2011 MLB Season

[gunnar hendershow]

We can have the All-Virgin Team picked solely by people who spend 3 hours a day on Baseball Prospectus as the second All-Star Game. I'm sure the ratings will be just BONKERS for that one.

And after that we can have the all moron team picked solely by people who thought that signing Vladdy and Mark Reynolds was going to make the Orioles better than the Rays. The ratings will be great unless there's a Two and a Half Men rerun airing opposite.

Pretty sure I didn't have much if anything positive to say about Reynolds. Vlad has made the Orioles lineup better, the numbers don't lie. And the two teams are pretty tight this far through the season. Both teams have had some nice streaks and some bad streaks. Matt Joyce is the only factor making the Rays a little better than the Orioles and Jays, besides that the three "other" teams in the East all stack up very evenly.

[Ananas]

The numbers do not lie, maybe you lie about the numbers. .289/.314/.403 from a DH? That makes the Orioles better? Orioles DHs combined for a line of .278/.359/.506 in 2010 so Vladdy's numbers have been a step down year to year. Maybe he'd have made the team better if their 2010 DH had been Royce Clayton. And the Rays are on pace to win 84 games, the Jays 82 and the O's 76. I'm not sure how on pace to be 6 games out of 4th and 8 out of 3rd constitutes "tight". In runs scored, the Blue Jays have 272, the Rays have 232 and the Orioles have 216. In ERA, the Rays are at 3.60, the Jays are 3.94 and the Orioles are 4.35. But who am I to argue with your vast baseball knowledge, I'll just go back to Baseball Prospectus and keep my stupid "fact based opinions" to myself.

[GhostMachine]

2. Certain players get into the ASG based on past performances or what team they play for, and that's not right. If you suck ass in the current season, you DO NOT belong in the game, no matter who you play for. To me, Panni89's reason for voting for Jeter makes sense. Voting for him because of who he is or what he's done in the past when there players better than him right now being left out just plain doesn't.

You realize you just contradicted yourself in the same paragraph, right? You say Panni voting for Jeter makes sense, meanwhile the reason he voted for him is because he stands out. He clearly stands out because he's Derek Jeter and his past performances. That's why he has that certain appeal.

The next sentence you say voting for him because of who he is or what he's done in the past doesn't make sense. Care to make sense of your hypocrisy?

Read the first sentence of Panni's post. That's the part that made sense.

I've thought about it and I think a better way to handle the ASG would be this:

Leave the way players are selected by fan balloting alone, but change it so that when the managers pick alternates (including pitchers), they have to pick from players who won postseason awards the previous season first. And they CANNOT pick players from their own team unless it was an award only given to one player (ie, the league MVP is left out for some reason) or all the other players they invite first decline.

(The reason I'm against managers picking players from their own team is because one year Bobby Cox loaded up on Braves players and left out a few players who should have been there more)

Edited June 3, 2011 by GhostMachine

[SeanDMan]

So this started out by complaining that fans pick morons so now, to solve that, the managers who pick the remaining players should discard this year's play and elect people who were given awards for what they did last year.

That would certainly fix absolutely nothing with your original complaint. Well done. Have you considered working on the Israeli/Palestinian peace process?

[GhostMachine]

I didn't say it was a perfect solution. But its better than a bunch of players getting in who don't even deserve to be in the game at all who only get in because the manager likes them or they play for him.

[SeanDMan]

You're basically suggesting that instead of making an informed decision of who has been the best this year, we should remove the bias and slot in people who were judged to be the best last year.

Because this makes sense.

[SeanDMan]

Why don't we just put people in based on alphabetical order, if we're discarding objective views of how they've played this year and going with an arbitrary system?

[SeanDMan]

That would keep Derek Jeter out.

...unless you went with first names. Shit.

[gunnar hendershow]

The numbers do not lie, maybe you lie about the numbers. .289/.314/.403 from a DH? That makes the Orioles better? Orioles DHs combined for a line of .278/.359/.506 in 2010 so Vladdy's numbers have been a step down year to year. Maybe he'd have made the team better if their 2010 DH had been Royce Clayton. And the Rays are on pace to win 84 games, the Jays 82 and the O's 76. I'm not sure how on pace to be 6 games out of 4th and 8 out of 3rd constitutes "tight". In runs scored, the Blue Jays have 272, the Rays have 232 and the Orioles have 216. In ERA, the Rays are at 3.60, the Jays are 3.94 and the Orioles are 4.35. But who am I to argue with your vast baseball knowledge, I'll just go back to Baseball Prospectus and keep my stupid "fact based opinions" to myself.

A quick look at projected standings for the rest of 2011 actually points out that (due to their remaining schedules) the Orioles should finish with a better record than Toronto and on level pegging with Tampa Bay. In line with the overall drop the Orioles lineup is also moderately better than it was most of last year (From August on is a very weird anomaly, teams don't have those sorts of improvements very often. There is nothing statistical that can explain it). With players like Scott, who was DHing a lot last year, playing a number of different positions due to necessity the Orioles have certainly improved their lineup at the top this year and Vlad is a reason for that. Adam Jones is currently one of the hottest hitters in baseball, Matt Wieters is getting things together, and Nick Markakis has quietly gotten his average back up closer to respectability after his terrible start. Plus, adding to the benefit of Vlad is how big of a drop there has been in Scott's been this year. Stats can only tell so much, you have to watch the team for a ton more knowledge. So I'll just watch the team instead of relying on a website for my knowledge of them and their goings on. Billy Beane's constant stat pruning sure has won Oakland a lot of rings.

[GhostMachine]

So anyone have any thoughts about the Giants' GM still driving the waaaahmbulance over Buster Posey a week after it happened?

Personally, I think a fine and a warning against the retaliation he mentioned are in order.

[sahyder1]

So anyone have any thoughts about the Giants' GM still driving the waaaahmbulance over Buster Posey a week after it happened?

Personally, I think a fine and a warning against the retaliation he mentioned are in order.

Yeah, Sabean probably will be fined. People are going a little over the top with this. Home plate collisions are rare but they happen. Collisions at 2nd base are far more frequent. What's next...eliminating slides to break up double plays?

[GhostMachine]

Sabean has gone over the top, just like the Cleveland Cavaliers owner did over LeBron James going to Miami. Except that was somewhat understandable. Sabean is just whining about something that everyone and their brother has said was a routine baseball play but should probably lead to rules changes, plus he made a threat. I just don't see how MLB can stand by and not punish him.

And if the Giants retaliate against Cousins, the player who does it and Sabean should both be tossed out of baseball. I don't mean suspended, but banned.

[Ananas]

A quick look at projected standings for the rest of 2011 actually points out that (due to their remaining schedules) the Orioles should finish with a better record than Toronto and on level pegging with Tampa Bay.

I'd find you examples of people like Keith Law talking about how ludicrous the strength of schedule stat is especially two months into the season, but I'm sure you'd just say he sits in his mother's basement all day playing D&D and not watching baseball at all.

In line with the overall drop the Orioles lineup is also moderately better than it was most of last year (From August on is a very weird anomaly, teams don't have those sorts of improvements very often. There is nothing statistical that can explain it).

Not statistical, but it's not uncommon for a change of manager to shock the players into life.

With players like Scott, who was DHing a lot last year, playing a number of different positions due to necessity the Orioles have certainly improved their lineup at the top this year and Vlad is a reason for that.

Wait, what? Vlad has only been a DH this year. The line I gave you was not solely Luke Scott, it was the combined numbers of Orioles DHs. Since he's less positionally flexible than Scott and has been worse than the combined DH numbers of Scott/Wigginton/Reimold etc, in what way has he made the Orioles a better team than 2010?

Adam Jones is currently one of the hottest hitters in baseball, Matt Wieters is getting things together, and Nick Markakis has quietly gotten his average back up closer to respectability after his terrible start.

No one ever denied the young talent the Orioles have. More the decision to spend a ton of money on players that should be in a retirement home.

Plus, adding to the benefit of Vlad is how big of a drop there has been in Scott's been this year.

Still been better than Vlad.

Stats can only tell so much, you have to watch the team for a ton more knowledge. So I'll just watch the team instead of relying on a website for my knowledge of them and their goings on. Billy Beane's constant stat pruning sure has won Oakland a lot of rings.

*sigh* This being an argumentative prick thing doesn't suit me so I'm trying to avoid it. I hate getting into these stupid pissing matches because they're a waste of both of our time, but that just completely unnecessary and condescending knock on stats conscious fans annoyed me. But let me assure you, I watch plenty of baseball. I've been to all but one of the Jays home games since the start of the 2008 season (and that was one of the three games that got shifted to Philly because of a G8 summit in Toronto). I'm a Sunday Night Baseball junkie. I have an MLB.tv package for when I have a lazy afternoon. I don't play Fantasy Baseball, so my stat slant is more towards having a greater understanding of the game. One word of advice, if you want to knock stats fans Fangraphs has totally replaced BP as the site du jour for us nerds living in our mother's basements. And I wouldn't be a nerd living in his mother's basement if I didn't point out that Theo Epstein and Andrew Friedman had done pretty well with a stats slanted approach.

[Toe]

I think the Jays are looking better and better as the season goes on. It has surprised me how well they have managed with Adam Lind out of the line up. He was absolutely raking. When he returns, having him behind Bautista is the line up is going to be a big upgrade.

The Jays and Orioles play the first of three tonight in Baltimore. It should be fun.

[Toe]

If the Jays cannot get a 3B that can hit anything, they should probably allow John MacDonald to play there full-time. Nix and Encarnacion are both dissapointing offensively. At least you get solid defence with Joey Mac playing third. I say play Mac at third until Brett Lawrie is called up. I believe they were going to bring him up now, but he got injured.

[sahyder1]

If the Jays cannot get a 3B that can hit anything, they should probably allow John MacDonald to play there full-time. Nix and Encarnacion are both dissapointing offensively. At least you get solid defence with Joey Mac playing third. I say play Mac at third until Brett Lawrie is called up. I believe they were going to bring him up now, but he got injured.

They had announced his call up before the minor league game was over. He ended up injuring himself and ended up in the hospital. I think they have him listed as day-to-day.

[sahyder1]

A somewhat unbelievable stat of the night. David Ortiz has never been hit by the Yankees. He's owned the Yankees with something like 33 or 34 career homeruns and 120 RBIs. He's playing his 160th career game against the Yankees right now.

[gunnar hendershow]

Bob Geren has been fired by Oakland as a result of their 9-game losing streak.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=6644571

[sahyder1]

Joe Girardi told the media today that Jobs Chamberlain probably needs Tommy John surgery.

[Toe]

Sounds like Dustin Pedroia is going to miss a month with a knee injury.