Despite nearly making the playoffs last season, the San Diego Padres decided it was time to rebuild. In order to restock the farm system, San Diego traded away Adrian Gonzalez — easily their best player — and acquired Cameron Maybin, who may roam center field in Petco Park for many, many years. For teams like the Padres, who have essentially punted this season to rebuild their team, the performance of young players or prospects is one of the few positives ownership can sell to the fans. Cory Luebke, a former first-round pick, was given the opportunity to make his first start of the season this past Sunday.

Although Luebke, 26, was having a phenomenal season in the bullpen, the Padres decided he could be a larger asset in the rotation. In his first start, Luebke didn’t disappoint — going five innings with six strikeouts, while allowing only one hit. It may have been a successful debut for Luebke, but there are reasons for concern going forward.

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Source: The Washington Post

Consider this: The MLB’s opening day rosters were 72.3% America-born and, therefore, 27.7% foreign-born. Moreover, my diligent Googling skillz have suggested that 42 million Americans play baseball — recreationally, collegiately, high schoolally, professionally, or otherwise. So, that is 7 out of every 10 MLB players coming from a stock of 13.4% of Americans (24 42 million players / 313 million Americans).

In other words, the pool for American baseball talent is large and well-tapped (because it fills the most roster spots). High school and college teams have done an excellent job of vetting young American talent, ensuring that only the best reach the minors — and then the best of the best reach the majors. Despite this considerable pool of American talent, the teams that want an edge know they cannot let the local talent satisfy their needs. Enter: East Asia.
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The following is the first and behemoth installment of a three-part (or more) series concerning baseball’s next great market inefficiencies.

The STRIKE ZONE is that area over home plate the upper limit of which is a horizontal line at the midpoint between the top of the shoulders and the top of the uniform pants, and the lower level is a line at the hollow beneath the kneecap. The Strike Zone shall be determined from the batter’s stance as the batter is prepared to swing at a pitched ball.

—Official MLB Rulebook, Page 22

On Tuesday, in the sixth round of the MLB Draft, the San Diego Padres selected outfielder Kyle Gaedele (who the Tampa Bay Rays had previously drafted in the 32nd round of the 2008 draft). Gaedele plays center field and shows good signs of hitting for power, but what most writers, sports fans, and guys named Bradley talk about is Gaedele’s great uncle.

Casual fans probably do not know about Kyle’s great uncle, Eddie Gaedel (who removed the e off his last name for show-business purposes). We nerds can forgive the casual fan for forgetting a player who outdid, in his career, only the great Otto Neu. Gaedel took a single at-bat, walked to first, and then left for a pinch runner.

What makes Eddie Gaedel a unique and important part of baseball history, however, is not his statistics, per se, but his stature. Gaedel stood 3’7″ tall, almost half the height of his great nephew. Gaedel was the first and last little person to play in Major League Baseball, and the time has come for that to change.

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We’ve already run through first basemen and designated hitters, corner outfielders, and middle infielders who could be available at the trading deadline. Today, we cover five relievers who could be switching teams over the next two months.

PLAYER: Heath Bell
TEAM: Padres
POSSIBLE DESTINATION(S): Cardinals, Indians, Phillies
CONTRACT STATUS: $7.5 million, free agent after the season
PROJECTED WAR: 1.3

Bell is pretty clearly the best “proven closer” on the market, and he’s likely the best overall reliever as well. Even though his K/9 is down to 7.0 this year, his swinging strike rate of 9.1% indicates that it’ll increase a bit, even if it doesn’t get all the way back to his gaudy 11.1 rate from 2010. To compensate, Bell’s ground ball rate is up to 51% this year — an especially nice quality to keep were he to exit spacious PETCO Park.

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The following data is current through 5-30-2011.

If you, dear reader, are like me, then you agonize unnecessarily over every lineup on every team in every game. Aaron Rowand leading off?! Yargh! No! Carlos Gomez batting second for the Brewers?! WRONG. Aaron Miles batting anything?! Unforgivable.

Holding egos constant, inefficiency is the greatest enemy of success. With regards to lineups, however, teams can really only lose a handful of runs over the course of full season, but a handful of runs, in real terms, can mean the difference between the division or a boring October. So it’s a dicey proposition. A mismanaged lineup on the Royals team does not mean a whole lot because they will lose the division by several trillion runs. A few lost runs for the Rays, Yankees, or Red Sox, though, can mean the season.
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I think I’m like most baseball fans in that when I think of a designated hitter, I think of home runs. The DH spot has usually been filled by power hitters since its inception in 1973, and that makes sense. If a player is playing a position with no defensive value, he needs to produce on offense. Home runs are the most valuable offensive event. The most valuable hitters in any given year usually have plenty of home runs and extra base hits. One often hears that a player who doesn’t hit for power doesn’t have the bat to play on the “easy end” of the defensive spectrum, and and even moreso in the case of a player who is primarily a DH. Billy Butler is a current example of a player who mostly fills the DH spot, but since he hasn’t hit for much power (yet), you will sometimes hear people say that he doesn’t fit the profile of a DH. Without focusing specifically on Butler, I’d like to write briefly about what it means to “hit well enough to be DH,” and then to see how often that actually happens with a relatively low amount of power.

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Coming into the eighth inning of Wednesday’s game against the San Diego Padres, the Milwaukee Brewers held a 6-5 lead. With just six outs remaining, it seemed like a safe bet that the Padres were done scoring, considering San Diego entered the game averaging just over three runs a game; then the eighth inning happened. Facing a three-game sweep, the mighty Padres’ scored eight runs on nine hits to take a 13-6 lead over the Brewers.

The frame started with Mitch Stetter versus Brad Hawpe in a lefty-on-lefty matchup. Hawpe — who entered the game as a pinch-hitter – pulled a slider into right field for a lead-off single. With the right-handed bats of Chris Denorfia, Jason Bartlett, and Jorge Cantu due up, Ron Roenicke made a move to the bullpen for Kameron Loe. Roenicke’s choice was rooted in sound process especially since Loe has earned a 3.07 FIP/3.17xFIP against right-handed batters since he joined the Brewers’ bullpen in 2010. On the other hand, the results were disastrous.

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“I heard the jury was still out on… Science…”

–G.O.B. Bluth, Arrested Development

Saunter over to the Shutdown and Meltdown leaderboard and you will find a curious leader: The San Diego Padres.

Yes, the Friars have somehow amassed an absurd 31 shutdowns (SD) while winning a sport-worst nine games. This seems somewhat surprising, because experience has taught me — among many things about cats — that bad teams typically do not need great bullpens. They might have them (*cough* Joakim Soria *cough cough*), but they do not need them because they get destroyed early and often.

Take my hand and follow me down Logic Avenue: The worst teams will not often participate in three-run, save-opportunity games — or even one-run games. Instead they will presumably watch this and employ a slew of mop-up long men who do not affect the game’s already-decided outcome. I mean, c’mon, three-fifths of the Royals rotation is likely to allow five runs before finishing the 6th inning. What can a bulllpen possibly do when the score is 5 to -1?

In the same stroke of logic, wouldn’t we expect the best teams to have fewer save opportunities? Unlike impressively mediocre teams, like the Chicago Cubs, the New York Yankees spend a good deal of time slapping homers and trouncing weaklings. As a result, we should expect they play fewer close games than the Cubs, who must crawl, snarl, and curse their way into every victory and loss.

Well, that may be logical, but it’s not entirely correct.
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For the second year running, the Padres look to have one of the best bullpens in baseball. After posting a 2.75 ERA and 2.95 FIP as part of an unlikely 90-win season in 2010, the Padres are doing it again in 2011, with a 2.33 ERA and 2.85 FIP out of the gates. Although Heath Bell is the headliner of the group, his opening act, Mike Adams, deserves just as much credit. His ascension from total baseball obscurity was detailed excellently by SBNation’s Grant Brisbee today. The man just keeps getting better, too: since 2010, Adams has a 1.60 ERA and 2.31 FIP, both in the top 10 among pitchers with at least 40 innings pitched in that span.

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This past offseason, the Florida Marlins traded away toolsy but flawed Cameron Maybin to the Padres in exchange for a pair of relievers. So far this season, Maybin has been putting up a .260/.337/.481 line and looks good in the field. Can we stamp this trade as a win for the Padres already?

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