At least Royals fans have Joakim Soria. He's a joy to watch.

Huh, nice projection for Carlos Rosa. Ummm... who's Carlos Rosa?

If Gordon and Butler put up those seasons, this franchise is in huge trouble.

They have Kala, not Kila, right?

Tug Hulett is 6 years old again.

I think Rany has mentioned this potential House/Pena platoon at C, it would be glorious.

Sorry, I meant they have Kila, not Kala. I can see how it gets confusing ;)

no, they have Kila.

Really like the new format!

Tug Hulett will always be 6 years old! But an 88 OPS+ at 6 sets off even my roid radar.

Nice to see TPJ has a 1% chance of not sucking.

Where's the defense in the new format? And I miss the "average" lines for the pitchers. I haven't decided if I miss the positional sort enough to whine about it.

I agree about the comments on Moore. Many odd moves for a franchise where they are.

Greinke isn't even close to what I expected.

Robinson Tejeda?

Scratch the Tejeda comment, I see him now.

Sure he has downside risk, so does Peavy or Santana or any other pitch. Greinke certainly isn't on par with them yet but he was pretty filthy last year with very good numbers two years in a row and was a top prospect in the minors. I'm just surprised to see him project out to be basically an average 3 when he pitched pretty close to what you expect out of ace of your staff the last season in a half. You can see progression in his numbers since 2005, I'm just surprised you are projecting regression...and a good bit of regression at that. I'll admit I'm biased having just completed a deal not long ago to bring Greinke to my team but I really expected something close to Kazmir like projection with less Ks and BBs. Just very surprised the last 300+ innings he has pitched isn't good enough after struggling as a 22 year old in 2005...can you tell I'm surprised? :D

Best comps:

David DeJesus: Johnny Damon. They wish!

Mark Grudzielanek: Frank White. They wish!

Tug Hulett: Dick McAuliffe. Only if he actually is six years old.

Willie Bloomquist: Rich Amaral. I can totally see this (even if Amaral did get more than one extra-base hit per year.)

Tony Pena Jr.: Mario Mendoza. Bullseye!

Carlos Rosa: Carl Pavano. Well, cancel the excitement then.

Joel Peralta: Two guys who combined for 667 saves. Hmm.

Brian Bannister: The obvious comparison is his fellow intellectual Jim Bouton, but I like Fred Sanford. He's comin', 'Lizbeth! He's comin'!!

Pitching projections seem awfully pessimistic. I'll be quite surprised if Greinke puts up an ERA over 4.00, or if Hochevar or Davies are quite that awful. Then again, this defense is going to be pretty terrible, at least at all positions other than left and centerfield.

Really surprised Gordon is "average" defensively. Most metrics I've seen have him as quite terrible.

JR House projection is interesting. Too bad he won't get a single at bat in KC, while Buck and Olivo combine for a .300 OBA for about $6 million combined.

Tony Pena couldn't hold Mario Mendoza's jock.

Dan -- love the new matrices. I have other comments at the Royals Review thread that I don't want to bore people with here.

You probably see about 100 more Royals games a year than me, but in the 5 or 6 times I've seen Gordon he looked ok out there.

For what it's worth UZR has Gordon at +2.3 runs/150 over 2300 innings.

I should say I like the new format overall. I'd recommend adding age to the offensive matrix -- helps put those comps into better perspective (Grudz = Larkin! :-)

Uh Dan, Coco Crisp says he's going to steal 40 bases this year, so you may want to up his "caught stealing" total.

Dan, I think this format is the winner.

The cause for pessism on Grienke is that home run rate. It's a higher rate than any season since his rookie year (excluding his six inning 2006) and the walls at Kaufman have moved back since that season. That's rather curious.

I like the new format a lot.

PECOTA has Greinke with the 15th best projection in baseball among SP's for 2009, and there really isn't that big a difference between ZIPS and PECOTA. PECOTA is giving him three more starts and around 24 more IP, and has Greinke giving up a few less total earned runs. The two projections are actually very similar, it's just that PECOTA's is a little easier on the eyes I suppose.

I'll take the over on Greinke. I like his chances to beat both projections. He's a better pitcher than Kazmir too, if for no other reason than he actually gets to the 6th inning without having thrown 100+ pitches. For what it's worth, Alex Fernandez and Kevin Appier are among his comparables via the PECOTA system.

Great format by the way. I'm on board...

The first six hitters on Dan's list are essentially the same hitter. Kinda interesting.

The Red Sox or Yankees aren't able to do a whole lot of high-risk plays.

Except that, of course they are. It's just that on their budgets, they're different kinds of high risks.

I agree about the comments on Moore. Many odd moves for a franchise where they are.

I don't think those moves are odd, simply because I think management is perfectly content to threaten to break .500 once in a while. That's their division title: an 82-80 record, a couple of times a decade. I suspect the Royals FO equates risk with "OMG, what if we fail and go 50-112?" And it's clear enough they don't have the smarts to be able to motor along at 70 wins while stockpiling young talent that might all break out at the same time.

Dan,
Count me among the admirers of the new format!
Give me the over on Crip and I'll parlay that with the under on JR House. What's the payout on that 9 to 5 right?

Agreed on the format. It's a right purty format for a right ugly team there. And I'll take the under on the Meche ERA+, mostly out of M's fan spite, I admit.

Very much agreed on new format.

What happened to Billy Butler's upside?

What happened to Billy Butler's upside?

Donuts are delicious.

Love the new format.

It's amazing that a team that's had high draft picks for so long hasn't really developed a "star" level talent since Beltran. Just a thoroughly mediocre team.

The Red Sox or Yankees aren't able to do a whole lot of high-risk plays.

Except that, of course they are. It's just that on their budgets, they're different kinds of high risks.

I was about to disagree, but mostly on semantics. You're right.

I think Dan is saying the Red Sox can't afford to carry on their roster all year long a player about whom they're unclear whether he's high upside or crap. (In this sense, as in most, risk=variance.) They need to be reasonably certain of what they're getting, even if it's mediocrity. The Royals, however, can put a high-risk prospect on the MLB roster to see what they've got. There's no sense blocking him with a veteran mediocrity this year, because they'll have the same question about their prospect next year and be no closer to getting their answer.

Boston's high-risk players are generally high-risk with regard to health (and thus playing time), not quality. For that reason they've stockpiled a bunch of such starting pitchers, with the hopes that any five of them will be active at a given time. The starting pitchers they seek, while high-risk for health, are generally low-risk for quality. Again, they can't take a high risk on quality.

What happened to Billy Butler's upside?

Donuts are delicious.

I guess that would also explain his backside.

Boston's high-risk players are generally high-risk with regard to health (and thus playing time), not quality. For that reason they've stockpiled a bunch of such starting pitchers, with the hopes that any five of them will be active at a given time. The starting pitchers they seek, while high-risk for health, are generally low-risk for quality. Again, they can't take a high risk on quality.

Thus; J.D. Drew, Penny, Smoltz, Shilling, and to a lesser extent, Beckett. This is why the Wily Mo Pena trade was a little weird by Boston's standards. Also, sometimes it doesn't work; see also, Gagne, Eric.

Hey Dan? You know how I periodically request a projection for some semi-to-really obscure guy, preferably one who's primarily played in some non-domestic leagues?
Would you consider doing one for RHP Federico Castaneda? He's a deep, deep, deep sleeper to make the Royals pen who's put up decent numbers in Mexico (has yet to play in the states, likely to open in AA).

Would you consider doing one for RHP Federico Castaneda? He's a deep, deep, deep sleeper to make the Royals pen who's put up decent numbers in Mexico (has yet to play in the states, likely to open in AA).


I'll project him, but I'll still shout curses of your name that will shake the very foundations of Asgard.