Quick. Name a starting pitcher on the New York Yankees from the mid-2000’s.
Randy Johnson and Mike Mussina are the gimmes. Andy Pettitte. Javier Vazquez. Carl Pavano. Kevin Brown. Orlando Hernandez. Chien-Ming Wang.
Chien-Ming Wang. The Taiwanese sensation is famous enough in his home country to incite a murder, but is routinely overlooked when reminiscing over quality starters throughout the past decade.
This kicks off a position-by-position series that will look at the upcoming free agents. Because there are fans of 26 teams out there already thinking about next year and how their team can get better, that’s why.
Top Shelf
Ramon Hernandez
Not a single free agent catcher qualified for the batting title. Among those that managed 200 PAs, though, Hernandez led the crew in both batting average and wOBA. He actually managed offense that was 11% better than the league average, which is like wow for a catcher. The position managed a .245/.313/.389 line, and Hernandez had a .282/.341/.446 line. That would make him the offensive class of the free agent class. And by Matt Klaasen’s most recent catcher defense rankings, he graded out as top-tier as well. So why might the Reds let him go? Well they have Ryan Hanigan in hand and Devin Mesoraco on the way, so they don’t need to spend that money. Also, Hernandez is 36 years old, has averaged 337 PAs over the past three years, and is as likely to be below-average with the bat as he is to be above-average (or more likely below, given he’s another year older). Even though his defense is at least decent and the Dodgers are a possibility, the best fit for him might be an American league team that can shuttle him between catcher and DH to keep him fresh. Could he return to Baltimore? Replace free-agent-to-be Josh Bard in Seattle? The Mariners are looking for offense at any position they can get it.
Verdict: Mariners.
Every season some players have a power breakout (Granderson) or meltdown (Dunn). I decided to look at the players with the highest and lowest ISO increases this season and the reasons behind the changes for a few of the players.
Livan Hernandez struggled against the Mets on Sunday, giving up six runs on eight hits over 5 1/3 innings. As he exited the field in the top of the sixth, his 2011 season had officially come to an end.
Hernandez isn’t injured. He isn’t on a strict innings limit either. The Nationals simply decided to shut Hernandez down for the season’s final month. Removing him from the rotation enables the team to test out various youngsters in preparation for next season. Livan didn’t put up a fight. He understood the decision and accepted it, and will embrace his new role as mentor and de facto second pitching coach.
This type of decision isn’t made every day, especially with a pitcher still as productive as Hernandez. Then again, Hernandez isn’t your every day type of pitcher, and this story will only add to his legend as one of the best characters and people in the game.
Four great men from Philadelphia once said, “You don’t know what you’ve got, til’ it’s gone.” In the case of Stephen Strasburg, at least in my case, I think we didn’t know what he had until he returned. Last night, Strasburg turned in a very pedestrian performance by his standards, striking out only four batters while allowing only two hits and zero walks.
I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I suggest that should Strasburg stay healthy and avoid the problems that ended his first season, he could be the best pitcher I’ve ever seen, and perhaps the best pitcher to ever play the game. He is only 73 innings into his young career, and already we’ve seen more excitement and amazement than many pitchers provide in a career. He already has a 14 strikeout game, a 10 strikeout game, a nine strikeout game, and two eight strikeout games. He’s thrown 100 MPH fastballs and 92 MPH changeups. He’s thrown freezing curveballs and now, Pitch F/X suggests he may have even found a fourth pitch.
Tonight, Stephen Strasburg returned from Tommy John surgery to make his season debut for the Nationals. Here is a look at his Pitch FX speeds from tonight compared to one of his starts from last season. Read the rest of this entry »
Two years ago, the top two picks in the June draft were pretty obvious – Stephen Strasburg was going to go #1 and Dustin Ackley was going to go #2. Strasburg was the best pitching prospect in the draft’s history, while Ackley had comfortably settled in as the low-risk college position player option. Because of the enormous difference in perceived potential, there was no real question that the Nationals would take Strasburg #1, even with the greater chance of risk associated with drafting a pitcher. I made the case for Ackley at the time, but even I admitted that, given the #1 pick, I’d take Strasburg too.
Now, though, a lot has changed. Strasburg had a remarkable ascent and debut in the big leagues, but then also had to go under the knife and has spent the last year rehabbing from Tommy John surgery. Ackley, meanwhile, had some pedestrian numbers in the minor leagues, took longer to get to the show, but has made a pretty nifty little splash since he got there.
The Nationals made a pair of moves Saturday, sending utility-man Jerry Hairston Jr to the Brewers and starting pitcher Jason Marquis to the Diamondbacks. Both were marginal moves that weren’t all that exciting, but the Nats turned two players who didn’t factor into their plans into prospects who might. In exchange for Hairston, the Brewers sent back outfielder Erik Komatsu. For Marquis, the Diamondbacks traded away shortstop Zach Walters. Neither prospect is what we might label “can’t-miss” but both have the upside to help the Nationals as their rebuilding blossoms into contention.
Hairston signed a one year, $2 million deal in the offseason with the Nats, leading some to question why a team in their position even needed someone like him. Well, this is why. As the trade deadline approaches, some fringe contender is going to need middle infield help, either to replace a failed starter or to bide time due to an injury, and will make a trade for a player of that ilk. Hairston accomplishes both of those goals for the Brewers, who are not only dealing with the offensive impotence of Casey McGehee and Yuniesky Betancourt, but also injuries to Rickie Weeks and Carlos Gomez.
The opening salvo of the last week of trading season has been fired… and by the Washington Nationals, who sit 15 games back of the Phillies for the NL East race and nine games back of the Braves for the NL Wild Card. The Nationals pulled the trigger on a deal with the Cincinnati Reds acquiring left fielder Jonny Gomes for minor league pitcher Chris Manno and outfielder Bill Rhinehart.
Wait, what?
The impetus of this deal for the Reds is simple. Chris Heisey has been an above average hitter and has earned time in the left field hole for Cincinnati. With Gomes’s usefulness limited to his performance against left-handed pitching, Heisey has made him redundant. The movement of Gomes makes room for Yonder Alonso to come up and add another left-handed bat to the outfield mix and to the bench.
The thought process for the Nationals, however, is not so clear. The reward for the Nationals appears to be a right-handed platoon partner for Laynce Nix. Gomes does crush left-handers to the tune of a .382 wOBA for his career and a whopping .426 wOBA so far this season. He’s effectively worthless against righties — a .319 wOBA career and .296 this year — and in the field, where he carries a -38 career UZR in about four seasons’ worth of plate appearances in the corner outfield positions.
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).
