Please welcome our new weekend editors!
by KLSnow on Nov 6, 2009 5:00 PM CST
in Site News
12 comments
Last week I asked for applicants for a new Weekend Editor position here at BCB, and today I'm proud to announce that three weekend editors have been brought on board.
If you've visited the comments section, you're probably familiar with NoahJ, Morineko and Fatter than Joey. Starting tomorrow, the three of them will be responsible for weekend content here on the site, working on a rotation. NoahJ will debut tomorrow, with Morineko and FTJ making their debuts in the weeks to come.
Please join me in welcoming them on board!
12 comments | 0 recs
Brewers decline David Weathers' option
Another $3.3 million saved. (There was a $400,000 buyout.)
Looking back at community projections: Second basemen
by KLSnow on Nov 6, 2009 2:00 PM CST
in Statistical Analysis
0 comments
Ok, after a day off for The Thinker, let's jump back into this with a look at second basemen:
Take a moment to think, once again, about what happened at second base for the Brewers, and the somewhat miraculous results. Early in the season, Rickie Weeks went down for the year and the Brewers were left with turmoil at the top of the order and at second base. Six players played second at one point or another for the Brewers, yet somehow the position was one of the team's most productive.
Projections:
Rickie Weeks
Projected: .257/.362/.425
Actual: .272/.340/.517
Craig Counsell
Projected: .231/.322/.332
Actual: .285/.357/.408
Casey McGehee
Projected: ..279/.334/.393
Actual: .301/.360/.499
TheJay, while refusing to predict exactly who would end up playing in Weeks' place, nearly nailed a 2009 prediction for Weeks, saying: "Hey, someone has to figure he’ll both bash up his wrist again and hit about what he’s done so far in his career." Wekks was ahead of his career numbers at the time, but sure enough, a wrist injury ended his season significantly early.
Craig Counsell's playing time projection at this and the other infield positions will probably seem low, but keep in mind, Counsell wasn't actually re-signed for 2009 yet when we made these projections.
Finally, there's probably not a single player at any position we missed on more than Casey McGehee. Back in January, we collectively projected him to get roughly two and a half percent of the plate appearances at second base, and didn't project him to play third at all.
Playing time:
| Player | Projected % | Actual % | Diff |
| Rickie Weeks | 80.2% | 21.2% | -59% |
| Jason Bourgeois | 6.1% | 0% | -6.1% |
| Hernan Iribarren | 5.6% | .4% | -5.2% |
| Alcides Escobar | 2.7% | 0% | -2.7% |
| Casey McGehee | 2.7% | 12.1% | +9.4% |
| Craig Counsell | 2.2% | 27.1% | +24.9% |
| Bill Hall | .5% | 0% | -.5% |
| Felipe Lopez | 0% | 38.6% | +38.6% |
| Frank Catalanotto | 0% | .5% | +.5% |
Wow, look at that mess. I didn't even know how to sort this table to appropriately display the chaos. And yet somehow, it worked.
At this point in January, Jason Bourgeois had just wrapped up a long hitting streak in Mexico, and if you had told me the Brewers would use six second basemen in 2009 and he wouldn't be one of them, I would have been shocked. In a world where Craig Counsell had yet to re-sign, Bourgeois projected to be Weeks' top backup. Instead, he spent most of the season patrolling the outfield in Nashville.
Overall:
| AVG | OBP | SLG | OPS | |
| Projected | .258 | .354 | .413 | .767 |
| Actual | .302 | .378 | .475 | .852 |
| Difference | +.044 | +.024 | +.062 | +.085 |
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Friday's Brisket Carving Station.
by Rubie Q on Nov 6, 2009 8:09 AM CST
37 comments
Some things to read while checking the departures from Kansas City International Airport (Greinke's gotta be on one of those planes) ...
I’m guessing this is how you, fair reader, reacted when you first clicked on BCB this morning:
YOU (setting down your bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch and firing up your computer): Time for my first stop of the day, Brew Crew Ball. I wonder who KL lined up to handle the Mug today? First, we had Dan Walsh linking to a blog on pizza, then we had Tyler Maas, who writes for the blog on pizza. This has been a terrific two days. What fantastic pizza purveyor is on tap today?
Oh. It’s just Rubie Q.
Sigh.
Am I right? I’m close, aren’t I?
According to the formula I was given, this is the part of the Mug where I link to our site, our Twitter feed, our Facebook page, our MySpace page, our LinkedIn page, and provide all of our Social Security numbers. When I’m feeling frisky, I’ll write something off-color on Quevedo at the Buffet. (Which is to say: I don’t write very much on the Buffet.) If you’re hip to the Twitter or Facebook thing, good for you. I’m not. (What’s that you say? 2007 called and said I should catch up with the times? Yeah, well, I think you should get the hell off my lawn.)
ANYWAY, since we don’t run any ads on the Buffet, and since 83% of our posts revolve around inside jokes (many of which aren’t even funny in the first place), I’m not going to direct you there. Instead, I’ll plug my boy Dan Walsh’s site. He doesn’t have a joe job like the rest of us; he actually tries to make money doing this stuff. Plus, he’s got Li’l Walshy (Yosty-ed!) in the fold now, and early reports indicate that LW bears a striking and unfortunate resemblance to her Papa. That kid’s gonna need all the help she can get, so turn on your heart light and check out The Daily Drink.
Now, then: onto buisness…
On Wednesday, Walsh linked to this post from Brewers Locker, which advocated trading for Juan Pierre, who's apparently still masquerading as a "legit leadoff hitter." In response, I give you this Fire Joe Morgan Classic. (Please note: linking to FJM is my way of saying: "Please please please please please Jesus God in Heaven don't trade for Juan Pierre.")
With each passing day, Tim Lincecum becomes more and more like Mitch Kramer: he's got the hair, he's got the wire-thin frame, Ben Affleck chases him around town with a wooden paddle, and now (allegedly) he's been busted with pot. You cool, Tim? (He was asking if you get high.)
(I hope the Washington authorities cut Mitch some slack. After all, the guy lives and works in California six months out of the year, and, in California, you can buy pot in vending machines.)
If you're physically incapable of reading things two inches to the left right (or, if you're physically incapable of distinguishing between left and right, as I apparently am), you may have missed RogueJim's FanPost on important free agent dates. The good news? Opening Day is officially less than five months away. The bad news? The home opener is on a Monday. Boo. (Three day weekend, anyone?)
McCalvy's got a note on the start of free agency, too (and gosh darnit if RogueJim didn't scoop me on that one, as well; throw me a bone, Jim), and the news that Kendall, Cameron, and Lopez qualified as Type B free agents -- with Lopez finishing just behind Dan Uggla, the last Type A free agent among second basemen, third basemen, and shortstops. As Anthony Witrado might say: Why you gotta be crimpin' FeLo's style, Dan Uggla?
Here's your Friday dose of Yankee hate:
- Nicole at CuteSports bemoans the ubiquitous Yankee hats, which managed to infiltrate an innocent AHL game.
- My great and good friend Reid at the Buffet calls the Yanks the "big stack bully of the MLB poker table."
- Tyler at Bugs & Cranks awoke from his short winter's nap to find the World Series was over.
- I'm putting Joe Posnanski's post on the Yankees' payroll in the clean-up slot because, as per usual, Pos knocks it out of the park. (To paraphrase Pos: while everybody else is playing "Contra" with the standard allotment of three lives, the Yanks have gone UP UP DOWN DOWN LEFT RIGHT LEFT RIGHT B A START. Is it within the rules of the game? Sure. Does that make it any easier to swallow? Hells no.)
- Happy Yankees = one sad Clown.
- Haudricourt gets in on the fun, too, with an article titled: "Yanks Pocket a Series Win." (Semi-related note: There were a lot of ESPN types who were lavishly praising the Yankees for keeping the "core" group of Jeter, Posada, Rivera, and Pettitte together. Why, exactly, do they get credit for this? The Yanks ability to outbid and outspend doesn't just relate to other teams' players; it applies to their own, too.)
Around the Majors:
- Thursday was the first day that players could file for free agency, and many of them jumped at the opportunity. According to MLB.com, 79 of the 183 eligible players filed yesterday.
- The ChiSox and Royals pulled off the rare intradivision trade yesterday, with the Pale Hose getting Mark Teahen and the Roy Boys getting Josh Fields and Chris Getz. And the Sox also signed Mark Kotsay to a $1.5 million, one-year deal.
- The Bo Sox nabbed Jeremy Hermida from the Marlins, in exchange for two left-handed pitchers whose names I can't be bothered to remember.
- The Angels signed Bob Abreu for another two years.
- And for anybody hoping that the Crew might make a push for Braves pitcher Tim Hudson, that train appears to have sailed: rumor has it that Braves and Hudson and crossing the Ts and dotting the lower-case Js on a three-year extenstion.
In Mug tradition, I'll finish with a birthday. However, I don't know where KL gets all those Brewer birthday notes, so I can't hook you up there. Instead, I'll tell you that November 6 is Glenn Frey's birthday. What's the best thing about Glenn Frey? It's not that he was in the Eagles. It's not that he was the apparent inspiration for the character of Russell Hammond in Almost Famous. Nope -- it's this thing that Will Ferrell and Ben Stiller made.
Dig in, friends.
37 comments | 0 recs |
Elias rankings are out and #Brewers' Felipe Lopez indeed slipped to Type B.
Tweet from mlb.com's Adam McCalvy. Cameron, Kendall, Looper, and Weathers all also qualify as Type B free agents.
1 day ago
roguejim
10 comments
0 recs
Pitching: Concentration vs. Skill
by Jordan M on Nov 5, 2009 4:30 PM CST
15 comments
This is outside my normal realm of analysis, but it's something I've wanted to address for a while. I'll get some Arizona Fall League Pitch F/x stuff up later in this week or early next week for sure.
I'm not too much of a pitcher, but I sometimes get that role in stickball games. I often struggle with my control. I'm inside, outside, high, and low. It really has nothing to do with my concentration or mental ability. It has a lot to do with my ability to throw a ball where I want to throw it.
If a quarterback misses on a throw, we don't accuse him of being a head-case. If a shooting gaurd misses a three, we don't accuse him of being a head-case. So what's my point here? Control is a skill, just like pitching velocity is a skill and pitch movement is a skill. An argument can be made that the control skill is in a way dependent on a pitcher's concentration, focus, and mental clarity, but then again, almost all skill actions in sports are.
We can acknowledge that pitchers like Manny Parra and also Yovani Gallardo have some problems with their control. It's not only measured by walks per inning but in general, better control sets up better success in getting strikeouts and groundballs-- the two best things a pitcher can do to help their success. But I don't think we need to assume that the control problems are the result of mental issues. It's not fair to the pitchers.
Concentration is an important part of athletics. The ability to concentrate is paired with a physical ability to make our world-class athletes what they are. A hitter must be able to swing a bat incredibly quickly, have fast reflexes and instincts, and be able to have the mental awareness and concentration to connect with a ball. In the same way, a pitcher needs to have the physical ability to throw a ball very hard, the ability to throw it where he wants to, and the concentration to not lapse in his mechanics and throw a poor pitch.
Pitchers are not in a unique situation that they can somehow become better by thinking harder and clearer. Pitching control is a skill. It's possible to improve control, just as it's possible to improve velocity or a hitter's swing. It's not fair to blame a pitcher's mentality or attitude for having less than stellar control unless we know something specific. It's not a logical way of looking at the problem when you compare pitchers to other types of athletes.
Criticism of pitch sequencing and selection is another issue entirely. Pitchers, catchers, and the coaching staff work together to come up with a plan before the game-- it's not as if a pitcher like Parra decides what to throw on the fly. If there are issues in this area, they need to begin changing with the coaching staff and catcher.
15 comments | 0 recs |
The Thursday Thinker: Thinking about Ben Sheets
by KLSnow on Nov 5, 2009 2:00 PM CST
in Events
24 comments
Before I left on vacation, we had a couple of extended conversations about Ben Sheets and his value. Sheets had the best season of his career in 2004, going 12-14 with a 2.70 ERA in 237 innings, striking out 264.
Only six pitchers in Brewer history, including Sheets, have ever finished a season with a sub-3.00 ERA and over 200 innings pitched. How many can you name in five minutes?
Again, here are the rules: Post your score in the comments, but don't comment on any specific answer until after 6 pm Central time, so everyone gets a chance to try it out without having it spoiled for them. And, of course, there's no reason to cheat here, because there's no prizes.
Since there are only six answers, odds are someone will get a perfect score. If you manage to get them all, post your time along with your score in the comments. With that said, don't be too embarrassed if you forget a couple (I wouldn't have gotten them all).
Have fun, and don't forget to post your score in the comments!
24 comments | 0 recs |
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NL Central Standings
| W | L | PCT | GB | STRK | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
St. Louis
|
91 | 71 | .561 | 0 | Lost 6 |
|
Chicago
|
83 | 78 | .515 | 7.5 | Lost 1 |
|
Milwaukee
|
80 | 82 | .493 | 11 | Won 3 |
|
Cincinnati
|
78 | 84 | .481 | 13 | Won 2 |
|
Houston
|
74 | 88 | .456 | 17 | Lost 3 |
|
Pittsburgh
|
62 | 99 | .385 | 28.5 | Lost 2 |
(updated 11.7.2009 at 4:17 AM CST)
Certain photos copyright © 2009 by Associated Press or Getty Images. Any commercial use or distribution without the express written consent of Associated Press and Getty Images is strictly prohibited.
