6-4-2 — an Angels/Dodgers double play blog

The Angels have designated Jeff Weaver for assignment, and have called up Jered Weaver from AAA Salt Lake.

Update: Jered will replace his brother in the rotation. Ouch.

Reports have surfaced ... that the Dodgers -- whom Weaver pitched for last year -- are in need for a pitcher and might be willing to give their former starter another chance.

Mike Waldner in the Daily Breeze has come out in favor of the trade, making the astonishing comment that "Navarro's much-ballyhooed potential was a figment of former GM Paul DePodesta's imagination." Wow, so a guy who was sixth in the league for average among catchers playing 50 or more games is a "figment"?

Buster Olney, predictably, also doesn't get it:

Andrew Friedman wanted Dioner Navarro, and he got him, in a trade with the Dodgers. Got to admit that my gut reaction to this deal is that the Dodgers got an incredible steal -- Navarro already had lost his job as L.A.'s No. 1 catcher, and I think Mark Hendrickson is among the most underrated pitchers in baseball; he's a classic lefty, getting better as he gets older. In a marketplace in which many teams are dying for pitching, I thought the Devil Rays would get more. We'll see if it works out for them.

And then there's this:

... after doing more thinking about Tampa Bay's trade of Mark Hendrickson to the Dodgers this week, I believe the AL-NL disparity is part of the reason why the deal was a head-scratcher for me, from the Rays' point of view. Hendrickson is not a dominant pitcher, he's not going to the Hall of Fame, and he'd never be the staff ace if and when Tampa Bay becomes a more competitive team.

But he's a solid left-hander who is getting better, and he is battle-tested in the AL East, where the lineups are rugged and where there is no room for the faint of heart. Hendrickson went 11-8 with a 5.91 ERA in 2005, and in the great tradition of left-handers, he seems to be getting better with age; this year, he is 4-8, but with a 3.81 ERA, and he has averaged seven innings per start. He threw 15 scoreless innings in April, had a 5.59 ERA in May, and a 3.58 ERA in June.

Okay, so we're supposed to cut Hendrickson some slack — to the point of calling this a steal for the Dodgers. But taking a look at his career splits and erasing his numbers against the Red Sox and Yankees only yields a 4.53 ERA. The guy had to face the Devil Rays as a Blue Jay, and still ended up with a 4.15 career ERA! How does that happen — unless he's a screaming 32-year-old mediocrity?

Update: Christina Kahrl brightens my day:

Ah, it’s always fun when a new GM "does something" to prove that he’s on top of things. There’s something delightfully overstated about the Dodgers’ need to go out and get Hendrickson to "solve" their problems in the rotation. It’s pretty amusing, considering that just about the only way he seems like an asset is if you get really worked up over his great day in PETCO on June 14. Counting that complete game, one-run win, the guy has four quality starts in thirteen this season. Four, as in one fewer than Seo, but in three more starts. Hendrickson’s not young and improving, not at 32, and his brief run at respectability in the last two months has lowered his career ERA to 5.01. Maybe it’s a good thing that he’s wilder this year than in seasons past, but absent a trick pitch, it looks like he’s just been fortunate with his defensive support. That might last in LA, in that the Dodgers boast a better defense than the D-Rays, but he’s always been hittable, and if he’s wild, homer-prone, and hittable, how is this supposed to be an improvement over the likes of Tomko?

...

[T]o give credit where credit is due, Ned Colletti has scraped up Tomko and Aaron Sele, and now traded good stuff for Hendrickson. Shopping for mediocrity takes an eye for a particular kind of talent, and on that score, Colletti certainly seems gifted. To be fair, Odalis Perez seems so broken he can’t get up, and Perez is DePo’s mistake, not Colletti’s. But why not just plug Seo into the rotation? Handing away a catching prospect of Navarro’s measure to acquire a journeyman starter on a really modest streak of adequacy does not seem like the best way to secure a title in LA, and it doesn’t seem like a necessary move. With Navarro and Seo, the club already had insurance behind the plate and a perfectly handy in-house solution to their rotation problems. I suspect that isn’t the consideration in play, though, and if the man they call Ned can’t equal DePo’s first-year feat, how long before new cries for blood paint the pages of Smogtown’s dailies? All the more reason to be seen as doing something, and if Ned cares, how can you hold it against the guy that Hendrickson isn’t really any good? Won’t that be Hendrickson’s fault?

Thanks to Jon for the note that the Padres have hired Paul DePodesta as a special assistant to Sandy Alderson. Good news for the Padres, but given the Dodgers' last couple of trades, this isn't likely to be good news for the Dodgers.

Today's Birthdays

Angels To DFA Jeff Weaver, Other Roster Notes

• The Angels will bring up Jered Weaver from Salt Lake and DFA brother Jeff, according to the Register. The Dodgers might sign him if that happens.
• Mike Scioscia, still not getting it:

  "I think you can absorb a little bit of lack of power, you can absorb a little bit of lack of on-base percentage, as long as you're pushing that on-base percentage into scoring position and you're hitting very well with runners in scoring position," Scioscia said. "Our problem is, we're really, really soft in too many areas."

• Bill Stoneman considers the only untouchable Angels Vlad Guerrero, John Lackey, Scot Shields, and Francisco Rodriguez.
• Garret Anderson hopes to return to the lineup tonight.

Four Angels Games Moved To 830 AM

Owing to a scheduling conflict between KSPN's contract with USC football, four Angels games will be broadcast on 830 AM instead. Arte Moreno and a consortium of others bought the station in February of this year. The team's contract with 710 ends this year, but there have been talks held over an extension.

How The Dodgers Recharged Their Minor Leagues

Here's a good Times story about how the Dodgers turned around their situation from the late 90's under Kevin Malone:

The plan was this: Avoid the high-end free agents when possible, because of their cost not just in big-league payroll, but in compensatory draft picks. When the Dodgers courted Vladimir Guerrero after the 2003 season, for instance, he had not been offered arbitration by the Montreal Expos, and therefore was not subject to those compensation rules.

And this: Just pick the best player. Although the draft swung toward college players, and still leans toward them, the Dodgers have fairly consistently selected high school players. Of their current top 10 prospects, five (Billingsley, Broxton, Scott Elbert, Blake DeWitt, Kemp) were drafted out of high school, two (Andy LaRoche, Martin) out of junior college and three (Guzman, Tony Abreu, Chin-Lung Hu) were foreign-born, undrafted free agents. In the 2006 draft, the Dodgers, in the seventh spot, took the first prep player — left-hander Clayton Kershaw, from Dallas.

Through his research, White came to believe the "Moneyball" system had devalued the high school player, leaving better prep players available later in the draft. Because the Dodgers generally picked middle to late in the first round, he said, "For a good college guy to get to us at 24 or so, somebody's going to have to make a mistake."

White also found that although exceptional high school players — those who become everyday major leaguers and All-Stars — generally take longer to reach the major leagues than college players, the difference was less than he thought: half a year to a year.

News

• Kevin Goldstein ranks the minor league catchers out there now, and likes Jeff Clement best of all of 'em; the name Jeff Mathis never comes up, but at the tenth spot, Hank Conger does, an interesting comment considering Conger has yet to play the position professionally (he's been the AZL Angels' full-time DH).
• Howie Kendrick and Jered Weaver will be on the PCL All-Star squad, assuming they don't both get a callup tomorrow. Joe Saunders also gets a nod in his first AAA appearance. Dodgers prospect James Loney will represent the 51's.
• Following Friday's awful performance by Oliver Perez, the Pirates sent their erstwhile ace down to AAA Indianapolis, and recalled Tom Gorzelanny.
• Update: Thanks to the anonymous dude in the comments for mentioning that Jose Arredondo was promoted to AA Arkansas. The Travs, no doubt, will be grateful for the help, if indeed he proves to be help; recall Rafael Rodriguez's dominance at Rancho, only to be overwhelmed by the Texas League. Chris Hunter moves to the bullpen even though Arredondo's promotion merely completes a depleted roster (increased to 23 with the move). Arredondo will join the team on Sunday.
• Update 2: Thanks again, Anon, for the tip that Nick Adenhart has been promoted to Rancho and will start on Sunday. I'm SO there. (Karl Gelinas was moved to the inactive list to make room.)
• Anthony Ortega was moved up to Cedar Rapids from Orem to take Adenhart's place at Cedar Rapids.

Scores

Attached to my caveat about Nap's numbers (here, for the impatient), spelling aberrations and all:

SO its june 29 now, and naps is still doing fantastic. he is leading the team in OBP, slugging, is in the top 3 for BA and has a good HR count. I played with this guy every season of my life since I was 12, believe me he is the real deal. he is freakishly talented, fearless, and the most humble person i have ever met. God forbid any injury, Mike Napoli is a name you will see in the hall of fame some day. I promis you that.

Today's Birthdays

Roster Notes

• Reports on last night's postgame show indicated the Angels would probably make some roster moves tomorrow without being specific as to what.
• The Register says the Angels might recall the younger Weaver, at the expense of brother Jeff's time in the rotation. Jeff has 10 losses, and the only other pitcher in the majors to have more than nine is Tampa Bay's Seth McClung.
• With the Angels facing a left-hander, Mike Scioscia benched Chone Figgins, who's hitting only .216 from the right side of the plate. Figgins is "not mired in a slump, his .253 batting average in June identical to his average for the season" according to the Times, but compared to last year, it's as big as slumps get.
• The Angels admitted that Garret Anderson won't be right until the offseason; he could go on the DL with ongoing lower back pain.
• Matt Kemp says he's chasing bad pitches and getting himself into outs, regardless of which position he bats from.

New Angels Blog

Man, thick as flies, I tells ya... the Chronicler informs us of new Angels blog Angelsblog.

Cy Younger To Cy Young: Twins 6, Dodgers 3

Bobby Cox, back in the heyday of the 90's Braves rotations that started Maddux-Glavine-Smoltz, got the question which one would start the first game of the postseason, to which he replied (from memory), "whichever one won the Cy Young last year". It isn't that way yet for the Twins, whose awful start and flaky offense has almost certainly doomed them to second-tier status, but so far as the Dodgers are concerned, it doesn't matter. Olmedo Saenz drove in the only runs of the game, a bases-loaded double off starter Johan Santana.

Santana got the win anyway, thanks to plentiful run support off Odalis "Stick A Fork In Me, Grady" Perez. Perez, who hoped to make a good impression, failed to do so, at least with the Dodgers, although I'm quite certain Batgirl was pleased with what she saw. Regardless, Odalis has seen his last start, and he becomes the world's most expensive long reliever. The game was essentially over from the first inning; unable to get the third out, OP gave up a grand slam instead.

But it's hard to fault this team for getting swept; they just ran into a buzzsaw anchored by a pair of the AL's best starters. The good news for the Dodgers: the upcoming series with an even worse Angels club.

ESPN Box • Recap

It's Time To Play For 2007: Rockies 6, Angels 2

The only player doing anything consistently right is Mike Napoli, and as a rookie, his ability to keep going that way is suspect. Vlad finally came out of his slump, but whether he's out of it for more than one game is still an open question. Orlando Cabrera used his magical anti-Kryptonite shield to get on base for the 56th straight time. Juan Rivera managed to drive in a run. But the rest of these chokers kept alive the suckage that has been the 2006 Angels.

That was incredibly capped by Scot Shields' idiotic handwave on a squibber past the mound. Instead of catching the ball — which he could actually have done — he instead deflected it into the hole between third and short, thus ensuring a run would score.

So, screw it. It's time to play for 2007. I keep saying this, and my blood pressure would be better off, if the Angels front office would pay attention to just how badly this team is playing, not just one or two games here and there, but three or four times a week. It's almost as if the old 2002 squad is going through a death spasm, and nobody wants to hear about it.

Fine. Maybe you can ignore the seven warning signs of cancer, Bill Stoneman, but the rest of us have to watch this team night after night. Jettison Weaver the Elder and Kennedy, call up Howie and Jered, and let's start getting Howie the 200 or so at bats he'll need to be a productive major leaguer. I could live with this kind of pain if I knew it meant the team was progressing toward something. They're not, save for a fourth-place finish in the AL West. It's time.

ESPN Box • Recap

News

• From the Angels website we learn that the Halos have come to terms with three draft picks, all pitchers: Robert Fish (sixth round), Leonardo Calderon (10th round) and Blake Holler (13th round).
• I missed this in yesterday's Baseball Prospectus, but Kevin Goldstein has a nice review of the AL West's prospect status up.
• Over a week old, but the June 19 entry at FutureAngels points us at this Press-Enterprise story announcing the retirement of Brian Specht, all of 25. Specht at one time was the Angels' top position prospect, but injuries took a toll on him; the Angels took him away from a career in medicine in the draft (he once had a medical scholarship to Baylor), and who knows but that he may yet pursue one. Good luck, Brian.
• The Suns sent nine players to the Southern League All-Star Game, the most of any team. The players are infielders Tony Abreu, Craig Brazell and Chin-Lung Hu, outfielders Wilkin Ruan and Justin Ruggiano, and pitchers Mark Alexander, Casey Hoorelbeke, T.J. Nall and Heath Totten.
• The Carolina League beat the Cal League All-Stars 6-3. Jose Arredondo gave up two earned runs in his only inning of work, the first, and took the loss. Michael Collins was 1-2.

Scores

News

I'm too tired right now to paste in the league notebooks; tomorrow morning, I hope.

Update: I just don't have time to do a complete rundown — very busy at my day job — so this will have to do for now: PCL, Texas League, Southern League, Cal League, Sally League, Midwest League, and the Florida State League. It looks like there aren't any notebooks for the complex leagues (AZL and GCL), nor for the Pioneer League.

Scores

Being a fan of two teams means you get twice the misery when they both lose, as they did today.

That Lowe Feeling: Twins 9, Dodgers 2

The talk in this game is all about Derek Lowe and his meltdown on the mound, but how many people will mention that Rafael Furcal committed yet another error? He leads the team with 17, not to mention leading the league. Not that it mattered, as neither his nor Cesar Izturis's errors created any runs.

Sure, Furcal went 2-4, but the Dodgers were apparently so startled by his appearance on base that Nomar Garciaparra and Jeff Kent both forgot what to do with a man on. The offense was uniformly dead; even Matt Kemp, demoted to the seven hole, collected three strikeouts. Still, we give him a 'bye for facing the Twins' forty-years-too-late answer to Sandy Koufax. In all, a series loss and a pretty pathetic one at that.

ESPN Box • Recap

Double Nickels: Rockies 12, Angels 4

I haven't much been in a mood to talk about Jered Weaver, partly because of the cranky response I'm certain to get from Rich about picking a position and sticking with it. Last Friday, following Jered's 14-K outing, Rich put up a brief post which elicited a firestorm of comments over whether or not Weaver The Younger should be brought up. That's not an issue I'm necessarily going to take sides on now, but one thing that's increasingly obvious: following a couple lousy starting pitching performances by the hitherto good Angels' rotation, you might be tempted to think the Angels will call up Jered again. That could happen, but perhaps the more interesting question is who he'll replace.

The obvious candidate to move to the bullpen is Jeff Weaver, but outside of today and his April appearances, he's been a mediocre pitcher. The other candidate would be Kelvim Escobar, who has been fantastic in relief but has so far mostly excelled in a starting role. Pull both out and you could be looking at a Colón-Lackey-Weaver-Santana-Saunders rotation — provided you can figure out who to leave on the side of the road along with his bags. Kevin Gregg might just have nominated himself for that role, having given up five runs — oh, but only three of them earned. (Thanks, Vlad and Izturis.) There's one more to move, but that would mean admitting defeat in the case of garbage-time lefty J.C. Romero, or releasing someone like the still marginally effective Brendan Donnelly.

Finally, Mike Napoli went 2-4 batting fifth, which is cool, and Orlando Cabrera had his 55th straight game getting on base. That's great for him, but why isn't he batting leadoff, then? I'm grateful that Vlad got an RBI along with his 0-2-ing, but he needs to be benched. He got a couple at bats worth of replacement by Robb Quinlan, and while that's good, somebody needs to stand him down and just tell him to chill. Vlad's whiffs and weak groundouts have become a pathetic routine.

ESPN Box • Recap

This morning's rumored trade has gone down, Jae Seo and Dioner Navarro to the Devil Rays for Mark Hendrickson and Toby Hall. More from Jon, who also passes along this Inside The Dodgers note that Brett Tomko has gone on the DL. It just gets better and better...

Snarky retorts at BTF.

Update: Also at BTF's Transaction Oracle:

Hendrickson

Year           BABIP     ERA
==============================
Career       .301        5.21
2006         .252        3.81

Hmmm, something's different, I just can't quite put my finger on it...

Hendrickson, of course, remains Mark Hendrickson. He's still really tall. He still has no fastball. He still has a few other pitches of varying quality that batters swing out mainly out of boredom.

Update 2: according to tonight's Dodger broadcast, and contrary to the current Dodgers probables page, Hendrickson will face the Angels at Angel Stadium on Saturday in what is currently Brad Penny's scheduled start.

Update 3: I've shied away from making any kind of snap judgments on these trades, but, as I mentioned in the comments below, Steve (formerly of Fire Jim Tracy) characterized the trade as a replay of the Edwin Jackson and Chuck Tiffany for Danys Baez and Lance Carter trade. Navarro is all of 22, and a solid hitting catcher. At 22, there are plenty of guys who only now got drafted. Mark Hendrickson is 32 and has been consistently below average every single year he has pitched (given enough opportunities). Worse, he's only got one more year after this one of arbitration eligibility, and he won't likely be good enough to earn whatever salary he's liable to make. Toby Hall is nothing special defensively, and offensively, he's an aging (30 years old) nonentity. That is to say, the Dodgers just paid the D'Rays to take out their garbage while getting a hard kick to the groin and a "thank you sir, may I have another" besides.

There's a strong temptation to read into this a Frank McCourt moment of weakness, the idea that if the team's near contention, they need to do everything they can this very instant to help that along. But tossing aside kids like Navarro for garbage like Hendrickson and Hall, and before them, Jackson and Tiffany for Baez and Carter, makes me question the sanity of Ned Colletti. Almost certainly, Hendrickson won't be pitching well the rest of the way for the Dodgers, and if he is, the absence of Billingsley-grade, near-major-league-ready prospects in the Dodgers minors will ensure another year's worth of his mediocrity. Navarro was flawed, to be sure, but this flawed?

Update 4: Two quotes, one from the retired blogger Tom Meagher at Jon's:

"No, it's not something he will keep up," Meagher said. "In fact, it's kind of a sign of a stronger collapse to come. Pitchers do not wake up one morning with the ability to keep batters from hitting line drives. In terms of persistence of skill, LD% is at the bottom with HR/Fly, behind K, BB, and G/F. While the fluctuation Hendrickson is seeing is at the extreme, it is just fluctuation. ...

"Now, I don't mean to imply that it is impossible that Hendrickson has made some major change and that his pitching has improved considerably this year because of a change in his skills. It's not just his LD% that's down, he's also getting more Ks and BBs this season, so one could look at his line and decide that he's changed. However, to do so requires a great deal of naivete and wishful thinking. If he truly had made a significant change - had added velocity, came up with a new pitch - then we might assume there was a reason for the change in his line. But I've heard nothing about that being the case, and the team who would know best whether it was true is the one that just sent him packing. ...

"Performance fluctuates greatly all the time, and the fact that a perfect storm of fluctuations away from his career norms has only yielded Hendrickson a 3.81 ERA should be disquieting enough."

Now, contrast this with Mike Emeigh's comment here (see comment 46):

Allowing fewer line drives is not a skill.

Yes, it is.

There's a structural problem when standard statistical methods are used that makes it appear as though LD rate is not under the pitchers control (the same problem exists with BABIP). A pitcher with a high LD rate *has* to get better at it in order to keep pitching in the majors. When he does get better at it, statistically it looks like a regression to the mean.

When you look at pitchers that allow more LD than average as a group, they tend to allow more LD than average year in and year out. When you look at pitchers that allow fewer LD than average as a group, they tend to allow fewer LD than average year in and year out. That evidence suggests that LD rate (or more precisely, keeping balls in play from being hit hard) is in fact part of a pitcher's skill set.

I have no idea who's right, but my inclination is to believe Tom's theory, as it's more in line with Murphy's Law; wishful thinking, especially about veterans, rarely works out.

Today's Birthdays

Too Many Pitches: Twins 8, Dodgers 2

Were the Twins waiting for revenge from their 1965 World Series loss? (Probably not. But a win's a win.) Was Chad Billingsley just a victim of too many pitcher's parks in the Dodgers minor league system? (Who knows. Isn't it odd that the Angels and Dodgers have opposite problems in that regard, with the Dodgers' pitchers learning in mostly pitcher's parks and the Angels' hitters learning in mostly hitter's parks?) Did he throw too many pitches again? (103, only 55 for strikes. That latter part wasn't good news.) Anyway, Bills might not be the in-utero answer to the Dodgers' rotation woes. I tell you what, though, I did find it funny to see Proven Closer Baez used as mop-up — and still getting slammed.

Recap • ESPN Box

Roster Notes

• The Dodgers are near to a trade with the Devil Rays for Tampa Bay's Mark Hendrickson; the Dodgers would send Dioner Navarro in exchange for Toby Hall.
• A Tale of Two Papers: Los Angeles Times: Eric Gagné could be out several more weeks.
  Long Beach Press Telegram: Gagné could be back soon.

  Believe what you want.

• The Dodgers still have no idea when Brett Tomko will make his next start. Odalis Perez will get his next scheduled start instead.
• Darin Erstad will return to Anaheim Wednesday (why?), but not to the lineup.
• Of Bartolo Colón's stuff:

  "The ball was not coming out of his hand as well," Scioscia said. "He was trying to be quick to the plate, and was not finishing his stuff as well. His stuff in the bullpen was electric, it's in there, he just needs to bring it to the mound."

• Orlando Cabrera's 54-game on-base streak is the fifth longest since 1950. Barry Bonds reached 58 times in 2003, the longest in that time.

Obituary: Dodger Dog Inventor Thomas G. Arthur

The Times informs us that Thomas G. Arthur, the inventor of the Dodger Dog, has passed away in St. Louis, of a heart attack; he was 84. Originally called a foot-long dog after the hot dogs sold at Coney Island, Arthur's were 10 inches; a customer complaint about the size discrepancy led to the renaming as Dodger Dogs.

News

• It's going to be a slightly abbreviated news section today, because I have real work to do (I didn't follow the Dodgers game at all, horrors), and so the weekly league notebooks from MILB.com will get out tomorrow.
• In this week's Prospect Hot Sheet:

  2. Jered Weaver, rhp, Angels (Triple-A Salt Lake)
  Weaver continues to prove he's the best sixth starter in the business, leaving little doubt that he is ready for the Major Leagues. After a hiccup in his return to Triple-A, Weaver was dominant in his second start back, throwing a complete game shutout in which he struck out 14 batters while allowing just three baserunners.

  From the "In the Team Photo" section:

  James Loney, 1b, Dodgers (Triple-A Las Vegas): Seemingly the lone example of a Dodger prospect stuck in the minors, Loney has not slowed since Los Angeles sent him to Triple-A Las Vegas on April 24. In June, the first baseman is hitting .388, and proving there is power in his bat with a .573 slugging percentage for the month.

• Andy LaRoche will not require surgery on his shoulder:

  He threw Saturday and he threw today and feels OK," Dodgers scouting director Logan White said on Sunday. "It's just now where he's throwing with no pain, though he hasn't really aired it out yet. So we'll see, but we're pleased with the way he's responded." LaRoche has been hitting off a tee and took some live batting practice over the weekend while the team was in Tucson. Since being called up from Double-A Jacksonville, LaRoche batted .333 with a pair of homers in just four games with Triple-A Las Vegas.

  Thanks to Jon for the link.
• Unsurprisingly, Jered Weaver is PCL Pitcher of the Week. No Dodgers were so honored this week.
• No Angel or Dodger prospect was an Offensive Player of the Week.
• I should probably mention that during today's Angels telecast, we learned that Casey Kotchman is expected back on the 25-man possibly as soon as within the month.
• Finally, I wanted to mention this Owlz game reporting that the user known as dummysr brought to my attention in the Orem Herald. I've given some thought to adding links to local newspaper coverage of the various team affiliates into the sidebar, but it's just not feasible given the space constraints, though using layers or something like that it could maybe work. Usually, these stories end up online way too late for me to get to them at my "press time", which is usually pretty late in the day.

Scores