Hendry suddenly smart?

[UK1679666180]

I don't understand what he has done that would separate himself from other GMs this off-season, the results remain to be seen. He probably does have greater flexibility with his contract offers, but he hasn't done anything that would sway my opinion of him.

 

FWIW, the Cubs still have not spent what they lost in expired contracts as Wood, Pierre, Maddux still cost more than Soriano, Derosa, and increases to Ramirez and Blanco.

[Soul]

I don't understand what he has done that would separate himself from other GMs this off-season, the results remain to be seen. He probably does have greater flexibility with his contract offers, but he hasn't done anything that would sway my opinion of him.

 

FWIW, the Cubs still have not spent what they lost in expired contracts as Wood, Pierre, Maddux still cost more than Soriano, Derosa, and increases to Ramirez and Blanco.

 

So the money's there at the moment, and Hendry's spending it.

 

I have no problem with it. I mean, the man's job is on the line. He's got a farm system that's drained, and he needs to win right now or else.

 

Of course he's going to lay out what cash he has to try and win sooner rather than later. One thing I'll say about Mr. Hendry: he's at least doing what I would expect a GM to do in his position. For me, that's a change. I don't know if it makes him "smart."

Edited November 24, 2006 by Soul

[nilodnayr]

 

What are you kidding me!?!?! The DUMB Hendry SET the market this year by overpaying for Soriano, and he did the same thing last year. HE is the one who set the market at overpriced. He also still is dumb and doesn't know what OBP is. So Hendry is dumb and always will be dumb.

 

:roll: (sarcastic post people :lol: )

 

They eye roll smiley doesnt work as well when you are mocking somewhat solid points. Its not Soriano who set the market, heck he was asking for Beltran money, Hendry gave him MORE than he was asking for. And although we do not know for sure we can assume that no other GM was willing to come anywhere near what Hendry offered.

 

1)The signing happened so early in the offseason.

 

2)The signing materialized so quickly. Soriano's agent isn't dumb, he and Hendry talked Saturday. He then took the offer the cubs had on the table and shopped in around to others teams that were interested. He was met with a resounding "Hell NO", and then quickly accepted Sunday morning. If he was even met with an apprehensive "maybe", it wouldn't have materialized so quickly.

 

By this definition of overpaying, every FA who does not give a hometown discount is overpayed. The nature of the free agent market is such that in order to sign a player, a team must be willing to offer more money than any other team. I don't think it is reasonable to say that no other team would have bid anything near that if given the chance, especially if the contest became a drawn out bidding war.

 

All FAs are going to be overpayed. That is pretty much the nature of the market. The thing is, good players are a rare commodity, and being able to get them without giving up talent is a valuable exchange. For a large market team, signing overpayed free agents is better than signing no free agents or signing marginal free agents.

 

Yes, obviously the nature of the market is that a team must overpay to sign a player, I'm not debating that. And given the timing of this signing, I definitely think its reasoable to say that no other team would have bid anything near what we paid for Soriano. If they would have, then Sori's agent would have played the two teams off of one another to inflate the contract as you mentioned in the bidding war. That obviously didn't happen here given the quick materialization of the signing. Your comments on the nature of the FA market are all valid, but have nothing to do with what we are debating.

[Lefty]

No.

[KingKongvs.Godzilla]

im not so sure giving 136 million to alfonso soriano would be classified as smart in my book

 

Agreed.

 

Great, he's thrown money at guys who want money and they joined the Cubs. Anyone of us given the money he has to spend could do what he's done.

 

Hendry is not the long term guy for this orginization, I can't believe money being thrown freely is making people say "oh this guys growing a brain."

 

He's not.

 

Sucks, cause I realize he feels he HAS to do this to keep his job. Doens't mean he's doing whats right for the Cubs in the long term.

 

He's going to be gone from the Cubs. The damage he's done because he wanted to keep his job? Not going to go away with him.

Edited November 24, 2006 by KingKongvs.Godzilla

[BigbadB]

 

What are you kidding me!?!?! The DUMB Hendry SET the market this year by overpaying for Soriano, and he did the same thing last year. HE is the one who set the market at overpriced. He also still is dumb and doesn't know what OBP is. So Hendry is dumb and always will be dumb.

 

:roll: (sarcastic post people :lol: )

 

They eye roll smiley doesnt work as well when you are mocking somewhat solid points. Its not Soriano who set the market, heck he was asking for Beltran money, Hendry gave him MORE than he was asking for. And although we do not know for sure we can assume that no other GM was willing to come anywhere near what Hendry offered.

 

1)The signing happened so early in the offseason.

 

2)The signing materialized so quickly. Soriano's agent isn't dumb, he and Hendry talked Saturday. He then took the offer the cubs had on the table and shopped in around to others teams that were interested. He was met with a resounding "Hell NO", and then quickly accepted Sunday morning. If he was even met with an apprehensive "maybe", it wouldn't have materialized so quickly.

 

The Cubs (Jim Hendry) still see the offensive problem as having to do with a failure to hit in the clutch / hit with RISP / as a straight hitting problem vs an on-base problem.

 

Someone linked to a Dan Fox chat at Baseball Prospectus the other day. He received a lot of Soriano questions and, while answering a question about the Cubs' philosophy on free agents, he referred to a joint Baseball Digest / Bleed Cubbie Blue Blog interview with Jim Hendry this past August. Fox then wrote:

 

Quote:

But what was more interesting was an exchange that wasn't published. BDD asked Hendry if the Cubs will try and initiate a philosophical change in trying to get guys on base since they were 28th in the league in runs scored and 29th in OBP or perhaps sign some free agents who have historically had higher on base percentages (maybe Carlos Lee or J.D. Drew?) or even bring in a new hitting coach to alter the mindset of the approach at the plate. Hendry responded with the following:

 

Jim Hendry wrote:

"Well we'd like to get guys who can get on base, but our trouble was knocking guys in. We finished 4th or 5th in the league in hitting so we did manage to get guys on base. You can get all the guys on base that you want, but you have to knock them in."

 

That right there shows that Hendry really doesn't understand OBP.

 

:shock: Oh my god.

 

The Cubs also finished 4th in AB's. That's because no one walks!!

 

Pittsburgh: 1921 base runners (hits and walks only)

Cubs: 1891 base runners

 

I'm not asking to lead the league in BB's. Just quit finishing dead last. 8th would at least be respectable. But, they'd need to walk 136 times more than they did last year to reach 8th.

 

As far as hits, they only needed 19 hits to finish 2nd overall in hits. Timely hitting? Uh no. The teams that get issued the most free passes along with a batting average like the Cubs put up in 2006 are the teams that score the most runs.

 

The team that led the league in runs in 2006 had the best OBP in the NL. The Cubs had a better AVG than the team that scored the most runs in the NL last year. The difference in runs scored is 149 by the two teams, or nearly 1 run per game.

 

Timely hitting factors on a much smaller scale than just getting guys on base. OBP and SLG should be the most important things when analyzing players to add to your roster.

 

The Cubs have been dead last in walks the last 2 years. They haven't finished above 13th in walks since 2002.

 

Try it! I think you'll like it.

[nilodnayr]

 

:shock: Oh my god.

 

The Cubs also finished 4th in AB's. That's because no one walks!!

 

Pittsburgh: 1921 base runners (hits and walks only)

Cubs: 1891 base runners

 

I'm not asking to lead the league in BB's. Just quit finishing dead last. 8th would at least be respectable. But, they'd need to walk 136 times more than they did last year to reach 8th.

 

As far as hits, they only needed 19 hits to finish 2nd overall in hits. Timely hitting? Uh no. The teams that get issued the most free passes along with a batting average like the Cubs put up in 2006 are the teams that score the most runs.

 

The team that led the league in runs in 2006 had the best OBP in the NL. The Cubs had a better AVG than the team that scored the most runs in the NL last year. The difference in runs scored is 149 by the two teams, or nearly 1 run per game.

 

Timely hitting factors on a much smaller scale than just getting guys on base. OBP and SLG should be the most important things when analyzing players to add to your roster.

 

The Cubs have been dead last in walks the last 2 years. They haven't finished above 13th in walks since 2002.

 

Try it! I think you'll like it.

 

I think a couple years back Tim had an article on the front page that showed a slew of stats' statistical correlation with runs scored...and guess what, OBP had the highest correlation. Anyone want to try to find that?

[BigbadB]

And I think I'll survive going after mediocre OBP guys if they would just keep guys like Neifi and Izturis out of the top spots in the batting order.

 

If you can't get on base at a .350+ clip, you are a bottom of the order hitter. Period.

[BigbadB]

 

:shock: Oh my god.

 

The Cubs also finished 4th in AB's. That's because no one walks!!

 

Pittsburgh: 1921 base runners (hits and walks only)

Cubs: 1891 base runners

 

I'm not asking to lead the league in BB's. Just quit finishing dead last. 8th would at least be respectable. But, they'd need to walk 136 times more than they did last year to reach 8th.

 

As far as hits, they only needed 19 hits to finish 2nd overall in hits. Timely hitting? Uh no. The teams that get issued the most free passes along with a batting average like the Cubs put up in 2006 are the teams that score the most runs.

 

The team that led the league in runs in 2006 had the best OBP in the NL. The Cubs had a better AVG than the team that scored the most runs in the NL last year. The difference in runs scored is 149 by the two teams, or nearly 1 run per game.

 

Timely hitting factors on a much smaller scale than just getting guys on base. OBP and SLG should be the most important things when analyzing players to add to your roster.

 

The Cubs have been dead last in walks the last 2 years. They haven't finished above 13th in walks since 2002.

 

Try it! I think you'll like it.

 

I think a couple years back Tim had an article on the front page that showed a slew of stats' statistical correlation with runs scored...and guess what, OBP had the highest correlation. Anyone want to try to find that?

 

You have to go back to 1998 to find a Cub team that scored 800+ runs. That team went to the playoffs.

 

And the pitching staff in 1998 was NOT good. Kevin Tapani had a 19-9 record with a 4.85 ERA. Score enough runs, and you can make a mediocre pitcher look good in the win column.

[nilodnayr]

 

:shock: Oh my god.

 

The Cubs also finished 4th in AB's. That's because no one walks!!

 

Pittsburgh: 1921 base runners (hits and walks only)

Cubs: 1891 base runners

 

I'm not asking to lead the league in BB's. Just quit finishing dead last. 8th would at least be respectable. But, they'd need to walk 136 times more than they did last year to reach 8th.

 

As far as hits, they only needed 19 hits to finish 2nd overall in hits. Timely hitting? Uh no. The teams that get issued the most free passes along with a batting average like the Cubs put up in 2006 are the teams that score the most runs.

 

The team that led the league in runs in 2006 had the best OBP in the NL. The Cubs had a better AVG than the team that scored the most runs in the NL last year. The difference in runs scored is 149 by the two teams, or nearly 1 run per game.

 

Timely hitting factors on a much smaller scale than just getting guys on base. OBP and SLG should be the most important things when analyzing players to add to your roster.

 

The Cubs have been dead last in walks the last 2 years. They haven't finished above 13th in walks since 2002.

 

Try it! I think you'll like it.

 

I think a couple years back Tim had an article on the front page that showed a slew of stats' statistical correlation with runs scored...and guess what, OBP had the highest correlation. Anyone want to try to find that?

 

You have to go back to 1998 to find a Cub team that scored 800+ runs. That team went to the playoffs.

 

And the pitching staff in 1998 was NOT good. Kevin Tapani had a 19-9 record with a 4.85 ERA. Score enough runs, and you can make a mediocre pitcher look good in the win column.

 

I think you are responding to the wrong post :lol:

[BigbadB]

No, I'm not. I was attempting to show how well the Cubs did with a really good OBP in 1989 in comparison to the rest of the league.

 

I just threw the pitching stuff on the end because it shows that the Cubs were able to win a lot of games with a good offense and bad pitching.

 

The Cubs walked A LOT that year.

[nilodnayr]

No, I'm not. I was attempting to show how well the Cubs did with a really good OBP in 1989 in comparison to the rest of the league.

 

I just threw the pitching stuff on the end because it shows that the Cubs were able to win a lot of games with a good offense and bad pitching.

 

The Cubs walked A LOT that year.

 

1989 or 1998? In 1998, they didn't have a great OBP. It was good, but definitely not great. .335 ranked 7th in the NL. Their slugging was 5th in the NL. But yes, their pitching was poor. Sosa, Grace and O'Henry, really carried that team.

[BigbadB]

Whoops. No, I meant 1998. A .337 team OBP is pretty good, actually.

[nilodnayr]

Whoops. No, I meant 1998. A .337 team OBP is pretty good, actually.

 

In 1998, every hitter with 200+ABs on the Astros had a 337 or greater OBP!!! And if it weren't for Ricky Gutierrez, I could have said 355! Thats how you win 102 games (Pythagorean had them at 106).

[jjgman21]

And I think I'll survive going after mediocre OBP guys if they would just keep guys like Neifi and Izturis out of the top spots in the batting order.

 

If you can't get on base at a .350+ clip, you are a bottom of the order hitter. Period.

 

 

not that Neifi or Izturis belong anywhere near the top of the order, but I presume by bottom of the order hitter you mean 4, 5, 6, 7, 8?

 

there were 96 qualified hitters in all of baseball with a .350 obp in 2006. in 2005 there were 70. you also have to consider that a large percentage of those players are 3-4 hitters. statements like this miss the reality of baseball. I want high obp's at the top of the order and the middle of the order and the bottom of the order, but sometimes you just have to settle.

[Pinktermite]

If the Cubs would need 126 more walks to finish in the middle of the pack, then DLee will give you better than half of those, maybe most of them. Not having him in the lineup made a huge difference. Made the Cubs look worse than they should have all the way around.

[nilodnayr]

If the Cubs would need 126 more walks to finish in the middle of the pack, then DLee will give you better than half of those, maybe most of them. Not having him in the lineup made a huge difference. Made the Cubs look worse than they should have all the way around.

 

The cubs had 67 walks from the firstbasemen last year (and don't forget some of that was DLee himself). DLee typically gets about 80ish a season. So he adds about 15 walks. Nowhere near half or most of 126. Obviously not having him in the lineup made a huge difference, but not really to our IsoD, which was not horrible (.071).

 

DLee has had the following IsoD for the cubs:

 

2006: .082

2005: .083

2004: .078

 

A full season of DLee is not going to solve our walk issues...sorry.

[jjgman21]

If the Cubs would need 126 more walks to finish in the middle of the pack, then DLee will give you better than half of those, maybe most of them. Not having him in the lineup made a huge difference. Made the Cubs look worse than they should have all the way around.

 

The cubs had 67 walks from the firstbasemen last year (and don't forget some of that was DLee himself). DLee typically gets about 80ish a season. So he adds about 15 walks. Nowhere near half or most of 126. Obviously not having him in the lineup made a huge difference, but not really to our IsoD, which was not horrible (.071).

 

DLee has had the following IsoD for the cubs:

 

2006: .082

2005: .083

2004: .078

 

A full season of DLee is not going to solve our walk issues...sorry.

 

yes, but the guy getting alot of the walks in place of DLee was the guy who should have been getting walks as the Cubs second baseman.

 

Perez, Hairston, Cedeno, Bynum, Womack = 347 abs, 16 BBs as secondbaseman.

 

not enough to make up the difference, but another chip into the walk crisis.

 

edit

perhaps a better way to illustrate my point is the Cubs 1B and 2B combined for 115 walks last year. Lee would predictably have had 85-90.

[BigbadB]

statements like this miss the reality of baseball.

 

Well that's a bit uncalled for, don't ya think?

 

First off, why did you only list qualified players? The list shows 92 out of 120 total players. And even though Mark Loretta (using just one example) finished just short of the .350 mark in OBP, he's put up much higher OBP's in previous seasons and it wouldn't be a stretch to think he could do it again.

 

The Cubs are a top 5 spending team in the league. To think they can't afford a couple of .350+ OBP guys at the top of the order is not missing the reality of baseball.

 

They could have easily done it last year by putting Walker in the lead off spot and Murton 2nd.

 

That option right there would have been head over heels better than Pierre and Neifi.

 

I'll argue with you all day. But, can we leave insults out of it when your opinion differs with someone elses?

[jjgman21]

statements like this miss the reality of baseball.

 

Well that's a bit uncalled for, don't ya think?

 

First off, why did you only list qualified players? The list shows 92 out of 120 total players. And even though Mark Loretta (using just one example) finished just short of the .350 mark in OBP, he's put up much higher OBP's in previous seasons and it wouldn't be a stretch to think he could do it again.

 

The Cubs are a top 5 spending team in the league. To think they can't afford a couple of .350+ OBP guys at the top of the order is not missing the reality of baseball.

 

They could have easily done it last year by putting Walker in the lead off spot and Murton 2nd.

 

That option right there would have been head over heels better than Pierre and Neifi.

 

I'll argue with you all day. But, can we leave insults out of it when your opinion differs with someone elses?

 

well I think that statement is relatively benign. certainly falls well short of many of the things you said during the Wilkerson/Pierre debates. IMO it also falls well short of many of the Neadrathal comments people like to throw around, which you are more likely to laugh at rather than correct.

 

I think you are completely changing what you said above in this post. before it was a naked statement that if your OBP is below .350 you should be a bottom of the order hitter. "Period." to me that means the 7-8 slots in the NL and the 8-9 slots in the AL.

 

you have a problem with my cutoff mark so I will try again. there were a total of 116 players in all of baseball that had 400+ PAs and an OBP of .350 or above. that still only slots in the 1-4 spots in the batting order for all 30 teams. so yes, stating that sub .350 obp players all belong at the bottom of the order does in fact miss the realities of baseball because that leaves everyone without a 5-6 hitter in the NL and a 5-6-7 hitter in the AL. had you stated guys with poor OBPs shouldn't be at the top of the order, I wouldn't have a problem, but I don't think that is all you were trying to say with the above post.

 

scores of those .350 OBP players are pre-arbitration eligible that cannot be obtained for reasonable player costs. so while I think the Cubs should try to get better OBP guys, that's not always possible. whether they would or not even if they were available of course is a question of concern.

 

I have no problem with putting higher OBP guys at the top of the order. I'm not sure why you are implying I think otherwise.

[Mephistopheles]

hey jj, why not look at it in a simpler and easier way. The league OBP is .339 in the AL (which I am going to use to extrapolate the DH problem). Using simple stat 101 class stuff we can find the standard deviation using the formula s = sqrt (pqn)/n in this case. So if we let, say a 600 PA cut off, we get s = sqrt (600*.339*.661)/n = .019. So a .350 OBP is .569 stdevs over the mean, which the tail is going to correspond with a little less than 30% of the league having an OBP over .350.

 

However, there's a bit of an issue that the league average is skewed by countless scrubs getting a lot of ABs (guys who wouldn't normally get 600 PAs which brings this down in the averages).

 

Of the 148 players in MLB last season who got at least 500 PAs, 91 (61%) had OBP of .350 or higher. They averaged a .356 OBP. And mathematically, 62% of those players should have had an OBP over .350. If you break this down into teams, that gives an average of over 3 on each team, BUT doing so gives us an average offense. Any teams from like 5th to 10th in the league in offense would have 3 guys with this obp on their team. If you want a playoff caliber offense you're going to need five or so - or a lot of power to back it up

[jjgman21]

hey jj, why not look at it in a simpler and easier way. The league OBP is .339 in the AL (which I am going to use to extrapolate the DH problem). Using simple stat 101 class stuff we can find the standard deviation using the formula s = sqrt (pqn)/n in this case. So if we let, say a 600 PA cut off, we get s = sqrt (600*.339*.661)/n = .019. So a .350 OBP is .569 stdevs over the mean, which the tail is going to correspond with a little less than 30% of the league having an OBP over .350.

 

However, there's a bit of an issue that the league average is skewed by countless scrubs getting a lot of ABs (guys who wouldn't normally get 600 PAs which brings this down in the averages).

 

Of the 148 players in MLB last season who got at least 500 PAs, 91 (61%) had OBP of .350 or higher. They averaged a .356 OBP. And mathematically, 62% of those players should have had an OBP over .350. If you break this down into teams, that gives an average of over 3 on each team, BUT doing so gives us an average offense. Any teams from like 5th to 10th in the league in offense would have 3 guys with this obp on their team. If you want a playoff caliber offense you're going to need five or so - or a lot of power to back it up

 

because I was smart enough to get the only B.S. at UW that did not require me to go beyond Trig, so that's not easy for me?

 

btw, why didn't you use the NL since that is the league the team we are generally discussing here plays in?

 

so let's see where we stand in that theory

 

Zips projections

Lee .383

Ramirez .355

Murton .363

Barrett .349

 

Last year actual, Zips not so rosy

DeRosa .357

Soriano .351

 

40+ HR potential

Soriano

Ramirez

Lee

 

20+ HR potential

Jones

Barrett

 

15+ HR potential

DeRosa

Murton

 

by your definition, looks like a playoff caliber offense to me.

 

fwiw, the WS champions had 4 .350 OBP guys. two of them were just that. exactly .350. the team they beat had 2 .350 OBP guys (one of them exactly at .350). but believe me, I want more players on the Cubs with OBP over 350.

[Mephistopheles]

Yeah well the Cardinals scored four runs a game in the playoffs which would have placed them dead last in the national league, so I don't really see your point.

 

oh and the "they faced better pitching in the playoffs" argument won't cut it, so don't even waste your time making it. It can be slammed down rather easily.

 

No, my definition wasn't 5 obp > .350 = playoff caliber offense. I just said it's what most have. In fact you really do need three or so guys who have obp over .375 with 1 guy in the .400 range and a couple other guys in the .350 range AND power.

 

It wasnt just over .350, some of them need to be well over .350. Let's look at the top four offenses in the national league (which represent the top quarter of the league and the number of playoff teams)

 

The Phillies got 2 positions with obp over 400, Howard and Abreu + Dellucci. They had two other guys with OBP in the .380 range Utley and Burrell and they had Bell and Rollins placing average obps.

 

The Braves had one guy over 400 in Chipper Jones. They had a one guy over .380 in McCann and they had four guys in the .350-.360 range and another guy over .340.

 

The Mets had one guy in the 380 range in Beltran. They had four more guys in the .350-.370 range and they got a .490 slugging out of their 2b with a slightly below average obp at .330.

 

The Dodgers didnt have a lot of power, but they had a team obp of .348, a figure the Cubs have three guys tops who will break next season. They had 2 guys in the .390 range and six or so guys in the .360-.370 range.

 

Right now the Cubs have 1 guy at .380 in Derrek Lee. They have 1 guy in the .360 range in Matt Murton and 1 guy in the .350 range in Aramis Ramirez and one guy in the .340 range in Michael Barrett - who only plays two out of three games.

 

The rest of their positions are held down by

a .300 obp ss

a .320 obp rf

a .320 obp cf

a .330 obp 2b

 

Finally Mark DeRosa has never and will never hit 15 homers. Michael Barrett has never and will never play enough to have 20 homers.

[jjgman21]

Yeah well the Cardinals scored four runs a game in the playoffs which would have placed them dead last in the national league, so I don't really see your point.

 

oh and the "they faced better pitching in the playoffs" argument won't cut it, so don't even waste your time making it. It can be slammed down rather easily.

 

No, my definition wasn't 5 obp > .350 = playoff caliber offense. I just said it's what most have. In fact you really do need three or so guys who have obp over .375 with 1 guy in the .400 range and a couple other guys in the .350 range AND power.

 

 

I'm going to stop reading right there. what you said was

 

If you want a playoff caliber offense you're going to need five or so - or a lot of power to back it up

 

as for the part preceeding that, you made no mention of a World Series caliber offense before, but now you want to make that the point.

 

I'm not going to play this game with you. either you have a point you're going to stand behind or you're going to change your point when it's refuted. the first choice I will happily discuss with you. the second I will not.

[OleMissCub]

I like being in the dugout when jjman21 fights someone!