Prospectus Today: Blame Canada
5/27It's a little funny that on one of the distinctly American summer holidays, two of the best stories in baseball come from a place where Monday was just another day. The Montreal Expos took five of six on a brief homestand to come into Memorial Day at 32-18, just two games behind the Braves in the NL East. The Toronto Blue Jays? All they did was sweep a four-game series at Yankee Stadium for the first time ever, moving to 27-24 and closing within four games of first place in the suddenly very competitive AL East. I admit going into this piece that it's a "write it while you can" job. While the Expos and Jays are currently among the hottest teams in baseball, and right there in their divisional races, I don't think either will be in such a lofty place in two months. For now, though, each is making noise, and doing so in completely different ways.
Prospectus Today: Look Ma, No Bats
5/22The Dodgers won yet another close game last night, holding the Rockies to a pair of runs in a 3-2 win. That's an offensive explosion by the recent standards of Dodger opponents: The Blue Crew had given up just one run in five consecutive games dating to May 14. Thanks to Keith Woolner's latest creation, "Team Records and Streaks," we know that they lead or are tied for the lead in the number of games won when scoring two runs or four runs, and trail only the Braves in winning games in which they score three runs. Overall, the Dodgers have allowed a freakishly low 137 runs, 36 runs fewer than the Expos and 18 fewer than the A's. According to Michael Wolverton's analysis, which factors in the very good pitcher's park in which they play half their games, the Dodgers have the fourth-best rotation and the fourth-best bullpen in the game. Don't get too crazy about this idea, but the Dodgers are on pace to allow just 482 runs this season. That just isn't done. In fact, just three teams in the last 10 years have allowed fewer than 600 runs in a full season: the Braves of 1997, 1998 and 2002. The last team to break 500? The Orioles (430) and A's (457) did it in the strike-shortened season of 1972. (The A's missed seven games and may have turned the trick anyway; the Orioles missed eight, and would certainly have stayed under 500 in a full season.) Four teams--the Cardinals, Mets, Orioles and Tigers--did it in the last year of the modern dead-ball era, 1968. Even if the Dodgers can't maintain their pace, they're well on their way to being one of the top run-prevention teams of my lifetime.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: AL All-Star Ballot
5/21My 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.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: NL All-Star Ballot
5/20While 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.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: Strength of Schedule
5/19Whatever 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.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: Friday Fun
5/16I'm heading to Phoenix today for an impromptu gathering of BP staffers at Bank One Ballpark. It'll be my first ballgame there--I did eat dinner at the TGI Friday's in the park last year--and I'll be taking it in with Rany Jazayerli, Jonah Keri and Jonah's lovely wife, Angele. The BOB becomes my first new ballpark since I hit Fenway last June, and I'm fairly excited. I'll be more excited if Byung-Hyun Kim comes off the DL and throws well, as my roto team needs him to get healthy fast. (ed note: sorry Joe, looks like Miguel Batista or Andrew Good will more likely get the start tonight) There are cabs to be caught and sheer terror to be had--I'm not a good flier--but before that happens, I wanted to throw out one question: What the hell is up with Nate Cornejo?
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: Shedding the Tools of Ignorance
5/15While he hasn't done it just yet, it appears that Mike Piazza will be spending at least some time at first base this season. The Mets' initial fumbling of the decision will push things back a couple of weeks, but the transition is coming. Piazza has fought such a move for years, but a combination of factors--including the Mets' loss of Mo Vaughn and recent surgery that kept an otherwise healthy Piazza out of the lineup because he couldn't squat--appear to be breaking down his resistance to the idea.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: Raffy Roundtable
5/13For the second time in a week, Joe dips into the ol' e-mailbag, this time answering questions about Rafael Palmeiro's candidacy for the Hall of Fame.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: The Case for Raffy
5/12Yesterday, Rafael Palmeiro became the 19th player in major-league history to hit 500 home runs, joining the club with a three-run blast to right field in the seventh inning off the Indians' David Elder. His achievement has been met with lukewarm response, unusual for someone reaching such an important milestone. Not only has no eligible 500-home run hitter ever been left out of the Hall of Fame, none have ever sparked serious debate over their candidacy. Palmeiro's accomplishment, though, is being hailed not as the signature feat of a great player, but as an example of just how "cheap" home runs have become in the early 21st century. Palmeiro's qualifications for the Hall are being questioned, and he's being lumped in not with Reggie and Eddie and Michael Jack, but with modern DHs like
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: In Pythagoras We Trust
5/09The weird thing about the standings in the AL so far this season is how closely they match the projected standings based on runs scored and runs allowed. Usually this early there are more anomalies, more instances of division rivals whose positions in the standings don't reflect the caliber of baseball they've played. (Clay Davenport has taken this notion to an extreme, which you can find both in last week's article and every day in his Adjusted Standings.) Looking just at Pythagorean records, though, the entire American League is lining up the way it should. The NL is quite a different story. The Central's four contenders are separated by just two games in the stadings, but a whopping nine games based on runs. The Reds' sweep of the Cardinals closed the gap between the two teams to just a game, but the Cards have outscored their opponents by 50 runs, while the Reds have been outscored by 48, while the Astros and Cubs fall between those extremes. In the West, the seven-game edge the Giants have on the Dodgers is not reflected in the runs the two teams have scored; the Dodgers have a .596/.592 edge in expected winning percentage.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: Silly Slides
5/08There's one particular baseball play that I don't get: First and third (or bases loaded) and two outs, ground ball hit to a middle infielder who throws to his double-play partner for a force at second base. Most of the time, you'll see the runner slide into the bag, and the times he doesn't, it's because he's nowhere near it when the play is made. Why? Sliding has two purposes: avoiding a tag and decelerating into a base you can't legally overrun. While the above fits the latter category, it's a situation where the cost of deceleration is greater than the penalty for overunning the bag. If a runner instead chose to sprint through second base and keep heading for third, he might be safe--I don't know, let's say one time in 20, but I think it would be more than that--but every time he was safe, a run would score, with the runner likely being out in a tag play on his way to third base. I suppose you could argue that the runner slides in case the middle infielders botch the play, but I don't buy that, because an error gets made there about as often as I eat tofu. It seems to me that teams are "giving up" here, where a more aggressive approach--running through the bag and making the turn--could steal a few runs a season. This wouldn't apply all the time; some plays are going to be close enough to warrant a slide, and on others the runner isn't close enough to bother. But on maybe 40% to 50% of these plays, a meek slide into second base reduces the chance that the run will score for no reason other than politeness. Is there something I'm missing, a rule dating from the days of John McGraw's Orioles that disallows this practice? Or is it something from the Big Bob Book of Unwritten Rules, with its pages and pages of crayon drawings?
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: When We Were Kings
5/07Last week, I wrote about what baseball can do to improve the selection of owners. This week, I want to focus on the game's structure. Frankly it's a column that, if I thought I could get away with it, would consist of six words: Stop trying to be the NFL. Since 1994, when the game went to three divisions in each league and began allowing non-division winners into the playoffs, MLB has moved inexorably toward becoming Just Another Sports League. While the game's administrators like to defend the changes by invoking the need to appeal to young people and a broad audience of sports fans, the fact is that every single move has been reactionary, every one has eliminated a point of differentiation between MLB and the other three major sports, and none of them have shown any level of insight beyond: "How can we get more TV money right now?"
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: Right Wing Conspiracy
5/05Last night, the White Sox lost their 10th game in 14 tries, dropping a rain-shortened 5-1 decision to the Mariners. In addition to lowering their record to 15-16, by scoring just one run their runs-per-game fell to a meager 4.2, placing them 12th in the American League (and 10th in Equivalent Average). Why do the White Sox suck at the plate? This team was third in the league in runs scored last year, and they return essentially the same cast of characters. I expected them to have one of the better offenses in the league, thanks in part to a full season of Joe Crede at third base, and the arrival of Miguel Olivo behind the plate. Those two players, in fact, have been part of the problem; Crede is hitting .235/.259/.353 and Olivo, splitting the catching duties down the middle with Sandy Alomar Jr., is at .222/.236/.389. Mix in the failure of Aaron Rowand to be an adequate stopgap in center field (.133/.300/.167 in 60 at-bats before his demotion), and you can see that the White Sox infusion of youth has failed badly.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: Return of the Cripple Stick
5/02I've said it before and I'll say it again: reader feedback is one of the great parts of this job. I'm lucky--everyone at BP is lucky--to write for an audience that provides thoughtful, articulate responses. It keeps reading e-mail from being a cringeworthy job, and turns it into an informative experience. I read every piece of mail I get, from two-liners to two chapters. That I don't respond to it all is a flaw in my game, like my inability to handle a good fastball or make the throw from the hole. I'll keep working on it. For today, here's a sample of the feedback, and a promise to spend an afternoon next week going through my "Reader Mail" folder and getting back to you.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: The Red Sox Bullpen
5/01With Ramiro Mendoza and Brandon Lyon combining to allow two runs Wednesday, the Red Sox bullpen has now given up 16 runs in 23 9th innings. They've used seven different pitchers to protect 9th-inning leads (plus Jason Shiell to hold a 14th-inning bulge), and the question of who will pitch the ninth is a question that every member of Red Sox Nation has been obsessing about since long before Opening Day. Much of this stems from a misunderstanding of the "no-closer" bullpen that the Red Sox assembled this winter. While the strategy downplays the save statistic, it's not about random roles for pitchers, which is how many people have interpreted it. Roughly speaking, the idea is that the bullpen's best pitcher will throw the highest-leverage innings, rather than being used solely in save situations. This is done in part by trading off low-leverage save situations—-three-run leads in the ninth inning that can be protected by lesser pitchers—-for higher-leverage situations earlier in the game. There are other principles in play as well, such as minimizing the use of one-batter specialists, and allowing effective relievers to pitch multiple innings, but the basic idea is to allow game situations, not Jerome Holtzman's legacy, to dictate how the bullpen's best pitcher is used.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightProspectus Today: Owning Up to the Problem
4/30One of the baseball stories I managed to catch while on my vacation was Bud Selig's announcement that he would not pursue a new contract after his current one expires. This means that his tenure as commissioner--one that began with him taking the job on an interim basis a decade ago--would end in December 2006. It's no secret that I've disagreed with how Selig has run the game, in particular his anti-marketing strategies in pursuit of a favorable labor agreement. The short-term gain of a Collective Bargaining Agreement that benefited management wasn't worth the years of damage Selig and his cohort did with their relentless bashing of what was a healthy industry. Declines in attendance, TV ratings and revenue, as well as fiascoes like contraction and the Expos situation, can largely be traced to Selig's efforts to convince people that baseball wasn't viable, wasn't competitive, and wasn't worth their time. With a new CBA in place, though, and Selig setting his own exit date, it's time to look forward and see what can be done between now and the end of 2006. What positive steps can and should be taken to ensure that Selig leaves the game in better shape than it's in right now? Every now and then this year, I'm going to pick an aspect of the game and lay out what I think should be done to improve it. While I'll isolate one level of the game in each column, the ideas I'm presenting need to be viewed as a whole, as one big plan to get baseball where it needs to be. I'll start with the game's ownership, because I think everything grows from that. Over the past decade, baseball has brought in a number of owners, both individual and corporate, that have had a net negative effect on the game. From grandstanding over taxpayer-funded ballparks and inflated claims of losses, to taking short-term approaches in a long-term industry, the most recent set of "lords of the realm" have been a disaster.
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