Evaluating a strange offseason in San Diego
HardBallTimes Thursday, January 19th, 2012
Josh Byrnes has been busy in San Diego Click the title to read more. Read more great baseball stuff at The Hardball Times .
On Edgar Martinez
HardBallTimes Thursday, January 19th, 2012
Does Edgar Martinez deserve a spot in the Hall of Fame? Click the title to read more. Read more great baseball stuff at The Hardball Times .
SABR Analytics Conference
HardBallTimes Wednesday, January 18th, 2012
The Hardball Times is proud to be one of the sponsors of a brand new thing, the SABR Analytics Conference . We’re sponsoring this conference along with other well-known baseball organizations and websites such as Bloomberg Sports , Baseball Reference , Baseball Prospectus and Fangraphs . The conference, to be held in Scottsdale from March 15-17, is available to anyone and will feature research presentations, panels and guest speakers. Speakers will include a slew of major league insiders. Plus, there is going to be a case competition, in which teams from many undergraduate and graduate schools present their analysis and recommendations for a baseball business case. Yours truly will be on the panel of judges for the case competition. Bribes will be accepted. Here’s the registration webpage . Lower fees are still available for early registration. This event is highly recommended for all baseball nerds and easy to fit into a spring training tip, to boot. I hope to see you there. Read more great baseball stuff at The Hardball Times .
BOB: Mets owner scores another win in court
HardBallTimes Wednesday, January 18th, 2012
The latest in the business of baseball. Click the title to read more. Read more great baseball stuff at The Hardball Times .
Is Jorge Posada toast as a righty hitter?
HardBallTimes Wednesday, January 18th, 2012
Hey, he still hasn’t officially retired. Click the title to read more. Read more great baseball stuff at The Hardball Times .
A baseball card mystery: Thurman Munson and who?
HardBallTimes Wednesday, January 18th, 2012![](http://philaphans.com/phillies/wp-content/themes/blognewsv102/timthumb.php?src=http://philaphans.com/phillies/files/2012/01/8392Munson.jpg&h=&q=90&w=90&h=65&zc=1")
Jorge Posada ’s impending retirement has me thinking about great Yankee catchers. I’m not old enough to have seen Bill Dickey , Yogi Berra or Elston Howard in live action, but I’ve been fortunate to see both Posada and Thurman Munson up close and personal. Posada will be an interesting case for Hall of Fame discussion. His late start, coupled with his defensive shortcomings, will hurt his chances, though perhaps not irrevocably. Munson’s case for the Hall of Fame is a tougher sell. Due the ravaged state of his knees, he was already in decline by the time of the horrific plane crash and fire that took his life in 1979. His three phenomenal seasons of 1975 to 1977 constitute an impressive peak—he was arguably a better player than Carlton Fisk during that stretch—but three straight Hall of Fame seasons are not enough, at least not by themselves, to gain entrance to Cooperstown. With his squatty body and distinctive red chest protector, it’s always easy to pick Munson out on other player’s cards, like Terry Crowley ’s 1973 Topps card and Carl Yastrzemski ’s 1972 “In Action” card. Munson received his own action card in the 1972 set; he was one of 72 players to merit an action photo, complete with red banners all the way around. Technically speaking, we don’t really see Munson in action here, but rather in conference with one of his pitchers. Those conferences on the mound could become rather heated, with Munson loudly imploring his pitchers to pick up the pace, knock a hitter off the plate or simply throw some damn strikes. That brings us to this week’s baseball card mystery. It’s a two-parter, involving both location and identity. First off, the Yankees are clearly wearing their road grays, so we know that this photo was not taken at the old Yankee Stadium. Given the absence of the “Green Monster,” I think it’s safe to say that it’s not Fenway Park, either. That leaves us with 10 other choices, including old RFK Stadium in Washington, home of the Senators. Second, I’m left wondering which Yankee pitcher is standing on the mound next to Munson. His face is bathed in shadow, making an indentification difficult. His glove is not evident on his left-hand, so it is likely a southpaw. It could be Fritz Peterson , but I’m not certain. Other possibilities on the 1971 Yankees are Mike Kekich (whom I remember as being thinner than the pitcher on this card) and four relatively obscure relievers: Alan Closter, Rob Gardner , Gary Jones and Terry Ley . So who is it? And where is it? Read more great baseball stuff at The Hardball Times .
10th anniversary: Randy Winn’s greatest shot
HardBallTimes Wednesday, January 18th, 2012
Ten years ago, professional baseball player Randy Winn had maybe his best moment in sports. The neat part was, it had nothing to do with baseball. And Winn certainly didn’t expect to do anything memorable. No, he was just going to watch a basketball game in his home town of Los Angeles. He had tickets to that night’s Clippers-Cavaliers game in LA and just intended to see star Clippers players Elton Brand, Lamar Odom, and Corey Maggette play. The night turned out to be a bit more exciting for Winn, though. In the grand tradition of halftime entertainment, the Clippers promotional staff roped one random fan out of the stands to see if he could do the unlikely, sink a shot from half court in one, and only one, try. Oh, and just to make things interesting, a prize would be offered. A nice prize—a new car. As it happens, that lucky random fan was Winn. Well, from the point of view of the Clippers team and the car company, Winn is about as bad a random pick as you could hope for. He was something of a ringer. First, he was a professional athlete, as he was the starting right fielder for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays at the time. Second, he wasn’t just a baseball player. In college he played basketball in Division I. Winn was a college teammate of Steve Kerr at Santa Clara. In 1993, their team became the second 15th seed in history to win a game in the annual NCAA tournament. And now Winn was given a chance to sink a basket from half court to win a new car. You know how this ends. It wouldn’t be much of a story if he missed. Of course, Winn’s aim was true, and he won himself a brand new Mitsubishi Lancer. Since Winn was already a millionaire by this time, he didn’t really need the car, but he knew just what to do with it. He gave the new set of wheels to his mom. Oh, and the Clippers won, 109-103 . Aside from that, today many other events celebrate their anniversary or “day-versary” (which is an event that occurred X-thousand days ago). Here they are, with the better ones in bold if you’d rather just skim. Day-versaries 2,000 days since Luke Scott hits for the cycle. 5,000 days since Randy Winn makes his big league debut. 5,000 days since Ivan Rodriguez gets his 1,000th hit. 6,000 days since Ron Darling plays in his last game. 6,000 days since Reggie Sanders of the Reds hits three homers in one game. 6,000 days since Kirby Puckett belts his best WPA home run. With two outs in the bottom of the ninth and Minnesota trailing by two run, he connects for a three-run homer and a 7-6 Twins lead over the Mariners. His WPA for the home run: 0.892. 8,000 days since owners drop their demands on arbitration and salary consessions during the 1994-95 work stoppage. 9,000 days since the White Sox beat the Red Sox, 8-6, despite an odd quirk. Despite getting 11 guys on base, Chicago ends the game with zero runners left on base. Eight score, two are out in double plays, and the remaining baserunner is caught stealing . 10,000 days since Tony Perez hits the 11th and final walk-off home run of his career. It’s his sole pinch-hit walk-off home run. His homer gives the Reds a 7-5 win over Pittsburgh in 11 innings. 15,000 days since fire damages the abandoned Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. 20,000 days since many players make their big league debuts, including Roger Maris , Dick Drott , Sam Mele , and Jim Landis . 25,000 days since pitchers Whitlow Wyatt and Manny Salvo go after each other after exchanging beanballs in a 2-0 Braves win over the Dodgers. Anniversaries 1896 Bill McGowan, Hall of Famer, is born. 1934 Dizzy Dean confidently predicts the Cardinals will win the pennant, with himself winning 25 games and younger brother Paul notching 18-20 victories. 1938 Curt Flood , super fielding center fielder, is born . 1947 Pittsburgh purchases Hank Greenberg for $75,000. He’ll play one year there and then retire. 1952 The White Sox accept the resignation of GM Charles A. Comiskey, Jr. after his request for more money is turned down. 1954 Scott McGregor , pitcher, is born. 1961 Schoolboy Rowe , former Tigers pitcher, dies. 1964 Brady Anderson , unlikely 50-homer guy, is born. 1969 Washington hires Ted Williams as its manager. He’ll be the last manager in Senators history. 1971 Pittsburgh signs amateur free agent Tony Armas . 1972 Mike Lieberthal , longtime Phillies catcher, is born. 1973 Boston signs free agent Orlando Cepeda . He’ll be the team’s DH. 1985 The Brewers, Rangers, Mets, and Royals engage in the rare four-team trade. Texas gets Don Slaught , Milwaukee lands Danny Darwin and Tim Leary , KC gets Jim Sundberg , and the Mets receive Frank Wills . 1994 Baseball owners approve of a revenue plan that is keyed to a salary cap. This will need player approval, and that will cause that year’s strike . 1995 With the strike still going on, 55-year old Phil Niekro says a team contacted him and his 50-year-old brother Joe Niekro about possibly returning to the mound in 1995. He won’t say which team asked. 1995 Former baseball umpire and best-selling author Ron Luciano commits suicide at age 57 . 1999 Five are injured when a fiberglass panel falls from the roof of Olympic Stadium in Montreal during the setup for an auto show . 2002 San Diego signs free agent Ron Gant . 2006 Pitcher Danny Graves returns to Vietnam, where he had been born in 1973. It’s his first visit there since 1974. He’s there to teach kids baseball. 2008 The White Sox sign amateur free agent Alexei Ramirez . 2008 Seattle signs free agent reliever Arthur Rhodes . 2011 Detroit signs free agent pitcher Brad Penny . 2011 Gil Meche announces his retirement, opting to forego the final year of his contract . Read more great baseball stuff at The Hardball Times .
10,000 days since Buddy Bell walk-off slam
HardBallTimes Tuesday, January 17th, 2012
10,000 days ago, one of baseball’s more underrated talents did one of the coolest things a player could do. On Aug. 31, 1984 , Buddy Bell belted a walk-off grand slam to cap an impressive rally for his Texas Rangers. On that day, Texas hosted the Milwaukee Brewers, and things didn’t go the home team’s way for most of the day. The Brew Crew busted out to a 6-1 lead, largely thanks to a four-run sixth inning. (In that frame, Texas stopped the Milwaukee rally by calling on a young relief pitcher name Tom Henke , who made only his 30th big league outing on that day). Heading into the bottom of the ninth, it was still 6-1 and Milwaukee could seemingly sleepwalk to victory. However, reliever Jack Lazorko had lost his edge. After pitching three scoreless innings in relief (it was a different time), Lazorko began his fourth frame by surrendering back-to-back singles. Well that’s no good for Milwaukee, so skipper Rene Lachemann made a change, calling on Rick Waits to finish off the game. Waits was no better, however, as he also allowed back-to-back singles. Now the score was 6-3, with the tying run at the plate and still nobody out. Optimists in Arlington’s crowd of 9,404 started to wonder if Texas really could do it. Probably not. Milwaukee now brought in Pete Ladd , and he quickly got two outs. First he fanned Alan Bannister , and then he made leadoff hitter Mickey Rivers send a meek pop foul to the third baseman. Now Texas was down to its last out. Sure enough, they appeared doomed when Gary Ward , Texas’ last hope, hit a grounder to Milwaukee’s superstar shortstop Robin Yount . It should’ve been an easy out to end the inning and game. Should’ve. But Yount pooched the play somehow, and all hands were safe. That brought up Buddy Bell for his big moment. Bell was never a huge power hitter, but he had enough oomph to make teams respect him. He’d belted over 140 homers in his career and was a good enough all-around player to win selection to five All-Star games – including one earlier this year. Though he hadn’t belted a grand slam in three years, he’d hit five in his career. In fact, a dozen years earlier his first home run was a grand slam home run. And sure enough, he took a nice swing and drove the ball over the fence. It completed a wild comeback and gave the Rangers a 7-6 win over the Brewers, with the final runs officially unearned due to Yount’s error. Aside from that, many other events celebrate their anniversaries and “day-versraries” today. Here they are, with the better ones in bold if you’d prefer to skim the list: Day-versaries 5,000 days since the Marlins lose, dropping Jim Leyland’s career record under .500 (956-957). He remains under .500 until the very end of the 2011 season when he finally goes back over it. 7,000 days since the A’s trade Walt Weiss to the Florida. 7,000 days since the Reds trade Norm Charlton to the Mariners for Kevin Mitchell . 7,000 days since the NL expansion draft for the Marlins and the Rockies. The Rockies pick up: Eric Young from the Dodgers, Joe Girardi from the Cubs, Andy Ashby from the Phillies, Vinny Castilla from the Braves, Brad Ausmus from the Yankees, and future big league manager Eric Wedge from the Red Sox. The Marlins pick up: Trevor Hoffman from the Reds, Greg Hibbard from the White Sox, Jeff Conine from the Royals, Carl Everett from the Yankees, Brian Harvey from the Angels, and Darren Jackson from the Pirates . 9,000 days since Mike Young has the best known WPA game by a Baltimore bat. He goes 3-for-4 with two homers in an extra-inning 8-7 win over the Angels. Young homers in the 10th and 12th inning in the game. 9,000 days since Joe Carter belts three home runs in a game for the second time in his career. He’ll do it three more times in his career. 20,000 days since Jack Coombs , former 30-game winner, dies. Also along these lines, at some point today it will be one billion seconds since Larry Bowa legs out the only inside the park home run Tom Seaver ever allows. Anniversaries 1888 The American Association admits the Kansas City Cowboys to the league to replace the defunct New York Metropolitans. 1895 Andrew Freeman buys controlling interest in the Giants. 1895 St. Louis and Pittsburgh swap pitchers. The Pirates send Red Ehret and $3,000 to St. Louis for Pink Hawley . 1905 Ray Cunningham , who becomes one of the only ballplayers to live to the age of 100, is born. He’ll play 14 games for the 1931 Cardinals. 1915 The Cleveland Plain Dealer announces that the local AL team will now be called the Indians, replacing the Naps as their nickname . 1931 Don Zimmer , baseball lifer, is born . 1937 Cleveland trades pitcher Oral Hildebrand and two others to the Browns for three players. Hildebrand is guy who could’ve done much better for himself if he didn’t have the utterly horrible Browns defense behind him. 1939 Ed Barrow becomes Yankee president, replacing the recently deceased Jacob Ruppert . 1952 Darrell Porter , All-Star catcher, is born. 1952 Tigers owner Walter Briggs Sr. dies, making his son Walter “Spike” Briggs the big boss. 1960 Chili Davis , long-lasting outfielder, is born. 1970 Curt Flood files a $4.1 million lawsuit against baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn . 1970 In the January amateur draft, the following teams claim the following players: Cleveland gets Chris Chambliss , San Francisco gets Chris Speier , Boston gets Rick Burleson , Baltimore gets Doug DeCinces , Kansas City gets Greg Minton , and Washington gets Bill Madlock . 1979 Danny O’Brien signs a contract as president and CEO of Seattle nine days after resigning as Texas GM. 1983 Boston purchases Brian Kingman from Oakland. With Oakland, Kingman went 8-20 in 1980, and for a long time was baseball’s last 20-game loser. 1984 In the January draft, many teams draft prominent names that they won’t sign at this time, including: St. Louis drafting Jeff Blauser and Greg Vaughn ; Houston drafting Greg Hibbard; and Minnesota drafting Mark Grace . On a happier note, some teams draft players they will sign, most notably Pittsbugh with Jay Buhner and the Yankees with Tim Belcher . 1984 The Milwaukee Brewers release longtime infielder Don Money . 1999 The Giants sign free agent catcher Scott Servais . 2000 Tampa Bay signs free agent pitcher John Burkett . 2002 Bud Selig says Washington DC is a “prime candidate” for relocation if any team moves in the near future. 2002 Milwaukee signs free agent infielder Eric Young. 2002 David Wells signs with the New York Yankees, returning to the team he previously won a world title with . 2004 Former 1940s star pitcher Harry Brecheen dies. 2005 The Indians sign what’s left of Juan Gonzalez . 2008 Baseball owners vote unanimously to extend Bud Selig’s commissioner contract through 2012 . 2011 The Rockies sign free agent slugger Jason Giambi . Read more great baseball stuff at The Hardball Times .
The virtual 1958-68 Giants, Reds, and Cardinals (Part 7: 1963-64)
HardBallTimes Tuesday, January 17th, 2012
The Beatles are invading, it’s all the way with LBJ, and we understand that Brock kid might be available. Click the title to read more. Read more great baseball stuff at The Hardball Times .
Some thoughts on Moscoso
HardBallTimes Tuesday, January 17th, 2012
Part of the Rockies’ return package for Seth Smith is right-hander Guillermo Moscoso , who made 21 starts for the Athletics in 2011. Moscoso had some cups-of-coffee with the Rangers as a reliever in 2009 and 2010, but last year was the first time we got a good look (128 innings) at what Moscoso he has to offer. In short, he has a decent fastball and underwhelming off-speed pitches. He’ll throw his four-seamer a little under 91, backing it up with a high-70s changeup and slurvey curveball (the change goes against lefties, while batters from both sides will see his curve). At the end of July, Moscoco brought a mid-80s cutter into his repertoire as another weapon against righties (Dan Merqury made note of this last summer). Moscoso’s ERA last year was a very solid 3.38, but I’m lukewarm on his chances of replicating that mark. Over his career he has shown decent control (3.1 walks and hit batsmen per 9 innings), an unspectacular strikeout rate (5.6 strikeouts per 9), and an extreme flyball tendency (career ground ball rate of around 25%). His fastball has generated a swing-and-miss on nearly 17 percent of swings; that rate is league-average for four-seamers. However, none of his offspeed pitches have a rate over 21 percent, leaving him without a reliable out-pitch. He doesn’t really have anything that stays on the ground either: pitch x gb% Fastball 222 16% Curveball 103 41% Changeup 44 26% Cutter 13 38% Moscoso’s batting average on contacted pitches was .248 last year, lowest in the majors among pitchers with at least 100 innings. It’s fair to attribute some of this to the nature of Oakland Coliseum. As Greg Rybarczyk made note of in the 2011 THT Annual, Oakland’s colder-than-average temperatures help prevent home runs, and the park’s large amount of foul territory gets pitchers a lot of extra outs on balls hit into the air. What does this mean for Moscoso’s new team? Coors Field is a notorious slugger park and that does not fit Moscoso’s profile very well at all. The Rockies have plenty of starting pitchers (including Jhoulys Chacin , Jorge De La Rosa , Juan Nicasio , Jason Hammel , Drew Pomeranz , Kevin Slowey , Tyler Chatwood , and the other player in the Smith deal, Josh Outman ), so I doubt Moscoso even gets a look in the rotation at this point. Two notes – a) pitch IDs are by Harry Pavlidis (thank you, Harry); b) my dataset unfortunately is missing Moscoso’s last three 2011 starts, so the numbers in this article reflect his previous outings. Read more great baseball stuff at The Hardball Times .
