Thanks to nine runs in two innings–a week’s output for last April’s squad–the Detroit Tigers moved to 4-0 with a 10-6 win over the Minnesota Twins. While the Tigers have gotten fairly good pitching, with all four starters notching wins and a team ERA of 3.00, the key to the start has been an offense gone haywire. The Bengals have 30 runs in four games, with at least six tallies in each contest. It’s the first time since last May that the Tigers have scored six or more runs in at least four straight games (a streak that stretched to five at the time). I had a sense that what the Tigers had done this week was historic, so I decided to put on my researcher cap–two sizes too big, signed by Clay Davenport, and rarely worn–and check. I fired up my two favorite tools, the Sabermetric Baseball Encyclopedia and Retrosheet (God Bless Retrosheet!) and tried to ascertain how unique this was. Damned if I’ll go down that particular rabbit hole again. Thinking this would be a quick process, I soon discovered that the Tigers have gone where no team of their ilk had gone before. Of the worst 50 teams by winning percentage in baseball history, none had ever started the following season 4-0 until Steve Colyer closed out the game yesterday.
Like most teams, they can ill afford injuries to their key personnel, most notably Carlos Delgado and Roy Halladay. While Delgado has had some minor knee problems in the past, he is not taxed often with much running and keeps himself at a very low yellow. Given more to write about, I might try to make more of a case for keeping him as a green. Playing first helps, though the inflexibility at DH works against him slightly. In a pinch, the Jays could DH Delgado, playing Phelps or Myers at first, but this is certainly not a problem they hope to face. The injury to Eric Hinske last year showed that the drop to replacement level is, at almost every position, probably enough to push the Jays from contention. With Halladay, we deal with a pitcher that is arguably the best in the game. (Way to go out on a limb for the reigning Cy Young winner, Will!) Among Halladay’s plusses is his ability to work a high number of innings. This in turn is the result of his focus on pitch efficiency. He had only six outings of 110 pitches or more, his highest (122) coming in a complete game in his last outing. Having attended that game, I think it would have taken a team of mules to get him off the mound; seldom have I seen a pitcher willing himself a win to that extent, even going so far as to block the plate on the potential tying run.
Shane Reynolds goes down in Arizona. The Buffalo Bisons pick up Franklin Gutierrez in the Milton Bradley dump. Matt LeCroy goes down in Minnesota, adding insult to injury (literally). And Michael Young becomes the next beneficiary from the Alex Rodriguez salary dump in Texas (yeah, right). All this and much more news from around the league in your Friday edition of Transaction Analysis.
Most of the focus on this team will be on the staff. Led by the two former Yankees, Clemens and Pettitte will team with two potential aces and a quality starter in Tim Redding. This rotation is as deep as any in the league, including the Cubs and Red Sox–Dayn Perry’s made a very good case that I should be including the Yankees in that discussion. Among these four, all are subject to depth questions…except the Astros. More than any other team, the Astros can handle even a season-ending injury to a starting pitcher. With names like Carlos Hernandez, Brandon Duckworth, and Jared Fernandez available, the Astros had so much depth that they dealt away Jeriome Robertson and could perhaps make a deadline deal if needed. Of the current pitchers, I am most worried about Wade Miller, who spent most of last season hiding an elbow injury. Once it was discovered, the Astros did their best to deflect reports of a frayed UCL, but given the information we have, that’s the most likely diagnosis. Calling it “dead arm” just doesn’t fit, since his velocity never tailed off significantly.
We at Baseball Prospectus occasionally hear the complaint that we make the game too complicated, with all the numbers and bizarre acronyms we throw around. So today I’m going to do my part to simplify the game. I’m here to suggest that baseball and its fans would be better off without one of its most fundamental, and most complicated, scoring rules. It’s time to ditch the “earned” run. The earned-run rule is widely accepted, or at least tolerated, throughout the baseball world, even in sabermetric circles. There are several reasons for that. For one thing, there’s 116 years’ worth of tradition behind the rule. I learned the rule because my dad learned the rule because his dad learned the rule, etc. ERA is on the back of every pitcher’s baseball card, and it pops up in nearly every baseball-related article or news report you’ll see. For another thing, believing in “earned” and “unearned” runs isn’t nearly as harmful as, say, believing that RBI are meaningful for evaluating hitting. You have to pick your battles, and in the big scheme of things, this one may not be a battle worth fighting. Perhaps most importantly, the earned-run rule might have gotten a pass because it’s designed to achieve what everyone agrees is a noble goal: separating pitching from fielding. But good intentions aren’t enough. The earned-run rule is a lame and counterproductive attempt at solving the pitching/fielding conundrum, one that deserves to be put out of its (and our) misery.
I closed my comments on Joe Mauer yesterday with a line about how this relatively minor injury might impact his later career. That one deserves further explanation. What I mean is that small injuries such as Mauer’s torn meniscus have a tendency to cause further problems. Combined with the normal wear and tear a catcher’s knees take, Mauer might get into a situation where his bat becomes too valuable to risk further damage to his legs. The easy comp is Craig Biggio, moved for different reasons, but with good results. Mauer’s bat is special enough that he would retain a lot of his current value even if moved to third base. As I said, we don’t know enough about the stresses to make blanket statements; I made my comment as possibility, not fact. In the “when it rains, it pours” category, the Twins will now have to deal with an injury to Matthew LeCroy. LeCroy left Wednesday’s game with what was termed a “ribcage injury.” This sounds like an oblique strain to me…and almost as I type this, the phone rings to let me know that LeCroy is on the DL with an oblique strain. LeCroy strained the muscle batting, then injured it further on a throw to second. Oblique strains have a tendency to linger and LeCroy seems to be on David Wells’ diet–the old one. The Twins probably won’t do something as wild as remember that Justin Morneau once was a catcher (and said on Baseball Prospectus Radio last season that he would love to get back behind the plate!)
The Diamondbacks’ Brandon Webb is likely to regress after an impressive rookie campaign… or is he? The Royals are just chalked full o’ southpaws. And the Phillies’ Pat Burrell has many holes. All this and much more news from Arizona, Kansas City, and Philadelphia in your Thursday edition of Prospectus Triple Play.
I’ve been trying to write this column for about a month, but I wasn’t sure how to frame it. What follows isn’t a list of breakout players, or sleepers, or MVP candidates, or really anything that is easily describable. It’s just a list of players who I really, really like going into this season. They range from a player with 67 games of Double-A experience to a six-year veteran with his fourth team, and in age from 21 to 29. I expect some of these guys to get MVP votes, some of them to contribute to playoff teams, and others to just establish themselves as solid major leaguers or future stars. But I can’t lump all 10 of them into one category, unless, “guys who appear on almost all my fantasy teams,” is a category. I guess this is just a column about…my guys.
Carlos Gomez is a work in progress. At 26 years old, the Puerto Rico native has only 60 innings of professional ball under his belt in baseball backwaters such as Canton, Ohio and Allentown, Pa. With a high school career hampered by injury and a college career marred by ineffectiveness and then a bout of “Ankielitis,” envisioning any kind of professional career at all for Gomez seemed a stretch. But persistence and a willingness to experiment have allowed Gomez to cast off his pitching woes and remake himself as a sidearming reliever, and intellectual curiosity has spurred him to incorporate objective research into his pitching approach. His is the story of Moneyball writ small, one player searching for any advantage he can get in order to rise through the professional ranks.
Since Sunday at 5 p.m., I’ve watched approximately 417 baseball games, or about half the number of college basketball games I watched in March. The opening of the new season has me more excited than any supposedly grown man should really be, but I can’t help it: I’d missed baseball, and it was back in a big way the last few days. So what have we seen so far? Well, I’ve proven that I can jinx even the best pitchers: Mike Mussina, my pick for AL Cy Young, has now been blasted by the Devil Rays in two hemispheres to the tune of an 11.00 ERA. (Completely random note: Roy Halladay won the AL Cy Young Award last year despite having an ERA of 5.13 after eight starts.)
Is Michael Tucker really going to bat third for the Giants on a permanent basis? The Giants chapter in BP ’04 (you have your copy, right?) homed in on the indecent degree to which the Giants depended upon Barry Bonds for their offensive production last season. Well, a rewrite may be in order. Not since Liam Neeson defiled his career by appearing in Satisfaction has an elite performer been surrounded by such drek (yes, Julia, you’re drek).
The Braves improved their staff with a couple of nice trades. Despite an excellent spring, Grant Balfour isn’t the Twins’ current fifth starter. And Jose Cruz Jr. has begun the season on a good foot in Tampa Bay. All this and much more news from Atlanta, Minnesota, and Tampa Bay in your Wednesday edition of Prospectus Triple Play.
As I sat at last night’s Indianapolis book event, I wondered if I’d be able to just enjoy a margarita after a great night of talking baseball. I didn’t even make it to the end of the signing, though, without the Nokia blowing up with news of injuries. So here I am, your faithful servant, to break down the breakdowns and hit you with the hurt. Maybe Thursday will be quieter… it’s a longer drive back from Cincinnati and the cell coverage isn’t so good on the way back.
So, powered by that imaginary salt and tequila elixir (Hey, Chris, is there anywhere I can get one in Chicago?), on to the injuries…
The White Sox may try and make a Juan Pierre out of Willie Harris. The Cardinals hope to shake off a rough Opening Day performance. The Rangers’ early schedule won’t do them any favors. These and other news and notes in today’s Prospectus Triple Play.
As the owners and players jockeyed toward another mid-season labor showdown, the owner of one of MLB’s least efficient teams sought to set the record straight. Bud Selig announced: “The fact is, there are staggering cash operating losses in major league baseball today. …The enormous cost increase in player salaries is, by far, the biggest reason baseball has dire economic problems. Any charge other than that is clearly and totally unsubstantiated by the economic facts as they exist today.” MLB figures released after the season put the total of those “staggering cash operating losses” at less than 1% of revenue. In fact, player salaries had doubled since 1981. So had MLB’s revenue, as cable TV became an increasingly important source of income. Owners who reinvested their rights fees in payroll helped create a $300,000 gap between the major league minimum and the average salary. As the Braves and Pirates demonstrated, badly-run franchises could now waste more money than ever before.
Reports from Arizona have Luis Gonzalez making adjustments to compensate for his damaged elbow. The half-torn ligament is so problematic while throwing that Gonzalez is breaking out a sidearm throwing style for getting the ball back to the infield. Research from ASMI shows that throwing sidearm doesn’t significantly alter the forces placed on the arm. Gonzalez, we’ll note, says he’s having no problems at bat, just throwing. In addition to the sidearming, watch to see how Alex Cintron adjusts to help Gonzalez. Great quote today in the SF Chronicle: “Jason Schmidt threw in the bullpen for 14 minutes before Friday night’s game. His right shoulder remained attached to the rest of his body and he apparently did not shout in pain.” Jason Schmidt looked good in a workout, throwing all his pitches and coming away with only normal soreness. Schmidt is expected to slot back into the Giants rotation on the 14th. That slot is the first one where they’ll need a fifth starter. Schmidt wasn’t throwing at full tilt, but it’s exactly what the Giants were hoping for from this session.