Fire Gardy

Time for an update on some trivialities before the game today.

First, it seems Punto’s injury may not have been as serious as I initially feared. I’m still not happy about it, but at the very least we probably won’t be missing Punto much longer. He’s able to take some light swings and could return to action in a few days. Good news.

Blackburn is apparently still not ready to start, and so Humber’s getting his start instead. I wonder if pitching at the beginning of the game will make a difference for Humber. Some guys need a while to get used to coming out of the bullpen and don’t perform as well if they’re not starting. Maybe Humber is one of those guys right now — so hopefully he looks good on Monday.

Denard Span hasn’t gotten many hits — his average is just .107 — but there’s no reason to be worried. For one, this is spring training, and it’s meaningless. (Buscher and Young aren’t really going to hit .500 this year, in case you were wondering.) Secondly, he’s still been drawing walks; he has a team-leading 4 walks, and LEN3 passes along info that he was called out on a 3-2 count twice when the ball was out of the zone. (I do not know if this is true, but I believe it.)

Span’s timing is off, or he isn’t making good contact, or he’s getting unlucky on balls in play (or some combination, or whatever, it could be anything), but his eye is still working fine and he is maintaining his good discipline despite a temporary lack of hits.

This is what people mean when they say a player can still have value without a good batting average, or that a player’s value is contingent on a high batting average. Plate discipline and the ability to draw walks is less variable than batting average, and is closer to a consistent “skill” rather than “luck,” which is a big part of a player’s BABIP. If Span were batting .107 with no walks, it’d be time to worry — that’d be evidence that he might be regressing. But no. Span’s OPS could very well be disconnected from his batting average, much like a guy like Grady Sizemore (although Span has quite a bit less power). So if Span’s batting average this season drops to .250 or something, it doesn’t necessarily mean he had a bad season.

Finally, I particularly like this line from LEN3:

Interesting lineup today. You replace Gomez with Span, Mauer for Crede, Kubel for Young, Crede for Harris, Young for Butera and Punto for Tolbert and you might just have your Opening Day lineup.

Really? So this is pretty much the Opening Day lineup, if you just make these six changes? Doesn’t that make it extremely close to absolutely nothing like the Opening Day lineup? I’m probably the only person who finds that amusing. Oh well.

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