Base Hits: 8/3/2009

OK, let's cover the big story first. Melvin Mora is angry that he's been benched during 3 of the last 4 games, spouted off about it and may be on his way out of town.

Some Mora quotes:

"I don't appreciate the disrespect, because I've been playing hurt for a guy who won't respect you. I don't deserve it...Whatever he wants to do, he can do it. But like I told you before, I need to have my respect. This is not a guy who just came to the Orioles. This is a guy who's been here for nine years busting his butt for the organization....

"Don't give me the excuse that I cannot beat John Smoltz, that I cannot beat Josh Beckett or I cannot beat [Jon] Lester or I cannot beat Pedro Martinez or I cannot beat nobody here because I've been here for nine years...All those guys in the [American League] East, they know me. They know me and you don't make the All-Star team for nothing. You deserve respect. That's the only thing I can say."

First, I'll continue to beat a dead horse and point back to the Oscar Salazar trade (hi frostking...). On July 19th, the day Salazar was traded away, Mora had a slash line of .272/.322/.333. Salazar was moved due to a need to make room on the 25-man roster. Now, MacPhail got value back for Salazar which was admirable but he got value back at a position that the Orioles have some depth at in the minors. Instead, he could have cut loose Mora, given Wigginton the starting job at 3B and kept Salazar, giving Oscar more ABs between, thirdbase, firstbase and DH. (Mora has been even worse over the past 3-4 weeks...)

Now, they likely find themselves in a position where Mora will be released anyway and there is no chance to find out if salazar could have been a good stopgap at firstbase/DH in 2010.

Second, aside from the Marlins' Emilio Bonafacio, Melvin Mora is the worst third baseman in baseball. The worst. And he feels entitled to play regardless of performance. The Orioles, in some manner, showed respect for his tenure by keeping him on the team and let him play out his contract. They were not bringing him back next year. They threw him a bone by keeping him on the roster.

The Orioles seems to understand the concept of a sunk cost (see Jay Gibbons) and you would like to see them take some non-traditional directions as they move forward in the rebuilding process. Now Mora is forcing their hand. It's timeo for Melmo to go.

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I have little comment on the Boston series except to reiterate that Andy MacPhail did a lousy job at assembling a repsectable starting rotation to start the season. Jason Berken is getting his brains beat out because he was not ready for the majors and is only here because the Orioles had no other options.

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Speaking of guys arriving ahead of schedule, Brian Matusz is set to make his major league debut with a Tuesday start in Detroit.

While this is yet another move that smacks of desperation, I feel OK about this. This is not like rushing up a 20-year-old Hayden Penn or Jason Berken who had very little on his minor league resume to recommend promotion. Matusz is a polished college pitcher and has dominated every level of the minors. He's worthy of a shot, at least for two or three starts. I don't get the impression that he will be in over his head.

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The Arizona Diamondbacks are reportedly pursuing former Oriole hurler Daniel Cabrera.

Cabrera's career 5.09 ERA looks good right about now.

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This is interesting. Liz pitches well for the Tides but Chris Waters has been recalled to Baltimore according to the note at the end of the article. Waters for Berken perhaps?

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Work and personal life will be insane this week...see you next Monday?

Simon Makes the Rotation?

Alfredo Simon and his ERA:

2005 AA Norwich - 91.1 IP, 5.03 ERA
2006 A+ San Jose - 36.1 IP, 6.44 ERA
2006 AAA Fresno - 52.0 IP, 6.75 ERA
2007 AAA OK. City - 119 IP, 6.43 ERA
2008 AAA Norfolk - 4.2 IP, 5.79 ERA
2008 MLB Orioles - 13 IP, 6.23 ERA

I don't know if Hayden Penn will be claimed off of waivers. I don't know if he will ever be a decent major league pitcher. But I can guarantee you that Alfredo Simon won't outperform him in 2009.

Even CHONE (optimisitically) projects Simon at a 5.45 ERA. It puts Penn at a 5.14 ERA.

I'm predicting an ERA north of 5.75 for Simon this year. Not really sure that this is worth potentially kicking Penn to the curb for.

Andy, Dave: You really didn't need Daniel Cabrera for one more year?

Value Over Daniel Cabrera: Mark Hendrickson

I am now on the record that I don't believe Daniel Cabrera will ever be an above-average major league pitcher. What you see now is probably what you're going to get at this point in Daniel's career.

All that said, by any measure, he was still the second best Oriole pitcher of 2008. Forget how disappointing he was as a talent, there is nobody on the current roster who can be expected to replace his 180 innings of 5.25 ERA in 2009. Given that he could have been retained for about $3-4 million for next season, four pitchers (outside of Jeremy Guthrie) in the Oriole rotation needs to surpass the (admittedly) low benchmark of Daniel Cabrera's 2008 season to warrant letting Cabrera go.

The first candidate is 35-year old lefty Mark Hendrickson. The Orioles are projecting him as a swingman/long reliever but as of today, he would fill a position in the starting rotation. Even though I think the Oriole rotation's slogan for 2009 should be "We Take Anybody", Hendrickson is really pushing the concept.

Baseball-Reference.com has a neat tool to normalize a pitcher's stats for league average run support and neutral park factors (for a more detailed look at how the stats are "neutralized", see this explanation).

Mark Hendrickson's stats for 2008, pitching in the National League for the Florida Marlins:

              W   L   IP    BB   SO   ERA   WHIP
Hendrickson   7   8  133.7  48   81   5.45  1.46

Now, Hendrickson's stats, normalized for pitching in the American League, in Camden Yards:

                             W   L    IP    BB   SO   ERA   WHIP
Hendrickson (Adjusted 2008)  5   9  130.7   51   79   6.34  1.60

Just as a reminder, Daniel Cabrera's 2008 stats:

                W   L    IP    BB   SO   ERA   WHIP
Cabrera 2008    8  10   180.0  90   95   5.25  1.61

Mark Hendrickson is NOT a good bet to exceed even Daniel Cabrera's meager output of 2008.

Still more on this later...

What Will Daniel Cabrera Look Like as a National?

With Daniel Cabrera moving down the road to the Nationals, I wondered what he might look like next season. Not literally. Literally he'll look like a 6'7" guy from the Dominican Republic with a red cap. But how will he fare pitching in Nationals Park?

To begin, I'll steal some work by Derek Carty at The Hardball Times who did a study earlier this year on the effect that switching leagues had on pitchers. Using his formula on Cabrera's 2008 stats, we may get an idea of what he'll do for Washington in 2009.

               K/9  BB/9   HR/F   LOB%   LD%   GB%   IF/F   ERA   ERA+
Cabrera '08    4.5  4.2    12.7%  72.4%  19.7% 48.0% 7.7%   5.25   86
Cabrera WSN    5.1  3.7    12.9%  72.9%  20.1% 48.3% 7.8%   4.86   88

If you're going to face a pitcher every ninth at bat, in addition to banjo-hitting bench players and defensive specialists, you would expect to have a better ERA. The changes for most of these rate stats are marginal and they go both for and against the pitcher. Where Daniel is helped is by the slight uptick in K's he can expect and a supposed drop in walks. Cabrera has dropped his walk rate every year for the past three seasons but I don't see it dropping this much next season. With less imposing hitters in the lineup, there is less chance of a pitcher "pitching around" batters but I don't think Daniel ever consciously did that. You have to know where the ball is going to pitch around a guy.

Barring the long-awaited quantum leap, Cabrera will provide the Nationals what he provided for the Orioles last year; a mercurial season with more than 180 IP and an ERA+ in the high 80's. Oh, he'll be their second best pitcher too.

(I have a moratorium on the whole Teixeira deal, much like I finally did for Brian Roberts and Erik Bedard trade rumors last season. I'll comment on it once it's done...)

Bye-Bye, Danny.

This is just a quick note to acknowledge the departure of Daniel Cabrera. The Orioles non-tendered him over the weekend and appear to have no interest in resigning him at all.

It's the end of the Cabrera era! I had always hoped that the O's would try Cabrera out in the bullpen once they gave up on him being a starter but I guess they thought it was not worth the $3-4 million that he would get in arbitration.

The problem is (and I've said this many times) that I don't know how you can get rid of Cabrera when he was your second best starter last season. I am all in favor of letting Cabrera go once it is apparent that he is no longer one of your 5 best starters. That time is not now. $4 million is a relative bargain to keep him on for one more season.

I'm not arguing that Cabrera is a good pitcher nor am I sure (anymore) that he will ever be a good pitcher. But he is still valuable to this team as currently constructed. This is a BAD MOVE.

There are two circumstances that would make this move OK.

First, there is a plan in place to take that saved money and use it as part of a pool of cash to bring in a couple of free agent pitchers. The candidates that are available are not very attractive but we'll wait and see.

Second, The Warehouse has credible evidence that our young pitchers are further along than they look. Garrett Olson and Radhames Liz didn't look like they were ready to take the next step to me. Brian Matusz may be on the fast track but his performance in Arizona didn't indicate he's ready to grab a starting spot out of Spring Training. Troy Patton and Matt Albers; I like the idea of giving these guys a shot but both are coming off of injuries.

I hope MacPhail is right. But I think we gave up on Daniel one year too early.

Random Thoughts on the Last Two Games...

Wayward O has covered this nicely but I had to throw in my two cents.

Lots of lashing out at Dave Trembley for leaving Jeremy Guthrie in the game so long Tuesday night. Really? My complaint about Trembley has been that he doesn't leave his starters in long enough. I'm certainly not going to come down on him for erring on the other side of the equation.

But the real issue here is expectations. Some people are acting like this is a team of contenders. They're not. Three weeks ago, 100 losses were being touted across the O's blogosphere and general baseball press. Now that the team started 11-8 (now 12-9), people are acting like Trembley should be trying to keep the O's in the race. They are wrong.

Trembley gave his pitcher a chance, a pitcher who said he could get the job done. (Enough of the "every pitcher wants to stay in" argument. Tired.) Trembley hasn't seen what Guthrie can do in this situation so he decided to find out. Dave gave him the opportunity and Guthrie couldn't deliver. I don't expect Trembley to make the same mistake twice.

The point is, this is Trembley's first full season as manager with a lot of players who are in their first or second year in the big leagues. He is still learning what these guys may or may not be capable of and that's exactly what he should be doing in 2008, wins and losses be damned.

This team will be very fortunate to get to .500 by years end. It's important to remember that.

Nobody knows what kind of team the Orioles really have. I'll cut Trembley some slack while he works it all out. But if he does it again, I'll kill him for it.

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Wayward O also posted this defensive gem by Jeremy Guthrie but you must watch it again. It may be the best defensive play you see all year. (Of course, Ramon Hernandez fired the ball into rightfield right after that, negating everything.)

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Anyway, I have admitted I am a sucker when it comes to Daniel Cabrera and while I'm not sold by this latest run of success, it is easy for me to get carried away. I'll be taking (yet another) closer look at this later.

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"Spanky" Huff is an idiot. It's a good thing he can hit home runs because he certainly doesn't seem to have a head for the game. Anybody see him practically run over Juan Samuel as he ran through the stop sign and got thrown out at home? If Juan Samuel's not sending you, you have to be dead to rights. Juan hasn't been conservative enough of his tenure as thirdbase coach. Home runs or not, Huff must go and Scott Moore must take his place.

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Josh Kalk is a wiz with PITCHfx data and has created "player cards" for each pitcher's 2008 season thus far. Most interesting among Orioles is Jim Johnson's card where his similarity score shows him to be closest to Josh Beckett. I'm not sure how he calculates similarity but any comparison to Josh Beckett cannot be bad.

Good Cabrera vs. Bad Cabrera

I wouldn't dig in there if I were you. I don't know where it's going. I swear to God.
- Crash Davis

I don't think all these PITCHfx posts will have the the same title but the title certainly fits for Danny.

Today, I'll be looking at Daniel's poor start on April 2nd and his fine (well, better) start on April 12th. The bonus here is that he pitched both games against the Tampa Bay (devil)Rays so both games are against nearly identical lineups.

First, his pitch movement on both starts:

Two things are immediately noticeable. First, the fact that he threw almost nothing but fastballs his second time seeing the Rays lineup (which we already knew). Second, his fastball was much more lively during the second game. The horizontal break on 4/12 is nearly five inches more severe. And while his slider was quite lively during his first start is was nearly straight in the second. (Those blue plots on the lower right on the second chart can't possibly be changeups. I'm assuming they are curveballs mislabeled by the PITCHfx system.

Now the placement of Cabrera's pitches. I've added a very rough estimation of the strike zone to these plots.

Well, it's no wonder that great breaking slider didn't help him much in the first start; he couldn't control it at all!

Obviously, his pitch location is a little more focused during the second game. Yes, he's throwing more strikes but when he misses it's not by as much or it seems to be with purpose as he misses to particular spots.

Tampa's lineup is very lefty heavy so he's missing away or up and away from Carl Crawford and the like. But he's not afraid to come inside with that fastball against righties either which has to be pretty intimidating.

Is this why he's had some of his best performances against lineups loaded with lefties? When he's on that 94 mph fastball breaks with some significance away from lefties inducing weak waves, foul balls and weak grounders to short. If it breaks inside on righties, better hitters can still turn on those pitches or more easily identify it as a ball.

So is this the new (old) formula for Danny? Even in the second game he couldn't place his changeup for strikes at all. With very limited use he was able to get his slider over but his fastball, even with nothing else contrasting it, is nearly unhittable.

The Tampa Bay announcers observed (correctly) that Cabrera is a horrible fielder and they didn't know why more teams didn't bunt on him to put more pressure on his defense skills. The problem is, that fastball is so lethal and lively that it's hard to even bunt the ball! The Rays tried that night and couldn't lay down a single successful bunt in fair territory, not even for a sacrifice.

Rick Kranitz has a reputation for focusing on what his pitchers do best and not trying to make them do things they aren't good at. With a fastball so wicked, maybe he's letting Daniel throw his best pitch almost exclusively and just trying to tweak the accuracy. It makes sense. If a guy hasn't mastered control of his best pitch, what are the odds he's going to be able to learn a new one?

And some wildness helps Cabrera. He got a ton of strikes on balls he threw out of the strike zone.

This is all probably much ado about nothing (with Cabrera it usually is) but I'd be curious to see what strategy he takes against another lefty heavy lineup...the Yankees...on Friday.

They Did It Again...

Before Friday night, Carlos Pena was o-5 with four strikeouts against Jamie Walker. Oh, how times have changed.

First, here's the break on the pitches by Walker to Pena in the fateful 7th on Friday night.

The graph stands in counterpoint to Roch Kubatko's assertion that Jamie hung a breaking ball to Pena. The ball broke at least as well as anything else he threw that night. Pena just crushed a good pitch.

Saturday was a different story. Walker threw a belt-high fastball on the inside part of the plate and Pena turned on it and lined it into the rightfield stands. I suppose he was trying to sneak one by but I'm guessing he wanted to keep that ball down.

(As an aside, I wasn't the only one who thought Roch was being snarky with Jamie Walker. The comments on that blog entry later in the day had many replies remarking about the same thing.)

But the Orioles were not to be denied tonight as Ramon Hernandez out-Pena-ed the Rays, smashing a Dan Wheeler fastball over the leftfield fence to give the O's a 3-2 with 2 out in the top of the ninth.

Hernandez is only batting .194 but he's making it count. He is second on the team with 7 RBI this season.

Daniel Cabrera gave one of those performances that will break your heart later in the season. An outing like that makes you start believing. More on that later...

With the win, the Baltimore Orioles retain sole possession of first place in the AL East.

The Crystal Ball '08: Daniel Cabrera

Before I start this post, let me just admit that I'm a sucker.

I'm deluded and unrealistic. I am overcome by wishful thinking. I am looking through rose colored glasses and I am an overly optimistic fool.

When it comes to Daniel Cabrera.

Before last season, Cabrera's strong finish in 2006 and the prospect of getting a full Spring Training with Leo Mazzone had me positively upbeat about his prospects for 2007.

While there were some good things about Cabrera's season, it was (obviously) poor overall. He allowed a career high (by far) 24 homeruns, his strikeout rate dropped, he posted a 5.55 ERA and he lost 18 games.

The bright side? He posted the lowest walk rate of his career (4.5/9 IP, a huge improvement over the 6.7 he posted in 2006), topped 200 innings pitched and struck out a career high 166 batters.

The real regression for Cabrera was all those homeruns he gave up. One of his strengths over his perplexing career is that he was at least able to keep the ball in the park. It's what has helped him survive all those walks. Last year he gave up homers at a rate that was 40% higher than his career average.

According to Hit Tracker, Cabrera gave up 8 homers that had "just enough" to get out of the park and two of those were "lucky" homers (homeruns that were aided so much by the weather that they would not have been out of the park in neutral conditions). You can't take all those homers away but it is reasonable to assume that if things had gone as they normally would that he probably would've given up somewhere in the neighborhood of 19 homers instead of 24 over 34 starts. Much more respectable.

Did you know that Cabrera threw his fastball 75% of the time last season? I thought he had utilized his slider much more than that. Can you believe the guy has gotten this far into his career with basically a fastball and no real secondary pitch? That how good that fastball is. According to Roch Kubatko, Cabrera is throwing his changeup a lot in the Dominican Winter League this offseason. This is good news considering he only threw it about 2% of the time in 2007. Does this signal a change in Cabrera's pitching philosophy? If he can mix in his slider and a passable changeup this year, he could be unstoppable.

And this may be my undying optimism talking again but I really think Cabrera just had an off year in 2007. He wasn't great to begin with and he looked really bad during that down year. It happens to all pitchers but looked really bad on Cabrera.

There are only two possibilities for Daniel Cabrera this season: he will either improve as a starter or will end up in the bullpen, trying to reinvent himself as a closer. He will probably break my heart but I think he will make strides, maybe big strides as a starter. I'm thinking he tops 200 IP, posts a 4.50 ERA, racks up 180 strikeouts and cuts down on the longballs.

Yes, I am crazy. And a sucker.

Base Hits: 1/23/2008

There is some concern about the Orioles and their lack of progress in trading Erik Bedard and Brian Roberts and many see the deals as dead. Not I.

Why? MacPhail has made no forays into the free agent market as of yet. If the deals were truly dead, he would certainly be looking for a centerfielder. I just can't believe he's going into this season with Tike Redman manning anything more than a fouth outfielder role.

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The Oriole signed RHP Lance Cormier to a minor league deal this week. I watched plenty of Cormier when he pitched for Atlanta last year and I was less than impressed. A long reliever or a AAAA type guy at best. Of course, I said the same thing about Jeremy Guthrie at this time last year.

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Daniel Cabrera is asking for $3.3 million in arbitration. Quite frankly, in today's market that is not an unreasonable request even with Cabrera's poor season. Bedard is asking for $8 million and would be worth every penny.

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I can't find it right now but Roch reported in his blog that recently acquired 3B Mike Costanzo is to report to Spring Training with the catchers to presumably work out at that position. Very intriguing if true. That would certainly provide Costanzo a quicker route to the majors if he can be even passable defensively as a catcher.

Base Hits: 10/29/2007

LaTroy Hawkins had some not so nice things to say about playing for Baltimore in 2006. He didn't really balst the organization, just addressed the general feeling of negativity that permeated the club.

Speaking of Hawkins, he's a big, tall righty that tried but failed at being a starter. Once he turned 27, the Twins turned him into a reliever and he flourished. Daniel Cabrera is a big, tall righty who just turned 27. Just sayin'...

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Thank god the World Series is over. No more Tim McCarver until spring...

Joe Torre is gone and now A-Rod has opted out of his contract. The Yankees are weaker and that only helps the Orioles. Whether they can take advantage of it is another issue.

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Brandon Snyder is still tearing up the Hawaiian League is hitting .379 and OPSing .992. Snyder has two triples which surprised me but he had four in Delmarva last year. Pretty impressive baserunning for a former catcher.

Matt Wieters is hitting .302 and hit his first professional homerun this week. He is OPSing .876.

Pinstripe Destruction

O's win. 12-0. Over the hated New York Yankees.

Take that one to your grave Phil Rizzuto.

Phil Rizzuto is the perfect example of why I hate the Yankees. If he had played in St. Louis, you never would've heard of him. Because he played on some great teams for the Yankees, it got him into the Hall of Fame. It's a joke. A .273 career hitter. Career OPS+ of 93. He somehow managed to win an MVP in 1950 even though he was only the third best player on his team that year (behind Yogi Berra and Joe Dimaggio). All because he was an average hitter who was little and played for the Yankees. He never led the league in anything but sacrifices. Feh.

Anyway, the enigma that we call Daniel Cabrera shut down the Yanks last night for 6+ innings and allowed the mop up guys to mop up.

Hopefully, Erik Bedard shuts them down this afternoon and drops the Yankees further back in the playoff hunt.

Paul Bako Can Really Handle A Pitching Staff...

You heard that a lot about Bako when the O's signed him. Great glove man. Handles pitchers well. Intanglibles baby!

Well, when Paul Bako is behind the plate the league hits .267 against O's pitchers, a full 20 point above the .247 the league hits against Baltimore when Ramon Hernandez calls the game. They also slug 33 points better with Bako donning the mask (.409 to .376) instead of Hernandez.

While we're at it, opposing baserunners have stolen bases at a 72% success rate against Ramon this year. Not great. But our great glove man Bako has allowed them to steal at an 81% success rate.

Why do we still pay this guy?

Quick Notes

Aubrey Huff is (finally) having a truly great month in August, hitting .395 with 3 homers and 4 doubles thus far, good for an OPS of 1.191...Corey Patterson continues to (oddly) wear out lefty pitchers hitting them at a .322 clip for the season, 80 points better than his career average...If Erik Bedard strikes out 6 batters today he will pass Dave McNally (1968) and Mike Mussina (1996) to place third in Baltimore history in single season strikeouts (behind only Mussina's 2000 and 1997 seasons). He will also be 4th in franchise history which includes the St. Louis Browns.

Escapism

The O's get pummeled 10-3...Barry Bonds is the new homeruns champ...the Yankees are claing their way back into the AL East race...

Man, baseball sucks today. Time to have some fun with statistics and create a nice diversion for myself and maybe for you guys too.

Erik Bedard - Strikeout King

Erik Bedard has 192 K's with about 7 starts left on the year. Barring injury, he looks to be a cinch to pass Mike Mussina who currently holds the Baltimore Oriole record for stikeouts in a season with 218. However, he also has a shot at an even more impressive feat of passing the franchise record for K's in a season. Bedard only needs 41 mores punch-outs to surpass Rube Wadell's total of 232 that he set for the St. Louis Browns, a record that has stood since 1908!

O(riole)PS+ Leaders

OPS+
Frank Robinson, 1966 199
Frank Robinson, 1967 188
Jim Gentile, 1961 184
Boog Powell, 1964 176
Ken Singleton, 1977 165
Frank Robinson, 1969 165
Chris Hoiles, 1993 163
Boog Powell, 1970 163
Cal Ripken, 1991 162
Boog Powell, 1969 160

First off, I knew Chris Hoiles had a monster year in 1993 but I had no idea how favorably it would compare to, say, Cal Ripken's MVP season. In retrospect, he was completely overlooked for MVP consideration that year, placing 16th in voting despite putting up the 4th highest OPS in the AL that season from the catcher's position! He didn't even make the All-Star team even though he hit .300 with 18 homers in the first half! Robbery!

Oh, to be an O's fan in the late 60's. You could've seen Frank Robinson put up three of the six best slugging seasons in team history. And you would have seen Boog Powell put up three more in the top 10 (give or take a year).

He's a Winner?

Since he arrived in 2004, only Erik Bedard has as many wins (39) as Daniel Cabrera. I don't know if that means anything...just sayin'.

How Good is It?

Brian Roberts' season? Pretty extraordinary for a secondbaseman. At this pace, he will steal 45 bases, hit 40 doubles and bat better than .300 this season. In the history of baseball, no other player has matched that combination of speed, power and contact except for Craig Biggio's amazing 1998 campaign (.325, 51 2B, 50 SB).

The Case For Daniel Cabrera....

...was made pretty well last night. Even in his own flawed 5 BB, 3 K in 7 IP performance he showed the kind of talent he has to pitch around those mistakes. The Devil Rays may stink but they are a very good offensive team and D-Cab shut them down. I hate to sound like a broken record but I have to with all the "trade Cabrera now" sentiment. The O's are not exactly awash in proven major league starters. We can afford to wait Cabrera out awhile longer. Don't trade him!


The Answer?

I think Mark Texiera is a very good hitter and this point is probably moot since teams with much more to offer in trade are wooing Texas for his services, teams that will greatly overshadow anything Baltimore will be able to offer.

But what is the fascination with a guy who would maybe hit 30 HR this year (if he had been healthy all year), a guy who for his career (and this year actually) has hit .265 away from hitter-friendly Arlington Stadium and a power guy who will go weeks at a time without going deep? Are O's fans so beaten down that they want just anybody who mentions they would like to play here?

He's good, not great and certainly not worth Baltimore mortgaging the future for.


Let's Cowboy Up...

Speaking of guys who want to stay here, I hope the team keeps Kevin Millar. The pluses: he really seems to want to be here, he has been one of the top hitters for the team all year and for the production he gives you, he's dirt cheap. Obviously, if a team gets desperate and bowls you over with a nice prospect or younger MLB regular, you take it but I'm still holding out hope that he remains.


Guys Who May Be Traded

Steve Trachsel - Get what you can for him. He's pitched well for us this year and that was a bonus in itself. Get bodies for the minors and let Steve pitch for a contender.

Miguel Tejada - I'd like to keep him but if you get the right offer for him, you have to take it. I'm not a fan of just dumping him but if you can get good value you pull the trigger.

Jay Gibbons - Even though he has hit better lately, nobody will want this guy. Still, if somebody bites, you send him on his way. I have serious doubts that he will return to form over the long haul.

O's Win!

Jeremy Guthrie dominated the A's and Chad Bradford and Jamie Walker finished off the job. the O's win 2-0 and win the weekend series. Baltimore in its heyday was built around pitching, defense and the three-run homer.

The O's have the defense. They are second in the AL in team DER and 1stin the AL in fielding percentage.

The O's are developing the pitching. After a rough stretch with the 'pen, Dave Trembley seems to have found a way to work the relief staff in a more effective manner.

Now, we just need the slugging.

The Case for Dave Trembley

I was under the impression that Dave Trembley's moderate success may have been a product of the soft schedule the O's have been playing lately but au contraire:

Record of O's Opponents Pre-Trembley: .515
Record of O's Opponents Post-Trembley: .513

Pretty much the same strength of schedule. Trembley has guided the team to a .535 winning percentage while contending with injuries to Miguel Tejada and Melvin Mora, two of the O's better offensive players.

The funny thing is:

       BA   OBP    SLG    OPS
APR  .253  .322   .392   .714
MAY  .277  .344   .398   .742
JUN  .273  .333   .401   .734
JUL  .271  .327   .419   .746

The offensive production has not been much different from the rest of the year but Trembley seems to be managing it to a better effect in the W-L column. With injuries. Against similiar competition.

Sam who?


The O's and Their Draft Futility

I've highlighted the amateur drafts and Baltimore's general futility in building a functional farm system and I feel it's reason number one for the O's issues and the number one crime of the Angelos regime.

So, imagine my dismay when I saw this in the Baltimore Sun this morning:

With the Aug. 15 deadline to sign draft picks looming, Orioles director of scouting Joe Jordan remains confident that the club will sign its top two unsigned picks - Georgia Tech catcher Matt Wieters, the first-round selection, and Texas Christian pitcher Jacob Arrieta, the fifth-round selection. Both are represented by Scott Boras...

...The Orioles will not sign their 10th-round pick, Eryk McConnell, a pitcher from North Carolina State, or their 38th-round pick, Michael Harrington, an outfielder from the College of Charleston. Both likely will return to college.

OK, if you want to start building a farm system that is useful year in and year out, you have to sign the players you draft! Not all of them, obviously. There are some players who you take a flyer on in the late rounds and try to talk them out of going to college next season. However, at the minimum, you need to sign your picks in the first ten rounds! Why would you draft a guy that high that you did not reasonably think you could sign? This farm system needs bodies. In the words of Branch Rickey, "From quantity come quality." Every pick, especially at that point in the draft, counts.

So, forgetting Eryck McConnell for a moment, let's look at the 1st round pick Matt Wieters and 5th round pick Jacob Arrieta. Baltimore has to sign these guys. And I don't want to hear about big bully agent Scott Boras. Did anybody not know who their agent was? Of course not. They drafted these guys knowing exactly what they were getting into. If you don't want to deal with Boras, pass on his guys. Many teams do. You can't waste these picks if you're not willing to pony up the cash to make them Orioles.

We'll be watching.

Orioles W/L in Close Games

Even with their recent success, the O's are still only 6-9 in close games (decided by less than two runs, the sparks in red are close games, up in win, down is loss).

Daniel Cabrera's Future

There has been sentiment in the O's blogosphere, in the press and Baltimore fans in general that their patience with Cabrera is over and it's time for him to go. I have a rule of thumb when considering whether I want a player to go. Are there better players on the team to take their place? In this case, do the O's have five starters better than D-Cab? Let's see: Bedard, Guthrie...Guthrie...I can't think of anyone else better, even if he never improves. Maybe Garrett Olson, maybe Adam Loewen if they pan out...but he's still number 5.

If we can find three more arms better than Cabrera, trade away. Until then, Cabrera needs to stay.

Random Stats

(This post was written before Erik Bedard's stunning performance last night, so his numbers look even better now!)

The Emergence of Jeremy Guthrie



Let's put Guthrie's amazing performance into perspective:



AL Leaders in ERA

D. Haren 1.91
J. Guthrie 2.45
J. Verlander 2.78



AL Leaders in WHIP

J. Guthrie 0.920
D. Haren 0.943
J. Shields 1.037



K/BB Ratio

P. Byrd 9.2
C. Sabathia 6.4
J. Shields 5.3
J. Santana 4.2
J. Guthrie 4.1



Guthrie is the textbook example of why wins don't matter when assessing a pitcher's performance. Every peripheral that matters, he dominates in.



Erik Bedard is Still the Ace



Outside of two bad outings in April (vs. Minnesota and Oakland), Erik Bedard has pitched great this season and is pitching even better than last (even including those two rough outings). He lead the league in strikeouts, he's in the top 20 in the AL in ERA, and his K/BB ratio is 3.8.



But is he even better than he looks? His FIP is tied for third in the AL so the defense has been letting him down a bit. He is striking out a sick 11.1 per 9 and he's a staff workhorse (only Daniel Cabrera has more innings pitched, 103 to 100.). Make no mistake, he's still the team's best pitcher and probably one of the top 5 pitchers in the AL.



And What About That Other Workhorse?



Daniel Cabrera on the surface looks to have taken a step back this season. His ERA is up and the K rate is down. But how useful has he been this season?



As stated before, Cabrera leads the team in IP at 103. Every team needs at least one workhorse on the staff and Cabrera is providing that this year. When your former manager mismanages and overuses your bullpen, this role increases in importance.



The K rate is down but the K/BB rate is up slightly due to Cabrera shaving almost 2 off of his BB/9 rate. His WHIP is at a career low (1.38) too. So what's his undoing? The longball. He has already given up 14 HR, a career high and we're not at the All-Star break yet. He could be having a bad year as far as that goes but it's way out of line with his career numbers; he's always been really good about keeping the ball in the park.



He's still a great part of this staff but maybe as a third or fourth starter and not a number one or two. I say we don't trade him.


OPS Leaders for Baltimore

Roberts .854
Millar .785
Tejada .783
Markakis .777
Mora .746

First off, Brian Roberts is having an absolutely sick year. He leads all AL second baseman in OPS and that number doesn't even take into account his 25 stolen bases (at an 86% success rate!). I hate to say it but Peter Angelos meddled correctly when he blocked the Brian Roberts\Hayden Penn for Adam LaRoche\Marcus Giles trade.

Second, Kevin Millar is the O's second best offensive player and needs to be in the lineup everyday. Now, the fact that a guy with a .785 OPS is our second best player is not something to be proud of but it's also nothing to sneeze at. Millar brings decent pop to the plate and, something that this lineup really needs, plate discipline. He gets on base like a madman, only Roberts draws more walks.

The loss of Tejada was big.

Nick Markakis continues to develop his game. You have to remind yourself that this guy is only 23.

Although I had hoped for a Mora resurgence this year, his numbers are way closer to 2006 than his 2007 output. This is probably about what we're going to get from him from here on out.

Mora at Third

Although Mora has been a bit disappointing at the plate, that has not been the case in the field. Mora leads AL 3B in fielding percentage, is solidly in the upper half of in his Zone Rating (just above A-Rod, just below Brandon Inge; not too shabby) and is fourth in the league at making outs on balls out of his zone. If you've watched the O's regularly, you've seen him make all the plays, the routine and the spectacular.

I used to believe there would not be much of a dropoff if Aubrey Huff had to play third sometimes but no longer.

On a side note, before his injury Miguel Tejada was turning in the best overall performance by a SS in the field this year (1st in ZR, 2nd in FPct) although my criticism about him turning the double play seems to be correct (10th out of 14 in double plays started in the AL).

Random Weekend Notes...

Friday

Erik Bedard struck out 9 tonight but was pitching out of trouble often over his six innings of work. Still, he gave up only one run as he scattered 5 hits and 4 walks. The bullpen was lights out yet again.

Tejada and Roberts made a fool out of me, turning two beautiful double plays the same day that I ripped them for not showing a knack for turning two.

The legend grows. Nick Markakis' at bat in the 8th inning was an epic battle in itself as Nick got down 0-2, fouled off pitch after pitch from Wellenmeyer and finally poked a grand slam over the fence in right center. It was probably the greatest at bat I've ever seen.

Paul Bako is becoming a reliable RBI man? I could never have imagined that he would perform this well at the plate thus far. Yes, he is only hitting .222 but has 5 RBI over 8 games.

Saturday

The most important thing about Baltimore's win on Saturday was the fact that Daniel Cabrera only walked one batter. He has never had back to back games where he walked one or less. That allowed him to scatter 7 hits and strike out 5 which kept Baltimore in the game.

Chris Gomez had the big blast with a grand slam in the 6th, only the second of his career.

Sunday

A rainout. A good thing considering it not only allows Baltimore to skip Jeremy Guthrie's turn in the rotation but lets them miss facing Zack Grienke, the Royals best pitcher.

Before the season I targeted a team ERA of 4.35, a full run less than last year, as a success mark for "The Mazzone Effect". Two weeks in to the season, Baltimore's ERA is 3.73, good for 6th in the AL. Pretty good considering the rocky start in the Minnesota series.

Home Opener Win and Win Probability Graph

The O's win their home opener and I decided to do some Win Probability analysis. Win Probability looks at the odds of each team winning the game as the game moves along and the events that change the advantage from one team to another. For a more detailed description of WPA, see this article. Here's the graph:

As you can see, after an early Detroit run, the O's offense put their foot on the Tiger's necks in the 3rd inning and never let them back into the game. The big WPA hero for the O's was (of course) Daniel Cabrera (.174) who shut down the Tigers for 7.2 innings. At the plate, there were several players who knocked in a run but Melvin Mora (.116) came through at the clutchest times. He was followed by Kevin Millar (.104) and Brian Roberts (.102). Nick Markakis did not help the cause at the plate (-.088) as he went 0-4 and left 3 baserunners on. The graph above shows the biggest single event movers for the O's.

The goats for Detroit were Chad Durbin (-.291) who single-handedly gave the game away. Carlos Guillen also came up small for the Tigers (-.119).

Leaving Win Probability behind, how impressive was Cabrera yesterday? He strikes out 5 and walks none. Cabrera has only had one other game in his career where he walked none and it also came against Detroit in way back in June 2005. the guy really looks like he's turned a corner.

I love the way Melvin Mora is hitting the ball. It looks like he is going to have a pretty good year and Baltimore needs his production to compete. And Kevin Millar hits another homer. He is looking like he will be a useful player this year, despite the fact he probably shouldn't be starting.

Maybe most importantly, Cabrera's performance allowed the bullpen to get a nice rest. Only Chad Bradford had to be tapped on Monday. John Parrish had appeared in 4 of 5 games before yesterday.

Tonight, Jaret Wright will try to bounce back from a miserable performance in Minnesota against Nate Robertson. Robertson is a very hittable lefty and lives on his ability to pitch out of jams. If the hitters are patient, the O's can put up a big number on this guy. Gametime temperature: 21 degrees!

Cabrera Cruises, Not Enough Run Support

Daniel Cabrera was cruising through three, groundballs galore. He got wild later, had some bad luck on bloop hits, stolen bases, etc. But Cabrera never lost his composure and pitched great all game. Baltimore just couldn't manage to get men across the plate.

The bullpen looked great again for the second straight night.

Melvin showed that his 0-5 night was just a bit of bad luck as he jacked a homer into the leftfield stands in the 2nd.

Tejada is on fire. He is playing great shortstop, he is all over the field. He took a ball that ricocheted off of Cabrera's leg and if Aubrey Huff could've held it, would've robbed Castillo of a hit. Made a diving stop and flipped to Roberts at second starting a spectacular double play.

Alberto Castillo had worked with Cabrera before in the Dominican Leagues so he got the start last night. It's the closest thing Cabrera will ever get to a personal catcher. It was entertaining watching them interact. They looked like Dominican version of Crash Davis and "Nuke" LaLoosh.

The Twins have stolen 6 bases in the last two games and they haven't been caught stealing once. Ramon Hernandez led the league throwing out runners last season. Would Adam Donachie have been any worse than these guys?

Why has Freddy Bynum been the pinch hitter the last two nights? Last I checked, Chris Gomez is a pretty good hitter. Our best bench player rides the pine late in a close game.

Ask yourself this: A thirteen man rotation or a deeper bench? Which would be helping more right now?