Wasting Spaces

The only good reason for Ramon Santiago to be on the Major-League roster is make he doesn't take at-bats away from better players at AAA. In other words, Santiago, if used like the bench-warmer he is, won't get many as at-bats at the major leagues as if he was starting in Tacoma.

But he certainly isn't the 25th best player in the Mariners organization. Santiago has an Equivalent Average of .176, the lowest on the M's 25-man roster. That's lower than Neifi Perez, who was just released from the Giants. If we look at the Major-League Equivalent Average, which approximates what minor-leaguers would do in the major leagues, we see that there are five Rainiers over .215, well above where Santiago is playing.

I suppose the other factor is that Santiago plays short, whereas A.J. Zapp, who's been on a tear recently, plays first; and we already have enough corner infielders on the big league roster. Mostly, I continue to be flabbergasted that we traded the best shortstop in the majors (even if you count A-rod) for Ramon Santiago.

Updated Links

Thanks to USS Mariner, who now joins the list of blogs that link to me. I can't stress this enough: if you ever wonder anything about what's going on with the Mariners, go there to find straight, smart answers.

Also, The Safe has returned as a news aggragator. It has only commentary-free links, and it will get you to most of the stories around the web each day.

Leone out: proves he's not a "Gamer"

Justin Leone is out for the rest of the season with a couple of broken bones in his left hand. Listen to Bob Melvins reaction reported in the Times:

It's really too bad," Mariners manager Bob Melvin said. "After his first three weeks, teams have had a chance to scout him. And he was in the stage of adjusting, a time when you can really tell about a young player.
"When you play the game, you get an opportunity, and this was his big chance, and now this happens. It takes the edge off this game."

Does that sound to anyone else like Melvin is just about ready to write Justin off? The way I'm reading between the lines is: "The success he had to this point was probably just a result of being new in the league, and we were about to find out what he's really like. This was his chance to prove himself, but now he got himself injured, and he's gonna be really rusty now. Too bad for him." That may be to pessimistic of an interpretation, but nothing I've read has Melvin commending any aspect of what Leone has done so far in the big leagues.

Sure, Leone hasn't been the next Scott Rolen, but his low batting average is somewhat misleading. Though he hit only .216 in his brief stint in The Show, he also hit 6 home runs, and showed enough power to bump his OPS to .739, right between Edgar Martinez and Bret Boone. Melvin is right about needing to see Leone more to really see what he can do in the big leagues, though his minor league stats aren't completely irrellevant, as Bill Bavasi would have us believe.

What's unfortunate is that third base will probabaly be manned by a combination of Bloomquist, Speizio, and Ramon Santiago, none of whom are long-term or short-term solutions.

"Wait, I thought the trading deadline was in July"

If that's what you're saying after hearing rumors of trades, then you should check out--again, I can't believe I'm saying this--Jayson Starks Waiver Deals 101 column on ESPN.com. July 31st is the last day teams can trade players without those players first clearing waivers; but August 31st is the last day for teams to trade players at all, as well as the last day to set their post-season roster, making a trade after that date pointless anyway.

For a more general explanation on the rules of rosters and transactions, see the ever-useful Rob Neyer Transaction Primer.

More Expos: what might have been.

The Tacoma News-Tribune has an article about how devastated the Expos were by the 1994 strike. Author Darrin Beene notes how Montreal and Seattle were in similar situations:

"Had the season played out, the Expos were poised for a windfall. Increased
attendance would have added money, and a playoff appearance might have generated the kind of buzz the Seattle Mariners received in 1995."

It's been ten years of abuse at the hands of Baseball, and the Expos deserve better, now.

Breaking News: Sun rises tomorrow, Expos to remain homeless, Commissioner Spineless

Yep, ESPN.com rumor-monger Jayson Stark, who deserves little attention, does get credit for reporting that the Expos will still be homeless next year. To quickly re-articulate the reasons why this is beyond ridiculous:

• MLB currently owns the Expos, yet MLB bylaws prohibit any owner from owning parts of more than one team. This prevents an owner from stacking one team with all the good players, not to mention all the accounting scams possible. However, MLB being simply a federation of baseball team owners, every owner actually owns a portion of the Expos. Not surprisingly, the Expos have not increased their payroll since MLB has taken ownership, and they've lost all but four of their players, as Stark reports. More simply put, it's an inherent conflict of interest, whether or not any owner has direct control over Expos operations.
  
• Throughout this whole debacle, the Commissioner has continued to insist that the Expos will not stay in Montreal, rendering them essentially homeless. Not surprisingly, not many Montrealans seem to be particularly interested in seeing a team guaranteed to leave town. In 2002, after Selig's silly contraction ploy that suggested that would be their last season in Montreal, the Expos saw attendance go up by 33%--to 812, 537, worst in the majors. In 2003, MLB tried to raise attendance again (and it did) by putting some home games in Puerto Rico, increasing their average home game attendance from 10,031 in 2002 to 12,662 in 2003. But those gimmicks are wearing off. This years average game attendance is down to 9092, dead last. Selig continues to be the worst marketer of his own product, professional baseball, when he should be the consummate salesman of the game. He made his money selling cars, and now that he has to sell something that actually is a quality product, he continually bungles it.
  
• Baseball has several options for where to put the Expos, including the eighth largest market in the nation, Washington DC. Orioles owner Peter Angelos continues to whine that DC is his market, but if you combine Baltimore, Washington DC, and a little bit--say 15%--of the Richmond and Norfolk metro areas (following Mike Jones' example), you get a TV market that is bigger (3,487,995 TV households) than every market except LA (5,402,260) and New York (7,376,330), a market bigger than Chicago and the Bay area. Certainly, there is room for two teams to share this market. Angelos' whining and Seligula's determination to extract every ounce of guaranteed public funding for a stadium is the only thing keeping the team from relocating--it certainly isn't because there are no places to go. Other viable options: Sacramento (1,278,430), Portland (1,073,210), Indianapolis (1,038,370). Las Vegas, oft mentioned, doesn't make sense to me, as it is way down on the list (51st, 601,700).

The solution is to tell Angelos, as they must have told Steinbrenner when they pushed through greater revenue sharing, to take his medicine or feel free to put the Orioles up for sale. Auction the team to the highest bidder in the DC area. Jayson Stark's article mentions possible protections for Angelos' TV rights that seem eminently feasible. There's nobody in power, however, that has the personal integrity and political will to solve this problem, and it continues to be a ridiculous embarrassment besmirching the game.

Old News, but worth a reminder

A email exchange among fellow Mariner fans took me to this article, which was published in April, but just now came to my attention. At least according to the Puget Sound Business Journal, the M's were the most profitable franchise in baseball at season start. As we look to the off-season, let's remember the Mariners do have the wherewithal to sign marquee players.

On a more personal note, I thank whatever regular readers are left for their patience. An evening job and a move have kept me less attentive to the day-to-day foibles of our favorite team, and have taken much of the time and energy I'd be spending thinking of things to say in this consistently disappointing season.

There's been talk about the race to the bottom of the standings--Royals vs. Mariners, which I will see in person soon--and its implications for next year's draft. But if the M's sign a big free agent, doesn't that give their draft pick away to the team that lost that free agent? I know there have been several moves to eliminate "draft-pick compensation," but the last I heard, plans for scrapping it had been tabled. Anyone know any differently?
---
Update: Stephen left a comment in this post informing me that the teams with the 1st 15 picks in the draft do NOT forfeit those picks regardless of who they sign. Thanks!

Boone-doggle or Boone-anza?

Sorry for the pun.  The question is whether the M's should trade Bret Boone or keep him, thereby activating his $9M option for next year.  Using Baseball Prospectus' Statistics by position, we can compare Boone to other second-basemen.  David at U.S.S. Mariner thinks Boone won't be worth the $9M.  Depending on what metric you want to trust, Boone is either the 21st, 33rd, 35th, or 60th best second baseman, out of 70 listed, in the majors.   Or if we keep only the 2Bs with the most at-bats from each team (what appears to be their "starters"), Boone is 21st or 25th out of 30.  That's not great.

But who could we get that would be a better value for playing second base?  And let's think long-term.  Aging though he may be, Boone had the highest VORP of any AL second-baseman in 2003;  who is this year's Bret Boone circa 2003?  (In other words, who's having a hot year but won't next year?)  We're looking for a free-agent second baseman who's not just coming off a career year (Cleveland's Ron Belliard?)

Not knowing which second-sackers are going to be on the market next year, I really can't tell who's available, which is an essential part of the question I'm asking. Still, I'm not sure there are that many options for the M's.    Alex Cora?  D'Angelo Jimenez?  Maybe Mark Bellhorn?  The other option may be to move Leone to second.  But that leaves us with Spiezio and Leone starting, and I'm not sure those two will sustain enough offense even if we get a couple of mashers in the off-season.

There are a lot of good 2B'ers out there, but a lot of them won't be free agents very soon.  Alfonso Soriano,

Mostly, I'd like to see someone suggest who would play second next year, because who is available to replace Boone is an important consideration in whether we want to keep him.

Dramatic, but unnecessary

That's what Bucky's walk-off homerun was last night;  we should have had the lead before then.  (You can check out Bucky's bomb on the video highlights).  But if it weren't for Ichiro's baserunning gaffe in the 4th, the M's would have had six runs before the 10th inning.  

4th inning:
-Willie Bloomquist singles.
-Ichiro singles.  Bloomquist scores, Ichiro to second on throwing error by Barry Zito

So we have one of the fastest runners in the league on second, nobody out, and the heart of the order coming up.

-Ichiro Suzuki caught stealing third.
-Randy Winn doubles.
...

Caught stealling third!? Ichiro has taken stupid risks before, but this was ridiculous.  Attempting to steal third is almost always a bad idea, but it's especially dumb when there are no outs, because even two sac flies will score you.  As Steve at the Wheelhouse has pointed out, "Hustle does not make a dumb play smart.
 
I don't mean to look a gift horse in the mouth, though.  Last night's game is a great example of why baseball is such a great game.  You're team blows an opportunity to score, and you pull your hair out in frustration.  But redemption comes off the bat of a 28-year old rookie in the 10th.  That's excitement and drama--and winning--that we didn't see from the M's in the beginning of the year, and even if it's unnecessary, it's still fun.

You're ignorant, but at least you act on it.

A favorite cartoon of mine--a Calvin and Hobbes strip, as all of my favorites invariably are--has this exchange:

Calvin: The more you know, the harder it is to take decisive action.
Calvin: Once you become informed, you start seeing
complexities and shades of gray. You realize that nothing is as clear and simple as it
first appears. Ultimately, knowledge is paralyzing.
Calvin: Being a man of action, I can't afford to take that risk.
Hobbes: You're ignorant, but at least you act on it.

So go the Mariners, now, in 2004. They're going to shake things up, doggone it. Never mind whether anything is actually being accomplished. That's how the impending release of Olerud is going to work.
The M's are expected to release Olerud soon. In doing so they are releasing their fourth-best starter, not counting Justin Leone, whose numbers come from an as yet small sample size. Releasing Olerud, by the way, does not absolve them of paying his contract. Though a trade remains a "remote" possibility, how many teams are going to jump on the chance to give up prospects to get Olerud, when they can sign him for the pro-rated Major League minimum (he'll still collect his check from the M's regardless) in a few days?

Olerud isn't what he once was, and we'd have a lot of corner-infielder types (Olerud, Spiezio, Hansen, Bucky Jacobsen, Justin Leone) if we sent down Santiago or Bloomquist. Still, it seems like such a waste when there are so many worse hitters on the roster that could be sent down or let go. The other reason to keep here John is that, at least in my mind, he's a class act and a sentimental favorite, reasons which shouldn't trump the team improving itself. But, as I've explained, there are much smarter ways to make room on the roster--thus preparing for a better future--than this way.

But at least they're doing something, right?
------
Update: David Cameron at U.S.S. Mariner suggests that designating Olerud for assignment might be a way around Olerud's no-trade clause. DMZ says he's not sure, but he'll find out for sure.

Baseball, Society and other essentials

I intentionally chose a subtitle for this blog that left me a little wiggle room in the topics I discuss. So far, I've kept my remarks confined to the "Baseball" side of things, since most readers of this blog didn't start coming here for an ethics debate. Well, fear not. I don't intend to change that.

But I do want to point you to Tony Robinson's latest op-ed piece in the P-I. My chief interest in--and too often, my most frequent frustration with--the political process is political discourse, the exchange of ideas and making of arguments. Or more often, as Mr. Robinson articulates, the dearth of such discussions in our political landscape. As the quote that ends the article suggests, no one party or interest group holds any special claim to the ad hominem argument criticized in the piece. It is universally utilized, and universally destructive.

The trouble with Labrums

Check out this article by Will Carrol about Labrums--what they are, why they tear, and why it's so hard for pitchers to come back from labrum injuries. This is about the most succinct explanation I've found, and it's particularly relevant to a Mariner organization that has been ravaged with labrum injuries.

John Olerud's Value

Apparently some people have been griping about John Olerud's performance this year. Since I don't live in Seattle, and a night job keeps me from listening to a lot of M's games, I can only go off the word of folks like David Cameron. Though he usually articulates his argument's well, this is about the most absurd defense of Olerud's value I've ever seen. Maybe David thinks he's meeting Olerud's critics at their level, but arguing that Olerud has been a fierce competitor based on his teams' records? That's silly.

If there's griping about John Olerud's performance this year, it's because he's not living up to expectations.

	2001	2002	2003	2004
VORP	43.9	54.7	20.2	9.3
OPS	.873	.893	.762	.729

The hope was that Olerud had an off year last year, and would bounce back. In retrospect, we can see that age seems finally to have caught up with Johnny, and 2003 was the start of his age-induced decline.

The real reason not to single out Olerud is enumerated in the lastest Prospectus Triple Play, which mentions that he's fourth on the team in VORP. (He was fifth, third, and fourth on his team in VORP in 2001,2002, and 2003, respectively). He's also fifth on the team in OPS right now, if we include Dave Hansen (who's first) and Raul Ibanez.

Olerud is a bit of a disappointment this year. We expected more from him, and it would probably be good to get more production out of our first baseman. But he's also still one of the more valuable hitters on the team.

The Ring's the Thing?

I'm going to pick on Paul because he's the most recent purveyor of this theory, but it is rampant among sports fans. Some prefer it in rhyme: "The ring's the thing." Paul says the M's 2001 season "ended for them in the ALCS, thus resulting in the Mariners winning...nothing." Well, besides the division title and the Divisional Series with the Indians. How many times have we heard this line?

-The Bosox/Yankees "rivalry" isn't really a rivalry because the Sox "haven't won anything."

-The Oakland A's may have some good records, but they've "never made it past the first round."

-Pundits, in criticism of a particular player, say said player may have accomplished a lot, but they still haven't won a championship. The last time I heard someone say this it was applied to Gary Payton. (Never mind his Western Division championship on the way to the 1996 NBA finals.)

-General Managers, from any sport, touting the latesting signing of an OK veteran player by adding that "they know what it takes to win a championship." Like, say, Shane Spencer. If only the M's had signed Shane Spencer.

There are so many examples of great players that have not won their particuarly sport's championship that this line of reasoning is absurd. But beyond that, it's absurd to discount the many levels of accomplishment that teams achieve before the World Series, the NBA finals, the Final Four, the Superbowl, the Stanley Cup. This is especially true in baseball, one of the few remaining sports where most teams still do NOT make the playoffs.

So the A's haven't been to the ALCS in the last decade. They've certainly accomplished a lot more in those years than, say, the Detroit Tigers, the Kansas City Royals, the Colorado Rockies, the L.A. Dodgers, etc. The Red Sox have been a very successful franchise in recent memory, and have indeed won a lot more games against the Yankees than a lot of other clubs. And while the Yanks have had a good run since 1996, the Sox did beat out New York for the division title in 1995, a post-season which I certainly don't think was insignificant.

So Barry Bonds doesn't have a World Series ring. How does that diminish the fact that he is arguably the best hitter in baseball--EVER? As if Barry Bonds just didn't have the special World-Series-Champion-Aura that Chad Curtis gave the Yankees in 1999. This is, incidentally, the same line of reasoning that kept Alex Rodriguez from getting an MVP for so long. "How valuable can he be on a last place team?" For starters, a lot more valuable than anyone else would be on that team. As Rob Neyer pointed out, that's why it's called the Most Valueable Player award.

But I've deviated from my original topic: team accomplishments short of championships are not worthless. That doesn't mean we can't long for a World Series victory for the M's, but it does mean that we can, if we work hard enough to forget what the team is doing right now, think fondly of the banners hanging in Safeco Field and be proud of them.

We'll take the win

Not that it matters much in the larger scheme of things (since the M's have a pretty good lock on last place in the AL West), but I'll take a win any way I can get it, even if it's as ugly as the one tonight. Eight walks allowed by Mariner pitchers. In fact, if you look at the box score, you'll see that more Padres got on base than Mariners. With 8 hits, 8 walks, and a hit batsman, the Pads got one more on base than the 13 hits +3 walks by the Mariners. The M's did, however, show quite a bit of power, getting 23 total bases vs. San Diego's 13 total bases.

The tradition of Runs, Hits and Errors is so entrenched (Krylon spray paint even had a slogan based off it) that I doubt it will change any time soon, but including walks in that list would sure help give a better synopsis of the game, since they tell us a lot about the pitching and offense. Tonight, they'd tell us that the 7-3 win by the M's wasn't a dominating one. But like I said, I'll take 'em however they come.

What KC knows about Beltran

Just so you know, word in Kansas City is that Carlos Beltran doesn't really have the arm he used to, due to elbow problems. I can't verify this or disprove it, but thought I'd offer it for what it's worth.

I went to my first Royals game of the season on Sunday, with 20-year old Zach Grinke not able to match Tom Glavine and--surpise, surprise--the Royals lost. Beltran badly misjudged the distance on a ball that turned out to be a home run, crashing painfully into the outfield wall; and this is in his home ballpark.

None of this means the M's shouldn't pursue him in the off-season, but he may not be quite the defensive juggernaut that some believe him to be.

If you don't read Sports and Bremertonians, then you missed their link to an article with Carlos Guillen's comments--which strike them and myself as pretty accurate--about the Mariner's foolish dismissal of Guillen's talent and potential.

Protecting Outs

Scott at Caffienated Confines, with whom I used to banter with over on the Mariners official web site fan forum during its glory days, scoffs at the notion that the M's are lacking "fire." I agree. The M's are lacking hitters, pitchers, and fielders.

I really can't stand it when people say things that have no meaning, especially when they try to dress up vapid content with words that are supposed to sound hip or sophisticated. I see this in papers of undergraduates that I grade, and in sales pitches from people that don't know their product. To those people I say: you're only fooling yourself. The rest of us know you don't really know what you're saying. The key to effective words are significant ideas behind them.

But getting back to what Scott also says:

"Outs are guarded jealously, like Gollum with his “Precious", losing sight of the consideration that outs are merely a means to an end. The end being runs, which last time I checked was what they count up when they want to know who won or lost. The 2003 Marlins were one of the most go-go teams in baseball of the last several years, and they finished a lot further along than station to station teams like the Athletics."

First of all, the Marlins did not finish "a lot further along" than the A's. People who decry the Athletics approach to baseball often try to paint the A's as a failure, but they've made it to the playoffs more than the M's have in the last five years, and have done it in a tough division spending less money than any of their divisional opponents. The post-season is unpredictable, and the A's have just run into some hot teams or had some unfortunate breaks. But most teams should be jealous of the A's.

Secondly, outs, by themselves, aren't a means to an end. The recent talk about "Productive Outs" are an attempt to distinguish between outs that accomplish something, and those that don't. But it's far better to have good batters who get on base and don't make outs in the first place. Perhaps Scott's suggestion that Bob Melvin should take more risks is a good one, but not because Melvin should be making more outs. The real reason to give for running more would be that the benefits outweigh the risks. For a Mariner team that doesn't hit many extra-base hits, and does have a few speedy players, snagging additional bases is certainly a laudible goal. But the last thing bunt-happy Melvin needs to do is be less careful with his outs.

"Empty" Batting Averages, Exhibit A

Peter over at Mariner Musings goes through the M's and Expos' lineups to see if one good team could be made from both their lineups. If you're curious, go see what the answer is. Buried in that post is this little example of why batting average is so over-rated as a statistic, something I know in my head but have a hard time accepting intuitively. But when Peter compares left-fielders, he gets:

Raul Ibanez (.268/.330/.505, 23 XBH, 16 BB, 194 AB)
Brad Wilkerson (.236/.355/.455, 21 XBH, 36 BB, 191 AB)

Those averages are Batting, On-Base Percentage, and Slugging. XBH is extra-base hits. If someone offered you a .268 hitter or a .236 hitter which would you take? But Peter rightly notes that "essentially, the difference between Wilkerson and Ibanez is 5 singles (in Ibanez’s favor) and 16 walks (in Wilkerson’s favor). That’s 11 more times on-base, a.k.a. “11 fewer outs”, in Wilkerson’s favor." It's not like Wilkerson's advantage in OBP and Ibanez's in batting average cancel each other out: Wilkerson has been the better batter this year.

Oh, and by the way, Wilkerson is getting paid a near-league-minimum $375K this year, far less than Raul's near-$4M salary.

To be fair, Ibanez's isn't a totally "empty" batting average (see Dan Wilson for that). But I think the comparison here between Ibanez and Wilkerson is instructive.

Misc. thoughts on tonight's game...

*Koch issues an intentinal walk to Edgar after a 1-2 count? There are benefits to having a reputation such as Edgar's.

*Good to see Ichiro continue to see better success on the basepaths. His game is so dependent upon speed that losing a step would be devastating for him.

*How absurd is it that Dave Hansen has the same amount of plate appearances as Willie Bloomquist? Tonight's game adds to the small sample size of Hansen's performance this season

*Let's hope Melvin continues to put Winn in left field. He will likely do so for the wrong reasons--to keep Winn more relaxed in the batter's box--but at least he's doing it. Now, about actually putting your best defender in centerfield (psst! it's Ichiro) ...

*I don't usually listen to the post-game show, mostly because I can't stand to listen to callers who don't know what they're talking about. (Maybe I should call in myself, right?) Anyway, tonight was no exception. The first caller I heard actually called Melvin out, but did so for failing to bunt in the sixth. The next caller complained about not using the suicide squeeze; to their credit, radio men Norm Charlton and Tom Hutyler both cautioned about wasting an out, not to mention the risk that the batter won't make contact and the runner will just be tagged out. (I would be curious if someone has done a study specifically on suicide squeezes.)

As for the first caller's suggestion, let's look at that inning.
-D Hansen hit a ground rule double to deep center.
-S Spiezio walked.
-R Aurilia popped out to shortstop.
-D Wilson popped out to first.
-H Bocachica flied out to right.

Notice that bunting would have accomplished nothing. The inning would have ended with runners on second and third, instead of first and second.

Fans that think Melvin isn't bunting enough just haven't been paying attention.

*Also on the post-game show, Randy Winn pulls out the old "I'm not really looking to hit a home-run line" when asked about his massive shot. Why do players think trying to hit for power is something to be ashamed of? Winn's comments are by no means rare; so where did this line come from?

On Vacation

...in California (ye olde stomping grounds before Grad School) and will return in a week.