Peabody: Life, Friends Baseball

Here’s some snippets from this morning’s rant. I tried to establish some sort of cognitive pattern, but it IS very hard to do:

1. Keep throwing out bargain-bin players, you’ll get bargain-bin results.
2. A young team feeling its way. Learning its way. Wedge said after the game that his squad is close. And yeah, I can see that.
3. Except they aren’t. They are losing.
4. The M’s have some young prospects like Kyle Seager and Michael Saunders and yes, Dustin Ackley. Seager was a non-factor last night, Saunders messed up big-time on the bases and Ackley hit a home run but has been terrible this season. Not one of them is as promising as Mike Trout of the Angels who drove in five runs tonight, two of them on a flyball out. That alone is a warning sign. No team should score twice by tagging up on the same flyball.
5. So, why are you now bending over backwards to accept this so-called rebuilding strategy?
6. But what I’m not going to do, in the interim, is blame a guy like 33-year-old career journeyman Josh Kinney for last night’s loss.
7. the Mariners are not the Brewers, the Pirates, the Rays, or the A’s. They don’t have to play poor man’s Moneyball while the franchise gets wealthier off a tax-funded stadium. And if the M’s do try to start spending more next winter under the guise that they are now “ready” to do it, it will prompt the question of “Why now?” Which young core of players took that quantum leap forward in 2012 that prompted the additional spending this time around, as opposed to last winter, or two years ago? Who formed that game-changing group of difference-makers now?

Where to start? There are some good points, some confusion, some collateral damage, good old podium thumping outrage. Can’t really call it analysis, more like assessing the damage after a shotgun goes off in a small room full of stuffed animals.

1. Keep throwing out bargain-bin players, you’ll get bargain-bin results. Last week Baker wrote a piece advocating the FREE TALENT argument to augment a core group that asserted the bargain bin guys filled in around talent and youth. St. Louis is the prime example of that…analytically, you can’t argue for that approach one week and then say the Ms should follow the Red Sox the next week.

2. A young team feeling its way. Learning its way. Wedge said after the game that his squad is close. And yeah, I can see that.

3. Except they aren’t. They are losing. These two need to be responded to together. A team wins when all aspects of the game are played well and in balance, pitching, defense and hitting. Players develop pitch by pitch, at bat by at bat, inning by inning, game by game, week by week, month by month over several years whether the team wins or not.

Citing the win loss record of a rebuilding team that brought it’s first fruit of rebuilding drafts to the majors last June, July and August as succeeding or failing is stupid, ignorant or mendacious. The win loss record will show positive traction when a core group of players have 1,000 at bats or so. It might be a good idea though to pitch as many of the younger pitchers as soon as possible, because they represent a significant portion of the potential success of the rebuild.

4. The M’s have some young prospects like Kyle Seager and Michael Saunders and yes, Dustin Ackley. Seager was a non-factor last night, Saunders messed up big-time on the bases and Ackley hit a home run but has been terrible this season. Not one of them is as promising as Mike Trout of the Angels who drove in five runs tonight, two of them on a flyball out. That alone is a warning sign. No team should score twice by tagging up on the same flyball. So the two run sac fly, kind of lies at the feet of Eric Thames, although you could criticize Ackley for lining up for a throw home to get the run, Thames threw poorly to second base and the ball got past Ryan and the second run scored. As I noted last night Wells would have thrown him out and has a superior arm. Mr. Baker will not criticize any ex-bluejay or player from the great white north. It’s not a warning sign, it was a bad play especially against the Angels. Even if he hits Ryan with the throw, its problematic if they get the second runner at home. So the Ms don’t have Mike Trout, does that mean their rebuild is poor? Right now Mike Trout looks like the best player to come to the major leagues since Ruth, Mantle or Mays, in fact he’s off to a better start than all three of them. Significantly better, reminds me of a stronger version of Junior. Can the Ms use somebody like that? For sure! It is not likely to show up out of their system yet, because he’s not there, but there are some players coming.

5. So, why are you now bending over backwards to accept this so-called rebuilding strategy?
This is a baby being thrown out with the bathwater kind of thing. Other than Felix there really was no talent on this team when Zduriencik arrived and he’s been changing out by draft, dumpster diving and one bad free agent signing and another where the guy’s body just quit on him, or he does not want to play, who knows. In the midst of this the ownership has now cut annualized payroll in half. The criticism needs to be directed towards Lincoln and Armstrong and all the owners. That needs to be said, specifically and repeated.

6. But what I’m not going to do, in the interim, is blame a guy like 33-year-old career journeyman Josh Kinney for last night’s loss. Surely not. But the decision to run him out there and leave him there for both innings, regardless of Wilhelmsen’s presence or lack thereof can and should be criticized. There were other guys other than Kinney.

7. the Mariners are not the Brewers, the Pirates, the Rays, or the A’s. They don’t have to play poor man’s Moneyball while the franchise gets wealthier off a tax-funded stadium. And if the M’s do try to start spending more next winter under the guise that they are now “ready” to do it, it will prompt the question of “Why now?” Which young core of players took that quantum leap forward in 2012 that prompted the additional spending this time around, as opposed to last winter, or two years ago? Who formed that game-changing group of difference-makers now? Earlier this week Baker said the Ms could have done this with Jeff Clement, Jose Lopez, Wladimir Balantien, and Yuniesky Betancourt. Probably not. Most assuredly not. St. Louis is a better model.

The concern with the group of young players and pitchers now here accumulating at bats and continuing to develop is whether or not the resources are with the team to assist them in the face of stumbling along the way.

Until the group shows that they are getting it and playing well, it is unlikely they will sign top tier free agents here, because the ownership is cheap and the rest of baseball thinks the ownership group is not committed to winning. This coming winter there are not hardly any good free agent hitters.

This entry was posted on Saturday, August 11th, 2012 at 1:48 pm by terrybenish and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.