Rob

Ummm... That would make the Rays 1.5 "back" of the Royals, not 2.5. Easier way to look at it is winning%. Royals - .384 Rays - .393 Cubs - .397 Pirates - .408 Nationals - .432 Orioles - .434 The Nats and Orioles are probably only pretenders to the crown... I mean, it was even a surprise to see the Orioles had done that badly. Obviously, they have no place in the competition... and their proximity to the Nats eliminates them as well.

Agreed. Also, for the past 2 years his avg has been about .260(.385 obp in 2005 and 356 obp this year) and def a little shy from .270 which pecota projects. IMO, Edmonds shouldn't even be an option. He is the epitome of anti-Cub. i don't understand what "anti-cub"means. and i also don't understand how he won't be much better than pierre. It's exactly the same thing as when Damon was an "anti-yankee"

For the most part, the Greer comparison isn't bad. I do think Murton has more natural power than Greer though, even if his approach doesn't use it. I could easily see one of those fluke seasons where Murton keeps getting pitches up in the zone and hanging curve balls that he just can't help but smash... Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised to see a 30 HR season out of him sometime around age 28. But I wouldn't expect more than about 18-20 out of him in any other seasons.

You really believe that? His slugging alone makes him worth more than Pierre, and he isn't going to forget how to take a walk. Did you not notice the first part? If he continues on this decline, his numbers will look like Pierre's. I don't know if they will continue on that path. My guess is it won't be that drastic. But it's been that drastic for 2 years, and he's an old man with a thousand past injuries. goony hates older players. but that's okay, his pecota predictions, iirc, are pretty decent, plus his injuries haven't limited him as much as many would have you believe. if he's been injured, he seems to have played through it pretty well. PECOTA's 2007 .270/.396/.564 in 515 PA

I pray you aren't being serious... but somehow, I know you are... :evil:

Bruce, is the organization realizing that Izturis isn't a top-of-the-order threat, or are they just giving him a few games to get back from the injury before they move him back up to the two-hole?

Ok then, here's a valid question. If Fox isn't a top catching prospect, who do you feel is better? No offense, but I don't trust Baseball America to make all my decisions for me.

Ideally? The trib okays a payroll boost to $130M and... - Prior is healthy and in 2003 form. - Zambrano fixes his wildness and becomes a true ace - We outbid everyone for Daisuke and he's all that - We outbid everyone for Zito and he makes NL hitters look really silly - We sign Schmidt just for the heck of it to fill out the starting five - We keep Hill ready to go in case of injury or just to give the starting five an occasional game off. - We trade for a strong OBP/Power OF who can play CF or RF (moving Jones to center) - We sign Soriano for second base We celebrate our world series victory. Hey, this is ideally, right? :D Touché

Ideally... Zambrano Schmidt Hill Guzman Prior/Marshall/Marmol/Mateo/Gallagher/Veal I'd really be surprised if Guzman can't be at least an league-average innings eater kind of guy next year, if we'd just stop yanking him between the rotation, the bullpen, and the minors. I don't get why everybody is so down on him...

Fixed

me too He's actually helping my fantasy team. My opponent this week has both Hafner and Wilkerson on her team, and she still has both of them in her active lineup even though they're both out for the year. Too bad this matchup is only for 5th & 6th place. I'd made a Hafner for Liriano trade about a week before Liriano went down... I thought I'd gotten the best of the trade for my postseason run. Instead, I'm plugging waiver wire vets into the most important offensive position and my friend is getting Liriano back for the second week of the playoffs.

Was your book written by a children's author? My book was written with baseball knowledge. I dont like how stat geeks think they know what they are talking about. All they go by is stats, they dont see the things that happen that dont get recorded in a baseball stat book. For example: a runner at 2b with no outs, the hitter hits the ball to the to the right side of the infield. That is considered a great AB by a person who knowledges the game more than a stat geek. Stat geeks would classify that AB has a worthless AB. To be fair to the man, his more inflamatory comments may have been caused by a wicked potshot I delivered. I would like to apologize for that comment. I simply became rather aggrivated after making a few well thought out and articulated arguments, and saw you coming back with nothing but more rhetoric and anecdotal evidence. For what it's worth, I do see where all of your arguments come from. I had been indoctrinated with the same things throughout all my years of playing ball (a career cut tragically short by varsity football blowing my knee out on three separate occassions, causing me to miss baseball season rehabbing even though I was penciled in every season as the #3 or 4 hitter in the lineup, playing first or third base on a team that had a bunch of people go on to play college ball) I don't see the use of statistics as a substitute for good old baseball knowledge. It's simply another avenue of perception. Akin to the political world... watching only Fox News or only CNN isn't going to show you the truth. It's only going to cloud your vision with propoganda. The truth is in there somewhere... a happy medium.

I would hope not. That's about the best way to make a guy pitch like crap. No, the best way is to leave a rookie out there to throw 120 high-leverage pitches. That next start is always brutal...

Cabrera and his .966 Fielding % (hey, if you can use it I can.) versus Nomar and his .957? That's a margin of less than one error. And you've already established that the scorekeepers can be vindictive (which is half the reason Nomar was traded). For all intents and purposes, Cabrera didn't do any better than Nomar that year... and they were both below the league average fielding percentage. I thought judging someone on their defensive% was a horrible way to judge a player? :D It's not. But with your baseball experience, I'm sure you realize it's somewhat more applicable for shortstops than catchers. The SS position is the most demanding positions on the field. I was just joking with the guy anyways. I like to judge a player by his defensive %, but some dont. Then what is your justification for saying that Cabrera was that much better than Nomar that Boston wouldn't have won the title with him at SS. I dont have the stats In front of me, but I remember reading something about Cabrera committing very few errors(4 I believe)when he was traded to the Red Sox. Mientkiewicz also contributed to helping out the infield defense. Cabrera had eight errors in fifty seven games at short. Pokey Reese had six in seventy one games. Now this is an honest question I can't remember the answer to, what happened to Pokey that year? Did he get injured or something?

Cabrera and his .966 Fielding % (hey, if you can use it I can.) versus Nomar and his .957? That's a margin of less than one error. And you've already established that the scorekeepers can be vindictive (which is half the reason Nomar was traded). For all intents and purposes, Cabrera didn't do any better than Nomar that year... and they were both below the league average fielding percentage. I thought judging someone on their defensive% was a horrible way to judge a player? :D Forgive me. I'm trying to bring this information down to a level you've shown aptitude for understanding. Believe me, it's applicable at the higher levels of statistics in this case as well.

Cabrera and his .966 Fielding % (hey, if you can use it I can.) versus Nomar and his .957? That's a margin of less than one error. And you've already established that the scorekeepers can be vindictive (which is half the reason Nomar was traded). For all intents and purposes, Cabrera didn't do any better than Nomar that year... and they were both below the league average fielding percentage.

Ok, tell ya what. We'll give you that passed ball back. We'll give you half of all his passed balls the last 3 years back. He is still no longer an defensive asset anymore.

And I haven't? :roll: If that were the case you wouldn't embarass yourself with the following items: Only in certain (and rare) situations is sacrificing an out for advancing the runner going to contribute positively to win expectancy. Almost all of the cases are late in the game with a run differential of one or zero, no outs, and runners already in scoring position. Well it certainly isn't good. But does having one crappy defensive player exclude teams from postseason glory? Absolutely not. The Red Sox made it as far as they did in 04 due to Manny and Ortiz, not despite them. Only if you can make it to the postseason. There's such a turnover in pitching in-season due to injuries league-wide, that it's near impossible to keep a pitching staff intact and healthy for an entire 162 game schedule. The rate of pitching injuries trumps that of injuries for position players. A good offensive squad with pitching that fluctuates from average when healthy to bad when injuries strike is much more likely to make it to the postseason than a team with bad offense, but pitching that fluctuates from good when healthy to average when bad. It's simple. Just look at the permutations. Team A can have the following situations occur: Good Offense - Average Pitching Good Offense - Bad Pitching Team B can have these: Bad Offense - Good Pitching Bad Offense - Average Pitching With the offense being better, the team has the stability necessary to make it to the postseason more often. Just look to the pitching rich and injury riddled Cubs if you wish to make the situation hit closer to home. That's the one smart thing you've said so far.

That is because he packed on a couple of pounds since then. Bengie had a 3.55 CERA last year. 3rd best in all of baseball. Barrett had a 4.45 CERA last year. Isn't a 32yo. C that has been gaining too much weight for his own good a red flag? He isn't quick behind the plate and has been terrible at throwing out runners. He has thrown out 17.5% of the runners. Molina has a 4.55 CERA this year. Barrett is at 4.57. Although, I really don't like that stat. One thing that coaches would tell that they dont like about Molina is the number of pass balls he allows. Im not sure what his numbers are this year in that category, but last year he allowed 10 with the Angels. That can be contributed to the number of pitchers like K-Rod who throw alot of balls in the dirt. Whoa! Hold the train! Passed Balls are only committed when the ball doesn't hit the dirt before it gets to the catcher. Otherwise it's a Wild Pitch. Watch the games and you might know that.

I'd bet good money I've watched more baseball games than you. I caught every single Cubs game that was on WGN, CSN, ESPN, or Fox in 04 and 05, and whatever games I could find on MLBTV. Granted, I've slipped back to slightly in excess of a hundred games so far this year... but I don't doubt that beats you handily irregardless. Do you know what the difference between a .275 and a .300 hitter is? It's one hit every other week. There's a decent difference in the value of these two players, and I'd bet dollars to dimes you couldn't pick the one hitting better more than 50% of the time if you simply watched all the games and never looked at the statistics. The human brain just isn't set to function like you imply it is. You remember the big things, the important moments. You don't remember the guy hitting .300 getting the single in the top of the 4th with nobody on and two out. You remember the guy hitting .275 getting the single with the bases loaded in the 9th, two outs, and down by one. The fact of the matter is that 162 games is far too long for your mind to develop an accurate mental account of it all... especially what you saw back in the second week of May. Statistics aren't a substitute for the game. They're simply the only way to get an accurate portrait of what has happened...the stuff that your mind no longer can be counted on for. Now if you can't grasp the meaning of certain statistics... if you're scared of all the complex math that goes into them... don't use them. But certainly don't automatically assume that people that are fully capable of using them have only seen baseball inside a laboratory setting. I watch baseball. I know it damn well. But just because you don't know what we're talking about, suddenly I'm a stats geek who never watches the games? Puhleaze. Oh, and interestingly enough... That hypothetical situation you alluded to earlier? It's often measured using Run Expectancy or Win Expectancy... both of which I look at in determining the value of a player. Just because Darin Erstad does those things doesn't make him a viable option at first base, though. Even after those adjustments, he's one of the worst first basemen in the league.

No they are not. Let me guess, you're going to be using VORP and that other garbage to judge Molina? Stats dont tell you everything. Playing and watching are 2 different things. I hate it when people just use some meaningless stats like VORP to judge a player. Average, Hr, RBI's, OBP, and fielding% are a good way to judge a player in my book. Was your book written by a children's author?

Reputations are worth nothing. Give me proof he's even a shadow of his former self behind the plate or I'll continue to believe he's worthless. And I don't even know where to begin with the 162 game averages you've given. Maybe if we were looking for career value it'd be a worthwhile exercise, but career numbers have very little to do with predicting success the next year. Three year splits, on the other hand... are much more valuable for this exercise. Their three year splits are as follows... from 2004 to so far through 2006 .285/.322/.433 .289/.351/.494 That's a pretty huge difference. And it even includes Molina's career year too, so saying it's skewed because of Barrett this year isn't an applicable argument. Trying to put Molina and Barrett on equal offensive grounds is a ridiculous attempt. I've made no such attempt to put them on equal defensive grounds, even though the gap is much smaller in that regard (a mere 9 runs this year on defense, as opposed to the 20 run difference on offense)

When was that made? He was batting .325/.396/.578 with 5 HRs already by the end of April.

You're right. I forgot to check his contract status... it's a 7.5 million dollar option that'll be declined. He'll probably make about 5. Either way, it's not an insignificant amount. In 2002 and 2003 Bengie may have deserved a gold glove. I've got him coming in at 12 runs over average each year. 2004 he comes in at three below. Yeah, that looks like it might be a statistical anomaly... a sample size issue or something. He had done well in the prior seasons. 2005 he comes in at four below. It certainly decreases the odds that both years are anomalous. 2006 as we've established puts him at eight below average. The pattern has been irrefutably established. He is no longer an above average defensive catcher... and he's getting worse at an alarming rate. And those offensive numbers you posted are thoroughly unimpressive. The only reason he's amassed 15 HR and 46 RBI is that he's been trotted out there for 384 at bats. If Henry Blanco had the same number of at bats this year, he'd have 12 HR and 62 RBI. Playing time isn't the same thing as production... and his .315 OBP is not acceptible production... at least not on an offensive squad as weak as the Cubs already are. Maybe the Red Sox could hide a guy like him in the lineup... but the Cubs can't afford the downgrade. The only argument you've made that I can't refute with numbers is his ability to call a game. And you've got nothing to back up that claim either.

The word that I've heard is that Toronto is going to up their payroll in 2007. $100 million is the current rumour. And don't get me wrong, I love Wells... but he's not worth Barrett. Especially considering the fact we could probably get him for Izturis, Pie, and a live arm. Why give up one of the top players at his position for Wells when you can divest yourself of Izturis for the mere cost of an exceptionally talented, but far from sure thing prospect? I don't see Toronto wanting Izturis back. I think it would take 2 very good pitching prospects and Pie. Have you looked at their middle infield situation? The Cubs have a bad middle infield, but Toronto's puts it to shame.