schierholtz
They might swap Renteria and Schierholtz since Renteria is the vet and would be better able to handle batting 8th more than a prospect. Heck, if Renteria is healthy, he could bat 6th and Molina 7th or 8th.
This probably also means that the Giants are done signing hitters. Despite what people say about the Giants management, they have tried to give their young hitters a chance to prove themselves, and with this move, only RF is unspoken for, with Schierholtz the expected winner but battling with Bowker, who should give him a good run for the money, particularly if he can continue to get on base like he did in AAA.
However, that does not preclude picking up some hitters via a minor league contract. One hitter in particular I would hope the Giants kick the tires on is Eric Byrnes, who was recently let go by the D-backs, despite the $11M that they still owe him for 2010. He would be a much better backup than Andre Torres: while also playing all the OF positions and a RHH, Byrnes is a much better hitter, hits for more power, steals bases much better than Torres (much higher success rate in majors, 85%, than Torres compiled in minors, 75%), the only thing Torres is better is defense and at least Byrnes have been a good defensive outfielder when healthy.
And that is the key, whether he is healthy. But he should be willing to take a minor league contract so that the Giants don't have to clear a spot for him on the 40-man roster because he's getting $11M from the D-backs anyway. Plus, the Giants are his childhood team, it would be a dream come true for him to make the team.
And if healthy, he should be able to give Torres a run for the money in spring training for a backup position, which he acknowledged in a recent interview in the Chronicle is what he is now given the past two years, a backup. And if he made the Giants, he would be able to provide both power, speed, and defense off the bench, and across the OF, as he could play all three positions.
In addition, he could push Rowand in 2010. If healthy, he could take over starting in CF for long stretches if Rowand gets into one of his deep slumps again, like he did in 2008 and 2009. At minimum, Bochy could give Rowand the rest he said he wanted to give him more of in 2010 by starting Byrnes in CF.
And Torres, despite the fanboy love he has engendered with a subset of Giants fans, is not going to repeat his 2009 performance. He struck out like he was a power hitter and his BABIP was unsustainable even for the best hitters in MLB history, let alone a backup journeyman like Torres. Byrnes, if healthy, would be a better backup, by heads and shoulders over Torres.
But, if you haven't guessed yet, Byrnes has to prove to be healthy.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Graphical Player 2009: MINERS for Hitters
Graphical Player is an annual put out by John Burnson, who heads up Heater magazine; I've been buying GP regularly since it first came out. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in studying the statistics for players and Amazon sells it for about 30% off the cover price. The only minus is that he has been changing it slightly each year, so the continuity is not always there, but since I like seeing different ways of understanding how a player is doing grahpically, it's all good for me, but I know that some might prefer more continuity.
I will be taking stuff from this book and putting up posts on items relating to the Giants. Obviously, this is the first one.
MINERS for Hitters
This is a section of the book that covers MINERS for Hitters. MINER shows a projection of a player's "true talent," using monthly OPS for the full career of the hitters chosen from vets with eight or more seasons in the MLB (starts on page 5). The "true talent" line is not just a rolling average, they write, it incorporated OPS over the past three seasons, including minor league stats adjusted for MLE, and adds a component of regression to the MLB mean, where the size of regression is inversely related to the amount of playing time. They also note: "The lesson that you should draw from these graphs is to take the long view."
Devoted to Fantasy players, the book noted that Edgar Renteria is a buying opportunity for players who undershot their true talent. That applies, I presume, to real life as well. Below, I will discuss what the graph shows for a number of vet hitters plus include some info from their profile section (I'll cover the non-vet hitters in another post) and my thoughts.
Bengie Molina
The first Giant vet covered is Bengie Molina. I've seen a number of fans say over the years that he's hitting over his head, but according to the MINER system, he has basically been hitting what his talent for a number of years now, even back to when he was with the Angels. He's been very consistent in that way, based on his graph of actual OPS versus "true talent" OPS.
From text taken from the player profile portion of the book, the analyst does note that Molina's "advancing age should start to show" and that "his excellent defense and veteran presence must be some comfort to his young starters." However, his OPS projection shows a slight drop in 2009 before steady and steep declines. Based on this system, keeping him on beyond 2009 at the same salary appears to be a losing proposition, as they expect 2009 to be the best of the years to come. Of course, that's true for most projection systems that take age into account, as most players start their final decline once they reach Bengie's age range.
Some people think he should be traded now, but I think that unless we get two prospects close to the value of the draft picks we could get for him if he goes free agent, we should hold onto him until mid-season, at which point we should have a better idea how good Posey is and how close he is to reaching the majors. We should also get a better idea of how good a hitter Sandoval really is as well, because even if Posey isn't ready for 2010, if Sandoval does turn out to be a pretty good hitter - and the signs point to yes because of his ability to avoid strikeouts and get the bat on the ball - then he could keep the catching position steady until Posey is ready.
But if neither if ready, which is still a significant possibility, then we need Molina around as a backup plan for 2010 and trading him would make him very unlikely for us to sign him as a free agent after the 2009 season.
Edgar Renteria
According to MINER, Renteria's true OPS lies closer to 800 than it is to 700, another indication that his deal is a good one, as an 800 OPS at SS is much above average. And this 800 OPS level of "true talent" has been so since 2003 season. The analyst noted, "With his fine K%, we expect somewhat of a bounceback in terms of BA and OBP."
That is basically what I've been saying, that his K% in 2008 was very much like it was during his career, which is a good rate for hitters, a good sign he will continue to hit well in 2009, particularly after hitting .812 OPS after the All-Star break. And even if he hit .699 OPS like he did in 2008, that would still be a huge improvement over what we got in 2008 at SS. Still, given his batting peripherals, he looks like he should be able to reach his true talent OPS level in 2009, which would be another jump in level of improvement over what the SF shortstops did in 2008, as they really did very poorly, that was one of the biggest holes in the lineup.
According to my analysis of lineups, with Renteria, the lineup should be improved from the 4.0 runs per game averaged in 2008 to 4.1-4.2 runs per game with Renteria (and others), based on the most conservative projections for 2009. That should basically put us at .500 for 2009 given our pitching. CHONE projections, which were recently shown by The Book's website author to be the best of the projection systems for 2008, has the Giants at 4.19 RS, 4.05 RA (assuming 0.13 unearned runs average) or an 83-84 win season.
Aaron Rowand
According to MINER, Rowand's true OPS lies closer to 800 than his performance in 2008. Rowand has exhibited 800-ish talent since the start of the 2004 season. The analyst noted that "Rowand's intense style of play might have led to his weak finish in 2008. Of course, his apparent lack of comfort at home, and generally hitting in the #5 spot didn't help either." They forecast that he'll be closer to what he hit in 2008, and still rates him as 2 white gloves, where 3 white gloves is best and 3 black gloves are worst. (Molina has 3 white gloves, Renteria 2 black gloves, FYI).
Clearly, from his last three seasons stats, he hits best when he is patient and not striking out so much. It appears that Rowand will hit 6th or lower in 2009, as Lewis, Molina and Sandoval appear to be the guys slotted to hit in the middle, with Molina batting cleanup again, in 2009. Hopefully, now that he should be over his first season jitters, plus perhaps any lingering injury is healed properly, and the team not as dependent on his hitting, he can hit like he did early in 2008, around 900 OPS, for most of the season. The key is him avoiding the strikeout.
Randy Winn
Winn's talent has been steadily around 800 OPS since the 2002 season, and he has rarely been below his true talent level during his career; but we all know how steady a performer he has been. While a decline is forecasted for 2009, it is a very slight drop, and most probably related to his age. The analyst noted that "Winn continues to hit for average, play a brilliant right field," but warns that "it may be too much to expect for him to keep that up at his age - the forecast says the floor is about to drop," as beyond 2009, the forecast has him dropping greatly in OPS.
What I see is that his K% stayed consistently good all season long in 2008, and his H% was over .300 much of the season, in fact, peaking by season's end. Rated for three white gloves, he should still hit well enough in 2009, his last year on his current contract. The Giants should not entertain Winn's agent's offer to negotiate an extension.
With Schierholtz in the wings and all their talk about how he's ready, the Giants will probably give the starting outfield extra rest early in the 2009 season plus sit injured players when needed in order to give Schierholtz enough opportunities to show what he can do. While it made sense to sit down other prospects relatively quickly when they had slow/poor starts, I think they will give Schierholtz more rope because he's one of the few top prospects to spend a lot of time in AAA, giving the team more assurance that he's more of a real thing, or at least don't need more AAA seasoning.
Assuming Schierholtz does as well as I expect him to do - he appears to be duplicating his pattern during his rise up the system, hit .300 with no power initially to gain his bearings before hitting for power - Winn could then be dealt mid-season to open up RF for Schierholtz or, if not enought talent is not offered, the Giants could try to get the draft picks for him and give RF to Schierholtz in 2010.
I will be taking stuff from this book and putting up posts on items relating to the Giants. Obviously, this is the first one.
MINERS for Hitters
This is a section of the book that covers MINERS for Hitters. MINER shows a projection of a player's "true talent," using monthly OPS for the full career of the hitters chosen from vets with eight or more seasons in the MLB (starts on page 5). The "true talent" line is not just a rolling average, they write, it incorporated OPS over the past three seasons, including minor league stats adjusted for MLE, and adds a component of regression to the MLB mean, where the size of regression is inversely related to the amount of playing time. They also note: "The lesson that you should draw from these graphs is to take the long view."
Devoted to Fantasy players, the book noted that Edgar Renteria is a buying opportunity for players who undershot their true talent. That applies, I presume, to real life as well. Below, I will discuss what the graph shows for a number of vet hitters plus include some info from their profile section (I'll cover the non-vet hitters in another post) and my thoughts.
Bengie Molina
The first Giant vet covered is Bengie Molina. I've seen a number of fans say over the years that he's hitting over his head, but according to the MINER system, he has basically been hitting what his talent for a number of years now, even back to when he was with the Angels. He's been very consistent in that way, based on his graph of actual OPS versus "true talent" OPS.
From text taken from the player profile portion of the book, the analyst does note that Molina's "advancing age should start to show" and that "his excellent defense and veteran presence must be some comfort to his young starters." However, his OPS projection shows a slight drop in 2009 before steady and steep declines. Based on this system, keeping him on beyond 2009 at the same salary appears to be a losing proposition, as they expect 2009 to be the best of the years to come. Of course, that's true for most projection systems that take age into account, as most players start their final decline once they reach Bengie's age range.
Some people think he should be traded now, but I think that unless we get two prospects close to the value of the draft picks we could get for him if he goes free agent, we should hold onto him until mid-season, at which point we should have a better idea how good Posey is and how close he is to reaching the majors. We should also get a better idea of how good a hitter Sandoval really is as well, because even if Posey isn't ready for 2010, if Sandoval does turn out to be a pretty good hitter - and the signs point to yes because of his ability to avoid strikeouts and get the bat on the ball - then he could keep the catching position steady until Posey is ready.
But if neither if ready, which is still a significant possibility, then we need Molina around as a backup plan for 2010 and trading him would make him very unlikely for us to sign him as a free agent after the 2009 season.
Edgar Renteria
According to MINER, Renteria's true OPS lies closer to 800 than it is to 700, another indication that his deal is a good one, as an 800 OPS at SS is much above average. And this 800 OPS level of "true talent" has been so since 2003 season. The analyst noted, "With his fine K%, we expect somewhat of a bounceback in terms of BA and OBP."
That is basically what I've been saying, that his K% in 2008 was very much like it was during his career, which is a good rate for hitters, a good sign he will continue to hit well in 2009, particularly after hitting .812 OPS after the All-Star break. And even if he hit .699 OPS like he did in 2008, that would still be a huge improvement over what we got in 2008 at SS. Still, given his batting peripherals, he looks like he should be able to reach his true talent OPS level in 2009, which would be another jump in level of improvement over what the SF shortstops did in 2008, as they really did very poorly, that was one of the biggest holes in the lineup.
According to my analysis of lineups, with Renteria, the lineup should be improved from the 4.0 runs per game averaged in 2008 to 4.1-4.2 runs per game with Renteria (and others), based on the most conservative projections for 2009. That should basically put us at .500 for 2009 given our pitching. CHONE projections, which were recently shown by The Book's website author to be the best of the projection systems for 2008, has the Giants at 4.19 RS, 4.05 RA (assuming 0.13 unearned runs average) or an 83-84 win season.
Aaron Rowand
According to MINER, Rowand's true OPS lies closer to 800 than his performance in 2008. Rowand has exhibited 800-ish talent since the start of the 2004 season. The analyst noted that "Rowand's intense style of play might have led to his weak finish in 2008. Of course, his apparent lack of comfort at home, and generally hitting in the #5 spot didn't help either." They forecast that he'll be closer to what he hit in 2008, and still rates him as 2 white gloves, where 3 white gloves is best and 3 black gloves are worst. (Molina has 3 white gloves, Renteria 2 black gloves, FYI).
Clearly, from his last three seasons stats, he hits best when he is patient and not striking out so much. It appears that Rowand will hit 6th or lower in 2009, as Lewis, Molina and Sandoval appear to be the guys slotted to hit in the middle, with Molina batting cleanup again, in 2009. Hopefully, now that he should be over his first season jitters, plus perhaps any lingering injury is healed properly, and the team not as dependent on his hitting, he can hit like he did early in 2008, around 900 OPS, for most of the season. The key is him avoiding the strikeout.
Randy Winn
Winn's talent has been steadily around 800 OPS since the 2002 season, and he has rarely been below his true talent level during his career; but we all know how steady a performer he has been. While a decline is forecasted for 2009, it is a very slight drop, and most probably related to his age. The analyst noted that "Winn continues to hit for average, play a brilliant right field," but warns that "it may be too much to expect for him to keep that up at his age - the forecast says the floor is about to drop," as beyond 2009, the forecast has him dropping greatly in OPS.
What I see is that his K% stayed consistently good all season long in 2008, and his H% was over .300 much of the season, in fact, peaking by season's end. Rated for three white gloves, he should still hit well enough in 2009, his last year on his current contract. The Giants should not entertain Winn's agent's offer to negotiate an extension.
With Schierholtz in the wings and all their talk about how he's ready, the Giants will probably give the starting outfield extra rest early in the 2009 season plus sit injured players when needed in order to give Schierholtz enough opportunities to show what he can do. While it made sense to sit down other prospects relatively quickly when they had slow/poor starts, I think they will give Schierholtz more rope because he's one of the few top prospects to spend a lot of time in AAA, giving the team more assurance that he's more of a real thing, or at least don't need more AAA seasoning.
Assuming Schierholtz does as well as I expect him to do - he appears to be duplicating his pattern during his rise up the system, hit .300 with no power initially to gain his bearings before hitting for power - Winn could then be dealt mid-season to open up RF for Schierholtz or, if not enought talent is not offered, the Giants could try to get the draft picks for him and give RF to Schierholtz in 2010.
Monday, July 28, 2008
Trade Deadline Talk
I was reading Grant's post on McCovey Chronicles about the Giants trade deadline plans, and I wrote so much that I thought I would post it here too. Grant wonders about Winn and Molina in particularly, Aurilia too, and about how Winn is blocking Schierholtz while doing worse than Schierholtz this season:
Winn Vs. Schierholtz
It depends on whether the Giants believe that the .726 OPS Winn currently carries represent his net future value or the .766 career OPS or .798 OPS he has compiled as a Giants player. If you think he is done (the .726 OPS), then you try to dump him now, throwing cash out and playing Schierholtz. Think of it this way, nobody thought of this earlier in the season when he was hitting better, only when he has been slumping recently, and yet the only real difference between then and now is that Winn is slumping right now. Unless you think he suddenly lost it, there is no reason to think he's not still the roughly .800 OPS hitter he has been for us the past few years. And if you think it's the .798 OPS, then you hold onto Winn because of his better defense and veteran experience, because then he has Nate beat on three counts, offensive, defensive, and intangible leadership.
BTW, that is the trade scenario that Ted Robinson discussed while on Ralph's and Tom's show the other day when he suggested that Winn was horribly overpaid since we could get equivalent production by playing Schierholtz (nevermind the fact that players of his offensive abilties are getting that much and more - hello Gary Mathews Jr. - on the open free agent market). He admonished the Giants for not trading Winn when we got an equivalent or better player (and much younger and cheaper) sitting in AAA.
It also depends on whether you believe that Schierholtz is actually the .778 MLE OPS from this season or the .787 MLE OPS is his 2007 suggests, or if the holes in his swing that scouts and observers have noted about him would expose him in the majors as a AAAA hitter, much like Todd Linden's 2005 .904 MLE OPS didn't really portend anything close to that in the majors. That MLE hasn't really materialized yet, has it?
Not to jinx him, but MLE is not a guarantee, it is an approximation that, while nice for giving you a ballpark estimate of his MLB abilities, is still only a very rough estimate, with a wide bell curve, and sometimes your prospect falls behind the curve, much like the Cards discovered recently with Anthony Reyes, who was their Tim Linceucm/Matt Cain a couple of years ago, but they just recently gave up and traded him away for nothing much, at least I didn't recognize the name.
I love Nate, else I wouldn't quote him in my sig, and wish him well, but as good as he is hitting, he is only 29th in OPS in the PCL. Unless you think there are going to be 30 players coming up from the PCL over the next year and not only start but hit nearly .800 OPS as a regular starter, you have to admit that there are many of these players out of that 30 who are going to eventually go to the majors and majorly suck. If you know that Nate is not going to be one of them, then you deserve a job as a fortune teller, because there isn't anybody who knows that for certain, there are levels of belief and possibilities.
Giants Trading Deadline Plans
It also depends regarding the Giants deadline plans. Typically, Sabean and the Giants pronouncements are much like Horton The Elephant, "he says what he means, he means what he says," and what he last said was that the team is in transition and they are listening to offers for any veterans but are not trading away any young pitching. Now, how much they accept in trade is another question, but A.J. notwithstanding, the Sabean regime has been pretty good when trading with other teams, we tend to come out ahead of the deal, sometimes by a little, sometimes by a lot. Even in the cases of the no-name names that Grant notes, most of the time, the other team didn't get much either.
I think that no team will wow the Giants for Molina, which is what that would take because we have nobody who can take over right now, unless we get their lame-o catcher back in return - and at least get a good enough defensive catcher - along with a good prospect. In this case, getting their catcher would clear the way towards the other team being OK taking on Molina's 2009 contract. I think it would take the loss of the starting catcher for the season while leading the division to get the team to be that desperate for Molina, but then you don't get the lame-o catcher in return, so that's a catch-22. So losing Molina is unlikely in my opinion.
I think Aurilia will probably be gone after the trade deadline, because he can still hit well (road OPS .791; 34 AB/HR or about 20 HR in 680 AB season, good HR power; mashes lefties with .893 OPS) and can play 1B, 3B adequately and SS, 2B in a pinch, can come off the bench for power and driving in RISP. His contract is also pocket change at that point.
After because he's not a difference maker - Durham can make a huge difference if he continues to hit well while Weeks sucks - since he can't hit RHP that well and is not great defensively, so a team would want to acquire him to help them get over the top as the season nears ending and it is clearer what the team's chances are for winning it all. He may or may not make the playoff roster (not if after August 31st), again because he's not a difference maker UNLESS the other team lost a starter for the season and has no adequate replacement. He could be a supplemental acquisition, like how we picked up Bill Mueller one September past.
Winn is not a difference maker either, but is much more valuable than Aurilia because he hits so consistently throughout his career and plays good defense at all three OF positions. He would also represent speed off the bench, along with a touch of double-digit power. Given his 2009 contract, I think it would again take a situation like I described above for Molina for Winn to be traded.
He's a nice player, a complementary player, and it would probably take an injury to an OF late in the season where the team still has a good chance to get into the playoffs for a team to be desperate enough to trade for a Winn now, plus perhaps the situation of losing an OF as a free agent this offseason, meaning Winn has a spot for next season. Otherwise, I don't see another team taking on Winn's contract until the off-season and the musical chairs music ends, and a team finds that they need to get a decent OF in trade. I think we can probably get a failed prospect, much like we got for Durham, plus a prospect with flawed but decent potential (probably a lot of speed too), again much like Durham's trade.
Winn Vs. Schierholtz
It depends on whether the Giants believe that the .726 OPS Winn currently carries represent his net future value or the .766 career OPS or .798 OPS he has compiled as a Giants player. If you think he is done (the .726 OPS), then you try to dump him now, throwing cash out and playing Schierholtz. Think of it this way, nobody thought of this earlier in the season when he was hitting better, only when he has been slumping recently, and yet the only real difference between then and now is that Winn is slumping right now. Unless you think he suddenly lost it, there is no reason to think he's not still the roughly .800 OPS hitter he has been for us the past few years. And if you think it's the .798 OPS, then you hold onto Winn because of his better defense and veteran experience, because then he has Nate beat on three counts, offensive, defensive, and intangible leadership.
BTW, that is the trade scenario that Ted Robinson discussed while on Ralph's and Tom's show the other day when he suggested that Winn was horribly overpaid since we could get equivalent production by playing Schierholtz (nevermind the fact that players of his offensive abilties are getting that much and more - hello Gary Mathews Jr. - on the open free agent market). He admonished the Giants for not trading Winn when we got an equivalent or better player (and much younger and cheaper) sitting in AAA.
It also depends on whether you believe that Schierholtz is actually the .778 MLE OPS from this season or the .787 MLE OPS is his 2007 suggests, or if the holes in his swing that scouts and observers have noted about him would expose him in the majors as a AAAA hitter, much like Todd Linden's 2005 .904 MLE OPS didn't really portend anything close to that in the majors. That MLE hasn't really materialized yet, has it?
Not to jinx him, but MLE is not a guarantee, it is an approximation that, while nice for giving you a ballpark estimate of his MLB abilities, is still only a very rough estimate, with a wide bell curve, and sometimes your prospect falls behind the curve, much like the Cards discovered recently with Anthony Reyes, who was their Tim Linceucm/Matt Cain a couple of years ago, but they just recently gave up and traded him away for nothing much, at least I didn't recognize the name.
I love Nate, else I wouldn't quote him in my sig, and wish him well, but as good as he is hitting, he is only 29th in OPS in the PCL. Unless you think there are going to be 30 players coming up from the PCL over the next year and not only start but hit nearly .800 OPS as a regular starter, you have to admit that there are many of these players out of that 30 who are going to eventually go to the majors and majorly suck. If you know that Nate is not going to be one of them, then you deserve a job as a fortune teller, because there isn't anybody who knows that for certain, there are levels of belief and possibilities.
Giants Trading Deadline Plans
It also depends regarding the Giants deadline plans. Typically, Sabean and the Giants pronouncements are much like Horton The Elephant, "he says what he means, he means what he says," and what he last said was that the team is in transition and they are listening to offers for any veterans but are not trading away any young pitching. Now, how much they accept in trade is another question, but A.J. notwithstanding, the Sabean regime has been pretty good when trading with other teams, we tend to come out ahead of the deal, sometimes by a little, sometimes by a lot. Even in the cases of the no-name names that Grant notes, most of the time, the other team didn't get much either.
I think that no team will wow the Giants for Molina, which is what that would take because we have nobody who can take over right now, unless we get their lame-o catcher back in return - and at least get a good enough defensive catcher - along with a good prospect. In this case, getting their catcher would clear the way towards the other team being OK taking on Molina's 2009 contract. I think it would take the loss of the starting catcher for the season while leading the division to get the team to be that desperate for Molina, but then you don't get the lame-o catcher in return, so that's a catch-22. So losing Molina is unlikely in my opinion.
I think Aurilia will probably be gone after the trade deadline, because he can still hit well (road OPS .791; 34 AB/HR or about 20 HR in 680 AB season, good HR power; mashes lefties with .893 OPS) and can play 1B, 3B adequately and SS, 2B in a pinch, can come off the bench for power and driving in RISP. His contract is also pocket change at that point.
After because he's not a difference maker - Durham can make a huge difference if he continues to hit well while Weeks sucks - since he can't hit RHP that well and is not great defensively, so a team would want to acquire him to help them get over the top as the season nears ending and it is clearer what the team's chances are for winning it all. He may or may not make the playoff roster (not if after August 31st), again because he's not a difference maker UNLESS the other team lost a starter for the season and has no adequate replacement. He could be a supplemental acquisition, like how we picked up Bill Mueller one September past.
Winn is not a difference maker either, but is much more valuable than Aurilia because he hits so consistently throughout his career and plays good defense at all three OF positions. He would also represent speed off the bench, along with a touch of double-digit power. Given his 2009 contract, I think it would again take a situation like I described above for Molina for Winn to be traded.
He's a nice player, a complementary player, and it would probably take an injury to an OF late in the season where the team still has a good chance to get into the playoffs for a team to be desperate enough to trade for a Winn now, plus perhaps the situation of losing an OF as a free agent this offseason, meaning Winn has a spot for next season. Otherwise, I don't see another team taking on Winn's contract until the off-season and the musical chairs music ends, and a team finds that they need to get a decent OF in trade. I think we can probably get a failed prospect, much like we got for Durham, plus a prospect with flawed but decent potential (probably a lot of speed too), again much like Durham's trade.
Monday, June 09, 2008
Further Thoughts on Posey plus Molina Public Cry and Interesting Draft Picks
I am still a bit embarrassed about my initial reaction to Posey. Not only was he considered a #1 pick by some, but he is the prototypical position player that Sabean loves: athletic, can play a number of positions, great defensive skills. At least I saw the errors of my ways soon afterward, some people still would rather have Smoak.
While I can sympathize, clearly, at this moment, Buster Posey was the correct pick. He was highly rated and ranked, with some thinking him deserving of being the number one pick overall. He filled a position of strong long-term need for the Giants.
It is particularly critical to get a catcher who can provide gold-glove caliber defense since the Giants future is so tied to our pitching staff, and especially so since Jackson Williams is struggling mightily to hit his weight in A-ball Augusta and thus does not look like he'll be making it to the majors for at least another 4 years plus. And it is rare to see a catcher with strong offensive and defensive skills so high in the draft, they don't grow on trees, making Posey a rarity in any draft.
Oddly enough, there was one in the last draft in Matt Weiters. Weiters would have been nice last season - there was talk that he might fall to the Giants but no such luck - but there is still questions on whether he can stay at the catcher's position with his size; this was an issue with the Twin's Mauer, which he has dispelled and thus give encouragement that Weiters could do likewise, but that will hang over his head much like Lincecum's size will always hang over his.
There is no such concerns over Posey, however, he could be our catcher for a long time once he develops and makes it up to the majors and some think he could do the same playing SS for us as well, which would be great should Williams ever show he can hit in the majors..
And a player like Smoak is typically available when you pick high in the draft as the Giants appear headed to doing again in the 2009 draft. And we still have need at 3B as well, so we are not limited to getting just a power-hitting 1B next year, plus everyone can always use a power hitting SS, should one be available. Examples include Alvarez, T.Beckham, and Smoak in 2008, Moustakas, Vitters, Wieters in 2007, Longoria in 2006, Upton, Gordon, Braun, and Tulowitski in 2005 (wow, that was a good year).
In addition, we already have a player like Smoak in our system in Villalona. While both look like they are good hitters with 40+ power potential and good defensivel abilities, both don't look like they can move to another position like LF. This will force the Giants to have to trade off one or the other away to fill other needs.
And we can see how that can turn out from the McCovey/Cepeda dilemma the Giants had years ago, or more recently with Texas when they had Teixiera but essentially traded away Travis Hafner and Adrian Gonzalez for nothing much, showing the risk of having two similar players at the same position. As I noted long ago in my article on Sabean's habit of focusing on pitcher, it is much harder to find a trading partner match when you have a position player to offer than when you have a pitcher to offer, for a good pitcher can fill up to 12 positions of need for a variety of teams, which expands the number of teams you can deal with, increasing the value you can derive from the trade both due to need and competitive bidding.
Molina Not Feeling the Love
Another fall-out from the Posey pick was Sabean's comment afterward about Molina's time with the Giants possibly ending soon since his contract is up after the 2009 season. Molina had a public complaint about that, his feelings were clearly hurt.
I think it was pretty clear that when Sabean was talking about Molina's "clock is winding down", he wasn't talking about his abilities as a ballplayer, particularly with him doing so well, but about his contract status. A lot of fans did not get that so I wanted to point it out. And despite how much a player will profess to love the team and say they want to stay - hello, David Bell - there is no guarantee that Molina will stay with the Giants at a price they want to pay for him. For instance, lets say after hitting like this, he wants a 3 year contract for $30M, there's no way the Giants will want to do that, particularly at his age, but then the result is no Molina, no starting catcher.
Also, I didn't think Molina was wussy enough to feel this way, much less air it publicly, but oh well. But his main complaint was that he thought he has done enough to deserve an extension, because he wants to feel the love, unlike at Anaheim and Toronto when they gave him no extensions.
And the thing is, this really had nothing to do with Molina. If anything, it was a public challenge by Sabean to Posey and his agents to get his signing done quickly and not drag it out to the August deadline, like many draftees did last season. He was basically saying time's (and opportunity) a-wasting if they are going to wait until the deadline to sign, just quibbling over a few hundred thousands or a million or two when he could be starting in the majors sooner than later if he signed immediately. And he threw out an olive branch, saying that a major league contract is not out of the question.
The thing is, with the youth movement, Molina is stupid if he thinks the Giants are planning on giving him an extention (as he seems to think he deserves) when with his outlier season this year, they will probably rather let him leave via free agency and hope they pick up two draft picks for him, presumably a late first rounder plus supplemental, because at his age, only a contender will pick him up most probably.
And there is no reason for the Giants to trade Molina, they have no strong or even decently average defensive catcher ready to come up and start for them, Holm is not that good defensively nor have I heard anything about his pitch-calling abilities. And to drive it home, none of the major prospect books thought enough of him to include him on the Giants top prospect list, including Baseball America. And I consider Alfonso done after two suspensions for PED usage. And Pablo Sandoval is still in Advanced A-ball in San Jose.
Sandoval could be ready to start by the 2009 season, though, so a trade in the winter is possible if he wants to make a big enough stink about it. But he's a gamer so he shouldn't, right? That's what Durham did, when Frandsen talked about taking 2B, Durham said "bring it on", he's not going to lose the position.
To sum up, Bengie shouldn't worry so much over a comment made more to give Posey and his agent a kick start to negotiations and signing and be happy that the Giants gave him a huge vote of confidence with his three year contract when probably most teams were probably offering less years as well as less dollars. If he's worried about the future, good, keep hitting and you don't really have to worry about your future, you just have to wonder where you will end up. Baseball is a travelling show typically for all except the greats, so that's not new news, hopefully.
Draft Aftermath
Two interesting historical tidbits from the second day of the draft that I wanted to note.
First is that the Giants drafted Tyler Thompson, OF, and son of Giants' fan favorite, Robby Thompson. He is a high schooler in Florida and was selected in the 41st round. No news on the chances of signing him, don't know if he was back that far because of college commits or lack of talent, though I guess I would assume the former.
Second is that they drafted Ryan Mantle, a right-handed-hitting outfielder from Missouri State, who is a third cousin of Hall of Famer Mickey Mantle, in the 19th round. No pressure there!
In addition, they drafted a number of players with local connections:
While I can sympathize, clearly, at this moment, Buster Posey was the correct pick. He was highly rated and ranked, with some thinking him deserving of being the number one pick overall. He filled a position of strong long-term need for the Giants.
It is particularly critical to get a catcher who can provide gold-glove caliber defense since the Giants future is so tied to our pitching staff, and especially so since Jackson Williams is struggling mightily to hit his weight in A-ball Augusta and thus does not look like he'll be making it to the majors for at least another 4 years plus. And it is rare to see a catcher with strong offensive and defensive skills so high in the draft, they don't grow on trees, making Posey a rarity in any draft.
Oddly enough, there was one in the last draft in Matt Weiters. Weiters would have been nice last season - there was talk that he might fall to the Giants but no such luck - but there is still questions on whether he can stay at the catcher's position with his size; this was an issue with the Twin's Mauer, which he has dispelled and thus give encouragement that Weiters could do likewise, but that will hang over his head much like Lincecum's size will always hang over his.
There is no such concerns over Posey, however, he could be our catcher for a long time once he develops and makes it up to the majors and some think he could do the same playing SS for us as well, which would be great should Williams ever show he can hit in the majors..
And a player like Smoak is typically available when you pick high in the draft as the Giants appear headed to doing again in the 2009 draft. And we still have need at 3B as well, so we are not limited to getting just a power-hitting 1B next year, plus everyone can always use a power hitting SS, should one be available. Examples include Alvarez, T.Beckham, and Smoak in 2008, Moustakas, Vitters, Wieters in 2007, Longoria in 2006, Upton, Gordon, Braun, and Tulowitski in 2005 (wow, that was a good year).
In addition, we already have a player like Smoak in our system in Villalona. While both look like they are good hitters with 40+ power potential and good defensivel abilities, both don't look like they can move to another position like LF. This will force the Giants to have to trade off one or the other away to fill other needs.
And we can see how that can turn out from the McCovey/Cepeda dilemma the Giants had years ago, or more recently with Texas when they had Teixiera but essentially traded away Travis Hafner and Adrian Gonzalez for nothing much, showing the risk of having two similar players at the same position. As I noted long ago in my article on Sabean's habit of focusing on pitcher, it is much harder to find a trading partner match when you have a position player to offer than when you have a pitcher to offer, for a good pitcher can fill up to 12 positions of need for a variety of teams, which expands the number of teams you can deal with, increasing the value you can derive from the trade both due to need and competitive bidding.
Molina Not Feeling the Love
Another fall-out from the Posey pick was Sabean's comment afterward about Molina's time with the Giants possibly ending soon since his contract is up after the 2009 season. Molina had a public complaint about that, his feelings were clearly hurt.
I think it was pretty clear that when Sabean was talking about Molina's "clock is winding down", he wasn't talking about his abilities as a ballplayer, particularly with him doing so well, but about his contract status. A lot of fans did not get that so I wanted to point it out. And despite how much a player will profess to love the team and say they want to stay - hello, David Bell - there is no guarantee that Molina will stay with the Giants at a price they want to pay for him. For instance, lets say after hitting like this, he wants a 3 year contract for $30M, there's no way the Giants will want to do that, particularly at his age, but then the result is no Molina, no starting catcher.
Also, I didn't think Molina was wussy enough to feel this way, much less air it publicly, but oh well. But his main complaint was that he thought he has done enough to deserve an extension, because he wants to feel the love, unlike at Anaheim and Toronto when they gave him no extensions.
And the thing is, this really had nothing to do with Molina. If anything, it was a public challenge by Sabean to Posey and his agents to get his signing done quickly and not drag it out to the August deadline, like many draftees did last season. He was basically saying time's (and opportunity) a-wasting if they are going to wait until the deadline to sign, just quibbling over a few hundred thousands or a million or two when he could be starting in the majors sooner than later if he signed immediately. And he threw out an olive branch, saying that a major league contract is not out of the question.
The thing is, with the youth movement, Molina is stupid if he thinks the Giants are planning on giving him an extention (as he seems to think he deserves) when with his outlier season this year, they will probably rather let him leave via free agency and hope they pick up two draft picks for him, presumably a late first rounder plus supplemental, because at his age, only a contender will pick him up most probably.
And there is no reason for the Giants to trade Molina, they have no strong or even decently average defensive catcher ready to come up and start for them, Holm is not that good defensively nor have I heard anything about his pitch-calling abilities. And to drive it home, none of the major prospect books thought enough of him to include him on the Giants top prospect list, including Baseball America. And I consider Alfonso done after two suspensions for PED usage. And Pablo Sandoval is still in Advanced A-ball in San Jose.
Sandoval could be ready to start by the 2009 season, though, so a trade in the winter is possible if he wants to make a big enough stink about it. But he's a gamer so he shouldn't, right? That's what Durham did, when Frandsen talked about taking 2B, Durham said "bring it on", he's not going to lose the position.
To sum up, Bengie shouldn't worry so much over a comment made more to give Posey and his agent a kick start to negotiations and signing and be happy that the Giants gave him a huge vote of confidence with his three year contract when probably most teams were probably offering less years as well as less dollars. If he's worried about the future, good, keep hitting and you don't really have to worry about your future, you just have to wonder where you will end up. Baseball is a travelling show typically for all except the greats, so that's not new news, hopefully.
Draft Aftermath
Two interesting historical tidbits from the second day of the draft that I wanted to note.
First is that the Giants drafted Tyler Thompson, OF, and son of Giants' fan favorite, Robby Thompson. He is a high schooler in Florida and was selected in the 41st round. No news on the chances of signing him, don't know if he was back that far because of college commits or lack of talent, though I guess I would assume the former.
Second is that they drafted Ryan Mantle, a right-handed-hitting outfielder from Missouri State, who is a third cousin of Hall of Famer Mickey Mantle, in the 19th round. No pressure there!
In addition, they drafted a number of players with local connections:
- UCLA shortstop Brandon Crawford (fourth round, Foothill High School, Pleasanton),
- U.C. Davis right-handed pitcher Justin Fitzgerald (11th round, U.C. Davis and Cardinal Newman High School),
- Cal State Chico (party on!) right-handed pitcher Kyle Woodruff (27th round, Cal State Chico, Leland High School and College of San Mateo) and
- shortstop Abe Ruiz (47th round, Pacific Grove High School).
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Merc Stats on Giants in May
Thought I would note some stats from Andy Baggarly of the Merc today about the Giants offense that supports my contention that the Giants offense would be adequate:
- Averaging 4.48 runs in May after a 3.21 runs in April. Hard to score when your leadoff hitter is making outs constantly when Roberts was in there. He shouldn't have been playing, he should have went on the DL immediately with the start of the season. It put us in a 0-6 hole immediately that has been hard to climb out of. We have been 21-25 since.
- Run production was also more consistent (well, I guess that is pretty obviously what happens when you push runs scored from 3.2 to 4.5) with 20 games in May out of 23 with at least 3 runs scored versus 16 out of 29 in April (meaning only 3 games in May with 2 or less runs scored versus 13 games in April). Showing how meaningful this stat is, Lincecum is 12-0 in 20 career stats when receiving at least 3 runs of support.
Of course, it helps when you have a good number of highly productive hitters doing well at the same time. Bengie Molina has been so hot that he actually was named the National League player of the week for May 19-25. He hit .652 with 6 doubles and 9 RBIs.
Rowand Good Acquisition
Aaron Rowand, as I had argued during the off-season, has been a very good addition to the lineup, hitting .331/.398/.538/.936 thus far this season. That is very similar to what he did in 2004 and 2007, plus 2006 until his injury, leaving 2005 as the anomalous season:
2004-H1 .298/.339/.524/.863
2004-H2 .319/.377/.559/.936
2007-H1 .310/.385/.478/.863
2007-H2 .307/.361/.554/.915
2006-IN .310/.356/.516/.872
And for those who noted that he played in good offensive parks:
2004-Road .317/.360/.547/.907
2007-Road .299/.368/.475/.843
2007 vs. 2008
Believe it or not, I just read somebody who was looking to trade away Rowand. It's like I've been saying, the team is not that far away from being competitive. With the pitching we got, we can win a lot of games with a middling offense. And it doesn't take a lot of pieces to make a middling offense, last year our offense was actually OK when Bonds was not in the lineup. For some reason Durham froze (or was un-nerved by) batting behind Bonds and his stats batting 5th behind Bonds was horrible or 3rd ahead of Bonds, while he was actually OK batting 4th.
- Durham batting 5th early on mainly: .234/.306/.409/.715
- Durham batting 3rd mainly when trying to get out of funk: .181/.269/.268/.537
- Durham batting 4th when Bonds not in lineup: .275/.344/.413/.757
I think the numbers was 4.0 runs scored with Bonds in lineup, 4.6 runs scored when Bonds not in lineup, 4.2 runs scored overall (from memory from previous Mercury article; I love Baggarly's analysis!). 4.6 runs, while not stupendous, would be great combined with our pitching when it is going well.
To finish up, other hitters who have been helping with the boost in offense include the steady Randy Winn, the adequate production from Ray Durham (probably just enough that we can trade him for a prospect by August), and very nice production from Fred Lewis.
Fred Lewis!
Krukow was very praiseful of Lewis this morning as well as Lincecum. He noted that Lewis has been doing a good job of adjusting to what the pitchers adjust to him so far, and that he is going to be very good.
I have to applaud Fred on his job well done so far. It is far more than I thought, I guess I was a bit jaded hearing about how he was going to be such a good middle-of-lineup hitter while he was rising but then he didn't do so well the previous couple of years until 2007 when he finally busted out. So far this season: .273/.346/.465/.811 with 4 homers in 172 AB (43 AB/HR) and 8 SB in 10 attempts (80% success rate, not too bad). He doesn't have the hype that other young prospect hitters have gotten in the majors, but I'll take .811 OPS anytime.
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Lincecum-itis: Young Tim's Fourth Start
Lincecum-itis (lin - suh - cum - i - tis): the urge of the Giants opposing team's batters to sit out that game, for whatever reason (pain, rest, etc.) when Lincecum is the opposing pitcher.
Krukow brought this up in his morning show on KNBR and the post-game wrap, that batters will soon miss games where Lincecum is starting. Yesterday's game was the first known case of Lincecum-itis, as Craig Biggio, who regularly plays in 153+ games (8 of last 11 seasons), missed yesterday's game after playing in 41 of 44 games. Skipper thought he needed a rest.
Krukow then noted how Biggio looked silly last week striking out three times - a sombrero, new term for me. Biggio, in a spiteful remark, after that performance, noted that Lincecum has "the best young stuff I've seen since I saw Kerry Wood." :^) He also noted, "he dropped that thing from the roof of Minute Maid and I was like, 'Where did that come from?' " Apparently they tried to prepare for him last time by watching his game against the Phillies, where he got blasted because he used mainly fastballs, and missed his great start with Colorado where he used all his pitches much more and to greater effect.
Fourth Start of the Lincecum Era
He pitched well again against the Astros, but was not as dominant as he was last time. He no-hit them for the first 3 innings, showing that they didn't seem to learn much on him, and lasted 8 innings, giving up 5 hits, 2 runs/ER, 0 HR, 1 walk, got 4 strikeouts. He did this in 104 pitches, 71 of them for strikes, which is a very good ratio, and I think the ratio went up as the game went on as it seemed like it was around 60% earlier in the game. However, it was slightly disappointing that he only got 4 strikeouts, though I guess that's good since he went deep into the game with 104 pitches.
It is another dominating game with a 4 PQS, only missing out because he only stuck out 4 this time, versus 10 last time. He now has 3 dominating games out of 4, so he now has 75% DOM/25% DIS. And had he lasted two more outs in his first game without giving up another hit, he would have earned a 2 PQS for that game and not be given an automatic 0 PQS for not pitching 5 innings.
For a pitcher known for his wildness in college, even in his breakout year when the Giants drafted him, he has now allowed only 1 walk a game for his past 3 starts, after walking 5 in his first start. This has allowed him to keep his WHIP around 1.0 (1.03), which he has done by also keeping his hits low, he has giving up only 19 hits in 26.1 IP. And if you throw out his first start, he has a 1.64 ERA, a WHIP of 0.77, and a 20:3 K/BB ratio in 22 IP.
Frandsen Graduates
Just wanted to leave a note of congratulations to Kevin Frandsen for earning his final two course units necessary to graduate from San Jose State University. He has a bachelor's degree in finance. He was shooting to graduate in 4 years but unfortunately two classes he needed his final year was cancelled in his last semester and so he had to finish off the classes later, via correspondence.
Giants Notes
Got some news from the Merc and sfgiants.com today:
- RP/Closer Tyler Walker has started throwing live batting practice and is expected to be assigned to a minor league affiliate in mid-June, about one year after getting Tommy John surgery last year.
- SS Emmanuel Burriss, who had a great start to his pro career for us on Salem-Keizer's Rookie A league team, was jumped to Advanced A San Jose this year but, unfortunately he was overmatched, batting only .165 in 139 ABs for San Jose, and so he was demoted to Augusta's A-league team in the Sally League (South Atlantic League). He is considered one of the fastest prospects in the minors, better than even Marcus Sanders. He is a hair behind Detroit's great prospect, Cameron Maybin.
- Winn's 20 game hitting streak ended yesterday, which tied Willie Mays for the fifth longest streak in SF Giants history and is the longest since Robby Thompson's 21 game streak in 1993 (hope the same don't happen to Winn, Robby's career went into the tanker after that season, after he signed that huge contract with us).
- Been meaning to report this, but Bengie Molina was interviewed a while back about his clutch hitting for us lately, particularly with 2 strikes, and he noted that when there is less than 2 strikes, he swings like he's 6' 5", but when he is at 2 strikes, he swings like he's 5' 6". Which is a nice way of following your little league coach's advice to choke up on the bat and protect the plate when there is two strikes. :^)
- Good news about Dave Roberts, as he continues to show rapid improvement in his recovery from surgery to remove bone spurs and bone chips from his left elbow. He hasn't started throwing yet, so there's still much to do and go, but at least he has started swinging a fungo bat, 10 days after surgery, which I guess is pretty good, based on the way it is written. Roberts noted, "I'm trying not to get ahead of myself, but it's pretty encouraging." As I noted in another post, I wonder who they will keep as the utility OF when Roberts come back, Lewis or Ortmeier. It would make more sense to keep Ortmeier, but Lewis has played very well since coming up so it would be a nice reward to keep him up. But if not them, who then? There is no real obvious other choice.
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Giants To Sign Cain to Similar Deal to Lowry (plus Big Mo talks!)
The Giants are about to sign Cain to a deal similar to Lowry, according to reports, which I think is great, because I thought Cain could ask for a lot more in this post and the deal would still make sense for the Giants to do. It sounds like it was pending a physical that he went through last night and so the deal should get announced today sometime. Hurray and huzzah!
Per my post, I still think the Giants could have went further, though perhaps Cain's agents didn't want to go that far. Lowry's deal was for $9.25M over 4 years with a $6.25M club option, which covers all the years that the Giants control their players. According to Cot's Contracts, bonuses may increase the total value of the extension to $17M plus escalators may increase the club option to $7.75M, for a total of about $25M. An middle rotation pitcher is going for around $9-10M today, so that's paying about 2.5 seasons worth of average pitching over a 5 year period, less once you factor in player salary inflation. The should have been able to buy out his first free agent year for $10-12M.
Yes, I know young pitchers can fizzle out, TINSTAAPP, and all that, plus there is the injury factor as well. Things aren't working out so well for the Cubs with Mike Prior and Kerry Wood. But here's how I see it work out, scenario-wise:
Bengie Speaks!
The KNBR morning show interviewed Bengie Molina this morning and he sounded like a nice guy. He impressed me by stating that he couldn't get to sleep last night because today is his first game as a San Francisco Giant - I did that when I got my present job, I was out of work for an extended period trying to switch careers and I thought I would have to give up the dream when the job came out of the blue. I was up all night, but the day just flew and I even worked past 8 hours and never felt tired at all (today, it's a totally different situation! :^)
The more important part, since much of these are usually chit-chat, how's it going type of stuff, was he discussed his impression of Russ Ortiz thus far in spring training. He apparently didn't know the story of how Ortiz's mechanics got out of kilter until Leo Mazzone set him straight in Baltimore - he speculated that perhaps Ortiz had some injury or something, which resulted in his pitching problems last season (that much he was aware of). Then Molina said, basically, that whatever Oritz was going through, he appears to be over it because he looks like the Ortiz he remembers from the 2002 World Series. Ortiz had a 3.61 ERA, 1.33 WHIP that season.
Looking over Russ's stats during that period, he just majorly benefited from pitching in AT&T. His HR rate dropped in half or more while pitching there for his home. And while his walk rate always drove people crazy, his stats actually look very similar to Barry Zito's career: more walks and HR and less strikeouts than what you would care for, but he kept the hit rate very low for balls in play, which enabled him to survive stuff like that. If he can even get his ERA in the mid-4's, that would be a huge plus for the rotation and the team, over other teams who have crap for their 5th starter.
Because that's the beauty of the Giants as constructed for 2007: all the players are above average (or are capable of above average), but not elite players, up and down the lineup and pitching rotation, for the most part, except for Bonds and (hopefully) Cain. Most teams have multiple holes in the lineup, a poor #5 starter (plus possibly a poor #4 too), but the Giants are solid up and down, plus have backups who are not terrible replacements (like Vizcaino and Greene was last season), should a regular go down (Klesko, Linden, Alfonzo, Frandsen for position players, Sanchez, Hennessey, and Lincecum for starting pitchers, Sadler, Threets, and Anderson for relief). There is depth and the step down in talent from the first string to the next is not that great a drop, unless you lose a big guy.
Per my post, I still think the Giants could have went further, though perhaps Cain's agents didn't want to go that far. Lowry's deal was for $9.25M over 4 years with a $6.25M club option, which covers all the years that the Giants control their players. According to Cot's Contracts, bonuses may increase the total value of the extension to $17M plus escalators may increase the club option to $7.75M, for a total of about $25M. An middle rotation pitcher is going for around $9-10M today, so that's paying about 2.5 seasons worth of average pitching over a 5 year period, less once you factor in player salary inflation. The should have been able to buy out his first free agent year for $10-12M.
Yes, I know young pitchers can fizzle out, TINSTAAPP, and all that, plus there is the injury factor as well. Things aren't working out so well for the Cubs with Mike Prior and Kerry Wood. But here's how I see it work out, scenario-wise:
- Cain bad: none of the escalators/bonuses kick in, we just need 2 average years out of 5 for the deal to still work out at the market price for pitchers.
- Cain good: he will be worth every penny in escalators/bonuses, plus we have him for 5 years plus option instead of 4 years plus option.
- Cain ace good: bargain of the century.
Bengie Speaks!
The KNBR morning show interviewed Bengie Molina this morning and he sounded like a nice guy. He impressed me by stating that he couldn't get to sleep last night because today is his first game as a San Francisco Giant - I did that when I got my present job, I was out of work for an extended period trying to switch careers and I thought I would have to give up the dream when the job came out of the blue. I was up all night, but the day just flew and I even worked past 8 hours and never felt tired at all (today, it's a totally different situation! :^)
The more important part, since much of these are usually chit-chat, how's it going type of stuff, was he discussed his impression of Russ Ortiz thus far in spring training. He apparently didn't know the story of how Ortiz's mechanics got out of kilter until Leo Mazzone set him straight in Baltimore - he speculated that perhaps Ortiz had some injury or something, which resulted in his pitching problems last season (that much he was aware of). Then Molina said, basically, that whatever Oritz was going through, he appears to be over it because he looks like the Ortiz he remembers from the 2002 World Series. Ortiz had a 3.61 ERA, 1.33 WHIP that season.
Looking over Russ's stats during that period, he just majorly benefited from pitching in AT&T. His HR rate dropped in half or more while pitching there for his home. And while his walk rate always drove people crazy, his stats actually look very similar to Barry Zito's career: more walks and HR and less strikeouts than what you would care for, but he kept the hit rate very low for balls in play, which enabled him to survive stuff like that. If he can even get his ERA in the mid-4's, that would be a huge plus for the rotation and the team, over other teams who have crap for their 5th starter.
Because that's the beauty of the Giants as constructed for 2007: all the players are above average (or are capable of above average), but not elite players, up and down the lineup and pitching rotation, for the most part, except for Bonds and (hopefully) Cain. Most teams have multiple holes in the lineup, a poor #5 starter (plus possibly a poor #4 too), but the Giants are solid up and down, plus have backups who are not terrible replacements (like Vizcaino and Greene was last season), should a regular go down (Klesko, Linden, Alfonzo, Frandsen for position players, Sanchez, Hennessey, and Lincecum for starting pitchers, Sadler, Threets, and Anderson for relief). There is depth and the step down in talent from the first string to the next is not that great a drop, unless you lose a big guy.
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