Not content with Jeff Keppinger and Carlos Beltran as trade deadline acquisitions, the San Francisco Giants added veteran middle infielder Orlando Cabrera to the mix. In exchange for Cabrera, the Giants sent 23-year-old outfielder Thomas Neal to the Cleveland Indians – who had little use for Cabrera after Jason Kipnis was promoted.
The biggest chip in the 2011 trading season has officially been moved. After weeks of rumors, the Giants pulled the trigger on a deal to bolster a struggling offense, acquiring Carlos Beltran from the Mets in exchange for prized pitching prospect Zach Wheeler. Beltran will infuse some life into an offense which enters Thursday’s play with an overall batting line of .241/.306/.360, worth an 82 wRC+ that sits dead last in the National League.
Ichiro Suzuki is getting old. In life, that’s not a bad thing. In baseball, it is.
He is now in season 11 of the MLB portion of his career and season 20 of his professional career. Despite his age, he has played in 102 of the Seattle Mariners’ 103 games this year (not counting today). Moreover, he has more plate appearances (457) than anyone over age 35 in 2011. The next closest, Paul Konerko, is over 30 PAs behind him.
Ichiro may look as healthy and athletic as ever, but his numbers this year have been very un-Ichiro-like:
wOBA: .285
wRC+: 80
UZR: -8.4
Bsr: 2.3
All, except for the base-running (UBR) numbers, are career lows for Ich-dawg. We have long-anticipated Ichiro would slow down his ageless mastery of baseball at some point, but the depreciation in his 2011 statistics seem rather sudden. Worth noting:
Barry Bonds terrorized major league pitchers and managers in 2004. The proof: He walked 232 times — 120 of which were intentional. Both numbers are single-season records, which, to this point, no one has come close to touching. Needless to say, Bonds’ 2004 was a pretty unique year.
Read the rest of this entry »
Looking to sure up an area of weakness – the middle infield – the San Francisco Giants acquired Jeff Keppinger from the Houston Astros for a pair of minor league arms. For the Astros, selling a piece like Keppinger makes sense even if the return – or in this case returns – never pan out. I will not pretend to know much about Henry Sosa and Jason Stoffel; however, getting two live arms in a system void of many prospects in exchange for a player who does not have much a future in the organization is a worthwhile gamble regardless of the outcome.
Early in the season Eno Sarris introduced us to Brian Wilson’s flithy two-seam fastball, a pitch Wilson claims to have added this year. Sarris’s GIF showed Jamey Carroll flailing wildly at Wilson’s newest offering. Wilson, 29, already had three years as a solid closer for the the San Francisco Giants, so the idea of him adding another nasty pitch is intriguing. With over half the season books and Wilson effective again this year — though his peripherals have taken a step back — I wanted to check in on that two-seamer.
Read the rest of this entry »
Whence we last examined yonder batting orders, we came away with several expected observations (Jose Bautista plays baseball like a video game, the Oakland Athletics do not care much for scoring runs, Rick Ankiel and Ian Desmond are not feared hitters, and so forth) as well as a number of curious findings (the Cubs lead-off combo was tops in the majors, the 7th hitters on AL teams were worse than the 9th hitters, NL managers effectively managed the bottoms of their lineups, and such).
Quite often we hear that a relief pitcher does or does not have what it takes to get the high pressure outs. Certain pitchers have “it” while others melt under the spot light. Ryan Madson could not be a successful closer because he lacked the vaunted “closer’s mentality.” I’m sure on a case by case basis you will find players who simply cannot handle the pressure; however, studies have shown that a reliever should perform to his talent level regardless of the leverage. After all, they are just roles not skill-sets.
As a fan of the Rays, I have watched Kyle Farnsworth transform from a guy who also lacks the closer’s mentality in to a true relief ace pitching in high leverage situations. Farnsworth is not the only middle reliever to graduate to the high life with success. Including Farnsworth, I found five relief pitchers who moved from the mid-to-low level situations up to a higher level. All five pitched at least 50 innings last season with a pLI less than 1.0. In 2011, they have tossed 30 or more innings with a leverage index of 1.3 or higher (basically set-up man or more). Here is the list…
Trying to play the “If you thought…” game with Ryan Vogelsong can get so out of hand, that we’ll just start here — if you thought Ryan Vogelsong was a good pitcher heading into the 2011 season, you were undeniably crazy. Everything that has happened since then has been completely unpredictable. Not only did Vogelsong re-emerge in the majors after nearly five seasons, but he managed to establish himself as an effective pitcher when injuries forced him into the rotation. After 13 starts and a 2.13 ERA, Vogelsong’s miraculous season continued as he was been named to the NL All-Star team last Sunday. While his selection is fairly controversial — Bruce Bochy did make the selection — no one can deny that Vogelsong is having an exceptional season. Even if his performance isn’t All-Star worthy, Vogelsong is proving that he’s a completely different pitcher.
Read the rest of this entry »
While trade season primarily involves contenders raiding also-rans for useful players, we always hope for that trade that makes us go: what? When the Red Sox traded Manny to the Dodgers in 2008: What? (Which was preceded, of course, but a much louder what when it was reported they traded him to Florida.) We don’t see those very often, because they often involve high-profile players with big contracts, which complicates matters. Chances are we won’t see any jaw-dropping moves this off-season, but that doesn’t preclude us from writing about possibilities.
Today we’ll hold a bad contract swap meet. There aren’t too many huge, horrible contracts out there — that is, contracts that a team would dump if possible and not really miss the player’s production. The entrants, with the year their contracts expire and the money they’re owed beyond 2011 (assuming options declined):
Boston Red Sox: John Lackey (2014, $47.85m)
New York Mets: Jason Bay (2013, $39.26m)
San Francisco Giants: Barry Zito (2013, $46m)
Chicago Cubs: Alfonso Soriano (2014, $57m)