General Manager: Jed Hoyer
Farm Director: Randy Smith
Scouting Director: Jaron Madison

2006-2009 Draft Results:
First three rounds included
x- over-slot signees ($200,000 or more)

2009 1st Round: Donavan Tate, OF, Georgia HS
2. Everett Williams, OF, Texas HS
3. Jerry Sullivan, RHP, Oral Roberts
s- Keyvius Sampson, RHP, Florida HS
6x – James Needy, RHP, California HS
17x – Jorge Reyes, RHP, Oregon State

The Padres nabbed the toolsy Tate with the club’s first pick, but the first-selection curse continues to haunt the players. The outfielder has already had more medical procedures than big league at-bats. So far, he’s suffered from a sports hernia, and suffered a broken jaw/facial lacerations (thanks to an off-season ATV accident).

Williams was a possible first-round selection, so the club was lucky to get him in the second round. The outfielder appeared in just 10 games but he showed flashes of his explosiveness with some power and speed.

Sullivan is a big, strong right-hander with a plus change-up. He pitched 53.2 innings and allowed 44 hits in short-season ball. He showed some iffy control (4.53 BB/9) but he racked up his fair share of strikeouts (9.73 K/9). Sampson made four appearances after signing out of the third round. In 8.0 innings, he allowed four hits and struck out eight batters.

Needy appeared in five games and made three starts. The right-hander showed good control (2.65 BB/9) but he didn’t strike out many batters (6.88 K/9). He’s not a big strikeout pitcher to begin with as his fastball currently grades out slightly below-average but he’s young and could add velocity. Reyes, 22, made just three appearances after signing. A starter in college and in his debut, he’s expected to eventually move to the bullpen since he lacks a third pitch.

2008 1st Round: Allan Dykstra, 1B, Wake Forest
1S. Jaff Decker, OF, Arizona HS
1S. Logan Forsythe, 3B, Arkansas
2. James Darnell, 3B, South Carolina
3. Blake Tekotte, OF, Miami
3S. Sawyer Carroll, OF, Kentucky
6x – Cole Figueroa, 2B, Florida
8x – Beamer Weems, SS, Baylor

The club nabbed four Top 10 picks in Decker, Forsythe, Darnell, and Carroll. Dykstra has been slowed by injuries and poor numbers. He spent last season in low-A ball and hit just .226 despite walking at a crazy rate (19.4%). He struck out a lot (25.1%) and posted an ISO rate of just .148.

Tekotte, 22, also spent the season in low-A ball and hit .258/.345/.396 in 530 at-bats. He showed a respectable walk rate at 11.1% and kept his strikeout rate below 20%. The speedy outfielder nabbed 30 bases in 42 attempts. Figueroa remains one of my favorite sleepers. He hit .319/.408/.403 in 238 low-A at-bats before moving up to high-A where he struggled in 21 games. The second baseman has a good eye at the plate, as well as some speed and a line-drive bat. Weams posted a solid walk rate (16.7%) in high-A but he lacks pop and speed, so he projects as more of a utility player. He’s excellent with the glove.

2007 1st Round: Nick Schmidt, LHP, Arkansas
1S. Kellen Kulbacki, OF, James Madison
1S. Andrew Cumberland, SS, Florida HS
1S. Mitch Canham, C, Oregon State
1S. Cory Luebke, LHP, Ohio State
1S. Danny Payne, OF, Georgia Tech
2. Eric Sogard, 2B, Arizona State
2. Brad Chalk, OF, Clemson
3. Tommy Toledo, RHP, Florida HS (Did not sign)

With eight picks before the third round, the club was set to add a lot of depth. Unfortunately, top pick Schmidt was derailed by surgery and Kulbacki had a terrible offensive season in ’09 while dealing with his own health concerns. Luebke is the only top draftee who appears on the Top 10 list, but he’s joined by Lance Zawadzki (4th round) and Wynn Pelzer (9th).

Cumberland had a nice season in ’09 (although he missed time with injuries) while playing in low-A ball for the second straight season. The infielder hit .293/.386/.410 in 290 at-bats. He stole 19 bases in 22 tries and showed a good eye at the plate with a BB/K of 1.11.

Already 25, Canham continues to work on his defense behind the plate. He hit OK in double-A this past season with a line of .263/.339/.371 in 407 at-bats. His power output (.108 ISO) was a bit of a disappointment. After an intriguing debut, Payne’s last two seasons have been disappointments. He has posted excellent walk rates but his strikeout rates have been way too high given his modest power output (.143 ISO in ’09).

Sogard was recently traded to Oakland while Chalk projects as a possible fourth outfielder. In ’09, he hit .301/.357/.398 with 33 steals in 41 attempts in high-A.

2006 1st Round: Matt Antonelli, IF, Wake Forest
1S. Kyler Burke, OF, Tennessee HS
2. Chad Huffman, OF, Texas Christian
2. Wade LeBlanc, LHP, Alabama
3. Cedric Hunter, OF, Georgia HS
11x – Mat Latos, RHP, Florida HS

Antonelli had a solid ’07 but he was rushed through the system and hasn’t hit in the past two seasons. His injury-shortened ’09 season in triple-A produced a line of .196/.300/.339. The most promising player in the draft is Latos, who may have already secured himself a rotation spot after posting respectable numbers in his MLB debut (10 starts).

Burke is another talented prospect but he was dealt to the Cubs. Huffman has shown flashes of excellent power, including an ISO rate of .200 in triple-A, but the jury remains out on whether or not he projects to be a big league regular, or a quad-A star.

LeBlanc, 25, posted a 4.97 FIP in nine big-league starts in ’09 but the southpaw has a below-average fastball (even for a lefty) and his command hasn’t been as sharp in the Majors as in the minors. He may end up in the bullpen where he can focus on his cutter/change-up mix.

At just 21 years of age, Hunter remains a sleeper prospect but he hit just .261 with a walk rate of 4.3% in double-A in ’09. He’ll need to get on base more often and his lack of power doesn’t help his chances. Third baseman David Freese was a nice find in the ninth round, but he’s now in St. Louis.

Up Next: The San Diego Padres Top 10 Prospects

Take a look around the league and you’ll see few, if any, bullpens that couldn’t use another arm. We’ve come to recognize relievers as the most volatile entities in baseball. Because they pitch so few innings it becomes difficult to gauge their true talent level, and so we see production fluctuate from one year to another, sometimes to a high degree. Even teams with solid bullpens could do worse than sign a high-potential reliever to a minor league contract. Yet, Kiko Calero remains unemployed.

I’d ask why this is the case, but the answer stares us in the eyes. Over the past three seasons Calero has missed time due to shoulder injuries. The most severe came in 2008, when he strained his rotator cuff and missed the first two months of the season. Upon his return he pitched reasonably well, allowing three runs (two earned) on just three hits and three walks through 4.2 innings. The only runs came in a single appearance against the Yankees, and it was actually Alan Embree who allowed the runners to score. One two-inning scoreless appearance later, the A’s designated Calero for assignment, releasing him 10 days later.

Why would the A’s release a reliever like Calero, who had pitched so well for them in the past? I’m not quite sure, but his performance in Triple-A later that season put that question to rest. He got roughed up in the hitter-friendly PCL, allowing four home runs and walking 12 in 21.1 innings. The sample was short, but the results were anything but encouraging. Calero had to settle for a minor league deal with the Marlins, though he broke camp with the team.

Despite again missing time with shoulder issues, this time inflammation, Calero managed 60 innings with the Marlins, posting a 2.56 FIP on the strength of 69 strikeouts and just a single home run. Not only was his FIP an excellent 2.56, but his tERA checked in at an even lower 2.29. As R.J. noted in September, Calero’s contact rate was among the lowest in the league. He finished 10th lowest among MLB pitchers with at least 50 IP.

Beyond injuries, one concern is that Calero’s ridiculously low home run is unsustainable. His 1.4 percent HR/FB ratio in 2009 was the lowest of his career, despite his fly ball rate being the highest. Any ERA predictor that normalizes for home run rate would have pegged Calero a bit higher than FIP and tERA, and we saw that in his 3.92 xFIP. Even so, that’s a decent number for a middle reliever.

He performs especially well against righties, a plus for any interested team. Over his career he’s faced 787 same-handed batters, striking out 223 of them, 28 percent, and walking just 62, or 8 percent, both better than his career averages. Perhaps most importantly, he’s allowed just 13 home runs, or one every 60.5 right-handed hitters faced. This is in spite of his fly ball rate, which sits at 52 percent against righties. Yet he pitches well enough against lefties that having him face a pinch-hitter, or a lefty between two righties, isn’t a huge concern.

It doesn’t appear a major league offer is in the cards for Calero. He was reportedly in negotiations with the Cubs last month, but nothing came of that. The Marlins have expressed their concerns with his shoulder, and that might have warded off other potential suitors. But in a league where a team’s best non-closer one year can rank among their worst the next, Calero presents an excellent option.

Pitchers and catchers report to their team’s camps in Arizona and Florida today, kicking off the beginning of spring training and the 2010 baseball season. It’s a good day.

However, with spring training starting off, it’s time for the annual reminder to not pay any attention to numbers for the next six weeks. We like our stats here, obviously, but spring training numbers just don’t mean a thing. At all. Anything. Need proof?

Last year, 7 NL players hit .400 or better in spring training. Included in that list of guys who tore it up in March were Jeremy Reed, David Eckstein, Khalil Greene, and J.J. Hardy. Reed played badly enough that he was non-tendered, and is now a non-roster invite with the Blue Jays. Greene did even worse than Reed, and is also now trying to fight his way back into Major League Baseball after losing his job with St. Louis. Hardy had the worst year of his career, then got shipped to the Twins over the winter. Eckstein posted the lowest wOBA of his career, and that’s saying something.

Okay, you say, batting average is flukey, but power, that’s legit. After all, Ryan Howard hit 10 bombs to lead all NL players in spring training a year ago, and he’s a monster. Sure, I’ll give you that.

But Craig Monroe finished second with 8 spring home runs, followed closely by Travis Ishikawa with seven. It’s even better when you look at the AL leaderboard – the immortal Mike Wilson out-homered all of the junior circuit competition, then forgot how to hit minor league pitching once the season started. Not too far behind Wilson are the immortal trio of Mike Jacobs, Mark Teahen, and Wilson Betemit. Yeah.

The lowest ERAs of any AL pitcher last spring? David Purcey and Chris Jakubauskas. Brian Moehler was second in spring training ERA for NL hurlers.

The games don’t count, and the players know this. They’re working on things. They’re facing minor league players or guys trying to come back from injury. Half the teams play in a desert atmosphere that helps the ball travel like its Colorado. I know its easy to get sucked in by the story of a new swing, a new pitch, a winter full of hard work, and I’m sure some of that is true. But you won’t find those guys by looking at the stats. Ignore the numbers coming from the Cactus and Grapefruit Leagues. They don’t mean a thing.

The literal answer to this question is, naturally, no. The perfect 5th outfielder is probably Ichiro Suzuki, or somebody similarly great. Obviously, that’s a pipe dream. In a league with 30 teams, the top 100 outfielders have found their places before teams can begin filling their 5th outfielder position. The Texas Rangers fulfilled their 5th outfielder need on Monday, adding Endy Chavez.

Chavez is, of course, no Ichiro. Chavez does, however, fill the position of fifth outfielder nearly perfectly for Texas. With David Murphy currently set to be the team’s 4th outfielder, the team would have been hard pressed to find an adequate defensive center fielder if the young Julio Borbon either lost time due to injury or was ineffective. Chavez is historically an excellent defender in CF, and he fills that void in the Rangers’ bench.

His bat isn’t great. With an almost complete lack of power (.097 career ISO), Chavez is limited to slapping out singles and taking the occasional walk. He can steal some bases, as shown by his 9 SBs against only 1 CS last season in only 182 PAs and an 82.6% SB rate since 2007. Even with the best of BABIP luck, his absolute ceiling is probably as an average hitter. His more likely wRC+ range of 85-90 still allows him to profile as a 1.0 to 1.5 win player over a full season. That makes him well worth a bench spot, especially on a $1 million deal.

He’s nearly the perfect fifth outfielder. In my view, the perfect fifth outfielder, much like Chavez, can fill in at all 3 outfield spots, is a suitable pinch runner or defensive replacement in the last inning, and won’t kill you at the plate, even if he might be below average. Above all, he can give all this production without much of a marginal cost.

The only place where Chavez diverges from my ideal 5th outfielder is in handedness. Between Murphy, Borbon, and Josh Hamilton, 3 out of the 4 current outfielders on the team were left handed, just as Chavez is. This limits platoon opportunities in an injury situation, but this is a minor quibble at best. A right handed hitter may have fit the situation better, but given how well Chavez fits in other more important areas, this isn’t important enough to make him a bad fit overall.

This is only the latest in a series of excellent move for the Rangers over the course of this offseason. The AL West is certainly shaping up as one of the most exciting divisions in baseball this year.

FanGraphs Audio is shooting to the top of the charts. (And, yes, we’re just as surprised as you.) Audio after the jump.

Episode Three
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During a discussion on fifth starters, I ended up doing some research on ground balls and their relative worth as compared to non-ground ball batted ball types. What began as a throwaway point has since captured my attention and so I bring some results to you.

First, I looked at batted ball types in complete isolation. I believe it is widely accepted that a ground ball is better than a fly ball from a pitcher’s point of view on average. Arguing whether it is better to be a ground-ball pitcher or a fly-ball pitcher is not the scope in question here. A huge amount of complexity resides in studying such a question, some of which I explore below, but for this first initial look, I just wanted to know nothing more than the relative weight of a ground ball versus a ball in the air on average run scoring.

I need to make a quick note on the terminology here. A ground ball is any batted ball classified as a ground ball or a bunt. A ball in the air is any batted ball classified as a fly ball, a line drive or a pop up. These are my own distinctions. I used the batted ball classifications provided by MLBAM since that is what I had available to me in easy to use database form. I do not expect that the results would be vastly different using other sources since large samples are in play.

I have two sets of information that helped me determine this figure. The first is the average number of outs recorded on each batted ball type. The second is the average run value, derived from changes in score and the run expectancy matrix after each play per batted ball type. For this first isolated comparison I used totals from the American League in 2009. I looked at a couple other years and the National League as well and the numbers change only slightly.

The results were that the average ground ball generated 0.04 runs and caused 0.80 outs while the average ball in air generated 0.23 runs and caused just 0.62 outs. On a runs-per-out basis, balls hit into the air created almost 7.5 times as much offense as balls kept on the ground did.

What constitutes a line drive is somewhat fuzzy and open to subjective bias. However, even with ignoring line drives, fly balls and pop outs by themselves generate an average of about 0.1 runs and cause 0.79 outs. That rate is still about three times more offensive than the average ball hit on the ground. The additional risk of yielding a home run matters, a lot.

Tomorrow, I am going to look at home run rates in closer detail.

I often find inspiration for my article in the words of my fellow writers, as their insightful observations give rise to further questions for me. Anyway, today is no different, as I am particularly intrigued by Dave Cameron’s observations about the components of a platoon split. The platoon split is clearly seen in fielding-independent measures like strikeout, walk, and ground-ball rate, but Dave C. found (via David Appelman) that there is only a slight platoon split for BABIP and HR/FB, a couple of points for the former and tenths of a percent for the latter.

Dave then questioned whether this general rule is the case for all pitchers, particularly if you have a pitcher who throws for a non-standard arm slot. He brought up a handful of guys. Since I had written about Vicente Padilla before and had his data laying around, I thought he would be an interesting test case.

Padilla has enormous xFIP split (5.11 versus LHBs and 3.83 versus RHBs) which comes from his K, BB and GB% platoon splits, but beyond that he also has a slight HR/FB split and a huge BABIP split (.324/.273). Going forward should we expect him to have just a slight difference in his BABIP against LHBs and HRBs like most pitchers, or is there something different about Padilla?

First off, Padilla does not have a great pitch against LHBs. He has a rarely thrown, ineffective changeup/splitter and even his okay curve shows a pretty big platoon split (while most curves do not). So against LHBs, he is left throwing his fastballs — two- and four-seam — 70% of the time to LHBs, and, of those, over 75% are his four-seam fastball. That four-seam fastball shows a big platoon split in BABIP, .280 against RHBs and .330 versus LHBs. Where does this come from? The BABIP of a pitch depends on a number of things, but the pitch’s horizontal location plays an important role. So I looked at that relationship for Padilla’s and the average RHP’s four-seam fastballs.

For most pitchers the BABIP of a four-seam fastball decreases the further inside the pitch is. Against RHBs Padilla has a similar trend, but generally his fastball have a much lower BABIP than average. Against LHBs on the outside his BABIP is similar, but on inside pitches, instead of dropping off, it picks back up. So it looks like, for some reason, LHBs can make solid, high-BABIP contact on Padilla’s inside fastballs. Whether this has to do with Padilla’s delivery or the movement on his fastball or whether the result is just noise is unclear. In all, I think Padilla’s problem against LHBs stems from not having a solid off-speed pitch and a four-seam fastball that — maybe because he cannot go inside against lefties — displays an out-sized platoon split compared to average.

General Manager: Billy Beane
Farm Director: Billy Owens
Scouting Director: Eric Kubota

FanGraphs’ Top 10 Prospects:
(2009 Draft Picks/International Signees Not Included)

1. Chris Carter, 1B, Triple-A
DOB: December 1986 Bats: R Throws: R
Signed: 2005 15th round – Nevada HS (Chicago AL)
MLB ETA: Mid-2010 40-Man Roster: Yes Options: 3

If you want to dream on a power prospect, Carter is your man. He has Ryan Howard-like power potential, although there are concerns over his lack of contact and high strikeout numbers. Carter is likely a .250-.270 hitter in the Majors (His .337 average in double-A was aided by a .406 BABIP). His strikeout rate in double-A was 24.3% in ’09. On the plus side, he also had an ISO rate of .238, an OPS of 1.1011 and a walk rate of 13.8%. Although the 6’4” 210 lbs first baseman is not swift-of-foot, he is a smart base runner who nabbed 13 bags in 18 tries. Daric Barton is Carter’s biggest “roadblock” to the first base job in Oakland; although he’s far from a five-tool player, the prospect is a better all-around player than Jake Fox or Jack Cust.

2. Michael Taylor, OF, Triple-A
DOB: December 1985 Bats: R Throws: R
Signed: 2007 5th round – Stanford University (Philadelphia)
MLB ETA: Mid-2010 40-Man Roster: No Options: 3

Obtained from the Phillies, via the Blue Jays during the Roy Halladay musical chairs, the organization gave up a more promising bat (Brett Wallace) for the better all-around player in Taylor. Oakland has a lot of outfield depth with the likes of Travis Buck, Eric Patterson, Rajai Davis, and Ryan Sweeney, but none of those players can match Taylor’s potential. He’s also MLB ready, so he could step into a full-time or platoon gig in April. Taylor, 24, had a solid ’09 season in double-A where he hit .333/.408/.569 in 318 at-bats. He displayed a reasonable walk rate at 9.6% and kept his strikeout rate below 20% (16.0%) while maintaining excellent power (.236 ISO). Taylor also added 18 steals in 22 tries. Promoted to triple-A, he hit .282/.359/.491 with a .209 ISO in 110 at-bats. Taylor possesses a strong arm and can play both outfield corners, although he sees most of his time in left field.

3. Jemile Weeks, 2B, Double-A
DOB: January 1987 Bats: B Throws: R
Signed: 2008 1st round – University of Miami
MLB ETA: Mid-2011 40-Man Roster: No Options: 3

Weeks battled through injuries in ’09 and appeared in just 80 games. The second baseman opened his season with a power burst that was unsustainable and probably a fluke. He posted a .169 ISO in his first 50 games with high-A (all seven of his homers came in his first 97 at-bats) before moving up to double-A where he posted an ISO rate of .105, which was more in line with his debut (.108 ISO in ’08). A switch-hitter, Weeks performed much better against right-handed pitchers in ’09 with an OPS of .899 vs .615 against southpaws. Defensively, the 23 year old is athletic with a strong arm, but he makes some careless errors.

4. Adrian Cardenas, 2B, Triple-A
DOB: October 1987 Bats: L Throws: R
Signed: 2006 supplemental 1st round – Florida HS (Philadelphia)
MLB ETA: Late-2010 40-Man Roster: No Options: 3

It was an up-and-down season for the 22-year-old Cardenas. He received a quick promotions to triple-A in ’09 but struggled by hitting .175 in May and was sent back to double-A, where he set the world on fire by hitting .326/.392/.446 in 325 at-bats. Moved back up to triple-A in August, he posted a line of .287/.354/.396 in August and .340/.392/.532 in September. In the lower minors, the prospect showed the ability to steal 15-20 bases but he hasn’t topped eight steals in the past two seasons. Cardenas’ bat will have to carry him as he is an average fielder at best at the keystone. A permanent spot at third base could be in the cards, but his power output is below average for the position. The former Phillies draft pick should be ready for the Majors right about the time Mark Ellis‘ contract expires.

5. Tyson Ross, RHP, Double-A
DOB: April 1987 Bats: R Throws: R
Signed: 2008 2nd round – University of California
MLB ETA: Late-2010 40-Man Roster: No Options: 3
Repertoire: 89-94 mph fastball, slider, cutter, change-up

If you love ground-ballers like we do at Fangraphs, then you’ll want to meet Ross. The right-hander posted a 56.6% ground-ball rate on the season, including a 61.9 GB% in 66.3 double-A innings. Just 22, Ross is a promising pitcher despite a modest strikeout rate in double-A (8.55 in high-A, 5.58 K/9 in double-A). His fastball can touch the mid-90s so the strikeouts should come once he improves his secondary pitches. He also needs to improve his command and control a bit after posting a walk rate of 3.48 on the seasons. Ross allowed 10 homers in high-A (1.04 HR/9) despite his impress ground-ball numbers. If his secondary pitches don’t improve, he could become a dominating late-game reliever with his sinking fastball.

6. Pedro Figueroa, LHP, High-A
DOB: November 1985 Bats: L Throws: L
Signed: 2003 non-drafted international free agent (Dominican Republic)
MLB ETA: Late-2011 40-Man Roster: Yes Options: 3
Repertoire: 91-96 mph fastball, slider, change-up

Figueroa was not on the watch list when the season began but quickly jumped onto it. A little older than most prospects in low-A at 23, the southpaw posted a solid strikeout rate of 8.13 K/9 at the junior level while showing OK control with a walk rate of 3.23 BB/9. Moved up to high-A for 11 starts, Figueroa’s walk rate jumped to 4.80 BB/9 but his strikeouts also increased to 9.18 K/9. Overall, he allowed 151 hits in 152.0 innings of work, while producing a respectable ground-ball rate of 46.2%. Because he’s now 24, Oakland could be aggressive with Figueroa and move him up to double-A despite his control issues.

7. Fautino De Los Santos, RHP, Injured
DOB: February 1986 Bats: R Throws: R
Signed: 2005 non-drafted international free agent (Dominican Republic)
MLB ETA: Late-2011 40-Man Roster: Yes Options: 3
Repertoire: 89-95 mph fastball, slider, curveball, change-up

One of the key players in the Nick Swisher trade with the White Sox, De Los Santos made just five starts with Oakland’s system in ’08 before going down with a major injury. He returned in ’09 to make seven rehab starts in rookie ball and he showed his fastball of old, but his secondary pitches are still being worked back in. The right-hander has the potential of a No. 2 starter if he can harness his breaking ball and change-up but he could also develop into a dominating reliever. We’ll know a lot more about De Los Santos’ potential as the season progresses. If healthy, he should opened the season in high-A ball.

8. Sean Doolittle, 1B, Triple-A
DOB: September 1986 Bats: L Throws: L
Signed: 2007 supplemental 1st round – University of Virginia
MLB ETA: Late-2010 40-Man Roster: No Options: 3

Doolittle was yet another prospect bitten by the injury bug in ’09. He started the year in triple-A and was just a quick phone call away from making the Majors before knee problems (and surgery) ended his season. When everything is clicking for Doolittle, he is a .280-.300 hitter with 15-20 homer potential. He has always displayed good walk rates (12.4% in ’09) but he strikes out a bit too much for his power output (21.9%). An above-average defender at first base, Doolittle was moved to right field (Thanks to the presence of Chris Carter) where he is average.

9. Shane Peterson, OF, Double-A
DOB: February 1988 Bats: L Throws: L
Signed: 2008 2nd round – Long Beach State University (St. Louis)
MLB ETA: Late-2010 40-Man Roster: No Options: 3

Acquired in last season’s Matt Holliday trade with St. Louis, Peterson projects to be an average MLB player mainly due to the fact that he possesses below-average power for his best positions (corner outfield, first base). The prospect is actually similar to fellow left-handed hitting Sean Doolittle in the sense that he projects to hit 10-15 homers with a batting average between .270 and .300. After struggling against southpaws in ’08, Peterson rebounded to post a line of .302/.348/.430 against them in ’09. The 22-year-old hitter has more speed than Doolittle and he nabbed 16 bags in 17 tries in ’09.

10. Josh Donaldson, C, Double-A
DOB: December 1988 Bats: R Throws: R
Signed: 2007 supplemental 1st round pick – Auburn University (Chicago NL)
MLB ETA: Late-2010 40-Man Roster: No Options: 3

Part of the loot for Rich Harden during an ’08 trade with the Chicago Cubs, Donaldson has seen his value improve significantly since joining his new organization. At the time of the trade, Donaldson was hitting .217/.276/.349 in low-A ball. He was immediately promoted to high-A with Oakland and finished the year with a line of .330/.391/.564 in 188 at-bats. He continued to hit well in ’09 despite being moved up to double-A and he produced a triple-slash line of .270/.379/.415 in 455 at-bats. Although he posted a 20.2% strikeout rate, Donaldson also walked at a rate of 14.8%, good for a BB/K rate of 0.87. He’s shown flashes of solid power, but he’s more of a line-drive hitter and he had an ISO rate of .145 in ’09. Donaldson has the tools to be an average big league backstop, although he’s still working on his receiving. He threw out 40% of base stealers last season.

Up Next: The San Diego Padres

For two years, Chien-Ming Wang looked like a top of the rotation starter. He didn’t blow away hitters, but instead fed them sinker after sinker, forcing them to hit the ball on the ground. Keeping the ball out of the air meant keeping the ball in the park, leaving Wang with the best HR/9 rate in the AL for both 2006 and 2007. This, combined with a low walk rate, kept his FIP under 4.00, despite the poor strikeout rate.

Wang then opened the 2008 season in grand fashion, allowing just 19 runs, including one home run, and walking 19 in 59 innings. Making matters worse for opposing batters, he also started striking out more hitters, 38 in those 59 innings. It appeared he was taking another step forward. But then something changed.

On May 18 Wang gave up seven runs in seven innings to the Mets. He followed that by allowing five or more runs in his next three appearances. Those unconvinced that Wang’s true ability matched his early season performance might have called it a statistical correction, but there seemed to be more at play. In 2006 and 2007, and even earlier in 2008, Wang released his pitches from a three-quarters arm slot. Beginning with his May 18 start, that release point move upward, as shown in the following three graphs.

Those graphs, as you can see, also contain 2009 data, which we’ll get to in a moment. The higher arm angle didn’t seem to work for Wang, though we didn’t get a large enough sample to make any real determination. On June 15, during an interleague game in Houston, Wang fractured his lisfranc, ending his season.

Wang appeared ready to return in 2009, and looked fine in spring training. His first three starts, however, went as poorly as possible, as he allowed 23 runs over just 6 IP. The Yankees placed him on the disabled list with what they termed “hip weakness,” but the move was really to buy them time to figure out what was wrong. He returned on May 22, but continued to struggle. His season eventually ended on the Fourth of July, as he dueled with Roy Halladay in the Bronx. Later that month we learned he would need surgery to repair a torn ligament in his shoulder capsule.

Back to the above graphs, it’s clear that Wang released his sinker from an even further over the top arm slot in 2009. This caused many of his pitches to fall flat. So flat, in fact, that PitchFx categorized many of them as two-seam fastballs. Wang had thrown just under 5 percent two-seamers in 2008 — which could also have really been flat sinkers — and that number jumped to 22.9 percent in 2009. His fastball took a somewhat corresponding hit, as he threw it 73.6 percent of the time in 2008 and only 56.8 percent in 2009.

We learned earlier today that the Nationals will announce that they’ve signed Wang at a press conference on Friday. While his recovery from shoulder surgery remains the foremost concern, the Nationals also have to work to get his release point back to where it was in 2006, 2007, and early 2008. It seems that’s a big part of his sinker’s success. Without that bread and butter pitch Wang has a much lesser chance of recovery to his previous form.

A big thanks to my buddy Jay Gargiulo and my friend and colleague Mike Axisa for putting together much of this data. The three of us are going to miss having Wang in the Yankees’ rotation.

Ever since Curtis Granderson revealed that the Yankees asked if he’d be willing to move to left field this weekend, various people have weighed in on the merits of such a move. My take? It really doesn’t matter much at all. Whether you have Brett Gardner in left and Granderson in center or vice versa, the overall impact on the Yankees will be so minor as to not be worth the discussion.

Gardner may actually be the better defender at this point, and we have been conditioned to believe that the best defensive outfielder should play center, as he will have more opportunities to flag down balls than either of the corner outfielders. But if you have two guys who can capably handle center field (as the Yankees now do), it isn’t all that important which one ends up in CF.

The CF-playing-a-corner guy doesn’t magically lose some range when shifting to a corner. His physical abilities are the same, and his ability to cover ground to his left and right remains the same. The only difference is that instead of covering two gaps, he’s now covering one gap and one line.

Even if we accept that Gardner is a better defensive outfielder than Granderson, which may or may not be true, the Yankees wouldn’t lose anything in their ability to cover the gap in left center with the current alignment. They would take a very marginal hit in right field gap coverage, but that would be somewhat offset by the gain in their coverage of the left field line.

The total difference in defensive performance between the two alignments is simply the drop in value in right-center balls caught minus the rise in value in left field line balls caught. We’re talking about a marginal difference on just a handful of balls in play over a full season. We’re talking about fractions of a run.

The Yankees have two center fielders. One of them will play left field. It doesn’t matter which one. So, just to avoid it becoming a story, it should probably be Granderson. No point creating something for the media to talk about when the end result just doesn’t matter.