There are plenty of managerial decisions that I routinely do not understand. Most of them relate to the bullpen and how the manager selects a reliever for certain situations. The rest relate to lineup construction. We know that in the macro lineup order doesn’t matter that much, but that doesn’t exactly justify the decision to use a well below-average hitter in that position. Why place a poor hitter among your best? Why not move him to the bottom, so the good hitters have a better chance to get on base and knock each other in?

This leads to another managerial tactic that I never understood: placing a replacement in the starter’s batting order spot. When this happens with a bottom of the order hitter it’s usually no big deal. It’s when the manager replaces one of his top hitters with a replacement that baffles me. There has to be some reason behind it, since so many managers routinely do it. But that doesn’t make it any less perplexing.

Ron Gardenhire not only does this, but he’s doing it while one of his starters is on the DL. Orlando Hudson should be back from his wrist injury by week’s end, but until then Matt Tolbert acts as his stand-in. If this were just a defensive move it wouldn’t be a problem. After all, few teams can absorb an injury to their starting second baseman and replace him with someone who can produce similarly. The problem is that Gardenhire has not just penciled Tolbert’s name into Hudson’s spot in the field, but also in the batting order. In 45 PA this year Tolbert has gotten on base 10 times. Last year, in 231 PA, he had a .303 OBP. He belongs nowhere near the No. 2 spot, and yet Gardenhire has used him there for most games during Hudson’s absence.

Tigers center fielder Austin Jackson is currently day-to-day with back spasms. He left Sunday’s game and hasn’t played since. That shouldn’t be a big problem for the Tigers, since they have Johnny Damon, who for most of his career was a leadoff hitter, in the No. 2 spot. But instead of moving Damon up one spot and putting a hitter like, say, Brennan Boesch or Carlos Guillen in the second spot, Leyland has chosen to use Jackson’s replacements, Ryan Raburn and Don Kelly, in the leadoff spot. Raburn, maybe, makes a degree of sense. He had a .359 OBP and .378 wOBA last season, though he’s playing horribly this season. Kelly, however, is a plain bad hitter. He’s actually brought down his .290 career OBP this year, reaching safely just 13 times in 77 chances. There is no reason to hit him first and give him more PA than hitters like Guillen and Boesch.

These are just two examples I noticed last night. Many other managers do this, too. Jerry Manuel, for instance, used to bat Alex Cora second when giving Luis Castillo a day off. Hitting Castillo second is questionable in the first place, but at least he had a .347 OBP to help justify the move. But to replace him in the field and in the batting order with Cora just seems reckless. In only three seasons of his career has Cora’s wOBA broken .300, the last time in 2008 with the Red Sox. He has a .306 OBP this season. There are plenty of hitters on the Mets, including David Wright, who would fit better in that spot when Castillo sat. With Castillo on the DL Manuel has shown a shred of sanity, hitting Angel Pagan second.

The question still remains of why these managers employ this tactic. It can’t be because the other players are comfortable in their batting order spots. Manuel has messed with his lineup numerous times this season, moving Wright from third to fifth, to fourth for a game, and now back to third. Jason Bay has hit in the Nos. 3, 4, and 5 spots. Neither has hit second even one time. Alex Cora has 16 times. Similarly, Damon has hit leadoff three times and has hit third four times. Why in the world, then, play Kelly there for even one game? Gardenhire routinely hits Justin Morneau third when Joe Mauer takes a day off. Why, then, can’t he put a hitter better than Matt Tolbert in the second spot?

Again, on a macro level, lineup order doesn’t matter a great deal. But on a game-to-game basis, when anything can happen at any moment, why wouldn’t you want to put your best hitters near the top of the order, where they can get on base and knock each other in? Why put a player who makes out more frequently than other players in the lineup near the top? Why let them take one more turn at bat than clearly superior hitters? It just doesn’t make sense. That hasn’t stopped managers from doing anything, though, so I fully expect this trend to continue. But that doesn’t make it any less of a shame.

To start the 2009 season the A’s made a somewhat surprising move by bringing both Brett Anderson and Trevor Cahill north to Oakland to start the season. Since they were not only the team’s top two prospects, but also Baseball America Nos. 7 and 11 prospects made this something less than shocking, but both had under 40 innings of experience above A ball. Since the A’s stood little chance of contending, though, they thought it prudent to get their best guys some major league experience. The move worked out in many ways.

While Anderson went on to have a very good year, certainly worth Rookie of the Year consideration, Cahill stumbled a bit. While he did induce groundballs at a decent clip, one of his signatures in the minors, he just couldn’t get major leaguers to swing and miss. Or, specifically, he couldn’t get them to swing and miss with two strikes. He and Brett Anderson shared a 7.4 percent swinging strike rate, which ranked in the bottom third of the league among qualified starters. Yet Anderson struck out 7.70 per nine while Cahill managed just 4.53.

After the season David Golebiewski broke down Cahill’s first experience. While it was written with a fantasy bent, it was an excellent overall look at Cahill’s performance vs. his potential. While David makes a number of good points, I took away three main points:

1) Cahill abandoned his breaking pitches, throwing his curveball 3.4 percent of the time and his slider 6.7 percent.

2) Lefties absolutely murdered him, a .286/.361/.558 line.

3) He feel behind batters more often than the average MLB pitcher.

Those are, of course, in addition to his low strikeout and high home run totals. These concerns were enough, apparently, for the A’s to start him in AAA this season. After two starts they called him up to the bigs, though it looked like he might succumb to the same issues. In five innings against Toronto he allowed eight runs, six earned, against Toronto while allowing three home runs and striking out the same number. A month and a half later, that seems like a blip on the radar. Cahill has been excellent ever since, posting a 3.32 ERA on the season. That’s a bit better than his peripherals, though we have seen some improvement there, too.

Strikeouts have been on the rise for Cahill. He’s had a few low-strikeout affairs — one in 5.2 innings against Texas and two in seven innings against Los Angeles — but he’s also had a few high-K games, including six in six innings against Minnesota and, last night, five in 5.2 innings against Chicago (NL). His current mark is 5.14 per nine, and while that doesn’t remotely approach his minor league rate it is certainly an improvement over last year. It appears to come from pitch selection, as his swinging strike rate, 7.2 percent, is actually lower than last year.

He has also increased his groundball rate, getting it up to 52.5 percent. In fact, in every game since that first one against Toronto he’s induced more groundballs than fly balls, which certainly plays to his strengths. The added groundballs have come at the expense of both fly balls and line drives, which have helped his BABIP and his home run rate. Further helping his home run rate is a decrease in his HR/FB ratio, down to 10.3 percent this year from 13.2 percent last year. That makes for a happy tERA, 4.25, down from 5.39 last year.

Another excellent note on his groundballs: he gets them more often with men on base than with the bases empty. That prevents extra base hits, which in turn prevents runners from scoring. They seem to be poorly struck grounders, too, as his BABIP with men on base is just .214.

Lefties? Not a problem. In fact, he’s pitched better against lefties this season than he has righties. His BA and OBP against numbers are identical against batters of both handedness, but his SLG against lefties, .336, is considerably lower than his SLG against righties, .367. He’s striking out 6.23 lefties per nine innings, and has allowed just two of the 125 he has faced to take him deep despite surrendering more fly balls to them. We’re still in small sample country, so there’s a chance that lefties will catch up to him. For now, though, he’s clearly getting the job done.

Finally, we see that he has altered his pitch selection. In its pre-2009 scouting report of Cahill, Baseball America remarked that, “He backs up his fastballs with a nasty 79-81 mph knuckle-curve, a swing-and-miss pitch with hard downward movement.” They also praised his slider. Yet, as we saw, Cahill did not employ them much in 2009, opting to use his two-seamer, four-seamer, and changeup almost equally. We’ve seen quite a shift in that regard this year. He is now relying more heavily on the two-seamer, throwing it 46.4 percent of the time. Hence all the groundballs. He’s taken a step back with the four-seamer and changeup, and has started throwing that nasty knuckle-curve more often, 12.4 percent of the time. It hasn’t quite worked as an out pitch so far — its weighted value is -0.7, compared to his slider, which he throws far less frequently, at 0.6. But in time I suspect that his increased curve usage will pay off.

To this point in 2009 Cahill has certainly impressed. This article might have been a bit more timely after his previous start, when he downright dominated Los Angeles for eight innings. Last night against Chicago he allowed four runs in 5.2 innings, though his peripherals looked a bit better than that. He still has some kinks to work out — he’s still throwing first pitch strikes at a below league-average rate — but he has still shown tremendous improvement in his sophomore campaign. The kid just turned 22 and could continue along a growth path and justify that No. 11 prospect status. The A’s are starting to see that this season.

Overview

At 34-30 the Jays are playing better than most expected. Yet they’re still stuck in the AL East, where they currently reside in fourth place. Their situation is nearly identical to last year, when they were 34-31 through 65 games. By the All-Star break they had fallen to 44-46 and were ready to deal. While this team could play above-.500 ball for a bit longer, their situation remains the same.

Buy or Sell?

Most teams with a 35-30 record at this point would probably look into adding a few pieces. The Jays actually have just a few weaknesses, and two of them in particular, second base and DH, come from players who powered their hot start last season. Yet the Jays aren’t any other team. They’re an underdog in the AL East, which features not only the two teams that share the best record in baseball, but also the team with the next best record in the AL.

Unless buying involves players that can help them not only this year but also in the next two, the Jays should probably quell any shopping urges. Even if the Red Sox further succumb to injuries and the Jays overtake them, they still have to get some help from either the Yankees or the Rays. And, again, that would also require the Jays not only to keep up their current pace, but also improve by a decent margin. They’re currently on pace for 87 wins.

At the same time, they don’t have much to sell. Despite his improvement over last year’s performance, Vernon Wells’s contract is still untouchable. Their three best pitchers — Shaun Marcum, Ricky Romero, and Brett Cecil — are under team control for a number of years and can help the Jays rise back to contention in the future. Their two most reputed hitters, Aaron Hill and Adam Lind, are both hitting poorly and, anyway, are young enough that they can help in the future as well.

In the final year of his contract, Lyle Overbay sounds like an attractive trade chip, especially since the Jays have first base prospect Brett Wallace on the farm. His .311 wOBA is underwhelming for a first baseman, but the outlook isn’t all bad. Since May 14 he is hitting a much more respectable .306/.359/.537, which is a bit more in line with his career numbers. He doesn’t provide a ton of power from the position, but a contender with a weakness at first base — say, the Angels — might find Overbay useful.

Jose Bautista remains under team control for 2011, so perhaps the Jays can find someone to buy high on him. He has cooled off a bit in his past nine games, in which he is 2 for 32 with no extra base hits. Assuming that some of his hot start is a legitimate improvement, the Jays can probably find a taker, though if no team is willing to pay a premium they could easily just hold onto him.

One name that seems interesting at the moment is John Buck. Signed to a $2 million contract after Kansas City declined to tender him a contract in December, Buck has joined the power hungry Jays offense, knocking 11 home runs, which already eclipses his 2008 and 2009 totals. His BA and OBP remain at their normal low levels, and there has to be concern that his power will revert after a trade. He is eligible for free agency after the season, which might make the Jays more apt to deal him. But, since they don’t have a ready replacement for him, I’d expect them to wait until the last possible moment, when their non-contention is completely assured and they risk little by installing Jose Molina as their starting catcher.

On The Farm

The Jays restocked the farm when they traded Scott Rolen last July and Roy Halladay in the winter, but that wasn’t enough of a haul to catapult them to the top of the farm system rankings. Baseball America, which ranked the systems before the Roy Halladay trade, put the Blue Jays 28, and commented that they’d have been No. 30 if not for the Rolen trade. Keith Law expresses a similar sentiment, but ranks the Jays 16th thanks to the two trades. Kevin Goldstein had them at 22, down from No. 10 in 2009.

The drop in the Jays’ system ranking comes mostly from the disappointing performances from their top prospects. A few of them have shown signs of recovery this year, which, while it likely won’t help the Jays fill holes immediately, might help facilitate their selling of position players. For example, with Brad Emaus hitting well enough at AA to warrant a promotion, and then hitting well at AAA, the Jays might be more apt to trade Hill. With J.P. Arencibia showing improvement in his second AAA stint, maybe the Jays can find a taker for Buck.

Even then, the Jays might not be apt to trade one of these players if his replacement isn’t ready for the call-up. Since both Emaus and Arencibia could use more time on the farm the Jays might wait until the off-season to trade either

Budget

The Jays’ $78 million payroll is their lowest number since 2006, so they could probably add salary if they were so inclined. A number of factors, beyond their unlikely chances of contending, mean that they almost certainly will not. They’ll shed a number of salary obligations this off-season, including $6 million for Halladay, $7 million for Overbay, $4 million for Scott Downs, $2.75 million for Alex Gonzalez, $10 million for B.J. Ryan, $2.65 million for Jason Frasor, and $2 million for Buck. But they’ll also add a few million in current obligations, including $4.5 million more for Lind and $10.5 million for Wells.

That, however, amounts to roughly $19.4 million in savings, which the Jays can use during the off-season to improve the team. If they’re going to raise payroll it seems like the off-season, rather than July, is the time to do it. This year looks rough for the Jays, but next year is a whole new season. Maybe then they can make the AL East a four-horse race.

Trading season has officially opened. This morning the Arizona Diamondbacks, last place in the NL West by 7.5 games, traded outfielder Conor Jackson to the Oakland A’s for 24-year-old minor league reliever Sam Demel. The move not only reflects Jackson’s poor performance this year, but also Arizona’s need for bullpen arms now and in the future.

Jackson, the 19th overall selection in the 2003 draft, was until recently considered a part of the organization’s plan. After dominating Triple-A in 2005 he played a full season at first base for the Diamondbacks in 2006, posting a .352 wOBA. He improved in 2007, posting a .363 wOBA. A move back to the outfield in 2008 proved useful. Not only did Jackson post his best offensive season to date, but he also ranked positively on defense, in UZR and DRS, at both left field and first base.

But then, just as Jackson was entering his prime years, he fell ill. Last week Pat Andriola examined Jackson’s case of Valley Fever which cost him most of the 2009 season. He did make a recovery, but, as Pat notes, the physical tolls of the illness might still be plaguing Jackson. Not only has he hit for far less power, but he also has spent time on the DL this season with a hamstring strain. The Valley Fever might be out of his system, but it appears that the lingering effects remain.

Why, then, would the Diamondbacks, who have the luxury of being patient, trade him away so early in the season? He does, after all, have another year of team control, so if he makes a recovery later in the year the Diamondbacks could have reaped the benefits in 2011, when they might have a chance of contending. The answer appears to be twofold.

First is the obvious need to rebuild the bullpen. Arizona currently sports the league’s worst bullpen. The unit surrenders 5.78 runs per game and allows inherited runners to score 47 percent of the time (second worst in the majors). Demel will immediately join the major league team, and they hope he can somewhat replicate the success he showed this year in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League. Always a relatively high-strikeout and low-homer reliever, Demel has greatly improved his walk rate this season, 2.8 per nine compared to his minor league average of 4.5 per nine. While he might not become a striking success, he should represent an improvement for Arizona.

The second is to open up a spot for one of the Diamondbacks’ younger players. Jackson makes $3 million this year, and there might be pressure to play him as long as they’re paying him. MLB.com’s Steve Glibert, who broke the story, reports that Gerardo Parra, “will likely get the bulk of the playing time in left field with Jackson gone.” Parra, the Diamondbacks’ No. 2 prospect in 2009, doesn’t have the profile of a corner outfielder. He never really hit for power in the minors, and none of the scouting reports suggest that’s a tool he’s sure to develop. He still had a decent showing in 2009, and his power has increased a bit early this season. The Diamondbacks at least want to get a good look at what he can do.

There are also a couple of players on the farm, namely Arizona’s first and second rounders in the 2009 draft, who could eventually graduate to take Jackson’s spot. First rounder A.J. Pollock is still out after undergoing surgery to repair a growth plate fracture in his right elbow, though he still factors into the team’s plans. Marc Krauss, their second round pick, profiles as more of a corner outfielder. In its organizational rankings, Baseball America commented that Krauss, “could be the first player from Arizona’s 2009 draft class to reach the majors.” He’s currently in high-A ball.

We knew that the Diamondbacks would undergo big changes, and this appears to be just the start. Moving Jackson isn’t a big move in itself, but is part of a longer outlook that the Diamondbacks hope will bring them back into contention. As Dave said in his Diamondbacks trade deadline article, they could save some money after the season by non-tendering Jackson. They instead traded him for a player who, while unspectacular, helps fill a grave need. They’ll now get a better look at a former top prospect, and will, after the season, have a better idea of how to fill the left field spot in the long term.

October steals our hearts. After six long months we finally get to see the best from each league battle each other in three rounds of pure bliss. Every moment in October is amplified. What was routine in June becomes exceptional in October.

While October remains my favorite month of the year, April doesn’t lag far behind. Not just because it’s my birth month, but also because it is something of a mystical time for baseball. Every team has a chance. Players post ridiculous numbers, making us wonder if a strong start is really the year, or if it’s just another statistical fluke. We saw no shortage of that in April 2010.

Plenty of players jumped off to hot starts. I noted two in particular earlier in the season. Both have dropped off in the past few weeks, so let’s check in on them.

Austin Jackson

When I wrote about Jackson in late April, the point wasn’t to predict a regression. Nearly all of his stats made it clear that such a correction was coming. Rather, the point was that Jackson could avoid completely dropping off if he made a few adjustments. Again, nothing groundbreaking — young players have to make adjustments all the time as the league gets a better read on them. With Jackson I mainly dealt with his walk and strikeout rates.

As expected his BABIP has come down from the .520 mark he was sporting in April. His current .418 BABIP will likely come down a bit, too. But, as before, he can make adjustments so that the regression doesn’t kill his overall production. For instance, he shouldn’t see his BABIP dip too far if he keeps hitting line drives at the high clip he has achieved. He was at 31.9 percent in late April, and stands at 29.2 percent right now, which remains impressive.

Jackson has made the biggest adjustment in his strikeout rate. In late April he was striking out at a ridiculous clip, 32.9 percent of his PA — 32 in 86 PA, just to keep things in perspective. Since then he has been to the plate 181 times and has struck out just 35 times, or 19 percent of his PA. It looks like he won’t be breaking Mark Reynolds’s single-season strikeout record, after all.

In terms of power, though, Jackson hasn’t replicated his early-season success. Through those first 86 PA he had an ISO of .145 on the power of five doubles, two triples, and a homer. In the following 181 PA he has plenty of doubles, 12, but just one triple and no homers, dragging  his ISO down to .104 on the season. One of the biggest concerns the Yankees had with Jackson was his ability to hit for power. It seems that his other tools compensated, but the lack of power has been real in his debut season.

As it was back in April, if the season ended today Jackson would still likely be among the AL Rookie of the Year candidates. His biggest competition to date: teammate Brennan Boesch, who is at 1.6 WAR to Jackson’s 1.9, despite having 103 fewer plate appearances.

Andruw Jones

In mid-May I saw something peculiar. Andruw Jones had basically the same numbers as last year at the same point. In 2009 his wOBA through 111 PA was .424, and was at .427 in 2010 through the exact same number of plate appearances. The rest of 2009 didn’t go so well for Jones, as he tumbled and ended up with a .338 wOBA, most of which came from the DH spot. Would Jones, I wondered, find the same fate this year?

In his last 63 PA Jones is just 6 for 51. He’s keeping his walks up, which is a plus, and three of those six hits have been for extra bases. Still, six hits in 63 PA just won’t cut it. His triple slash in that span: .118/.270/.216. His triple slash in the 62 PA after his first 111 in 2009: .193/.242/.491. There isn’t much similarity in that, as Jones hit five homers during that span last year. Yet we saw his crash continue. From PA 174 through the end of the season Jones hit .179/.297/.388.

In his defense, Jones has been battling a few injuries which has probably left him worse off at the plate. Still, it’s hard to ignore the similarities between the two seasons even if they don’t look identical right now. He started the season strong, which encouraged talk that he was back to the Andruw we all knew in Atlanta. Yet after a hot start his production began to fall. He still has time this season to get back on track. Given his record, however, I wouldn’t put money on that.

When I saw Armando Garlarraga’s performance last night and decided to write up a bit about him, I wondered if it would be possible to do so without mentioning the perfect game that wasn’t. Clearly I decided that such a mention was necessary, at least at this stage. It still is, and will continue to be for some time, Galarraga’s defining moment.

It is also the highlight in what is so far a very good start of the season for Galarraga. With his peripherals, a 2.67 ERA is certainly unsustainable — his 4.50 FIP and 4.91 xFIP speak to that — but a few things have changed for Galarraga. These small changes could make his 2010 season look more like his 2008 campaign than his 2009 hit parade.

Here are a few observations from Galarraga’s five starts and one relief appearance.

Better control

You can see it right in his Dashboard: Galarraga hasn’t walked many batters in his 33.2 IP this season. He is neither a strikeout nor a groundball pitcher, so keeping hitters off base can be be a bit of a problem. One way this type of pitcher can mitigate his situation is by issuing few free passes. Galarraga has walked just seven so far. Even more impressive: he walked three in his first start against the Red Sox, meaning he was walked just four in his last four in his last 28 IP.

A high walk rate was part of Galarraga’s undoing last season. He walked 4.20 per nine after keeping that number around three per nine in 2008. More walks plus a normal BABIP equals a ballooning ERA. If Galarraga can keep his walk rate in the 2 to 2.5 per nine range, he might be able to stave off disaster once his BABIP rises from its current .212 mark.

More bad contact

Galarraga has missed fewer bats this year than ever before. With just 13 strikeouts and a 6.4 percent swinging strike rate, his fielders will have to do plenty of work. Thankfully for them, the work hasn’t been all that arduous. Galarraga has been inducing poor contact, taking pressure off the defense that has to turn plenty of plays behind him.

Specifically, Galarraga’s line drive rate is way down, 12.7 percent. In 2007 he was at 16.8 percent, and I’d expect a regression to somewhere around that mark, if not a bit higher, by year’s end. His O-Swing% is actually down compared to the league average, but his O-Contact percentage is way, way up. He never even got to a league average level in 08 and 09, but this year he’s well above, 74.1 percent against the 66.4 percent average. Finally, hitters haven’t been hitting the ball far in the air, as just four of his 48 fly balls have left the park, which constitutes a mark below his career HR/FB rate of 12.7 percent.

Getting ahead in the count

Of the 131 batters Galarraga has faced this season, 67 have seen an 0-1 count while another 18 have put the ball in play. In other words, Galarraga is getting ahead in the count at an above-average clip. He’s also seeing good results in those situations. On the first pitch hitters are just 4 for 18 with one extra base hit. Once down 0-1, opponents are batting just .175/.224/.302. Those numbers probably won’t stand up, but for now they’ve been to his benefit.

More fastballs (and fewer changes)

Given the way the data is collected, it’s tough to find significant changes from year to year in a pitcher’s repertoire. For instance, the year-to-year, not to mention park-to-park, PitchFX calibration can make for tough comparisons. I’m not exactly sure what to make of these changes, but I wanted to note them anyway.

It looks like he’s definitely thrown his fastball more. According to the BIS data Galarraga threw 49.1 percent fastballs in 2008 and 48.9 percent in 2009. This year he’s throwing 64.6 percent. Not only that, but the BIS data has him a full mph faster. The PitchFX data is close, having him at 61.9 percent fastballs (including 7.6 percent two-seamers). He’s doing this by slightly cutting down on his slider usage, from roughly 38 percent in the last two years to around 32 percent this year. More drastically, he’s cut down on his changeup, nearly eliminating it from his repertoire.

It’s tough to say whether these changes will translate into future success for Galarraga. Given his history and scouting report it would appear that he’s due for a regression. It’s tough for any pitcher to succeed with Galarraga’s strikeout, home run, and groundball rates. Whatever he’s doing so far has worked, though. His season, and perhaps his career, might be defined by his outing against the Indians, but that’s just one big part of an otherwise excellent season to date.

During the off-season the Braves had the most wonderful of problems. In a league where starting pitching comes at a premium, having six solid starters under contract becomes a huge advantage. The Braves could choose to carry all six, keeping one in the bullpen in case one of the starting five needed time off. Conversely, they could afford to deal one of the starters to fill a hole. The Braves chose the latter, though they only nominally filled a hole. While Melky Cabrera can be a serviceable outfielder, the real return was top pitching prospect Arodys Vizcaino, who has impressed so far. Still, that left the big league team a little lighter on the pitching front.

We so often see teams with heralded pitching depth come up dry. Last year the Red Sox not only had a strong starting five heading into the season, but they had John Smoltz on the comeback trail and Clay Buchholz waiting at AAA. That depth thinned quickly, leaving them searching for pitching later in the season. The Braves have faced a similar, though not as dire, situation this year. While Tim Hudson and Tommy Hanson have pitched admirably, both Derek Lowe and Kenshin Kawakami have been below average to date. Even worse, Jair Jurrjens, one of their rotation pillars in 2008 and 2009, not only pitched terribly in his first four starts, but he left the fifth with hamstring tightness. He has been on the DL ever since.

The Braves had some flexibility at that point and didn’t require a fifth starter until May 8, and then not again until May 18. For those starts they turned to Kris Medlen, who had been pitching quite well out of the bullpen in his second major league season. In 12 appearances covering 17.2 innings, Medlen struck out 16 to just three walks, allowing five earned runs along the way. He also pitched very well out of the pen in 2009, striking out 53 to 19 walks in 49.1 innings. The problem was, he hadn’t shown much during his brief stint as a starter.

Medlen, a 10th round pick in 2006, actually started his career in the bullpen. He absolutely dominated the lower minors, earning a spot in AA by 2008. There he split the year between the bullpen and the starting rotation, starting in 17 of his 36 appearances on the year. That kept his innings, 120.1, in check and allowed him to show his stuff. In his 92.1 innings as a starter he struck out 90 to 21 walks and just four home runs. He then started 2009 in the AAA rotation and was even better, striking out 40 to 10 walks and no homers in 34 IP. That earned him a call-up, though he stumbled out of the gates. The Braves then moved him back to his native bullpen, where he was, again, pretty excellent.

In the rotation full-time since mid-May, Medlen has pitched his way into the Braves’ future plans. In 42.2 innings during his six starts he has struck out just 27, but has shown plenty of control, walking just seven. The only downside, it seems, comes from the seven home runs he has allowed. It’s not all bad, though. Three of them came in one appearance, easily his poorest of the year. Two also came in his second start, against the Mets, and both were solo shots. He’s been such a pleasant addition that the Braves will have to think hard about what to do once Jurrjens is ready to return.

Of course, once Medlen entered the rotation he also exited the bullpen. The Braves had a solid back end of Billy Wagner and Takashi Saito, but what about the pitchers before them? Medlen played a prominent role, not one that can be easily replaced. I’m sure the Braves didn’t think that Jonny Venters would step into a primary setup role when they called him up in mid-April, but sometimes crazy things like that just work out. The emergence of Venters probably made it easier for the Braves to move Medlen from the bullpen to the rotation.

As R.J. wrote at the end of May, Venters’s performance has been special enough to warrant a mention. At the time R.J. wrote it Venters had a 60 percent groundball rate and a 14 percent swinging strike rate through his first 17 innings. He has since added another 10.2 innings to that total, and things are actually going better. His swinging strike rate is up to 15.5 percent, which is second in the majors among pitchers with at least 20 innings. (First is a subject of a previous post, Luke Gregerson.)

This improvement is even more remarkable because he has done it in higher leverage situations. From his debut on April 17 through R.J.’s article on May 25 Venters had faced just two situations where his pLI was above 1.00. The first came on May 8, in relief of Medlen, in which he succeeded in holding the game. The other came against Pittsburgh on the 23rd, in which he also succeeded in recording the one out with which he was charged. Yet in three of his last four appearances he’s faced a pLI of over 2.00. His stats in those three high-leverage situations: 2.1 IP, 3 H, 3 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 6 K.

The three unearned runs and two walks came in the same appearance against Arizona. He struck out two in the inning but also walked two. After the second strikeout a runner reached on an error, which meant that Venters picked up no earned runs on the ensuing bases-loaded double. He did, however, allow the D’Backs to tie the game. His offense later bailed him out. Otherwise Venters has pitched brilliantly, even when the situations get tough.

Neither pitcher is perfect. Venters still walks too many guys, and as he showed during that meltdown against Arizona, that can haunt you. Medlen has seen one of his biggest advantages, a low home run rate, evaporate as a starter. He has already allowed eight this year, in 61.1 IP, than he did in all of last year’s 67.2 IP. Yet both have given the Braves hope for the future, both in the immediate and long-term. Both their rotation and their bullpen look stronger with Medlen and Venters.

When the Marlins called up Mike Stanton earlier this week, the baseball world teemed with excitement. It wasn’t just Marlins fans. While they were the most excited of us, the rest of the baseball world watched intently. While Stanton has always been a highly regarded prospect, this year he developed something of a mythical lore akin to Matt Wieters and Jason Heyward. In just 190 at-bats at AA, Stanton hit 21 home runs, one every nine AB. Southern League pitchers were so afraid of him that they walked him 44 times, which is 13 more times than he walked in AA last year — in 109 more AB. By all appearances, he was ready to make his major league debut.

The Marlins would have to make a few lineup adjustments to fit in Stanton, a right fielder. They already had three outfielders. Cody Ross, an established player in his third season of full-time work, would certainly remain. The casualty, then, was between 2009 Rookie Of The Year Chris Coghlan and former top prospect Cameron Maybin. Both have been disappointing so far this season, and the Marlins would probably benefit in the short-term by using Stanton as an upgrade. The odd man out, given the numbers, seemed an obvious choice.

Coghlan started off the year horribly, but his low point came early. After an 0 for 4 day against the Phillies on April 18 his triple slash sat at .109/.146/.109. Since then he’s been much more like the Coghlan we got to know last season. In his last 185 PA he’s hitting .308/.359/.432 and has been the Marlins’ leadoff hitter.

Maybin, on the other hand, presents a nearly opposite story. After that same April 18 contest Maybin was actually as this peak, hitting .309/.377/.400. Since then he has hit .189/.252/.315 in 140 PA. When the Marlins made the decision to call up Stanton, they also made the complementary decision to remove Maybin from the starting lineup. Instead of sending him back to AAA, however, they instead moved him to the bench, optioning OF Brett Carroll. Given Maybin’s considerable talent, it seems like an odd move.

For years, dating back to his professional debut in 2006, scouts and scouting publications have loved Maybin. In their Top 10 Tigers prospects list after the 2006 season, Baseball America said, “Maybin has all the tools and, all the more impressive, those tools are well developed at his young age.” They went on to say that, “Maybin has very few shortcomings,” noting his high strikeout rate as the only factor that warranted even the slightest concern. Similarly, Baseball Prospectus’s Kevin Goldstein gushed about Maybin, remarking in early 2008 that, “[w]hen it comes to tools, Maybin is Home Depot.” Later that year, after the 2008 season, Goldstein again sang Maybin’s praises. “Maybin’s raw tools rate with those of any other prospect in the game,” he said.

Yet, for all the accolades, strikeouts became a bigger problem for Maybin as he advanced levels. In his pre-season assessment of Maybin, Goldstein noted Maybin’s biggest problem area. “He understands the strike zone well enough, but needs to improve his pitch recognition, as he’s prone to chasing breaking balls out of the zone,” he said. In the postseason assessment he said something similar: “His swing has a pronounced trigger in it, which makes it difficult for him to adjust on pitches in flight, often forcing him to flail badly.” The only question, then, was the degree to which this would hold him back at the major league level. The answer, as we’ve seen this year, is considerably.

A look at Maybin’s pitch type values shows that he has trouble with non-fastballs. His positive marks come on the cutter and split-finger, while he has a slightly positive mark on the four-seamer. Sliders, curveballs, and changeups all seemingly give him fits. It’s not exactly that he’s chasing these pitches outside the zone; his O-Swing% is a bit above league average but not greatly so. Instead, he’s missing a significant number of these pitches, 53.5 percent against a 66.3 percent league average. He’s also faring relatively poorly on pitches inside the zone, making contact on just 82.9 percent of his swings against an 88.3 percent league average. This shows up in his swinging strike rate, 11.6 percent, up about a point from last year and 3.4 points above league average.

It would seem, then, that pitch recognition remains Maybin’s biggest weakness as a hitter. He won’t learn to recognize pitches while sitting on the bench, though, so again the Marlins’ decision to leave him in the majors seems an odd one. He might not see high quality breaking balls in AAA, but that would still afford him a better chance to learn than a bench role on the major league roster. The Marlins, as we’ve learned in the past few years, are a shrewd organization. Surely they have a plan here.

Michael Jong of Marlin Maniac sheds some light on the situation. This weekend the Marlins head to St. Petersburg to play the Rays, and then, after two home series, will travel to Baltimore for a final interleague matchup. That gives the Marlins six games in which they can use the DH, and therefore use all four of their outfielders. It’s possible that they’ll use the next two weeks as an evaluation of sorts. If Maybin doesn’t show improvement, then maybe he’ll head back to AAA where he can continue to work on his pitch recognition.

Plenty could change between now and the trade deadline if the Marlins don’t work their way back into contention. Given the current outlook, though, it seems like Maybin will find his ticket to AAA at the conclusion of the Baltimore series. If pitch recognition is at the center of his issues, then he’ll do better to work on that playing every day in the minors rather than a couple times a week in the bigs. The Marlins have the option, and I suspect that they’ll use it. If that fails they’ll have to draw up a new plan, but for now it seems like the future of Cameron Maybin rests on his ability to develop his pitch recognition skill.

The Orioles do not score many runs. In fact, their 3.33 runs per game in 2010 puts them not only at the bottom of the American League, but also at 28th in the majors. Therein lies the crux of their league-worst 16-42 record. While their young pitchers have struggled at times, the offense has lacked the power to bail them out. Even with the veteran pitchers on the mound, the O’s have struggled to stay in games.

That wasn’t the plan when Andy MacPhail acquired Kevin Millwood at the Winter Meetings last December. The Orioles had scored 4.57 runs per game last season, a bit below league average but serviceable given the circumstances. Their lineup featured a number of young players coming into their primes. Improvement and maturation from Adam Jones, Nolan Reimold, Matt Wieters, and, to a certain extent, Nick Markakis (who had already established himself) figured to help catapult the offense a bit and provide support for the young pitchers.

Adding Millwood gave the Orioles another veteran presence in the rotation. He, along with Jeremy Guthrie, afforded MacPhail and Co. the flexibility to keep some of its less developed arms in the minors. Also, since he was likely to outperform the young arms, he gave the team a better chance to win some ballgames. The scheme was well laid, but it doesn’t take a Robert Burns to understand what can go wrong between plan and execution.

Wieters and Jones have struggled to produce anything so far. Reimold performed so poorly that he’s now at AAA — though could return as a first baseman, which is just another of the Orioles’ problems. Miguel Tejada, brought in to provide an upgrade over the departed Melvin Mora, has hit just as poorly as the latter. Those troubles extend to nearly everyone in the lineup. Of the nine Orioles with 100 or more PA, only three have an OBP above .320. That has made life tough for their pitchers.

To start the season Millwood did exactly what he was supposed to. Through 10 starts he had allowed just 28 earned runs, a 3.71 ERA against a 4.09 FIP. It wasn’t ace-like, but it should have been good enough for a team that scored between 4.5 and 5 runs per game. Yet, as we know, the Orioles fell far short of that. They had managed wins in just four of those 10 games, and in none of them did they have, or hold, a lead when he left the game.

While the Orioles have a poor offense to begin with, they’ve been even worse with Millwood on the mound. They have scored just 3.1 runs per game in his starts, compared to 3.3 per game overall. Over the course of 32 starts that amounts to about 6.5 runs, which doesn’t seem awfully significant, but can certainly make a difference if it’s concentrated in a few starts. What stands out more, however, is the support the Orioles have provided while Millwood is in the game.

To preface, Millwood is currently averaging 6.6 innings per game, which is more than he has averaged in any year since 1999. He’s helping the Orioles by pitching deeper into games and taking the burden off their woefully inadequate bullpen. The Orioles have rewarded his efforts with just 2.2 runs during the innings he pitches. Obviously they’ll score more than that in some games and fewer in others, but on average it means the Orioles are wasting even his quality starts. It means that efforts like his seven-inning, three-run outing against the Twins on May 8 go to waste. It means they don’t have much of a shot when he pitches all eight innings, allowing just four runs, in a game on the road, as he did on April 21 in Seattle.

Things have gotten much worse for Millwood in his last three starts. On May 28 he allowed five runs, four earned, in six innings against the Blue Jays. Then he ran into the Yankees twice, allowing six runs in 5.2 innings both times. In the four starts following his eight-inning, three-run performance against the Royals his ERA has jumped a full run. That should get better once he starts facing offenses not in the league’s top four, but the offensive problems will still persist.

The Orioles offense is just not scoring, and it’s affecting no one quite as greatly as Millwood. He has done exactly what the Orioles expected. He has afforded them flexibility with their young pitchers, and he has, until recently, kept opposing teams at bay. Andy MacPhail had a solid plan, but, as Burns so duly noted, those plans often gang aft agley.

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I’d say Millwood is the least-supported pitcher in the league, but that would ignore Zack Greinke. As Joe Poz tweets, the Royals have failed with Greinke in the game during his last four starts. They have scored 2.4 runs while he’s in the game, which is a tick more than Millwood, but have scored only 3.1 for the entire game in which he pitches. The Royals offense as a whole has scored 4.34 runs per game, so the Royals seem to be failing Greinke more than the Orioles are failing Millwood. Also, like Millwood, Greinke has stumbled lately. Not that there’s a causal connection between poor run support and declining performance. But it is an interesting connection, at least.

Today, instead of telling a story using numbers, I’ll let the numbers do all the storytelling. I think in this case that they have something to say. The table below comes from Jamie Moyer’s plate discipline stats. While I am interested in Moyer in general, it’s not his stats here that jumped out at me. Instead it’s the major league averages, which appear in the orange-colored rows.

Click for larger size

The first two columns certainly stand out. While overall swing percentage isn’t too far off from previous years, both O-Swing% and Z-Swing% have moved moved a bit. This year hitters are swinging at 28 percent of pitches outside the zone, a nearly three point jump from 2009. The number does move around a bit, dipping as low as 16.6 percent in 2004. On the other side, hitters are swinging at fewer pitches inside the zone as last year, 63.8 percent against 66 percent from last year. That number appears to increase to some degree all the way back to 2002. We’re also seeing much more contact on pitches outside the zone.

I’m obviously wondering why we’re seeing this discrepancy. Why are hitters swinging at pitches outside the zone more frequently than in the past? This seems like a good question to crowdsource. I’ll present a couple of ideas, and you guys can build on them. It’s certainly something I’d like to hear more about.

1, This is just an early season thing. They say hitters get better as the weather warms. Maybe that has as much to do with them getting into a groove — hitters are getting closer to the 250 PA mark — as it does the weather.

2. It’s just part of the natural cycles of the game. Hitters were more patient earlier in the decade. Maybe now they’re starting to be more aggressive.

3. Related to No. 2, and perhaps a bit to No. 4, pitchers are exploiting a weakness and are making hitters chase more.

4. Pitchers are just hurling nastier stuff. Hitters are having a hard time adjusting to tougher breaking and off-speed pitches. I’m not sure how you could go about proving this one, so it’s probably an afterthought, if that.

5. The criteria for pitches inside and outside the zone has changed.

6. Just blame the umps.

Again, I’m not really sure if this is something that we’ll see continue all season, or if No. 1 more fully explains it. I’m also sure that there are many, many more possible reasons. I’d like to hear them, though.