Andre Ethier

[rawaction]

I like Ethier. He's not a special type player, but he is a guaranteed .800-.850 OPS. He's young, he's cheap and he has a good approach. I think he would be a perfect platoon partner for a player like Murton in RF, as they are quite similar. Probably not gonna have much more power than he's shown so far, but I always feel there's a chance for a LH in Wrigley to see increased power production.

[UK1679666180]

Was noted that Ethier is LH Murton. Is he really as lousy and Pierre-armed defensively in RF as Murton? I don't know much about Ethier's D.

 

But it would be fun to have a 9-inning guy in RF, rather than somebody who you want to take out for a no-hit defensive replacement every time you're winning in the late innings, as with Murton.

 

If Ethier is perfectly satisfactory defensively, I agree that he'd be a very nice fallback option. Young guy who, especially if partnered with Murton, could give you solid low .800's OPS for low pay, and leave the money for elsewhere.

 

It's hopeful that next year, we might have some meaningful new costs. Like, if Wood pitches well his salary could jump. If Prior was to be back and look good 2nd half, he too could be a major expense to retain should we desire. And unpopular as board may consider it, it's even possible that Dempster will turn out to be an effective rotation guy and be an expense next year.

 

I really don't have a sense for Ethier's value in the trade world, or exactly what LA will end up needing. Hill is too much, but if Marshall is too little, what about Marshall/Wuertz? Still too little for them? Way too much for us?

 

He's better defensively than Murton, prob. projects as avg. arm strength and accuracy. While he has prob. slightly below avg. range in the OF like Murton.

[craig]

He's better defensively than Murton, prob. projects as avg. arm strength and accuracy. While he has prob. slightly below avg. range in the OF like Murton.

 

thanks, ping. Sounds more adequate than Murton. But average arm and sub-average range sounds like below-average overall. That's too bad. I admit my perceptin has Murton's range as more than slightly below average, so I've tended to view him as a double liability, both the noodle-arm and the range issues.

 

I'm probably slightly overreacting to recent Cub history. But I really would like to assemble a team where all of the starters could qualify as 9-inning players.

 

Last year for a while we'd have Fontenot as a 7-inning 2B who you'd replace ASAP, and Floyd/Murton as 7-inning RFers. That strains the bench, and I think also contributes to a GM/manager building their bench with hitting sacrificed to defense, since late-inning defense is one of the primary responsibilities. If you then do have an injury so that the bench guy is starting, defense-over-offense bench guys hurt the lineup more severely than might be necessary if you hadn't chosen those players with late-inning defense in mind. I'd kind of like to have a bench where you could fit a number of bat-first guys, like Ward and Murton and what I'd hoped Floyd would be if Murton and Jones had hit well from the start.

 

I admit I also kind of like the idea of having every-day players as well as 9-inning players. From that standpoint, Ethier looks fairly interesting. Murton career has a .138-point split, whereas Ethier's is only 0.067. So it would seem that Ethier is not like Pie or Jones, guys who really fall off the table versus LHP. He could play every day, or at last stay in against LHP fairly often without it being a big problem. But if you did platoon, Ethier at .836 career vs RHP with Murton at .901 career vs LHP, that could be a pretty solid combo.

 

I like the idea of getting Fukudome. But if Ethier/Murton could be basically an .850-OPS platoon pair, I'd have to guess that Fukudome will OPS under rather than over .850.

[BigbadB]

I'm probably slightly overreacting to recent Cub history. But I really would like to assemble a team where all of the starters could qualify as 9-inning players.

 

I agree with this, but the huge contracts to Zambrano, Soriano, Ramirez and Lee make it extremely difficult to acquire the guys you are looking for, especially since the organization has failed to develop guys who can qualify to be quality 9 inning players.

[UK1679666180]

He's better defensively than Murton, prob. projects as avg. arm strength and accuracy. While he has prob. slightly below avg. range in the OF like Murton.

 

thanks, ping. Sounds more adequate than Murton. But average arm and sub-average range sounds like below-average overall. That's too bad. I admit my perceptin has Murton's range as more than slightly below average, so I've tended to view him as a double liability, both the noodle-arm and the range issues.

 

I'm probably slightly overreacting to recent Cub history. But I really would like to assemble a team where all of the starters could qualify as 9-inning players.

 

Last year for a while we'd have Fontenot as a 7-inning 2B who you'd replace ASAP, and Floyd/Murton as 7-inning RFers. That strains the bench, and I think also contributes to a GM/manager building their bench with hitting sacrificed to defense, since late-inning defense is one of the primary responsibilities. If you then do have an injury so that the bench guy is starting, defense-over-offense bench guys hurt the lineup more severely than might be necessary if you hadn't chosen those players with late-inning defense in mind. I'd kind of like to have a bench where you could fit a number of bat-first guys, like Ward and Murton and what I'd hoped Floyd would be if Murton and Jones had hit well from the start.

 

I admit I also kind of like the idea of having every-day players as well as 9-inning players. From that standpoint, Ethier looks fairly interesting. Murton career has a .138-point split, whereas Ethier's is only 0.067. So it would seem that Ethier is not like Pie or Jones, guys who really fall off the table versus LHP. He could play every day, or at last stay in against LHP fairly often without it being a big problem. But if you did platoon, Ethier at .836 career vs RHP with Murton at .901 career vs LHP, that could be a pretty solid combo.

 

I like the idea of getting Fukudome. But if Ethier/Murton could be basically an .850-OPS platoon pair, I'd have to guess that Fukudome will OPS under rather than over .850.

 

If the Cubs keep Pie in CF, between him and Ethier, there's enough range there not to require Pagan/Fuld as a late defensive replacement.

[craig]

If the Cubs keep Pie in CF, between him and Ethier, there's enough range there not to require Pagan/Fuld as a late defensive replacement.

 

Pretty certain that if Murton starts in right, managers will certainly use defensive replacement for Matt whether Pie is in center or not. If Ethier is enough superior to Murton to obviate that practice is encouraging.

[UK1679666180]

Agreed especially with the Cubs being a RH'ed dominated line-up and with that, the improved defense over Murton as well as a likely L/R switch most managers would make that move, I assume Ethier would make the decision less as obvious.

[javy knows my name]

If the Cubs keep Pie in CF, between him and Ethier, there's enough range there not to require Pagan/Fuld as a late defensive replacement.

 

Pretty certain that if Murton starts in right, managers will certainly use defensive replacement for Matt whether Pie is in center or not. If Ethier is enough superior to Murton to obviate that practice is encouraging.

What?