For the second year in a row, Mark Kotsay has received a major league contract. The Padres agreed to a one-year deal worth $1.25 million with the 35-year-old (about to enter his age-36 season) on Tuesday.
For the second year in a row, Mark Kotsay does not deserve a spot on a major league roster — at least, not on his merits as a baseball player.
Earlier this week I posted about the best bunts of 2011. Taking some of the comments to that post into consideration, the obvious follow-up is the worst bunts of the 2011 season according to Win Probability Added (WPA).
On Tuesday, we took a quick look at the competitive balance in the MLB, and I made the claim that baseball may have more parity than most leagues, but it also has want of greater balance. During the course of the piece, I made this statement:
The NFL has decided it wants payroll to have essentially no impact on winning, so teams basically trot out the same amount of money every Sunday and hope their money was better-spent. Is that what the MLB wants?
Aft’wards, Paul Swydan pointed out to me that indeed NFL salaries are not flat. Despite their hard cap, their hefty revenue sharing, and their tight spandex pants, the NFL still exhibits nearly a $77M gap between the biggest and lowest payroll — impressive, but still nothing compared to the MLB:
Yesterday, Cubs President of Baseball Operations Theo Epstein announced the Chicago Cubs and manager Mike Quade have parted ways. Kudos to Theo Epstein for not doing what we all expected him to: Fire Quade immediately.
It appears Epstein — like he has approached most everything in his young Cubs reign — decided to withhold judgement until he had fully investigated the matter himself. Like Joe Maddon is wont to say, “Tell me what you think, not what you heard.”
Quade’s managerial time with the Cubs was both short and possibly undeserved. Taking the helm when Lou Piniella suddenly retired in 2010, Quade inherited a team that was predisposed towards failure. But, despite that, the team went 24-13 to close out the season. That was enough proof for Jim Hendry to vault Quade not only into the manager discussion, but the manager’s chair:
If the Cubs didn’t get hot in late 2010, does Mike Quade
even get an interview for manager? Probably not.
Well, actually I have no idea if Carlos Gonzalez loves the mountains or if Chase Headley hates the beach, but if my home/road splits looked like their’s, I would certainly start to appreciate/blame the topography.
Many have pointed out how dramatic a split young Carlos Gonzalez possess — at home in Colorado, he’s an elite swing sultan; away from where the beer flows like wins, he is a pedestrian, league-average bat-swinger. Yeah, we get it. Everyone knows, right?
Well, the split is perhaps more dramatic than initially anticipated. Looking at players in the last decade (from 2001 through 2011) with a minimum of 500 home and 500 away PAs, we see CarGo has hit a wRC+ 74 points higher at home than away — more than anyone else in the period:
In other words, no one compares to Carlos Gonzalez… Okay, well, actually one guy does.
And it makes a world of difference.
Some of the following twirlers can really play the game of ball called base!
In 2011, a total of 272 different pitchers started a game in the MLB — that’s an average of 9 starters per team. In other words, five starters is not enough. Successful MLB organizations need pitching depth — and lots of it. Some teams may need a 7th or 8th starter for only 1 game, but ask the Boston Red Sox how important 1 game is.
For teams in the need, the 2012 starting pitcher free agent list has some value and some worthy risks out there, but as with every year, no team should expect the free agent market to have all the answers. The following list, though not exhaustive, runs down the most important names of the 2012 free agents:
Top Tier — Starters who promise big contracts and big seasons.
C.J. Wilson (LHP, Age 31 next season, free agent)
CC Sabathia (LHP, 31, may opt out)
Hiroki Kuroda (RHP, 37, FA)
Edwin Jackson (RHP, 28, FA)
Mark Buehrle (LHP, 33, FA)
Javier Vazquez (RHP, 35, FA)
The Obvious One, Mr. C.J. Wilson, finally promises to pull in that contract big enough to purchase his long-awaited solid-gold rocket car. Wilson, the heat-hurling lord of the lefties figures to have at least two very impressive suitors — the New York Yankees and his present team, the Texas Rangers. Since becoming a starter two years ago, he has posted a combined 10.5 WAR, sporting an ace-worth 3.24 FIP this year.
Not only does Wilson have a shot to break the bank, but there appears to be a chance that twirling titan CC Sabathia may opt out of the final four years of his contract with the Yankees. Sabathia has been yawningly awesome through his 10-year career, never posting a FIP- higher than 96 and assembling a career-best 2.88 FIP in 2011.
It seems to be a foregone conclusion in Milwaukee that Prince Fielder is a goner. A rough estimate of the Brewers’ payroll might have them about $10 million short of 2011’s outlay once arbitration numbers are final, and $10 million a year is not enough to sign Prince Fielder. But baseball benefits from a long, well-recorded history. What can we learn from the other Prince Fielders that have left before?
Players who combine power and speed are fun. There, I said it. I know, shocking stuff. Most of the time such players are good, but not always. I didn’t find any bad offensive seasons with 30 or more home runs and steals, but once I lowered the standard to 20-20, well, let’s just say some guys could stand to take a few more walks. It’s a bit of a random collection, overall, so let’s take a look at the worst individual offensive seasons with at least 20 home runs and 20 steals.
Orlando Hudson has been outspoken — at times, controversial — when it comes to African-Americans in baseball. The San Diego Padres second baseman cares deeply about the subject, and his knowledge of the game spans from the Negro Leagues to the present day. Perhaps most important to him, though, is the game’s future.
The numbers are sadly staggering: In 1975, African-Americans populated more than a quarter of major-league rosters. By 1996, when Hudson signed his first professional contract, the figure was 17%. Today, only 8.5% of this season’s Opening Day big-leaguers were African-American. The downward trend is one that Hudson would like to see reversed.
The four-time Gold Glove winner addressed the subject when the Padres visited Fenway Park earlier this summer.
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Hudson, on the man who preceded Jackie Robinson: “Fleetwood Walker was the first African-American to play in the big leagues. People say that Jackie broke the barrier, but Fleetwood broke in back in [1884]. He had a couple of years in before they said, ‘We don’t want blacks in baseball.’ He was a light-skinned brother. He was the first one and then — 60 years later — Jackie came along, in 1947. It was like, ‘OK, I’m here to stay.’ He played nine or 10 years in the big leagues. Then it was [Don] Newcombe and [Larry] Doby, and so forth.
On the players who followed Robinson: “They aren’t [as well known] because they were there at the same time as Jackie. Here’s a prime example: At one time you had Jeter, A-Rod, Tejada, Nomar and Vizquel. Wow. All right, out of that bunch you have four who are still playing. Nomar is out, so nobody talks about him anymore. Everyone forgets that Nomar was one of the best in the game. They mostly talk about Jeter and A-Rod. That’s why I think that Doby and those guys aren‘t talked about. Jackie got all the limelight. Branch Rickey was like, ’OK, this is the first guy, right here, Jackie Robinson.’ People just gravitated to him.”
Heath Bell and Carlos Pena were each claimed on waivers earlier this week, though it appears that neither player will be moving.
The Giants claimed Bell, most likely to bolster their bullpen given the injuries to Brian Wilson and Sergio Romo. The waiver claim could have also been submitted to block the Diamondbacks from acquiring Bell. The Yankees claimed Pena, even though Mark Teixeira plays virtually every inning at first base and Jorge Posada has performed well against righties this season with a .359 wOBA.
But given the Yankees place in the standings and the lack of need for the Red Sox, the claim on Pena probably wasn’t used as a blocking mechanism.
Both players should have been dealt back at the trade deadline, when teams could unilaterally work with one another. Both Bell and Pena might not represent massive improvements to anyone with only a month remaining in the season, but they could have impacted the playoff picture if traded in mid-July, when more teams were seemingly in the race. Let’s take a look at both situations.
