The Orioles bullpen has been awful, the Rockies can’t hit the ball out of the park, and the Mets get to experience life without Mike Piazza. Plus more news and notes out of Baltimore, Colorado, and New York.
My American League All-Star picks were easier than my NL ones, which reflects
the lack of talent in the AL right now, at least relative to the NL. There are
four or five AL teams who don’t have any player remotely deserving of All-Star
consideration.
First Base: Carlos
Delgado. This was the toughest call. Jason
Giambi has established himself as the better player, but Delgado has
never been that far behind him. Delgado has been the best hitter in the AL
this year, while Giambi has struggled. I can see the argument for either
player; both fit the definition of “All-Star,” and this pick is
admittedly inconsistent with my thought process in filling out the ballot.
Derek Zumsteg chimes in with a handy, dandy guide to identifying your local sportswriter. Not to be taken internally.
Rickey Henderson has a new challenger for the all-time SB mark…Manny. Ken Griffey’s the missing element in the once-predicted Best Outfield Ever. Charles Nagy getting innings doesn’t bode well for the Padres pitching staff. Plus more and notes out of Boston, Cincinnati, and San Diego.
While at Bank One Ballpark Friday, I filled out my first All-Star ballot
of the year. Well, it was probably my only All-Star ballot of the year; I used
to do a bunch of them—-issuing votes for my favorite players, the best ones,
the guys on my Strat team, the Yankees—-but I feel like one is enough now. It’s
not unlike my change in attitude toward cheesesteaks.
Before I continue, I have to say that filling out an All-Star ballot with
friends is one of the great pleasures of being a baseball fan. The
good-natured debates over what constitutes an All-Star are a key part of
loving the game, and getting to go through this process with Rany and Jonah
last week was a lot of fun. The all-Royals and all-Expos ballots were a little
tough to take, but that’s life in a democracy for you.
Anyway, I’ll run my NL ballot today, AL tomorrow. As always, I consider
All-Stars to be the top players at their position, with current stats running
secondary to established performance.
Once again, go ahead and cringe. Mike Piazza is waiting on an MRI for his strained groin, but it was pushed back due to swelling. You almost never like to see the words “swollen” and “groin” in the same sentence, so if we’re trying to figure out the severity of Piazza’s injury, this…well, this tells us nothing. Short term, Piazza wasn’t expected back anyway, but until the results of the MRI come back, there’s not much in the way of new guidance.
Seeing that Steve Karsay was headed back to the offices of Dr. Jim Andrews should have been the first clue, but Karsay is now officially out for the season. He’ll undergo surgery on Tuesday to determine the problem in his shoulder. The guess is that there is a small tear in his rotator cuff, but the surgery is termed “exploratory.” Some Yanks’ fans will no doubt question why surgery wasn’t performed back in April when Dr. Andrews said surgery wouldn’t be necessary. The chance of someone coming back without surgery often outweighs the pain and problems of injury rehab. Dr. Andrews has become quite conservative about opening up pitchers in the last 18 months, a fact worth knowing.
Eric Hinske hit a nice long one last night, but he’s still experiencing some problems with his wrist. Reports now move away from the earlier tendinitis and focus on a “radiating bruise.” The symptomology still sounds like some sort of impingement, but we’ll continue to monitor this. The worst of this is that even in an organization that ‘gets it’ like the Jays, some are still encouraging the ‘warrior mentality.’
My Giants source tells me that Neifi Perez knew the infield fly rule. I suppose that knowing the rules is something, but I’d rather have a player who can actually play the game. Everyone this weekend seemed to lose both their concentration and their cool–and thanks to some unfortunate luck, a number of them will lose some time to injury. Let’s get right to the good stuff…
Whatever its benefits, it’s clear that the unbalanced schedule has made it even more difficult to draw conclusions about teams in the early stages of the season. Schedules are so skewed that you have to consider quality of opponents in any discussion of what a team has done and what it might do going forward.
Take the Yankees. They opened the year 16-3 without Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera, inspiring a discussion of whether this team might be as good as the 1998 team that went 114-48. Since then, they’re just 11-13, and not even alone in first place. The difference? They opened the season with the Blue Jays (seven games), Devil Rays (five games) and Twins (seven games)–teams that now have an aggregate record of 65-65. They’ve since spent three weeks playing the AL West, a division that’s 94-77 overall and 56-39–good for a .589 winning percentage–when not playing itself.
Kris Benson is a slacker for not pitching a shutout every time out. Jose Guillen fails to grasp the concept of small sample size. Craig Monroe earns the first complimentary Tigers quote all season. Plus more quotable notables from around the league.
Jack McKeon has his work cut out for him in Florida. Nick Johnson goes down just as he started to meet his potential. Kip Wells is one walk per game away from becoming a true ace. Plus more notes and notes on the Marlins, Yankees, and Pirates.
A few items from the mailbag generated by The
Man With the Golden Gun: 2002, which ranked baseball’s best catcher
arms using a measure of Stolen Base Runs Prevented (SBRP):
I was glad that you concede that your analysis is biased against players that have a solid reputation. It strikes me as a limited phenomenon anyway. Only the real newbies are likely to get much of a bump from extra throwing opportunities against uninformed opposition. All catchers with good reputations will benefit by the comparison to the Piazzas of the world who have so many attempts against them.
— CDS
I did note in the original article that a catcher’s reputation
influences the number of steal attempts against him, and that the
number of steal attempts in turn affects his Stolen Base Runs
Prevented rating. But I wouldn’t say the analysis is biased against
players that have a solid reputation.
It all comes down to what you’re trying to measure, skill or value.
If you’re trying to measure skill–how strong, accurate, and
generally impressive a catcher’s arm is–then yes, you would want to
give extra credit to those catchers who prevent runners from even
attempting to steal.
Ken Griffey, Jr. returns to the Reds, much to the chagrin Jose Guillen; Travis Hafner and Ben Broussard trade spots on the major league roster; Kirk Saarloos is given little time to prove himself; and the prodigal son returns to the Yankee lineup for the first time since Opening Day.