Proceeds from the ads below will be donated to the
Bob Wuesthoff scholarship fund.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006 |
Pickoff Moves
Today's Birthdays
Pete Cimino CAL b. 1942, played 1967-1968
Pop Dillon BRO b. 1873, played 1904, d. 1931-09-12
Seth Etherton ANA b. 1976, played 2000. A first-round pick in 1998, Etherton was a College World Series star out of USC who had four quality pitches he could throw for strikes, finishing his senior year with a 3.23 ERA, a 13-3 record in 18 starts, and leading the NCAA in strikeouts. He signed for a $1.075M bonus, and started in AA, where he was immediately overmatched. Repeating AA the next year, he had problems with the longball, giving up 21 in 28 starts spread between AA and AAA. He came up in 2000 at a point when the rotation consisted of Kent Bottenfield, Brian Cooper, Jarrod Washburn, Scott Schoeneweis, and Etherton at the back end; his debut game against the Royals went well until he gave up consecutive homers to Jermaine Dye and Mark Quinn, but it was exactly the sort of outing he was likely to have as he continued his major league career. He's been with seven organizations, and hasn't stuck with any of them yet.
Jim Gilliam LAN,BRO b. 1928, played 1953-1966, All-Star: 1956, 1959, d. 1978-10-08. Nicknamed "Junior" because he was so much younger than the other players on the Baltimore Elite Giants of the Negro League. Bill James has him ranked as the 27th best second baseman in history (as of 2000), but in fact he often played third base to allow other players in at that position, and even spent a little time in the outfield, mostly in his early career. James tells this story about Gilliam:
Gilliam's nickname on the Dodgers was "The Devil"; he was a good-natured guy with a wicked underside. In 1963 Don Dillard of the Braves slid into second base trying to break up a double play, and Maury Wills hit him right between the eyes with the throw, knocking him out. Everybody gathered around Dillard, afraid he was dead, except Gilliam, who retrieved the ball and tagged Dillard, lying flat on the ground, to make sure he was out. According to John Roseboro in Glory Days with the Dodgers, "That's the first time I tagged out a dead man," chuckled The Devil.Gilliam retired three times and came out of retirement twice to resume his playing career with the Dodgers; he stayed on with the team as a coach until his untimely death in 1978, of a sudden brain hemorrhage, just before the World Series.
Update, and geeky aside: Don Dillard faced the Dodgers, and likely was involved in the play as described, on May 30, 1963, a 7-4 loss to the Braves.
Mark Johnson ANA b. 1967, played 1998
Johnny Klippstein LAN b. 1927, played 1958-1959, d. 2003-10-10
Mike Sandlock BRO b. 1915, played 1945-1946
Driving Forward By Looking At The Rear-View Mirror
I haven't generally paid much attention to the Kamenetzky brothers' blog at the Times, but there was such a howler there today that I couldn't pass it up. Regarding the Dodgers' retooling, brother Brian has this to say:What the Dodgers don't want to become are the Angels, who have not only been stingy in giving up prospects, but have watched the value of their guys drop once they've hit the bigs and struggled. Dallas McPherson and Casey Kotchman, for example, won't fetch now what they might have a couple years back before the "can't miss" label was removed from their names. Could they still be good? Absolutely, but when a player struggles, whether at the big league level or a higher minor league class, it wipes some of the shine off that guy's value. The Angels have prospects blocking their prospects. The Dodgers aren't quite that rich, but have currency to spend. Often GMs will hold on to guys because they're terrified that young player will turn out to be the next Jeff Bagwell or Ryan Howard. But they generally don't.Wow, so of a sudden you don't give guys who make the All-Star team at every minor league level a chance to play? News to me. Confronted with a player about to get really, really expensive, a player who has a significant injury history (Troy Glaus), do you give that chance to the kid in AAA (Dallas McPherson)? Well, of course you do. Kamenetzky here is happy to use hindsight to condemn Bill Stoneman, but the decision at the time was perfectly sound. We'll find out how sound Ned Colletti's furious trading is in three years or less.
Bullets
- The Lou Piniella-led Cubs are now supposed to make a hard run after A-Rod (via BTF).
- Bud Selig is rooting for the Mets to get into the World Series, from a ratings perspective.
- Steve Lyons will keep his part-time job with the Dodgers. Unfortunately. I didn't think that what he said was all that problematic, so almost certainly his firing was about something else.
- The Giants will talk to Bud Black about their managerial opening.
- In that same article, Giants trainer Stan Conte has resigned. "Conte said his departure was his call and not the result of any conflicts with front-office personnel or any rift with Bonds."
Comments:
Technically, Glaus was already expensive (making about $10 million a year over the last couple years before he left).
Daniel -- my reaction is to say that the move at the time was sensible but it did not turn out so well for the Angels. The last two years' worth of Troy Glaus's production were definitely worth having, but the question is, at what price? Dallas McPherson has certainly been more injured than Glaus over that period, but he's also been cheap, cheap, cheap. Unless you were willing to argue that McPherson would be even more injured than Glaus at the time the Angels didn't renew Glaus's contract, I don't see how the decision could be criticized.
Oh, and regarding the Cubs -- absolutely. They're at least three years away from contending, and probably more.
Stoneman may have been guilty of giving up the nucleus of that World Series team too soon, it seems. As for the difference between the approach of Stoneman and Coletti, it is obvious to almost everyone that Coletti had backup options. The rookies weren't 'handed the keys' so they didn't feel the pressure to perform. They have been eased in while solid veterans held down the spots. As for 'furious trading', Coletti has dealt several guys with the wrong type of attitude and work ethic- see Navarro, Guzman, etc. We will see what happens, but so far, as a Dodger fan, I like the result. Can you say the same lately for the Angels?
# posted by 
: 10/17/2006 03:05:00 PM
: 10/17/2006 03:05:00 PM
Anon -- I dunno. The Angels, at least, have advanced in the postseason. Talk all you want about crapshoots, but the Angels outperformed the Dodgers in a tougher league and division.
Wills retired three times and came out of retirement twice to resume his playing career with the Dodgers; he stayed on with the team as a coach until his untimely death in 1978, of a sudden brain hemorrhage, just before the World Series.
You mean Gilliam retired three times?
You mean Gilliam retired three times?
So you would rather that the Angels won more games than made the postseason? That makes one heck of alot of sense. Why is it assumed that it is a tougher division? The A's are not exactly world beaters, even though they caught the Twins at the right time and without possibly their best pitcher in Liriano. The Mariners were pretty much horrible. The Rangers, as usual, had no pitching. As for the Angel rookies. McPherson looked overmatched in his time and Morales looked average at best. The young pitchers did well, that's true. However, I was referring more to position players. I'll take the Dodger quartet of Billingsley, Broxton, Kuo and Saito any season though. That is so funny to hear Angel fans still hanging on that one World Series. It's been years now guys! You ain't going anywhere with Stoneman at the helm. Oh, I hope that the Dodgers have a better record than the Angels, who cares about making the playoffs. Do you think that the Cardinals care what their regular season record was now?
# posted by : 10/17/2006 10:01:00 PM
: 10/17/2006 10:01:00 PM
So you would rather that the Angels won more games than made the postseason?
1) Where did I ever say that? My point is that the Dodgers weren't especially impressive; one-and-done isn't anything worth bragging about, especially seeing as how they couldn't even defend a division lead going down the stretch.
Why is it assumed it is a tougher division?
Even walking away from the idea that the AL is a stronger league than the NL (and there's a fair amount of evidence for it), the collective record for the AL West is 308-340, for a .525 winning percentage; the NL West is 385-404, or a cumulative .512 winning percentage. So, yeah, a stronger division.
That is so funny to hear Angel fans still hanging on that one World Series. It's been years now guys! You ain't going anywhere with Stoneman at the helm.
It's so funny to read cowards like you (who show up here and don't bother to put your name to anything) pretending that one postseason win by Jose Lima since 1988 is anything better. The Angels under Stoneman have done a lot more than anyone the Dodgers have put on the throne.
1) Where did I ever say that? My point is that the Dodgers weren't especially impressive; one-and-done isn't anything worth bragging about, especially seeing as how they couldn't even defend a division lead going down the stretch.
Why is it assumed it is a tougher division?
Even walking away from the idea that the AL is a stronger league than the NL (and there's a fair amount of evidence for it), the collective record for the AL West is 308-340, for a .525 winning percentage; the NL West is 385-404, or a cumulative .512 winning percentage. So, yeah, a stronger division.
That is so funny to hear Angel fans still hanging on that one World Series. It's been years now guys! You ain't going anywhere with Stoneman at the helm.
It's so funny to read cowards like you (who show up here and don't bother to put your name to anything) pretending that one postseason win by Jose Lima since 1988 is anything better. The Angels under Stoneman have done a lot more than anyone the Dodgers have put on the throne.
Matt, it's worse than that: they didn't even win the division. The Dodgers won the Wild Card, despite having the same record as the Padres (the Pads had a better record against the Dodgers in regular season matchups).
Matt - No Dodger fan cried over the loss of the "Gold Glove shortstop". The guy couldn't hit a lick except for two good months last year. And the Dodgers had three other shortstops. And they got back Greg Maddux for a stretch run of rather strong pitching. We'll see about if they bring him back, but Dodger fandom thought that Colletti robbed Hendry blind on that one. Slick-fielding no-hit shortstops grow on trees.
# posted by : 10/18/2006 08:45:00 AM
: 10/18/2006 08:45:00 AM
Capital -- I think the argument to be made isn't so much that there's one big screeching error in any of those trades, it's the general looseness with which trades are made. Now, it happens I agree with you about the Maddux trade -- that was a steal -- but the jury is definitely out on the others. If I could do one thing for the Dodgers, it would be to remove the phone number of the Devil Rays' FO from Ned Colletti's speed dial.
Rob- Agreed on the main point. I just feel that the argument is weakened by throwing in the one obviously good trade along with all the questionable ones.
# posted by : 10/19/2006 07:51:00 AM
: 10/19/2006 07:51:00 AM
Ok, my name is Mark Watkins. What does that matter. Cowardly, what do you want to meet in an alley or what? Just don't want to take the time to register. We will see what the Dodger trading will amount to but my feeling is that the only player that they traded that I worry about making an impact is Joel Guzman. And he has questionable character. He pouted when they sent him down. As for the others, Navarro- a career backup, Izturis- another backup, the prospects- probably just that, prospects. The other factor to take into account, as written in the article you ridiculed, is that they could have lost many of these players to the Rule 5 draft anyway. The point is that Coletti made the effort, whether or not they went one and out. The players appreciate that effort. Free agents will take notice when a GM has the gonads to bring in players and try to win the division. Or in the Angels case, when the GM doesn't have them. You are the only one who continues to resist criticizing this guy. One impact hitter and the Angels could have even went all the way!
# posted by : 10/19/2006 12:45:00 PM
: 10/19/2006 12:45:00 PM
I'm sorry, Matt, but those age comps aren't very good. Oly two of them even approach average production as measured by OPS+. Plus, they assume that Izturis was going to stay at shortstop. Had Izturis stayed in LA, it wouldn't have been at short (unless you think he'd bump off Furcal). Move Izzy to, say thirdbase, second, or leftfield (har, har) and his 68 OPS+ bat becomes an even greater liability.
Given that, what would Izturis have given the Dodgers in 2006 and going forward had they kept him? As it's likely he would have been a three-million dollar defensive-replacement/pinch-runner, the answer is, "Not Much." What they got instead in trade was 12 more-or-less strongly pitched games in which they went 6-3. Pitch those games with Tomko, Hendickson, or Sele and you're looking at a team that misses the playoffs.
I've had this argument with Rob before, typically regarding the Dodgers' farm system. My position is that a prospect/young player has two values. The fist is the value of that player to contribute to your team ("real value") and the other is that players ability contribute as percieved by other teams ("trade value"). Due to the imperfect nature of scouting and forcasting the future, these two values are rarely in lockstep. That's why trades happen.
Methinks you put too much real value in slappy shortstops.
Given that, what would Izturis have given the Dodgers in 2006 and going forward had they kept him? As it's likely he would have been a three-million dollar defensive-replacement/pinch-runner, the answer is, "Not Much." What they got instead in trade was 12 more-or-less strongly pitched games in which they went 6-3. Pitch those games with Tomko, Hendickson, or Sele and you're looking at a team that misses the playoffs.
I've had this argument with Rob before, typically regarding the Dodgers' farm system. My position is that a prospect/young player has two values. The fist is the value of that player to contribute to your team ("real value") and the other is that players ability contribute as percieved by other teams ("trade value"). Due to the imperfect nature of scouting and forcasting the future, these two values are rarely in lockstep. That's why trades happen.
Methinks you put too much real value in slappy shortstops.
# posted by : 10/20/2006 11:52:00 AM
: 10/20/2006 11:52:00 AM
As an addendum-
I also think that you should look at these comps because comps for what is to come are somewhat more enlightening that comps for what has come already.
I also think that you should look at these comps because comps for what is to come are somewhat more enlightening that comps for what has come already.
# posted by : 10/20/2006 11:57:00 AM
: 10/20/2006 11:57:00 AM
Those are Maddux's W-L's, not the Dodgers. The team went 8-4 in his 12 GS.
His ND's were in a 1-0 win over SF (no run support, very well pitched), a 4-2 win over Colorado (ditto, well pitched), and a 9-7 loss at Arizona (4 runs in 5 IP, but left leading).
So even in the games in which he NDed, he had a positive impact, for the most part.
His ND's were in a 1-0 win over SF (no run support, very well pitched), a 4-2 win over Colorado (ditto, well pitched), and a 9-7 loss at Arizona (4 runs in 5 IP, but left leading).
So even in the games in which he NDed, he had a positive impact, for the most part.
# posted by : 10/20/2006 12:14:00 PM
: 10/20/2006 12:14:00 PMNewer› ‹Older
 |
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.