Although they converged on today’s game in wildly different fashions, both the St. Louis Cardinals and Pittsburgh Pirates entered Busch Stadium finishing lost seasons. The Cardinals roster contained one of the most formidable front end starting rotations along with two of the game’s best players in Albert Pujols and Matt Holliday, and they will be forced to watch the Cincinnati Reds play in October. The Pirates have been by far the league’s worst team, entering at 55 games below .500 and waiting for the merciful end of a six-month death march.

At least both teams received some encouragement this afternoon in the form of two excellent performances from the starting pitchers, P.J. Walters of the Cardinals and James McDonald of the Pirates. Walters earned the win, going seven shutout innings, allowing four hits and a walk and striking out four. McDonald received a tough-luck loss despite allowing only one run in six innings (on an Allen Craig HR) and striking out seven against no walks.

For Walters, this was merely building on a successful minor league season. Walters threw just under 125 innings for the AAA Memphis Redbirds this season, compiling a 3.81 FIP in the hitter friendly PCL and a very encouraging 8.7 K/9 and 2.5 BB/9 over that stretch. Walters doesn’t have much in terms of velocity – his fastball averages around 88 MPH – but he flashes a curveball, a changeup, a slider, and a cutter. With that arsenal combined with solid control, Walters has seen success at every level, most notably in 2009 and 2010 at AAA.

For McDonald, this is just more of the same. As I wrote about two weeks ago, McDonald has done his best impression of an ace so far this season, and although he probably yields too many fly balls to keep up this kind of pace, he’s showing the potential to at least become a top-half of the rotation starter, something that will be key to McDonald’s success. After today’s start, McDonald has struck out 61 batters and only walked 24 in his 64 innings as a Pittsburgh Pirate. It’s hard to imagine that Neal Huntington could have imagined much more when McDonald was acquired at the trading deadline.

Of course, each team did have a relatively poor lineup on the field today, as can happen in late September with expanded rosters. The Pirates, although they’ve played better of late, aren’t a good offensive team, and the Cardinals were sitting their superstars Albert Pujols and Matt Holliday. Still, these performances are impressive against Major League lineups of any quality, and both clubs must be very happy with their young arms today.

Wins are at a premium right now for the three teams competing for the final two spots in the National League playoff race. With both San Francisco and Atlanta winning last night, it was imperative for San Diego to defeat the Chicago Cubs and stay within a half game of the Braves and a full game of the Giants. But the Cubs and Alfonso Soriano simply wouldn’t lie down for the Padres at PETCO Park last night.

After five innings, Mat Latos of the Padres and Ryan Dempster of the Cubs both had good starts going. Latos allowed two runs in the fifth due to a couple of errors and a double by Kosuke Fukudome, and the Padres had tied it on a Nick Hundley home run, leaving the score at 2-2.

Latos has had terrible results in September, allowing a 6.94 ERA despite fantastic peripheral numbers. Although we can’t blame the first two runs of the game on him due to errors, the next runs the Cubs scored are completely on Latos. After allowing a line drive single to center field, Alfonso Soriano drilled a two run homer to left field to give the Cubs a 4-2 lead. The home run clearly goes down as the turning point of the game, as the Cubs win expectancy rose from 55.5% to 81.2% on the play. This doesn’t even take into account the run suppressing tendencies of PETCO Park, so in all likelihood this win probability was likely even higher for Chicago, making the situation even bleaker for the Padres.

The Cubs bullpen has been, on the whole, roughly average this year, compiling 23 runs above replacement and just under +1.0 WPA on the season. But judging the Cubs bullpen “on the whole” isn’t entirely fair – Sean Marshall and Carlos Marmol account for +47 runs above replacement and +5.2 WPA, meaning that the rest of the Cubs bullpen has, to put it lightly, struggled. As Sean Marshall pitched on the 27th, there was a good chance that the Cubs would turn to another candidate in the 8th, meaning that a two run lead for the Cubs wasn’t necessarily safe.

Soriano, however, wasn’t done. Facing Mike Adams – perhaps the nastiest member of the vaunted Padres bullpen – Soriano belted a second home run out of PETCO Park, putting the Cubs up 5-2 and lowering the Padres win expectancy from 11% down to 5.4%.

With Marmol waiting in the bullpen, the Padres only chance was likely to come against rookie Andrew Cashner, who despite solid stuff and a 96 MPH average fastball has struggled mightily against major league hitters. Cashner, however, managed to retire the side in order, all but sealing the Padres fate. Marmol entered in the ninth, and, somewhat shockingly, recorded only one strikeout in a hitless ninth. It was only the 30th time in 75 appearances that Marmol has failed to record at least two strikeouts, showcasing just exactly why he has been the best closer in the league by WAR.

In a low run environment and with a scoreless ninth almost a guarantee, the three runs from Alfonso Soriano home runs were truly killers for the Padres last night. There’s no reason for panic in San Diego – they’re only 1.5 back of Atlanta and 2 back of San Francisco. Atlanta gets Philadelphia in their next series, and San Diego gets a personal hack at the Giants to close the season. The Padres, however, need to take care of business from here on out and barring a sweep against San Francisco, they’ll need some help. Coolstandings has dropped the Padres’ playoff odds to 19.2% – panic may not be in order, but if I’m a fan of the friars, I’m definitely worried.

The whole baseball world knows about Felix Hernandez and his 12-12 win-loss record, certainly a travesty of justice of the highest order. A similar travesty is occurring in Atlanta, although not quite to the same level of Hernandez – namely, Tommy Hanson’s 10-11 win-loss record. Hanson has started 33 games for the Braves this year, compiling a 3.31 FIP and even a 3.41 ERA and yet he still carried a sub-.500 record into last night’s start against the Florida Marlins.

Hanson’s throwpitches were in full effect yesterday. The Braves’ righty went 7.2 innings and only allowed five hits and no walks while converting three Marlins into base ball outs via alphanumeric character “K.” It was another fine start for the 24 year old – however, he couldn’t earn the win, and in fact he barely escaped with a no-decision.

Hanson cruised into the eighth inning with a 1-0 lead (on a Brian McCann home run), but a Mike Stanton single and stolen base put a runner into scoring position with one out. Marlins catcher Brad Davis then delivered Stanton home with a double. At this point, the game was tied at 1-1 and the Marlins had a win expectancy of 54.8%. Hanson was dangerously close to exiting the game with the chance to lose, but he retired Wes Helms and rookie reliever Jonny Venters retired Cameron Maybin to end the inning and at least prevent a loss for Hanson. However, when Venters entered the game, Hanson was once again unable to earn the win for a start that was likely deserving – nearly eight full innings, only one run, and only five hits. Hanson compiled +.196 WPA on the game as well.

It was just another start for Hanson – pitch well, get no run support, and miss out on the victory. However, the Braves did pick up Hanson in the late innings. Venters, Peter Moylan, Billy Wagner, and Mike Dunn combined for 3.1 scoreless innings with only one hit and one walk allowed out of the bullpen. The Braves finally struck off Jose Veras in the 11th inning, as Veras put two runners on via the walk and a two out walk-off single by Omar Infante scored the elusive second run to give the Braves the victory.

For as unjust Hanson’s season has been from an individual perspective, at least he can hold on to the fact that he’s giving his team a chance to reach the playoffs. He was key in this victory, which gave the Braves a half game lead in the Wild Card over the San Diego Padres. That’s about as good of a consolation prize as I can think of for a season like Hanson’s.

This piece by Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe mostly focuses on the postseason chances of Roy Oswalt‘s Philadelphia Phillies, but buried in there is also a nugget about Oswalt’s former team, the Houston Astros. Cafardo reports that in an attempt to increase Carlos Lee’s trade value, the team will move the struggling outfielder to first base to start the 2011 season.

Lee has had a terrible year by anybody’s standards, let alone his own. After ten straight seasons of above average offensive performance and a total of 149 runs above average in that timeframe, Lee has collapsed in 2010. His slash line has dropped to .246/.289/.415 this season. Much of that is part of a BABIP collapse to .238, but his power numbers have continued to decline after his ISO dropped below .200 for the first time since 2001. Overall, Lee has a .306 wOBA and a 91 wRC+ – numbers that aren’t terrible overall, but a player needs to provide some defensive value to back up those kind of hitting numbers.

If it weren’t for defensive issues, a move to first base wouldn’t even be in the discussion. However, Lee is utterly Dunnian (or maybe Hawpesque?) when it comes to the outfield. He was serviceable earlier in his career, but his age has caught up to him, and an utter lack of quickness or speed makes Lee a liability in left field. DRS and UZR both have Lee between -15 and -17 runs this season in left field, and Tom Tango’s Fans Scouting Report ranks Lee as one of the bottom 10 left fielders in the majors. That kind of performance puts Lee’s defensive contributions below the value of a designated hitter.

In that sense, a move to first probably makes sense – not only is first base the easiest position, but it also sees the fewest chances of any position as well. Due to this lack of chances, it’s hard to imagine Lee as much worse than -10 – although it’s certainly possible – which is the level that would be equal to -15 in LF. If he can play at even a -5 level, that would make him about half a win better, and if Lee is an average first baseman, then his defensive value is probably increased by about one full win.

Of course, that won’t matter if his hitting doesn’t rebound – nobody’s going to give up prospects or take on salary to add a first baseman with a sub-.300 on-base percentage. There is a chance that he could improve, though. Lee’s contact skills are excellent, as he has only struck out 109 times in nearly 1300 plate appearances over the last two seasons. The problem is being able to produce with that contact, something that’s nearly impossible with a .238 BABIP, and the decline in power production hasn’t helped either.

As a plodding 34 year old with a drastically falling line drive rate, it’s not surprising that Lee’s BABIP has plummeted, and given that profile, there’s no guarantee that it rebounds. Even if it does, it probably won’t get above .300 – the last time Lee posted a .300+ BABIP was 2004. However, CHONE’s projection of .282/.328/.478 would at least make him an above average hitter. With a conservative estimate of -3 runs at first base, that would make Lee a 1.0 WAR player.

That looks like it would certainly increase Lee’s value, although not enough to get anything of value in return, particularly if the Lance Berkman trade or the Roy Oswalt trade are indicators at all. However, this analysis so far has overlooked the presence of Brett Wallace at first base. Wallace has looked awful in the majors to date, but he is rated highly by some talent evaluators. Starting Lee at first base would mean that Wallace is either relegated to AAA or the bench. The latter could be a disastrous decision for Wallace’s development. The former would mean a third tour through AAA, a league in which he has already posted .800+ OPSs twice. Perhaps Wallace, who turned 24 last month, could learn more with another stint in the minors, but it’s also possible that he needs to develop at the MLB level.

When it comes to trade value, the book on Carlos Lee is simple: he has none, and barring an unlikely offensive explosion at the age of 35, he won’t have any next year either. In any case, the position that he plays is probably inconsequential. The real issue for the Astros here isn’t Carlos Lee, but instead the developmental track for Brett Wallace. This decision says to me that the player development sector of the Astros front office thinks Wallace needs time in AAA. If Carlos Lee can bring in any sort of value back in a trade – sometimes, the trade market is quite unpredictable – then that’s just gravy for Houston.

Things were looking interesting for the Rockies in the NL West entering the weekend. A series sweep over the Giants would move them to only half a game behind with seven to play and a good chance to move into the playoffs in the last two weeks of the season. But the Rockies couldn’t handle Tim Lincecum in game 1. Despite their game 2 victory, a loss in the third game of the series would knock them 4.5 games behind San Francisco and at least 3.5 behind Atlanta for the Wild Card. Thanks to a brilliant performance from Matt Cain, Colorado’s season is now effectively over.

Cain had some help, particularly from home runs by Freddy Sanchez and Cody Ross, but Cain’s fantastic performance stands tallest for the Giants. Over a complete game, Cain only allowed two runs – a Melvin Mora pinch hit home run in the 8th inning. The Rockies could only muster two more hits and a walk off Cain while striking out eight times.

Not only was Cain brilliant, but he was brilliant in the context of a close game. He took the 2-0 lead staked to him by the Sanchez home run and ran with it. The Rockies were within three until the 7th inning, and then after the Mora home run, Cain had to shut the door on a potent Rockies offense in the 8th and 9th. Overall, Cain earned a whopping +.469 win probability added in the start – as a total of +.500 is required for the team to win the game, you can almost say that Cain won the game by himself.

The loss doesn’t quite eliminate the Rockies, but with six games to go for San Francisco and seven for each of San Diego and Colorado, the Rockies are in dire straits. Any combination of three Colorado losses or San Francisco wins now ends the Rockies NL West hopes, and any combination of four San Diego wins or Rockies losses would end any Wild Card hopes. Not only did Matt Cain utterly dominate and shut down the Colorado Rockies offense on Sunday afternoon, but he also buried their season. The Giants can now turn their attention for the rest of the season on what should be a stupendous race against the Padres and Braves for the final two NL playoff spots – all three teams are within a game of each other, and surely all three are glad to have the Rockies securely in their rear-view mirrors.

To say that Dan Johnson is something of a cult figure among Rays fans and bloggers may be something of an understatement. Despite the fact that the 31 year old journeyman and former NPBer has only appeared in 42 games as a Tampa Bay Ray, he’s already earned his own nickname from the incomparable Jonah Keri: The Great Pumpkin. Why? Because of this:

Rises up once a year, kills the Red Sox, goes back into the ground. And he’s a ginger too.

Not only that, but now he’s getting his own holiday:

On this, the twenty-first day of September in the year two-thousand and ten, we, the DRaysBay staff, do heartily proclaim that henceforth, every September 9th shall be celebrated among the Rays’ Faithful as “Great Pumpkin Day”, in honor of Dan Johnson’s repeated heroic performances for the Tampa Bay Rays.

For in the Rays’ need, Dan Johnson (or as he is know in the Kerian tongue, “The Great Pumpkin”) has come forth from the great Pumpkin Patch of Obscurity to deliver blow after blow to the Great Enemies, the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees. Great in might and long in pocketbook, these Enemies have plagued the Rays for many a year and have been immune to even the heartiest of assaults, yet none can withstand the stroke of The Great Pumpkin.

This may seem like an abnormal amount of fanfare for a player with a career wOBA of .336 at first base, and, as mentioned above, only 42 games as a Tampa Bay Ray. In those 42 games, Johnson has only accrued 141 plate appearances and 0.6 WAR. That’s hardly worth celebrating, much less creating a holiday out of.

Johnson’s performance, however, has been remarkable in context. In the 2008 season in which the Rays won the AL East and reached the World Series, Johnson received 28 plate appearances in September and compiled +.12 WPA, including a game-tying home run against Jonathan Papelbon in his first game back in the Major Leagues on September 9th.

It’s what Johnson has done in 2010 that has truly rallied the Rays’ fanbase around him. In 113 plate appearances since August, Johnson has posted a fine .374 wOBA and 0.5 WAR. More impressive, however, is his +0.88 WPA, in part bolstered by a solid +0.36 clutch score. Johnson has had more late game heroics this season, including a go ahead home run as part of this two home run game against the Yankees and yet another home run against Papelbon on August 28th, this time of the walk-off variety.

With Evan Longoria out for the weekend, Johnson will get an opportunity to play third base for the Rays against the Mariners. With how well the Great Pumpkin has played – and his minor league numbers back up this kind of performance – the Rays will likely try their hardest to get him in the lineup as the season ends and into the playoffs. By that time, it’s likely that opposing pitchers will understand to beware The Great Pumpkin.

With a solo home run against Felix Hernandez in the first inning of today’s game against the Mariners, Jose Bautista of the Blue Jays hit his 50th home run of the season, becoming the first player this season and the first since Prince Fielder and Alex Rodriguez in 2007. Bautista is now the 26th player to accomplish this feat in Major League history.

Let’s go deeper into Bautista’s home runs with the help of the fantastic Hit Tracker Online. With a rough estimate of 395 feet on Bautista’s home run today, his 50 home runs traveled a whopping 20,167 feet. That’s 3.82 miles, or roughly the distance of one Adam Dunn home run.

Even though the Rogers Centre has probably helped Bautista – it has a 114 park factor for right handed home runs, according to StatCorner, there’s little doubt that Bautista has hit the tar out of the ball this season. His average home run distance of 403.5 feet and average speed off the bat of 106.8 miles per hour are both well above the MLB averages of 396.7 and 103.3 respectively. Yes, Bautista has hit 11 “Just Enough” home runs – those that cleared the fence by 10 vertical feet or fewer or landed only one fence length beyond the fence – but that’s simply a function of the pure volume of home runs he has hit this season. His 18 “No Doubt” homers – those that cleared the fence by 20 vertical feet and landed 50 feet past the fence – are by far the most in the league, with Adam Dunn coming in second with 14.

Finally, let’s take a look at where Bautista has hit these home runs.

[Click to embiggen]

I think it’s safe to call Bautista the King of Left Field this season. His Majesty’s domain has seen 45 of his 50 homers, with left field defined as those home runs between 135 and 105 degrees on the above chart. The other 5 landed in the left half of center field.

Jose Bautista will, barring a minor miracle, lead the Major Leagues in home runs this season after toiling away in relative obscurity for the first six years of his career. Although his 20.9% HR/FB rate is a bit of an anomaly compared to his career numbers, it’s not that out there for someone with solid power in a hitter’s park. Nobody should be projecting Bautista for 50 home runs again next season, but there are certainly reasons to believe that he should continue to be a threat at the plate for the Blue Jays. Congratulations to Bautista on his majestic achievement.

When the Padres acquired Miguel Tejada, they were likely looking for little more than a stopgap until David Eckstein returned from injury and some added depth for their bench. Instead, they’ve received one of the most productive players since the trading deadline. Tejada had put up a solid (and PETCO deflated) .263/.314/.426 line entering last night’s game. In said game, Tejada once again came up large for San Diego, homering and posting +.240 WPA as part of a 3-4 night.

That slash line above might not look that impressive, but we have to remember that this is PETCO Park we’re talking about here. According to StatCorner, the park suppresses wOBA by about 8% for right handed hitters, a number which is supported by Baseball-Reference’s multi-year park factor.

As Dave mentioned earlier this month, when a park strongly effects the run environment, it inherently changes the value of a run to a team.

That makes each individual run less valuable in helping a team win. If the Rockies need to score six runs at home in order to win, a home run – which has a league average run value of 1.4 runs – by Gonzalez gets them 23.3 percent of the way there. The Padres, for instance, only need to score four runs in order to win at home, so a home run at Petco by Adrian Gonzalez, worth the same 1.4 runs, gets them 35 percent of the way to their needed total. A run in San Diego, or anywhere really, is worth more than a run in Colorado because of the run environment.

That quote is remarkably convenient to our discussion here. Unadjusted, Tejada’s offensive line is just slightly above average. But a team that is playing in PETCO Park and scoring the league average amount of runs per game – like, say, the 2010 Padres – is likely to win a significant amount of games. With the park adjustment, Tejada has a 112 wRC+, equaling his mark last season as well as some of his early years with the Athletics. Throw in that Tejada is doing that at the shortstop position without negatively impacting the team in the field, and he’s a player that’s provided 1.5 WAR in a mere 204 plate appearances with the club. Tejada has played like an All-Star for San Diego down the stretch, and given their precarious and ever-changing position at the top of the National League West race, that makes him one of the most important deadline acquisitions of the season.

As Dave, Joe, and I discussed on the most recent edition of FanGraphs Audio, Josh Hamilton is probably the MVP of the American League, but the lack of attention paid to Adrian Beltre’s season has been criminal. Let’s take a look at exactly what the superb Red Sox third baseman has done in 2010.

People around baseball certainly took notice of Beltre’s bat in 2004, when he posted a .334/.388/.629 en route to a 10.8 WAR season and his only Silver Slugger award. Although his 2010 isn’t quite living up to that lofty standard, it will probably be good enough for a second Slugger. After a move from spacious Safeco Field to friendly Fenway Park, Beltre’s bat has exploded once again. This season, Beltre is slashing .325/.371/.564, good for a .396 wOBA and a 148 wRC+.

That’s great, for sure – he’s a top 10 hitter in the AL this season – but it can’t quite match up with players like Josh Hamilton, Miguel Cabrera, or Paul Konerko. Instead, those numbers compare very favorably to players like Robinson Cano, Shin-Soo Choo, and Luke Scott – excellent hitters, no doubt, but they don’t really figure into the MVP discussion. However, Beltre brings one thing to the table that these players don’t, and neither do the players in front of him: elite defense.

Another topic of interest that we addressed on the podcast was whether or not analysts, as individuals, would completely factor in high UZR scores when discussing a player’s MVP worthiness. Some people, for example, weren’t convinced when they saw Ben Zobrist posting a UZR above +20, as there was little prior evidence of his elite fielding – they could believe that he was +10, maybe, but not quite at the level suggested by the statistic, and therefore, by WAR. Adrian Beltre, then, would be subject to this same question, as he is rated as a +12 fielder this year by UZR, and those 12 runs are the difference between his current 2nd place ranking by WAR and a tie for sixth place with Miguel Cabrera.

Personally, having seen Adrian Beltre’s defensive wizardry, as well as the consistency with which advanced metrics rate his defense as above average, along with the views of other fans, scouts, and other baseball people around the league, I have no trouble believing that number. Beltre typically adds in about 15 runs above the average defensive player, where as other candidates like Josh Hamilton or Miguel Cabrera are merely average or even 15 runs below.

I still think Josh Hamilton is deserving of the MVP award despite the fact that he will end up missing so much time, particularly because the regular season time that he’s about to miss is really of no value to the Rangers, who have been up by a wide margin in the AL West for months now. However, if, for some reason, you were to disqualify Hamilton due to his playing time, Adrian Beltre should be the next choice. Between his offense and his defense, you can’t find an American League player who has been more complete this year, and even though the value he’s added to the Red Sox won’t bring them to the playoffs, they maintained 50% playoff odds through the All-Star Break and 20% playoff odds through August. There’s no question that Beltre has been extremely valuable by any definition of the word, and he most certainly deserves consideration for the MVP award and praise for his accomplishments this season.

The Cardinals released super-utility infielder Felipe Lopez yesterday after what can only be described as a disappointing 2010 season. Lopez hit only .231/.310/.340 for the Cardinals and rated as relatively poor on defense. All together, Lopez only posted 0.2 WAR in 425 plate appearances for St. Louis. The last straw for Cardinals’ management appears to have been Lopez’s continual tardiness, coming to a head yesterday, according to Fox Sports Midwest.

It’s hard to fault the Cardinals for investing in Lopez, as the season cost them only one million dollars. Lopez was coming off of a career year between the Diamondbacks and the Brewers, a season in which he posted 3.9 WAR and a 116 wRC+. In that sense, it’s kind of a surprise that Lopez was forced to take such a small contract, but apparently teams saw through the .358 BABIP and perhaps some of these behavioral issues which resulted in Lopez’s release were known prior to the season. Regardless, picking up a player who CHONE projected for 2.5 WAR for only a cool million has to be considered a shrewd investment that simply didn’t work out.

Going forward, it’s hard to say that much has changed with Lopez. Outside of BABIP fluctuations, his last four years rate as slightly below average to average as a hitter. Lopez walks slightly more than average and makes slightly more contact than average. His weak spot is his power, as he’s typically a single-digit home run player. Much as his great numbers from 2009 were BABIP supported, his poor numbers from 2010 are a result of a low .272 BABIP. CHONE’s updated projections have Lopez’s slash line at .270/.343/.390, a roughly average line for a MLB hitter.

Given the issues that Lopez apparently had with management as well as the fact that Lopez’s contract was set to expire at the end of the season anyway, the Cardinals’ decision to release Lopez makes sense and is hardly likely to negatively affect their future. But Lopez’s struggles this season don’t suggest that he’s finished as a productive player by any means. It would behoove teams with open infield utility spots on their bench or teams desperate for a 2B or 3B starter to take a look at Lopez next season, as he will likely be cheap once again and he should provide somewhere between one and two wins above replacement.