With a classic World Series — the most exciting in a long time, if not the best-played or best-managed — now over, it is time to hand out individual awards for the 2011 regular season. Sure, some people are anticipating the Cy Young, MVP, and Rookie of the Year announcements, but I bet true baseball fans really pumped for stuff like today’s award, which attempts to measure how much a hitter has contributed to his team’s wins beyond what traditional linear weights indicates. Who is 2011’s King of Little Things?

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Near the beginning of last night’s World Series Game Four, which ended up being the Greatest Game in World Series History Pitched by a 14-year old, Joe Buck and Tim McCarver were discussing Lance Berkman, specifically his status as one of the most productive switch-hitters in major-league history. Now, I usually believe everything people on TV say. For example, when Tim McCarver asserts, as he has during this season’s Fall Classic, that “Michael Young didn’t complain” when asked to change positions for Elvis Andrus and Adrian Beltre, or that “Tony La Russa doesn’t lie,” I just take it at face value. However, while I agree that Berkman is and has been an excellent player who may have even have Hall of Fame credentials, I thought I should both trust and verify. How does Berkman compare to the other great switch-hitters in major-league history, and who exactly are they?

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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.

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The corner outfielder often gets lumped into the mix with the first basemen / designated hitter types. You might call that part of the market the ‘last piece saloon.’ But, Raul Ibanez aside, corner outfielders need to be able to run a little bit, too.

Oh, would you look at that, Ibanez is a free agent. But who needs a corner outfielder at all? Depending on how they put their team together, the Braves could maybe use another outfielder. The Red Sox have an opening, but after their last high-priced acquisition in the outfield, and their plethora of in-house options, it might not be a priority. Both Chicago teams are a maybe, with the NL version more probable. Do the Dodgers have any money? The Giants will sign one for sure. The A’s will wait for a bargain, as they always do. The Mariners have to be considered dark horses for any piece of offense. The Nationals could try again. That pretty much defines your market, and it’s a pretty decent one in terms of demand.

What does the supply look like?

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A pitcher even finer than even these two upstanding gents!

Quick! There’s no time to waste!

Name the five best FIP- seasons in the history of MLB. (Minimum, a scant 20 IP.)

I’d imagine your list includes Eric Gagne‘s crazy 2003 and Pedro Martinez’s nutso 1999 season. And you’d be correct. But there’s another modern-day pitcher you’d have only guessed if you had cleverly looked at the title of this post:

1) Ed Cushman, 10 FIP- (1884, year of our lord)
2) Henry Porter, 13 FIP- (1884)
3) Eric Gagne, 20 FIP- (2003)
4) Sergio Romo, 25 FIP- (2011)
5) Pedro Martinez, 30 FIP- (1999)

I imagine there are a number of baseball fans who, like myself, had not even heard of Sergio Romo until they made him their setup man while playing Baseball Mogul 2008.

We’ll learn his name because he might be one of the greatest late-blooming relievers in the history of the game.
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Late last week, I posted a scouting report on Atlanta Braves third-base prospect Edward Salcedo. I received several comments voicing concern over the lack of hitters throughout the organization’s minor-league levels.

But as much as I understand the frustration (I certainly don’t enjoy watching a starting lineup full of non-prospects and organizational players), I’d urge readers to adopt a more big-picture view of the Braves organizational philosophy. And it’s really quite a brilliant strategy: leverage the ability to develop arms better than anybody else to fill needs at the big-league level. After all, ultimately it’s about World Series rings and not how many sluggers an organization has on its Double-A roster, isn’t it?

At the trade deadline, I was shocked that the Braves were able to acquire Michael Bourn without dealing a single “key” prospect. Sure, Paul Clemens (SP), Brett Oberholtzer (SP), Juan Abreu (RP) and Jordan Schafer (CF) might all wind up being big-leaguers in some capacity. but Michael Bourn is a top-flight center fielder who posted the second-highest WAR at the position between 2009 to 2011. For me, the sum of the parts who were dealt for Bourn didn’t equal one of the better center fielders in baseball.

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We know this much: The NL will send a team from its Central Division to the World Series. Who? We do not yet know. But: The fact remains that this circumstance is no less a surprise to many prognosticators, forecasting systems, and blathering media faces. I cannot recall any one credible source projecting the the NL Central as the team to send a World Series team into the fray — much less to two playoff-teams to the tourney.

Nonetheless, here we sit on the cold stone of pondering, staring into the abyss of unpredictability, the majestic, mysterious abyss of this:

A moon ago, we heard news of the impending Astro’s sale, which comes with a DH apparently, as the proud once-Colt .45s intend to move AL-wise.

This is bad news for the top chihuahuas of the NL Central who feasted on their weak division, and produced perhaps the two least-qualified World Series contenders in a long… long… long time.
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The thought of Atlanta Braves third base prospect Edward Salcedo forces me to think of a popular Dave Matthews Band song titled, “The Best of What’s Around“. Maybe the lyrics don’t fit exactly, but the title is perfect when discussing the bats, or lack thereof, in the Braves minor league system. On a humid evening in July, I wound up sitting next to a scout I had met two seasons earlier in Savannah and spent much of the game discussing the Braves system. After talking through the top-flight pitching prospects in the organization, the conversation turned to potential big league hitters to which the scout commented, “Salcedo is the only bat in the entire system.” Having scouted Braves affiliates including Rome, Mississippi and Gwinnett in person, I don’t completely agree, but do concede the fact Salcedo is the only prospect system-wide with a middle-of-the-order ceiling.

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Episode Eighty-Six
In which baseball sells itself.

Headlines
The Events of September 28th — Recapitulated!
The Saddest Story Ever — Told Briefly!
The 2011 Playoffs — Super-Previewed!

Featuring
Dave Cameron, Full-Time Employee

Finally, you can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio on the flip-flop. (Approximately 45 min. play time.)

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Several reasons have floated around for the cause of the Braves’ historic collapse. Many people point to the horrible September that the Braves and their players experienced. Similar down months happened previously in the 2011 season, but went unnoticed due to the lack of playoff implications.

No Offense

The Braves offense was not a powerhouse over the entire season. They averaged just under four runs a game (3.96). It was 10th in the NL. While not great, it was even worse over the last month. They scored only 87 runs, or 3.22 runs per game. Now, which of the following slash lines led to the offensive collapse:

#1: 0.235/0.300/0.357
#2: 0.222/0.290/0.388

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