We all like to think that the first round of the amateur draft is a can’t miss event, but more often than not picks in the first round have a fairly high failure – or at least disappointment – rate. A year ago, two such examples would have included Pittsburgh’s Neil Walker and Toronto’s David Purcey. In the past few months, though, both players have shown that they just might provide some value to the organizations that drafted them – albeit a few years later than projected.

Purcey was taken 16th overall in the 2004 draft and Toronto passed on the likes of Philip Hughes, Gio Gonzalez, Huston Street, Yovani Gallardo, and Dustin Pedroia. The Jays gave the hard-throwing lefty out of the University of Oklahoma $1.6 million to sign as a 22-year-old pitcher that was expected to move fairly quickly. However, Purcey hit a wall in double-A. His inconsistent command led to too many base runners via the walk and the hit. He was also known as a one-pitch pitcher who had little desire to improve his secondary pitches, which allowed even minor league hitters to time and jump all over his above-average heater.

The real break for Purcey came with the move to the bullpen at the beginning of 2010 – a move that had been talked about pretty much since he entered pro ball. He’s now all but abandoned his change-up and favors his fastball about 80% of the time, while mixing in the occasional slider and curveball to keep MLB hitters on their toes. Purcey has seen his fastball command improve significantly and has a positive pitch type value on his heater for the first time in the Majors (over parts of three seasons). He’s still an extreme flyball pitcher but his line-drive rate is down noticeably and batters are hitting just .169 against him (.200 BABIP). His 21 games at the MLB level in 2010 is obviously a small sample size but the 28-year-old hurler has finally started to move in the right direction to carve out a respectable MLB career as a reliever.

Walker was also taken in the 2004 draft – 11th overall out of a Pennsylvania high school, making him a marketing agent’s dream for the Pirates organization. Jered Weaver, Billy Butler and Stephen Drew were taken in the draft right after him. Unfortunately, Walker’s career was dealt a blow when the former catcher had to move out from behind the dish to third base when his defense failed to develop. Although he hit double-digit homers four times in his minor-league career, Walker lacked the prototypical power for third base and he seemed to wilt under the pressure of his new position by posting a .694 OPS at triple-A in 2008. He began to make improvements, though, when the organization switched him to a super-utility role where he played all over the diamond. His OPS jumped to .791 in ’09 and then to .951 in 2010 (43 games).

Called up to Pittsburgh in late May, Walker has continued his hot hitting. He currently has a triple-slash line of .302/.342/.453 in 225 at-bats while playing mostly second base. Walker is showing good pop for a second baseman with an ISO rate of .151. On the down side, his defense has been pretty mediocre, according to UZR, which has him at -7.2 at the keystone. The rating is due mostly to poor range, which is not surprising for a former-catcher-turned-third-baseman-turned-second-baseman. If Walker keeps hitting as well as he has (although it would be nice to see an improvement on the 5.3% walk rate), Pittsburgh may be willing to live with the defensive deficiencies. If not, though, Walker could end up back in a utility role.

It’s fairly clearly that neither Purcey nor Walker will ever perform well enough to justify their former draft slot but both players have MLB value. It’s also impressive that, in both cases, their original organizations held onto them long enough to reap some benefits. Perhaps both Purcey and Walker are examples that organizations now realize how much money they can save by developing and holding onto their own prospects.

Erik Bedard made it all the way to, what was supposed to be, his lone Triple-A rehab start before breaking down again. Bedard had progressed so far that he even had a scheduled start for the Mariners before suffering from shoulder pain after his Triple-A outing. Medical imaging and three surgical opinions later and Bedard heads back under the knife today. Though no official word came out, it appears from quotes that the procedure aims to clears out some bone spurs in Bedard’s shoulder. A normal recovery for that procedure would put Bedard on track to be ready for Spring Training in 2011 but it is difficult to put faith in the normal time line at this point.

The Mariners invested $1.5 million guaranteed dollars in Erik Bedard this season. That investment has not paid off. The Mariners are used to that this season, but in the case of gambling on an injury-prone pitcher they are not alone in the AL West this season. The Rangers gave $7.5 guaranteed million to Rich Harden coming off his two reasonably close to full seasons and the Athletics gave a whopping $10 million to Ben Sheets even though he hadn’t thrown a competitive Major League pitch in 18 months.

Neither team has had the risk rewarded. Harden became a shell of his former self with half his swinging strike rate and a career high walk rate. Over 72 innings pitched so far, he’s been below replacement level. Rehabbing another injury, Harden is likely to end up in a relief role if he manages to make it back.

Ben Sheets is also spending his days on the disabled list right now. Seeking other opinions on his elbow injury, Sheets is hoping to avoid missing the remainder of 2010 but the picture remains murky on that front. In his 119.1 innings tossed before being shelved, Sheets also suffered from a reduced swinging strike rate and a career high walk rate. A pitcher once renowned for his strikeout to walk ratios posted just a 2.0 ratio in 2010. His 0.7 WAR is valued at just under $3 million leaving Oakland currently with a $7 million shortfall.

The conclusion isn’t that injured pitchers aren’t worth the risk. All pitchers are risky, even the seemingly healthy ones and getting anyone with talent at a discount is always an avenue worth investigating. The point is to remember why teams consider these pitchers high risks to contribute in the first place. It’s to remember the other side from the too-easy story of redemption and coming back. Sometimes people don’t get off the mat. And it’s because not everyone does or even can that makes those that do special.

If you have not caught an Oakland Athletics’ game lately, then seeing the names “Matt Watson” and “Matt Carson” in the box score might catch you off guard. By this point in the season, it should be no surprise that the A’s are rummaging through each and every trashed box with the words “outfield” marked. Since opening day, their outfield has been in a liquid state. Take a look at the starting outfield by the first game of every month for proof:

Opening day: Travis Buck/Rajai Davis/Ryan Sweeney
May 1: Eric Patterson/Davis/Gabe Gross (Sweeney’s platoon mate)
June 1/July 1: Gross/Davis/Sweeney
August 1: Watson/Davis/ Carson

The A’s have had a dozen different players start games in the outfield. That number is one more than the depleted Boston Red Sox have sent beyond the infield dirt. So who are these Matt fellows? Let’s start with Watson. For the sake of timeliness, here are each of the organizations Watson has been a part of since being drafted by the Montreal Expos in 1999:

Montreal
New York Mets (twice)
Oakland Athletics (twice)
Toronto Blue Jays
Lancaster (Independent League team)

Watson actually did reach the majors with the Mets in 2003, racking up 25 plate appearances in September. Two years later he resurfaced with these very same Oakland A’s and now he’s back. As far as personal achievements go, I’m not sure how highly he cherishes breaking the 100 career plate appearances mark, but he broke it earlier this week, so congratulations to him on that and having an interesting choice in facial hair.

Carson’s story is less winding since Oakland is only the second organization he’s played with. Drafted by the New York Yankees out of BYU, he spent years intheir minor league system before joining Oakland prior to the 2009 season. Naturally, he made his major league debut last season and even hit a home run. He’s got one this year as well.

Honestly, neither is performing well enough to think they will ever be anything more than organizational soldiers called upon during lost seasons – which is why you’d never heard of them before. That’s not to diminish what they’ve accomplished, though, as only a select few amongst the world’s baseball players get to don a major league uniform, and even fewer for the amount of time these two will have if they can last the season .

Just 1 day until the event! Tickets will be available online up until 8am tomorrow morning as long as they’re not sold out.

Location: Florence Gould Hall (55 East 59th Street)

Tickets: $15 online (+$1.36 surcharge). $20 cash only at the door.

NY Baseball (9:00am – 9:40am)

Joe Pawlikowski, Mike Axisa, Benjamin Kabak (All RiverAveBlues.com), Matthew Cerrone (MetsBlog.com), and Mark Simon (ESPN) will be discussing all things baseball in NY. Moderated by Carson Cistulli.

Baseball Media (9:45am – 10:30am)

Jonah Keri (Bloomberg Sports) will host a panel comprised of Will Leitch (Deadspin, New York Magazine), Michael Silverman (Boston Herald), Matthew Cerrone (MetsBlog.com), Alex Speier (WEEI.com), and David Biderman (WSJ) to discuss how baseball media coverage has changed in recent years and will continue to evolve.

Baseball Stats (10:40am – 11:15am)

Jon Sciambi (ESPN), Mitchel Lichtman, Sky Kalkman (Beyond the Boxscore), Dave Cameron, and David Appelman will discuss where advanced baseball stats are right now and where they’ll be headed. Moderated by Carson Cistulli.

Bloomberg Sports Presentation (11:20 – 11:35)

Bloomberg Sports will make a presentation of a brand new product.

FanGraphs Q&A (11:40 – End)

Dave Cameron, Carson Cistulli, Bryan Smith, Joe Pawlikowski, Mike Axisa, and David Appelman will take questions until we’re officially kicked out (a little after 12:00).

Afterparty (3:30pm – Game Over)

Additionally, we’re going to host a game-watching party for attendees to gather at a local watering hole and view that afternoon’s Boston-New York match-up together. Those who make it to the event will be invited to join us for several more hours of fun later in the afternoon. Details and directions will be given at the event.

One constant refrain in minor league statistical analysis is that Context is Everything. Statistics mean very little in a vacuum, but instead, we need to know factors like their age relative to level, their league’s run environment, their park’s run environment. These are all factors that can wreak havoc on our attempt to judge a basic AVG/OBP/SLG batting line. We’ll be playing around to make things context-neutral all winter, but today, I wanted to magnify an environment that is universally known to favor pitching: the Florida State League.

Scouts and statisticians alike know the difficulty hitters face in the FSL, and both are long ahead of me in making adjustments. If you want to see the specific proof, I always point to a great offseason article at the Hardball Times by Justin Inaz. In terms of runs and BaseRuns alike, the FSL is the hardest league in professional baseball for hitters. As a result, I think most of us (I know that I’ve been) are guilty of seeing a batting line out of Florida, and saying, “Well, he’s played in the FSL, so I should boost up those numbers relative to other High-A players.”

However, it’s important to remember that if we continue on the path towards context-neutral, our adjustments need to be taken a step further: park adjustments. While we know how the league plays in the context of the Carolina and (especially) California Leagues, I haven’t seen a ton detailing how the specific stadiums play within the context of the league itself. In that vein, I calculated the runs per game and home runs per game at each FSL stadium (by both the home and road team) from both this season, and over the 2008-2010 period.

Name           R/G     HR/G     3R/G     3HR/G     
FSL Avg       8.45     1.01     8.34      1.10
Brevard       8.02     0.67     7.84      0.88
Clearwater    8.59     1.31     8.30      1.34
Daytona       9.07     1.30     8.99      1.21
Dunedin       8.81     1.47     8.89      1.45
Fort Myers    8.64     0.76     8.13      0.90
Jupiter       7.79     0.63     7.72      0.84
Lakeland      8.07     0.93     8.87      1.34
Palm Beach    7.68     0.75     7.78      0.79
St. Lucie     9.93     1.07     9.35      1.27
Tampa         7.56     0.81     7.77      0.78

Note: Not included above are Bradenton and Charlotte, because those affiliates haven’t existed for 3 years. Bradenton has played (relatively) hitter-friendly this year, at 9.79 runs and 1.30 home runs per game. Charlotte is somewhere between neutral and pitcher-friendly, at 7.38 runs and 1.13 homers per contest.

You see quite a bit of diversity in those numbers. This season, for every home run hit in Jupiter, there have been 2.3 hit in Dunedin. The league has three stadiums that seem to be extreme pitcher’s parks (Jupiter, Palm Beach, Tampa), and two others that favor pitchers (Brevard, Fort Myers) by a decent amount. By contrast, hitters from Clearwater, St. Lucie, Dunedin and Daytona probably receive more credit from our sub-conscious FSL adjustments than they deserve.

Some thoughts on how these findings should alter our thoughts on specific prospects numbers this season.

When is a top prospect not a top prospect? Dave covered that topic right before the deadline, and he makes an important point. There are plenty of things that can happen between the time when a prospect gets graded and when he gets traded that changes how teams value him. A No. 1 prospect can struggle at a higher level, causing his team to lose a little faith. We saw something along those lines when the Twins traded Wilson Ramos for Matt Capps. Unless the organization egregiously overvalued Capps, they had to have seen something that cause them to second guess Ramos’s potential.

We’ve seen the Dodgers do this a few times, most notably in 2008 and then again this year. At the trade deadline two years ago they traded Jon Meloan, who before the season was one of their No. 8 prospect, for veteran help from Casey Blake. Around the same time they also traded their No. 2 prospect, Andy LaRoche, in the deal that sent them Manny Ramirez. To date neither player has produced at the major league level. In fact, the player the Dodgers most regret trading, Carlos Santana, didn’t even make their Top 10 that year.

Once again the Dodgers were at it this year. To obtain Octavio Dotel, they traded the Pirates their Nos. 1 and 2 prospects from 2009, Andrew Lambo and James McDonald. Of course, both players’ situations have changed since the start of the 2009 season. Lambo had a so-so showing as a 20-year-old in AA. McDonald actually pitched excellently in the minors last year, striking out 11 per nine, but he exhausted his prospect status by pitching 63 innings. He wasn’t bad by any means, a 4.00 ERA, though his FIP, 4.48, and xFIP, 4.78, suggested he might have gotten a bit lucky.

This year both McDonald and Lambo produced poorly. Lambo improved slightly in his repeat performance at AA, but it was nothing that would raise his prospect status. McDonald spent some time injured, but was otherwise so-so in the minors. He didn’t get much of a chance in the majors. Both were seeing their stocks at their lowest, and the Pirates took advantage by dishing an expendable reliever in Dotel for the pair. So far it has worked out in their favor.

Last night McDonald dazzled in his Pittsburgh debut, striking out the side in the first and ending the night with eight strikeouts through six innings. The Pirates took it easy on him, sending up Jeff Clement to pinch hit in the bottom of the sixth with two outs even though McDonald had thrown just 89 pitches and had a 5-0 lead. It was as good a debut as they could have hoped, and it certainly has to give them further hope that a change of organizations is just what McDonald needed to fulfill his potential.

One start, of course, doesn’t mean that McDonald has gone from underperforming top prospect to legit major league starter. It’s a nice first step, but he has a long way to go before he proves the Dodgers wrong about his value. After all, the Dodgers have a decent track record when trading prospects when their values have been low. But for starters, a 0.3 WAR night will do just fine. It might be better than what Dotel produces for them the rest of the season.

With Kris Medlan suffering a tear in his UCL, the Braves are in need of a starting pitcher, and so they’re summoning Mike Minor from Triple-A to fill the rotation spot on Monday. The pitcher that Medlan originally replaced in the rotation, Kenshin Kawakami, was not an option to fill the spot because he’s thrown only one inning in the last six weeks.

Kawakami, however, has not been hurt, suspended, or otherwise absent from the team. He has just been chilling in the bullpen, waiting for Bobby Cox to summon him to the mound, an invitation that never materializes. And now that the Braves actually have a spot for him, he’s not stretched out enough to fill the hole, and is headed to Triple-A to get back on the mound. The entire saga of Kawakami’s usage is one of the more perplexing story lines of 2010.

While he is certainly no kind of ace, Kawakami is a perfectly serviceable major league starter. His performance is no different this year than it was last year, as his nearly identical xFIPs indicate. His ERA is up due to some BABIP fluctuation, but even that number isn’t overly high. He didn’t even pitch himself out of the rotation – his last start before being banished resulted in a strong performance against the Tigers.

And yet, Bobby Cox clearly has no faith in him. He kept him on ice, waiting for a low leverage long relief spot to let him soak up innings, but one never came, and he refused to use Kawakami in any game where the outcome was not yet determined. Why doesn’t he trust Kawakami? Your guess is as good as mine. His win-loss record isn’t pretty, but Cox has to be able to see how useless that number is, right?

So, instead of using a decent enough pitcher to help keep the Phillies at bay in a pennant race, the Braves now find themselves hoping he pitches well enough in Triple-A to generate some interest from another team, leading to an August trade. With a $6.7 million salary for 2011, he is sure to clear waivers, even though that amount isn’t much more than he’s worth.

Once the Braves find a team willing to look past wins and losses, Kawakami will likely have a new home – one where the manager is actually willing to give him the ball.  The Braves, meanwhile, will lean on a rookie to try to keep them ahead of the Phillies in the NL East. For their sake, I hope Minor pitches well, because otherwise, they’ll have a lot of reasons to look back and wonder why their manager simply refused to use a pretty decent major league pitcher in the middle of a pennant race.

For a player sometimes referred to as “Joey Bats,” Jose Bautista hadn’t exactly been an offensive stalwart prior to 2010. A 20th-round draft-and-follow-pick of the Pittsburgh Pirates back in 2000, Bautista wasn’t placed on the Bucs’ 40-man roster after the 2003 season. His omission began a Rule V odyssey taking him through Baltimore, Tampa Bay, Kansas City, Queens, and finally back to the ‘Burgh (as part of a deadline deal for Kris Benson) within the span of six months. The Pirates shipped Bautista to Toronto in August of ’08 for catcher Robinzon Diaz, currently struggling to slug .330 for Detroit’s Triple-A affiliate. From 2004-2009, Bautista’s bat was six percent below average (94 wRC+), and his .161 Isolated Power was right around the big league norm. He racked up a combined 1.8 wins above replacement. To most fans, Joey Bats was just another Joe Shmoe trying to stick on a major league roster.

And then, 2010 happened. In 452 plate appearances, Bautista is batting .263/.376/.600. His .162 wRC+ dwarfs his modest CHONE and ZiPS pre-season projections (both called for a 94 wRC+). With 33 home runs, Bautista holds a five dinger lead over his closest competitor, Adam Dunn. Jose’s .337 ISO tops all big leaguers (Miguel Cabrera is a distant second, at .300) and more than doubles his pre-season forecasts (.162 from ZiPS, .163 from CHONE). Despite his continued defensive issues, Bautista ranks 16th among position players with four WAR. He hasn’t simply surpassed expectations. Rather, he has taken those expectations, crumpled them into a little ball, and then hammered them all the way to Quebec.

How has Bautista done it? Well, he’s hitting the ball on the ground much less often. Bautista’s ground ball rate, 41.9 percent from 2004-2009, is just 32.2% in 2010. His fly ball percentage, 42.8 percent from ’04 to ’09, is 52.2% (third-highest in the majors). His home run per fly ball rate has spiked from 10.4% from ’04 to ’09 to 21% this season (fifth in the majors).

Bautista is also pulling the ball a lot more this season:

The chart above is normally positive for most players, as the average batter shows far more power to the pull side than to the center and opposite fields. But it’s even better for Bautista. He’s an abysmal hitter when he puts the ball in play to right field:

The past couple of years, he has been Tony Pena Jr. circa 2008 when he goes the opposite way. He has never hit an opposite-field homer in his career. To center, Bautista performs quite well compared to the average hitter:

But that’s nothing compared to his exploits when pulling the ball. Bautista has long been above average when hitting to left, but check out those 2010 numbers.

Bam! Pow! Zap! A .650 wOBA. A .699 ISO, with nearly 47% of his fly balls finding the cheap seats. Twenty-nine of Bautista’s 33 home runs have been hit to the pull side. Take a look at his home run chart from Hit Tracker Online:

There’s an inverse relationship between power and fastballs seen — the more pop a player displays, the less often he gets a heater. We’ve seen that with Bautista this season, as he has gotten a fastball just 49.4%, which is the fifth-lowest FB% among MLB hitters and is well below his career 57.7% rate of fastballs seen. It hasn’t much mattered to this point, as Bautista is killing everything but changeups.

Bautista’s gargantuan season has been a happy development for the Blue Jays, and it would be a mistake to simply waive off his power display as a total fluke. That being said, there’s no way he’s going to keep an ISO approaching Babe Ruth’s career mark. ZiPS projects a .359 wOBA for Jose, with a .245 ISO that essentially splits the difference between his career figure entering 2010 and his current, jaw-dropping total.

It will be interesting to see what course of action the Jays take with Bautista this off-season. He’s arbitration-eligible in 2011 and then hits free agency. Bautista’s making $2.4 million this year, and early estimates of his arbitration award this winter are in the $6-$8 million range. Even with significant regression, Bautista is worth that sum. But would Toronto be best off shopping him this off-season, while his value is at its apex? I have a hard time believing GM Alex Anthopoulos won’t heavily consider that option. What do you think?

With both myself and the newly arrived Carson Cistulli now residing in Madison, Wisconsin, the only natural thing to do would be to catch the main baseball fare of the city. That means heading down to the Duck Pond at Warner Field and catching a Northwoods League game with the Madison Mallards.

The Northwoods League is in the same vein as the Cape Cod League and many others in that it is a collegiate wood bat league. Outside of the fact that these players are amateurs, the Northwoods League models itself as a minor professional league, using the same rules and equipment. The league is in its 16th season and has graduated at least 48 MLB players and has seen 277 players drafted in the last two seasons alone. Notable alumni of the Mallards include Ian Kinsler and Ryan Spilborghs; others from around the league include Ben Zobrist, Andre Ethier, Max Scherzer, Curtis Granderson, and most recent graduate, newly debuted Cubs’ starter Thomas Diamond.

Mallards starter Matt Morgan (Purdue) was torched for a few singles in the first inning by the opposing Eau Claire Express, allowing three runs in the first inning. Felix Cardenas (University of Texas-Permian Basin), starting for Eau Claire, got touched up for three runs in the first inning as well, thanks to three well-struck doubles from Mallards hitters. After another two Express runs scored in the second, thanks partially to SS Ty Forney’s (Yavapai) second single of the game, Morgan settled in, striking out 9 (unofficial) batters in only five innings of work, walking two. But the Express, led by Forney and a two hit performance from Nathan Orf (University of Illinois-Chicago) did manage six runs off of Morgan.

Six would be just enough to hold off Madison, who despite a 3-5, 2 2B performance from Josh Parr (Illinois) and a 3-5, 2B performance from Carson Cistulli special Reed Gragnani (Virginia), couldn’t take home a win. With the score 6-5 in the bottom of the 9th, the Mallards put two on base, but #3 hitter Kyle Gaedele (Valparaiso) grounded into a double play (in a possible bunt situation!), and the Mallards’ rally died along with their chances of winning the game.

Carson has his own notes from the game, as follow:

• Firstly, it’s impossible not to note the quality of the facility (Madison’s Warner Park) and the excellent crowd in attendance. I’ve mentioned in both these and other pages how underwhelming the experience frequently is at Portland’s PGE Park, a stadium that was drawing fewer than 4000 fans per game this season despite a capacity of around 19,000. By contrast, the announced attendance at Warner was something like 6,700 — this despite the fact that Jack and I, eyeballing the stadium, figured it couldn’t have a capacity of much more than 5,000.

• Along the same lines as that first note, it’s also impossible to ignore the contributions of Warner Park PA announcer, who the internet says is named Aaron Sims. Sims talks constantly during the game and generally behaves unlike any other announce this author has ever come across. Example: Any fan who retrieves a foul ball can exchange said ball for a free hot dog. It’s for this reason that, any time a ball leaves the field of play, Sims says — in the most matter of fact way — he just says, “Wiener.” At one point, when a ball was hit over the backstop, but was just barely caught by the net that protects the fans back there, Sims said, “Rejected wiener.”

• In terms of performance, Mallards reliever and Santa Clara sophomore J.R. Graham displayed the best stuff of any pitcher. Throwing the 8th and 9th innings for the Mallards, Graham routinely hit 95 and 96 mph with his fastball — this while every other pitcher struggled to cross the 90 mph threshold. Graham complemented his fastpiece with an 85 mph slider that appears to be a decent, if not devastating, offering. Though he struck out two in this two innings of work, his strikeout totals for the summer (18 K in 26.0 IP) don’t appear to be in line with what I saw tonight. Nor were his numbers at Santa Clara off-the-charts awesome this year: 27.1 IP, 21 K, 10 BB). This is on a Santa Clara team that featured no fewer than four pitchers with K/9 above 9.00.

• Among batters, Madison’s Kyle Gaedele, who just finished his sophomore year at Valparaiso, looks the part of a prospect. He offers an interesting power-speed skillset, entering the game second on the Mallards in homers (6), first in triples (5), and first in stolen bases (23 in 25 attempts) in 247 at-bats. Interestingly, his numbers in college this season were almost identical: 236 AB, 8 3B, 7 HR, 17/17 SB. His plate discipline numbers (23 BB and 40 K in Madison, 23 BB and 42 K at Valpo) are also shockingly similar. Interesting note: Gaedele is the great-nephew of Eddie Gaedel, the 3’7″ player who became the shortest player to bat in a major league game, taking a plate appearance for the St. Louis Browns while wearing the jersey number 1/8.

• Finally, catcher Rafael Lopez had probably the hardest hit ball of the night — an opposite-field line-drive double almost all the way to the left-center wall. Though he doesn’t have a body you’d call “projectable” — he stands at 5’9″ — his numbers on the season are hard to ignore: 92 AB, .337/.436/.533, 14 BB, 11 K. This for a team with a collective line of .282/.369/.398. Lopez had a less impressive college season, slashing .278/.389/.397 for a talented Florida State team that slashed .300/.411/.496 as a team en route to an 18-12 record in the ACC.

And of course, it’s not a Wisconsin event without some fried cheese curds:

This edition of One Night Only is so funny you’ll probably forget to laugh.

(NERD scores listed beside pitchers’ names.)

Friday, August 06
St. Louis (Adam Wainwright, 8) at Florida (Ricky Nolasco, 9) | 7:05pm ET
• I’ll let people who’re smarter than me and care more about it debate the relative merits of trading away Ryan Ludwick. The immediate benefit of the trade, however, is that we all get more Jon Jay and Allen Craig in our respective lives. Jay’s .416 BABIP and regressed wOBA of .326 (courtesy of StatCorner) suggest that — shockingly! — his .366/.415/.553 line is unsustainable. Craig’s 48 plate appearance this season haven’t been super impressive, but at Triple-A the last two seasons, he’s been like the Prince of baseball — i.e. a producer of hits — slashing .322/.380/.551 in 842 PA.
• My memory isn’t so good, but I don’t recall Nolasco’s NERD being so high even this time last month. What’s happened in that time? Well, I asked the internet that question, and here was its answer: 4 GS, 27.1 IP, 30 K, 5 BB. That’s about a 2.50 FIP, probably. Also, Nolasco has an excellent strike rate of about 69.5% over that time.
• If I had my druthers: Adam Wainwright would throw the curveball to end all curveballs.

Los Angeles Americans (Jered Weaver, 8) at Detroit (Justin Verlander, 8) | 7:05pm ET
• Per Total Zone, Peter Bourjos was worth +76 runs in 360 games started in center field from 2006 to 2009.
• Per Erik Manning’s trick knee, Peter Bourjos is gonna be a star.
• If I had my druthers: Peter Bourjos, Peter Bourjos, Peter Bourjos. (Those are the lyrics to a song.)

Texas (Cliff Lee, 8) at Oakland (Dallas Braden, 6) | 10:05pm ET
• Perhaps it’s because the Texas farm system is so incredibly deep, or perhaps it’s because he was originally a 17th round draft pick, but Mitch Moreland appears to have received less attention than his performance would otherwise merit. If Gaby Sanchez (9/2/1983) and Logan Morrison (8/25/1987) were the oldest and youngest of three brothers, Moreland (9/6/1985) would be the middle brother. Like those two, he plays first base. And, like those two, his game is more predicated on excellent contact skills than power. Last year, his stikeout rate hovered around 13% between High-A and Double-A. This year, in 410 Triple-A plate appearances, it came in at 15.4%.
• Cliff Lee is, in the parlance of our ancestors, bodacious. As our Full-Time Employee noted a couple days ago: “Cliff Lee has completed at least eight innings in nine consecutive starts, throwing the full nine innings in six of those. In 18 starts, he’s only failed to finish the 7th inning once.”
• If I had my druthers: We would always, all of us, use the parlance of our ancestors.

Saturday, August 07
Boston (John Lackey, 3) at New York Americans (CC Sabathia, 3) | 4:05pm ET
• Have you ever watched a baseball game surrounded by the hardcorest of the hardcore baseballing nerds? Not in a sexy/gross way, but more like a hey-we’re-all-friends way? I ask, because that’s the the sort of thing that’ll be happening today in New York City, after the Live Event. (Note: Only ticketed Live Event-ers will be given the very secret location of the viewing spot).
• Ken Tremendous tweets: “Ryan Kalish will hit .538 for his career. 20 years. .538. Book it.”
• If I had my druthers: Ken Tremendous would also tweet: “Carson Cistulli is America’s sweetheart.”

Colorado (Jorge de la Rosa, 9) at Pittsburgh (Ross Ohlendorf, 2) | 7:05pm ET
• With a roster full of prospects — or, if not prospect-prospects, at least interesting young players — on their side, the Pirates have been one of the more compelling teams for the baseballing nerd. This past trade deadline, GM Neal Huntington made the team even cooler, sending away Octavio Dotel, Bobby Crosby, and some Donruss ’87 Rated Rookie card for more interesting young players (like my man Chris Snyder over here). But don’t take my word for it! Jack Frigging Moore wrote about it real hard this past Monday.
• I’m a Nerd and So Can You isn’t the title of Ross Ohlendorf’s forthcoming book. But Matt Klaassen wouldn’t surprised if it were.
• If I had my druthers: Ross Ohlendorf would’ve actually already written a book.

Sunday, August 08
New York Nationals (R.A. Dickey, 6) at Philadelphia (Roy Halladay, 10) | 1:35pm ET
• A guy goes away for a week and then, when he gets back, Domonic Brown all of a sudden has over 30 major league plate appearances. Sheesh, what gives? Anyway, he entered the season as the top prospect in the Philly system per Baseball America and Marc Hulet. Minor League Splits has his MLE line at .270/.321/.454 between Double- and Triple-A this season.
• Back in March, Tom Tango suggested how the differential between strikeouts and walks actually reveals more about a pitcher’s control over the strike zone than the ratio. Well, this year, Roy Halladay is striking about 7 more K than BB for every 9 innings he pitches (7.99 K/9, 1.06 BB/9). That marks the best differential of his career.
• If I had my druthers: When his pitching career is over, R.A. Dickey would fight cancer with this much intensity:

Cincinnati (Travis Wood, 7) at Chicago Nationals (Thomas Diamond, N/A) | 2:20pm ET
• In his major league debut — this past Tuesday versus Milwaukee — Diamond posted a line that looked almost identical to this: 6.0 IP, 27 TBF, 10 K, 3 BB, 3 GB on 14 BIP. Really, with the exception of all those strikeouts, it’s exactly the line you’d expect from Diamond, who (per First Inning) recorded 104 K, 46 BB, and a 33% GB rate through 108.1 Triple-A innings. (Our man Joe Pawl wrote about Diamond more in depth a couple days ago.)
• For his part, Wood has posted only a 28.7% groundball rate through his first. His minor league numbers suggest something at least closer to the mid-30% area, but that’s still extreme-flyball territory. Long story mostly short: with Wood and Diamond pitching — and a high of 89 degrees expected in Chicago — I’d take the over on whatever the line is for home runs in this game.
• If I had my druthers: Young men, the whole land over, would somehow make the surnames Diamond and Wood into a dirty joke type of thing.