Useless Offday Thoughts: Morales, Young, Casilla, DOrtiz
You know what I hate? Offdays. But you know what I love? Useless Offday Thoughts! So let’s get some.
Despite missing the first month of the season and slumping for the most recent one, Mauer has produced this year like a transcendent superstar — he’s put together 43.4 Runs Above Replacement so far this year, which is amazing at this point of the year even without considering the time missed. Everyone knows this — everyone also knows that Morneau has done pretty well, at 35.6 RAR he’s also a pretty big star.
Aside from the two superstars, we also have Kubel and Crede over 20 RAR, at 21.9 and 21.1, respectively, along with a couple more solid players in Span and Cuddyer at 18.9 and 12.5 RAR on the year so far. So how can a team with 2 superstars, 2 good regulars, and 2 more solid regulars end up with a bad offense? Well, before I answer that, guess who the 7th best offensive regular has been thus far.
Seriously, guess.
I didn’t think you’d get it — it’s Jose Morales. That’s right, in extremely limited time in the majors, during which Gardy kept him on the bench as much as possible, Morales produced 7.0 RAR. I’m not advocating for that much more playing time for Morales, after all I’d like Mauer to get as much time at catcher as possible. And he’s proven extremely durable so far this year, and Redmond hasn’t been an unmitigated disaster as a backup — I mean, he sucks, and at $1M per year we’d expect him to produce about 0.2 WAR. He’s at 0.1 so far, so he’s right on pace to be exactly what we’re paying him for.
The problem is not Morales or Redmond. The problem is that the rest of the team has been unable to produce more in the entire season (so far) than Morales produced in a month and a half of extremely (and unacceptably) limited playing time. After a good week, Gomez has jumped up to 4.0 RAR (0.4 WAR), making him the last guy on the roster that isn’t replacement-level or worse. (And knowing Gomez, he’ll be right back down at 0.1 by Monday.)
Redmond, Punto, Harris, and Buscher are all completely replaceable at 1.0 RAR. The real problem, of course, is the guys coming in below them: Tolbert at -9.3, Young at -13.3, and Casilla at -13.7 RAR, all in very limited playing time, have been hemorrhaging wins from this team. If none of them had played at all this season, and instead we’d had easily found AAA-caliber players at their positions, we’d be more than 3 wins better right now, and would be in first place. So the next time you wonder about what it’d be like to be leading the division, don’t blame Mauer and Morneau for not being better, and don’t blame Bill Smith for failing to acquire a top player at one of our positions of need, and don’t blame the pitching (too much) — just blame the fact that Tolbert, Casilla, and Young are fucking terrible at baseball and have sucked as much as anyone in the league.
Oh, another useless thing. Apparently David Ortiz tested positive for steroids in 2003. The famous list of 104 strikes again — boy is it a good thing that thing wasn’t destroyed like it should have been, right? Of course, it was pretty obvious that DOrtiz had done steroids as soon as he went to the Red Sox — in 2003. He went from a 120 OPS+ to a 144 OPS+ right then (which is a big jump), from 1.3 WAR straight to 3.4 WAR. From a merely good hitter to one of the best in the league. Subjectively, he went from a regular-sized guy who wasn’t good enough at hitting to stick as a DH and wasn’t good enough at fielding to stick as a 1B to a big fat slugger pounding homers at a prodigious rate. Pictures of him before 2003 are tough to find, but the last time I looked he’d put on a whole lot of weight as soon as he put on a Red Sox uniform.
That’s all fine. But can we be sure he started in 2003 once he got to the Red Sox, and never did anything when he was with the Twins? I don’t think so. He was starting to get bigger in his last season with the Twins, he did hit 20 HR, and his OPS+ in previous seasons? 101 and 106, before his 120 in 2002. He very well may have noticed that the Twins weren’t high on him, and that he was at risk of washing out of the league. You can’t be sure. But that’s not my problem. I’ve pretty much gotten over all this steroid bullshit.
My problem now is that these names keep getting leaked to the press, one or two at a time. The test was supposed to be anonymous, and the list was supposed to be destroyed years ago. It wasn’t, of course. And now some dickhead lawyers are keeping up a slow trickle of names. My take on that? I think every time the steroid conversation subsides a little bit, these guys leak the next biggest name on the list. It’s basically as sleazy as possible, and given how many more names are on that list, this is going to continue for a long time. My advice? Don’t get too worked up. It’s just not worth it any more.
Oh … one last thing. I’d hereby like to apologize to Garrett Jones. I know he’s having a great time for the Pirates right now, really hitting the crap out of the ball — but that’s all about to end. I picked him up for my fantasy team, and if there’s one thing I know about guys on my fantasy team, it’s that they immediately start sucking. Or get injured.
Alright everyone, hopefully this little bit of rambling tided you over a little bit during this brutal offday. I know it helped me. Tomorrow, we start a pretty big series against the Angels. Go Twins.
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Here you go. Rookie shot of David (Ariaz) Ortiz:
http://www.homeruncards.com/imagesrc/david-ortiz-ultra.jpg
Enjoy
Wow, he’s even thinner than I remembered.
Thanks!
Tell me you didn’t like the IB/OF part on his card :)
Hey, he looks smaller and nimbler than Delmon in that picture. He could probably stumble around aimlessly and awkwardly in the outfield.
But look at the size of that head…
(and I still claim that Delmon is a better OF than Cuddyer. And this claim can’t be broken until either Cuddyer plays @LF -ha- or Delmon plays @RF)
Cuddyer’s UZR/150 in the OF in the last 2 years: -12.2, -12.0 Delmon’s UZR/150 in the OF in the last 2 years: -14.9, -20.4
Oh, and this is amusing … Delmon has been above replacement level in his career at exactly one position: RF. Meanwhile, Cuddyer has been below replacement level in his career at exactly one outfield position: RF.
I’m going to go ahead and speculate that they’re both playing the wrong position.
Oh, and another thing, I think Cuddyer isn’t one of the guys you should be railing against. He’s one of our best hitters, and Delmon is the only guy on the field worse than Cuddyer on defense AND hits like a slow Punto. It’s probably time to accept that a 127 OPS+ isn’t a disaster when his “replacement” has a 73 OPS+.
hmmm…
this season, DY is hitting .316 with RISP and Cuddyer .232 with RISP (and I am not using OPS, OPS+ or anything like that, because all you need is a single to drive the runner in.) Who would you pick?
I’m going to go ahead and say that BA/RISP doesn’t really measure the quality of the player. And also that nothing demonstrates that BA/RISP regresses rapidly to the mean than the 2008/2009 Twins.
Wait, no, I’m not done yet. Firstly, Delmon only has 63 PA with RISP vs Cuddyer’s 123. So while they both suffer from pretty severe sample size issues, Delmon’s is even worse.
Another thing that’s eyebrow-raising about it? IsoD. Cuddyer’s OBP with RISP is .366, while Delmon’s is .333 — which means Cuddyer’s IsoD is .134 (pretty damn good), while Delmon’s is .017 (unbelievably horrible).
IsoD is more stable than batting average, and a gap like this indicates that pitchers at least respect Cuddyer a LITTLE bit, and don’t respect Young at all. It probably also makes a difference that Young often bats after Cuddyer, possibly indicating that pitchers REALLY don’t respect Young. Enough that they’ll walk the guy in front of him when runners are already in scoring position. And it works a lot.
I haven’t seen anything yet that indicates Young is a better player than Cuddyer this season.
So… when a runner is in scoring position, do you want the hitter to take a walk (Cuddyer high isoD) or to get a hit and drive him him (Young high BA)?
Ah, the old “Ted Williams wasn’t a good hitter” argument. Old fashioned, but I like it.
A walk is better than an out, regardless of who’s on base. And Delmon creates more outs than Cuddyer, regardless of who’s on base.
I’d rather have the better hitter at the plate, because batting average with runners in scoring position has been repeatedly shown not to be a repeatable skill.
Oh, and one last thing. In case you don’t believe my “you know, it’s kind of a luck thing” argument, here’s a little tidbit:
Cuddyer, BABIP w/RISP, 2009: .263 Young, BABIP w/RISP, 2009: .429
Cuddyer’s BABIP is unsustainably low, and Delmon’s is unsustainably high. You know that both will regress.
Also …
Cuddyer, K/BB w/RISP, 2009: 22/20 Young, K/BB w/RISP, 2009: 18/2
Delmon has struck out 18 times in 63 PA with runners in scoring position (awful), but I want everyone to take a look at those K/BB ratios again:
22/20 vs 18/2
One of those is a pretty good hitter, and one of them should spend a LOT more time learning to hit. Guess which one is which.
A 5 year old girl could point out that Young is a worse hitter and outfielder than Cuddyer… you dont even NEED stats to back that up! How insane a comment.
So do we get Scutaro, Eckstein, or Cabrera today? Actually I heard last they were interested in Adam Kennedy as well… I dont believe Eckstein or Cabrera is much of an upgrade (besides the “hooray, we made a move” excitement)… between Scutaro and Kennedy, who would you rather have?
I’d much rather have Scutaro than Kennedy.
But you’re right — Eckstein is a downgrade from Punto, and Cabrera is a downgrade from Harris. We really shouldn’t go for either one of them.
(And knowing the way both Beane and Smith work, my guess is that we end up giving up Valencia, Revere, Slama, Guerra, and cash considerations for Cabrera and a kick to the groin.)
We are also paying Young $1.152M this year… I would like to see what his actual value is = to his production this season… I’m sure it’s negative $$.
Cuddyer is making $6.75M
I agree, I would like to see Scutaro out of that 4 if it was anyone…
And you are probably correct with your trade assumption… however, we’d likely get 2 kicks to the groin as a “bonus”!
So far this year, Cuddyer has been worth $5.7M — he’s easily on pace to surpass what we’re paying him.
Young has been worth -$6M … he should just never play.
Right, that’s only 101 games in… Cuddyer should hopefully maintain his “pace” and easily reach over $6M in value… whereas Young I’m afraid will continue to suck the life out of the lineup when he does play… fortunately it seems that he’s been regulated to the bench in favor of Gomez and will most likely be used as a DH vs LHP… which I guess I’m fine with if he still has to take up a spot on the roster.
The thing is, I like Delmon and I still think he has potential. I just wish we could send him to the minors or something to get his head straight (and get him off our team for a while). He’s just not good enough to be in the majors right now.
I mean, really. He’s been the 5th worst player in baseball this year, by Fangraphs’ WAR. (Guess who’s been the 4th worst? That’s right, Casilla.)
And both Young and Casilla have put up these horrible counting stats in limited playing time. This is ludicrous.
I totally agree… it would have been ideal to send him down and let him try to rework some things… i dont think he’ll ever be a very good defensive outfielder and probably should move to RF sooner than later, but his approach at the plate is horrible and has obviously not improved over the last 1.5 years… that’s what alarms me the most, even despite his age and potential…
Back to the potential “trades”… It sounds like they have made “progress” in acquiring Cabrera and that the A’s would be moving him over Kennedy (who they may resign)… If we do by chance get Cabrera, would you move Harris to 2B and have Cabrera at SS? Does that hurt our defense more than it improves our offense?
I guess when it comes to the offense over defense argument, I’m the opposite of Gardy… I would sacrifice defense to get some more pop in the lineup.
Gardy hates Harris at 2B, so I think acquiring Cabrera pushes Harris to the Bench and we’d keep Casilla/Punto at 2B. Which would improve our infield defense by like 2.5 runs per year, and hurt our offense by like 1 run per year.
Basically … it’d be a completely meaningless trade. And we shouldn’t give up anything more than organizational filler.
This whole Young vs. Cuddyer thing is misleading…yeah, pretty much any player in the league is going to look pretty good when they’re compared to Seldom Young. It’s misleading because we’re forgetting how bad a player Cuddyer is and how replaceable he should be. Sure, the guy has numbers that we can look at, but, like Torii Hunter, Cuddyer’s made his millions by putting up good numbers in non-pressure situations –hitting for the cycle in 12-1 games, and such. And in his best season in the majors, he did that hitting between Joe Mauer (who should have been MVP) and Justin Morneau (who was MVP).
Sure, when it comes to keeping Cuddyer or a shit sandwich, I’ll take Cuddyer anyday. But let’s not forget that Cuddyer consistently fails in the clutch and I for one am sick and tired of him.
But those really are your choices. Cuddyer or a shit sandwich. Complain about THAT if you want to, but I don’t think it’s worth complaining about Cuddyer himself.
Oh, another thing. I still don’t understand what the fuck is the problem with a right handed power bat putting up 1 127 OPS+ in a lefty-heavy lineup. He’s our best right handed hitter. (Our second best right handed hitter is Crede, who for some reason can’t hit lefties.) Unless we get something better, anywhere in the lineup, we need Cuddyer.
And no, a 127 OPS+ with a cannon arm that bats right handed does NOT grow on trees. They get signed to big money contracts on big money teams.
I think some people just can’t get over the injury-riddled season Cuddyer had last year. (Much like the folks who hounded Punto mercilessly in 2008, even when he was hitting okay, because of his awful 2007 campaign.) Cuddyer’s proved to be a steady veteran bat in the lineup, and while he’ll have his share of godawful strikeouts with RISP, he also provides good power and a decent batting average. It’s odd, but I don’t hear the same whining about Joe Crede, who hasn’t provided nearly as much offense (I like Crede, don’t get me wrong).
Complaining about Cuddyer getting playing time is idiotic when there are so many more legitimate gripes you could have about the team. Priorities, people.
I know, seriously.
“Boo hoo, the 5th best player on our team plays too much. We should bench him in favor of the 5th worst player IN THE ENTIRE MAJOR LEAGUES.”
This makes sense?
Cuddyer’s fine, but he’s a guy I hate to have at the plate with the game on the line. He’s hitting .130 this year with 2 outs and RISP; that kind of production is very disappointing. Now, never did I say to put Seldom Young in there — never. But let’s not put a halo over Cuddyer’s head, either.
Nobody’s putting halos anywhere.
Looks like Cabrera to the Twins is a done deal.
I think it’s been said already, but now with Cabrera here, I’m afraid he will be locked in at SS and the 2-hole for the rest of the year, let’s hope that doesn’t yield the same production we’ve been seeing all year… It also means, as Sirsean said, Gardy will bench Harris in favor of Punto at 2B… I would say either Casilla or Buscher will be demoted to AAA…
I still think Harris should move to 2B and Punto moved to the bench… I also dont think Cabrera should be batting in front of Mauer, we’ve now won 4 games in a row with Mauer back in the 2 spot, despite the big guns not hitting well during the Sox series, we still won…
Span Mauer Morneau Kubel Cuddyer Crede Harris Cabrera Gomez
Now THAT doesn’t sting so bad does it…
Don’t be that surprised to see a deal that sends away one of our “major league level” players, so we don’t have to ship anyone to the minors.
Think Buscher or Harris getting dealt along with a prospect for a pitcher. If I were Bill Smith that’s what I’d be doing.
You’re right, though. Mauer should remain in the 2 hole. We win all the time with him batting there, and it’s just the right move. Of course, Gardy won’t do it.