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Thursday, December 22, 2005

Shorter Bob Ryan

"Don't be your usual pathetic selves and blame Damon, after all he did for us."

[Apologies to Atrios.blogspot.com, inventor of this format of condensed column, wihch I plan to be stealing a lot.]

Wednesday, December 21, 2005

OK, What Just Happened??

Like most of you, I woke up to be unexpectedly cracked on the head, not unlike the time Pat Patterson hit Bruno Sammartino on the head with a chair during an interview.

Like most of you, I had the traditional response to a Sox player going to New York: hoping he gets injured.

The emotional impact of Damon's leaving is hard to address, at least beyond what's already in print. This sucks, and makes 2004 feel like a long time ago. Will Yankee fans remember the way Damon ended their season and sealed their place in history as the first team to choke a 3-game lead? Hope so, but they'd be forgiven for taking a more opportunist slant, for now.

Anyway, we can at least look at some numbers. Damon was fourth in the league in runs, went 18/19 in steals, and put up decent slugging for a leadoff hitter. None of that really matters much. Runs say more about the guys behind you; steals are nice but competent baserunning is all you need with Ortiz coming up; and slugging... like I said, the job is to get on base for the big guns.

So for this job -- Sox leadoff hitter -- the key qualification is on-base percentage. Damon was 19th in the AL at .366. Is that special, exactly? Well, Julio Lugo checked in at .362. Probably the next biggest qualification is patience. Now, what makes patience important is twofold: running up pitch counts is generall good, and where a hitter can work the count into an advantageous situation, it means he's taking control of the strike zone. The latter is a subjective matter, but at least regarding the former we can look at pitches seen. Damon ranks 22nd in the AL. Again, good, but the domain of the Lugos, Renterias (remember him?) and Sorianos... well behind the immortal Brandon Inge.

Defensively, Damon's play in center was commendable. With his quickness he covered a ton of ground, and his fearlessness was an asset in Fenway's strange dimensions. His arm was kind of a joke, however, so the comparisons to DiMaggio will be left aside for now.

All this adds up to one conclusion: if you don't get too emotional about it, Damon is replaceable. At far less than $13 mil a year. I wish it didn't come to this. But it did, and it's not that tall a task.

Personally I hope it's Jeremy Reed. The guy is 24, so his rookie season can't be evaluated seriously. He put up a .450 OB% in his last season in the minors. Not being a hitting coach, I can't say with any certainty how his success at the prior level can be translated into the bigs. But he can play the outfield, and has potential to be a top-of-the-order guy. The alternatives aren't special, and the Sox should avoid rusing headlong into any emergency deals. The biggest thing working against them is the scarcity of guys who can play center and get on base. But neither of those skills is unheard of, or irreplaceable.

Monday, December 12, 2005

So Many Rumors, So Little Time

* Do the Sox have an organizational plan? Apparently we're going to find out in an hour or two. Of course, I'm in DC and our hosts don't have NESN, so maybe I'll know by tonight. The question on everyone's mind, of course, is not what Ben Cherington and Jed Hoyer will be doing but Theo. Nobody's saying whether Theo is part of today's shindig.

* Evidence that they DO have a plan: contacting Clemens' agent for a return which would work on a number of levels. First, the guy can still pitch, and hard. Second, as a free agent who was not offered arbitration, he won't cost them draft picks. Lastly (I'm skipping the PR angle), bringing in a guy who Papelbon and Beckett admire could have a nice trickle down effect on the young guys on the roster, and even inspire Schilling, a former protege. [Clemens the role model? Has it come to this?] It also reinforces that the Sox are committed to the young guys, bringing in a short-timer while Papelbon, Hansen and Lester gestate a little longer, rather than the classic Steinbrenner move of signing a flashy name for the rotation who blocks all the youngsters indefinitely.

* Tejada sounds like an unlikely option. It's all too talk-radio simple to deal him for Manny, and doesn't take into account a lot of the ordinary complications, like how the money balances out, whether teams would trade within the division (to the team they're trying to catch), etc. My sense is that if Tejada really does want to leave, we wouldn't get him for less than Papelbon and Lester, which I think/hope is a non-starter. Anyway, if the O's go dealing, I just don't think it will be for a bat. They are desperate for pitching, and Tejada is one of their only commodities who could bring pitching in return.

* I did a little victory lap this morning when I saw Renteria complaining about the Fenway infield. I swear, it doesn't take a genius to think through the game. Case in point.

Thursday, December 08, 2005

The Aftermath

Just a couple quick notes. So now it appears the Sox want Marte for themselves, which sounds like great news to me. I had said earlier that maybe Lugo was a decent substitute for Renteria, if that deal had gone through, but because of Tampa's utter stupidity the Sox wind up with a far better deal: Marte, and whoever else they can get to play short, including a semi-incumbent Alex Cora. Like I said, the Sox seem to have a stash of blackmail materials on the rest of the league.

Like other blue chippers, we don't really know what Marte is, but by all accounts he has a very high ceiling, something that can't be said of Lugo, and probably can't be said of Renteria at this point. Of the three players rumored in the proposed 3-way deal, Marte is the most valuable because mega-prospects are much harder to find than shortstops with league-average production. And because mega-prospects can either turn into themselves, or be turned into established stars in need of a change of scenery. [And no, I don't want to see him traded for Tejada. The Orioles loved Clement a year ago; maybe they still do.]

My choice right now at SS is Alex Gonzalez. His defense intrigues me. As for Edgar, I guess we will never know if he would have gotten comfortable in Boston. But if he flops in Atlanta, at least then we will know it wasn't about getting comfortable so much as getting old.

BTW, there's a post in me, in a more contemplative mode, about Steven Goldman's Mind Game, particularly the chapter on controlling the strike zone. More later, I hope.
Shortstop Carousel Pt. III: Now What?

Yesterday and earlier, we looked into the relative strengths and weaknesses of incumbent Sox SS Edgar Renteria versus a couple rumored options. But we failed to compare him to his current real-life replacement: nothing. Had we done so, we might have seen those 30 errors as a small price to pay for Renteria's value-above-a-warm-body factor.

But now that we are there, and we know something will happen, let's consider two more options. First, in exchange the Sox acquired uber-prospect Andy Marte. Since Marte is further along in his development and boasts both power and defense on his resume, it's a bit generous to say Hanley Ramirez' departure makes this a wash, but Hanley's value increases slightly as a shortstop, so we will call this even. Add up all the deals and you've got Beckett + Lowell + Mota + Loretta for Renteria + Mirabelli + the two minor league pitchers. Four major league contributors (we'll remove "stud" from Beckett's name til that shoulder performs a bit) for a backup catcher, a shortstop who should have been better, and two kids. If we stopped there, one could scarcely complain.

But option A, supposedly, is to flip Marte for Lugo. Amazingly, it's the Devil Rays who have been objecting, although seasoned rumor readers will know that most GMs consider it impossible to talk to the D-Rays because they will always insist on your four best players in exchange for their refuse. From my perspective, it should be the Sox objecting. If Marte is the new Hanley Ramirez... well, it was risky to trade the original Hanley for a top-of-the-rotation starter, so I can't see why we would trade the next Hanley for a guy whose play might be nearly replicated off the waiver wire or bottom of the free agent market.

Which turns us, one can hope, to option B. Alex Gonzalez is the best freebie out there, despite a nightmarish .300-ish on-base %. He HAS hit for power -- 25 homers in 2004, in Miami no less -- before crashing back to Earth last year. Still, his 500 outs a year aren't as devastating with Loretta now taking care of business in the #2 slot; he could get his power stroke back in friendly Fenway; and he's good-glove, great-arm in the field. Think of him as Pokey Reese, except replace a dozen or so slap singles with three-run bombs.

So do we really like Alex Gonzalez? Not especially. But is the differential between him and Lugo worth giving up a great prospect?? No freakin' way.

Update! A certain Belgian cyclist points out that Alex Cora is another option already on board. He can be counted on for about a .700 OPS, and last time he played 138 games (in LA) he had 8 errors. So I would guess he can field. Presumably Pedroia is waiting in the wings, arriving no later than 2007.

Wednesday, December 07, 2005

How Can This Have Happened?

Someone in the Sox' office has nude photos of all the other owners. That's the only way to explain some of the trades we've been on the receiving end of in the last 8 years. Pedro for Armas and Pavano? Schilling for ... what was his name again?? Varitek and Lowe for Slocumb? And now... Mark Loretta for Doug Mirabelli? [I'll hold off on grading the Beckett trade, I still believe in some jinxes.]

Anyway, I simply can't see why we should be the recipients of such a lopsided deal. Mirabelli was a really useful guy, a luxury as a backup, but was never going to hit enough to warrant a feature role, even if Varitek wasn't around. I wrote last year that Mirabelli kills lefties, and even in the throes of a weak season in 2005 he still rang up a .356 OB%-.420 Slug-.776 OPS. Not too shabby. But a guy who gets 140 at-bats and serves as one pitcher's personal receiver simply isn't all that important.

Loretta, meanwhile, is almost an on-base machine. His career numbers, even in pitcher's parks in San Diego, are .365-.408-.773. Last year was an off-year, which combined with his age (34) is presumably why the Padres let him go. He was an all-star in 2004, when he hit .335 with an OPS just under .900, and at least one website claimed he was a gold-glove caliber defender. He came back to Earth some last season, presumably because of injuries given that he only played 105 games, and his slugging lost 150 points (to .347), well below any past performances. Bears watching. As does his transition to the AL, where he's never played.

But I like his chances -- the AL is the nibblers' league, and Loretta's hallmark, like many of his new teammates, is patience. As much as his slugging has fluctuated, his OB% numbers are steadily between .350 and .390... and as I said last night, for the table setters slugging isn't nearly as important as getting on. His strikeout totals the last four seasons are 37, 62, 45, 34. Good news, considering he's replacing Bellhorn for whom those numbers would reflect his last four months. Walk numbers max out in the high 50s, but last year he saw 3.9 pitches per at-bat, a Manny-like number. If healthy and rejuvenated (as a switch to the big time should guarantee), he will fit in perfectly with the Sox lineup.

Tuesday, December 06, 2005

The Shortstop Carousel, Part II

Just to prove that I am a topical fellow, along comes the shocking news that the Red Sox are contemplating trading Edgar Renteria for either Julio Lugo, or some other set of deals that would bring back Orlando Cabrera. Given that the Yankees are supposedly looking to complete their acquisition of the former Holy Trinity by putting Nomar in center, I guess nothing should surprise us. So let's break it down!

First, two background thoughts: one, I am a SABR devotee, and that's where this is headed, though I recognize that some people still put stock in batting average and RBIs. Second, my gut tells me I agree with Petey and Drew below, that Renteria would likely do better in 2006 than last year, having taken the early part of the season to get adjusted. That said, there's a negative vibe around him thanks to the fans, who are... well, let's just say Boston fans can be a bit unfair, and let's just say that in arriving there they can be... well, the kind of people who chant "Jeter sucks! A-Rod swallows!" even when the Sox are playing the Royals. So as far as the intangibles go, it's fair for the Sox to contemplate a change, even if it's a bit sad.

Numbers that matter
Renteria: .345 OB%, .399 slug, .744 OPS (2005: .335-.385-.720)
Lugo: .340-.400-.740 (2005: .362-.403-.765)
Cabrera: .315-.403-.718 (2005: .309-.365-.674)

Renteria's slow start last year is handily attributable to the fact that he had never played in the AL; subtract that and you get a guy who was pretty much right on his career numbers. In fact, after the All-Star Break the numbers were .345-.384-.730. And his reduced slugging probably has more to do with the dimensions of Fenway, where the balls don't roll forever and allow fast baserunners extra bases. Add back nine bases from steals and you're probably just about there. As for his fielding, 30 errors were nearly triple his 2004 total of 11. But consider: Fenway has a notoriously bumpy infield; and his first baseman was Kevin Millar... on a good day. Also, the supposed gold standard in Boston is Cabrera... but in a mere 57 games with the Sox, he had 8 errors, which translates into 22 over a 162-game season. And consider further that in 2004, Cabrera had 7 errors in 101 games with Montreal, and last year he committed 7 errors in 141 games with the Angels. Fenway starts looking like the only place Cabrera's ever made errors. Unfortunately, I can't find any source that breaks down errors by ballpark... but I'm wondering if the problem may have less to do with the player than the field? In St. Louis Edgar's error totals from 1999-2004 were 26, 27, 24, 19, 16, 11. So the popular angst that he sucks in the field might be completely unfounded. Maybe, just maybe, Sox fans have their heads up their ass.

Cabrera, meanwhile, has easily the worst offensive numbers, compounded by a 38-point dropoff upon signing a nice deal in Anaheim. We do know he can field, though as noted it's not clear he's any better than Renteria. And as discussed a year ago, his career high in OB% (.347) is about Renteria's average, with lows (.309) and averages (.315) that say "career minor leaguer." Of the three, he may be the best slugger -- by a hair if you use career averages, though he put up a .460 in 2003 -- but damn, he makes a TON of outs. There's a popular myth in Boston that he thrived in Fenway, and if 58 games tells you much, well, the totals were .320-.465-.785. That would be acceptable if he hadn't spent pretty much the rest of his career, and ALL of last season, undermining them.

Worse still, do we really even care about slugging here? Mild differentials mean little when the numbers are hovering around .400, and the shortstop's role in Boston is mostly to get on base, with little regard for which base, when you've got Manny and Papi coming up. If you focus on OB% primarily, Cabrera's not on the same page.

Which leaves Lugo. If you ignore the fact that he's the same age (31) as Renteria (Cabrera's 32), you might see an up-and-coming hitter. He's the least intimidating of the three in terms of homers, but after that the numbers look intriguing. Last year's .362 OB% is rather nice, especially for a guy who toggled back and forth between .322 and .338 the previous four seasons, and even more so for a guy who stole 39 bases when he did get on. Looking closer, his strikeouts went from 100 in 2003 (in roughly 20 fewer games), to 106, to 72, while his walks went from 44 to 54 to 61. And as for whether he would fit the system, he saw 3.62 pitches per at-bat, just shy of Renteria's 3.65 and well above Cabrera's 3.50. [If you're not sure what a truly patient hitter looks like, consider Manny saw 4.06 pitches per at bat last year. Remind me again why we're trading him?] I have no idea if Lugo can field, but the fact that he's been on carpet for a while isn't a good thing. At least he can run, 39 steals at age 31 are nothing to sneeze at.

[On second thought, this raises a red flag -- his walks didn't really go up much, so the 30-point bump in OB% was mostly on hits... and some years guys have a higher percentage of balls in play that fall in for hits, a number that suggests mostly luck, and which usually evens out the next year. However, on third thought, dropping his strikeouts by 30% suggests he was making better contact, meaning maybe the extra hits were attributable to hitting the ball harder. That's been known to work.]

The numbers don't tell us enough about whether we want Lugo versus Renteria, but they do seem to suggest Cabrera is the worst choice. Going that route is putting "chemistry" and "fan input" above empirical evidence, and if Cabrera came back and did well, we could only chalk it up to some intangible. And if we're gonna go on instinct, my gut tells me that Renteria will come back with something to prove. Lugo is a gamer, so he might fit well in Boston, or he might miss the relative calm of Tampa -- no telling. And Cabrera might come back to do his victory lap a year later, about the last thing the Sox need now.

Conclusion: keep Renteria. And stop leaking trade rumors, it just makes the fan-idiocy worse. Lugo's a close second. As for O-Cab, thanks for the memories.
Sign of the Apocalypse?

Should I be disturbed that the Globe is leading off an article on the Patriots by quoting Keats?

Monday, December 05, 2005

The Red Sox' Ride on the Shortstop Carousel

Newsflash! Rafael Furcal signs a blockbuster 3-year, $39 million deal to become the new Dodger shortstop, one of the big-name signings in one of the hottest free-agent battles of the new offseason.

It also makes him about a million shy of the riches the Red Sox bestowed on Edgar Renteria a year ago -- in one less year. For what figures to be about the exact same performance.

All season long Sox fans wondered aloud, almost too loudly, whether the Renteria signing was a good idea. Fairly or not, Renteria was held up to a somewhat mythical standard, that of the man he replaced, Orlando Cabrera, whose smiling face and occasional ringing shots off the wall were one of the many pleasant images of Our Glorious 2004. Everyone loved Cabrera, either for these reasons or perhaps only because the day he showed up, a.k.a. the day he left, is the day it all started happening.

Of course, only portions of the preceding statements are actually true: the Sox didn't get going until a few weeks later, aided almost not at all by offensive performance or even defense, so much as the righting of the pitching staff. But Cabrera exceeded low expectations, filled a position that was becoming a sore spot, and acquitted himself well enough defensively and in a few clutch situations.

That was 2004. Not 2005, or any of the subsequent years, a point that needs to be stated at the outset: Renteria was not replacing the contributions Cabrera made in 2004; he was replacing Cabrera's expected performance in the next year or years.

And with that warning, let us wade into the numbers to decide the ultimate question: was Renteria a good signing?

Thursday, December 01, 2005

Manny revolution

Apparently Sox fans are so desperate that they are trying to use the democratic process to keep Manny Ramirez in red hose. As if democracy ever got us anywhere...
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