At one point, Josh Willingham was one of the most valuable players in baseball. Not necessarily from a production perspective, but from a production for the money perspective. Back in 2012 he was in the midst of a .260/.366/.524 season with 35 homers and 110 rbis, and he was in the first year of a 3 year, $21 million dollar contract. Fangraphs.com does some fancy stuff with player value, and that season was worth $15.9 million according to their metrics. He could have been moved for a pretty good offer at the 2012 trade deadline, most likely, but the Twins decided he was worth holding on to even though the season was kind of an outlier and he wasn't likely to still be around when they got back to contending. Two years later, injuries and poor play torpedoed his value, though a decent second half so far was enough to trick the Royals into trading for him, though the return is dubious at best.
Kansas City has been desperate for outfield power this season, particularly as they try to make a playoff push, so Willingham is pretty perfect match consider the Royals and their aversion to costs, both monetary and prospect wise. Though his average is poor for the second straight year (.210), he put up a very nice OBP (.345) and decent enough slugging (.402) that he represents an upgrade for the Royals. Royal outfielders have slugged just .381 this year, and their RFers (where Willingham will most likely play with Alex Gordon entrenched in left) have OPSed just .687 (better than the Twins, actually) so RF was a good place to upgrade and KC was able to do it fairly cheaply.
The Twins received pitcher Jason Adam in return, and it's a mixed bag for certain. Adam's numbers in his minor league starting career aren't great. Hell they aren't even good with a career 4.38 ERA, but his peripherals suggest he's better than that (7.4 K/9 vs. 2.6 BB/9, good FIP, bad BABIP) and most prospect lists I could find going into 2014 had him ranked right around #10, with my favorite guy John Sickels from Minorleagueball.com ranked him 11th and said he's "not an ace, but could be a fourth starter." High praise? No. A good return for Willingham at this point? Absolutely. Worst case he should end up a fairly decent middle reliever, which is where he's been slotted since being promoted to triple A midway through the year and put up a 2.35 ERA in 8 appearances.
Frankly I didn't expect to get anything of value for Willingham. Actually, I didn't expect the Twins to trade him at all because I thought they had screwed it up twice, so getting a possibly useful arm is a pretty big win, if you ask me. Even if his upside is just a 4th starter, if you stockpile enough of those kind of arms eventually you might end up with a few halfway decent starters. In any case it's a good return on a player who was completely expendable and extremely unlikely to be around in the future. Even if Adam doesn't pan out at the very least the Twins opened up their outfield playing time, which means plenty of time for Oswaldo Arcia to figure out his bat, Kennys Vargas at DH to gain experience, Chris Parmelee at first so the Twins can figure out he's not very good, and Danny Santana in center to gain time playing a new position. And of course, Jordan Schafer who probably deserves his own post. But I'm not going to do that.
Schafer, once regarded as a top prospect in the Braves' system, was selected off waivers by the Twins a few weeks back and has played well. Since those top prospect days he was traded once (in the Michael Bourn deal) and waived twice, so as you might guess things haven't exactly been working out. Schafer has been a terrible hitter in his major league career, hitting just .223/.308/.305 in just over 1,200 career plate appearances spread over 5 seasons, while striking out far too much for such little power. This year he's been spectacularly bad, leading the Braves to finally throw in the towel. Naturally, one team's trash is always the Twins' treasure bin, so they scooped him up to give a look.
Thus far he's played much better for the Twins than at any other point in his career, hitting .273/.333/.364 with 6 stolen bases and a very good walk rate, and he's playing pretty good defense, especially as a corner outfielder. Don't get all excited though. He's still striking out a ton and hitting for zero power, and nothing has drastically changed when you look deeper, so he's probably the same hitter his track record portrays. But guess what? He's fast, plays good defense, seems scrappy, and is under team control until 2017 so you know they're going to keep him around. Get used to this guy.
Showing posts with label Josh Willingham. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Josh Willingham. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 13, 2014
Thursday, July 24, 2014
Adios, Kendrys. We hardly knew ya.
The Twins got the ball rolling today, trading Kendrys Morales, one of the three guys I said absolutely must be traded at this deadline, to the Seattle Mariners for middle reliever Stephen Pryor.
Morales was a bit of a weird signing by the Twins, grabbing him mid-season after his "you have to give up your #1 pick if you sign him status" had expired for $7 million. It didn't make a ton of sense to me because the Twins don't really throw around that kind of money, they already had a glut of slow DH/1B/corner OF types, and signing someone like Morales seemed like the kind of move a team on the verge of the playoffs would make, which the Twins clearly weren't. Then again, at the time I said it makes sense to see if he can move the needle on your offense at all, and if not hope you can flip him at the deadline, so all-in-all a good signing.
Naturally Morales didn't really cooperate. After a hot start he's now hitting .234/.259/.325, by the far the worst season of his career (you probably don't remember this, but back in 2009 he finished 5th in AL MVP voting). He's never OPSed below .785 in a full season, yet is at .584 this year with just one home run in 162 plate appearances. He's basically been a disaster at the plate, walking at about half his career rate while popping up twice as often, and combined with poor defense he's actually played at a level below replacement level this year. Obviously this kind of performance torpedoed his value in the trade market, but the Twins were at least able to get back a young, capable reliever who is somewhat proven and under their control through 2018.
Seattle drafted Pryor as a reliever in the 5th round of the 2010 draft, and although he was never at the top of any of their prospect ratings on the lists I saw he usually fell somewhere in the teens. He was a definite strikeout pitcher in the low minors, appearing in the closer role and putting up K/9 numbers in the 14s and 15s. Those numbers dipped as his competition level increased, but remained respectably around 10, however his walks went up to a concerning level. In 2013 he got hit with a couple of injuries and ended up only throwing 11 innings between the majors and minors, and has spent most of this season at AAA, with a little bit of time in AA and one appearance of 1.2 innings in the majors (against the Twins).
In 31 innings at Tacoma (AAA) he struck out 27 and walked 18, a horrible ratio, which helped lead to a 1.42 WHIP and 4.65 ERA. Really though that's not the point because he's clearly a different pitcher since the injuries. His fastball in 2012 averaged 96.3 mph. His fastball this year, his first back from the injury, averaged just 91.7 mph. That is a major, major drop. I realize his 1.2 innings in the majors this year is a teeny tiny sample size, but he did throw 23 fastballs so it's not completely insignificant either, and the reduction in strikeouts in the minors, just 7.8 per nine this year, backs it up.
So the Twins traded Morales for a bit of a gamble, a bit of a reclamation project, but one with significant upside. If he returns to his pre-injury form he has closer potential, perhaps even as Glen Perkins replacement when he gets too expensive. If he never recovers, all you've lost is a couple months of a player who you weren't going to re-sign anyway, and who wasn't that good this season any way. Would have been nice if Morales would have actually, you know, hit this year and the Twins could have nabbed a mid-level type of prospect at least, but this is a worthwhile gamble, for sure. Now let's hurry up and trade Josh Willingham to the Royals for Christian Binford, Kurt Suzuki to the Orioles for Mike Wright and Drew Dosch, and Jared Burton to the Blue Jays for L.B. Dantzler.
It's going to be awesome if any of those trades actually happen.
FUN FACT: Remember in 2012 when Seattle pitched that weird no-hitter with six pitchers being involved? Kevin Millwood started and pitched 6 no hit innings, but then hurt his groin and couldn't continue so six relievers came on and closed out with a combined 3 more no hit innings. Those relievers were Charlie Furbush (tee hee), Lucas Luetge, Brandon League, Tom Wilhelmsen, and............Stephen Pryor. Yep, our Stephen Pryor. He pitched two thirds of inning, walking two guys before getting a strikeout to close out the seventh.
And he got the win.
Morales was a bit of a weird signing by the Twins, grabbing him mid-season after his "you have to give up your #1 pick if you sign him status" had expired for $7 million. It didn't make a ton of sense to me because the Twins don't really throw around that kind of money, they already had a glut of slow DH/1B/corner OF types, and signing someone like Morales seemed like the kind of move a team on the verge of the playoffs would make, which the Twins clearly weren't. Then again, at the time I said it makes sense to see if he can move the needle on your offense at all, and if not hope you can flip him at the deadline, so all-in-all a good signing.
Naturally Morales didn't really cooperate. After a hot start he's now hitting .234/.259/.325, by the far the worst season of his career (you probably don't remember this, but back in 2009 he finished 5th in AL MVP voting). He's never OPSed below .785 in a full season, yet is at .584 this year with just one home run in 162 plate appearances. He's basically been a disaster at the plate, walking at about half his career rate while popping up twice as often, and combined with poor defense he's actually played at a level below replacement level this year. Obviously this kind of performance torpedoed his value in the trade market, but the Twins were at least able to get back a young, capable reliever who is somewhat proven and under their control through 2018.
Seattle drafted Pryor as a reliever in the 5th round of the 2010 draft, and although he was never at the top of any of their prospect ratings on the lists I saw he usually fell somewhere in the teens. He was a definite strikeout pitcher in the low minors, appearing in the closer role and putting up K/9 numbers in the 14s and 15s. Those numbers dipped as his competition level increased, but remained respectably around 10, however his walks went up to a concerning level. In 2013 he got hit with a couple of injuries and ended up only throwing 11 innings between the majors and minors, and has spent most of this season at AAA, with a little bit of time in AA and one appearance of 1.2 innings in the majors (against the Twins).
In 31 innings at Tacoma (AAA) he struck out 27 and walked 18, a horrible ratio, which helped lead to a 1.42 WHIP and 4.65 ERA. Really though that's not the point because he's clearly a different pitcher since the injuries. His fastball in 2012 averaged 96.3 mph. His fastball this year, his first back from the injury, averaged just 91.7 mph. That is a major, major drop. I realize his 1.2 innings in the majors this year is a teeny tiny sample size, but he did throw 23 fastballs so it's not completely insignificant either, and the reduction in strikeouts in the minors, just 7.8 per nine this year, backs it up.
So the Twins traded Morales for a bit of a gamble, a bit of a reclamation project, but one with significant upside. If he returns to his pre-injury form he has closer potential, perhaps even as Glen Perkins replacement when he gets too expensive. If he never recovers, all you've lost is a couple months of a player who you weren't going to re-sign anyway, and who wasn't that good this season any way. Would have been nice if Morales would have actually, you know, hit this year and the Twins could have nabbed a mid-level type of prospect at least, but this is a worthwhile gamble, for sure. Now let's hurry up and trade Josh Willingham to the Royals for Christian Binford, Kurt Suzuki to the Orioles for Mike Wright and Drew Dosch, and Jared Burton to the Blue Jays for L.B. Dantzler.
It's going to be awesome if any of those trades actually happen.
FUN FACT: Remember in 2012 when Seattle pitched that weird no-hitter with six pitchers being involved? Kevin Millwood started and pitched 6 no hit innings, but then hurt his groin and couldn't continue so six relievers came on and closed out with a combined 3 more no hit innings. Those relievers were Charlie Furbush (tee hee), Lucas Luetge, Brandon League, Tom Wilhelmsen, and............Stephen Pryor. Yep, our Stephen Pryor. He pitched two thirds of inning, walking two guys before getting a strikeout to close out the seventh.
And he got the win.
Tuesday, July 8, 2014
Twins and the Trade Deadline
We're nearly at the all-star break, which means we're a fair way past the first half of the season but everyone's required to refer to it as the first half anyway. It's also a good time to look back on what has transpired thus far and what I hope to see in the 2nd half, mainly because that's what everyone does at the all-star break. The most exciting part of the second half for a non-contending team is the trade deadline, so here's what the Twins should be looking to do:
First off, the Twins are not contending for the Wild Card, so put that out of your silly little head right now. They are currently 9.5 out of the second Wild Card spot with six teams either ahead of tied with them. It's not happening, no matter how optimistic Dan Gladden wants you to be. In that case, the Twins need to be ready and willing to sell off anybody and everybody who isn't a clear part of their future plans. That means everybody outside of Joe Mauer (untradeable in any case), Brian Dozier, Danny Santana, Oswaldo Arcia, Kyle Gibson, and probably Eduardo Escobar (just in case he's actually good) should be available for the right trade, and yes I'm including Glen Perkins.
Perkins is an elite level closer - yes elite - who is having the unluckiest year of his career (career high BABIP and career low LOB%) and is still putting up good numbers including a career best K/9 and BB/9. Considering he'll make just about $17 million through 2017 with a team option for $6.5 mil in 2018, he's an extremely valuable commodity - assuming you can find a team who overvalues relief pitching. The Twins won't be a contender until at least 2016 in my opinion, so if you can get a monster offer for Perkins you have two more seasons to develop a new closer. The Tigers, Jays, Yankees, and Angels all rank in the bottom 10 in the majors in bullpen ERA and all have deep pockets and are known to make splashy moves when deemed necessary. It's probably worth making a phone call, or at least answering the phone.
The other player I'd consider tradeable, but only for a great offer is Phil Hughes. Not because I think he's suddenly become Cy Young, but because you do need to field a full rotation next season and with any luck they find a way to unload Ricky Nolasco and Kevin Correia for.......something. Hughes has looked rejuvenated this year, and there's enough behind his numbers to at least suggest this isn't a fluke. He's signed to a very affordable deal ($8m per) and is signed through 2016, so if the Twins hold on to him they'll have him through that first season where I'm hoping they're competing for a playoff spot (2016).
The only other guy I would even consider holding out and passing on trading if you don't get a really good offer is Trevor Plouffe. It's pretty clear who he is at this point - a .240ish hitter with good pop, decent plate discipline, and decent defense at 3B - not a monster asset but a pretty decent player. Considering he's under team control through 2017 and is making just $2.4m he's a pretty good value, so there's no reason to rush on him. That being said, with Miguel Sano theoretically on the way and hopefully entrenched at third by 2016, he's not a necessary cog so any above market trade offer should be jumped on.
Literally everyone else is eminently tradeable, although most either have an unwieldy contract (Nolasco) or are just plain old too crappy to be considered desirable by anyone (everyone else). Two guys who should hold enough value who absolutely need to be traded are Josh Willingham and Kurt Suzuki. Willingham is a free agent after this season and it's doubtful the Twins will resign him, so come trade deadline dangle him out there and take whatever the top offer is - there's absolutely zero reason for Willingham to finish the season on the Twins' roster.
Suzuki is a bit more complicated, given that he's having a career year, made the All-Star team, and seems so much like Gardy's kind of guy it's actually painful. On the other hand, he's on a one year deal and some of his numbers look pretty fluky. Suzuki could be an ideal fill-in for a contending team needing catching help, whether just for depth or because of an injury, and Suzuki has hit well enough this year that he could offer help at DH or simply pinch hitting as well. The Orioles lead the AL East but have very little at catcher now that they've lost Matt Wieters, while they're getting chased by Toronto who has gotten nothing this year from the position. The Dodgers are another potential trade partner considering Drew Butera leads all Dodger catchers in plate appearances this season.
In the bullpen there's probably some potential to move Jared Burton, Casey Fien, and Brian Duensing. Burton is putting up career worst numbers but should have enough of a track record to garner some interest from a pitching starved quasi-contender. He's on the hook for a $3.6m team option next year with a buyout of just $200k, so it's not like any team would be making a major investment to acquire him. Fien is putting up his third straight solid season and is under team control all the way through 2018 so I could see holding on to him - maybe he's the future closer if they get a overwhelming offer for Perkins and actually pull the trigger. Duensing has pretty much established who he is at this point, but his ERA is at his career low even if his peripherals aren't any better than usual and he's been very good against lefties in his career so he could draw some interest. Hopefully.
Simply put, the Twins aren't going anywhere for at least another season and they have enough trade chips here that they should make this next month pretty interesting - SHOULD. Willingham and Suzuki really should be traded and if the management likes them that much they'll have the opportunity to bring them back a la Rick Aguilera. At least one out of Burton and Duensing should be traded, and there are other guys who could draw interest including blockbuster potential with Perkins. It should be fun leading up to the trade deadline. Yet somehow I get the feeling it will be all anticipation with no pay-off. Again. At some point this organization needs to realize they aren't developing players like they used to, and get more aggressive with trades and free agency (to be fair we did see a little of this last offseason) in order to get back to being competitive. Or just keep missing the playoffs.
[EDIT: Just realized I somehow completely forgot Kendrys Morales. Absolutely needs to be traded. Hopefully he gets hot again.]
First off, the Twins are not contending for the Wild Card, so put that out of your silly little head right now. They are currently 9.5 out of the second Wild Card spot with six teams either ahead of tied with them. It's not happening, no matter how optimistic Dan Gladden wants you to be. In that case, the Twins need to be ready and willing to sell off anybody and everybody who isn't a clear part of their future plans. That means everybody outside of Joe Mauer (untradeable in any case), Brian Dozier, Danny Santana, Oswaldo Arcia, Kyle Gibson, and probably Eduardo Escobar (just in case he's actually good) should be available for the right trade, and yes I'm including Glen Perkins.
Perkins is an elite level closer - yes elite - who is having the unluckiest year of his career (career high BABIP and career low LOB%) and is still putting up good numbers including a career best K/9 and BB/9. Considering he'll make just about $17 million through 2017 with a team option for $6.5 mil in 2018, he's an extremely valuable commodity - assuming you can find a team who overvalues relief pitching. The Twins won't be a contender until at least 2016 in my opinion, so if you can get a monster offer for Perkins you have two more seasons to develop a new closer. The Tigers, Jays, Yankees, and Angels all rank in the bottom 10 in the majors in bullpen ERA and all have deep pockets and are known to make splashy moves when deemed necessary. It's probably worth making a phone call, or at least answering the phone.
The other player I'd consider tradeable, but only for a great offer is Phil Hughes. Not because I think he's suddenly become Cy Young, but because you do need to field a full rotation next season and with any luck they find a way to unload Ricky Nolasco and Kevin Correia for.......something. Hughes has looked rejuvenated this year, and there's enough behind his numbers to at least suggest this isn't a fluke. He's signed to a very affordable deal ($8m per) and is signed through 2016, so if the Twins hold on to him they'll have him through that first season where I'm hoping they're competing for a playoff spot (2016).
The only other guy I would even consider holding out and passing on trading if you don't get a really good offer is Trevor Plouffe. It's pretty clear who he is at this point - a .240ish hitter with good pop, decent plate discipline, and decent defense at 3B - not a monster asset but a pretty decent player. Considering he's under team control through 2017 and is making just $2.4m he's a pretty good value, so there's no reason to rush on him. That being said, with Miguel Sano theoretically on the way and hopefully entrenched at third by 2016, he's not a necessary cog so any above market trade offer should be jumped on.
Literally everyone else is eminently tradeable, although most either have an unwieldy contract (Nolasco) or are just plain old too crappy to be considered desirable by anyone (everyone else). Two guys who should hold enough value who absolutely need to be traded are Josh Willingham and Kurt Suzuki. Willingham is a free agent after this season and it's doubtful the Twins will resign him, so come trade deadline dangle him out there and take whatever the top offer is - there's absolutely zero reason for Willingham to finish the season on the Twins' roster.
Suzuki is a bit more complicated, given that he's having a career year, made the All-Star team, and seems so much like Gardy's kind of guy it's actually painful. On the other hand, he's on a one year deal and some of his numbers look pretty fluky. Suzuki could be an ideal fill-in for a contending team needing catching help, whether just for depth or because of an injury, and Suzuki has hit well enough this year that he could offer help at DH or simply pinch hitting as well. The Orioles lead the AL East but have very little at catcher now that they've lost Matt Wieters, while they're getting chased by Toronto who has gotten nothing this year from the position. The Dodgers are another potential trade partner considering Drew Butera leads all Dodger catchers in plate appearances this season.
In the bullpen there's probably some potential to move Jared Burton, Casey Fien, and Brian Duensing. Burton is putting up career worst numbers but should have enough of a track record to garner some interest from a pitching starved quasi-contender. He's on the hook for a $3.6m team option next year with a buyout of just $200k, so it's not like any team would be making a major investment to acquire him. Fien is putting up his third straight solid season and is under team control all the way through 2018 so I could see holding on to him - maybe he's the future closer if they get a overwhelming offer for Perkins and actually pull the trigger. Duensing has pretty much established who he is at this point, but his ERA is at his career low even if his peripherals aren't any better than usual and he's been very good against lefties in his career so he could draw some interest. Hopefully.
Simply put, the Twins aren't going anywhere for at least another season and they have enough trade chips here that they should make this next month pretty interesting - SHOULD. Willingham and Suzuki really should be traded and if the management likes them that much they'll have the opportunity to bring them back a la Rick Aguilera. At least one out of Burton and Duensing should be traded, and there are other guys who could draw interest including blockbuster potential with Perkins. It should be fun leading up to the trade deadline. Yet somehow I get the feeling it will be all anticipation with no pay-off. Again. At some point this organization needs to realize they aren't developing players like they used to, and get more aggressive with trades and free agency (to be fair we did see a little of this last offseason) in order to get back to being competitive. Or just keep missing the playoffs.
[EDIT: Just realized I somehow completely forgot Kendrys Morales. Absolutely needs to be traded. Hopefully he gets hot again.]
Thursday, July 18, 2013
Fun With WAR: AL's Best Players by Position at the All-Star Break
Here's a look a the top players by position at the All-Star Break for the American League. I thought I'd do this mainly as an exercise to see how far off the Twins are at position from the best players. I'll look at WAR and try and include offensive and defensive tidbits. For these purposes I'll use Fangraphs.com's WAR calculation and ratings because they're much easier to pull into a report than B-R.
Catcher - Joe Mauer, Twins
The beauty of the catcher position is that there are only 7 that qualify with enough plate appearances for me to rank. Two of them are actually Twins thanks to Doumit's multi-positional weirdness. Mauer leads this group with a 3.9 WAR, with Houston's Jason Castro at #2 with a 2.3 WAR. Carlos Santana is 3rd (1.7 WAR). The best rated fielder is Matt Wieters with Mauer second. Wieters threw out 17 of 39 base stealer guys. Mauer's All-Star backup Salvador Perez had just a 1.4 WAR.
For numbers that people actually understand, Mauer led in hits (113), runs (50), AVG (320), OBP (402) and was .002 behind Castro in slugging at 473. Blue Jays' catcher JP Arencibia hit 16 homers and Wieters had 44 RBI to lead those categories. None of them stole more than a couple bases because they have knees like I do, only mine are from sitting on the couch.
First Base - Chris Davis, Orioles
This is a no brainer as Davis is right there with Cabrera for first half MVP. "Crush" (not sure where I stand on that nickname yet...the beverage is delicious though) produced a 5.1 WAR, giving him a healthy lead over Edwin Encarnacion at #2 (2.7). James Loney is a surprising #3 on the list with a 2.2 WAR. Prince Fielder was way down at #11 (0.8) because he gets dinged on his poor defense. Justin Morneau is #13 with a 0.6 WAR.
Davis led AL first basemen in hits (108), HR (37), R (70), RBI (93), AVG (315), OBP (392) and SLG (717). It was a clean sweep for him. Just sick. Loney tied him with the .315 average. Encarnacion (25), Dunn (24) and Mark Trumbo (21) also cleared the 20 homer mark. The best fielding rating belonged to Mike Napoli (6.2), which seems pretty weird. Trumbo (4.9), Hosmer (4.7) and Loney (4.0) are also among top defenders. The worst fielder was Mark Reynolds at (-7.8), with Fielder hot on his tail at -7.7.
Second Base - Robinson Cano, Yankees
Cano is having another great year and led AL second basemen with a 3.8 WAR. Dustin Pedroia and Jason Kipnis were right on his heels with 3.7 and 3.4, respectively. Brian Dozier is 7th (1.5) thanks to his very good defense and base running ratings. Oh, and just to give you an idea how well no-batting-gloves Matt Carpenter is playing for the Cardinals in the NL; he has a 4.3 WAR.
Cano leads in homers (21), RBI (65) and slugging (531). He's just average in fielding (0.4) and is actually a negative value in baserunning (-0.6). Pedroia leads in hits (119), average (316), OBP (396), runs (57) and is just behind Omar Infante (5.1) in fielding with 5.0. Kipnis leads in steals with 21, although somehow Zobrist gets the best base running rating with a 3.6. Apparently he has a great UBR, which has something to do with how many extra bases he takes.
Third Base - Miguel Cabrera, Tigers (duh)
It's no surprise that last year's Triple Crown winner is on the top of the heap here. What is amazing though is that he's nearing a second consecutive Triple Crown, which has never been done. Blockhead Chris Davis is tripping him up right now in the homers and Davis is also right behind Cabrera in RBI. There are some great AL third basemen this year with Cabrera (6.0 WAR), Evan Longoria (4.4), Josh Donaldson (4.3) and Manny Machado (4.2) at the top of the stack. Poor Adrian Beltre is 6th despite hitting 316/358/543 with 21 homers. Trevor Plouffe barely doesn't qualify, but if I lower the plate appearances standards a bit he clocks in at 8th with a 0.4 WAR.
As if you didn't know, Cabrera leads in everything with 365/458/674, 30 homers, 95 RBI and 73 runs. Only 11 players had at least 30 homers and 95 RBI in all of 2012. The best fielder is Manny Machado with a whopping +16 runs saved. Our guy Plouffe is at -6.7, but Cabrera is worst at -11.9. Miguel laughs at your defensive uber stats. The best base runner besides utility guy Jayson Nix (2.5) is Kyle Seager (0.9).
Shortstop -Derek Jeter Jhonny Peralta, Tigers
Jhonny freaking Peralta is the best we have to offer at shortstop in the AL. It's a motley crew where Mark Belanger would fit right in. Peralta is actually hitting really well and providing average defense. Funny that he's in better shape and playing so well in a contract year. Peralta has a 2.7 WAR, Yunel Escobar is 2nd with a 2.3, Jed Lowrie is 3rd with a 1.8 and Pedro Florimon is tied with Alexei Ramirez for 4th with a 1.7! JJ Hardy, who leads AL shortstops in homers (16) and RBI (52) is 6th with a 1.6 WAR because he doesn't walk and has a poor average.
Peralta leads shorstops in average (303) and slugging (447). He's second to Lowrie (364) in OBP with a 361 mark. Elvis Andrus leads in runs with 50 and is a +4.8 runs thanks to great base running. Otherwise, he sucks the big one (0.6 WAR). Nice signing, Texas. Nice fantasy trade, WWWWWWWW.
Florimon is the best fielder with a +9.0 runs; he's also a +2.8 base runner. The worst fielder is Jed Lowrie (-7.9) and the worst base runner is Asdrubal Cabrera (-2.4).
Left Field - Alex Gordon, Royals
Alex Gordon is second to Mike Trout actually; Gordon has a 2.2 WAR and Kelly Johnson is third with a 1.8. However, since 2/3 of Trout's games were in CF, we'll cover him there. There's a lot of sucky left fielders out there. .224 hitting Josh Willingham is 14th with a 0.4 WAR.
Raul Ibanez leads left fielders with 24 homers, 578 slugging and 56 RBI. Someone get some of that dude's pee ASAP. Alejandro De Aza has the runs with 54. Daniel Nava leads with a 288 average and a 374 OBP. Nate McLouth leads in steals with 24. The best fielding LF is Andy Dirks with a +10.6; the worst is Daniel Nava at -9.5 splitting time between left and right field. The best base runner is McLouth with a +3.6 runs; Melky Cabrera is the worst wtih a -3.3 tally. Funny how Melky's numbers have dropped back to where he was at in his Yankee days after getting suspended 50 games for roiding.
Center Field - Mike Trout, Angels
Trout is cranking out another pretty great year; in relative silence because the rest of the Angels have been pretty sucky and Cabrera and Davis have been putting up massive power numbers. His 5.7 WAR in the first half puts him on pace to exceed his MLB leading 10.0 WAR from last year. Colby Rasmus and Jacoby Ellsbury are tied for second at 3.5, Desmond Jennings and Brett Gardner are tied for fourth at 2.7 and Adam Jones is sixth with a 2.5 WAR. Aaron Hicks is dead last at 15th with a 0.0 WAR.
Trout leads in AVG (322), OBP (399) and SLG (565). Adam Jones leads in homers (19), runs (67) and RBI (67). Ellsbury leads in steals with 36 and also is tops with a base running with a +8.7 runs. The worst base runner in CF is Lorenzo Cain with a -0.5 runs. Cain however, is the top fielder with a +11.8; De Aza is last at -7.9.
Right Field - Jose Bautista, Bleu Jays
Joey Bats! His 3.0 WAR leads right fielders. Shane Victorino is second with a 2.4 WAR; Zobrist is third with 2.2. Torii Hunter leads in AVG (315) and OBP (352) unless we count Nava again. Chris Parmelee isn't last! He's second to last ahead of JD Martinez.
Nelson Cruz leads in homers (22), RBI (69) and SLG (517). The only stat Bautista actually leads in is runs (61), but he's close in a number of categories. The best fielder is Victorino, a converted center fielder, with +14.0; JD Martinez is worst with a -7.1 (again unless we count stone legs Nava). Drew Stubbs is the best base runner (4.0) and Boom Stick Cruz is last with a -2.6.
Final Tally for the Twins:
C: 1st
1B: 13th
2B: 7th
3B: 8th
SS: 4th
LF: 14th
CF: 15th
RF: 14th
Catcher - Joe Mauer, Twins
The beauty of the catcher position is that there are only 7 that qualify with enough plate appearances for me to rank. Two of them are actually Twins thanks to Doumit's multi-positional weirdness. Mauer leads this group with a 3.9 WAR, with Houston's Jason Castro at #2 with a 2.3 WAR. Carlos Santana is 3rd (1.7 WAR). The best rated fielder is Matt Wieters with Mauer second. Wieters threw out 17 of 39 base stealer guys. Mauer's All-Star backup Salvador Perez had just a 1.4 WAR.
For numbers that people actually understand, Mauer led in hits (113), runs (50), AVG (320), OBP (402) and was .002 behind Castro in slugging at 473. Blue Jays' catcher JP Arencibia hit 16 homers and Wieters had 44 RBI to lead those categories. None of them stole more than a couple bases because they have knees like I do, only mine are from sitting on the couch.
First Base - Chris Davis, Orioles
This is a no brainer as Davis is right there with Cabrera for first half MVP. "Crush" (not sure where I stand on that nickname yet...the beverage is delicious though) produced a 5.1 WAR, giving him a healthy lead over Edwin Encarnacion at #2 (2.7). James Loney is a surprising #3 on the list with a 2.2 WAR. Prince Fielder was way down at #11 (0.8) because he gets dinged on his poor defense. Justin Morneau is #13 with a 0.6 WAR.
Davis led AL first basemen in hits (108), HR (37), R (70), RBI (93), AVG (315), OBP (392) and SLG (717). It was a clean sweep for him. Just sick. Loney tied him with the .315 average. Encarnacion (25), Dunn (24) and Mark Trumbo (21) also cleared the 20 homer mark. The best fielding rating belonged to Mike Napoli (6.2), which seems pretty weird. Trumbo (4.9), Hosmer (4.7) and Loney (4.0) are also among top defenders. The worst fielder was Mark Reynolds at (-7.8), with Fielder hot on his tail at -7.7.
Second Base - Robinson Cano, Yankees
Cano is having another great year and led AL second basemen with a 3.8 WAR. Dustin Pedroia and Jason Kipnis were right on his heels with 3.7 and 3.4, respectively. Brian Dozier is 7th (1.5) thanks to his very good defense and base running ratings. Oh, and just to give you an idea how well no-batting-gloves Matt Carpenter is playing for the Cardinals in the NL; he has a 4.3 WAR.
Cano leads in homers (21), RBI (65) and slugging (531). He's just average in fielding (0.4) and is actually a negative value in baserunning (-0.6). Pedroia leads in hits (119), average (316), OBP (396), runs (57) and is just behind Omar Infante (5.1) in fielding with 5.0. Kipnis leads in steals with 21, although somehow Zobrist gets the best base running rating with a 3.6. Apparently he has a great UBR, which has something to do with how many extra bases he takes.
Third Base - Miguel Cabrera, Tigers (duh)
It's no surprise that last year's Triple Crown winner is on the top of the heap here. What is amazing though is that he's nearing a second consecutive Triple Crown, which has never been done. Blockhead Chris Davis is tripping him up right now in the homers and Davis is also right behind Cabrera in RBI. There are some great AL third basemen this year with Cabrera (6.0 WAR), Evan Longoria (4.4), Josh Donaldson (4.3) and Manny Machado (4.2) at the top of the stack. Poor Adrian Beltre is 6th despite hitting 316/358/543 with 21 homers. Trevor Plouffe barely doesn't qualify, but if I lower the plate appearances standards a bit he clocks in at 8th with a 0.4 WAR.
As if you didn't know, Cabrera leads in everything with 365/458/674, 30 homers, 95 RBI and 73 runs. Only 11 players had at least 30 homers and 95 RBI in all of 2012. The best fielder is Manny Machado with a whopping +16 runs saved. Our guy Plouffe is at -6.7, but Cabrera is worst at -11.9. Miguel laughs at your defensive uber stats. The best base runner besides utility guy Jayson Nix (2.5) is Kyle Seager (0.9).
Shortstop -
Jhonny freaking Peralta is the best we have to offer at shortstop in the AL. It's a motley crew where Mark Belanger would fit right in. Peralta is actually hitting really well and providing average defense. Funny that he's in better shape and playing so well in a contract year. Peralta has a 2.7 WAR, Yunel Escobar is 2nd with a 2.3, Jed Lowrie is 3rd with a 1.8 and Pedro Florimon is tied with Alexei Ramirez for 4th with a 1.7! JJ Hardy, who leads AL shortstops in homers (16) and RBI (52) is 6th with a 1.6 WAR because he doesn't walk and has a poor average.
Peralta leads shorstops in average (303) and slugging (447). He's second to Lowrie (364) in OBP with a 361 mark. Elvis Andrus leads in runs with 50 and is a +4.8 runs thanks to great base running. Otherwise, he sucks the big one (0.6 WAR). Nice signing, Texas. Nice fantasy trade, WWWWWWWW.
Florimon is the best fielder with a +9.0 runs; he's also a +2.8 base runner. The worst fielder is Jed Lowrie (-7.9) and the worst base runner is Asdrubal Cabrera (-2.4).
Left Field - Alex Gordon, Royals
Alex Gordon is second to Mike Trout actually; Gordon has a 2.2 WAR and Kelly Johnson is third with a 1.8. However, since 2/3 of Trout's games were in CF, we'll cover him there. There's a lot of sucky left fielders out there. .224 hitting Josh Willingham is 14th with a 0.4 WAR.
Raul Ibanez leads left fielders with 24 homers, 578 slugging and 56 RBI. Someone get some of that dude's pee ASAP. Alejandro De Aza has the runs with 54. Daniel Nava leads with a 288 average and a 374 OBP. Nate McLouth leads in steals with 24. The best fielding LF is Andy Dirks with a +10.6; the worst is Daniel Nava at -9.5 splitting time between left and right field. The best base runner is McLouth with a +3.6 runs; Melky Cabrera is the worst wtih a -3.3 tally. Funny how Melky's numbers have dropped back to where he was at in his Yankee days after getting suspended 50 games for roiding.
Center Field - Mike Trout, Angels
Trout is cranking out another pretty great year; in relative silence because the rest of the Angels have been pretty sucky and Cabrera and Davis have been putting up massive power numbers. His 5.7 WAR in the first half puts him on pace to exceed his MLB leading 10.0 WAR from last year. Colby Rasmus and Jacoby Ellsbury are tied for second at 3.5, Desmond Jennings and Brett Gardner are tied for fourth at 2.7 and Adam Jones is sixth with a 2.5 WAR. Aaron Hicks is dead last at 15th with a 0.0 WAR.
Trout leads in AVG (322), OBP (399) and SLG (565). Adam Jones leads in homers (19), runs (67) and RBI (67). Ellsbury leads in steals with 36 and also is tops with a base running with a +8.7 runs. The worst base runner in CF is Lorenzo Cain with a -0.5 runs. Cain however, is the top fielder with a +11.8; De Aza is last at -7.9.
Right Field - Jose Bautista, Bleu Jays
Joey Bats! His 3.0 WAR leads right fielders. Shane Victorino is second with a 2.4 WAR; Zobrist is third with 2.2. Torii Hunter leads in AVG (315) and OBP (352) unless we count Nava again. Chris Parmelee isn't last! He's second to last ahead of JD Martinez.
Nelson Cruz leads in homers (22), RBI (69) and SLG (517). The only stat Bautista actually leads in is runs (61), but he's close in a number of categories. The best fielder is Victorino, a converted center fielder, with +14.0; JD Martinez is worst with a -7.1 (again unless we count stone legs Nava). Drew Stubbs is the best base runner (4.0) and Boom Stick Cruz is last with a -2.6.
Final Tally for the Twins:
C: 1st
1B: 13th
2B: 7th
3B: 8th
SS: 4th
LF: 14th
CF: 15th
RF: 14th
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
Fun with Nerd Stats
I was doing some work in Excel on my data and formulas for player props, and came across some interesting stats that I found interesting. So look:
- B.J. Upton is having an absolutely terrible year, and a big reason is pop-ups. Upton has a major league worst 30.2% in-field fly ball rate with 13 pop-ups in 192 plate appearances, a big reason why his BABIP is so low at just .208. Upton is also striking out 33.9% of the time, which means 64.1% of his plate appearances end with him having zero chance of getting on base. So if every Upton ground ball and fly ball managed to find a hole and he hit 1.000 on those, he'd still only be hitting .360. That's preposterous. Also from a Twins' perspective Josh Willingham's pop-up rate of 22.4% and K rate of 26.4% are a pretty bad combo too. He needs to get it together so they can trade him this summer for something halfway decent.
- There are 8 players who have yet to pop out this year, and they range from slap hitters (Ruben Tejada, Jose Altuve, Howie Kendrick), awesome hitters (Joey Votto, Mike Trout), really shocking guys who you'd think popped out every five minutes (Ryan Howard), guys I've never heard of (Jason Castro), and asians (Shin-Soo Choo).
- The following players have more walks than strikeouts so far this year: Dustin Pedroia, Coco Crisp, Marco Scutaro, and Norichika Aoki. That is an epically annoying group of players.
- Ervin Santana (13/13), Dan Haren (12/9), and Kevin Correia (13/12) are all contenders for the Bronson Arroyo Memorial Club of pitchers who give up more homers than walks in a season, but if anyone is a lock to join the group it's got to be Bartolo Colon with 7 homers and 4 walks allowed so far. It seems he's decided to absolutely not walk anybody this year, and if history holds and he makes around 30 starts he should give up around 20 homers. At his current walk rate he'll come in under that, but who knows if it will hold? He's never walked this few batters in his career, but it seems to be working for him so far (3.33 ERA, 3.34 FIP). Maybe even crazier? He's only had a single 3-0 count this entire season.
- Fastest average fastball velocity for any starter is Stephen Strasburg at 95.4 mph with the slowest 81.1 mph by R.A. Dicky (slowest non-gimmick pitcher FB is Barry Zito at 83.4). Fastest average fastball period goes to Detroit's Bruce Rondon at 99.3 mph (Aroldis Chapman is fourth at 97.1). Glen Perkins throws the fastest heater of any Twin at 94.5 mph, with the team's hardest throwing starter, Mike Pelfrey, averages 91.8 mph and every single thing I wrote in that last sentence is totally gross.
- More Twins stuff:
- Shin-Soo Choo completely crushes fastballs, Carlos Gomez (Snacks -> hi) kills the curve, while Chris Davis smokes sliders (Willingham is second here) and Evan Longoria owns the change-up (followed by Carlos Gonzalez and Troy Tulowitzki which is notable because all three are on $nake and I's fantasy team). On the flip side, fastballs confuse Ruben Tejada, John Buck is owned by the curve, Nelson Cruz can't hit a slider, and Matt Wieters is always fooled by a change.
- Lastly, the best heater in the bigs goes to Cliff Lee (Clayton Kershaw runner-up), best curve to Adam Wainwright (A.J. Burnett) - neither a big surprise, best slider belongs to Yu Darvish (Justin Masterson), best change to Marco Estrada (Cole Hamels), best cutter to Travis Wood (Clay Buchholz), and best splitter (people still throw this?) to Hisashi Iwakuma (Ryan Dempster) and no, not many people throw it.
- B.J. Upton is having an absolutely terrible year, and a big reason is pop-ups. Upton has a major league worst 30.2% in-field fly ball rate with 13 pop-ups in 192 plate appearances, a big reason why his BABIP is so low at just .208. Upton is also striking out 33.9% of the time, which means 64.1% of his plate appearances end with him having zero chance of getting on base. So if every Upton ground ball and fly ball managed to find a hole and he hit 1.000 on those, he'd still only be hitting .360. That's preposterous. Also from a Twins' perspective Josh Willingham's pop-up rate of 22.4% and K rate of 26.4% are a pretty bad combo too. He needs to get it together so they can trade him this summer for something halfway decent.
- There are 8 players who have yet to pop out this year, and they range from slap hitters (Ruben Tejada, Jose Altuve, Howie Kendrick), awesome hitters (Joey Votto, Mike Trout), really shocking guys who you'd think popped out every five minutes (Ryan Howard), guys I've never heard of (Jason Castro), and asians (Shin-Soo Choo).
- The following players have more walks than strikeouts so far this year: Dustin Pedroia, Coco Crisp, Marco Scutaro, and Norichika Aoki. That is an epically annoying group of players.
- Ervin Santana (13/13), Dan Haren (12/9), and Kevin Correia (13/12) are all contenders for the Bronson Arroyo Memorial Club of pitchers who give up more homers than walks in a season, but if anyone is a lock to join the group it's got to be Bartolo Colon with 7 homers and 4 walks allowed so far. It seems he's decided to absolutely not walk anybody this year, and if history holds and he makes around 30 starts he should give up around 20 homers. At his current walk rate he'll come in under that, but who knows if it will hold? He's never walked this few batters in his career, but it seems to be working for him so far (3.33 ERA, 3.34 FIP). Maybe even crazier? He's only had a single 3-0 count this entire season.
- Fastest average fastball velocity for any starter is Stephen Strasburg at 95.4 mph with the slowest 81.1 mph by R.A. Dicky (slowest non-gimmick pitcher FB is Barry Zito at 83.4). Fastest average fastball period goes to Detroit's Bruce Rondon at 99.3 mph (Aroldis Chapman is fourth at 97.1). Glen Perkins throws the fastest heater of any Twin at 94.5 mph, with the team's hardest throwing starter, Mike Pelfrey, averages 91.8 mph and every single thing I wrote in that last sentence is totally gross.
- More Twins stuff:
- Best Fastball (by results/value): Perkins
- Worst Fastball: Pelfrey
- Best Curve: Ryan Pressly
- Worst Curve: Scott Diamond
- Best Slider: Pressly
- Worst Slider: Perkins
- Best Change-Up: Jared Burton
- Worst Change: Pedro Hernandez
- Casey Fien and Josh Roenicke also have very good cutters, while Vance Worley has one that is completely god awful
- Best Fastball Hitter: Joe Mauer (and it's not even close - he crushes fastballs - runnerup: Eduardo Escobar)
- Best Curveball Hitter: Mauer (Trevor Plouffe)
- Best Slider Hitter: Josh Willingham (Plouffe)
- Best Change-Up Hitter: Mauer (Oswaldo Arcia)
- Most Aggressive Hitter: Wilkin Ramirez (runner up: Arcia)
- Best Eye: Brian Dozier (Jamey Carroll)
- Best Baserunner: Pedro Florimon (Aaron Hicks)
- Worst Baserunner: Plouffe (Chris Parmelee)
- Best Fielder: Justin Morneau (Florimon)
- Worst Fielder: Plouffe (Hicks - advanced stats have his range as terrible, advanced fielding stats still suck)
- Shin-Soo Choo completely crushes fastballs, Carlos Gomez (Snacks -> hi) kills the curve, while Chris Davis smokes sliders (Willingham is second here) and Evan Longoria owns the change-up (followed by Carlos Gonzalez and Troy Tulowitzki which is notable because all three are on $nake and I's fantasy team). On the flip side, fastballs confuse Ruben Tejada, John Buck is owned by the curve, Nelson Cruz can't hit a slider, and Matt Wieters is always fooled by a change.
- Lastly, the best heater in the bigs goes to Cliff Lee (Clayton Kershaw runner-up), best curve to Adam Wainwright (A.J. Burnett) - neither a big surprise, best slider belongs to Yu Darvish (Justin Masterson), best change to Marco Estrada (Cole Hamels), best cutter to Travis Wood (Clay Buchholz), and best splitter (people still throw this?) to Hisashi Iwakuma (Ryan Dempster) and no, not many people throw it.
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Twins Remain Delusional, Make no Moves at Trade Deadline
Aargh this is frustrating. Once again, the Twins made no moves at the trade deadline (outside of the Liriano deal) despite being irrefutably out of playoff contention and having players other teams covet but who don't or shouldn't figure in the team's future plans - you know, the perfect combination to make a whole bunch of trades (see: Astros, Houston). Last season the team had Jason Kubel, Michael Cuddyer, and Joe Nathan (among others) who were all going to be free agents and all could have been traded away, yet none were. I was frustrated but understood the thinking at least, given that the Twins would receive a draft pick for each once they signed somewhere else - that isn't the case this year.
There were reports of team's after Denard Span, Justin Morneau, Josh Willingham, Jared Burton, and Glen Perkins, and there was absolutely no reason to hold on to Morneau or Burton (and maybe not Perkins either, depending on your opinion of his future). At this point the Twins need to realize they're at least two more years if not more away from contending and it's time to figure out who is going to be a part of this team when it comes back around, assuming it does, and then trade everybody else. Span is still a pure leadoff hitter, and although he and Revere are somewhat redundant he's also signed to a very team friendly deal through 2015 so there's no reason to trade him unless a deal knocks you on your ass, which apparently the Reds didn't do today - although if you could get Homer Bailey and a couple good prospects I'd have pulled the trigger. Willingham's kind of in the same boat, pretty much the team's only pure power hitter who is also signed to a great contract through 2014, so I get holding on to him too. But the rest?
Morneau has a big contract, owed $14 million next year and a pro-rated $14 for the rest of this year so it might be a litter tougher to get full value back, but it was reported the Dodgers, Giants, and Blue Jays were all after him, but the Twins were asking for too much back, including a major leaguer in return and having the team that received Morneau pick up his entire contract. Well guess what? If you can't get that this year you sure as shit aren't going to get it next year when he's just going to be a two month rental for some team. At least this year whatever team traded for him would get an entire year and change out of the deal. Now? They've basically gambled that he can get himself back to a $14 million a year player, at which point they won't be able to afford to resign him after his contract is up because they're hamstrung by the Mauer deal. Best case scenario at this point is he plays out of his mind, walks, and they get a pick. Well played, Terry Ryan.
And as for Burton and Perkins? They're relievers. Relievers pretty much grow on trees. Reports are the Rangers were going after Burton and that "Perkins was in high demand today." What? For what reason would you possibly hold on to middle relievers when you aren't a contender? Perkins, maybe, if you've decided he's your closer of the future (foolish, but it at least makes some sense) but Burton? The average lifespan of a middle reliever on a team is 1.2 years, a figure I completely made up but it sounds right. From year-to-year they're notoriously unreliable, and the odds Burton is on this team when they're back in contention are basically nil. It just doesn't make a lick of sense.
Who on this team might possibly matter in the future? Mauer, because they're stuck with him. Span, Revere, Willingham, Dozier, Plouffe, and Parmelee? I mean, I like Ryan Doumit quite a bit, but on a team like the Twins he's just a placeholder so if anybody comes sniffing around him (and it sounds like nobody did this year) he's another one who should be traded. Diamond's pretty much the only starter worth penciling in your 2014 rotation, and between their lack of value and youth they'll obviously hold on to guys like DeVries, Deduno, Walters, and Hendriks, but pretty much everybody else needs to go and if they don't trade Carl Pavano at the waiver deadline I'm going to start making Molotov Cocktails.
There's no point to being shitty with old, crappy players who are going to be out of the league by the time you stop sucking. The Astros have it figured out, trading Chris Johnson, Wandy Rodriguez, Brett Myers, Brandon Lyon, J.A. Happ, and Carlos Lee in the last month. Basically everybody they knew wasn't a key building block or had no chance of developing into one. The Pirates used this basic strategy for years, and are now in line to make the playoffs for the first time since Barry Bonds couldn't throw out Sid Bream. Their leadoff hitter for most of this season (Jose Tabata) and one of their starters (Jeff Karstens) were acquired for Damaso Marte and Xavier Nady in 2008, their second guy off the bench and super utility man was acquired from the Cubs for two middle relievers in 2009, two other starters were acquired in the Nate McLouth trade (Charlie Morton) and Octavio Dotel trade (James McDonald), and they got their closer (Joel Hanrahan) for Lastings Milledge when they gave up on him. They've also got great organizational depth thanks to the sheer volume of prospects and minor leaguers they've acquired. Of course, it also helps that they've nailed the draft recently (Pedro Alvarez, Andrew McCutchen, Neil Walker, Gerrit Cole, Jameson Taillon, Starling Marte) but the point stands.
And of course, what do Dick and Bert open up tonight's broadcast with? How glad they are nobody other than Liriano was traded. Honest to god I think I'd rather have Hawk Harrelson's over-the-top homer shtick than this aw shucks folksy we love these boys bullshit these two keep slingin'. No wonder the Twins' brass can get away with this, the announcers are feeding the fans this crap and they're eating it up based on what I've heard on the radio and read on the internet. It's like some sort of crazy collective delusion where everybody thinks this team is team is thisclose to being a contender again - like a cult like those Waco guys or the Mormons or Dyson Vacuum Cleaner Owners. Guess what, idiots? This is the worst version of the Twins we've seen in our lifetimes. FACT. The 1981 and 1982 editions were a worse combo than 2011 and 2012, but I was too young to care or even realize what was going on, and outside of then this is the worst two year stretch in team history. There is no quick fix. When you need to burn your house down for insurance money and then build a new, better house you don't run around swapping out a few chairs for equally shitty, but different chairs - you burn that mother down with gasoline and a bazooka. Like Beavis would.
There were reports of team's after Denard Span, Justin Morneau, Josh Willingham, Jared Burton, and Glen Perkins, and there was absolutely no reason to hold on to Morneau or Burton (and maybe not Perkins either, depending on your opinion of his future). At this point the Twins need to realize they're at least two more years if not more away from contending and it's time to figure out who is going to be a part of this team when it comes back around, assuming it does, and then trade everybody else. Span is still a pure leadoff hitter, and although he and Revere are somewhat redundant he's also signed to a very team friendly deal through 2015 so there's no reason to trade him unless a deal knocks you on your ass, which apparently the Reds didn't do today - although if you could get Homer Bailey and a couple good prospects I'd have pulled the trigger. Willingham's kind of in the same boat, pretty much the team's only pure power hitter who is also signed to a great contract through 2014, so I get holding on to him too. But the rest?
Morneau has a big contract, owed $14 million next year and a pro-rated $14 for the rest of this year so it might be a litter tougher to get full value back, but it was reported the Dodgers, Giants, and Blue Jays were all after him, but the Twins were asking for too much back, including a major leaguer in return and having the team that received Morneau pick up his entire contract. Well guess what? If you can't get that this year you sure as shit aren't going to get it next year when he's just going to be a two month rental for some team. At least this year whatever team traded for him would get an entire year and change out of the deal. Now? They've basically gambled that he can get himself back to a $14 million a year player, at which point they won't be able to afford to resign him after his contract is up because they're hamstrung by the Mauer deal. Best case scenario at this point is he plays out of his mind, walks, and they get a pick. Well played, Terry Ryan.
And as for Burton and Perkins? They're relievers. Relievers pretty much grow on trees. Reports are the Rangers were going after Burton and that "Perkins was in high demand today." What? For what reason would you possibly hold on to middle relievers when you aren't a contender? Perkins, maybe, if you've decided he's your closer of the future (foolish, but it at least makes some sense) but Burton? The average lifespan of a middle reliever on a team is 1.2 years, a figure I completely made up but it sounds right. From year-to-year they're notoriously unreliable, and the odds Burton is on this team when they're back in contention are basically nil. It just doesn't make a lick of sense.
Who on this team might possibly matter in the future? Mauer, because they're stuck with him. Span, Revere, Willingham, Dozier, Plouffe, and Parmelee? I mean, I like Ryan Doumit quite a bit, but on a team like the Twins he's just a placeholder so if anybody comes sniffing around him (and it sounds like nobody did this year) he's another one who should be traded. Diamond's pretty much the only starter worth penciling in your 2014 rotation, and between their lack of value and youth they'll obviously hold on to guys like DeVries, Deduno, Walters, and Hendriks, but pretty much everybody else needs to go and if they don't trade Carl Pavano at the waiver deadline I'm going to start making Molotov Cocktails.
There's no point to being shitty with old, crappy players who are going to be out of the league by the time you stop sucking. The Astros have it figured out, trading Chris Johnson, Wandy Rodriguez, Brett Myers, Brandon Lyon, J.A. Happ, and Carlos Lee in the last month. Basically everybody they knew wasn't a key building block or had no chance of developing into one. The Pirates used this basic strategy for years, and are now in line to make the playoffs for the first time since Barry Bonds couldn't throw out Sid Bream. Their leadoff hitter for most of this season (Jose Tabata) and one of their starters (Jeff Karstens) were acquired for Damaso Marte and Xavier Nady in 2008, their second guy off the bench and super utility man was acquired from the Cubs for two middle relievers in 2009, two other starters were acquired in the Nate McLouth trade (Charlie Morton) and Octavio Dotel trade (James McDonald), and they got their closer (Joel Hanrahan) for Lastings Milledge when they gave up on him. They've also got great organizational depth thanks to the sheer volume of prospects and minor leaguers they've acquired. Of course, it also helps that they've nailed the draft recently (Pedro Alvarez, Andrew McCutchen, Neil Walker, Gerrit Cole, Jameson Taillon, Starling Marte) but the point stands.
And of course, what do Dick and Bert open up tonight's broadcast with? How glad they are nobody other than Liriano was traded. Honest to god I think I'd rather have Hawk Harrelson's over-the-top homer shtick than this aw shucks folksy we love these boys bullshit these two keep slingin'. No wonder the Twins' brass can get away with this, the announcers are feeding the fans this crap and they're eating it up based on what I've heard on the radio and read on the internet. It's like some sort of crazy collective delusion where everybody thinks this team is team is thisclose to being a contender again - like a cult like those Waco guys or the Mormons or Dyson Vacuum Cleaner Owners. Guess what, idiots? This is the worst version of the Twins we've seen in our lifetimes. FACT. The 1981 and 1982 editions were a worse combo than 2011 and 2012, but I was too young to care or even realize what was going on, and outside of then this is the worst two year stretch in team history. There is no quick fix. When you need to burn your house down for insurance money and then build a new, better house you don't run around swapping out a few chairs for equally shitty, but different chairs - you burn that mother down with gasoline and a bazooka. Like Beavis would.
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Super Shark is Super Puke
Well I have nothing better to do with my time and the Tivo is busy Tivo-ing so I can't watch the Twins, so might as well dip once again into the well and see what all I have as far as giant aquatic creature movies. Yes that's right, I'm once again going for the Live Movie Blog. As I look, I have Super Shark and Sharktopus on this TV, and I don't feel like going downstairs or walking all the way to the DVD cabinet so it's going to be one of these two. Super Shark is about a giant, prehistoric shark terrorizing a seaside town and stars the blonde Duke from Dukes of Hazzard who I think was Bo. Sharktopus is about exactly what you think it is and stars Julia Roberts brother. Both are off SyFy so possibility of nudity is nil in both cases. I'm going with Super Shark, it at least sounds like it has a chance to not suck, right? right?
- On IMDB this has a rating of 2.5/10. For reference, Piranhaconda was a 2.9. I'm fucked.
- Interesting wrinkle in that we're starting the movie off with military guys guarding a beach with big-ass guns. Usually that doesn't happen until later. And there''s the shark. Which just beached itself and isnot leaping about the sand like a god damn Super Mario Brother and roaring the entire time. Yes, roaring the entire time while bouncing around the beach like the sand was a trampompolline. And science-y looking chick says, "this isn't working" and then cut to credits. So we've got:
1. Shark roaring
2. Shark on land and mobile
3. A complete disregard for science
4. Ignoring of the Jaws formula of "tease, hint, but don't reveal your monster until later in the movie"
And we're one minute in. Great.
- ....one week earlier.....there are some dudes on an oil derrick who broke through the earth's crust or something and caused an earthquake where the "Super Shark" came out of the ground and somehow caused an explosion and then leaped out the water and grabbed part of the thing and pulled it under water. Yeah. I'm going to go refreshen this rum and coke so it's way stronger.
- Obligatory beach shot while credits run to music. No gratuitous shots of female body parts. This is rough.
- There's your gratuitous bikini shot right there, and on a sluttier looking Ana Faris kind of chick too. I dig.
- Her dude or whatever is scuba diving and asked her to throw a net into the water for some reason so she did and it made the super shark roar and then turn around like it was all mad. It's true, sharks hate nets that are thrown in the water for no reason.
- This is the girl who has been walking around in a bikini for like, 7 minutes. Well done SyFy, well done.
 |
| This is where 2.4 of that 2.5 rating come from |
- And now she's dead because the shark jumped out of the air and landed on the boat. Yep, I wish I was the kind of guy who could paint a picture with words because that was just shitty stupid. And that's twice now this shark has jumped, and like 5-8 times if you include that opening scene. I think the producer/director/writer of this watched Air Jaws a few too many times.
- In this movie, Quint will be played by a hawaiian shirt wearing, cowboy hat wearing, swisher sweet smoking, fruity umbrella drink with a bendy straw drinking, sunglasses around the neck on a string having caricature of Jimmy Buffet. Christ.
- Science chick just told Buffet that he should take her to the site of the oil platform crash or whatever and gave him a bunch of money and he said it's off limits and she said "my badge says Oceanic Investigation Bureau, it'll get us past anyone." That can't be a real thing, right? Then on the boat ride out she takes off the fancy jacket and nice blouse so she can just sunbathe in a bikini. Not that I'm arguing, but that can't be consider professional conduct by the Oceanic Investigation Bureau. If she's not careful she's going to get a censure.
- I'm 17 minutes into this movie. 17. Shit.
- FYI: Josh Willingham is officially known as "Mrs. W's boyfriend" around our house. Just thought ya'll should know.
- Science chick is now telling Luke Duke that the area where that oil platform sank is loaded with chemicals. Well no shit. then she gets all hard-assy on him and he manages to somehow turn that into a dinner date. Oh, I'm sure she doesn't think of it as a date, but once she has a couple glasses of wine and he turns on that duke boy charm her pants will be on the floor of the General Lee before she even realizes she's been roofied.
- The shark roared again.
- Ooh, there was a survivor of the oil rig accident. Which honestly doesn't make a lick of sense because the whole thing blew up and was then pulled underwater by the most roaringest shark since Jaws 4.
- Plus this guy (we'll call him Kobe because he looks like Kobe) actually saw the shark, which is also stupid because in that scene Kobe was down in bowels of station or whatever and then somehow apparently sprinted to the top where he saw the shark and then somehow survived when the whole top level exploded and also survived when it got pulled over. He really is like Kobe, except he'd probably recognize the talent he has in the paint and work to get them involved in the offense.
- Suddenly now there's a navy sub for some reason. I know it's the Navy because the operators are all wearing the kind of NAVY hats you can buy at Walmart.
- The shark is ramming the sub with it's head at it's side, kind of in a "I'd really like to get to know you biblically" kind of way. Sexy.
- Never mind it bit the sub in half instead. Man, talk about a violent relationship. This shark's got nothing on Dez Bryant, who, by the way, is a cornerstone in my rebuilding effort in our Fantasy Football keeper league. Ass.
- THERE WAS POTASSIUM FELDSPAR IN THE WATER! It HYDROLIZES INTO KAOLINITE AND QUARTZ AND POTASSIUM HYDROXIDE! IT CAN CREATE A CHEMICAL THAT CAN BREAK DOWN ROCKS!
- This lady is a dummy. She thinks this hyrdolizing thing caused the rocks around the base of the oil platform to crumble thus causing it to sink. Stupid lady, we all know it was a shark. Excuse me, a super shark.
- Potassium Feldspar is used to make glass and ceramics. Kaolinite is used in medicines and paper manufacturing. Quartz is quartz. Potassium Hydroxide is actually corrosive, but in a way where it's used in batteries and cuticle removers, but it's most common use is to make soap and biodiesel which I assume is some kind of fuel. Hydrolysis is a real thing that means the breakdown of chemicals by the addition of water. So in theory all of those words science lady used could happen, except for the part where it created something that basically melted rock. Also known as, "the whole half-assed scientific theory this movie is based on." Plus the shark roars.
- By the way, congrats should go out to Snacks and Mrs. Snacks as they welcomed their first child, Baby Lukas, into the world late Monday evening. Pretty cool stuff, though I would have gone with a "c".
- Two life guard girls who have been in several scenes but have been too boring to mention are now at some karaoke bar with some dude that looks like that mean guy from the OC but isn't. Also earlier that one lifeguard lady was like telling the other lifeguard lady how they'd have a big party for her birthday but now it's just the three of them and this is very sad. But it turns out there's a bikini contest, so all is not lost.
- This bikini contest is sad. And a sad bikini contest is the saddest thing of all.
- Oh snap! The birthday girl life guard girl decided to join the contest and be brave and strip because of course she had her bikini on under her clothes and she was all happy until she turned and looked and saw OC guy and other lifeguard girl guy making out. Sad. Reminded me of when Screech saw Zack and Lisa making out before the fashion show at the Max. Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about.
- I wasn't paying attention and there was an Advil commercial that I thought was part of the movie. I'm not sure if that says more about this movie or me but I'm a stupid free blogger and this is a movie that presumably cost 10s of thousands of dollars I assume. Right? 100s? I don't know. How much does something like this cost? And what can the profit margin possibly be? Like 8 bucks? I hope.
- These lifeguards broads are arguing over that OC dude and then the one who didn't get the guy said I wish I was dead and then the shark ate her by jumping on the beach which is genius. Then it ate her traitorous friend by jumping again and eating her. The shark bouncing through sand is actually starting to win me over. It's the stupidest thing ever other than Sex and the City but god damn at least they're consistent. Something to be said for that I assume but I'm drunk so shut your mother.
- The shark just ate somebody. I don't know. What am I, Kreskin?
- Man, the Oceanic Bureau of Investigation sure does have a lax dresscode, because she's just out there and loving any minute of it. and it worked because her and Jimmy Buffet guy just found he shark, AND IT'S CIRCLING THE BOAT! The wake trailing behind the dorsal fin also looks like a child drew it with crayon.
- Huh. It seems that if you turn off your radio a giant prehistoric shark that is circling your boat for no real reason will leave. Actually, now Investigator Boobsy explains that the shark was giving off it's own radio waves that were interfering with the boat's radio. Yep, that's their explanation.
- Bikini photo shoot on the beach. I fear for these ladies lives. But of course, the killer animal in this is a shark and they aren't actually in the water, so clearly they're safe. Of course they're not safe you fool! Did you forget we aren't dealing with some kind of regular old Tom Gugliotta of sharks, this is like, the kind of sharks! The Kevin Durant or Rico Tucker of sharks! And right on cue sharky boy jumps onto the beach and eats the photographer and both girls, but not before the blond one tries to beat it up by using a beach umbrella as a javelin or a jousting stick thing. It didn't work.
- Science lady, who it turns out is not an actual investigator with the ocean CSI or whatever but is in reality a hippie who hates people who drill for sweet, sweet oil, is now hammered at the bar because apparently she hates sharks or something. I don't know. I'd post a picture of the young lass but sadly I can't find a good one. Or I'm struggling to use google properly.
- Here comes the army or whatever to try to kill the shark before the big 4th of July festivities. I was going to make a joke here but I got nothin'.
- Speaking of gotting nothing, we went to a meat raffle tonight - me, TRE, Dr. Acula, Theory, and Lunny and TRE won twice (two $20 giftcards to a meat store), Theory won once (one giftcard), I won once (Six burgundy pepper marinated strip steaks), and Dr. Acula and Lunny were shutout in your face. I don't have any idea if those steaks are good but I won and wanted steak and it was either that or kabobs and the kabobs had vegetables on them and I didn't go to a vegetable raffle.
- Fake Dr. boobsy is winning me over. Mostly with the cleavage. Also winning me over? When I logged into an online sportsbook I hadn't used in about a year and saw over $300 in there. Sweet. Can't wait to blow it.
- We're back at the part with the army on the beach from before. I bet you guys like, $80 the shark jumps on the beach and eats that tank and all that shit.
- Bullets seem to only make super shark mad. Also this looks like something my son could creaate with his toy shark and army men, plus a little ketchup. Shark is actually walking on the beach on it's fins right now. I might be drunk enough for this to be sweet. Also, and this is quite the run-on post already, sharks hate fire. Apparently.
- Shark dude just jumped way the eff up in the air and took down Maverick and Goose. Probably a deleted scene from Top Gun.
- Best British Open Bets (to win): Sergio 30-1, Poulter 40-1, Furyk 40-1, Johnson 40-1, Stricker 60-1.
- Everyone is now listening to crazy fake ocean cop lady. She, with no examination mind you, says the shark has too tough of skin to shoot and is completely neutralized and/or driven crazy by radio waves because it omits waves, also claims it flies because it jumps, can walk on it's fins, and was trapped in rock, but was still alive, and escaped after the hydrolizing agent was used by the oil companies. And she delivers it so earnestly it's like she forgot what movie she is in.
- Mayor guy or whoever doesn't really care except to say "Those beaches must be open for the fourth of July." Pretty sure Jaws guy did this better.
- And she's sexing Jimmy Buffet guy who is once again wearing a Hawaiian shirt. This movie makes me hurt.
- The army dudes are going with some kind of walking tank, while Jimmy Buffet and his lady are rocking some pretty serious speakers. I will bet you $40 right now they end up doing something like cranking up the radio and it makes the sharks head explode. $40.
- That stupid tank thing misses the shark by like 90 feet every time it tries to shoot. Stupid tank.
- This. This is.....just indescribable. there are no words. It's just jumping around on the beach like Misti May (who married shitty baseball player Matt Traynor, by the way).
 |
| This is what you get when you're a failed baseball player. |
- Fake science lady blew up the shark by throwing a boombox in it's mouth. I think there was something about explosives in there too but I wasn't really paying attention because I was busy looking for pictures and doesn't it just seem right that throwing a boombox in the sharks mouth and like, turning it on or something would fit this movie well. I think so, and that's how I choose to believe this ended. Makes it easier when i think about how I spent my time watching this instead of gambling.
Sunday, April 15, 2012
Week in Review - 4/16/2011
Feels like I haven't done one of these in a while, but in honor of baseball really getting going I figure I probably should. But since I also didn't get started on this until 8pm on Sunday night, let's cut the chit-chat and just get down to business. This isn't some romantic vacation on an island in some kind of awesome sweetwith rose petals and a jacuzzi with Luther Van Dross playing in the background, sweetheart.
WHO WAS AWESOME
1. Josh Willingham. There are actually more positive Twins' things I could report on that I would have expected given that the team is 2-7 right now, but the #1 is clearly Willingham (let's not call him Willie, ok, it's super more annoying than any of the other -y nicknames) smacking the ball all over everywhere. He leads the AL in home runs with four and has a hit in every single game this year and he's not getting lucky either - he's crushing the ball. He leads the AL in OBP, slugging, and OPS. It's at the point now where he hasn't hit a homer in the last three games and I'm wondering what's wrong. With his bat humming, Denard Span with three multi-hit games already, and Liam Hendriks looking surprisingly feisty there are some decent signs of life here. None of it will matter if Mauer and Morneau don't start hitting, the bullpen continues to refuse to get anybody out, and the starting pitching is mostly awful, but I'm looking for anything to latch on to here. Plus, as a point in his favor, Mrs. W has quite the raging lady boner for Mr. Willingham, so that's a point in his favor.
2. Matt Kemp. So much for all that "slumping the year after a contract year" nonsense. He had a career year last year, batting .324 and coming one home run shy of notching a 40-40 year and then signed a nice fat 8-year deal that is suddenly looking like it might be a bargain for LA. Kemp currently leads the majors in batting average (.487), OBP (.523), slugging (1.023), OPS (1.548), home runs (6), RBI (16), runs (13), and hits (19). He has one fewer home run than Justin Morneau has hits, with Mauer having just two more. I don't know if he's back with Aaliyah or not back with Aaliyah or dating Bobby Brown or whatever, but it's doesn't really matter - I think Matt Kemp is officially the best player in baseball, other than Clete Thomas of course.
3. Barry Zito. What' more unexpected than Zito's complete game shutout in his first start this year? How about him following that up with another quality start and now sits with a 1.13 ERA and a 0.69 WHIP. The change? He's abandoned his 84mph fastball, throwing only about a third of the time compared to over 50% most of his career, and starting throwing a slider with regularity. Because he still has an 84mph fastball I doubt he can keep this up, particularly once players figure out that slider, but a starting rotation of Lincecum-Cain (1-hitter this week)-Bumgarner-Vogelsong-Zito would damn hard to touch. If, you know, Lincecum didn't completely suck now - more on that later.
4. UCLA Bruins. So I guess all the "UCLA won't be able to recruit anymore after that story on Howland/Reeves Nelson" is just so much bullshit, because they certainly didn't have any trouble this signing period. The Bruins grabbed Shabazz Muhammad, the #1 recruit in the country according to Rivals and #2 according to ESPN, who now joins Kyle Anderson (#3/#5) and Jordan Adams (#62/#41) in giving UCLA ESPN's #3 class in the country, which would be #2 if Nerlens Noel had picked anywhere other than Kentucky. Even more interesting, big man Tony Parker (#27/#26) is still out there and won't make his decision known until Friday, but it's thought to be down to UCLA (Tony's choice) or Georgia (Mom's choice) with Duke, Ohio State, and Kansas still officially in the mix. If Parker picks UCLA the Bruins likely become the #1 class in the country and vault back into a national power. So nice try Reeves, but you can't bring down a juggernaut. Unless you're in a snow speeder and you use your tow cable, but even then you probably lose your co-pilot. Poor Dak. My favorite part of the story though is that Muhammad's sister, Asia, is a pro on the women's tennis tour. She's ranked #386 on the tour with career earnings of $80k, yet she has a shoe deal with Adidas. Adidas, who sponsors UCLA hoops. Funny world, eh?
5. Chip Armelin. He wasn't awesome nor did he suck this week, but I need a spot to write about him so I'm sticking him here, seeing as how he's transferring and everything. I've always liked Chip and thought his instant offense off the bench was important, as well as the fact that out of everybody on the team he seemed to be the only one who had confidence in his own offensive game and was willing to look for his own shot (although Coleman and Dre Hollins got there in the end). In a normal offseason I would be really bummed about losing him, but if the choice is Armelin or Mbakwe you go Mbakwe every single time. The reality was with Mbakwe back and Rodney not doing anything stupid you had a scholarship problem and somebody was going to have to leave. There were 3 choices who wouldn't majorly kill the team - Armelin, Ahanmisi, and Ingram. Because Ingram was going to be a senior and it's likely not many D-I schools would take Ahanmisi (or Ingram for that matter) I had always anticipated Armelin would be gone, and it sucks but was inevitable. I wish him nothing but luck, and I fully expect him to end up averaging 15+ per game for somebody. Seems like in these cases the player always ends up back in his home state and there's no shortage of schools in Louisiana. So whoever - La Tech, Tulane, or even somewhere else like Texas or Arkansas or somewhere in that vicinity (my prediction) they're getting a good one. I'll definitely miss that crazy ass lefty jumper no matter how much or little space he had to get it off, and there was nobody who was less shy about taking a heat check. Godspeed, Chipper. Godspeed.
WHO SUCKED
1. Matt Capps. Thanks to Snacks for point this out to me, but when Cappsy tried like to hell to blow that save on Thursday against the Angels (you know, when the Angels went single-single-single to start the inning but came up one inning short) do you realize out of 23 pitches he threw 21 of them were fastballs? And, as we know, this isn't Jonathan Papelbon or Aroldis Chapman throwing smoke, it's Matt effing Capps and his 92 mph noodle-arm heater. He's always been over-reliant on that mediocre fastball, but most years he's thrown it around 75% of the time and this year he's at 83%, which isn't good considering he's about 2mph slower than he was in his "glory" days with the Pirates. The best part? As his fastball has gotten slower his change-up has gotten faster and there is now just a 5mph gap between the two (where it should be about 10). The worst part? I can't think of a single reliever on the Twins' roster I'd trust more than Capps, because for all p=Twins, trust=null. Ha ha, nerd talk.
2. Yeonis Cespedes. If you pay too much attention to stuff like this, you remember people talking about the A's could/should start Cespedes in the minors because the level of competition in his Cuban league was more like double A here and also because Oakland sucks and weren't going to be competing for anything except next year's number 1 pick. Well the A's said fuck that noise and threw him into the starting lineup where he started out with a bang, hitting 3 homers in his first four games. Since then he's gone 3-20 and struck out eight times (and has now struck out in every game but one with 6 multi-K games). Now, he can still crush (of his seven hits, five of them are for extra-bases) and he has a good eye for the zone (4 walks this year - not great but not bad) so he'll probably end up being a solid player, and that's all I can say because I haven't even come close to watching Oakland this year, except for when I almost got up for those games in Japan but then didn't.
3. Tim Lincecum. I think it's like super possible Wiley Wiggins (aka Mitch Kramer) finally did the thing where he kills the real Tim Lincecum and then takes over his body and his life and bangs his wife and spends his money and smokes his dope and all, and I say that because maybe the most unhittable pitcher in baseball over the last several seasons has now gotten lit up by Arizona and Colorado and now has the highest ERA in the majors (12.91) and a sky high WHIP (2.22), which sounds more Wiley Wiggins-y than Lincecum-y. Plus I also say that because if I was Wiley Wiggins that's exactly what I would do.
4. Charlotte Bobcats. I have no idea how I didn't know this already, but Charlotte is like, historically bad. They have seven wins this year. Seven! And they won their first game of the year, so they've won six since December. They're currently in the midst of a 16-game losing streak, and it's not even their first 16-game losing streak this year. Their most recent loss came on Sunday, 94-82 to the Celtics in a game where Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, and Kevin Garnett all sat out, leaving both Brandon Bass and Avery Bradley to score 22 points. They haven't scored 100 or more in a non-OT game since March 17th, allowing their opponents to reach 100+ twelve times. D.J. White starts for them. Byron Mullens gets serious run. This could pretty much go on forever. They're like, the Minnesota Twins of the NBA.
5. Justin Smoak. Sigh. Come on dude, you're killing me. I've always had a crush on Smoak, as evidenced by the six entries (now 7) on this blog that have his name as a label despite him having a pretty non-descript career thus far and not being a Twin nor being in their division, but seriously dude WTF? He's awful. He's just awful. In four partial seasons he's never hit better than .239, and yes batting average isn't the end-all-be-all but he's also never OBP'd better than .323 or slugged better than .407, so he can't hit for power or average and doesn't walk - basically the opposite of his minor league career. This year might be the worst, as so far he's hitting at Puntonian levels with an average under .200, an OBP under .250, and a slugging percentage under .300 - for reals. Ouch. He's still young and he might end up ok, but at this point I dropped in our fantasy league for Daniel Murphy. Daniel effing Murphy. Or maybe David. The one who plays for the Mets. Gross.
One other thing is that the wife and I rewatched Malibu Shark Attack this weekend and it reminded me how much fun it is/was to watch crappy shark movies and blog about them, and I haven't done that in forever. So I'm going to try to do it soon. Stay tuned.
WHO WAS AWESOME
1. Josh Willingham. There are actually more positive Twins' things I could report on that I would have expected given that the team is 2-7 right now, but the #1 is clearly Willingham (let's not call him Willie, ok, it's super more annoying than any of the other -y nicknames) smacking the ball all over everywhere. He leads the AL in home runs with four and has a hit in every single game this year and he's not getting lucky either - he's crushing the ball. He leads the AL in OBP, slugging, and OPS. It's at the point now where he hasn't hit a homer in the last three games and I'm wondering what's wrong. With his bat humming, Denard Span with three multi-hit games already, and Liam Hendriks looking surprisingly feisty there are some decent signs of life here. None of it will matter if Mauer and Morneau don't start hitting, the bullpen continues to refuse to get anybody out, and the starting pitching is mostly awful, but I'm looking for anything to latch on to here. Plus, as a point in his favor, Mrs. W has quite the raging lady boner for Mr. Willingham, so that's a point in his favor.
2. Matt Kemp. So much for all that "slumping the year after a contract year" nonsense. He had a career year last year, batting .324 and coming one home run shy of notching a 40-40 year and then signed a nice fat 8-year deal that is suddenly looking like it might be a bargain for LA. Kemp currently leads the majors in batting average (.487), OBP (.523), slugging (1.023), OPS (1.548), home runs (6), RBI (16), runs (13), and hits (19). He has one fewer home run than Justin Morneau has hits, with Mauer having just two more. I don't know if he's back with Aaliyah or not back with Aaliyah or dating Bobby Brown or whatever, but it's doesn't really matter - I think Matt Kemp is officially the best player in baseball, other than Clete Thomas of course.
3. Barry Zito. What' more unexpected than Zito's complete game shutout in his first start this year? How about him following that up with another quality start and now sits with a 1.13 ERA and a 0.69 WHIP. The change? He's abandoned his 84mph fastball, throwing only about a third of the time compared to over 50% most of his career, and starting throwing a slider with regularity. Because he still has an 84mph fastball I doubt he can keep this up, particularly once players figure out that slider, but a starting rotation of Lincecum-Cain (1-hitter this week)-Bumgarner-Vogelsong-Zito would damn hard to touch. If, you know, Lincecum didn't completely suck now - more on that later.
4. UCLA Bruins. So I guess all the "UCLA won't be able to recruit anymore after that story on Howland/Reeves Nelson" is just so much bullshit, because they certainly didn't have any trouble this signing period. The Bruins grabbed Shabazz Muhammad, the #1 recruit in the country according to Rivals and #2 according to ESPN, who now joins Kyle Anderson (#3/#5) and Jordan Adams (#62/#41) in giving UCLA ESPN's #3 class in the country, which would be #2 if Nerlens Noel had picked anywhere other than Kentucky. Even more interesting, big man Tony Parker (#27/#26) is still out there and won't make his decision known until Friday, but it's thought to be down to UCLA (Tony's choice) or Georgia (Mom's choice) with Duke, Ohio State, and Kansas still officially in the mix. If Parker picks UCLA the Bruins likely become the #1 class in the country and vault back into a national power. So nice try Reeves, but you can't bring down a juggernaut. Unless you're in a snow speeder and you use your tow cable, but even then you probably lose your co-pilot. Poor Dak. My favorite part of the story though is that Muhammad's sister, Asia, is a pro on the women's tennis tour. She's ranked #386 on the tour with career earnings of $80k, yet she has a shoe deal with Adidas. Adidas, who sponsors UCLA hoops. Funny world, eh?
5. Chip Armelin. He wasn't awesome nor did he suck this week, but I need a spot to write about him so I'm sticking him here, seeing as how he's transferring and everything. I've always liked Chip and thought his instant offense off the bench was important, as well as the fact that out of everybody on the team he seemed to be the only one who had confidence in his own offensive game and was willing to look for his own shot (although Coleman and Dre Hollins got there in the end). In a normal offseason I would be really bummed about losing him, but if the choice is Armelin or Mbakwe you go Mbakwe every single time. The reality was with Mbakwe back and Rodney not doing anything stupid you had a scholarship problem and somebody was going to have to leave. There were 3 choices who wouldn't majorly kill the team - Armelin, Ahanmisi, and Ingram. Because Ingram was going to be a senior and it's likely not many D-I schools would take Ahanmisi (or Ingram for that matter) I had always anticipated Armelin would be gone, and it sucks but was inevitable. I wish him nothing but luck, and I fully expect him to end up averaging 15+ per game for somebody. Seems like in these cases the player always ends up back in his home state and there's no shortage of schools in Louisiana. So whoever - La Tech, Tulane, or even somewhere else like Texas or Arkansas or somewhere in that vicinity (my prediction) they're getting a good one. I'll definitely miss that crazy ass lefty jumper no matter how much or little space he had to get it off, and there was nobody who was less shy about taking a heat check. Godspeed, Chipper. Godspeed.
WHO SUCKED
1. Matt Capps. Thanks to Snacks for point this out to me, but when Cappsy tried like to hell to blow that save on Thursday against the Angels (you know, when the Angels went single-single-single to start the inning but came up one inning short) do you realize out of 23 pitches he threw 21 of them were fastballs? And, as we know, this isn't Jonathan Papelbon or Aroldis Chapman throwing smoke, it's Matt effing Capps and his 92 mph noodle-arm heater. He's always been over-reliant on that mediocre fastball, but most years he's thrown it around 75% of the time and this year he's at 83%, which isn't good considering he's about 2mph slower than he was in his "glory" days with the Pirates. The best part? As his fastball has gotten slower his change-up has gotten faster and there is now just a 5mph gap between the two (where it should be about 10). The worst part? I can't think of a single reliever on the Twins' roster I'd trust more than Capps, because for all p=Twins, trust=null. Ha ha, nerd talk.
2. Yeonis Cespedes. If you pay too much attention to stuff like this, you remember people talking about the A's could/should start Cespedes in the minors because the level of competition in his Cuban league was more like double A here and also because Oakland sucks and weren't going to be competing for anything except next year's number 1 pick. Well the A's said fuck that noise and threw him into the starting lineup where he started out with a bang, hitting 3 homers in his first four games. Since then he's gone 3-20 and struck out eight times (and has now struck out in every game but one with 6 multi-K games). Now, he can still crush (of his seven hits, five of them are for extra-bases) and he has a good eye for the zone (4 walks this year - not great but not bad) so he'll probably end up being a solid player, and that's all I can say because I haven't even come close to watching Oakland this year, except for when I almost got up for those games in Japan but then didn't.
3. Tim Lincecum. I think it's like super possible Wiley Wiggins (aka Mitch Kramer) finally did the thing where he kills the real Tim Lincecum and then takes over his body and his life and bangs his wife and spends his money and smokes his dope and all, and I say that because maybe the most unhittable pitcher in baseball over the last several seasons has now gotten lit up by Arizona and Colorado and now has the highest ERA in the majors (12.91) and a sky high WHIP (2.22), which sounds more Wiley Wiggins-y than Lincecum-y. Plus I also say that because if I was Wiley Wiggins that's exactly what I would do.
4. Charlotte Bobcats. I have no idea how I didn't know this already, but Charlotte is like, historically bad. They have seven wins this year. Seven! And they won their first game of the year, so they've won six since December. They're currently in the midst of a 16-game losing streak, and it's not even their first 16-game losing streak this year. Their most recent loss came on Sunday, 94-82 to the Celtics in a game where Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, and Kevin Garnett all sat out, leaving both Brandon Bass and Avery Bradley to score 22 points. They haven't scored 100 or more in a non-OT game since March 17th, allowing their opponents to reach 100+ twelve times. D.J. White starts for them. Byron Mullens gets serious run. This could pretty much go on forever. They're like, the Minnesota Twins of the NBA.
5. Justin Smoak. Sigh. Come on dude, you're killing me. I've always had a crush on Smoak, as evidenced by the six entries (now 7) on this blog that have his name as a label despite him having a pretty non-descript career thus far and not being a Twin nor being in their division, but seriously dude WTF? He's awful. He's just awful. In four partial seasons he's never hit better than .239, and yes batting average isn't the end-all-be-all but he's also never OBP'd better than .323 or slugged better than .407, so he can't hit for power or average and doesn't walk - basically the opposite of his minor league career. This year might be the worst, as so far he's hitting at Puntonian levels with an average under .200, an OBP under .250, and a slugging percentage under .300 - for reals. Ouch. He's still young and he might end up ok, but at this point I dropped in our fantasy league for Daniel Murphy. Daniel effing Murphy. Or maybe David. The one who plays for the Mets. Gross.
One other thing is that the wife and I rewatched Malibu Shark Attack this weekend and it reminded me how much fun it is/was to watch crappy shark movies and blog about them, and I haven't done that in forever. So I'm going to try to do it soon. Stay tuned.
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Notes from 50,000 feet (Welcome to the Twins, Willy + Paul trade reaction)
I'm on a plane. And it has wi-fi. What a glorious time to be alive. A lot has seemingly changed since I changed jobs and stop flying to random cities basically monthly and getting drunk on a bathroom sink full of Coors Lights. This is actually my first business trip since almost exactly a year ago when I went to LA (which is where I'm going today again). Of course, not that much has changed because the freaking reading lights don't work on this god forsaken plane, so I'm forced to either sleep or type. Awesome. Also Blake Lewis's version of "You Give Love a Bad Name" just started playing on my ipod, so I'm pretty sure I'm doing something wrong. Anyway. I'm bored. And you're going to listen to me, god help you.
- Biggest news is the signing of Josh Willingham by the Twins for 3 years, $21 million which I'm assuming has been finalized. (side note: Busta Rhymes now on the ipod, things are looking up). Considering this is very close to the contract they offered Michael Cuddyer (3 yrs, $25 mil) and they're both outfielders I think this signals the end of the Cuddyer era in Minnesota, for good or for ill. Let's look first at playing ability.
Both Cuddy and Willingham will be 33 to start next season, and although both are corner outfielders Cuddy is primarily a RF with a great arm and Willingham is a LF with a so-so arm, which automatically raises questions about what happens to the Twins' outfield since neither Span nor Revere can even get the ball from RF to 3B on the fly or so I assume. Fielding-wise, using UZR which is an advanced fielding stat that I couldn't begin to describe but is one of the more popular ones, both were equally shitty range-wise, which backs up what I've seen with my own two eyes. Add in Cuddy's ability to play a sub-par 1st, 2nd, or 3rd and the Twins do lose out slightly in the field with this swap, mostly due to the now lack of a true RF in my eyes.
Batting wise once again these two players are similar. Over the past 3 years, Cuddyer has a slightly higher average (.276 to .257), while Willingham has a slightly higher OBP (.360 to .341) and SLG (.479 to .465), which adds up to Willy's OPS+ of 125 trumping Cuddy's of 117, or about the difference between Troy Tulowitzki and Alex Gordon. Basically Willingham is probably a slightly better hitter, especially power and plate discipline-wise, while Cuddy might get a few more hits here and there. Plus Willingham has outhomered him each of the last two seasons, and although they have a virtually identical number of career HRs (Cuddy wins 141 to 132) Willingham has done it in about 1,300 fewer at-bats than Cuddyer (note: not a typo). So basically the Twins downgraded their defense a bit but upgraded offensively. Cool, you think, but what about the intangibles?
My answer to that question would be to punch you in the face if you were on this plane. Yes, Cuddyer filled a leadership void, but not because he's a great natural leader, but because SOMEBODY had to because Justin Morneau forgot where he was every 15 minutes and had to be reminded and every time Joe Mauer talked to anybody they fell asleep. I don't deny Cuddy provided a valuable service by becoming the face of the team by being in every single commerical, interview, event, and basically throwing himself in front of every camera he saw. I also don't deny that having a guy who is willing to play any position where he's needed, and can do so not embarrassingly, is a nice luxury to have. I also think both of those are very overrated on a baseball team. Not to mention him always chasing the press and forcing them to interview him kept the pressure off Mauer and Morneua, which at times is good but I would argue doing it to that extent during that kind of year is bad. I short, I will listen to your arguments that Cuddy is valuable in ways that have nothing to do with on-field performance, but I will also then dismiss this arguments with a roundhouse kick to our face and a condescending wave of my hand.
The Final piece of the puzzle is perhaps what pushes this from a pretty close to even swap that saves $4 million bucks to a great (well, good) decision by the Twins that saves $4 million bucks. Because Cuddyer was offered arbitration, that means that when Cuddy eventually signs with another team the Twins will receive both a first-round pick and a supplemental pick between rounds 1 and 2. That's good for any team, but for the Twins, whose list of prospects is getting thinner and thinner by the year, that's huge. That basically means two top-35 picks in the next draft, and even if Willingham was a notch below Cuddyer this swap might have been worth it. As it stands, it's the correct move. And if you're crying because Cuddy is gone, well, you're too dumb to care about anyway.
- Looks like this Chris Paul trade went down. Not to follow Bill Simmons' comments, but the Paul to Griffin combo is going to be pretty sick in the open court. I have no idea if Griffin is pick-n-rollable (and actually I don't know if Paul is either), but if they're both adept at the play look out. They also (reportedly) managed to do it without gutting their team. Paul, Billups (who they may regret adding at this point), Bledsoe, DeAndre Jordan, Griffin, and Caron Butler is absolutely a contender, especially if Bledsoe matures (and Jordan to a lesser extent). Not to mention they have decent vet rotation guys in Gomes and Foye (thanks Wolves), and a bunch of young guys (Willie Warren, Travis Leslie, Trey Thompkins). If one of those youngsters breaks out look the hell out. I grabbed some Clips to win the whole thing action at 15-1 last night when it started to look like they were close to getting Paul (heard it was 50-1 earlier in the day, dammit). Interested to see where that goes to.
And it's not like the Hornets screwed themselves either. Kaman is a serviceable center in a league with very few of them, Aminu sucks but has potential, and Eric Gordon is probably one of the best young players in the league (there's a Bill Simmons column on that but I'll be damned if I can find it now). Then there's the pick from the Wolves, which, no matter how optimistic you are, you have to admit is going to be in the lottery. Hopefully it's late, but even if it's late that doesn't mean it ends up late. Especially because the Clippers just traded it, upping the odds it ends up in the top 3 by at least triple. It's a waaaaaay better package than they were getting in the Lakers/Rockets swap so, at least for now, it kind of looks like the league knows what it's doing.
I'm sure there is plenty more to write about, but the plane is landing shortly and they're saying something about turning stuff off, so I must go. Later.
- Biggest news is the signing of Josh Willingham by the Twins for 3 years, $21 million which I'm assuming has been finalized. (side note: Busta Rhymes now on the ipod, things are looking up). Considering this is very close to the contract they offered Michael Cuddyer (3 yrs, $25 mil) and they're both outfielders I think this signals the end of the Cuddyer era in Minnesota, for good or for ill. Let's look first at playing ability.
Both Cuddy and Willingham will be 33 to start next season, and although both are corner outfielders Cuddy is primarily a RF with a great arm and Willingham is a LF with a so-so arm, which automatically raises questions about what happens to the Twins' outfield since neither Span nor Revere can even get the ball from RF to 3B on the fly or so I assume. Fielding-wise, using UZR which is an advanced fielding stat that I couldn't begin to describe but is one of the more popular ones, both were equally shitty range-wise, which backs up what I've seen with my own two eyes. Add in Cuddy's ability to play a sub-par 1st, 2nd, or 3rd and the Twins do lose out slightly in the field with this swap, mostly due to the now lack of a true RF in my eyes.
Batting wise once again these two players are similar. Over the past 3 years, Cuddyer has a slightly higher average (.276 to .257), while Willingham has a slightly higher OBP (.360 to .341) and SLG (.479 to .465), which adds up to Willy's OPS+ of 125 trumping Cuddy's of 117, or about the difference between Troy Tulowitzki and Alex Gordon. Basically Willingham is probably a slightly better hitter, especially power and plate discipline-wise, while Cuddy might get a few more hits here and there. Plus Willingham has outhomered him each of the last two seasons, and although they have a virtually identical number of career HRs (Cuddy wins 141 to 132) Willingham has done it in about 1,300 fewer at-bats than Cuddyer (note: not a typo). So basically the Twins downgraded their defense a bit but upgraded offensively. Cool, you think, but what about the intangibles?
My answer to that question would be to punch you in the face if you were on this plane. Yes, Cuddyer filled a leadership void, but not because he's a great natural leader, but because SOMEBODY had to because Justin Morneau forgot where he was every 15 minutes and had to be reminded and every time Joe Mauer talked to anybody they fell asleep. I don't deny Cuddy provided a valuable service by becoming the face of the team by being in every single commerical, interview, event, and basically throwing himself in front of every camera he saw. I also don't deny that having a guy who is willing to play any position where he's needed, and can do so not embarrassingly, is a nice luxury to have. I also think both of those are very overrated on a baseball team. Not to mention him always chasing the press and forcing them to interview him kept the pressure off Mauer and Morneua, which at times is good but I would argue doing it to that extent during that kind of year is bad. I short, I will listen to your arguments that Cuddy is valuable in ways that have nothing to do with on-field performance, but I will also then dismiss this arguments with a roundhouse kick to our face and a condescending wave of my hand.
The Final piece of the puzzle is perhaps what pushes this from a pretty close to even swap that saves $4 million bucks to a great (well, good) decision by the Twins that saves $4 million bucks. Because Cuddyer was offered arbitration, that means that when Cuddy eventually signs with another team the Twins will receive both a first-round pick and a supplemental pick between rounds 1 and 2. That's good for any team, but for the Twins, whose list of prospects is getting thinner and thinner by the year, that's huge. That basically means two top-35 picks in the next draft, and even if Willingham was a notch below Cuddyer this swap might have been worth it. As it stands, it's the correct move. And if you're crying because Cuddy is gone, well, you're too dumb to care about anyway.
- Looks like this Chris Paul trade went down. Not to follow Bill Simmons' comments, but the Paul to Griffin combo is going to be pretty sick in the open court. I have no idea if Griffin is pick-n-rollable (and actually I don't know if Paul is either), but if they're both adept at the play look out. They also (reportedly) managed to do it without gutting their team. Paul, Billups (who they may regret adding at this point), Bledsoe, DeAndre Jordan, Griffin, and Caron Butler is absolutely a contender, especially if Bledsoe matures (and Jordan to a lesser extent). Not to mention they have decent vet rotation guys in Gomes and Foye (thanks Wolves), and a bunch of young guys (Willie Warren, Travis Leslie, Trey Thompkins). If one of those youngsters breaks out look the hell out. I grabbed some Clips to win the whole thing action at 15-1 last night when it started to look like they were close to getting Paul (heard it was 50-1 earlier in the day, dammit). Interested to see where that goes to.
And it's not like the Hornets screwed themselves either. Kaman is a serviceable center in a league with very few of them, Aminu sucks but has potential, and Eric Gordon is probably one of the best young players in the league (there's a Bill Simmons column on that but I'll be damned if I can find it now). Then there's the pick from the Wolves, which, no matter how optimistic you are, you have to admit is going to be in the lottery. Hopefully it's late, but even if it's late that doesn't mean it ends up late. Especially because the Clippers just traded it, upping the odds it ends up in the top 3 by at least triple. It's a waaaaaay better package than they were getting in the Lakers/Rockets swap so, at least for now, it kind of looks like the league knows what it's doing.
I'm sure there is plenty more to write about, but the plane is landing shortly and they're saying something about turning stuff off, so I must go. Later.
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