The Arizona Diamondbacks had a disappointing 2012 season and the front office has identified key areas in which the team must improve. The outfield isn’t one of these areas, as the Diamondbacks now boast five players who could all stake a claim for a starting role, whether in Arizona or on another team.

They could conceivably make things work if everyone was retained, but that seems like a sub-optimal use of valuable resources. With platoons — both traditional and non-traditional — and injury risk, carrying four or five competent outfielders is often necessary. However, trading one or two of these players could solve issues elsewhere on the diamond. The team would still boast a solid outfield while improving in other key areas. But determining who to trade isn’t as straightforward, as non-performance factors must be taken into consideration.

The Diamondbacks currently have Justin Upton, Chris Young, Adam Eaton, Jason Kubel and Gerardo Parra under contract. Upton is the most talented of the group as well as the most expensive. Eaton is a top prospect under team control that played well in a small sample of September plate appearances. Kubel is a strong hitter who can’t run or field who is signed to a team-friendly contract. Parra is an average hitter under team control with excellent fielding marks. Young is a terrific defensive centerfielder capable of 20/20 production under team-friendly contractual terms.

The team is likely to retain Upton and play him in right field. The team also seems intent on playing Eaton in center field, which means that Young seems like the odd man out. He could shift to left field, but part of what makes him valuable would get eliminated in the process. Given his age, fielding skills, offensive pop and contract status, as well as the free agent market developing at the position, Young would instantly become a very attractive trade target if he were made available. Dealing him makes the most sense for the Diamondbacks, as he has become expendable with Eaton’s presence on the roster, and could extract the most value in return.

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On Oct. 30, 2001, the New York Yankees hosted the Arizona Diamondbacks in the third game of a World Series played just seven weeks after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Left-hander Brian Anderson was on the mound for the D-Backs. Derek Jeter batted second in the Yankees lineup.

Eleven years later, Anderson, who finished his career with 82 wins, does color commentary and play-by-play. Jeter remains a marquee player, although he suffered a broken ankle on Saturday, shortly after recording his 200th post-season hit.

Not surprisingly, Jeter was a primary focus for Anderson when he took the mound. The Yankees shortstop went 1-for-3 against his slants, and his team won the game 2-1. Arizona went on to win the Series in seven games.

Anderson talked about his game plan against Jeter — and what happened in each at bat — earlier this season.

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Anderson on the game plan: “I had faced Jeter a number of times and everybody knows he has the good inside-out swing. He’s a guy that if you stay away, stay away, stay away — even if you’re changing speeds — he’ll shoot you. He’s happy to take his hits to right field. Everybody knows that. Then, if you’re going to come in on him, you really have to get it in there.

“A lot of times, you try to get him leaning, looking to go the other way, and then try to jam him. Sometimes that’s difficult, especially if you don’t execute the pitch properly. He had such a good inside-out swing that if the ball stayed middle-in, he could kind of fight it off and push it. He’d get those little bloop hits out into right field. Read the rest of this entry »

I will now include, for your consideration, an incomplete list of things this ALCS Game 1 post could’ve been about:

1. Robinson Cano being called out at first in the second inning
2. Alex Rodriguez continuing to struggle
3. Doug Fister picking it up after getting drilled by a comebacker
4. Delmon Young torching the playoffs
5. Jose Valverde being a massive liability
6. Ichiro and the home-run porch
7. Raul Ibanez condensing a career’s worth of heroics into one week
8. The Tigers’ bullpen being poorly set up behind the starters
9. Drew Smyly dominating

The opener of the American League Championship Series did not leave us wanting for twists and intrigue, with the Tigers finally knocking off the Yankees 6-4 in 12 innings and five hours. It’s good to know the crescendo of the Division Series round has carried over into the next. Game 1 left us with entirely too many question marks and talking points, but after everything else, we were left with one major story drowning out the others: Derek Jeter is hurt. He’s hurt bad, and he’s done for the playoffs.

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I did not know five minutes ago — but probably should have, owing to how I’ve watched Law and Order at least once in my life — that, per U.S. law, all deaths are classified as one of five sorts. These sorts, in fact:

• Natural
• Accidental
• Homicide
• Suicide
• Undetermined

Another thing I didn’t know five minutes ago, but have realized is likely not the worst idea, is that a way to discuss the Nationals’ (now deceased) 2012 season — and, in particular, their playoff-series defeat at the hands of the St. Louis Cardinals — is via the language of forensic science, a very basic understanding of which I’ve just acquired from Wikipedia, and which I will now dispense haphazardly throughout what follows.

“What was the cause of the death of the Nationals’ 2012 season?” we ask.

Here are cases for all five of the legally recognized types:

Type of Death: Natural

Real Definition: Death by illness or malfunction of the body.

Baseball Definition: All humans die. All baseball teams but one (i.e. the World Series winners) are eliminated. Most human deaths are natural. Most baseball teams, just by virtue of the season/playoff format, are unlikely to win a championship in a given season.

Relevance to Nats: The Nationals were a good baseball team this year, posting the best Pythagorean record in the National League. That said, the Cardinals were also a good baseball team, one which posted the second-best Pythagorean record in the National League. Over the course of 162 games, the Nationals would probably have beaten the Cardinals, like, 82 times. Logic dictates then that, over the course of a playoff series — a short, five-game series, especially — each team probably had about a 50% chance of winning.

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Of the four teams that made it into the American League Division Series round, two were lovable underdogs, teams no one expected to get anywhere close to that far. Around spring training, the Orioles were projected to finish last in the AL East, as they are just about every year. The Athletics were projected to finish last or close to last in the AL West, well behind the elite-level Rangers and Angels. No one expected the Orioles or A’s to make any noise, so when they did, people got swept up, and they were two incredibly easy teams to root for in the first series round of the playoffs.

And both of them got eliminated, leaving us with the Yankees and the Tigers to fight over the AL pennant. The Tigers played in the ALCS as recently as 2011, and the Yankees played in the ALCS as recently as 2010, so something about this matchup doesn’t quite feel so fresh. Granted, the Tigers and the Yankees have faced their adversity, too. The Tigers were multiple games out of a playoff spot in the middle of September. The Yankees not only had to fight off the Orioles, but they also had to deal with major injuries to Mariano Rivera, Michael Pineda, and Andy Pettitte. It’s been an easy road for neither team, but because people long expected both the Yankees and the Tigers to make the playoffs, this matchup doesn’t feel as appealing as it could’ve been.

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The Cardinals are just ridiculous.

Last year.

Source: FanGraphs

This year.

Source: FanGraphs

We’re all going to be telling our grandkids about the early 21st century Cardinals and their miraculous Octobers.

As expected, Alex Rodriguez finds himself on the bench to start game five, with Eric Chavez playing third base and Raul Ibanez filling in at DH. We talked about this possibility yesterday, with both having better numbers against right-handers this year and A-Rod obviously not having a very good postseason thus far. With their backs against the wall, the Yankees are going with the platoon advantage and guys who have performed better versus right-handed pitching this year. It’s hard to blame them, even if swapping out Rodriguez for Ibanez probably doesn’t make a huge difference one way or another.

But, there’s a pretty interesting subplot that develops because of this decision – by starting two LHBs who have huge platoon splits in Chavez and Ibanez, there is almost certainly going to be a situation where Buck Showalter goes to a left-handed reliever to get one of them out late in the game. If the score is even remotely close, Girardi will have to strongly consider pinch-hitting for either one, as they simply aren’t effective big league hitters against lefties at this point in their career. And A-Rod is going to be Girardi’s best right-handed batter on the bench.

So, starting Ibanez and Chavez sets up the very real chance that Rodriguez is going to be sent up to pinch-hit in a high leverage “clutch” situation – the very role that the narrative claims he performs the worst in. At least throughout his postseason history, the narrative is wrong, but this line-up choice sets up a situation where Girardi is going to have to publicly decide whether he buys into that narrative or not.

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The Yankees’ decision to bench Alex Rodriguez has consequences extending beyond Game 5 of the 2012 ALDS, win or lose. Staying in the here and now, it’s a decision by the Yankees to prioritize the platoon advantage — with Eric Chavez at third base instead of Rodriguez, the Yankees will be throwing seven left-handed (or switch-hitting) batters at Orioles starter Jason Hammel. Only Derek Jeter and Russell Martin will bat from the right side.

Joe Girardi is betting against a trend from this season’s New And Improved Jason Hammel: against 257 lefties, he allowed a .262 wOBA; against 236 righties, he allowed a .306 mark.

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The playoffs have a way of turning role players into celebrities. The playoffs also have a way of turning superstars into celebrities — it’s all about who performs at the right time over small samples — but the playoffs are a time for role players to capture extensive attention, and a guy who’s getting a lot of attention right now is side-arming Orioles reliever Darren O’Day. O’Day has been of tremendous value to the Orioles in 2012, and in this ALDS. Previously, he went undrafted out of college. The Mets grabbed him from the Angels in the Rule 5 draft. The Rangers grabbed him off waivers from the Mets. The Orioles grabbed him off waivers from the Rangers. O’Day’s always been valued enough to have a job, but not really enough to keep it for long.

One of the interesting things about O’Day — one of the things that’s made him valuable — is that, for a side-arming righty, he’s been surprisingly effective against left-handed hitters. Not just this series, not just this season, but over his career. Over 640 total plate appearances, righties facing O’Day have posted a .281 OBP. Over 364 total plate appearances, lefties facing O’Day have posted a .285 OBP. There are differences in average, slugging, and wOBA, as you’d expect, and it’s not like O’Day has an even platoon split, but he doesn’t have a giant platoon split, and that’s kind of weird for a guy with his arm angle.

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Because I’m married — and because my wife informed me that we needed to “get out of the house” at around 5pm CT or whatever — I watched the last third of yesterday afternoon’s Cardinals-Nationals NLDS game from a very authentic sort of supper club near my house in Madison, Wisconsin.

Watching baseball at a supper club in Wisconsin is nothing to complain about — one is warm, one is drinking a brandy Old Fashioned, one is drinking (later on) a second brandy Old Fashioned. Life, in short, has been perfected.

What is something to complain about, I learned — especially if you’re Matt Holliday or the TBS broadcast team or (later on) the entire internet — is home-plate umpire Jim Joyce’s strike zone.

These were not complaints that I actually heard with my own ears. Perhaps the one drawback of watching a baseball game at an authentic sort of supper club in Wisconsin is that a constant soundtrack of top hits from the 50s and 60s and 70s takes precedence over audio commentary.

However, all was not lost: as a married person — and especially as a married person who is also an idiot — I have become quite adept at registering frustration in the facial and bodily expressions of others (wives, most notably, but different kinds of people, too). Which, as an expert in this area, frustration is what I registered on the face and body of Matt Holliday following the third pitch (and third called strike) of his eighth inning plate appearance against Nationals.

Can you spot it?

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