My advice to you, one layabout to another: don’t ever go to work again.

My other advice: start today.

Thursday, July 22 | Colorado at Florida | 12:10pm ET
Starting Pitchers
Rockies: Jorge de la Rosa (NERD: 8)
30.2 IP, 9.39 K/9, 5.58 BB/9, .315 BABIP, 52.4% GB, 22.7% HR/FB, 4.17 xFIP

Los Marlins: Josh Johnson (10)
128.0 IP, 9.14 K/9, 1.97 BB/9, .285 BABIP, 49.0% GB, 3.6% HR/FB, 3.01 xFIP

A Mostly Irreverent Note on Jorge de la Rosa
If I’m correct, they changed their player search function ahead of this season, but traditionally it’s been impossible to search for players whose names are shorter than three letters in Yahoo’s fantasy baseball platform*. Hence, it’s been tres difficile — because of the two two-letter words — to search for de la Rosa. Another player whom this has affected: Fu-Te Ni. And also: Chin-lung Hu. (Racism, innit?) Off the top of my head, de la Rosa’s the best of the group, however.

*It returns the following: “Your search query must be at least 3 characters. (Error #163)”

A Slightly More Substantive Note on Jorge de la Rosa
He crapped the bed last time out — at Cincinnati on July 17. Line: 19 TBF, 0 K, 5 BB, 5 GB on 13 BIP (38.5%). That resulted in 3 HR and 7 R (6 ER) in just 3.1 IP.

Unlike the previous outing, in which de la Rosa conceded 7 R (5 ER) in 4.1 IP but generally did his part (6 K, 1 BB, 22 TBF), this wasn’t explained away by bad luck.

A Completely Obvious Note on Josh Johnson
While ranking Johnson No. 9 overall in his recent Trade Value series, Full-Time Employee Dave Cameron wrote of Johnson: “If you haven’t seen him pitch, you’re missing out. The fastball has both velocity and movement, the slider is a knockout, and the change-up plays up because of how hard he throws it.”

Hear Cameron now, and believe him now, too: Josh Johnson is the goods.

Batter Bullets
• Gaby Sanchez appears to be a major leaguer. His nerd line on the season: .301/.367/.462, .367 wOBA, 128 wRC+. Question: Is his .340 BABIP helping matters? Answer: Yes, and it’s more than possible that he’s just a league-average hitter, but he’s got the sort of high-contact, line drive approach — like a Michael Young, maybe — that can be pleasant to watch.
• Carlos Gonzalez’s plate “discipline” has been the subject of some interesting work around these electronic pages of late. Dave Goleblahski recently looked at said work and even coerced Resident Cyborg Dave Allen into producing this swing contour thing:

Cool, right? Anyway, if you want a hint as to what the deal is with CarGo, here’s his walk rate: 4.4%. Now here’s his strikeout rate: 24.3%. Connect the dots, America.

If I Had My Druthers
• Sources would reveal that the “rosa” of Jorge de la Rosa’s surname is actually the selfsame one as in Seal’s 1994 smash-hit single “Kiss from a Rose.”
• Either Seal or de la Rosa or someone would explain why and/or how there’s a kiss from said “rosa” — and how it got on that grave and whether it’s still there or not.
• Heidi Klum.

At some point yesterday afternoon, I decided that I wanted to look into Starlin Castro on a historical basis. I go to Baseball-Reference and enter the filters required to get the desired results from the Play Index tool — notably shortstops, age 20, who played in at least 50 games and played at least 50% of those games at short. Nothing too strict, really, and naturally that query only returned 22 seasons. That within itself should give the impression of how rare Castro’s situation is.

Actually, we’ve been spoiled with 20-year-old shortstops: Castro this year, Elvis Andrus last, Jose Lopez in 2004, and Jose Reyes in 2003. If you reach into the 1990s, you have Edgar Renteria and Alex Rodriguez, with Gary Sheffield missing by a year. Between 1930 and 1950, only one joined the ranks (Arky Vaughan) – presumably the whole World War thing played into it – and it wasn’t until the 1970s when this sort of thing became an every-few-years phenomenon.

The question of importance is how Castro is performing against his peers. The answer is quite well. Throw out Rodriguez’s ridiculous 36 home runs, 1.045 OPS season in ’96 and Castro stacks up well against everyone else. Obviously, OPS+ is not the best measure of hitting performance in the world, but it does a worthwhile job here:

Rodriguez 160 OPS+
Vaughan 113
Jim Fregosi 108
Reyes 102
Travis Jackson 102
Whitey Witt 100
Castro 95
Garry Templeton 91

Everyone else had OPS+ below 90, including Ed Brinkman in 1962: he played in 54 games and his OPS+ was a mere 25. Nonetheless, Castro is in good company. Rodriguez is bound to join Vaughan and Jackson in the Hall of Fame, and Fregosi as well as Templeton appeared in numerous All-Star games. Truthfully, there are worse careers to mimic than Witt’s too. Sure, he was out of the league shortly after turning 31, but he appeared in more than 1,130 games and had a career OPS+ of 97.

Moreover, he had a name to compete with Starlin DeJesus Castro, too, as he was born Ladislav Waldemar Wittkowski.

Back in April, I noted how Tim Lincecum’s velocity just continued to decline, and how he had transformed into an entirely different pitcher than he was coming out of college, but that he’d been able to maintain his dominance despite the shift in skills. Specifically, I remember telling Erik Manning that we could start worrying about Lincecum’s velocity loss once it started affecting his performance.

Well, commence worrying.

Last night, Lincecum faced the Dodgers, and while the game was more notable for what happened later, it was probably the worst he’s ever thrown as a major leaguer. Results wise, he didn’t even make it through the fifth inning, gave up five runs, walked three, hit a batter, and only managed to strike out two of the 24 batters he faced. Stuff wise, it was even worse.

His fastball averaged 89 MPH, and the hardest pitch he threw all night was 91.8 MPH. He wasn’t even able to sustain that, however, as he was down to sitting in the 87-88 MPH range by the end of his performance. Via BrooksBaseball, the graph of his velocity from last night tells the story.

It was notable that his fastball was down when he was throwing 91-94. Last night, he was several ticks below that, and since a brilliant April, it’s been a struggle for Lincecum. Here’s his splits by month:

April: 1.78 BB/9, 10.85 K/9, 49.4% GB%, 2.25 xFIP
May: 5.70 BB/9, 9.91 K/9, 50.5% GB%, 4.10 xFIP
June: 3.38 BB/9, 9.56 K/9, 41.6% GB%, 3.23 xFIP
July: 3.38 BB/9, 7.09 K/9, 44.3% GB%, 4.06 xFIP

From 2007 to 2009, Lincecum had two months (June 2007, September 2007) where his xFIP was over 4.00. He’s now done it two of the last three months. He’s never had a month with a strikeout rate as low it is right now in July.

In his start prior to last night, he threw a complete game shutout, his fastball averaged 92 MPH, and he hit 95 a couple of times. It looked like he might be getting back on track, even though he only had five strikeouts. But, after last night’s no stuff/no command outing, it seems clear that something is going on. The Giants are in the midst of a pennant race, but they also owe it to their ace to make sure he’s alright. And right now, he doesn’t look like alright.

Perhaps, like Madison Bumgarner, he just needs a few starts to get some things straightened out and the velocity will come back. We can’t conclude simply from lessened velocity and poor performance that Lincecum is hurting – only he and the doctors know that. If I’m the Giants, though, I’d want to know 100 percent that there’s nothing structurally wrong before I let him take the mound again. The version of Lincecum who pitched for San Francisco last night won’t help them win anything anyway.

It was a classic case of why we don’t take early season stats seriously. Entering his fifth start of the season on April 29, Jair Jurrjens sported a 5.48 ERA. He hadn’t pitched particularly poorly, but did have one rough outing that made his overall performance seem a bit worse. He didn’t help matters in that fifth start, as he allowed a three-run homer in the first before leaving the game with a strained hamstring. He hit a snag during his recovery, and ended up missing two full months. The rest appears to have done him some good, as he’s been excellent since returning on June 30.

We can see some pretty stark differences in Jurrjens pre-injury and Jurrjens post-injury. For starters, here’s his velocity graph:

It looks like his first and third starts were at pre-2010 levels, while his starts at San Diego, New York, and then St. Louis were way down. The St. Louis start is understandably lower than the rest, since he was probably pitching through hamstring woes in the first. It does appear, however, that the Atlanta gun might be a tad hot. The four highest-reaching bars on the chart are all starts at home. Last night, when pitching at home, he maxed at 94 while averaging 91.

We can see plenty of other changes in Jurrjens from earlier in the season, even during his better starts. Most notably, we see big changes in his strand and strikeout rates.

This is nothing but good news for the Braves. While Jurrjens was out of the rotation the team went on a tear, moving atop the NL East standings and even creating a bit of a cushion. Now with Jurrjens back in the rotation they’re that much stronger. ZiPS projects him to pitch 120.7 more innings this season, procuing a 3.95 ERA against a 4.10 FIP. That will fit perfectly in the Braves’ rotation.

When we eventually look at Jurrjens’ season in retrospect this off-season, we probably won’t remove those April starts in which he skewed his season numbers. After all, it’s not like those games didn’t happen. They did, and they contributed to the Braves’ slow start. But he’s also contributing to their current winning ways, and figures to continue doing so for the rest of the season.

Yesterday, R.J. Anderson discussed just how impressive Billy Wagner’s career has been and how magnificently he is pitching this season:

FIP supports that Wagner has pitched extremely well. His 2.12 figure would actually be the second best seasonal total of his career, which is a bit breath-taking within itself. Wagner gets lost in the shuffle with Mariano Rivera doing his thing as the premier salt-and-pepper whiskered closer, but he’s right there with him. Evidently Wagner is talking about retiring at season’s end.

Braves fans should convince him to reconsider given how he’s pitching.

There is no question that Wagner has had a phenomenal career. He has never had an ERA above 3.00 during a full season in the major leagues. Since 1997, his season-high FIP has been 3.09 in 2007 (a year in which he had a 2.88 tERA and 2.63 ERA), which is his only season with a FIP over 3.00 since his rookie year. Simply put, Billy Wagner has been one of the best closers/pitchers in baseball since he came to the major leagues, and has simply dominated.

Although the Hall of Fame is something that analytical folks tend not to worry about, I still think it has a certain genuine lure and appeal that things like the All-Star Game and Gold Gloves just do not. Call me a softie, but I still like thinking about the Hall of Fame, however messed up the process may be to get in (and it’s extremely messed up).

By objective value standards which we use at Fangraphs, Wagner has produced 23.8 WAR thus far in his career (Rally’s WAR database currently has him at 27). For comparison, we also have Robin Ventura at 61.3 WAR and Bret Boone at 25.4 WAR. Those guys aren’t knocking on the Hall’s doors any time soon.

But we know that we have to value relievers differently than we do starting pitchers and positional players. Wagner has had a positive WPA every year in his career save one (2000). His career WPA/LI is higher than Goose Gossage’s. There are a few things holding him back in terms of mainstream importance:

1) Living in the shadow of Mariano Rivera and Trevor Hoffman
2) No World Series appearances/rings
3) Relative lack of Saves (he has 17 fewer Saves than John Franco)
4) Never started a major league game (see Eckersley and Gossage)

Don’t think those shortcomings actually play a tangible factor? Here’s Ron Chimelis, a member of the BBWAA who will likely be voting on Wagner’s candidacy in the future:

Can a one-inning guy be an immortal? Mariano Rivera proves he can.

As for Wagner, in 15 years, has pitched all of 822 innings. It took him 769 games to do it.

The Hall of Fame’s small roster of closers consists of Dennis Eckersley, Goose Gossage, Rollie Fingers and Bruce Sutter.

Eckersley made it partly because he was also a starter. That will no doubt get John Smoltz in, too.

The other three enshrined closers were multiple-inning guys. They also helped define the art…

Among left-handers, John Franco ranks first with 424 saves. Wagner is second.

Is Franco a Hall of Famer? I don’t think so….

So, who gets in? Rivera, for sure.

It’s hard to dispute Hoffman, the all-time leader….

There are other reasons to dismiss him, though. No World Series (also not his fault), and an 8.71 playoff ERA.

In his only League Championship Series, in 2006 with the Mets, Wagner’s ERA was 16.88.

Is Boston’s new reliever a Hall of Famer? I don’t think so, whether he reaches 400 saves or not.

Wagner has had an amazing career. Somehow, the success of the Atlanta Braves this year, as well as his performance in a couple of innings in the playoffs in October, could be the tipping point in his Hall of Fame candidacy. Now there’s a reason why the process, and not the concept, is so messed up.

Just 10 days from the trade deadline and a few days removed from the Trade Value series wrapping up – should have lots to talk about today.

There have been rumblings of discontent among parts of the Philadelphia media with Jayson Werth recently, but I never thought it would come to this: apparently, the Phillies are considering moving Jayson Werth. But this isn’t as part of a plan to sell at the deadline, which would make sense given the Phillies status, seven games behind the Atlanta Braves in the NL East, in a struggle for second place with the New York Mets, and behind Cincinnati, San Francisco, Colorado, and Los Angeles for the Wild Card. Instead, Werth would be either be moved for starting pitching or in tandem with a move for starting pitching, indicating that the Phillies are still playing for this year.

The plan seems patently ridiculous. Jayson Werth is the Phillies second best position player – the best, with Chase Utley on the disabled list – and the only pitcher on the team more valuable than Werth is Roy Halladay. Werth has been worth 2.2 WAR to date, hitting almost exactly at his ZiPS projection and with his worst fielding season on record. Weth’s feilding numbers are not wholly unreasonable, given his age, but it’s also possible that his UZR isn’t properly reflecting his ability this season. Given his projections and recent performance in the field, expecting something around 2.5 WAR for the 300 or so plate appearances remaining in the season is perfectly reasonable.

For the Phillies to move Werth and still function as buyers, they have to trade his 2.5 wins – for which they’re only paying $2.85 million – and receive a pitcher worth more than 2.5 WAR. With 69 games remaining, there are probably 13 starts remaining for whoever the Phils would acquire, which would probably max out at 90 innings. Here is an exhaustive list of pitchers currently averaging 2.5 WAR per 90 innings pitched:

Francisco Liriano
Josh Johnson
Cliff Lee
Jon Lester
Roy Halladay

I don’t think the Phillies will be acquiring any of those players, and nobody else terribly close to 2.5 WAR/90 IP is going to be available.

But there is the argument that Dominic Brown is ready to come up and replace Jayson Werth in right field. As a rookie, it seems clear that Brown’s absolute peak would be the year that Jason Heyward has compiled so far, a 2.0 WAR season in just over 300 PAs. But there is no way that we could project that for Brown, a player with 76 plate appearances above AA. Projecting Brown as a league average, 1.0 WAR player in 300 plate appearances even seems like it may be a bit much – his CHONE projected worth prior to the season was 0.1 WAR, and his great season in the minors so far has only boosted that to 0.4 WAR in the July update. For the sake of argument, however, let’s call Brown a 1.0 WAR player for the rest of this season.

In this case, the Phillies would have to gain more than 1.5 WAR out of a starter to improve the team while unloading Werth, which certainly increases the pool of players that they could add from – 46 pitchers have done that so far this season, and the bottom of the Philadelphia rotation is almost certainly replacement level. Still, these types of players are expensive, and teams know that wins are at a premium for Philadelphia. We actually have a recent analog for this kind of move, as Joe Blanton had posted 1.3 WAR in 127 IP and was coming off a 5+ WAR season before the Phillies acquired him in 2008. The Phillies traded Adrien Cardenas and Josh Outman, who were in the bottom half of John Sickels’s Top-100 prospects list at the end of 2008, and Cardenas was also ranked in the 70’s in the Baseball America top 100 list before both 2008 and 2009. Perhaps Werth can net that pitcher instead, but Victor Wang’s prospect value research places top-100 prospects as assets worth roughly $10 million – two of those prospects add up to a solid amount more than Werth’s surplus value.

That leaves two scenarios: either Werth and possibly a prospect go for a starting pitcher, or Werth is traded for prospects and some other prospects are traded for a pitcher in a separate deal. Neither seems particularly likely to leave the Phillies with a better team, and this convoluted scenario seems awfully similar to dealing for Roy Halladay and then turning around and dealing Cliff Lee just to re-stock the farm system. It doesn’t mean that the Phillies shouldn’t trade Werth – selling isn’t the worst idea given their current situation – nor does it preclude a call up for Brown, as he could easily replace Raul Ibanez, who is in the middle of a complete collapse.

The idea of trading Werth in order to make the team better today, though? As much as I try to wrap my head around it, I can’t find a way for it to happen. There is about a 1% chance that Dominic Brown can even approach Jayson Werth’s value this season, and no pitcher on the market approaches Werth’s value either. If this move or combination of moves happens, this is just one more mark in a series of questionable moves by Ruben Amaro Jr. His simultaneous desire to stock a farm system while also improving for a playoff run just might lead to a string of .500 seasons instead of the dynasty we may have expected after two straight World Series appearances.

Lastings Milledge is one of those players who always seemed destined for more than he could accomplish dating back to his days in the Mets’ system. After the 2007 season, the Mets traded him within the division to the Nationals, and last summer the Nationals traded him to the Pirates. At age 25, Milledge’s time in baseball was quickly becoming an artifact of his promise rather than a statement of his performance.

Milledge started 2010 as poorly as one can start a season. In April he hit .229/.281/.289. He kicked things up a notch in May by hitting .269/.360/.346. An improvement on a sober April, definitely, but ultimately a teaser for a hot June and volcanic July. His wOBA in June hit .394 thanks to nine extra base hits in 80 plate appearances; Milledge had 10 extra base hits in the previous 179. In his first 36 July plate appearances, he had four extra base hits – including two homers, doubling his season total.

A July wOBA over .400 pushed me to ask Pirates’ radio personality Rocco DeMaro for his thoughts on Milledge’s recent success. DeMaro tweeted in response that Milledge has been “Getting more backspin on his flyballs,” and that he “seems to be hitting fewer grounders.” DeMaro added that Milledge is showcasing a good line drive stroke as of late and has definitely made some adjustments. DeMaro, by the way, is a bright guy and he’s correct. Milledge was hitting more grounders in April and May than he has in June and July; his line drive rate is similarly up as well.

Offense is really the only area in which Milledge provides value. He’s a mundane fielder and a poor baserunner despite his short stature. Milledge is not much of a threat to steal bases – his career success rate is sub-70 – and he rarely takes an extra base. In fact, he has made more outs on the paths during his career (22) than extra bases taken (20), and that doesn’t include his caught stealing tallies, either.

The recent heat has balanced with the early frost to make Milledge’s overall numbers appear league average. A league average bat that doesn’t play defense too well nor run the bases isn’t overly valuable. As such, Milledge’s value really comes down to whether you believe his bat can play up or not. The expectation from those who believe in his tools is that this latest surge is the come up. The expectation for those who do not believe in his tools is that this latest surge is a front. In the end, ultimately Milledge’s bat is fit to play the part of the Sword of Veracity, thus illuminating the truth to all who seek it.

Many pundits (myself included) applauded Boston’s contract with Adrian Beltre this past off-season. The one-year deal (with a player option) teetered on the balance of risk minimization and upside maximization perfectly. If Beltre performed well in 2010, he would appear underpaid. On the flip side, if Beltre had the worst season of his career he wouldn’t be paid too much in excess and given the cheap rate of his 2011 option, he would have the chance to even out any losses endured.

Even the added incentives are a stroke of well-placed foresight; Beltre’s 2011 option increases to $10 million with 640 plate appearances this season. Beltre has recorded at least 640 plate appearances three times in his career. His average (not per 162 games, per season) plate appearance total as a Mariner was 612. Even with the assumed bump thanks to an improved run environment, Beltre would only reach that total by staying healthy and performing well. And you know what, if he did that, and if that $10 million option were exercised as a result, he’d probably still be underpaid.

David Golebiewski covered Beltre under a more analytical tone a few weeks ago. I’ll defer in that aspet to him while quoting one of the more impressive feats offered:

In Boston, Beltre is enjoying his best season since that double-digit WAR total back in ’04. After a four-for-four night against the Rays, he’s batting .349/.387/.561 in 310 trips to the plate, with a .410 wOBA that ranks ninth among qualified major league hitters. He’s flashing the leather again, too, with +12.9 UZR/150. Beltre has already compiled 3.8 WAR this season, trailing only Justin Morneau, Robinson Cano and Carl Crawford among position players. With $15.1 million in Value Dollars, he has already more than justified Boston’s investment.

Perhaps the most fitting moment of the season occurred when Beltre hit a home run off Ben Sheets last night. You see, the Athletics lusted after the third baseman too. Some reports even had Oakland offering more financial security than Boston. Yet, Beltre spurned the added fortune for Boston. In the aftermath, Oakland gave that money to Sheets. That home run won’t make Ken Burns next baseball documentary or anything; for Oakland it’s just proof that the ways of the universe are sometimes utterly cruel.

And for Beltre it’s proof that sometimes betting on yourself is a worthwhile venture.

From the Chicago Sun-Times:

According to a major-league source, Williams spent the last few days trying desperately to pry Adam Dunn from the grasps of the Washington Nationals, offering up “anyone and anything he has in the minor leagues in a package.” And no one is untouchable, including pitcher Daniel Hudson or infielder Dayan Viciedo.” The problem Kenny is finding out is that [Nats GM Mike] Rizzo is acting like Dunn is Ryan Howard,” the source said.

I suppose that on the surface, this comparison might seem kind of ridiculous. Adam Dunn wasn’t even offered arbitration upon leaving the Diamondbacks and is in the final season of a two-year, $20 million contract. Ryan Howard, on the other hand, has an MVP award and has three more top-five MVP finishes. He has parlayed that into a five-year, 125 million dollar extension, on top of his most recent arbitration award of $19 million. One would certainly think that this kind of disparity in contracts, as well as the reputations that have led to them, would be reflected in the numbers.

On the contrary, however, the numbers support Rizzo’s comparison, particularly in terms of hitting. Given that the White Sox would play Dunn at DH, this would be the primary concern of Kenny Williams. Here’s how Adam Dunn’s career compares to Ryan Howard’s, without park adjustments.

Particularly notable is the stretch from 2007-2010 – the significant stretch for predicting a player’s future, as when you start getting more than four years out, those stats are hardly predictive of what a player can do now. And you’ll notice, that even without park adjustments, that Adam Dunn has been just as good or better than Ryan Howard for four years. The parks aren’t much of a factor for the years that Dunn was with the Reds (LHB HR park factor of 123) or the Diamondbacks (118), but Nationals Park (95) is much harder for lefties to homer than Citizens Bank Park (116). Dunn has a wRC+ advantage this year of 152 to 134, a pretty significant difference – although it is worth noting that it is easier to hit doubles at Nationals Park than it is at Citizens Bank Park, which mitigates much of the difference in parks.

ZiPS projects Dunn and Howard for .400 and .399 wOBAs respectively. Dunn is 10 days older than Ryan Howard. Basically, the only difference in these players is that Dunn is a worse fielder. Yes, Howard is slightly more valuable, but Rizzo isn’t too far off base in this comparison.

However, where Rizzo is completely off base is in his expectation that the return for Dunn should be that of a superstar. The simple fact is that neither Dunn nor Howard are superstars – their positions in particular and their defensive issues (an average defensive 1B has a net defensive value, including position, of -12.5 runs per 150 games, over a win) make them above-average players but well below the elite of the league. Given that Dunn will be a rental, Rizzo is going to have to severely tone down his expectations if he wants to move the slugger before the deadline. Maybe, if Rizzo values Dunn so highly, the Nationals should just give Dunn the four-year, $60 million contract he’s seeking.

Park factors from StatCorner