- 27,981
- 9,063
- Joined
- Nov 18, 2007
2016 MLB thread. THE CUBS HAVE BROKEN THE CURSE! Chicago Cubs are your 2016 World Series champions
- Thread in 'Sports & Training' Thread starter Started by proshares,
- Start date
- Status
- 27,981
- 9,063
- Joined
- Nov 18, 2007
- 8,956
- 39
- Joined
- Nov 14, 2007
Joel Zumaya needs to just call it quits
Do you guys think Weaver will ever get to cy young level?
Do you guys think Weaver will ever get to cy young level?
- 8,956
- 39
- Joined
- Nov 14, 2007
Joel Zumaya needs to just call it quits
Do you guys think Weaver will ever get to cy young level?
Do you guys think Weaver will ever get to cy young level?
- 15,437
- 182
- Joined
- Dec 29, 2007
It was meant for Jumpman. Dude put 100 Giants smoking emoticons. I understand being happy and all, but that was definitely OD.Originally Posted by dland24
Humble. Just had to show off the ring.
- 15,437
- 182
- Joined
- Dec 29, 2007
It was meant for Jumpman. Dude put 100 Giants smoking emoticons. I understand being happy and all, but that was definitely OD.Originally Posted by dland24
Humble. Just had to show off the ring.
- 27,981
- 9,063
- Joined
- Nov 18, 2007
I see that he edited. Didnt see it before.Originally Posted by Paul Is On Tilt
It was meant for Jumpman. Dude put 100 Giants smoking emoticons. I understand being happy and all, but that was definitely OD.Originally Posted by dland24
Humble. Just had to show off the ring.
- 27,981
- 9,063
- Joined
- Nov 18, 2007
I see that he edited. Didnt see it before.Originally Posted by Paul Is On Tilt
It was meant for Jumpman. Dude put 100 Giants smoking emoticons. I understand being happy and all, but that was definitely OD.Originally Posted by dland24
Humble. Just had to show off the ring.
jumpmanfromdabay
Banned
- 25,730
- 2,900
- Joined
- Jan 25, 2008
Originally Posted by dland24
I see that he edited. Didnt see it before.Originally Posted by Paul Is On Tilt
It was meant for Jumpman. Dude put 100 Giants smoking emoticons. I understand being happy and all, but that was definitely OD.Originally Posted by dland24
Humble. Just had to show off the ring.
jumpmanfromdabay
Banned
- 25,730
- 2,900
- Joined
- Jan 25, 2008
Originally Posted by dland24
I see that he edited. Didnt see it before.Originally Posted by Paul Is On Tilt
It was meant for Jumpman. Dude put 100 Giants smoking emoticons. I understand being happy and all, but that was definitely OD.Originally Posted by dland24
Humble. Just had to show off the ring.
- 27,981
- 9,063
- Joined
- Nov 18, 2007
Agreed. Weaver is a true ace already.
- 27,981
- 9,063
- Joined
- Nov 18, 2007
Agreed. Weaver is a true ace already.
- 12,443
- 1,194
- Joined
- Oct 14, 2005
How is Tim Wakefield still pitching?
- 12,443
- 1,194
- Joined
- Oct 14, 2005
How is Tim Wakefield still pitching?
- 8,408
- 41
- Joined
- Dec 1, 2009
the perfect gamers are both perfect thru 1e
Braden/Buehlre
Braden/Buehlre
- 8,408
- 41
- Joined
- Dec 1, 2009
the perfect gamers are both perfect thru 1e
Braden/Buehlre
Braden/Buehlre
- 6,994
- 85
- Joined
- Aug 11, 2008
TB is putting a spanking on the BoSox now
SMH for Longo out and not getting a piece of this
SMH for Longo out and not getting a piece of this
- 6,994
- 85
- Joined
- Aug 11, 2008
TB is putting a spanking on the BoSox now
SMH for Longo out and not getting a piece of this
SMH for Longo out and not getting a piece of this
Reds.
Piece on saves, pretty funny
Lowrie piece.
Piece on Showalter.
Rumors.
Spoiler [+]
Adam Dunn is one of the best hitters in the game. A metronome of power and patience, he's averaged more than 40 home runs and 100 walks a season for the past seven years. Going by advanced stats such as weighted on-base average, he's been a more valuable hitter than even perennial MVP candidate Ryan Howard.
So when the Cincinnati Reds shipped Dunn to Arizona on Aug. 11, 2008, the franchise's entire outlook changed … for the better.
Before we paint Dunn as the cause of an entire organization's ills, let's first establish that correlation doesn't necessarily equal causation. Still, Dunn has been the worst defensive player in all of baseball since FanGraphs started tracking ultimate zone rating results in 2002. His deletion from the Reds' lineup set the stage for one of the biggest defensive transformations in recent history and what could become a new era of NL Central dominance in Cincinnati.
[h4]D at last[/h4]
Much of the credit for the Reds' turnaround in the past couple of years should be given to their improved defense.
[table][tr][th=""]Year[/th][th=""]Team UZR rank[/th][th=""]Record[/th][/tr][tr][td]2003[/td][td]20[/td][td]69-93[/td][/tr][tr][td]2004[/td][td]21[/td][td]76-86[/td][/tr][tr][td]2005[/td][td]27[/td][td]73-89[/td][/tr][tr][td]2006[/td][td]21[/td][td]80-82[/td][/tr][tr][td]2007[/td][td]24[/td][td]72-90[/td][/tr][tr][td]2008[/td][td]24[/td][td]74-88[/td][/tr][tr][td]2009[/td][td]3[/td][td]78-84[/td][/tr][tr][td]2010[/td][td]4[/td][td]91-71[/td][/tr][/table]
The accompanying table shows the Reds' year-by-year UZR rank along with the team's record each year. From 2003 through 2008, all seasons that began with Dunn in the everyday lineup, the Reds finished no better than 20th in team defense and never finished above .500. In 2009, the first full season with Dunn gone, the Reds vaulted to third in team defense. In 2010, they were the fourth-best defensive team in MLB. They also won their first division title in 15 years.
Although addition by subtraction certainly helped, the Reds' return to glory got a big boost from an influx of elite glovemen. When Scott Rolen arrived in a 2009 deadline trade, skeptics wondered what a sub-.500 team could possibly want with a 34-year-old player who had a history of back problems. That the team was giving up Edwin Encarnacion -- a power-hitting third baseman nearly eight years Rolen's junior -- as part of the four-player deal made the pickup seem even more dubious. But that move proved to be a double win for the Reds. By ditching Encarnacion, Cincinnati was unloading a player who'd been fittingly dubbed "E5." Meanwhile, Rolen's defense has not slipped, and he has posted a UZR of 22.0 in the past three full seasons, which is good for sixth-best in all of baseball.
At the same time, an influx of homegrown, two-way players buoyed the Reds' defensive makeover. Joey Votto won last year's MVP award mostly on the strength of his big offensive numbers, but he rated as an above-average defender, too. Drew Stubbs rated as merely average with the glove in his first full big league campaign in 2010, but longer-term trends (not to mention great scouting reports) suggest he could be a plus defender. Meanwhile, Jay Bruce deserved some postseason hardware of his own last year, saving more than 20 runs above the average major league right fielder, easily the best mark for anyone at that position. (Multiyear UZR figures tend to be more reliable, and Bruce was excellent defensively in '09, too.) Add Gold Gloves for Brandon Phillips and Bronson Arroyo, and the Reds fielded a team rich with top defenders last year by the numbers, by reputation and, in several cases, both.
The Reds have supplemented their strong defensive core with a new wave of young pitchers who can pile up outs on their own. Johnny Cueto posted an impressive 3.97 FIP (fielding independent pitching, a stat that runs along a similar scale to ERA but strips out defense, luck and other factors a pitcher doesn't control) last year, the best result of his young career. Rookie Travis Wood rang up a strikeout-to-walk rate of better than 3-to-1. Young righties Homer Bailey and Mike Leake hinted at potential of their own. And Cuban sensation Aroldis Chapman delivered one of the most exciting 13-inning rookie seasons of all time, routinely flashing triple digits on the radar gun and topping out at 104 miles per hour.
The Reds have struggled with their run prevention in the early going this season, yielding 23 runs in two weekend losses to the Diamondbacks. But they're still in first place through their first three series of the season, with Cueto and Bailey expected back soon from early-season DL stints and all other hands on deck.
They might not have the bats of the Big Red Machine. But as long as they keep runs off the board, we could be seeing a lot more winning from the Little Red Engine That Could.
So when the Cincinnati Reds shipped Dunn to Arizona on Aug. 11, 2008, the franchise's entire outlook changed … for the better.
Before we paint Dunn as the cause of an entire organization's ills, let's first establish that correlation doesn't necessarily equal causation. Still, Dunn has been the worst defensive player in all of baseball since FanGraphs started tracking ultimate zone rating results in 2002. His deletion from the Reds' lineup set the stage for one of the biggest defensive transformations in recent history and what could become a new era of NL Central dominance in Cincinnati.
[h4]D at last[/h4]
Much of the credit for the Reds' turnaround in the past couple of years should be given to their improved defense.
[table][tr][th=""]Year[/th][th=""]Team UZR rank[/th][th=""]Record[/th][/tr][tr][td]2003[/td][td]20[/td][td]69-93[/td][/tr][tr][td]2004[/td][td]21[/td][td]76-86[/td][/tr][tr][td]2005[/td][td]27[/td][td]73-89[/td][/tr][tr][td]2006[/td][td]21[/td][td]80-82[/td][/tr][tr][td]2007[/td][td]24[/td][td]72-90[/td][/tr][tr][td]2008[/td][td]24[/td][td]74-88[/td][/tr][tr][td]2009[/td][td]3[/td][td]78-84[/td][/tr][tr][td]2010[/td][td]4[/td][td]91-71[/td][/tr][/table]
The accompanying table shows the Reds' year-by-year UZR rank along with the team's record each year. From 2003 through 2008, all seasons that began with Dunn in the everyday lineup, the Reds finished no better than 20th in team defense and never finished above .500. In 2009, the first full season with Dunn gone, the Reds vaulted to third in team defense. In 2010, they were the fourth-best defensive team in MLB. They also won their first division title in 15 years.
Although addition by subtraction certainly helped, the Reds' return to glory got a big boost from an influx of elite glovemen. When Scott Rolen arrived in a 2009 deadline trade, skeptics wondered what a sub-.500 team could possibly want with a 34-year-old player who had a history of back problems. That the team was giving up Edwin Encarnacion -- a power-hitting third baseman nearly eight years Rolen's junior -- as part of the four-player deal made the pickup seem even more dubious. But that move proved to be a double win for the Reds. By ditching Encarnacion, Cincinnati was unloading a player who'd been fittingly dubbed "E5." Meanwhile, Rolen's defense has not slipped, and he has posted a UZR of 22.0 in the past three full seasons, which is good for sixth-best in all of baseball.
At the same time, an influx of homegrown, two-way players buoyed the Reds' defensive makeover. Joey Votto won last year's MVP award mostly on the strength of his big offensive numbers, but he rated as an above-average defender, too. Drew Stubbs rated as merely average with the glove in his first full big league campaign in 2010, but longer-term trends (not to mention great scouting reports) suggest he could be a plus defender. Meanwhile, Jay Bruce deserved some postseason hardware of his own last year, saving more than 20 runs above the average major league right fielder, easily the best mark for anyone at that position. (Multiyear UZR figures tend to be more reliable, and Bruce was excellent defensively in '09, too.) Add Gold Gloves for Brandon Phillips and Bronson Arroyo, and the Reds fielded a team rich with top defenders last year by the numbers, by reputation and, in several cases, both.
The Reds have supplemented their strong defensive core with a new wave of young pitchers who can pile up outs on their own. Johnny Cueto posted an impressive 3.97 FIP (fielding independent pitching, a stat that runs along a similar scale to ERA but strips out defense, luck and other factors a pitcher doesn't control) last year, the best result of his young career. Rookie Travis Wood rang up a strikeout-to-walk rate of better than 3-to-1. Young righties Homer Bailey and Mike Leake hinted at potential of their own. And Cuban sensation Aroldis Chapman delivered one of the most exciting 13-inning rookie seasons of all time, routinely flashing triple digits on the radar gun and topping out at 104 miles per hour.
The Reds have struggled with their run prevention in the early going this season, yielding 23 runs in two weekend losses to the Diamondbacks. But they're still in first place through their first three series of the season, with Cueto and Bailey expected back soon from early-season DL stints and all other hands on deck.
They might not have the bats of the Big Red Machine. But as long as they keep runs off the board, we could be seeing a lot more winning from the Little Red Engine That Could.
Piece on saves, pretty funny
Spoiler [+]
I'd like to propose the creation of a new statistic, an accounting stat for relievers that might help separate out a little of the noise from the generally awful save statistic. The new figure won't have much, if any, predictive value, but would merely exist for what I call "accounting" purposes -- a record of what happened for the curious or trivially-inclined, but of little use for looking ahead. It's for fun, and I deny any responsibility for harm that comes to you or your loved ones for unapproved or unauthorized usage.
I hate the save.
[h4]Ill-Gotten Saves[/h4]
All-time leaders in saves while giving up at least one run:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Total[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]53[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Lee Smith[/td][td]48[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Jeff Reardon[/td][td]46[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]46[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]John Wetteland[/td][td]44[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]44[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Bruce Sutter[/td][td]43[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Dan Quisenberry[/td][td]43[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]Dennis Eckersley[/td][td]41[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]40[/td][/tr][tr][td]11[/td][td]Todd Jones[/td][td]40[/td][/tr][tr][td]12[/td][td]Robb Nen[/td][td]39[/td][/tr][tr][td]13[/td][td]Gene Garber[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]14[/td][td]Rod Beck[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]15[/td][td]Rick Aguilera[/td][td]36[/td][/tr][tr][td]16[/td][td]Hoyt Wilhelm[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]17[/td][td]Randy Myers[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]18[/td][td]Jose Mesa[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]19[/td][td]Roberto Hernandez[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]20[/td][td]Rollie Fingers[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][/table]
I do. It's a number whose existence implies meaning that isn't there, a reckoning that has altered bullpen usage, roster construction, and the game's salary structure, thanks to two generations of managers, pitching coaches, and front-office executives who grew up hearing relievers praised for high save totals and others excoriated for their apparent inability to handle the pressure of the ninth inning.
The save falls into the worst category of counting statistics, those that depend on context as much as -- or more than -- they depend on the individual player's performance. The pitcher win is a good example, while the RBI is the Laurent Gbagbo of baseball stats, refusing to bow out gracefully even when its time has clearly come. (I promise to give the RBI a fair trial and painless execution when its day of reckoning finally arrives.)
The save gives a performance by a pitcher additional weight based on the score and inning, rather than based on the pitcher's actual performance. Consider: Three outs in the ninth with a three-run lead gets you a save, but the same three outs recorded in a tie game, which is higher-leverage work, do not.
That example gets at a minor criticism of the save -- that is, a pitcher can pitch poorly and still get one. With a three-run lead, a closer can give up two runs in his inning of work and still notch the save, even though I don't think many analysts would consider the 2:1 runs allowed-to-innings ratio an acceptable one. Yet we have no line in our ledger to reflect these pseudo-saves, to show that while the reliever fiddled, Rome reached medium well before the fire was finally extinguished.
[h4]Really Ill-Gotten Saves[/h4]
All-time leaders in saves while giving up at least one run in no more than one inning of work:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Total[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]47[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Todd Jones[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Wetteland[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]Robb Nen[/td][td]33[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]30[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Jose Mesa[/td][td]30[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Brad Lidge[/td][td]29[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]29[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Armando Benitez[/td][td]28[/td][/tr][/table]
With the glorious Play Index at baseball-reference.com, we can, in fact, see who the primary culprits were in collecting these ill-gotten saves (as you can see in the top chart at right), and I'd like to propose that we name the non-scoreless save after the man who earned more of them over his career than anyone else did. I give you my new statistic, the Hoffman.
"But hey," you say (or would say, if I was secretly controlling your voice), "you can give up a run in a two-inning save and it's not that bad, really -- okay it's not that great but it's just fine, I mean, we can live with that can't we?" Sure we can! So let's change the criteria to one run or more allowed in no more than one inning of work, again with a save "earned". See the second chart.
That's right: Trevor Hoffman earned 27 percent more of these "short Hoffmans" than any other reliever in the history of baseball. Of course, that's partly a function of Hoffman pitching as long as he did, and earning more total saves than anyone else (a situation likely to change within the year), so let's look at the top ten leaders in saves with their Hoffman percentage (Hoffmans/total saves):
[h4]The "Hoffman" Percentage[/h4]
The current top ten leaders in saves next to their "Hoffman" percentage:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Saves[/th][th=""]Hoffmans[/th][th=""]Hoffman %[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]601[/td][td]53[/td][td]8.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]563[/td][td]44[/td][td]7.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Lee Smith[/td][td]478[/td][td]48[/td][td]10.0%[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]424[/td][td]46[/td][td]10.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]Billy Wagner[/td][td]422[/td][td]32[/td][td]7.6%[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Dennis Eckersley+[/td][td]390[/td][td]41[/td][td]10.5%[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Jeff Reardon[/td][td]367[/td][td]46[/td][td]12.5%[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]358[/td][td]40[/td][td]11.2%[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]Randy Myers[/td][td]347[/td][td]35[/td][td]10.1%[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Rollie Fingers+[/td][td]341[/td][td]34[/td][td]10.0%[/td][/tr][/table]
The most interesting part of that table, to me, is that there's someone below Mariano Rivera in percentage -- Wagner beats him by a Hoffman, since if Wagner had earned one more he would have been fractionally higher in the percentage column.
The range of Hoffman percentages among save leaders isn't all that high -- if you earn a lot of saves, you'll earn a lot of Hoffmans along the way. You can separate yourself slightly from the pack in this stat -- Rivera, Hoffman, and Wagner are the three best modern/one-inning closers, pretty much any way you slice it -- but the difference between these guys and average (10.7 percent) of the others in the top 10 is about a Hoffman every other year. That's not much.
The save is a bad stat, a point the Hoffman only further emphasizes.
I hate the save.
[h4]Ill-Gotten Saves[/h4]
All-time leaders in saves while giving up at least one run:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Total[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]53[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Lee Smith[/td][td]48[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Jeff Reardon[/td][td]46[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]46[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]John Wetteland[/td][td]44[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]44[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Bruce Sutter[/td][td]43[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Dan Quisenberry[/td][td]43[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]Dennis Eckersley[/td][td]41[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]40[/td][/tr][tr][td]11[/td][td]Todd Jones[/td][td]40[/td][/tr][tr][td]12[/td][td]Robb Nen[/td][td]39[/td][/tr][tr][td]13[/td][td]Gene Garber[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]14[/td][td]Rod Beck[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]15[/td][td]Rick Aguilera[/td][td]36[/td][/tr][tr][td]16[/td][td]Hoyt Wilhelm[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]17[/td][td]Randy Myers[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]18[/td][td]Jose Mesa[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]19[/td][td]Roberto Hernandez[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]20[/td][td]Rollie Fingers[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][/table]
I do. It's a number whose existence implies meaning that isn't there, a reckoning that has altered bullpen usage, roster construction, and the game's salary structure, thanks to two generations of managers, pitching coaches, and front-office executives who grew up hearing relievers praised for high save totals and others excoriated for their apparent inability to handle the pressure of the ninth inning.
The save falls into the worst category of counting statistics, those that depend on context as much as -- or more than -- they depend on the individual player's performance. The pitcher win is a good example, while the RBI is the Laurent Gbagbo of baseball stats, refusing to bow out gracefully even when its time has clearly come. (I promise to give the RBI a fair trial and painless execution when its day of reckoning finally arrives.)
The save gives a performance by a pitcher additional weight based on the score and inning, rather than based on the pitcher's actual performance. Consider: Three outs in the ninth with a three-run lead gets you a save, but the same three outs recorded in a tie game, which is higher-leverage work, do not.
That example gets at a minor criticism of the save -- that is, a pitcher can pitch poorly and still get one. With a three-run lead, a closer can give up two runs in his inning of work and still notch the save, even though I don't think many analysts would consider the 2:1 runs allowed-to-innings ratio an acceptable one. Yet we have no line in our ledger to reflect these pseudo-saves, to show that while the reliever fiddled, Rome reached medium well before the fire was finally extinguished.
[h4]Really Ill-Gotten Saves[/h4]
All-time leaders in saves while giving up at least one run in no more than one inning of work:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Total[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]47[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Todd Jones[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Wetteland[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]Robb Nen[/td][td]33[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]30[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Jose Mesa[/td][td]30[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Brad Lidge[/td][td]29[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]29[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Armando Benitez[/td][td]28[/td][/tr][/table]
With the glorious Play Index at baseball-reference.com, we can, in fact, see who the primary culprits were in collecting these ill-gotten saves (as you can see in the top chart at right), and I'd like to propose that we name the non-scoreless save after the man who earned more of them over his career than anyone else did. I give you my new statistic, the Hoffman.
"But hey," you say (or would say, if I was secretly controlling your voice), "you can give up a run in a two-inning save and it's not that bad, really -- okay it's not that great but it's just fine, I mean, we can live with that can't we?" Sure we can! So let's change the criteria to one run or more allowed in no more than one inning of work, again with a save "earned". See the second chart.
That's right: Trevor Hoffman earned 27 percent more of these "short Hoffmans" than any other reliever in the history of baseball. Of course, that's partly a function of Hoffman pitching as long as he did, and earning more total saves than anyone else (a situation likely to change within the year), so let's look at the top ten leaders in saves with their Hoffman percentage (Hoffmans/total saves):
[h4]The "Hoffman" Percentage[/h4]
The current top ten leaders in saves next to their "Hoffman" percentage:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Saves[/th][th=""]Hoffmans[/th][th=""]Hoffman %[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]601[/td][td]53[/td][td]8.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]563[/td][td]44[/td][td]7.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Lee Smith[/td][td]478[/td][td]48[/td][td]10.0%[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]424[/td][td]46[/td][td]10.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]Billy Wagner[/td][td]422[/td][td]32[/td][td]7.6%[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Dennis Eckersley+[/td][td]390[/td][td]41[/td][td]10.5%[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Jeff Reardon[/td][td]367[/td][td]46[/td][td]12.5%[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]358[/td][td]40[/td][td]11.2%[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]Randy Myers[/td][td]347[/td][td]35[/td][td]10.1%[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Rollie Fingers+[/td][td]341[/td][td]34[/td][td]10.0%[/td][/tr][/table]
The most interesting part of that table, to me, is that there's someone below Mariano Rivera in percentage -- Wagner beats him by a Hoffman, since if Wagner had earned one more he would have been fractionally higher in the percentage column.
The range of Hoffman percentages among save leaders isn't all that high -- if you earn a lot of saves, you'll earn a lot of Hoffmans along the way. You can separate yourself slightly from the pack in this stat -- Rivera, Hoffman, and Wagner are the three best modern/one-inning closers, pretty much any way you slice it -- but the difference between these guys and average (10.7 percent) of the others in the top 10 is about a Hoffman every other year. That's not much.
The save is a bad stat, a point the Hoffman only further emphasizes.
Lowrie piece.
Spoiler [+]
When the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox emerge from their clubhouses Sunday night at Fenway Park, there is a chance that the best shortstop in uniform will be a spectator. Derek Jeter and Marco Scutaro are the starters at the position for the AL East rivals, but at this point in their careers, neither is as good as the Red Sox backup, Jed Lowrie.
To say that Lowrie has had a tumultuous career with the Red Sox would be an understatement, as he was hampered by or missed significant time with wrist problems and a bout of mononucleosis. However, after early struggles, he appeared to turn the corner last July. In 197 plate appearances after returning to the team, Lowrie smashed 14 doubles and nine homers, showed excellent discipline -- walked as many times as he struck out -- and had an impressive wRC+ of 143. Lowrie manned second base, filling in for the injured Dustin Pedroia, until he and Scutaro flip-flopped in September. Had Lowrie mostly worked at shortstop, that wRC+ would have been the best mark for a Red Sox shortstop since Nomar Garciaparra's mark of 154 way back in 2000. It was the first sign that Lowrie could be the coveted shortstop of the future, and it may have come just in time. He is 27 this season and stud prospect Jose Iglesias should be ready for the 2012 campaign, if not sooner.
While Lowrie probably isn't quite as good of a hitter as he showed last summer -- which is to say he isn't one of the best-hitting shortstops in baseball history -- the performance also doesn't scream fluke. His BABIP was a rather ordinary .292 and his plate discipline was such that his OBP wasn't hollow. Furthermore, with his wrist finally healthy, he showed that he was capable of hitting fastballs -- something that can't be said for Scutaro.
The Red Sox starting shortstop's performance in 2010 did more to evoke memories of Lou Merloni than of Garciaparra. Scutaro ended up being worth less than half of what he had been in 2009, which was largely due to the fact that he couldn't maintain his career-high walk rate. In 2010, Scutaro walked in only 7.6 percent of his plate appearances, almost half of his '09 total, and his lowest since 2004, when he was with the Oakland Athletics. As a result, his wOBA dipped from .354 in '09 to .319.
In context however, Scutaro's performance was acceptable enough for most teams. His 93 wRC+ was the first time a Sox shortstop had put up a wRC+ over 90 in anything other than a limited sample since 2005. He also performed admirably in relation to his peer group across the game. Scutaro's 93 wRC+ was 11th among qualified shortstops and his .319 wOBA tied for ninth, just one point below Jeter.
Jeter famously took a huge step backward last year, showing his age and leading to questions about how much The Captain had left to offer at the plate. Jeter has always maintained a high rate of hits on balls in play, but last year, his mark fell to a more average .307, which represented a 49-point drop from his 2007-2009 level. The reason was simple: Jeter hit the ball in the air much less frequently. His ground-ball percentage was his highest total since 2002. Conversely, his line-drive percentage and fly-ball percentage were his lowest to date. The combination of Jeter hitting nearly 9 percent fewer balls in the air combined with a much lower BABIP on balls hit on the ground contributed to driving his value way down. And given his age, it may be down to stay.
From 1996 to 2008, Jeter's wRC+ was 127, and in 2009, it was 135. Last season, it dipped to 95. His 2011 forecasts push him back over the average needle -- Dan Szymborski's ZiPS projections have him at 102, just a tick better than an average hitter. However, that is a far cry from his glory days, and with Jeter's batted ball profile in the first handful of games this season looking eerily similar to last season's, he may have to rely on his ground balls consistently growing eyes to see any sort of significant improvement.
Scutaro is forecast for pretty much the same season -- ZiPS pegs Scutaro's wRC+ at 96, though his superior glovework offsets the small difference in offensive production.
Due to the small amount of success Lowrie has had in the majors, his projections are at a similar level to the more established starters, but he's clearly trending upward. In 2010, he halved his career strikeout rate, whiffing in only 12.7 percentage of his plate appearances. Contact rates stabilize quickly, and suggest that Lowrie should be able to maintain some of the breakout performance from 2010.
At this point in their careers, the three shortstops may be projected for similar performances, but Lowrie is the one who has a chance to to take off and surpass his expectations. Unfortunately, he needs playing time in order to do so and Scutaro has started six of Boston's first eight games at shortstop. If the Red Sox want to inject some life into a lineup that has struggled out of the gate, perhaps putting their best shortstop on the field would be a good place to start.
To say that Lowrie has had a tumultuous career with the Red Sox would be an understatement, as he was hampered by or missed significant time with wrist problems and a bout of mononucleosis. However, after early struggles, he appeared to turn the corner last July. In 197 plate appearances after returning to the team, Lowrie smashed 14 doubles and nine homers, showed excellent discipline -- walked as many times as he struck out -- and had an impressive wRC+ of 143. Lowrie manned second base, filling in for the injured Dustin Pedroia, until he and Scutaro flip-flopped in September. Had Lowrie mostly worked at shortstop, that wRC+ would have been the best mark for a Red Sox shortstop since Nomar Garciaparra's mark of 154 way back in 2000. It was the first sign that Lowrie could be the coveted shortstop of the future, and it may have come just in time. He is 27 this season and stud prospect Jose Iglesias should be ready for the 2012 campaign, if not sooner.
While Lowrie probably isn't quite as good of a hitter as he showed last summer -- which is to say he isn't one of the best-hitting shortstops in baseball history -- the performance also doesn't scream fluke. His BABIP was a rather ordinary .292 and his plate discipline was such that his OBP wasn't hollow. Furthermore, with his wrist finally healthy, he showed that he was capable of hitting fastballs -- something that can't be said for Scutaro.
The Red Sox starting shortstop's performance in 2010 did more to evoke memories of Lou Merloni than of Garciaparra. Scutaro ended up being worth less than half of what he had been in 2009, which was largely due to the fact that he couldn't maintain his career-high walk rate. In 2010, Scutaro walked in only 7.6 percent of his plate appearances, almost half of his '09 total, and his lowest since 2004, when he was with the Oakland Athletics. As a result, his wOBA dipped from .354 in '09 to .319.
In context however, Scutaro's performance was acceptable enough for most teams. His 93 wRC+ was the first time a Sox shortstop had put up a wRC+ over 90 in anything other than a limited sample since 2005. He also performed admirably in relation to his peer group across the game. Scutaro's 93 wRC+ was 11th among qualified shortstops and his .319 wOBA tied for ninth, just one point below Jeter.
Jeter famously took a huge step backward last year, showing his age and leading to questions about how much The Captain had left to offer at the plate. Jeter has always maintained a high rate of hits on balls in play, but last year, his mark fell to a more average .307, which represented a 49-point drop from his 2007-2009 level. The reason was simple: Jeter hit the ball in the air much less frequently. His ground-ball percentage was his highest total since 2002. Conversely, his line-drive percentage and fly-ball percentage were his lowest to date. The combination of Jeter hitting nearly 9 percent fewer balls in the air combined with a much lower BABIP on balls hit on the ground contributed to driving his value way down. And given his age, it may be down to stay.
From 1996 to 2008, Jeter's wRC+ was 127, and in 2009, it was 135. Last season, it dipped to 95. His 2011 forecasts push him back over the average needle -- Dan Szymborski's ZiPS projections have him at 102, just a tick better than an average hitter. However, that is a far cry from his glory days, and with Jeter's batted ball profile in the first handful of games this season looking eerily similar to last season's, he may have to rely on his ground balls consistently growing eyes to see any sort of significant improvement.
Scutaro is forecast for pretty much the same season -- ZiPS pegs Scutaro's wRC+ at 96, though his superior glovework offsets the small difference in offensive production.
Due to the small amount of success Lowrie has had in the majors, his projections are at a similar level to the more established starters, but he's clearly trending upward. In 2010, he halved his career strikeout rate, whiffing in only 12.7 percentage of his plate appearances. Contact rates stabilize quickly, and suggest that Lowrie should be able to maintain some of the breakout performance from 2010.
At this point in their careers, the three shortstops may be projected for similar performances, but Lowrie is the one who has a chance to to take off and surpass his expectations. Unfortunately, he needs playing time in order to do so and Scutaro has started six of Boston's first eight games at shortstop. If the Red Sox want to inject some life into a lineup that has struggled out of the gate, perhaps putting their best shortstop on the field would be a good place to start.
Piece on Showalter.
Spoiler [+]
On Aug. 3, the day Buck Showalter managed his first game with the Baltimore Orioles, the team sat in last place at 32-73, a full 34 games out of first and 22.5 games behind the Toronto Blue Jays for fourth in the American League East. There was little hope for the 2010 Orioles to even escape the cellar, let alone make some noise in baseball's most challenging division.
However, the former "Baseball Tonight" analyst led the Orioles to a 34-23 record after taking over, behind only the Twins and Phillies for the best record in the majors during that stretch. The Orioles were firing on all cylinders, hitting better, pitching better and playing better defense.
The remarkable turnaround has carried through the offseason and into the first week of the 2011 regular season. The Orioles won four in a row to kick off the season, including a sweep of the division-rival Rays in St. Petersburg. Has Showalter developed a magical touch that has worked wonders with the young Orioles?
[h4]Buck Up[/h4][table][tr][th=""]Category[/th][th=""]2010 pre-Showalter[/th][th=""]2010-11 with Showalter*[/th][/tr][tr][td]W-L[/td][td]32-73[/td][td]38-24[/td][/tr][tr][td]Runs per Game[/td][td]3.61[/td][td]4.10[/td][/tr][tr][td]Runs Allowed per Game[/td][td]5.46[/td][td]3.60[/td][/tr][tr][td]*through Wednesday's game[/td][/tr][/table]
Digging a little deeper, we find the Orioles changed more than just their manager toward the end of last season.
First came the left-field transition. After trying Nolan Reimold and Corey Patterson as starting left fielders, Felix Pie started playing every day in early July. Pie didn't bring a strong bat to the lineup (although he's no worse than Reimold or Patterson), but he provided above-average defense alongside Nick Markakis and former Gold Glove-winner Adam Jones.
One of the few cornerstones of the roster, Brian Roberts, missed the majority of the 2010 season with a back injury. Coincidentally, Roberts returned to the lineup at the end of July, shortly before Showalter was hired. Roberts isn't a powerful offensive force, but he was a significant upgrade over Julio Lugo's sub-.300 OBP.
Roberts' return allowed Ty Wigginton to shift from second base, where he was overmatched defensively, to first. Around the same time, the Orioles traded Miguel Tejada and his .308 OBP, and gave prospect Josh Bell an audition as the everyday third baseman. Bell struggled mightily against major league pitching but is a small upgrade defensively over the veteran Tejada.
On top of the lineup turnover, the Orioles' pitching staff got a boost from the farm system. With Brian Matusz already in the rotation, Chris Tillman and Jake Arrieta had joined him by season's end. Tillman struggled in his first six starts in midsummer but got better results in his five starts with Baltimore after Sept. 1.
The Orioles also saw Koji Uehara return from an early-season injury to become an extremely effective option out of the 'pen, eventually taking over the closer's role from Alfredo Simon.
Regardless of the managerial situation, the Orioles' lineup heading into August was stronger, at least on the mound and in the field, than the roster Showalter's predecessors had to work with. While he's certainly generated some excitement around the Orioles, Showalter's "magic" is perhaps better characterized as "better players."
Most teams on impressive streaks benefit from at least a little luck, and Showalter's crew is no exception. In fact, the Orioles' offensive statistics since Showalter took the helm are almost identical to their pre-Showalter numbers, despite the fact that they've scored half a run more per game.
[h4]The Turnaround[/h4][table][tr][th=""]Category[/th][th=""]2010 pre-Showalter[/th][th=""]2010-11 with Showalter*[/th][/tr][tr][td]Batting Average[/td][td].256[/td][td].261[/td][/tr][tr][td]On Base Percentage[/td][td].314[/td][td].310[/td][/tr][tr][td]Slugging Percentage[/td][td].384[/td][td].386[/td][/tr][tr][td]Strikeouts per 9 Innings[/td][td]6.1[/td][td]6.7[/td][/tr][tr][td]Walks per 9 Innings[/td][td]3.6[/td][td]2.8[/td][/tr][tr][td]Home Runs Allowed per 9 Innings[/td][td]1.2[/td][td]1.0[/td][/tr][tr][td]Good Fielding Plays per Game[/td][td]2.1 (24th in MLB)[/td][td]3.1 (3rd in MLB)[/td][/tr][tr][td]Defensive Misplays + Errors per Game[/td][td]2.3 (19th in MLB)[/td][td]2.1 (10th in MLB)[/td][/tr][/table]
The improvement on the mound and in the field does show up in the numbers. Just watching the games, we can see the defensive improvement. Showalter's team has made more Web Gem-type Good Fielding Plays and fewer Defensive Misplays and Errors than the early-2010 team (as recorded by Baseball Info Solutions' video scouts). Additionally, the Orioles' staff has improved its strikeout, walk and home run rates since Showalter took over.
Heading into 2011, the Orioles traded for Mark Reynolds and signed free agent Derrek Lee, both moderate improvements over the offensive production the team got from Tejada, Bell, Garrett Atkins and Ty Wigginton at the corner infield positions last year. Although Reynolds has never rated well defensively (below-average runs saved at the hot corner in each of his five big league seasons), Lee brings a solid glove to the right side of the infield.
New shortstop J.J. Hardy also will be an upgrade over Cesar Izturis on both sides of the ball. And Baltimore signed 36-year-old Vladimir Guerrero coming off a resurgent season. However, after accounting for park effects, Guerrero is hardly an upgrade over the .902 OPS that Luke Scott posted in an underrated performance as the Orioles' primary DH last season.
Additionally, the Orioles' minor league system continues to churn out pitching prospects, as Zach Britton pitched well in his major league debut. When Matusz recovers from a back muscle injury, he'll complete a young rotation with tremendous upside -- the exact opposite of last year's Opening Day rotation, which featured Kevin Millwood at the top.
Unfortunately, Showalter's club has a tall mountain to climb. Despite its late-season surge, it finished 30 games out of the competitive AL East. While the 2011 Orioles are off to a fantastic start and are taking several steps in the right direction, Showalter's "magic" is unlikely to last long.
However, the former "Baseball Tonight" analyst led the Orioles to a 34-23 record after taking over, behind only the Twins and Phillies for the best record in the majors during that stretch. The Orioles were firing on all cylinders, hitting better, pitching better and playing better defense.
The remarkable turnaround has carried through the offseason and into the first week of the 2011 regular season. The Orioles won four in a row to kick off the season, including a sweep of the division-rival Rays in St. Petersburg. Has Showalter developed a magical touch that has worked wonders with the young Orioles?
[h4]Buck Up[/h4][table][tr][th=""]Category[/th][th=""]2010 pre-Showalter[/th][th=""]2010-11 with Showalter*[/th][/tr][tr][td]W-L[/td][td]32-73[/td][td]38-24[/td][/tr][tr][td]Runs per Game[/td][td]3.61[/td][td]4.10[/td][/tr][tr][td]Runs Allowed per Game[/td][td]5.46[/td][td]3.60[/td][/tr][tr][td]*through Wednesday's game[/td][/tr][/table]
Digging a little deeper, we find the Orioles changed more than just their manager toward the end of last season.
First came the left-field transition. After trying Nolan Reimold and Corey Patterson as starting left fielders, Felix Pie started playing every day in early July. Pie didn't bring a strong bat to the lineup (although he's no worse than Reimold or Patterson), but he provided above-average defense alongside Nick Markakis and former Gold Glove-winner Adam Jones.
One of the few cornerstones of the roster, Brian Roberts, missed the majority of the 2010 season with a back injury. Coincidentally, Roberts returned to the lineup at the end of July, shortly before Showalter was hired. Roberts isn't a powerful offensive force, but he was a significant upgrade over Julio Lugo's sub-.300 OBP.
Roberts' return allowed Ty Wigginton to shift from second base, where he was overmatched defensively, to first. Around the same time, the Orioles traded Miguel Tejada and his .308 OBP, and gave prospect Josh Bell an audition as the everyday third baseman. Bell struggled mightily against major league pitching but is a small upgrade defensively over the veteran Tejada.
On top of the lineup turnover, the Orioles' pitching staff got a boost from the farm system. With Brian Matusz already in the rotation, Chris Tillman and Jake Arrieta had joined him by season's end. Tillman struggled in his first six starts in midsummer but got better results in his five starts with Baltimore after Sept. 1.
The Orioles also saw Koji Uehara return from an early-season injury to become an extremely effective option out of the 'pen, eventually taking over the closer's role from Alfredo Simon.
Regardless of the managerial situation, the Orioles' lineup heading into August was stronger, at least on the mound and in the field, than the roster Showalter's predecessors had to work with. While he's certainly generated some excitement around the Orioles, Showalter's "magic" is perhaps better characterized as "better players."
Most teams on impressive streaks benefit from at least a little luck, and Showalter's crew is no exception. In fact, the Orioles' offensive statistics since Showalter took the helm are almost identical to their pre-Showalter numbers, despite the fact that they've scored half a run more per game.
[h4]The Turnaround[/h4][table][tr][th=""]Category[/th][th=""]2010 pre-Showalter[/th][th=""]2010-11 with Showalter*[/th][/tr][tr][td]Batting Average[/td][td].256[/td][td].261[/td][/tr][tr][td]On Base Percentage[/td][td].314[/td][td].310[/td][/tr][tr][td]Slugging Percentage[/td][td].384[/td][td].386[/td][/tr][tr][td]Strikeouts per 9 Innings[/td][td]6.1[/td][td]6.7[/td][/tr][tr][td]Walks per 9 Innings[/td][td]3.6[/td][td]2.8[/td][/tr][tr][td]Home Runs Allowed per 9 Innings[/td][td]1.2[/td][td]1.0[/td][/tr][tr][td]Good Fielding Plays per Game[/td][td]2.1 (24th in MLB)[/td][td]3.1 (3rd in MLB)[/td][/tr][tr][td]Defensive Misplays + Errors per Game[/td][td]2.3 (19th in MLB)[/td][td]2.1 (10th in MLB)[/td][/tr][/table]
The improvement on the mound and in the field does show up in the numbers. Just watching the games, we can see the defensive improvement. Showalter's team has made more Web Gem-type Good Fielding Plays and fewer Defensive Misplays and Errors than the early-2010 team (as recorded by Baseball Info Solutions' video scouts). Additionally, the Orioles' staff has improved its strikeout, walk and home run rates since Showalter took over.
Heading into 2011, the Orioles traded for Mark Reynolds and signed free agent Derrek Lee, both moderate improvements over the offensive production the team got from Tejada, Bell, Garrett Atkins and Ty Wigginton at the corner infield positions last year. Although Reynolds has never rated well defensively (below-average runs saved at the hot corner in each of his five big league seasons), Lee brings a solid glove to the right side of the infield.
New shortstop J.J. Hardy also will be an upgrade over Cesar Izturis on both sides of the ball. And Baltimore signed 36-year-old Vladimir Guerrero coming off a resurgent season. However, after accounting for park effects, Guerrero is hardly an upgrade over the .902 OPS that Luke Scott posted in an underrated performance as the Orioles' primary DH last season.
Additionally, the Orioles' minor league system continues to churn out pitching prospects, as Zach Britton pitched well in his major league debut. When Matusz recovers from a back muscle injury, he'll complete a young rotation with tremendous upside -- the exact opposite of last year's Opening Day rotation, which featured Kevin Millwood at the top.
Unfortunately, Showalter's club has a tall mountain to climb. Despite its late-season surge, it finished 30 games out of the competitive AL East. While the 2011 Orioles are off to a fantastic start and are taking several steps in the right direction, Showalter's "magic" is unlikely to last long.
Rumors.
Spoiler [+]
http://[h3]Ross nearing return[/h3]
11:50AM ET
[h5]Cody Ross | Giants [/h5]
Cody Ross is just about ready to start playing in games as he rehabs from a strained right calf injury, reports the team's Web site.
Ross is likely to play in an extended spring training game or two before moving to an affiliated roster.
Once hes ready to return, Nate Schierholtz is likely to be sent back to Triple-A, though he's been hitting of late and the Giants could decide to finally pull the plug on Aaron Rowand's tenure with the organization
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Figgins' injury serious?[/h3]
11:31AM ET
[h5]Chone Figgins | Mariners [/h5]
It doesn't appear that the thumb injury suffered by Chone Figgins Monday night will land him on the disabled list, as X-rays were negative, but he was removed from the game and could take a seat for a day or two while the bruise heals.
Luis Rodriguez, who smokes the game-winning hit in the bottom of the ninth against the Jays to cap a rally back from a 7-0 deficit, stepped in for Figgins at third base ans figures to be among those that fills in if Figgins misses additional time.
The club could also use Adam Kennedy at third base.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Does Francisco need more time?[/h3]
11:21AM ET
[h5]Frank Francisco | Blue Jays [/h5]
The Toronto Blue Jays are hoping to get Frank Francisco back soon, and the right-hander is on a rehab assignment in Dunedin, Florida. But he hasn't been sharp in either his two appearances so far, allowing six runs in an inning and two-thirds.
He's also allowed two long balls and walked three batters, a sign that his command is not there, and the Blue Jays may prefer he shows some consistency before activating him from the disabled list.
Their bullpen is fine, despite a meltdown Monday night in Seattle, and Francisco has more than three weeks left on his rehab clock.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Morales timetable[/h3]
11:00AM ET
[h5]Kendrys Morales | Angels [/h5]
While there is no official timetable for Kendrys Morales' return, he did take batting practice and participate in fielding drills last Tuesday, and plans to run on flat ground this week reports the L.A. Times.
Morales will need to show he can run the bases and show lateral agility without experiencing a setback before being activated, but a late-April return is still possible.
Morales is likely to be sent out on a rehab assignment to face live pitching before he debuts for the Halos.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Zumaya's future in Motown[/h3]
10:11AM ET
[h5]Joel Zumaya | Tigers [/h5]
We mentioned earlier this week how Joel Zumaya would be a nice addition to the Detroit Tigers' bullpen, but those plans were put on hold again last weekend when the reliever experienced some discomfort in his elbow was shut down.
Zumaya will rest and perhaps try throwing again after a few days, but the club continues to consult with Dr. James Andrews to determine what's next. One Detroit columnist says the Tigers may be putting too much stock in Zumaya?s return and need to cut the cord.
Drew Sharp of the Free Press writes that Zumaya remains a sentimental favorite thanks to his performance for the 2006 American League champions, but the injury issues are too big to ignore.
"He's the closest replica we've had to Mark Fidrych, that shooting star burning the brightest through the sheer velocity of its trajectory," Sharp writes. "But it's extinguished just as quickly and that's hard to accept. Instead of begging for a return to what once was, perhaps it's better now simply appreciating what once was."
The Tigers, at least publicly, are still hopeful for a return, even if Zumaya has pitched no more than 31 games each of the last four seasons.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Gutierrez close to rehab stint[/h3]
10:10AM ET
[h5]Franklin Gutierrez | Mariners [/h5]
UPDATE: Bob Condotta of the Seattle Times reports Gutierrez will work out in Seattle for the rest of the Mariners' homestand, then likely head to Triple-A Tacoma this weekend for a rehab stint.
--
Franklin Gutierrez played three innings in an extended spring training game in Arizona Friday, reports the Seattle Times, suggesting that the Gold Glove centerfielder is nearing a return to the lineup. But he'll have to show the team that the latest treatment plan for his digestive issues is working before he's activated.
The Seattle Mariners, once Gutierrez returns, will have to make a decision on Michael Saunders and Ryan Langerhans. One of them will have to be sent out, with Saunders the more likely candidate because he has an option remaining and can be shipped to Triple-A without the risk of exposing him to waivers, unlike Langerhans.
Neither player has hit yet, though Langerhans boasts a .353 on-base percentage thanks to five walks -- four Friday versus Cleveland. Langerhans also has half of the club's home run total for the year, though that is nothing to write home about as the M's have managed just two long balls in seven games.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Bullpen tests Ozzie's patience[/h3]
9:39AM ET
[h5]Chicago White Sox [/h5]
Ozzie Guillen may be doing his best to keep a stiff upper lip, but the White Sox manager is growing restless with his bullpen situation after Matt Thornton blew his third save of the season Monday against Oakland, reports Doug Padilla of ESPNChicago.com.
In defense of Thornton, Monday's blown save was the result of a dropped fly ball by left fielder Juan Pierre. As of now, Guillen isn't talking about drastic changes, even if his patience is running thin.
"(Thornton?s) going to be back out there," Guillen said "Like I say, it look like a rewind of the game a couple of days ago. We make a couple of mistakes and today, again, we don't help him."
Chris Sale picked up a save Sunday, while Guillen also could consider Jesse Crain or Sergio Santos for a closer audition.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Mazzaro staying in minors[/h3]
9:11AM ET
[h5]Vin Mazzaro | Royals [/h5]
The Kansas City Royals optioned Vin Mazzaro to Triple-A Omaha at the end of spring training because the team would not require a fifth starter until Friday.
Mazzaro hasn't been carrying his weight in the minor leagues, and the Royals have scrapped plans to have him make that Friday start against Seattle, reports Bob Dutton of the Kansas City Star.
Mazzaro was pounded for five runs in just 2 1/3 innings Sunday against Albuquerque, prompting the surprising Royals to switch to long reliever Sean O'Sullivan. While O'Sullivan may have 24 starts on his resume, his 5.81 career ERA makes him unlikely to remain in the rotation for long.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Another setback for Harden[/h3]
8:57AM ET
[h5]Rich Harden | Athletics [/h5]
Oakland's Rich Harden is currently in the midst of his 10th visit to the disabled list, and it doesn't look his stay is ending any time in the immediate future.
Harden suffered another setback Monday when the right-hander was shut down after warming up with the same lat soreness that landed him on the DL, reports MLB.com's Jane Lee.
The A's have not decided what will be the next step for Harden, who began the spring with a shot at the No. 5 spot in the rotation, but is now more likely to get innings out of the bullpen if and when he's healthy.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Peavy OK with using six starters[/h3]
8:42AM ET
[h5]Chicago White Sox [/h5]
Philip Humber pitched so well in his start Saturday that White Sox pitching coach Don Cooper was talking about the Joy of Six.
Humber, the third overall pick in the 2004 draft, allowed one run over six innings against the Rays, earning the right to stay in the rotation until the return of Jake Peavy, hopefully by the end of April.
Cooper, never afraid to take a less conventional approach, told reporters Sunday he would not be opposed to occasionally using a six-man rotation. "Long term (with six starters), no. Short term, one here and one there, certainly something that's popped in my mind," Cooper said.
Peavy, who is scheduled to pitch for Triple-A Charlotte, endorsed the idea of a six-man rotation.
The White Sox have games scheduled on 20 straight days beginning Friday, giving Cooper an opportunity to test his idea.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Bailey back by end of April?[/h3]
8:34AM ET
[h5]Andrew Bailey | Athletics [/h5]
Athletics closer Andrew Bailey moved a step closer to returning from the disabled list after completing his first successful bullpen session Monday in Chicago, reporta Jane Lee of MLB.com.
Bailey, a two-time All-Star who has a history of arm trouble, has said he hopes to return by the end of the month. Manager Bob Geren says Bailey will likely take a day or two off before throwing another bullpen and working his way toward a rehab assignment.
The A's have barely missed Bailey with Brian Fuentes converting four saves in as many opportunities. The bullpen will be even strong once Bailey returns and Fuentes returns to a set-up role with occasional closing duties.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Jurrjens could start Saturday[/h3]
8:16AM ET
[h5]Jair Jurrjens | Braves [/h5]
After pitching solid innings for Triple-A Gwinnett Monday night, Jair Jurrjens is on track to make his season debut Saturday against the New York Mets, reports Carroll Rogers of the Atlanta JC.
Jurrjens reported no problems with a right oblique injury that sent him on the disabled list to start the season. Rogers adds that Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez and pitching coach Roger McDowell made the trip up to watch Jurrjens face Norfolk.
The Braves began the season with Mike Minor as their fifth starter. The injury-plagued Jurrjens will get his chance, but he might have little margin for error after going 7-6 with a 4.64 ERA last season.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Snell not ready to quit[/h3]
7:58AM ET
[h5]Ian Snell | Cardinals [/h5]
Ian Snell isn't ready to call it quits after all.
The veteran right-hander came to the St. Louis Cardinals camp as a non-roster player, but surprisingly announced his retirement in March when it became apparent he would not win a job. Snell's agent, however, told MLB.com over the weekend that his client was mulling a return.
Derrick Goold of the Post Dispatch tweeted Monday night that the Cards have released Snell so he can pursue other opportunities. At this stage, Snell would almost certainly have to first agree to a minor-league deal.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Short term plan without Ordonez[/h3]
7:40AM ET
[h5]Detroit Tigers [/h5]
Magglio Ordonez was lifted from Monday's game with tightness in his right Achilles, tweets Jason Beck of MLB.com, and while it doesn't look like he's headed for the disabled list, his day-to-day status could mean a different lineup for the club for a day or two.
Tom Gage writes in Tuesday's Detroit News that Ordonez is likely to sit out the next two games.
If Ordonez does not play Tuesday versus the Texas Rangers, both Ryan Raburn and Brennan Boesch are likely to start, even with the left-handed C.J. Wilson scheduled to take the ball for the Rangers, since Boesch has been hitting of late. Don Kelly, another lefty stick, could also see time, as could right-handed slugger Casper Wells.
If Ordonez were to hit the DL, Clete Thomas could be called up from Triple-A, though the club could decide on infielder Danny Worth, too.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Dice-K's future at Fenway[/h3]
7:35AM ET
[h5]Daisuke Matsuzaka | Red Sox [/h5]
Red Sox Nation watched another brutal outing from Daisuke Matsuzaka Monday night, and there is some speculation that the Japanese right-hander could be made at least a partial scapegoat for the team's 2-8 start.
Matsuzaka allowed seven runs on eight hits with two walks and two strikeouts in only two-plus innings against the Rays Monday night at Fenway Park. "I wouldn't be surprised if we don't see him in a Red Sox uniform again," ESPN analyst Bobby Valentine said Monday on "Baseball Tonight."
Joe McDonald of ESPNBoston.com wonder if health is an issue with Matsuzaka, even if both the pitcher and manager Terry Francona insist there are no issues.
The Red Sox are built to win this season, so GM Theo Epstein has every reason to look for pitching help right now. James Shields and Brett Myers are believed to be among the pitchers that will be available around the July deadline, but teams generally do not deal starters this early this season at the risk of upsetting their fan base.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Replacing Furcal in Hollywood[/h3]
7:09AM ET
[h5]Rafael Furcal | Dodgers [/h5]
The Los Angeles Dodgers need a Plan B at shortstop after help after Rafael Furcal suffered a broken thumb sliding headfirst into third base during Monday night's game with the San Francisco Giants.
Furcal, who already was dealing with soreness to his wrist, is headed to the disabled list. While the club didn't offer a timetable for his return, Tony Jackson of ESPNLosAngeles.com reports that injuries of this nature typically take four to six weeks to heal.
Furcal even hinted at retirement, but Jackson though that was merely an "emotional reaction" on the infielder's part.
Jamey Carroll will likely become the starting shortstop and Ivan DeJesus could be recalled from Triple-A Albuquerque with Furcal sidelined. The Dodgers also could turn to veteran Juan Castro, who also is at Albuquerque.
MLB.com's Ken Gurnick says it is likely that the Dodgers would call up top prospect Dee Gordon from Albuquerque.
Los Angeles has been floated as a possible 2012 destination for Jose Reyes, but it appears unlikely the Mets would deal their free-agent-to-be this early in the season. It remains unclear whether the Dodgers would be willing or able to surrender the pitching talent the Mets would want in return.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]LaRoche on the mend[/h3]
6:46AM ET
[h5]Adam LaRoche | Nationals [/h5]
While it appears that the Washington Nationals will place Ryan Zimmerman on the disabled list with an abdominal sprain, an injury to first baseman Adam LaRoche is not as bad.
MLB.com's Bill Ladson reports that LaRoche, who left Sunday's game against the Mets with a groin strain, will avoid a trip to the DL. The hope is that LaRoche will be in the lineup Tuesday against Philadelphia.
The Nats could start Michael Morse or Matt Stairs at first base if LaRoche needs a day off.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Zimmerman to the DL?[/h3]
6:37AM ET
[h5]Ryan Zimmerman | Nationals [/h5]
Ryan Zimmerman has played at least 142 games in four of the last five seasons, so it takes more than a minor bump or bruise to keep the Washington Nationals third baseman out of the lineup.
That's why there is a cause for concern in D.C., however, after Zimmerman aggravated a strained abdominal muscle Saturday and sat out Sunday's game against the Mets. Bill Ladson of MLB.com reports that the Nats are expected to place Zimmerman on the disabled list before Tuesday's game with the Phillies.
Alex Cora and Jerry Hairston Jr. would likely share the duties at third base if Zimmerman needs more time off.
11:50AM ET
[h5]Cody Ross | Giants [/h5]
Cody Ross is just about ready to start playing in games as he rehabs from a strained right calf injury, reports the team's Web site.
Ross is likely to play in an extended spring training game or two before moving to an affiliated roster.
Once hes ready to return, Nate Schierholtz is likely to be sent back to Triple-A, though he's been hitting of late and the Giants could decide to finally pull the plug on Aaron Rowand's tenure with the organization
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Figgins' injury serious?[/h3]
11:31AM ET
[h5]Chone Figgins | Mariners [/h5]
It doesn't appear that the thumb injury suffered by Chone Figgins Monday night will land him on the disabled list, as X-rays were negative, but he was removed from the game and could take a seat for a day or two while the bruise heals.
Luis Rodriguez, who smokes the game-winning hit in the bottom of the ninth against the Jays to cap a rally back from a 7-0 deficit, stepped in for Figgins at third base ans figures to be among those that fills in if Figgins misses additional time.
The club could also use Adam Kennedy at third base.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Does Francisco need more time?[/h3]
11:21AM ET
[h5]Frank Francisco | Blue Jays [/h5]
The Toronto Blue Jays are hoping to get Frank Francisco back soon, and the right-hander is on a rehab assignment in Dunedin, Florida. But he hasn't been sharp in either his two appearances so far, allowing six runs in an inning and two-thirds.
He's also allowed two long balls and walked three batters, a sign that his command is not there, and the Blue Jays may prefer he shows some consistency before activating him from the disabled list.
Their bullpen is fine, despite a meltdown Monday night in Seattle, and Francisco has more than three weeks left on his rehab clock.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Morales timetable[/h3]
11:00AM ET
[h5]Kendrys Morales | Angels [/h5]
While there is no official timetable for Kendrys Morales' return, he did take batting practice and participate in fielding drills last Tuesday, and plans to run on flat ground this week reports the L.A. Times.
Morales will need to show he can run the bases and show lateral agility without experiencing a setback before being activated, but a late-April return is still possible.
Morales is likely to be sent out on a rehab assignment to face live pitching before he debuts for the Halos.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Zumaya's future in Motown[/h3]
10:11AM ET
[h5]Joel Zumaya | Tigers [/h5]
We mentioned earlier this week how Joel Zumaya would be a nice addition to the Detroit Tigers' bullpen, but those plans were put on hold again last weekend when the reliever experienced some discomfort in his elbow was shut down.
Zumaya will rest and perhaps try throwing again after a few days, but the club continues to consult with Dr. James Andrews to determine what's next. One Detroit columnist says the Tigers may be putting too much stock in Zumaya?s return and need to cut the cord.
Drew Sharp of the Free Press writes that Zumaya remains a sentimental favorite thanks to his performance for the 2006 American League champions, but the injury issues are too big to ignore.
"He's the closest replica we've had to Mark Fidrych, that shooting star burning the brightest through the sheer velocity of its trajectory," Sharp writes. "But it's extinguished just as quickly and that's hard to accept. Instead of begging for a return to what once was, perhaps it's better now simply appreciating what once was."
The Tigers, at least publicly, are still hopeful for a return, even if Zumaya has pitched no more than 31 games each of the last four seasons.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Gutierrez close to rehab stint[/h3]
10:10AM ET
[h5]Franklin Gutierrez | Mariners [/h5]
UPDATE: Bob Condotta of the Seattle Times reports Gutierrez will work out in Seattle for the rest of the Mariners' homestand, then likely head to Triple-A Tacoma this weekend for a rehab stint.
--
Franklin Gutierrez played three innings in an extended spring training game in Arizona Friday, reports the Seattle Times, suggesting that the Gold Glove centerfielder is nearing a return to the lineup. But he'll have to show the team that the latest treatment plan for his digestive issues is working before he's activated.
The Seattle Mariners, once Gutierrez returns, will have to make a decision on Michael Saunders and Ryan Langerhans. One of them will have to be sent out, with Saunders the more likely candidate because he has an option remaining and can be shipped to Triple-A without the risk of exposing him to waivers, unlike Langerhans.
Neither player has hit yet, though Langerhans boasts a .353 on-base percentage thanks to five walks -- four Friday versus Cleveland. Langerhans also has half of the club's home run total for the year, though that is nothing to write home about as the M's have managed just two long balls in seven games.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Bullpen tests Ozzie's patience[/h3]
9:39AM ET
[h5]Chicago White Sox [/h5]
Ozzie Guillen may be doing his best to keep a stiff upper lip, but the White Sox manager is growing restless with his bullpen situation after Matt Thornton blew his third save of the season Monday against Oakland, reports Doug Padilla of ESPNChicago.com.
In defense of Thornton, Monday's blown save was the result of a dropped fly ball by left fielder Juan Pierre. As of now, Guillen isn't talking about drastic changes, even if his patience is running thin.
"(Thornton?s) going to be back out there," Guillen said "Like I say, it look like a rewind of the game a couple of days ago. We make a couple of mistakes and today, again, we don't help him."
Chris Sale picked up a save Sunday, while Guillen also could consider Jesse Crain or Sergio Santos for a closer audition.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Mazzaro staying in minors[/h3]
9:11AM ET
[h5]Vin Mazzaro | Royals [/h5]
The Kansas City Royals optioned Vin Mazzaro to Triple-A Omaha at the end of spring training because the team would not require a fifth starter until Friday.
Mazzaro hasn't been carrying his weight in the minor leagues, and the Royals have scrapped plans to have him make that Friday start against Seattle, reports Bob Dutton of the Kansas City Star.
Mazzaro was pounded for five runs in just 2 1/3 innings Sunday against Albuquerque, prompting the surprising Royals to switch to long reliever Sean O'Sullivan. While O'Sullivan may have 24 starts on his resume, his 5.81 career ERA makes him unlikely to remain in the rotation for long.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Another setback for Harden[/h3]
8:57AM ET
[h5]Rich Harden | Athletics [/h5]
Oakland's Rich Harden is currently in the midst of his 10th visit to the disabled list, and it doesn't look his stay is ending any time in the immediate future.
Harden suffered another setback Monday when the right-hander was shut down after warming up with the same lat soreness that landed him on the DL, reports MLB.com's Jane Lee.
The A's have not decided what will be the next step for Harden, who began the spring with a shot at the No. 5 spot in the rotation, but is now more likely to get innings out of the bullpen if and when he's healthy.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Peavy OK with using six starters[/h3]
8:42AM ET
[h5]Chicago White Sox [/h5]
Philip Humber pitched so well in his start Saturday that White Sox pitching coach Don Cooper was talking about the Joy of Six.
Humber, the third overall pick in the 2004 draft, allowed one run over six innings against the Rays, earning the right to stay in the rotation until the return of Jake Peavy, hopefully by the end of April.
Cooper, never afraid to take a less conventional approach, told reporters Sunday he would not be opposed to occasionally using a six-man rotation. "Long term (with six starters), no. Short term, one here and one there, certainly something that's popped in my mind," Cooper said.
Peavy, who is scheduled to pitch for Triple-A Charlotte, endorsed the idea of a six-man rotation.
The White Sox have games scheduled on 20 straight days beginning Friday, giving Cooper an opportunity to test his idea.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Bailey back by end of April?[/h3]
8:34AM ET
[h5]Andrew Bailey | Athletics [/h5]
Athletics closer Andrew Bailey moved a step closer to returning from the disabled list after completing his first successful bullpen session Monday in Chicago, reporta Jane Lee of MLB.com.
Bailey, a two-time All-Star who has a history of arm trouble, has said he hopes to return by the end of the month. Manager Bob Geren says Bailey will likely take a day or two off before throwing another bullpen and working his way toward a rehab assignment.
The A's have barely missed Bailey with Brian Fuentes converting four saves in as many opportunities. The bullpen will be even strong once Bailey returns and Fuentes returns to a set-up role with occasional closing duties.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Jurrjens could start Saturday[/h3]
8:16AM ET
[h5]Jair Jurrjens | Braves [/h5]
After pitching solid innings for Triple-A Gwinnett Monday night, Jair Jurrjens is on track to make his season debut Saturday against the New York Mets, reports Carroll Rogers of the Atlanta JC.
Jurrjens reported no problems with a right oblique injury that sent him on the disabled list to start the season. Rogers adds that Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez and pitching coach Roger McDowell made the trip up to watch Jurrjens face Norfolk.
The Braves began the season with Mike Minor as their fifth starter. The injury-plagued Jurrjens will get his chance, but he might have little margin for error after going 7-6 with a 4.64 ERA last season.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Snell not ready to quit[/h3]
7:58AM ET
[h5]Ian Snell | Cardinals [/h5]
Ian Snell isn't ready to call it quits after all.
The veteran right-hander came to the St. Louis Cardinals camp as a non-roster player, but surprisingly announced his retirement in March when it became apparent he would not win a job. Snell's agent, however, told MLB.com over the weekend that his client was mulling a return.
Derrick Goold of the Post Dispatch tweeted Monday night that the Cards have released Snell so he can pursue other opportunities. At this stage, Snell would almost certainly have to first agree to a minor-league deal.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Short term plan without Ordonez[/h3]
7:40AM ET
[h5]Detroit Tigers [/h5]
Magglio Ordonez was lifted from Monday's game with tightness in his right Achilles, tweets Jason Beck of MLB.com, and while it doesn't look like he's headed for the disabled list, his day-to-day status could mean a different lineup for the club for a day or two.
Tom Gage writes in Tuesday's Detroit News that Ordonez is likely to sit out the next two games.
If Ordonez does not play Tuesday versus the Texas Rangers, both Ryan Raburn and Brennan Boesch are likely to start, even with the left-handed C.J. Wilson scheduled to take the ball for the Rangers, since Boesch has been hitting of late. Don Kelly, another lefty stick, could also see time, as could right-handed slugger Casper Wells.
If Ordonez were to hit the DL, Clete Thomas could be called up from Triple-A, though the club could decide on infielder Danny Worth, too.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Dice-K's future at Fenway[/h3]
7:35AM ET
[h5]Daisuke Matsuzaka | Red Sox [/h5]
Red Sox Nation watched another brutal outing from Daisuke Matsuzaka Monday night, and there is some speculation that the Japanese right-hander could be made at least a partial scapegoat for the team's 2-8 start.
Matsuzaka allowed seven runs on eight hits with two walks and two strikeouts in only two-plus innings against the Rays Monday night at Fenway Park. "I wouldn't be surprised if we don't see him in a Red Sox uniform again," ESPN analyst Bobby Valentine said Monday on "Baseball Tonight."
Joe McDonald of ESPNBoston.com wonder if health is an issue with Matsuzaka, even if both the pitcher and manager Terry Francona insist there are no issues.
The Red Sox are built to win this season, so GM Theo Epstein has every reason to look for pitching help right now. James Shields and Brett Myers are believed to be among the pitchers that will be available around the July deadline, but teams generally do not deal starters this early this season at the risk of upsetting their fan base.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Replacing Furcal in Hollywood[/h3]
7:09AM ET
[h5]Rafael Furcal | Dodgers [/h5]
The Los Angeles Dodgers need a Plan B at shortstop after help after Rafael Furcal suffered a broken thumb sliding headfirst into third base during Monday night's game with the San Francisco Giants.
Furcal, who already was dealing with soreness to his wrist, is headed to the disabled list. While the club didn't offer a timetable for his return, Tony Jackson of ESPNLosAngeles.com reports that injuries of this nature typically take four to six weeks to heal.
Furcal even hinted at retirement, but Jackson though that was merely an "emotional reaction" on the infielder's part.
Jamey Carroll will likely become the starting shortstop and Ivan DeJesus could be recalled from Triple-A Albuquerque with Furcal sidelined. The Dodgers also could turn to veteran Juan Castro, who also is at Albuquerque.
MLB.com's Ken Gurnick says it is likely that the Dodgers would call up top prospect Dee Gordon from Albuquerque.
Los Angeles has been floated as a possible 2012 destination for Jose Reyes, but it appears unlikely the Mets would deal their free-agent-to-be this early in the season. It remains unclear whether the Dodgers would be willing or able to surrender the pitching talent the Mets would want in return.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]LaRoche on the mend[/h3]
6:46AM ET
[h5]Adam LaRoche | Nationals [/h5]
While it appears that the Washington Nationals will place Ryan Zimmerman on the disabled list with an abdominal sprain, an injury to first baseman Adam LaRoche is not as bad.
MLB.com's Bill Ladson reports that LaRoche, who left Sunday's game against the Mets with a groin strain, will avoid a trip to the DL. The hope is that LaRoche will be in the lineup Tuesday against Philadelphia.
The Nats could start Michael Morse or Matt Stairs at first base if LaRoche needs a day off.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Zimmerman to the DL?[/h3]
6:37AM ET
[h5]Ryan Zimmerman | Nationals [/h5]
Ryan Zimmerman has played at least 142 games in four of the last five seasons, so it takes more than a minor bump or bruise to keep the Washington Nationals third baseman out of the lineup.
That's why there is a cause for concern in D.C., however, after Zimmerman aggravated a strained abdominal muscle Saturday and sat out Sunday's game against the Mets. Bill Ladson of MLB.com reports that the Nats are expected to place Zimmerman on the disabled list before Tuesday's game with the Phillies.
Alex Cora and Jerry Hairston Jr. would likely share the duties at third base if Zimmerman needs more time off.
Reds.
Piece on saves, pretty funny
Lowrie piece.
Piece on Showalter.
Rumors.
Spoiler [+]
Adam Dunn is one of the best hitters in the game. A metronome of power and patience, he's averaged more than 40 home runs and 100 walks a season for the past seven years. Going by advanced stats such as weighted on-base average, he's been a more valuable hitter than even perennial MVP candidate Ryan Howard.
So when the Cincinnati Reds shipped Dunn to Arizona on Aug. 11, 2008, the franchise's entire outlook changed … for the better.
Before we paint Dunn as the cause of an entire organization's ills, let's first establish that correlation doesn't necessarily equal causation. Still, Dunn has been the worst defensive player in all of baseball since FanGraphs started tracking ultimate zone rating results in 2002. His deletion from the Reds' lineup set the stage for one of the biggest defensive transformations in recent history and what could become a new era of NL Central dominance in Cincinnati.
[h4]D at last[/h4]
Much of the credit for the Reds' turnaround in the past couple of years should be given to their improved defense.
[table][tr][th=""]Year[/th][th=""]Team UZR rank[/th][th=""]Record[/th][/tr][tr][td]2003[/td][td]20[/td][td]69-93[/td][/tr][tr][td]2004[/td][td]21[/td][td]76-86[/td][/tr][tr][td]2005[/td][td]27[/td][td]73-89[/td][/tr][tr][td]2006[/td][td]21[/td][td]80-82[/td][/tr][tr][td]2007[/td][td]24[/td][td]72-90[/td][/tr][tr][td]2008[/td][td]24[/td][td]74-88[/td][/tr][tr][td]2009[/td][td]3[/td][td]78-84[/td][/tr][tr][td]2010[/td][td]4[/td][td]91-71[/td][/tr][/table]
The accompanying table shows the Reds' year-by-year UZR rank along with the team's record each year. From 2003 through 2008, all seasons that began with Dunn in the everyday lineup, the Reds finished no better than 20th in team defense and never finished above .500. In 2009, the first full season with Dunn gone, the Reds vaulted to third in team defense. In 2010, they were the fourth-best defensive team in MLB. They also won their first division title in 15 years.
Although addition by subtraction certainly helped, the Reds' return to glory got a big boost from an influx of elite glovemen. When Scott Rolen arrived in a 2009 deadline trade, skeptics wondered what a sub-.500 team could possibly want with a 34-year-old player who had a history of back problems. That the team was giving up Edwin Encarnacion -- a power-hitting third baseman nearly eight years Rolen's junior -- as part of the four-player deal made the pickup seem even more dubious. But that move proved to be a double win for the Reds. By ditching Encarnacion, Cincinnati was unloading a player who'd been fittingly dubbed "E5." Meanwhile, Rolen's defense has not slipped, and he has posted a UZR of 22.0 in the past three full seasons, which is good for sixth-best in all of baseball.
At the same time, an influx of homegrown, two-way players buoyed the Reds' defensive makeover. Joey Votto won last year's MVP award mostly on the strength of his big offensive numbers, but he rated as an above-average defender, too. Drew Stubbs rated as merely average with the glove in his first full big league campaign in 2010, but longer-term trends (not to mention great scouting reports) suggest he could be a plus defender. Meanwhile, Jay Bruce deserved some postseason hardware of his own last year, saving more than 20 runs above the average major league right fielder, easily the best mark for anyone at that position. (Multiyear UZR figures tend to be more reliable, and Bruce was excellent defensively in '09, too.) Add Gold Gloves for Brandon Phillips and Bronson Arroyo, and the Reds fielded a team rich with top defenders last year by the numbers, by reputation and, in several cases, both.
The Reds have supplemented their strong defensive core with a new wave of young pitchers who can pile up outs on their own. Johnny Cueto posted an impressive 3.97 FIP (fielding independent pitching, a stat that runs along a similar scale to ERA but strips out defense, luck and other factors a pitcher doesn't control) last year, the best result of his young career. Rookie Travis Wood rang up a strikeout-to-walk rate of better than 3-to-1. Young righties Homer Bailey and Mike Leake hinted at potential of their own. And Cuban sensation Aroldis Chapman delivered one of the most exciting 13-inning rookie seasons of all time, routinely flashing triple digits on the radar gun and topping out at 104 miles per hour.
The Reds have struggled with their run prevention in the early going this season, yielding 23 runs in two weekend losses to the Diamondbacks. But they're still in first place through their first three series of the season, with Cueto and Bailey expected back soon from early-season DL stints and all other hands on deck.
They might not have the bats of the Big Red Machine. But as long as they keep runs off the board, we could be seeing a lot more winning from the Little Red Engine That Could.
So when the Cincinnati Reds shipped Dunn to Arizona on Aug. 11, 2008, the franchise's entire outlook changed … for the better.
Before we paint Dunn as the cause of an entire organization's ills, let's first establish that correlation doesn't necessarily equal causation. Still, Dunn has been the worst defensive player in all of baseball since FanGraphs started tracking ultimate zone rating results in 2002. His deletion from the Reds' lineup set the stage for one of the biggest defensive transformations in recent history and what could become a new era of NL Central dominance in Cincinnati.
[h4]D at last[/h4]
Much of the credit for the Reds' turnaround in the past couple of years should be given to their improved defense.
[table][tr][th=""]Year[/th][th=""]Team UZR rank[/th][th=""]Record[/th][/tr][tr][td]2003[/td][td]20[/td][td]69-93[/td][/tr][tr][td]2004[/td][td]21[/td][td]76-86[/td][/tr][tr][td]2005[/td][td]27[/td][td]73-89[/td][/tr][tr][td]2006[/td][td]21[/td][td]80-82[/td][/tr][tr][td]2007[/td][td]24[/td][td]72-90[/td][/tr][tr][td]2008[/td][td]24[/td][td]74-88[/td][/tr][tr][td]2009[/td][td]3[/td][td]78-84[/td][/tr][tr][td]2010[/td][td]4[/td][td]91-71[/td][/tr][/table]
The accompanying table shows the Reds' year-by-year UZR rank along with the team's record each year. From 2003 through 2008, all seasons that began with Dunn in the everyday lineup, the Reds finished no better than 20th in team defense and never finished above .500. In 2009, the first full season with Dunn gone, the Reds vaulted to third in team defense. In 2010, they were the fourth-best defensive team in MLB. They also won their first division title in 15 years.
Although addition by subtraction certainly helped, the Reds' return to glory got a big boost from an influx of elite glovemen. When Scott Rolen arrived in a 2009 deadline trade, skeptics wondered what a sub-.500 team could possibly want with a 34-year-old player who had a history of back problems. That the team was giving up Edwin Encarnacion -- a power-hitting third baseman nearly eight years Rolen's junior -- as part of the four-player deal made the pickup seem even more dubious. But that move proved to be a double win for the Reds. By ditching Encarnacion, Cincinnati was unloading a player who'd been fittingly dubbed "E5." Meanwhile, Rolen's defense has not slipped, and he has posted a UZR of 22.0 in the past three full seasons, which is good for sixth-best in all of baseball.
At the same time, an influx of homegrown, two-way players buoyed the Reds' defensive makeover. Joey Votto won last year's MVP award mostly on the strength of his big offensive numbers, but he rated as an above-average defender, too. Drew Stubbs rated as merely average with the glove in his first full big league campaign in 2010, but longer-term trends (not to mention great scouting reports) suggest he could be a plus defender. Meanwhile, Jay Bruce deserved some postseason hardware of his own last year, saving more than 20 runs above the average major league right fielder, easily the best mark for anyone at that position. (Multiyear UZR figures tend to be more reliable, and Bruce was excellent defensively in '09, too.) Add Gold Gloves for Brandon Phillips and Bronson Arroyo, and the Reds fielded a team rich with top defenders last year by the numbers, by reputation and, in several cases, both.
The Reds have supplemented their strong defensive core with a new wave of young pitchers who can pile up outs on their own. Johnny Cueto posted an impressive 3.97 FIP (fielding independent pitching, a stat that runs along a similar scale to ERA but strips out defense, luck and other factors a pitcher doesn't control) last year, the best result of his young career. Rookie Travis Wood rang up a strikeout-to-walk rate of better than 3-to-1. Young righties Homer Bailey and Mike Leake hinted at potential of their own. And Cuban sensation Aroldis Chapman delivered one of the most exciting 13-inning rookie seasons of all time, routinely flashing triple digits on the radar gun and topping out at 104 miles per hour.
The Reds have struggled with their run prevention in the early going this season, yielding 23 runs in two weekend losses to the Diamondbacks. But they're still in first place through their first three series of the season, with Cueto and Bailey expected back soon from early-season DL stints and all other hands on deck.
They might not have the bats of the Big Red Machine. But as long as they keep runs off the board, we could be seeing a lot more winning from the Little Red Engine That Could.
Piece on saves, pretty funny
Spoiler [+]
I'd like to propose the creation of a new statistic, an accounting stat for relievers that might help separate out a little of the noise from the generally awful save statistic. The new figure won't have much, if any, predictive value, but would merely exist for what I call "accounting" purposes -- a record of what happened for the curious or trivially-inclined, but of little use for looking ahead. It's for fun, and I deny any responsibility for harm that comes to you or your loved ones for unapproved or unauthorized usage.
I hate the save.
[h4]Ill-Gotten Saves[/h4]
All-time leaders in saves while giving up at least one run:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Total[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]53[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Lee Smith[/td][td]48[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Jeff Reardon[/td][td]46[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]46[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]John Wetteland[/td][td]44[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]44[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Bruce Sutter[/td][td]43[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Dan Quisenberry[/td][td]43[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]Dennis Eckersley[/td][td]41[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]40[/td][/tr][tr][td]11[/td][td]Todd Jones[/td][td]40[/td][/tr][tr][td]12[/td][td]Robb Nen[/td][td]39[/td][/tr][tr][td]13[/td][td]Gene Garber[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]14[/td][td]Rod Beck[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]15[/td][td]Rick Aguilera[/td][td]36[/td][/tr][tr][td]16[/td][td]Hoyt Wilhelm[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]17[/td][td]Randy Myers[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]18[/td][td]Jose Mesa[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]19[/td][td]Roberto Hernandez[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]20[/td][td]Rollie Fingers[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][/table]
I do. It's a number whose existence implies meaning that isn't there, a reckoning that has altered bullpen usage, roster construction, and the game's salary structure, thanks to two generations of managers, pitching coaches, and front-office executives who grew up hearing relievers praised for high save totals and others excoriated for their apparent inability to handle the pressure of the ninth inning.
The save falls into the worst category of counting statistics, those that depend on context as much as -- or more than -- they depend on the individual player's performance. The pitcher win is a good example, while the RBI is the Laurent Gbagbo of baseball stats, refusing to bow out gracefully even when its time has clearly come. (I promise to give the RBI a fair trial and painless execution when its day of reckoning finally arrives.)
The save gives a performance by a pitcher additional weight based on the score and inning, rather than based on the pitcher's actual performance. Consider: Three outs in the ninth with a three-run lead gets you a save, but the same three outs recorded in a tie game, which is higher-leverage work, do not.
That example gets at a minor criticism of the save -- that is, a pitcher can pitch poorly and still get one. With a three-run lead, a closer can give up two runs in his inning of work and still notch the save, even though I don't think many analysts would consider the 2:1 runs allowed-to-innings ratio an acceptable one. Yet we have no line in our ledger to reflect these pseudo-saves, to show that while the reliever fiddled, Rome reached medium well before the fire was finally extinguished.
[h4]Really Ill-Gotten Saves[/h4]
All-time leaders in saves while giving up at least one run in no more than one inning of work:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Total[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]47[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Todd Jones[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Wetteland[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]Robb Nen[/td][td]33[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]30[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Jose Mesa[/td][td]30[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Brad Lidge[/td][td]29[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]29[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Armando Benitez[/td][td]28[/td][/tr][/table]
With the glorious Play Index at baseball-reference.com, we can, in fact, see who the primary culprits were in collecting these ill-gotten saves (as you can see in the top chart at right), and I'd like to propose that we name the non-scoreless save after the man who earned more of them over his career than anyone else did. I give you my new statistic, the Hoffman.
"But hey," you say (or would say, if I was secretly controlling your voice), "you can give up a run in a two-inning save and it's not that bad, really -- okay it's not that great but it's just fine, I mean, we can live with that can't we?" Sure we can! So let's change the criteria to one run or more allowed in no more than one inning of work, again with a save "earned". See the second chart.
That's right: Trevor Hoffman earned 27 percent more of these "short Hoffmans" than any other reliever in the history of baseball. Of course, that's partly a function of Hoffman pitching as long as he did, and earning more total saves than anyone else (a situation likely to change within the year), so let's look at the top ten leaders in saves with their Hoffman percentage (Hoffmans/total saves):
[h4]The "Hoffman" Percentage[/h4]
The current top ten leaders in saves next to their "Hoffman" percentage:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Saves[/th][th=""]Hoffmans[/th][th=""]Hoffman %[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]601[/td][td]53[/td][td]8.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]563[/td][td]44[/td][td]7.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Lee Smith[/td][td]478[/td][td]48[/td][td]10.0%[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]424[/td][td]46[/td][td]10.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]Billy Wagner[/td][td]422[/td][td]32[/td][td]7.6%[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Dennis Eckersley+[/td][td]390[/td][td]41[/td][td]10.5%[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Jeff Reardon[/td][td]367[/td][td]46[/td][td]12.5%[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]358[/td][td]40[/td][td]11.2%[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]Randy Myers[/td][td]347[/td][td]35[/td][td]10.1%[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Rollie Fingers+[/td][td]341[/td][td]34[/td][td]10.0%[/td][/tr][/table]
The most interesting part of that table, to me, is that there's someone below Mariano Rivera in percentage -- Wagner beats him by a Hoffman, since if Wagner had earned one more he would have been fractionally higher in the percentage column.
The range of Hoffman percentages among save leaders isn't all that high -- if you earn a lot of saves, you'll earn a lot of Hoffmans along the way. You can separate yourself slightly from the pack in this stat -- Rivera, Hoffman, and Wagner are the three best modern/one-inning closers, pretty much any way you slice it -- but the difference between these guys and average (10.7 percent) of the others in the top 10 is about a Hoffman every other year. That's not much.
The save is a bad stat, a point the Hoffman only further emphasizes.
I hate the save.
[h4]Ill-Gotten Saves[/h4]
All-time leaders in saves while giving up at least one run:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Total[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]53[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Lee Smith[/td][td]48[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Jeff Reardon[/td][td]46[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]46[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]John Wetteland[/td][td]44[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]44[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Bruce Sutter[/td][td]43[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Dan Quisenberry[/td][td]43[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]Dennis Eckersley[/td][td]41[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]40[/td][/tr][tr][td]11[/td][td]Todd Jones[/td][td]40[/td][/tr][tr][td]12[/td][td]Robb Nen[/td][td]39[/td][/tr][tr][td]13[/td][td]Gene Garber[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]14[/td][td]Rod Beck[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]15[/td][td]Rick Aguilera[/td][td]36[/td][/tr][tr][td]16[/td][td]Hoyt Wilhelm[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]17[/td][td]Randy Myers[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]18[/td][td]Jose Mesa[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]19[/td][td]Roberto Hernandez[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]20[/td][td]Rollie Fingers[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][/table]
I do. It's a number whose existence implies meaning that isn't there, a reckoning that has altered bullpen usage, roster construction, and the game's salary structure, thanks to two generations of managers, pitching coaches, and front-office executives who grew up hearing relievers praised for high save totals and others excoriated for their apparent inability to handle the pressure of the ninth inning.
The save falls into the worst category of counting statistics, those that depend on context as much as -- or more than -- they depend on the individual player's performance. The pitcher win is a good example, while the RBI is the Laurent Gbagbo of baseball stats, refusing to bow out gracefully even when its time has clearly come. (I promise to give the RBI a fair trial and painless execution when its day of reckoning finally arrives.)
The save gives a performance by a pitcher additional weight based on the score and inning, rather than based on the pitcher's actual performance. Consider: Three outs in the ninth with a three-run lead gets you a save, but the same three outs recorded in a tie game, which is higher-leverage work, do not.
That example gets at a minor criticism of the save -- that is, a pitcher can pitch poorly and still get one. With a three-run lead, a closer can give up two runs in his inning of work and still notch the save, even though I don't think many analysts would consider the 2:1 runs allowed-to-innings ratio an acceptable one. Yet we have no line in our ledger to reflect these pseudo-saves, to show that while the reliever fiddled, Rome reached medium well before the fire was finally extinguished.
[h4]Really Ill-Gotten Saves[/h4]
All-time leaders in saves while giving up at least one run in no more than one inning of work:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Total[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]47[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]37[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Todd Jones[/td][td]35[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Wetteland[/td][td]34[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]Robb Nen[/td][td]33[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]30[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Jose Mesa[/td][td]30[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Brad Lidge[/td][td]29[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]29[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Armando Benitez[/td][td]28[/td][/tr][/table]
With the glorious Play Index at baseball-reference.com, we can, in fact, see who the primary culprits were in collecting these ill-gotten saves (as you can see in the top chart at right), and I'd like to propose that we name the non-scoreless save after the man who earned more of them over his career than anyone else did. I give you my new statistic, the Hoffman.
"But hey," you say (or would say, if I was secretly controlling your voice), "you can give up a run in a two-inning save and it's not that bad, really -- okay it's not that great but it's just fine, I mean, we can live with that can't we?" Sure we can! So let's change the criteria to one run or more allowed in no more than one inning of work, again with a save "earned". See the second chart.
That's right: Trevor Hoffman earned 27 percent more of these "short Hoffmans" than any other reliever in the history of baseball. Of course, that's partly a function of Hoffman pitching as long as he did, and earning more total saves than anyone else (a situation likely to change within the year), so let's look at the top ten leaders in saves with their Hoffman percentage (Hoffmans/total saves):
[h4]The "Hoffman" Percentage[/h4]
The current top ten leaders in saves next to their "Hoffman" percentage:
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]Player[/th][th=""]Saves[/th][th=""]Hoffmans[/th][th=""]Hoffman %[/th][/tr][tr][td]1[/td][td]Trevor Hoffman[/td][td]601[/td][td]53[/td][td]8.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]2[/td][td]Mariano Rivera[/td][td]563[/td][td]44[/td][td]7.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]3[/td][td]Lee Smith[/td][td]478[/td][td]48[/td][td]10.0%[/td][/tr][tr][td]4[/td][td]John Franco[/td][td]424[/td][td]46[/td][td]10.8%[/td][/tr][tr][td]5[/td][td]Billy Wagner[/td][td]422[/td][td]32[/td][td]7.6%[/td][/tr][tr][td]6[/td][td]Dennis Eckersley+[/td][td]390[/td][td]41[/td][td]10.5%[/td][/tr][tr][td]7[/td][td]Jeff Reardon[/td][td]367[/td][td]46[/td][td]12.5%[/td][/tr][tr][td]8[/td][td]Troy Percival[/td][td]358[/td][td]40[/td][td]11.2%[/td][/tr][tr][td]9[/td][td]Randy Myers[/td][td]347[/td][td]35[/td][td]10.1%[/td][/tr][tr][td]10[/td][td]Rollie Fingers+[/td][td]341[/td][td]34[/td][td]10.0%[/td][/tr][/table]
The most interesting part of that table, to me, is that there's someone below Mariano Rivera in percentage -- Wagner beats him by a Hoffman, since if Wagner had earned one more he would have been fractionally higher in the percentage column.
The range of Hoffman percentages among save leaders isn't all that high -- if you earn a lot of saves, you'll earn a lot of Hoffmans along the way. You can separate yourself slightly from the pack in this stat -- Rivera, Hoffman, and Wagner are the three best modern/one-inning closers, pretty much any way you slice it -- but the difference between these guys and average (10.7 percent) of the others in the top 10 is about a Hoffman every other year. That's not much.
The save is a bad stat, a point the Hoffman only further emphasizes.
Lowrie piece.
Spoiler [+]
When the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox emerge from their clubhouses Sunday night at Fenway Park, there is a chance that the best shortstop in uniform will be a spectator. Derek Jeter and Marco Scutaro are the starters at the position for the AL East rivals, but at this point in their careers, neither is as good as the Red Sox backup, Jed Lowrie.
To say that Lowrie has had a tumultuous career with the Red Sox would be an understatement, as he was hampered by or missed significant time with wrist problems and a bout of mononucleosis. However, after early struggles, he appeared to turn the corner last July. In 197 plate appearances after returning to the team, Lowrie smashed 14 doubles and nine homers, showed excellent discipline -- walked as many times as he struck out -- and had an impressive wRC+ of 143. Lowrie manned second base, filling in for the injured Dustin Pedroia, until he and Scutaro flip-flopped in September. Had Lowrie mostly worked at shortstop, that wRC+ would have been the best mark for a Red Sox shortstop since Nomar Garciaparra's mark of 154 way back in 2000. It was the first sign that Lowrie could be the coveted shortstop of the future, and it may have come just in time. He is 27 this season and stud prospect Jose Iglesias should be ready for the 2012 campaign, if not sooner.
While Lowrie probably isn't quite as good of a hitter as he showed last summer -- which is to say he isn't one of the best-hitting shortstops in baseball history -- the performance also doesn't scream fluke. His BABIP was a rather ordinary .292 and his plate discipline was such that his OBP wasn't hollow. Furthermore, with his wrist finally healthy, he showed that he was capable of hitting fastballs -- something that can't be said for Scutaro.
The Red Sox starting shortstop's performance in 2010 did more to evoke memories of Lou Merloni than of Garciaparra. Scutaro ended up being worth less than half of what he had been in 2009, which was largely due to the fact that he couldn't maintain his career-high walk rate. In 2010, Scutaro walked in only 7.6 percent of his plate appearances, almost half of his '09 total, and his lowest since 2004, when he was with the Oakland Athletics. As a result, his wOBA dipped from .354 in '09 to .319.
In context however, Scutaro's performance was acceptable enough for most teams. His 93 wRC+ was the first time a Sox shortstop had put up a wRC+ over 90 in anything other than a limited sample since 2005. He also performed admirably in relation to his peer group across the game. Scutaro's 93 wRC+ was 11th among qualified shortstops and his .319 wOBA tied for ninth, just one point below Jeter.
Jeter famously took a huge step backward last year, showing his age and leading to questions about how much The Captain had left to offer at the plate. Jeter has always maintained a high rate of hits on balls in play, but last year, his mark fell to a more average .307, which represented a 49-point drop from his 2007-2009 level. The reason was simple: Jeter hit the ball in the air much less frequently. His ground-ball percentage was his highest total since 2002. Conversely, his line-drive percentage and fly-ball percentage were his lowest to date. The combination of Jeter hitting nearly 9 percent fewer balls in the air combined with a much lower BABIP on balls hit on the ground contributed to driving his value way down. And given his age, it may be down to stay.
From 1996 to 2008, Jeter's wRC+ was 127, and in 2009, it was 135. Last season, it dipped to 95. His 2011 forecasts push him back over the average needle -- Dan Szymborski's ZiPS projections have him at 102, just a tick better than an average hitter. However, that is a far cry from his glory days, and with Jeter's batted ball profile in the first handful of games this season looking eerily similar to last season's, he may have to rely on his ground balls consistently growing eyes to see any sort of significant improvement.
Scutaro is forecast for pretty much the same season -- ZiPS pegs Scutaro's wRC+ at 96, though his superior glovework offsets the small difference in offensive production.
Due to the small amount of success Lowrie has had in the majors, his projections are at a similar level to the more established starters, but he's clearly trending upward. In 2010, he halved his career strikeout rate, whiffing in only 12.7 percentage of his plate appearances. Contact rates stabilize quickly, and suggest that Lowrie should be able to maintain some of the breakout performance from 2010.
At this point in their careers, the three shortstops may be projected for similar performances, but Lowrie is the one who has a chance to to take off and surpass his expectations. Unfortunately, he needs playing time in order to do so and Scutaro has started six of Boston's first eight games at shortstop. If the Red Sox want to inject some life into a lineup that has struggled out of the gate, perhaps putting their best shortstop on the field would be a good place to start.
To say that Lowrie has had a tumultuous career with the Red Sox would be an understatement, as he was hampered by or missed significant time with wrist problems and a bout of mononucleosis. However, after early struggles, he appeared to turn the corner last July. In 197 plate appearances after returning to the team, Lowrie smashed 14 doubles and nine homers, showed excellent discipline -- walked as many times as he struck out -- and had an impressive wRC+ of 143. Lowrie manned second base, filling in for the injured Dustin Pedroia, until he and Scutaro flip-flopped in September. Had Lowrie mostly worked at shortstop, that wRC+ would have been the best mark for a Red Sox shortstop since Nomar Garciaparra's mark of 154 way back in 2000. It was the first sign that Lowrie could be the coveted shortstop of the future, and it may have come just in time. He is 27 this season and stud prospect Jose Iglesias should be ready for the 2012 campaign, if not sooner.
While Lowrie probably isn't quite as good of a hitter as he showed last summer -- which is to say he isn't one of the best-hitting shortstops in baseball history -- the performance also doesn't scream fluke. His BABIP was a rather ordinary .292 and his plate discipline was such that his OBP wasn't hollow. Furthermore, with his wrist finally healthy, he showed that he was capable of hitting fastballs -- something that can't be said for Scutaro.
The Red Sox starting shortstop's performance in 2010 did more to evoke memories of Lou Merloni than of Garciaparra. Scutaro ended up being worth less than half of what he had been in 2009, which was largely due to the fact that he couldn't maintain his career-high walk rate. In 2010, Scutaro walked in only 7.6 percent of his plate appearances, almost half of his '09 total, and his lowest since 2004, when he was with the Oakland Athletics. As a result, his wOBA dipped from .354 in '09 to .319.
In context however, Scutaro's performance was acceptable enough for most teams. His 93 wRC+ was the first time a Sox shortstop had put up a wRC+ over 90 in anything other than a limited sample since 2005. He also performed admirably in relation to his peer group across the game. Scutaro's 93 wRC+ was 11th among qualified shortstops and his .319 wOBA tied for ninth, just one point below Jeter.
Jeter famously took a huge step backward last year, showing his age and leading to questions about how much The Captain had left to offer at the plate. Jeter has always maintained a high rate of hits on balls in play, but last year, his mark fell to a more average .307, which represented a 49-point drop from his 2007-2009 level. The reason was simple: Jeter hit the ball in the air much less frequently. His ground-ball percentage was his highest total since 2002. Conversely, his line-drive percentage and fly-ball percentage were his lowest to date. The combination of Jeter hitting nearly 9 percent fewer balls in the air combined with a much lower BABIP on balls hit on the ground contributed to driving his value way down. And given his age, it may be down to stay.
From 1996 to 2008, Jeter's wRC+ was 127, and in 2009, it was 135. Last season, it dipped to 95. His 2011 forecasts push him back over the average needle -- Dan Szymborski's ZiPS projections have him at 102, just a tick better than an average hitter. However, that is a far cry from his glory days, and with Jeter's batted ball profile in the first handful of games this season looking eerily similar to last season's, he may have to rely on his ground balls consistently growing eyes to see any sort of significant improvement.
Scutaro is forecast for pretty much the same season -- ZiPS pegs Scutaro's wRC+ at 96, though his superior glovework offsets the small difference in offensive production.
Due to the small amount of success Lowrie has had in the majors, his projections are at a similar level to the more established starters, but he's clearly trending upward. In 2010, he halved his career strikeout rate, whiffing in only 12.7 percentage of his plate appearances. Contact rates stabilize quickly, and suggest that Lowrie should be able to maintain some of the breakout performance from 2010.
At this point in their careers, the three shortstops may be projected for similar performances, but Lowrie is the one who has a chance to to take off and surpass his expectations. Unfortunately, he needs playing time in order to do so and Scutaro has started six of Boston's first eight games at shortstop. If the Red Sox want to inject some life into a lineup that has struggled out of the gate, perhaps putting their best shortstop on the field would be a good place to start.
Piece on Showalter.
Spoiler [+]
On Aug. 3, the day Buck Showalter managed his first game with the Baltimore Orioles, the team sat in last place at 32-73, a full 34 games out of first and 22.5 games behind the Toronto Blue Jays for fourth in the American League East. There was little hope for the 2010 Orioles to even escape the cellar, let alone make some noise in baseball's most challenging division.
However, the former "Baseball Tonight" analyst led the Orioles to a 34-23 record after taking over, behind only the Twins and Phillies for the best record in the majors during that stretch. The Orioles were firing on all cylinders, hitting better, pitching better and playing better defense.
The remarkable turnaround has carried through the offseason and into the first week of the 2011 regular season. The Orioles won four in a row to kick off the season, including a sweep of the division-rival Rays in St. Petersburg. Has Showalter developed a magical touch that has worked wonders with the young Orioles?
[h4]Buck Up[/h4][table][tr][th=""]Category[/th][th=""]2010 pre-Showalter[/th][th=""]2010-11 with Showalter*[/th][/tr][tr][td]W-L[/td][td]32-73[/td][td]38-24[/td][/tr][tr][td]Runs per Game[/td][td]3.61[/td][td]4.10[/td][/tr][tr][td]Runs Allowed per Game[/td][td]5.46[/td][td]3.60[/td][/tr][tr][td]*through Wednesday's game[/td][/tr][/table]
Digging a little deeper, we find the Orioles changed more than just their manager toward the end of last season.
First came the left-field transition. After trying Nolan Reimold and Corey Patterson as starting left fielders, Felix Pie started playing every day in early July. Pie didn't bring a strong bat to the lineup (although he's no worse than Reimold or Patterson), but he provided above-average defense alongside Nick Markakis and former Gold Glove-winner Adam Jones.
One of the few cornerstones of the roster, Brian Roberts, missed the majority of the 2010 season with a back injury. Coincidentally, Roberts returned to the lineup at the end of July, shortly before Showalter was hired. Roberts isn't a powerful offensive force, but he was a significant upgrade over Julio Lugo's sub-.300 OBP.
Roberts' return allowed Ty Wigginton to shift from second base, where he was overmatched defensively, to first. Around the same time, the Orioles traded Miguel Tejada and his .308 OBP, and gave prospect Josh Bell an audition as the everyday third baseman. Bell struggled mightily against major league pitching but is a small upgrade defensively over the veteran Tejada.
On top of the lineup turnover, the Orioles' pitching staff got a boost from the farm system. With Brian Matusz already in the rotation, Chris Tillman and Jake Arrieta had joined him by season's end. Tillman struggled in his first six starts in midsummer but got better results in his five starts with Baltimore after Sept. 1.
The Orioles also saw Koji Uehara return from an early-season injury to become an extremely effective option out of the 'pen, eventually taking over the closer's role from Alfredo Simon.
Regardless of the managerial situation, the Orioles' lineup heading into August was stronger, at least on the mound and in the field, than the roster Showalter's predecessors had to work with. While he's certainly generated some excitement around the Orioles, Showalter's "magic" is perhaps better characterized as "better players."
Most teams on impressive streaks benefit from at least a little luck, and Showalter's crew is no exception. In fact, the Orioles' offensive statistics since Showalter took the helm are almost identical to their pre-Showalter numbers, despite the fact that they've scored half a run more per game.
[h4]The Turnaround[/h4][table][tr][th=""]Category[/th][th=""]2010 pre-Showalter[/th][th=""]2010-11 with Showalter*[/th][/tr][tr][td]Batting Average[/td][td].256[/td][td].261[/td][/tr][tr][td]On Base Percentage[/td][td].314[/td][td].310[/td][/tr][tr][td]Slugging Percentage[/td][td].384[/td][td].386[/td][/tr][tr][td]Strikeouts per 9 Innings[/td][td]6.1[/td][td]6.7[/td][/tr][tr][td]Walks per 9 Innings[/td][td]3.6[/td][td]2.8[/td][/tr][tr][td]Home Runs Allowed per 9 Innings[/td][td]1.2[/td][td]1.0[/td][/tr][tr][td]Good Fielding Plays per Game[/td][td]2.1 (24th in MLB)[/td][td]3.1 (3rd in MLB)[/td][/tr][tr][td]Defensive Misplays + Errors per Game[/td][td]2.3 (19th in MLB)[/td][td]2.1 (10th in MLB)[/td][/tr][/table]
The improvement on the mound and in the field does show up in the numbers. Just watching the games, we can see the defensive improvement. Showalter's team has made more Web Gem-type Good Fielding Plays and fewer Defensive Misplays and Errors than the early-2010 team (as recorded by Baseball Info Solutions' video scouts). Additionally, the Orioles' staff has improved its strikeout, walk and home run rates since Showalter took over.
Heading into 2011, the Orioles traded for Mark Reynolds and signed free agent Derrek Lee, both moderate improvements over the offensive production the team got from Tejada, Bell, Garrett Atkins and Ty Wigginton at the corner infield positions last year. Although Reynolds has never rated well defensively (below-average runs saved at the hot corner in each of his five big league seasons), Lee brings a solid glove to the right side of the infield.
New shortstop J.J. Hardy also will be an upgrade over Cesar Izturis on both sides of the ball. And Baltimore signed 36-year-old Vladimir Guerrero coming off a resurgent season. However, after accounting for park effects, Guerrero is hardly an upgrade over the .902 OPS that Luke Scott posted in an underrated performance as the Orioles' primary DH last season.
Additionally, the Orioles' minor league system continues to churn out pitching prospects, as Zach Britton pitched well in his major league debut. When Matusz recovers from a back muscle injury, he'll complete a young rotation with tremendous upside -- the exact opposite of last year's Opening Day rotation, which featured Kevin Millwood at the top.
Unfortunately, Showalter's club has a tall mountain to climb. Despite its late-season surge, it finished 30 games out of the competitive AL East. While the 2011 Orioles are off to a fantastic start and are taking several steps in the right direction, Showalter's "magic" is unlikely to last long.
However, the former "Baseball Tonight" analyst led the Orioles to a 34-23 record after taking over, behind only the Twins and Phillies for the best record in the majors during that stretch. The Orioles were firing on all cylinders, hitting better, pitching better and playing better defense.
The remarkable turnaround has carried through the offseason and into the first week of the 2011 regular season. The Orioles won four in a row to kick off the season, including a sweep of the division-rival Rays in St. Petersburg. Has Showalter developed a magical touch that has worked wonders with the young Orioles?
[h4]Buck Up[/h4][table][tr][th=""]Category[/th][th=""]2010 pre-Showalter[/th][th=""]2010-11 with Showalter*[/th][/tr][tr][td]W-L[/td][td]32-73[/td][td]38-24[/td][/tr][tr][td]Runs per Game[/td][td]3.61[/td][td]4.10[/td][/tr][tr][td]Runs Allowed per Game[/td][td]5.46[/td][td]3.60[/td][/tr][tr][td]*through Wednesday's game[/td][/tr][/table]
Digging a little deeper, we find the Orioles changed more than just their manager toward the end of last season.
First came the left-field transition. After trying Nolan Reimold and Corey Patterson as starting left fielders, Felix Pie started playing every day in early July. Pie didn't bring a strong bat to the lineup (although he's no worse than Reimold or Patterson), but he provided above-average defense alongside Nick Markakis and former Gold Glove-winner Adam Jones.
One of the few cornerstones of the roster, Brian Roberts, missed the majority of the 2010 season with a back injury. Coincidentally, Roberts returned to the lineup at the end of July, shortly before Showalter was hired. Roberts isn't a powerful offensive force, but he was a significant upgrade over Julio Lugo's sub-.300 OBP.
Roberts' return allowed Ty Wigginton to shift from second base, where he was overmatched defensively, to first. Around the same time, the Orioles traded Miguel Tejada and his .308 OBP, and gave prospect Josh Bell an audition as the everyday third baseman. Bell struggled mightily against major league pitching but is a small upgrade defensively over the veteran Tejada.
On top of the lineup turnover, the Orioles' pitching staff got a boost from the farm system. With Brian Matusz already in the rotation, Chris Tillman and Jake Arrieta had joined him by season's end. Tillman struggled in his first six starts in midsummer but got better results in his five starts with Baltimore after Sept. 1.
The Orioles also saw Koji Uehara return from an early-season injury to become an extremely effective option out of the 'pen, eventually taking over the closer's role from Alfredo Simon.
Regardless of the managerial situation, the Orioles' lineup heading into August was stronger, at least on the mound and in the field, than the roster Showalter's predecessors had to work with. While he's certainly generated some excitement around the Orioles, Showalter's "magic" is perhaps better characterized as "better players."
Most teams on impressive streaks benefit from at least a little luck, and Showalter's crew is no exception. In fact, the Orioles' offensive statistics since Showalter took the helm are almost identical to their pre-Showalter numbers, despite the fact that they've scored half a run more per game.
[h4]The Turnaround[/h4][table][tr][th=""]Category[/th][th=""]2010 pre-Showalter[/th][th=""]2010-11 with Showalter*[/th][/tr][tr][td]Batting Average[/td][td].256[/td][td].261[/td][/tr][tr][td]On Base Percentage[/td][td].314[/td][td].310[/td][/tr][tr][td]Slugging Percentage[/td][td].384[/td][td].386[/td][/tr][tr][td]Strikeouts per 9 Innings[/td][td]6.1[/td][td]6.7[/td][/tr][tr][td]Walks per 9 Innings[/td][td]3.6[/td][td]2.8[/td][/tr][tr][td]Home Runs Allowed per 9 Innings[/td][td]1.2[/td][td]1.0[/td][/tr][tr][td]Good Fielding Plays per Game[/td][td]2.1 (24th in MLB)[/td][td]3.1 (3rd in MLB)[/td][/tr][tr][td]Defensive Misplays + Errors per Game[/td][td]2.3 (19th in MLB)[/td][td]2.1 (10th in MLB)[/td][/tr][/table]
The improvement on the mound and in the field does show up in the numbers. Just watching the games, we can see the defensive improvement. Showalter's team has made more Web Gem-type Good Fielding Plays and fewer Defensive Misplays and Errors than the early-2010 team (as recorded by Baseball Info Solutions' video scouts). Additionally, the Orioles' staff has improved its strikeout, walk and home run rates since Showalter took over.
Heading into 2011, the Orioles traded for Mark Reynolds and signed free agent Derrek Lee, both moderate improvements over the offensive production the team got from Tejada, Bell, Garrett Atkins and Ty Wigginton at the corner infield positions last year. Although Reynolds has never rated well defensively (below-average runs saved at the hot corner in each of his five big league seasons), Lee brings a solid glove to the right side of the infield.
New shortstop J.J. Hardy also will be an upgrade over Cesar Izturis on both sides of the ball. And Baltimore signed 36-year-old Vladimir Guerrero coming off a resurgent season. However, after accounting for park effects, Guerrero is hardly an upgrade over the .902 OPS that Luke Scott posted in an underrated performance as the Orioles' primary DH last season.
Additionally, the Orioles' minor league system continues to churn out pitching prospects, as Zach Britton pitched well in his major league debut. When Matusz recovers from a back muscle injury, he'll complete a young rotation with tremendous upside -- the exact opposite of last year's Opening Day rotation, which featured Kevin Millwood at the top.
Unfortunately, Showalter's club has a tall mountain to climb. Despite its late-season surge, it finished 30 games out of the competitive AL East. While the 2011 Orioles are off to a fantastic start and are taking several steps in the right direction, Showalter's "magic" is unlikely to last long.
Rumors.
Spoiler [+]
http://[h3]Ross nearing return[/h3]
11:50AM ET
[h5]Cody Ross | Giants [/h5]
Cody Ross is just about ready to start playing in games as he rehabs from a strained right calf injury, reports the team's Web site.
Ross is likely to play in an extended spring training game or two before moving to an affiliated roster.
Once hes ready to return, Nate Schierholtz is likely to be sent back to Triple-A, though he's been hitting of late and the Giants could decide to finally pull the plug on Aaron Rowand's tenure with the organization
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Figgins' injury serious?[/h3]
11:31AM ET
[h5]Chone Figgins | Mariners [/h5]
It doesn't appear that the thumb injury suffered by Chone Figgins Monday night will land him on the disabled list, as X-rays were negative, but he was removed from the game and could take a seat for a day or two while the bruise heals.
Luis Rodriguez, who smokes the game-winning hit in the bottom of the ninth against the Jays to cap a rally back from a 7-0 deficit, stepped in for Figgins at third base ans figures to be among those that fills in if Figgins misses additional time.
The club could also use Adam Kennedy at third base.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Does Francisco need more time?[/h3]
11:21AM ET
[h5]Frank Francisco | Blue Jays [/h5]
The Toronto Blue Jays are hoping to get Frank Francisco back soon, and the right-hander is on a rehab assignment in Dunedin, Florida. But he hasn't been sharp in either his two appearances so far, allowing six runs in an inning and two-thirds.
He's also allowed two long balls and walked three batters, a sign that his command is not there, and the Blue Jays may prefer he shows some consistency before activating him from the disabled list.
Their bullpen is fine, despite a meltdown Monday night in Seattle, and Francisco has more than three weeks left on his rehab clock.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Morales timetable[/h3]
11:00AM ET
[h5]Kendrys Morales | Angels [/h5]
While there is no official timetable for Kendrys Morales' return, he did take batting practice and participate in fielding drills last Tuesday, and plans to run on flat ground this week reports the L.A. Times.
Morales will need to show he can run the bases and show lateral agility without experiencing a setback before being activated, but a late-April return is still possible.
Morales is likely to be sent out on a rehab assignment to face live pitching before he debuts for the Halos.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Zumaya's future in Motown[/h3]
10:11AM ET
[h5]Joel Zumaya | Tigers [/h5]
We mentioned earlier this week how Joel Zumaya would be a nice addition to the Detroit Tigers' bullpen, but those plans were put on hold again last weekend when the reliever experienced some discomfort in his elbow was shut down.
Zumaya will rest and perhaps try throwing again after a few days, but the club continues to consult with Dr. James Andrews to determine what's next. One Detroit columnist says the Tigers may be putting too much stock in Zumaya?s return and need to cut the cord.
Drew Sharp of the Free Press writes that Zumaya remains a sentimental favorite thanks to his performance for the 2006 American League champions, but the injury issues are too big to ignore.
"He's the closest replica we've had to Mark Fidrych, that shooting star burning the brightest through the sheer velocity of its trajectory," Sharp writes. "But it's extinguished just as quickly and that's hard to accept. Instead of begging for a return to what once was, perhaps it's better now simply appreciating what once was."
The Tigers, at least publicly, are still hopeful for a return, even if Zumaya has pitched no more than 31 games each of the last four seasons.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Gutierrez close to rehab stint[/h3]
10:10AM ET
[h5]Franklin Gutierrez | Mariners [/h5]
UPDATE: Bob Condotta of the Seattle Times reports Gutierrez will work out in Seattle for the rest of the Mariners' homestand, then likely head to Triple-A Tacoma this weekend for a rehab stint.
--
Franklin Gutierrez played three innings in an extended spring training game in Arizona Friday, reports the Seattle Times, suggesting that the Gold Glove centerfielder is nearing a return to the lineup. But he'll have to show the team that the latest treatment plan for his digestive issues is working before he's activated.
The Seattle Mariners, once Gutierrez returns, will have to make a decision on Michael Saunders and Ryan Langerhans. One of them will have to be sent out, with Saunders the more likely candidate because he has an option remaining and can be shipped to Triple-A without the risk of exposing him to waivers, unlike Langerhans.
Neither player has hit yet, though Langerhans boasts a .353 on-base percentage thanks to five walks -- four Friday versus Cleveland. Langerhans also has half of the club's home run total for the year, though that is nothing to write home about as the M's have managed just two long balls in seven games.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Bullpen tests Ozzie's patience[/h3]
9:39AM ET
[h5]Chicago White Sox [/h5]
Ozzie Guillen may be doing his best to keep a stiff upper lip, but the White Sox manager is growing restless with his bullpen situation after Matt Thornton blew his third save of the season Monday against Oakland, reports Doug Padilla of ESPNChicago.com.
In defense of Thornton, Monday's blown save was the result of a dropped fly ball by left fielder Juan Pierre. As of now, Guillen isn't talking about drastic changes, even if his patience is running thin.
"(Thornton?s) going to be back out there," Guillen said "Like I say, it look like a rewind of the game a couple of days ago. We make a couple of mistakes and today, again, we don't help him."
Chris Sale picked up a save Sunday, while Guillen also could consider Jesse Crain or Sergio Santos for a closer audition.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Mazzaro staying in minors[/h3]
9:11AM ET
[h5]Vin Mazzaro | Royals [/h5]
The Kansas City Royals optioned Vin Mazzaro to Triple-A Omaha at the end of spring training because the team would not require a fifth starter until Friday.
Mazzaro hasn't been carrying his weight in the minor leagues, and the Royals have scrapped plans to have him make that Friday start against Seattle, reports Bob Dutton of the Kansas City Star.
Mazzaro was pounded for five runs in just 2 1/3 innings Sunday against Albuquerque, prompting the surprising Royals to switch to long reliever Sean O'Sullivan. While O'Sullivan may have 24 starts on his resume, his 5.81 career ERA makes him unlikely to remain in the rotation for long.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Another setback for Harden[/h3]
8:57AM ET
[h5]Rich Harden | Athletics [/h5]
Oakland's Rich Harden is currently in the midst of his 10th visit to the disabled list, and it doesn't look his stay is ending any time in the immediate future.
Harden suffered another setback Monday when the right-hander was shut down after warming up with the same lat soreness that landed him on the DL, reports MLB.com's Jane Lee.
The A's have not decided what will be the next step for Harden, who began the spring with a shot at the No. 5 spot in the rotation, but is now more likely to get innings out of the bullpen if and when he's healthy.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Peavy OK with using six starters[/h3]
8:42AM ET
[h5]Chicago White Sox [/h5]
Philip Humber pitched so well in his start Saturday that White Sox pitching coach Don Cooper was talking about the Joy of Six.
Humber, the third overall pick in the 2004 draft, allowed one run over six innings against the Rays, earning the right to stay in the rotation until the return of Jake Peavy, hopefully by the end of April.
Cooper, never afraid to take a less conventional approach, told reporters Sunday he would not be opposed to occasionally using a six-man rotation. "Long term (with six starters), no. Short term, one here and one there, certainly something that's popped in my mind," Cooper said.
Peavy, who is scheduled to pitch for Triple-A Charlotte, endorsed the idea of a six-man rotation.
The White Sox have games scheduled on 20 straight days beginning Friday, giving Cooper an opportunity to test his idea.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Bailey back by end of April?[/h3]
8:34AM ET
[h5]Andrew Bailey | Athletics [/h5]
Athletics closer Andrew Bailey moved a step closer to returning from the disabled list after completing his first successful bullpen session Monday in Chicago, reporta Jane Lee of MLB.com.
Bailey, a two-time All-Star who has a history of arm trouble, has said he hopes to return by the end of the month. Manager Bob Geren says Bailey will likely take a day or two off before throwing another bullpen and working his way toward a rehab assignment.
The A's have barely missed Bailey with Brian Fuentes converting four saves in as many opportunities. The bullpen will be even strong once Bailey returns and Fuentes returns to a set-up role with occasional closing duties.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Jurrjens could start Saturday[/h3]
8:16AM ET
[h5]Jair Jurrjens | Braves [/h5]
After pitching solid innings for Triple-A Gwinnett Monday night, Jair Jurrjens is on track to make his season debut Saturday against the New York Mets, reports Carroll Rogers of the Atlanta JC.
Jurrjens reported no problems with a right oblique injury that sent him on the disabled list to start the season. Rogers adds that Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez and pitching coach Roger McDowell made the trip up to watch Jurrjens face Norfolk.
The Braves began the season with Mike Minor as their fifth starter. The injury-plagued Jurrjens will get his chance, but he might have little margin for error after going 7-6 with a 4.64 ERA last season.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Snell not ready to quit[/h3]
7:58AM ET
[h5]Ian Snell | Cardinals [/h5]
Ian Snell isn't ready to call it quits after all.
The veteran right-hander came to the St. Louis Cardinals camp as a non-roster player, but surprisingly announced his retirement in March when it became apparent he would not win a job. Snell's agent, however, told MLB.com over the weekend that his client was mulling a return.
Derrick Goold of the Post Dispatch tweeted Monday night that the Cards have released Snell so he can pursue other opportunities. At this stage, Snell would almost certainly have to first agree to a minor-league deal.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Short term plan without Ordonez[/h3]
7:40AM ET
[h5]Detroit Tigers [/h5]
Magglio Ordonez was lifted from Monday's game with tightness in his right Achilles, tweets Jason Beck of MLB.com, and while it doesn't look like he's headed for the disabled list, his day-to-day status could mean a different lineup for the club for a day or two.
Tom Gage writes in Tuesday's Detroit News that Ordonez is likely to sit out the next two games.
If Ordonez does not play Tuesday versus the Texas Rangers, both Ryan Raburn and Brennan Boesch are likely to start, even with the left-handed C.J. Wilson scheduled to take the ball for the Rangers, since Boesch has been hitting of late. Don Kelly, another lefty stick, could also see time, as could right-handed slugger Casper Wells.
If Ordonez were to hit the DL, Clete Thomas could be called up from Triple-A, though the club could decide on infielder Danny Worth, too.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Dice-K's future at Fenway[/h3]
7:35AM ET
[h5]Daisuke Matsuzaka | Red Sox [/h5]
Red Sox Nation watched another brutal outing from Daisuke Matsuzaka Monday night, and there is some speculation that the Japanese right-hander could be made at least a partial scapegoat for the team's 2-8 start.
Matsuzaka allowed seven runs on eight hits with two walks and two strikeouts in only two-plus innings against the Rays Monday night at Fenway Park. "I wouldn't be surprised if we don't see him in a Red Sox uniform again," ESPN analyst Bobby Valentine said Monday on "Baseball Tonight."
Joe McDonald of ESPNBoston.com wonder if health is an issue with Matsuzaka, even if both the pitcher and manager Terry Francona insist there are no issues.
The Red Sox are built to win this season, so GM Theo Epstein has every reason to look for pitching help right now. James Shields and Brett Myers are believed to be among the pitchers that will be available around the July deadline, but teams generally do not deal starters this early this season at the risk of upsetting their fan base.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Replacing Furcal in Hollywood[/h3]
7:09AM ET
[h5]Rafael Furcal | Dodgers [/h5]
The Los Angeles Dodgers need a Plan B at shortstop after help after Rafael Furcal suffered a broken thumb sliding headfirst into third base during Monday night's game with the San Francisco Giants.
Furcal, who already was dealing with soreness to his wrist, is headed to the disabled list. While the club didn't offer a timetable for his return, Tony Jackson of ESPNLosAngeles.com reports that injuries of this nature typically take four to six weeks to heal.
Furcal even hinted at retirement, but Jackson though that was merely an "emotional reaction" on the infielder's part.
Jamey Carroll will likely become the starting shortstop and Ivan DeJesus could be recalled from Triple-A Albuquerque with Furcal sidelined. The Dodgers also could turn to veteran Juan Castro, who also is at Albuquerque.
MLB.com's Ken Gurnick says it is likely that the Dodgers would call up top prospect Dee Gordon from Albuquerque.
Los Angeles has been floated as a possible 2012 destination for Jose Reyes, but it appears unlikely the Mets would deal their free-agent-to-be this early in the season. It remains unclear whether the Dodgers would be willing or able to surrender the pitching talent the Mets would want in return.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]LaRoche on the mend[/h3]
6:46AM ET
[h5]Adam LaRoche | Nationals [/h5]
While it appears that the Washington Nationals will place Ryan Zimmerman on the disabled list with an abdominal sprain, an injury to first baseman Adam LaRoche is not as bad.
MLB.com's Bill Ladson reports that LaRoche, who left Sunday's game against the Mets with a groin strain, will avoid a trip to the DL. The hope is that LaRoche will be in the lineup Tuesday against Philadelphia.
The Nats could start Michael Morse or Matt Stairs at first base if LaRoche needs a day off.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Zimmerman to the DL?[/h3]
6:37AM ET
[h5]Ryan Zimmerman | Nationals [/h5]
Ryan Zimmerman has played at least 142 games in four of the last five seasons, so it takes more than a minor bump or bruise to keep the Washington Nationals third baseman out of the lineup.
That's why there is a cause for concern in D.C., however, after Zimmerman aggravated a strained abdominal muscle Saturday and sat out Sunday's game against the Mets. Bill Ladson of MLB.com reports that the Nats are expected to place Zimmerman on the disabled list before Tuesday's game with the Phillies.
Alex Cora and Jerry Hairston Jr. would likely share the duties at third base if Zimmerman needs more time off.
11:50AM ET
[h5]Cody Ross | Giants [/h5]
Cody Ross is just about ready to start playing in games as he rehabs from a strained right calf injury, reports the team's Web site.
Ross is likely to play in an extended spring training game or two before moving to an affiliated roster.
Once hes ready to return, Nate Schierholtz is likely to be sent back to Triple-A, though he's been hitting of late and the Giants could decide to finally pull the plug on Aaron Rowand's tenure with the organization
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Figgins' injury serious?[/h3]
11:31AM ET
[h5]Chone Figgins | Mariners [/h5]
It doesn't appear that the thumb injury suffered by Chone Figgins Monday night will land him on the disabled list, as X-rays were negative, but he was removed from the game and could take a seat for a day or two while the bruise heals.
Luis Rodriguez, who smokes the game-winning hit in the bottom of the ninth against the Jays to cap a rally back from a 7-0 deficit, stepped in for Figgins at third base ans figures to be among those that fills in if Figgins misses additional time.
The club could also use Adam Kennedy at third base.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Does Francisco need more time?[/h3]
11:21AM ET
[h5]Frank Francisco | Blue Jays [/h5]
The Toronto Blue Jays are hoping to get Frank Francisco back soon, and the right-hander is on a rehab assignment in Dunedin, Florida. But he hasn't been sharp in either his two appearances so far, allowing six runs in an inning and two-thirds.
He's also allowed two long balls and walked three batters, a sign that his command is not there, and the Blue Jays may prefer he shows some consistency before activating him from the disabled list.
Their bullpen is fine, despite a meltdown Monday night in Seattle, and Francisco has more than three weeks left on his rehab clock.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Morales timetable[/h3]
11:00AM ET
[h5]Kendrys Morales | Angels [/h5]
While there is no official timetable for Kendrys Morales' return, he did take batting practice and participate in fielding drills last Tuesday, and plans to run on flat ground this week reports the L.A. Times.
Morales will need to show he can run the bases and show lateral agility without experiencing a setback before being activated, but a late-April return is still possible.
Morales is likely to be sent out on a rehab assignment to face live pitching before he debuts for the Halos.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Zumaya's future in Motown[/h3]
10:11AM ET
[h5]Joel Zumaya | Tigers [/h5]
We mentioned earlier this week how Joel Zumaya would be a nice addition to the Detroit Tigers' bullpen, but those plans were put on hold again last weekend when the reliever experienced some discomfort in his elbow was shut down.
Zumaya will rest and perhaps try throwing again after a few days, but the club continues to consult with Dr. James Andrews to determine what's next. One Detroit columnist says the Tigers may be putting too much stock in Zumaya?s return and need to cut the cord.
Drew Sharp of the Free Press writes that Zumaya remains a sentimental favorite thanks to his performance for the 2006 American League champions, but the injury issues are too big to ignore.
"He's the closest replica we've had to Mark Fidrych, that shooting star burning the brightest through the sheer velocity of its trajectory," Sharp writes. "But it's extinguished just as quickly and that's hard to accept. Instead of begging for a return to what once was, perhaps it's better now simply appreciating what once was."
The Tigers, at least publicly, are still hopeful for a return, even if Zumaya has pitched no more than 31 games each of the last four seasons.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Gutierrez close to rehab stint[/h3]
10:10AM ET
[h5]Franklin Gutierrez | Mariners [/h5]
UPDATE: Bob Condotta of the Seattle Times reports Gutierrez will work out in Seattle for the rest of the Mariners' homestand, then likely head to Triple-A Tacoma this weekend for a rehab stint.
--
Franklin Gutierrez played three innings in an extended spring training game in Arizona Friday, reports the Seattle Times, suggesting that the Gold Glove centerfielder is nearing a return to the lineup. But he'll have to show the team that the latest treatment plan for his digestive issues is working before he's activated.
The Seattle Mariners, once Gutierrez returns, will have to make a decision on Michael Saunders and Ryan Langerhans. One of them will have to be sent out, with Saunders the more likely candidate because he has an option remaining and can be shipped to Triple-A without the risk of exposing him to waivers, unlike Langerhans.
Neither player has hit yet, though Langerhans boasts a .353 on-base percentage thanks to five walks -- four Friday versus Cleveland. Langerhans also has half of the club's home run total for the year, though that is nothing to write home about as the M's have managed just two long balls in seven games.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Bullpen tests Ozzie's patience[/h3]
9:39AM ET
[h5]Chicago White Sox [/h5]
Ozzie Guillen may be doing his best to keep a stiff upper lip, but the White Sox manager is growing restless with his bullpen situation after Matt Thornton blew his third save of the season Monday against Oakland, reports Doug Padilla of ESPNChicago.com.
In defense of Thornton, Monday's blown save was the result of a dropped fly ball by left fielder Juan Pierre. As of now, Guillen isn't talking about drastic changes, even if his patience is running thin.
"(Thornton?s) going to be back out there," Guillen said "Like I say, it look like a rewind of the game a couple of days ago. We make a couple of mistakes and today, again, we don't help him."
Chris Sale picked up a save Sunday, while Guillen also could consider Jesse Crain or Sergio Santos for a closer audition.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Mazzaro staying in minors[/h3]
9:11AM ET
[h5]Vin Mazzaro | Royals [/h5]
The Kansas City Royals optioned Vin Mazzaro to Triple-A Omaha at the end of spring training because the team would not require a fifth starter until Friday.
Mazzaro hasn't been carrying his weight in the minor leagues, and the Royals have scrapped plans to have him make that Friday start against Seattle, reports Bob Dutton of the Kansas City Star.
Mazzaro was pounded for five runs in just 2 1/3 innings Sunday against Albuquerque, prompting the surprising Royals to switch to long reliever Sean O'Sullivan. While O'Sullivan may have 24 starts on his resume, his 5.81 career ERA makes him unlikely to remain in the rotation for long.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Another setback for Harden[/h3]
8:57AM ET
[h5]Rich Harden | Athletics [/h5]
Oakland's Rich Harden is currently in the midst of his 10th visit to the disabled list, and it doesn't look his stay is ending any time in the immediate future.
Harden suffered another setback Monday when the right-hander was shut down after warming up with the same lat soreness that landed him on the DL, reports MLB.com's Jane Lee.
The A's have not decided what will be the next step for Harden, who began the spring with a shot at the No. 5 spot in the rotation, but is now more likely to get innings out of the bullpen if and when he's healthy.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Peavy OK with using six starters[/h3]
8:42AM ET
[h5]Chicago White Sox [/h5]
Philip Humber pitched so well in his start Saturday that White Sox pitching coach Don Cooper was talking about the Joy of Six.
Humber, the third overall pick in the 2004 draft, allowed one run over six innings against the Rays, earning the right to stay in the rotation until the return of Jake Peavy, hopefully by the end of April.
Cooper, never afraid to take a less conventional approach, told reporters Sunday he would not be opposed to occasionally using a six-man rotation. "Long term (with six starters), no. Short term, one here and one there, certainly something that's popped in my mind," Cooper said.
Peavy, who is scheduled to pitch for Triple-A Charlotte, endorsed the idea of a six-man rotation.
The White Sox have games scheduled on 20 straight days beginning Friday, giving Cooper an opportunity to test his idea.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Bailey back by end of April?[/h3]
8:34AM ET
[h5]Andrew Bailey | Athletics [/h5]
Athletics closer Andrew Bailey moved a step closer to returning from the disabled list after completing his first successful bullpen session Monday in Chicago, reporta Jane Lee of MLB.com.
Bailey, a two-time All-Star who has a history of arm trouble, has said he hopes to return by the end of the month. Manager Bob Geren says Bailey will likely take a day or two off before throwing another bullpen and working his way toward a rehab assignment.
The A's have barely missed Bailey with Brian Fuentes converting four saves in as many opportunities. The bullpen will be even strong once Bailey returns and Fuentes returns to a set-up role with occasional closing duties.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Jurrjens could start Saturday[/h3]
8:16AM ET
[h5]Jair Jurrjens | Braves [/h5]
After pitching solid innings for Triple-A Gwinnett Monday night, Jair Jurrjens is on track to make his season debut Saturday against the New York Mets, reports Carroll Rogers of the Atlanta JC.
Jurrjens reported no problems with a right oblique injury that sent him on the disabled list to start the season. Rogers adds that Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez and pitching coach Roger McDowell made the trip up to watch Jurrjens face Norfolk.
The Braves began the season with Mike Minor as their fifth starter. The injury-plagued Jurrjens will get his chance, but he might have little margin for error after going 7-6 with a 4.64 ERA last season.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Snell not ready to quit[/h3]
7:58AM ET
[h5]Ian Snell | Cardinals [/h5]
Ian Snell isn't ready to call it quits after all.
The veteran right-hander came to the St. Louis Cardinals camp as a non-roster player, but surprisingly announced his retirement in March when it became apparent he would not win a job. Snell's agent, however, told MLB.com over the weekend that his client was mulling a return.
Derrick Goold of the Post Dispatch tweeted Monday night that the Cards have released Snell so he can pursue other opportunities. At this stage, Snell would almost certainly have to first agree to a minor-league deal.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Short term plan without Ordonez[/h3]
7:40AM ET
[h5]Detroit Tigers [/h5]
Magglio Ordonez was lifted from Monday's game with tightness in his right Achilles, tweets Jason Beck of MLB.com, and while it doesn't look like he's headed for the disabled list, his day-to-day status could mean a different lineup for the club for a day or two.
Tom Gage writes in Tuesday's Detroit News that Ordonez is likely to sit out the next two games.
If Ordonez does not play Tuesday versus the Texas Rangers, both Ryan Raburn and Brennan Boesch are likely to start, even with the left-handed C.J. Wilson scheduled to take the ball for the Rangers, since Boesch has been hitting of late. Don Kelly, another lefty stick, could also see time, as could right-handed slugger Casper Wells.
If Ordonez were to hit the DL, Clete Thomas could be called up from Triple-A, though the club could decide on infielder Danny Worth, too.
- Jason A. Churchill
http://[h3]Dice-K's future at Fenway[/h3]
7:35AM ET
[h5]Daisuke Matsuzaka | Red Sox [/h5]
Red Sox Nation watched another brutal outing from Daisuke Matsuzaka Monday night, and there is some speculation that the Japanese right-hander could be made at least a partial scapegoat for the team's 2-8 start.
Matsuzaka allowed seven runs on eight hits with two walks and two strikeouts in only two-plus innings against the Rays Monday night at Fenway Park. "I wouldn't be surprised if we don't see him in a Red Sox uniform again," ESPN analyst Bobby Valentine said Monday on "Baseball Tonight."
Joe McDonald of ESPNBoston.com wonder if health is an issue with Matsuzaka, even if both the pitcher and manager Terry Francona insist there are no issues.
The Red Sox are built to win this season, so GM Theo Epstein has every reason to look for pitching help right now. James Shields and Brett Myers are believed to be among the pitchers that will be available around the July deadline, but teams generally do not deal starters this early this season at the risk of upsetting their fan base.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Replacing Furcal in Hollywood[/h3]
7:09AM ET
[h5]Rafael Furcal | Dodgers [/h5]
The Los Angeles Dodgers need a Plan B at shortstop after help after Rafael Furcal suffered a broken thumb sliding headfirst into third base during Monday night's game with the San Francisco Giants.
Furcal, who already was dealing with soreness to his wrist, is headed to the disabled list. While the club didn't offer a timetable for his return, Tony Jackson of ESPNLosAngeles.com reports that injuries of this nature typically take four to six weeks to heal.
Furcal even hinted at retirement, but Jackson though that was merely an "emotional reaction" on the infielder's part.
Jamey Carroll will likely become the starting shortstop and Ivan DeJesus could be recalled from Triple-A Albuquerque with Furcal sidelined. The Dodgers also could turn to veteran Juan Castro, who also is at Albuquerque.
MLB.com's Ken Gurnick says it is likely that the Dodgers would call up top prospect Dee Gordon from Albuquerque.
Los Angeles has been floated as a possible 2012 destination for Jose Reyes, but it appears unlikely the Mets would deal their free-agent-to-be this early in the season. It remains unclear whether the Dodgers would be willing or able to surrender the pitching talent the Mets would want in return.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]LaRoche on the mend[/h3]
6:46AM ET
[h5]Adam LaRoche | Nationals [/h5]
While it appears that the Washington Nationals will place Ryan Zimmerman on the disabled list with an abdominal sprain, an injury to first baseman Adam LaRoche is not as bad.
MLB.com's Bill Ladson reports that LaRoche, who left Sunday's game against the Mets with a groin strain, will avoid a trip to the DL. The hope is that LaRoche will be in the lineup Tuesday against Philadelphia.
The Nats could start Michael Morse or Matt Stairs at first base if LaRoche needs a day off.
- Doug Mittler
http://[h3]Zimmerman to the DL?[/h3]
6:37AM ET
[h5]Ryan Zimmerman | Nationals [/h5]
Ryan Zimmerman has played at least 142 games in four of the last five seasons, so it takes more than a minor bump or bruise to keep the Washington Nationals third baseman out of the lineup.
That's why there is a cause for concern in D.C., however, after Zimmerman aggravated a strained abdominal muscle Saturday and sat out Sunday's game against the Mets. Bill Ladson of MLB.com reports that the Nats are expected to place Zimmerman on the disabled list before Tuesday's game with the Phillies.
Alex Cora and Jerry Hairston Jr. would likely share the duties at third base if Zimmerman needs more time off.
- 10,371
- 653
- Joined
- Jan 3, 2011
I love Josh Hamilton trying to score on that foul out. Too bad he failed and got hurt.
- Status