Transmogrified Tiger

Any news on Thomas?

Jacque Jones posted an .886 OPS v. RHP in 2006 and has a career .825 OPS v. RHP. That's a considerable asset if it's coming from your centerfielder. Indeed, only 3 qualifying MLB center-fielders have an OPS over .886 (Pence, Hunter, and Granderson) and only four more are between .825 and .886 (Rowand, Ichiro, Sizemore, and Suzuki). Twenty MLB center-fielders are below .825, including Beltran, Lofton, Mathews, Jr., Hall, Dejesus, Vernon Wells, Cameron, Church, Winn, Crisp, Andruw Jones, Chris Young, and Damon. Jones obviously has had a terrible year to date. And he's not a reasonable option in a corner spot. But to describe Jones as "abysmal" when he's being contemplated as this team's CF is simply wrong. Obviously, he should never ever start against LHP, but he's more than a credible option in CF against RHP. Jones is just broken at the plate right now. It's not as if he only had a .750 OPS against RHP in the first half, and is a good bet to turn it around. He's got a .635 OPS in nearly 200 PA's against them this year, and they're going in the wrong direction(OPS v. RHP by month: .662 in 79 April PA's, .630 in 65 May PA's, and .523 in 50 June PA's). Add in the fact that Pie is pretty capable against RHP too(.723 OPS despite his struggles, plus the minor league success previously posted) and a significantly better defender and baserunner, and it makes it an easier decision. What it boils down to is why gamble on Jones turning it around when you can make a similar(better?) gamble with Pie and enjoy the other benefits that choosing him provides(defense/baserunning, grooming future performance, having Soriano's buddy to thumb wrestle with, etc.)?

If Pie is not going to get a shot now, when we have players who can't hit or defend CF like Pagan and Jones as the only alternatives, when is he going to get a chance? If you want to platoon him with Pagan for a while to hedge your bets and stay in contention, that's okay. But playing Pagan or the abysmal Jones in CF against RHP is inexcusable when Pie is in the system, never mind already on the 25 man roster. You can't always have your cake and eat it too. Sometimes(most times) players struggle for a while breaking into the big leagues. Considering Pie's potential, current production(defense included), and (lack of) alternatives to him playing CF, he needs to be playing.

My goodness, Cedeno is making a mockery of AAA. Send Izturis to Baltimore and get him up here already.

Pagan looks really great for getting picked off now.

I thought that they ruled that Logan did offer on that bunt attempt?

Because? He's better at baseball.

Yes and no. Both Wuertz and Marmol struggle some with lefties, so there's some validity of needing more than one lefty in the pen. I don't think Wuertz or Marmol struggle enough against lefties to warrant another LHP in the pen. Wuertz has walked more of them this year, but his OPS against is nearly the same between the two sides of the plate, and he was significantly better against lefties last year(and he did well against them in AAA). Marmol is a little harder to get a read on considering he hasn't been a reliever that long, but my guess is considering his repertoire(similar to Wuertz's) that he won't have a super drastic split.

Anyone have any insight to what the contract negotiations are like between Posada and the Yankees? He's making 12 million this year, and will receive a 4 million buyout after the season(the buyout is from this year's team option so there's no guaranteed '08 money) and become a Free Agent.

Over who?

ocho cinco - Burnt QB Ben Roethlisberger Seneca Wallace RB Larry Johnson Edgerrin James Tatum Bell Mike Bell Fred Taylor WR Steve Smith Muhsin Muhammad Darrell Jackson TE Tony Gonzalez Owen Daniels K Josh Brown Neil Rackers DEF Atlanta And that should do it.

4th and Goal - ChiCubsFan QB Eli Manning Rex Grossman RB Shaun Alexander Rudi Johnson Ladell Betts DeAngelo Williams Jamal Lewis WR Roy Williams Chris Chambers Devery Henderson Javon Walker TE Randy McMichael K John Carney DEF Baltimore Carolina

Da Bars - UberGoober QB Matt Hasselbeck Steve McNair RB Brian Westbrook Cedric Houston Lamont Jordan Chester Taylor WR Randy Moss Keyshawn Johnson Mike Furrey Tim Carter Greg Jennings TE Heath Miller L.J. Smith K Robbie Gould DEF Pittsburgh

Ditka's Army - Tobias QB Marc Bulger Brett Favre RB Willis McGahee DeShaun Foster Wali Lundy WR Hines Ward Joe Horn Terry Glenn Jerricho Cotchery Donald Driver Mark Bradley TE Todd Heap K David Akers Jason Elam DEF Seattle

Well, some of you schmucks never got around to getting these, so I'll do the rest of them, starting with Raw's full roster. Raw Dawgs - Rawaction QB Carson Palmer Jon Kitna RB Clinton Portis Reggie Bush Ronnie Brown Frank Gore Travis Henry WR Reggie Wayne Reche Caldwell Reggie Brown Bernard Berrian TE Desmond Clark K Ryan Longwell DEF San Diego New England

The way those two guys have been lately, the Brewers could get through this injury without a blink. Nah, Mench is a disaster against RHP. This would definitely be good news for us.

Very good. Fontenot's not all that fast either.

Unless we're going big for an upgrade at SS(A-Rod, Tejada before he was hurt) or C(Saltalamacchia/McCann), I think we're much better served to give an extended look to Cedeno and Soto respectively.

He did have something like 4 hits in the first 2 games of the series.

What'd they say? They are saying he must have injured himself on that earlier slow roller play when he threw out the runner. Someone should get them an injury report. I think they're at least partially right. I've seen Ramirez run full bore to beat out a double play ball since he's come back from injury, he didn't look as comfortable running the bases there as he has looked in previous games since coming off the DL.

Graceful stuff from Flody.

Brenly brought that up the other day, IIRC he quoted Lou who said they looked at the tape and couldn't find anything that would indicate Hill was tipping his pitches.

Pie must've blown his hand off with a firework last night or something.

If you want a fresh arm to take to the break, fine. Just stop treating Gallagher like some AAAA journeyman. When you move him, move him to stay.

This jerking around of Pie is starting to irritate me. It's one thing when you have a conglomerate of low ceiling guys that don't have development to stunt and you can "play the hot hand", like the middle infield with Izturis, Theriot, Fontenot, DeRosa. Even if you want to protect Pie by platooning him for a while, I can deal with that. But refusing to play him to "protect his confidence" or to try to squeeze production out of mediocre players like Pagan is simply not worth stunting Pie's development, even more so when you consider that Pie is vastly superior defensively and on the basepaths.