Mephistopheles

ryan theriot isnt a better leadoff hitter than alfonso soriano. let's not pretend that he is.

Why, because it points out one of your corner outfielders is as about as prductive as Neifi Perez with about 1/3 of the ABs. It certainly ruffles the feathers around here to point out the flaws of the boards favorite son. good job missing the point.. anyways. 1. Open your eyes, I criticize Matt Murton and am doing so in a thread right now. 2. Sample Size. I hope I dont have to explain this to you. It isnt rocket science. No one's saying Murton has been productive, but then again Matt Murton hasnt played like he's capable of. Using Neifi is just [expletive]. It downright insults your intelligence.

im trying to understand the logic used in this thread, but i cant. comparing neifi to murton is dumb

Fine, he's no saint. Neither am I. Even if you accept him as having 30-35 HR power he's still inferior to Wieters in every possible way.

youre right, hes missed out on a lot of guys. you take your blind faith. ill be critical.

Care to explain why? because theriot, murton and derosa arent nearly as good as soriano

Now, but you're comparing a 6'1 25-26 year old MLB hitter to a 6'4 and 3/4ths (read that Vitters is up there now) 17 year old who is still growing into his body. I don't know for sure, but I can say pretty confidently Murton didn't show Vitters power potential at 17. Im not comparing Murton at 17 to Vitters at 17. Im comparing what others are projecting Vitters as, and it's not all that different from Murton, maybe a little better but I don't like the idea that I can make a valid comparison to Matt Murton with a guy we're supposedly looking at with the third pick in the draft.

Unfortunately, just because you say something it doesn't make it true. Even your God (BA and Callis) thinks he'll never develop 30 home run power. I'm saying BA improperly ranks tools on how important they are. This isn't exactly a radical idea. BA has always loved the speed tool and "pure hitter" which is just translated as "decent BA but not great power but we love his swing which doesnt mean jack but we love it so we need to compliment it"

sure they are. good batting average hitters with not so special power for their positions. its a great comparison, production wise.

unfortunately your idea isnt rational.

possibly. i havent seen tape or anything on him since aflac, where he didnt exactly impress.

Yes Blake. My only concern with him is his health, he's got an unorthodox delivery. He's probably the second best HS pitcher I've ever seen. That list includes Troy Patton, Homer Bailey, Kyle Drabek, James Loney and Joe Savery. The only guy better would have to be Scott Kazmir, although I wasn't able to make it up to Dallas last year to see Kershaw. Drabek might be better. To me, Beaven is a carbon copy of Jake Peavy. Their motion is the same. He's got a running low 90s two seam fastball with projectability and a plus slider, that at least in the Aflac game was the best breaking pitch I saw. He struggled some with it in the game I saw. He also hides the ball well with his delivery which ought to give him a great chance to develop a good changeup like Peavy giving him three solid to plus pitches with good command. The other top HS pitchers throw a tick harder, but, at least what I have seen, have near the movement he does. Moustakas wouldn't be terrible, but I don't understand why either of them should be taken over Wieters. If Wieters doesn't stick behind the plate, he's certainly capable of playing LF, RF, 1B or 3B. Vitters doesn't appear to have the arm to play right well. Wieters appears to have more power and a very disciplined approach at the plate. If he doesn't stick at home, his bat is good enough to play in RF. Wieters would probably play 3B well with his arm, quick feet and pretty good agility for a big guy. I don't understand why people think Vitters is a better move. Wieters has more power and at worst a similar approach and much better defensive tools. Vitters over him would be a mistake.

Alfonso Soriano's lack of walks has not made him a bad leadoff hitter yet or ever. Despite not walking he does make up for some of it with his power. Also, this year despite not walking his OBP is .359 and that's top ten in baseball among leadoff hitters. His OPS is 6th and will be top two or three when the season is over. The fact that he's aggressive doesn't mean he's a bad leadoff hitter. It's a shortcoming of his and it's something he makes up with power. There's a tradeoff. You can have a lackluster OBP if you're slugging 550 and you can have a lackluster walk rate if you're hitting .310.

and anyone on the vittersbandwgn must love matt murton too much. Vitters potential is Murton's bat. It's not elite production at his position. You HAVE to take a guy with elite production potential with the third pick in the draft. btw bandWGN is the most incredibly gay thing in the history of humanity.

meh at vitters. pure hitter = jeff cirillo. i want blake

Vanderbilt IP H R ER BB SO AB BF NP -------------------------------------------------- David Price......... 8.0 7 5 4 2 6 30 33 103

both could be but its unlikely that an injury would only result in struggles against lefties while improving dominance against righties.

True, but there was weakness in Z's peripherals last season to suggestion he wasn't right. I think he's injured. There's also this: I Split G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR BB IBB SO HBP SH SF ROE GDP SB CS Pk BA OBP SLG OPS BAbip sOPS+ tOPS+ Split +-+------------+---+----+----+---+---+--+--+--+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+------------+ 2003 vs RHB as RH 32 554 480 48 113 24 0 4 54 5 94 8 7 5 3 17 1 2 1 .235 .320 .310 .630 .282 77 92 vs RHB as RH vs LHB as RH 32 353 306 32 75 19 1 5 40 7 74 2 4 1 5 7 2 3 1 .245 .335 .363 .698 .307 80 112 vs LHB as RH 2004 vs RHB as RH 31 461 403 39 88 16 4 7 38 2 106 11 8 1 6 12 2 1 0 .218 .302 .330 .632 .278 74 94 vs RHB as RH vs LHB as RH 31 426 370 32 86 17 2 7 43 2 82 9 2 2 2 5 5 3 1 .232 .325 .346 .671 .279 72 106 vs LHB as RH 2005 vs RHB as RH 33 491 443 41 94 22 1 7 35 0 127 5 6 2 3 8 1 3 2 .212 .276 .314 .590 .280 64 87 vs RHB as RH vs LHB as RH 33 418 358 44 76 14 0 14 51 3 75 3 3 3 6 10 0 6 2 .212 .313 .369 .682 .228 77 116 vs LHB as RH 2006 vs RHB as RH 33 463 409 51 71 19 1 10 40 2 131 6 5 3 4 9 1 2 2 .174 .255 .298 .553 .225 50 66 vs RHB as RH vs LHB as RH 33 454 369 38 91 22 4 10 75 2 79 3 6 1 7 9 1 1 0 .247 .377 .409 .786 .288 98 136 vs LHB as RH 2007 vs RHB as RH 8 105 87 16 17 2 0 6 12 0 20 3 1 2 1 1 0 0 1 .195 .308 .425 .733 .175 108 65 vs RHB as RH vs LHB as RH 8 106 93 14 33 9 1 4 12 1 15 1 0 0 0 4 0 0 1 .355 .434 .602 1.036 .392 173 133 vs LHB as RH Now the ratios don't look like an injury's hurting him. It looks like there's been a change of philosophy that has hurt his ability to keep a decent K:BB against lefties.

Yes. Anyone who says no is wrong. Five weeks doesn't erase five seasons.

i dont think that is it. Hes never had the problem before. I Split G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR BB IBB SO HBP SH SF ROE GDP SB CS Pk BA OBP SLG OPS BAbip tOPS+ Split +-+------------+----+-----+-----+----+----+---+---+---+----+---+----+---+---+---+---+---+----+---+---+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+------------+ 1st inning 155 665 563 72 117 26 3 13 87 2 154 7 4 4 8 7 4 9 4 .208 .319 .334 .653 .260 95 1st inning 2nd inning 155 640 561 69 122 23 1 18 64 1 143 9 5 1 6 17 2 3 1 .217 .307 .358 .665 .259 98 2nd inning 3rd inning 152 632 541 60 114 21 2 11 70 2 126 9 10 2 9 13 2 4 4 .211 .310 .318 .628 .254 87 3rd inning 4th inning 150 628 544 58 126 20 3 13 63 6 136 8 8 5 5 14 5 2 1 .232 .318 .351 .669 .283 99 4th inning 5th inning 150 640 542 70 141 36 3 9 74 6 141 9 12 3 5 11 2 4 1 .260 .357 .387 .744 .334 122 5th inning 6th inning 137 558 485 54 117 28 3 11 61 8 98 4 3 5 6 14 4 3 0 .241 .328 .379 .707 .278 110 6th inning 7th inning 102 358 312 19 61 15 2 6 32 1 79 5 8 1 2 10 2 1 0 .196 .280 .314 .594 .241 77 7th inning 8th inning 49 184 162 16 41 10 0 4 16 0 18 4 1 1 1 5 0 0 0 .253 .333 .389 .722 .262 115 8th inning 9th inning 12 43 37 2 9 2 0 0 4 0 5 1 1 0 1 2 0 0 0 .243 .333 .297 .630 .281 88 9th inning Ext inning 1 2 2 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .500 .500 .500 1.000 .500 198 Ext inning Innings 1-3 156 1937 1665 201 353 70 6 42 221 5 423 25 19 7 23 37 8 16 9 .212 .312 .337 .649 .258 93 Innings 1-3 Innings 4-6 157 1826 1571 182 384 84 9 33 198 20 375 21 23 13 16 39 11 9 2 .244 .334 .372 .706 .298 110 Innings 4-6 Innings 7-9 109 585 511 37 111 27 2 10 52 1 102 10 10 2 4 17 2 1 0 .217 .301 .337 .638 .252 90 Innings 7-9 Innings 10+ 1 2 2 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .500 .500 .500 1.000 .500 198 Innings 10+

or the sample size, using nl data from 2000 to 2006 http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f189/kctigers23/CollegeStats1-1.gif

oddly enough his struggles seem to be confined to the first inning. if the problems were his arm angle or his arms health I would expect his struggles to be late in starts, not at the beginning. It could just be an anamoly at this time. When a pitchers arm gets tired theyre more likely to get sloppy with their mechanics and their arm angle (lowering it subconsciously as the start drags on). Since Carlos Zambrano is not doing this I do not think it is the arm angle. Same thing for the health, if he had a minor health issue I'd expect it to be more of an issue later in starts. To be honest, I think his struggles are due to two things: 1 lefties, and 2 emotions at the beginning.

yeah im convinced samardzija wont ever be anything as a starter. call it premature if you want. i call it visionary.

If I told you in January that it on May 10th Carlos Zambrano's ERA will be HIGHER than Jason Marquis' ERA + Rich Hill's ERA + Ted Lilly's ERA, what would you say? Z's ERA after the first was 6.26. Adding up the other three gives us 6.21.

Zambrano for Tabata and someone else or Zambrano for Martinez wouldnt be the worst ideas ever made. However, Zambrano to a different team may be the best for him and the Cubs if they trade him.