Archive for August, 2012

Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of Daily Notes.

1. Featured Game: Atlanta at San Diego, 22:05 ET
2. Other Notable Games (Including MLB.TV Free Game)
3. Today’s Complete Schedule

Featured Game: Atlanta at San Diego, 22:05 ET
Regarding This Game, Why It’s Notable
Tonight’s game between Atlanta and San Diego is notable, on account of it represents the major-league debut of real-live prospect Casey Kelly.

Regarding Casey Kelly, Who That Even Is
Casey Kelly is a right-handed pitcher whom the Padres acquired in the trade that sent Adrian Gonzalez to Boston in December of 2010. He’s also a player whom the Red Sox themselves originally took 30th overall in the 2008 draft out of a Sarasota (FL) high school.

Regarding Casey Kelly, His Rankings on Various Prospect Lists
In terms of where Kelly appeared on various prospect lists before the season, sixth is where our Marc Hulet ranked him among Padres farmhands. John Sickels of Minor League Ball, meanwhile, ranked Kelly eighth overall among Padres prospects, while Baseball America ranked him third.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Cardinals recently extended Jake Westbrook and converted his 2013 mutual option to a guaranteed salary with a new mutual option for 2014. St. Louis also began to shift its focus towards keeping Adam Wainwright in town beyond next season since he’s rounding into form after elbow surgery. Both starters have pitched very well for the Cardinals this season, and are major reasons for the recent surge that has Mike Matheny’s squad making inroads towards a wild-card berth.

It’s a tad surprising, though, that the team hasn’t engaged in any contract discussions with Kyle Lohse. An impending free agent who has pitched very well in the past two seasons, Lohse figures to draw a great deal of interest on the free-agent market. He likely will hit the market because, according to Jayson Stark, Cardinals executives have told others that they’re going to let the situation play out. Stark translated that to mean “free agency: here he comes.”

The Cardinals already have a crowded and effective starting rotation and Lohse made some sense as the odd man out. Regardless, he’s once again pitching effectively in a contract year, and he’s establishing himself as an innings-eater with good peripherals and solid run-prevention skills. That’s a roundabout way of saying that he’s a very good pitcher. Heading into his mid-30s, Lohse has begun pitching much better than his perception around would appear to indicate.

Read the rest of this entry »

Trevor Bauer doesn’t really need an introduction to FanGraphs readers. The top prospect in the Arizona Diamondbacks organization already had a well-earned reputation when he was drafted third overall last year out of UCLA. A 21-year-old right-hander, Bauer is known for his in-depth knowledge of sabermetrics and pitching mechanics just as much as he is for having an extensive repertoire that includes an overpowering fastball.

Bauer, who is currently pitching for the Triple-A Reno Aces, recently addressed several aspects of his unique and highly cerebral approach. Among the topics covered were pitch sequencing, video and visualization, and why velocity is more important to him than location.

——

Trevor Bauer: “Pitching can be as simple or complicated as you choose to make it. It goes from being as simple as the catcher setting up outside and you throwing the ball. It can be fairly simple on the brain, or it can be knowing which pitch you want to throw in what situation, and why. That’s from the mental side of things.

“Physically, it’s pretty complex. Obviously, you have a lot of moving parts. You need to have everything in sync — everything working together — and that’s pretty complicated. I guess it just depends on how you choose to look at it, and what your preference is as an athlete — how simple or complex do you want to make it?

“Most people looking at my approach on the mound would say that it’s very, very complex. I’ve been doing it for so long, and I’m so familiar with it, that it just kind of occurs naturally. But I’d say I’m definitely more to the extreme of being complex. I pretty much take everything I do, pitching-wise, and try to figure it all out. I find the last little bit of information that is going to help me out.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ben and Sam discuss the futures of the two teams involved in the weekend’s blockbuster trade, then talk about whether the Astros would benefit from signing Roger Clemens.

Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of Daily Notes.

1. Featured Game: Los Angeles AL at Detroit, 13:05 ET
2. Today’s MLB.TV Free Game
3. Today’s Complete Schedule

Featured Game: Los Angeles AL at Detroit, 13:05 ET
Regarding What’s Possible
It’s entirely possible that a reader — a brazen sort of reader, that is — it’s possible that such a reader might confront the author regarding his choice of featured game today.

On What Grounds a Reader Might Do That
In the event that a reader were to confront the author on his selection of today’s Featured Game, it’s possible he would do so on the grounds that the NERD score — i.e. the infallible watchability metric created by the author himself — that the NERD score for the Angels-Tigers contest is decidedly not the highest among today’s games.

Other Games with a Higher NERD Score Than Angels-Tigers, A Brief List
Here’s a brief list of games with a higher NERD score than today’s Angels-Tigers game:

• The Cardinals-Reds game
• The Brewers-Pirates game

Read the rest of this entry »

Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of Daily Notes.

1. Information: Who Is and Isn’t on the Red Sox
2. Today’s Notable Games (Including MLB.TV Free Game)
3. Today’s Complete Schedule

Information: Who Is and Isn’t on the Red Sox
A Note on What’s About to Happen
What’s about to happen — or, depending on when you’re reading this, what has happened already — is the Red Sox and Dodgers are going to conduct business with each other. Adult-type of business. Serious adult-type of business.

A Note on the Aforementioned Business, What’s Unclear About It
So far as the serious and aforementioned business is concerned, it’s not entirely clear — to the author, at least, who necessarily serves as the reader’s surrogate in such matters — it’s not entirely clear who’ll be on the Red Sox after the business has been conducted. Like, on the Sox’ 25-man roster.

Regarding Who’s Not on the Red Sox Anymore
As of this afternoon, here are the players who’ll no longer be on the Red Sox, it seems: Josh Beckett, Carl Crawford, Adrian Gonzalez, and Nick Punto.

Read the rest of this entry »

It’s a good day to be a fan of the Boston Red Sox.

The rumored trade between the Boston Red Sox and the Los Angeles Dodgers will save the east coast club more than $200 million but it will also infuses the organization with some young, cost-controlled, high-ceiling talent. Key names that are likely headed to Boston from the west coast include pitchers Rubby de la Rosa and Allen Webster, infielder Ivan DeJesus Jr., and outfielder Jerry Sands.

The Red Sox club is also said to be receiving veteran first baseman James Loney but he’s currently on a one-year contract and will be a free agent at the end of the season. It’s unlikely that he’d be re-signed given that he’s been at or below replacement level for the past five seasons (although a move away from Los Angeles should help his offensive numbers to a degree).

The key to the deal is de la Rosa. A hard-throwing native of the Dominican Republic, just 23 years old, he has the ceiling of a No. 2 starter. Only his lack of consistent command and control keep the No. 1 label from being adhered to de la Rosa. There are also some concerns over the durability of the hurler who underwent Tommy John surgery during the 2011 season. He doesn’t have the largest frame and puts a lot of strain on his body by reaching triple-digits with his fastball. His secondary pitches – a changeup and slider – both showed a lot of potential pre-surgery but he’s made just five official appearances since returning from the disable list.

Read the rest of this entry »

While nothing has been made official yet, it appears that the Red Sox and Dodgers are going to soon finalize one of the largest (and most interesting) deals in baseball history. The deal is believed to inclue Adrian Gonzalez, Carl Crawford, Josh Beckett, and Nick Punto heading to Los Angeles, with a group of five players (including James Loney, Rubby de la Rosa, Jerry Sands, Ivan DeJesus and “a prospect”) headed back to Boston.

We knew a shake-up was coming in Boston. We’re a year into the team badly underperforming their talent level, and the general circus atmosphere around the organization couldn’t be sustained much longer. A shake-up was inevitable. Beginning the demolition in one fell swoop was less predictable, however.

Read the rest of this entry »

Source: An unidentified team has claimed Josh Beckett on trade waivers. One MLB exec believes it may be Dodgers, but unconfirmed for now.

— Sean McAdam(@Sean_McAdam) August 24, 2012

Per the tweet above from Sean McAdam, Josh Beckett was claimed on waivers by someone with a lot of money to burn, apparently. When I wrote about Beckett’s trade value yesterday, I guessed that that the Red Sox would have to pick up $20 million or so of the remaining $36 million left on his deal. By putting in a waiver claim, the unnamed team is agreeing to take the entire contract, and let Boston off the hook for the remainder of the deal.

This is pretty great news for Boston, assuming that Beckett’s 10-and-5 rights don’t come into play and allow him to block any deal. By virtue of the CBA, Beckett has a blanket no-trade clause, though it is somewhat unclear if those rights can be used to block assignment via waivers. I believe the answer is yes, but am not 100% certain. Either way, I’d imagine the Red Sox will give Beckett whatever he wants to waive those rights and go to a team that actually wants to pay him $36 million for the next 2+ years.

In terms of who the claimant is, speculation focuses on the Dodgers mostly because they quite obviously have a large amount of money and are not afraid to throw it around. They were awarded claims for Cliff Lee, Adrian Gonzalez, and Joe Blanton already, and took the remainder of Hanley Ramirez’s deal before the trade deadline, so taking on money has clearly not been a discouragement to adding talent. However, with Clayton Kershaw, Chris Capuano, Chad Billingsley, Aaron Harang, and Joe Blanton already in the rotation, it’s not clear that Beckett would be a significant piece for the Dodgers this year, and they almost certainly could have landed a better pitcher in free agency this winter.

We should find out soon who the claiming team is, because it would be a pretty huge shock if Boston pulled him back. Perhaps an even bigger shock than the fact that he got claimed in the first place.

Update: It is the Dodgers. Potential theory – they agreed to take Beckett in an Adrian Gonzalez trade. This will make more sense if Gonzalez ends up in LA.

Stephen Strasburg is up to 145 1/3 innings, and the Washington Nationals are sticking to their guns: once Strasburg hits 180 innings or so, he’s done for the year, and that’s that.

There are two common arguments against this plan: 1) 180 is a number they picked out of thin air, and there’s no evidence that demonstrates that this type of shutdown will actually keep Strasburg healthier in the future; and 2) The Nats are a playoff team, and the Nats will be sorely hurt by depriving themselves of their fireballing ace. Most outside commenters (from Leo Mazzone to the Braves’ Chipper Jones to current Washington Nationals like Mark DeRosa) are displeased with the plan; everyone agrees that it’s risky. I will now attempt to defend the plan.
Read the rest of this entry »