You’re amazing.

Source: FanGraphs

It’s the World Series. Your team hasn’t played since Monday. You have a deep bullpen and the availability of a starting pitcher working on three days rest. It’s the World Series.

Top 5: Texas 4, St. Louis 3

Bases loaded, 2 outs: Colby Lewis struck out swinging

Read the rest of this entry »

With no game to mismanage last night, Tony LaRussa instead told reporters that he was going to go see Moneyball. He might have been joking, since he’s clearly not a fan of the concepts associated with the book. A bit later in the same interview, in fact, he said this:

“On-base percentage is one of the most dangerous concepts of the last seven, eight years, because it forces some executives and coaches and players to think that it’s all about getting on base by drawing walks. And the fact is that the guys that have the best on-base percentage are really dangerous hitters whenever they get a pitch in the strike zone.

“So if the pitcher knows that and the catcher knows that, they work the edges, and pretty soon it’s 2-and-1, 2-and-1 rather than 0-and-1 all the time.

“You watch your productive hitters in the big leagues, and they get a chance to drive in a run, they look for the first good strike, and the better the pitching, especially this time of the year, you get that first strike, that may be the last one that you get to see. So you’d better be ready to swing early. It’s not sitting up there and taking strike one, strike two so that you can work the count.’’

Let’s put aside the fact that the point of Moneyball was not “OBP=Good” and just address LaRussa’s contention directly – does the philosophy of taking pitches cause hitters to perform worse?

Read the rest of this entry »

There were a lot of head-scratching moments in last night’s game. The evening featured bizarre baserunning, way too much bunting, and some really inexplicable bullpen management, but more than anything else, there were intentional walks. A lot of intentional walks.

Some of them were understandable, if not defensible, because of the tradition of how baseball has been managed for years. For instance, in the third inning, with Rafael Furcal standing on third base and just one out, Ron Washington ordered an intentional walk to Albert Pujols. Despite this not being one of the situations where that’s a good move, there is upside to the play – a ground ball double play gets you out of the inning without allowing the run, the best possible outcome given the circumstances. The cost of putting an extra baserunner on makes it a poor percentage play in most circumstances, but it’s a gamble that offers the best case potential, and that can make it an enticing option for many managers.

The fifth inning IBB to Pujols was more of just straight up fear of the Cardinals best hitter, as putting him on to load the bases with two outs put C.J. Wilson – not a guy who was pounding the zone or instilling faith in anyone that he could throw strikes when he needed to – in a do-or-die situation. The walk there removed any margin for error, and you have to believe that the gap between what Pujols and Holliday could produce is staggeringly high in order to justify that one. But, you know, Holliday is having a bad series, and managers often react to recent performance more than they should. If you think Holliday’s struggles in the last week are predictive in some way, then you might be able to make a case for putting Pujols on to face an inferior batter. You probably shouldn’t believe that, but it’s not entirely ridiculous.

But, have no fear, the entirely ridiculous was still to come.

Read the rest of this entry »

So I’ll just throw this up there and let you guys post your reactions about the game as a whole in the comments. We’ll have more tomorrow, but for now:

Mike Napoli vs LHP, career: .294/.400/.555
Mike Napoli vs RHP, career: .253/.343/.498

Mark Rzepczynski vs LHB, career: .205/.289/.284
Mark Rzepczynski vs RHB, career: .266/.357/.427

LI of Napoli vs Rzepczynski: 4.13

I just have no idea how you can let that match-up happen.

With the World Series wrapping up on either Wednesday or Thursday night, the five day window that teams have for exclusive negotiating periods is going to expire at the beginning of next week, and the off-season will officially be underway. As is the case every winter, there are a small handful of players who are going to get paid handsomely – this year, that list includes Albert Pujols, Prince Fielder, Jose Reyes, CC Sabathia, and C.J. Wilson. The big five free agents – and Yu Darvish, if you want to throw him into that mix as well – are all going to be highly coveted and command bidding wars that will land them huge long term contracts.

The drop-off from those five to the next tier, however, is pretty striking. Everyone after that comes with either performance, age, or health concerns, and often a combination of the three. And, unfortunately for the non-premium free agents, they’re hitting the market at a really lousy time.

In any one off-season, teams have an available pool of money on which to acquire or retain talent. The total pool of cash might change slightly based on who is available, but for the most part, it’s driven by overall league revenues and expiration of previous contracts freeing up money that can be re-allocated to other players. At the league level, attendance was fairly flat (up 186 fans per game over 2010), and financial problems plaguing the Dodgers and Mets are threatening to take two traditionally large revenue franchises mostly out of play this winter. However, it’s not just a lack of big spenders that may end up thwarting salary growth for the non-premium tier of free agents – they also have to compete with the huge pool of talent that is headed to arbitration for the final time this winter.

Read the rest of this entry »