effectivelywild

QUOTE(Gregory Pratt @ Jan 26, 2007 -> 01:56 PM) What was AJ in there for? He appeared on Jerry Springer and helped break up a fight. Don't ask me why.

QUOTE(Craig Grebeck @ Jan 26, 2007 -> 01:10 PM) From 2001-2006, Erstad has not even had a year that was league average. In the three seasons that he actually had 600+ plate appearances, he posted OPS+ of 78, 88, 89 (100 is the league average). I sincerely doubt he was better than most outfielders during this time span. I'd probably put him in the lower quarter of outfielders during the last five-six seasons. Doesn't mean much when you consider he hasn't had an OPS over .746 in six years. Every team needs good ballplayers. Erstad is not great, he is not good, he is not average, he is below average. He does absolutely nothing tangible well. We are stunting Brian's growth for this? Giving Ozzie Erstad is like giving Dusty Baker Neifi/Womack/Macias. This will be the year where Ozzie's hard on for grittiness really hurts us and Brian. In short, his good days are behind him (as well as his average ones). The fact that he's on the 25 man roster makes me sick. I still hold out hope that BA will be improved enough this year to render this whole thread moot. And it would be hard for him to have a much worse year offensively this time around. BA's .649 OPS isn't even all that much better than Erstad's "injured" .605. So what's wrong with letting two sub-standard hitters compete in a race of "First one to .700 OPS wins". Or let's put it this way---last year we often had Mackowiak subbing in at CF, which made me cringe every time. Surely Erstad will at the very least be a better fielder. And this means we can use Mackowiak in LF

QUOTE(Vance Law @ Jan 26, 2007 -> 08:51 AM) In this year's Handbook, Bill James claims the break even point to be about a 64% or 65% stolen base rate. Really? I haven't picked it up yet. Did he mention why he's lowered the rate?

QUOTE(Kalapse @ Jan 25, 2007 -> 01:10 PM) I believe Baseball Prospectus did a study on the effect of a basestealer on the pitcher and found that they don't make much of a difference. I think I've read the same report. This may go down as one of those "scouting vs. stats" arguments---when you watch the game and see a pitcher obivously bothered by a speedy guy on first, you feel like it has to have an impact. But the stats don't back it up. In a slightly different vein, I think I've read that a base-stealer needs to have a ~75% success rate to break even in terms of net runs created. Anyone else heard this? Certainly this may be a bit different in close-and-late games, in which the difference between a man on first and a man on second can be more valuable.

Given Ozzie's love affair with speed, he would have loved Herb Washington 1+ years in the major as a pure pinch runner. With a 64% SB percentage. But hey, not all that much worse than Pods last year, right?

I think another reason hitters are reluctant to swing at the first pitch is the increasing emphasis on driving up a pitcher's pitch count. If you swing at the first pitch and ground out, you're giving the pitcher a huge gift in that sense, hence why most hitters almost never swing at the first pitch. Juan Uribe obviously doesn't have this problem.

Things are a little slow right now, and I just read a really interesting article on the importance of throwing strikes early in the count. According to the article, less than 8% of first-pitch strikes turn into hits. My question is, when Buehrle is struggling it seems like he's getting hammered on the first pitch, time and time again. Has anyone else noticed, and does anyone know of any way of looking at his stats broken down by count to be able to examine this more closely?

IMHO, so much of this depends on the pitching and the new bullpen. Will Buehrle return to form? Will Vazquez finally figure out how to not come completely unhinged after the fifth inning? What will we get from our 5th starter? And equally importantly, the bullpen: Yeah, I know Ozzie likes to leave the starters in as long as possible, but the bullpen was a real weak point last year. So we've got some new set-up guys that can throw hard. Let's hope they can locate their pitches. Offensively, the only thing I don't like is Posednik still being on the team, but given the contracts that were being thrown around thiss off-season and the lack of a viable replacement, I won't b**** about it too much. Yes, Anderson sucked for a lot of last year, but he looked better as the season went on. It was pretty noticeable if you watched his at-bats; early in the season he looked terrified to be at the plate, but in the second half he looked like he had actually played a bit of baseball before. And despite his occasional mental lapses (hello rookie season!) he really was an above average centerfielder. Give the kid another year to develop. Uribe? Yeah, he's an offensive black hole. I have dreams at night about him suddenly figuring out how to take a pitch and not swing at junk out of the zone. Does that make me weird? I think it does. Regardless, even without that we still have a great defender at a key position and the occasional home run from whatever pitcher is silly enough to throw him a strike. So, yeah, there's a lot of question marks, but there's no reason to think that some of the breaks couldn't go our way. Besides, what's the fun in being down on a team (only one year removed from being the world champs, mind you) before they've even played a game?

QUOTE(elrockinMT @ Jan 16, 2007 -> 02:24 PM) MLB Insider isn't much as far as being able to hang your hat on their so called insider rumors. I think from the latest is that Uribe will play for the Sox in '07 and all this speculation by Gammons and some others is just to stir up stuff because they have to earn their money somehow. Yeah, honestly, I don't put any stock in trade rumors from MLB Insider anymore, and the other speculative talk out there sounds pretty flimsy. I don't think anything will come of it.

.298/364/525

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 11:01 AM) His defense? BA is one of the best defensive CF's in baseball. Not THE best, but he is up there. He gets great jumps and makes good lines, has some good speed, is solid with the glove, and has an excellent arm. He is at least on par, if not better than, Rowand was. His defense doesn't concern me in the least. I actually remember reading some analysis was rated as the second best CF in the majors, defensively. Juan Uribe was rated as the best SS, FWIW.

I really hope Garland gets back on track. Last year, when he was on, he was a force. That being said, I hope that his slow start this season is due to small sample size and not that last year was a fluke. If I have ever prayed against a regression to the mean, let this not be it. I would love if Garland 2005 could show up on this staff. Also, you know, a harder throwing Garcia. Just wishing.

QUOTE(Jimbo @ May 10, 2006 -> 02:00 AM) Id assume they will ride Charlie boy as long as they can with Bmac ready for long relief. Well's hope, huh, don't we. Cause the feds are hot on our backs don't we.

QUOTE(Shamrock4Life @ May 10, 2006 -> 02:28 AM) "You say your are on the same side but you tell him to shutup. Do you really think its a good idea to tell other people to shutup with only 25 posts... I mean unless your looking to get banned." Oh God here we go again with the post count numbers. The guy has a point with that stats, but I disagree with him. I think a groundball out has a lot better outcome than a strike out just because of the confidence factor, which most sabermetricaticions (is that a word?) tend to forget about. If I strike out against pitcher A then I feel bad and my teammates feel bad, but not as bad if I made contact, preferably solid contact against the pitcher A. It also gives the batters behind me more confidence that this guy is hittable and that you just need to focus and hit it in the gaps, corners, up the middle. I am in no mood to look up that stats on that, or even feel like ever I bet because that is way to much work for not being paid for it, but I stand by that opinoin until somebody proves me wrong. EDIT:This edit option thing is the s***, but....I have 37 posts that is amazing to me. That is all. To begin with, if post count is an issue I can start randomly posting emoticons in the gamethread to boost my number. But that still has no reflection on my understanding of baseball as a game. I grew up in Indianapolis, where I watched minor league teams and rooted for the white sox. I collected Frank Thomas cards as a kid and held onto them; and now he's gone. Now. I learned about statistics from the Red Sox fans. And if you want to boot me, fine. But I'm just trying to add another level here while still going for the same team. If you have a problem, talk to the administrators. Look. All I am trying to say is that strikeouts and your basic groundout are statistically the same, thus far. The evidence that is out there is that the runner advanced benefit is cancelled out by the double play benefit. I'm not saying in certain situations that the decision to send the runner or whatever is often negated by the probability being caught. I guess I at worse am guilty of raising the cause of to steal or to not to steal. There is a certain percentage that makes mathematical sense. If, at any point, a club wishes to disavow my views, I would appreciate a formal notification.

QUOTE(SoxFan101 @ May 10, 2006 -> 02:16 AM) You say your are on the same side but you tell him to shutup. Do you really think its a good idea to tell other people to shutup with only 25 posts... I mean unless your looking to get banned. I'm on the same side as far as the team goes. And anyone who isn't should get booted. All I'm saying is that his analysis needs more looking at. All I'm trying to do is promote a more complete way of looking at players. Nothing more than that. Go Sox.

QUOTE(whitesoxfan101 @ May 10, 2006 -> 01:53 AM) I'm really not going to waste my time with all that Billy Beane Tom Foolery, but let me say this: there is a much better chance of Crede getting on base when he makes contact then their is when he strikes out, and I think the sharp raise in Crede's average and sharp drop in strikeouts is no coincidence. Also, correct me if i'm wrong, but Crede's walk ratio thusfar isn't much different than it ever has been, so his on base percentage isn't really affected, other than the fact it's obviously way up due to his BA being so high. 1. Shut up. All I'm saying is that the relationship betweens Runs Created---hello, a stat you obviously don't seem to grasp---and Strikeouts is one you don't seem to grasp. Here is what I am saying so that I am not misunderstood: Obviously, it is better if a player puts a ball in play than if he strikes out. With any ball in play, there is a certain baseline chance (for statistical purposes, this is often rounded to .300) that this will result in a hit. What I am saying is that the difference between, say, a groundout and a strikeout---assuming the same number of hits and thus, assuming a same batting average---is more or less similar to a runs created scenario. If I need to, I will look up the supporting numbers to back up my claims, but my idea stands: on average, a groundout is not better than a strikeout. That being said, Crede's raise in average and drop in SO's could be a result of an adjustment at the plate. Maybe he has made an adjustment with two strikes at the plate---a tendency to go the other way on two-strike pitches would do this. Obviously, this is something I'd need a lot of data to assess. Regardless, let's recognize that we are on the same side; Crede is hitting well and we hope it continues.

Not to rain on the parade, but you guys know how little a guy's SO percentage correlates to his runs created, right? That the drawback in him "not generating a productive out" is easily counterbalanced by the fact that when he strikes out he can't hit into a double play, yes? Over the course of a season, a player's strikeout numbers mean very little except that they drive down his OBP. Regardless, for a player with identical batting average, on-base-percentage, and slugging percentage---the statistics show that there's no real difference. And while I'll agree that Crede is hitting really well this year, it has more to do with his lack of weak outs than the number of his strikeouts.

Well...ok, 15 day DL. That's at most 3 starts. To stretch out McCarthy they'd need a long while, maybe even a minor league stint, so I doubt they do that unless the prognosis is Contreras is out for awhile. If the knuckle-baller struggles---and hey, let's give the kid a shot, the knuckler is a black-magic pitch and all---maybe they look for other options. But right now, with Contreras only out for a bit, McCarthy is too important in the pen.

Ummm, he looked ok. The HR was down the RF line but was still a nice shot. I hope he's back. That #5 part of the lineup is hot.

I'm a medical student, so I have a limited knowledge of the syndrome. Sciatica is often caused by inflammation and can clear up in as short of time as a couple of weeks (though it can last for a few months). Most of the time, there is no real need for surgery---I'm assuming the fact that he has been placed on the 15 day DL means it is not a result of a herniated disc, which would be more serious---there are some stretching and physical therapy measures that can be done, as well as some anti-inflammatory treatments. Certainly we should keep an eye on things, but we should wait for news on what treatments are being given, how he responds, etc. Regardless, this blows---Contreras has been lights out and this can be very painful.

How about Ozzie's comment the other day in regards to a question about how tough the AL Central will be this year "Yeah, it's gonna be a real catfight."

QUOTE(witesoxfan @ May 9, 2006 -> 11:50 PM) My one question is why? How does a team go from .250s-.280s to everyone in the middle of the order hitting in the .320s? Is it self-confidence? Is it expectations? Is Jim Thome THAT good? I'd say equal parts the team underachieving last year, equal parts the team overachieving this year (so far), with a dash of Jim Thome thrown in. That being said, the Sox are a much better offensive team this year, they have a real nice extended batting lineup. That being said, how bout a little love for Pods, huh? Yeah yeah, only one hit tonight, but he also drew 4 f&*^ing walks. That's the real measure of a leadoff man.

That was no fault of Iguchi's. He's playing in a giant puddle right now. Thank god that inning is over.

They are giving this game to the white sox. Freaking handing it to them and he can't throw strikes? Throw a goddamn fastball over the plate. Don't dick around with your breaking stuff. You're staked to a 6 run lead, its pouring rain, you just need three outs to get your team the win and you don't throw strikes. Garcia, you make me want to throw things.

Buehrle's cruising right now