jackie hayes

Are we arguing? B/c I agree w/ you... I'm really down on KW now, but I think it's fair that after hiring a new manager and changing the team philosophy he has 2 years to prove himself (I might even say 3 if I didn't disagree with him so much). Not that I think he's doing the right thing -- but thinking about it from management's perspective, you made a commitment to this guy and he's apparently worked hard to make this team a winner. You sided with him when he signed Ozzie and took the team in a different direction. As much as I don't like it, the Sox have got to let KW play out this hand.

Yeah, won't happen w/ the Sox -- if nothing else, Rooney and Farmer couldn't use their eternally funny joke that they've found a use for Bill James' books -- propping up a table leg... They're great announcers, but they need to get out more if they find that funny. Or watch more tv, something.... Personally, I'm indifferent to a stats guy or a nonstats guy. Schuerholz may be the best around, and he's not a stats guy. And this is getting ahead anyway -- I think KW has this year at least to prove himself.

Who really knows with DePodesta -- he hasn't had a chance to really remake the roster, it's been one season. I don't see how anyone can bash him or praise him at this point. So far, Beane's been successful, and Epstein's made some great moves (although this offseason is a good test). I think the track record is pretty good so far, overall.

Well, I'm not saying they're all great, but Boston did okay this past year.

Ortiz was definitely their worst move, Glaus was probably foolish, but it makes some sense. When he's on his feet he's a great hitter. I just don't get this philosophy. Take away RJ, add Penny and Ortiz. If you gained anything, it isn't much. Brazobahn is good, he'll help the bullpen. Take away Sexson, add Glaus and Green. Okay, that's definitely an upgrade. But overall, does it make you a contender? Not even close. It just seems to me like any team signing Counsell and Clayton as regulars might be able to convince itself that its flaws are deeper than this, that it needs an overhaul. Or not...

Yeah, I guess once you've dedicated your 110+ loss team to not rebuilding, might as well go full throttle. I like all 3 players, but I still can't believe they aren't interested in any younger players. But I guess once you've signed Clayton AND Counsell as starters, you may as well start printing those WS tickets. Given their direction, okay, I get it. But I still think this is one magnificently stupid offseason for the Diamondbacks, taken as a whole.

How? Do you really think they can win in the next couple years? It's the best pitcher in baseball for an old hitter, a good starter, and a very promising reliever. The first 2 they might not have for more than a couple years.

My God, Arizona couldn't possibly be more stupid.

I've only heard of Navarro as an 'overhyped Yankee prospect.' I keep wondering how he can be overhyped when everyone knows him mostly as that overhyped guy in the Yankees minor league system.

IIRC they already resigned Mirabelli, so it's almost certainly one or the other.

I was just going from the stats here, not from other evidence. If a guy can't hit a cutter, you don't bat him against Mariano Rivera, sure. But just because he hasn't hit one pitcher in the past, even though he's a much better hitter overall? You won't find many people, if any, in baseball who would bench Frank for Timo just b/c Timo's gone 4-for-9 and Frank's gone 0-for-7. Would you do that?

Ah, but in 2003 Timo hit only .179 with RISP and 2 out, so how can he be a guy who has it? If 13 abs are evidence of anything, Timo's 39 are a lead-pipe cinch.

It depends. If the players are otherwise identical, you go with the guy who has the better stats against the pitcher. But do you go with Timo over Hurt b/c Timo is 4/10 while Hurt is 1/10 against the pitcher? There's very little information there.

No, I don't think I will "hang it up". Sometimes (eg, hitting with the bases loaded) there just isn't enough information to draw a conclusion from the statistics. Deal with it. Maybe you look for "clutch" elsewhere. But to say this is the statistic I really want, so therefore it must be right in spite of the fact that statisticians say it's very inaccurate, is a bad argument.

Definitely not for bases loaded. Lee only got 13 abs last season w/ the bases loaded, he went 3/13=.231 avg in 2004 cited by Cowley. That's a joke. But even over 5 years, you're probably looking at 50 abs, not nearly enough. For the others, you could argue either way. But if you believe a player develops over time, that average isn't meaningful anyway. All careful statistical work that I've seen has said that RISP + "close and late" averages are basically just noise, that there's almost no correlation between past and future "clutch" performance. So if you want to argue that clutch statistics are meaningful, you have to ignore the statistics. Kind of funny, really.

I see that Foulke didn't perform, and Perez didn't perform, and Pettitte often didn't perform. You say there's something deeper than that, well, I can't disprove that, but I don't believe it for a second. And I have yet to see any evidence on that point, only testimonials. Btw, you can't lump both games together. He was bad in his 2nd outing, but it wasn't comparable to game 1. I'm dropping out of this argument. I simply don't have the same ability to judge character as all the other posters here. I'm at a game, I see pitches and swings and hits. Everyone else apparently sees mental fortitude. Maybe I just need to turn on subtitles.

I'm not predicting squat. I'm just saying that if you draw the conclusion about Perez, then you would have had to draw the same conclusion about Foulke. And you would have been wrong. Pitchers just fluctuate this way, starters too. Don't believe it? -- Look at Andy Pettitte, series by series. It's not been unusual for him to have an era over 10 in a series, other times he's been below 2.

He's using misleading stats. If we are trying to use the stats to measure Carlos's ability, then they're only valid if the sample size is large. He's picking stats that have small sample sizes, therefore (even though they're true) they are not reliable guides to Lee's ability.

I'd more or less agree with that. They don't tell you much. That was exactly my point. If Perez is not mentally tough b/c he faltered in the playoffs, then Foulke couldn't have been mentally tough b/c he did the same. But we saw this year that Foulke could perform damn well in the playoffs. (And last year he was pretty good, too.)

Excuse me? Wtf, Foulke had an era of over 11 in the 2000 postseason. Are you denying this? Or just talking out your ass?

Foulke got rocked in the 2000 ALDS, but he came back and did a great job this year. (There's your "truth".) My point is that these can simply be bad performances. Odalis was bad in the playoffs this year, but that doesn't imply he can't perform under pressure. (Just like Foulke's crappy series didn't prevent him from pitching well this year.)

You're preaching to the choir. Btw, does anyone know what the difference is? I can't find anything on mlb.com.

Foulke blew up in the playoffs too. Are you glad we don't have him? I think it was a one-time thing, I'd like to see Perez come here. But I agree w/ you, when all's said and done, he's going to cost someone.

We can all agree (right?) that Pods should steal, since he can beat whatever mark makes stealing effective. That still leaves the question of how valuable those steals are, and most calculations I've seen don't make the effect sound impressive.

There's some difference between ESPN's "close and late" and MLB's "close and late". Cowley was using MLB's, even though the ESPN stat is the common definition (at least, it's the one I've heard about before). Who knows why he chose that one... I can't figure out how MLB defines "close and late".