By the time you read this, The Idiot Brigade’s witch hunt (read: Congress’s steroids hearing) will be close to starting or already underway, so here’s another un-juiced entry of random baseball thoughts, with some non-baseball stuff mixed in for good measure. These spring training notes articles are quickly becoming a favorite of mine:
Royals fans have to be relieved today in the aftermath of Zack Greinke Strikes Back, as FreakChild pitched like that speed-changin’ mother we watched with such great joy a year ago. 3 2/3 innings, one hit, no walks, and most impressively, three strikeouts. Greinke reportedly implemented at least one of the delivery changes pitching coach Guy Hansen asked him to make after his four-walk disaster against Oakland. For all you fantasy baseball nuts out there, he’s back, and there’s nothing to be afraid of.Another guy who Hansen worked with – Mike Wood – is having a great spring so far. In 6 2/3 innings, Wood’s struck out eight batters against only one walk, and is my choice for the 5th starter coming out of camp. His PERA (Peripheral Earned Run Average) last season was 4.47, about a run-and-a-half lower than his actual ERA of 5.94. Denny Bautista will probably unseat him at some point this season, but guys like Wood who throw strikes, keep the ball down, and chew up innings will always have value to a contending team’s pitching staff.Then there’s Chris George, who doesn’t throw strikes, doesn’t keep the ball down, and will never have value to a contending ballclub. I know, I know. He’s going to keep getting chances because he throws with his left hand, but Chris George, Major League Pitcher just isn’t going to happen. He probably wouldn’t make it through waivers if the Royals do the sensible thing and try to send him back to Omaha, but making him someone else’s problem wouldn’t be any sort of a loss. Chris hasn’t displayed solid peripheral statistics since the Clinton regime.Ever wonder how once-proud organizations become the laughingstocks of baseball? One way is to trade a legitimate pitching prospect for a 40-year-old catcher like Benito Santiago, an unforgivable sin, especially for a team that isn’t in the “success” part of their success cycle. As Pirates GM Dave Littlefield noted in this MLB.com fluff article, the Buccos are “comfortable that [Santiago’s] going to help us.” Benny’s going to help them, alright. Their rousing quest for 80 wins wouldn’t have quite been the same without Santiago’s “veteran presence.” Somewhere, Allard Baird's chuckling.I think speed, defense, and “doing the little things” are all undervalued commodities in the baseball market nowadays, but ridiculous articles like this one really peeve me because of their sheer ignorance. The Chicago White Sox are usually at the forefront of discussions centering around the “power v. speed” debates, and this story provided no exception:
The White Sox hit 242 homers last season, the most in club history, but they won only 83 games and finished second in the American League Central, nine games behind Minnesota. Out the door went the heavy-hitting Lee and Magglio Ordonez. In the door came new baserunning coach Tim Raines, who as a member of the Montreal Expos, led the NL in 1983 with 90 steals, the most in a single season of his career.
[Chicago manager Ozzie] Guillen noted that there were moments when the 2004 White Sox "could score 14, 15 runs a game" and then spend "two, three days without even moving a guy over."
You’ve gotta love that logic. Guillen readily admits that the 2004 team “could score 14, 15 runs a game,” yet views that as a negative since the team only won 83 games. If the Sox think trading run-producing guys like Carlos Lee for guys like Scott Podsednik is going to help them win more games since the latter does a better job at giving away outs, they’re delusional. The name of the game is scoring more runs than your opponent, and whether Guillen wants to admit it or not, doing that becomes more difficult with every single out your team make on offense. But hey, while the White Sox are clearly on their way to the American League Central basement, at least Guillen’s proud that his team’s being constructed in his image:
"If I build the team the way I played, we're never going to win," Guillen told the Arizona Republic, his tongue stuffed firmly in cheek.
Ironically, he’d be right if he wasn’t being sarcastic. In case you’re wondering about “the way [he] played,” Guillen’s career OPS was a downright-awful .626, especially when you consider that the league average OPS during that time was .744.One of my biggest problems with people throwing steroid accusations around left and right is that we just don’t have enough information to make any kind of a judgment yet. We don’t know what exactly they do to the human body and, more importantly, how exactly that relates to a baseball player’s success on the field. Fortunately, guys like Will Carroll are around to educate us on the subject. (Premium Content)If Dusty Baker hasn’t taken up residence in some sort of a bomb shelter yet, he needs to. Cubs fans aren’t too happy about what’s happened to Mark Prior, and I can’t say I blame them. Even if Prior's career hasn't been permanently damaged, this should serve as a lesson about protecting young pitchers to the 29 other teams. Even if a guy has good mechanics, it's better to err on the side of caution while he's still developing physically.Carrie Underwood survived another week on American Idol, which means I get at least one more chance to nearly pass out when they put her gorgeous face on TV again next Tuesday.
This entry was posted
on Thursday, March 17, 2005 at 3/17/2005 12:00:00 AM.
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