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It's interesting that, even though ZiPS doesn't hate the White Sox starters, it predicts them all to regress (and Floyd and Peavy to regress considerably).
It's also worth noting that Alex Rios seemed to break out of his horrible slump in the last two weeks of the season. I'll make a bold prediction and say that he won't hurt the White Sox in 2010.
Is that what $10m is supposed to buy these days? Wow, is the bar really set that low for Rios?
I'm not trying to be harsh or even guess what he'll do next year. Mostly I stand in awe of Kenny Williams. That guy has balls as big as church bells to make some of the moves he has. Rios looked shaky in TOR, and the rumors that came out after the deal had to be available to Kenny beforehand, and yet he throws down for the guy at retail.
I used to laugh when he did some of the goofy moves, but over the years his outcomes have outpaced my expectations so I've stopped snarking. (Peavy looks like he's recovering as expected, but that Rios contract, man, church bells.)
I think you always push a guy as far "up" the defensive spectrum you can without exposing him, unless he gets injured at the tougher positions.
- ZiPS still doesn't like Floyd very much. It apparently doesn't buy the jump in his K-rate (7.6/9 this year versus a career average of ~6.5 coming into the year, although I'm not sure how relevant Floyd's Philly stats are on what he'll do in 2010).
- I certainly hope that Gordon Beckham is more Chet Lemon than Darnell Coles or Edwin Encarnacion.
- I'm pretty underwhelmed by that Tyler Flowers projection. He spent (most of) the season at Birmingham (a notorious pitcher's park) and had an OPS near 1.000. Does ZiPS think the k-rate is that debilitating?
- The rotation excites the hell out of me. I'd take the over on the Buehrle, Danks and Floyd projections. I'd be very happy if Peavy finished with those numbers (although I'm expecting a much higher IP total). Garcia as a fifth starter appears to be perfectly acceptable and having Hudson waiting in the wings is nice.
Dan -- do you have a projection for CJ Retherford? As always, these are much appreciated, especially getting 'em out this early.
On Beckham, 3B and 2B are pretty much the same spot on the defensive spectrum and it really depends on Beckham's mix of arm vs. range as to which he'd be better at. And 3B are "corner bats" in only the technical sense, they hit more like CF than 1B/LF/RF. The question normally would be whether he can handle short but the White Sox already have a pretty good SS ... unless he's moving to CF.
Anyway, a team in a position somewhat similar to where they were last offseason. Dye's an FA right? I'll guess that Rios moves back to RF. They have holes at DH, 2B (or 3B if they move Beckham), and CF while last year they had holes at 3B, 2B and CF. Abreu would look pretty good on this team (some DH, some RF with Rios sliding over). Branyan too though he doesn't seem like the Sox type of player. If they grabbed either of those two, Nady might not be a bad addition. Cameron would be a nice pickup.
The last few years, Williams has sort of specialized in the post-injury/"disappointment" end of the market (Dye, Thome, Quentin, Rios, Pierzynski ... OK, he's just annoying). Who, besides Nady, is on that end of the market this offseason? I could see him grabbing Upton from the Rays -- depends on whether they buy the "lazy" label. Burrell certainly is down here. Kelly Johnson? Felipe Lopez? Chris Young?
I assumed he meant that Rios won't hurt the team payroll-wise; that he'll be more or less worth his contract when considering offense and defense. I could be wrong.
Yes. If he hits as ZiPS projects (and I think he will) and plays plus defense in center, he'll earn his money next year.
I imagine the outfield will be Podsednik in left, Rios in center, and some combination of Quentin, Wise, Kotsay, or whoever else they pick up off the scrap heap in right. As Dan suggests, there's not a whole lot of room for improvement, and the Sox have pretty much made their bed alread in terms of 2010 payroll. As much as I'd like to see it, they're not adding Chone Figgins or Bobby Abreu - Williams already made his big moves for 2010 when he added Peavy and Rios.
Many moons ago, whene the Jays traded Lopez away, there were rumors that it was at least partially because he'd been introduced to the party life by Raul Mondesi, and taken to it like a fish to water.
If he's still living that lifestyle, I can see it being a major source of annoyance to his teams.
I'd like to see that as well, but the team is talking about a rotating DH for 2010, using it primarily to try and keep Podsednik and Quentin healthy, and to spell Konerko.
On USSMariner, Dave Cameron is suggesting the M's should trade Jose Lopez, Mark Lowe and Jason Vargas for John Danks.
I said I though the trade was ridiculous; Kenny Williams would laugh then hangup. He defends the trade as fair.
What do you guys think?
I was that commenter :-)
Dave's abusing me pretty good (as is his way) but I'll give it right back.
I suggested the M's should send King Felix to the Yankees for Cano, Coke and Mitre. It works according to his "math".
Well, it's because you are so abrasive.
Yes, the trade proposal is ridiculous.
Looking at the projections again, I'm actually pretty pleased that ZiPS sees Carlos Torres as being a more-than-acceptable depth guy. Barring a trade he'll be the 7th on the SP depth chart (perhaps sixth if they don't want to jerk Hudson around and just want to stick him in the bullpen for the year), which seems about right.
Even more so, Jenks' regression seems a bit harsh. He got his K rate back up and a spike back near/above normal BABIP hurt his overall line and performance, especially with the long ball toward the end. But considering the benefit of the doubt Rios is getting after his performance...this surprised me.
Rk Player OPS+ HR PA R RBI BA OBP SLG OPS1 Cal Ripken 112 431 12883 1647 1695 .276 .340 .447 .788
2 Dave Kingman 115 442 7429 901 1210 .236 .302 .478 .780
3 Andre Dawson 119 438 10769 1373 1591 .279 .323 .482 .806
4 Darrell Evans 119 414 10737 1344 1354 .248 .361 .431 .792
5 Ernie Banks 122 512 10395 1305 1636 .274 .330 .500 .830
6 Sammy Sosa 128 609 9896 1475 1667 .273 .344 .534 .878
7 Eddie Murray 129 504 12817 1627 1917 .287 .359 .476 .836
8 Carl Yastrzemski 129 452 13991 1816 1844 .285 .379 .462 .841
9 Dave Winfield 130 465 12358 1669 1833 .283 .353 .475 .827
10 Juan Gonzalez 132 434 7155 1061 1404 .295 .343 .561 .904
11 Rafael Palmeiro 132 569 12046 1663 1835 .288 .371 .515 .885
12 Jose Canseco 132 462 8129 1186 1407 .266 .353 .515 .867
13 Billy Williams 133 426 10519 1410 1475 .290 .361 .492 .853
14 Fred McGriff 134 493 10174 1349 1550 .284 .377 .509 .886
15 Ken Griffey 136 630 11196 1656 1829 .285 .371 .541 .912
16 Carlos Delgado 138 473 8657 1241 1512 .280 .383 .546 .929
17 Reggie Jackson 139 563 11416 1551 1702 .262 .356 .490 .846
18 Gary Sheffield 140 509 10947 1636 1676 .292 .393 .514 .907
19 Duke Snider 140 407 8237 1259 1333 .295 .380 .540 .919
20 Mike Piazza 142 427 7745 1048 1335 .308 .377 .545 .922
21 Jason Giambi 143 409 8135 1159 1330 .282 .405 .527 .932
22 Chipper Jones 143 426 9273 1458 1445 .307 .406 .541 .947
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 12/23/2009.
If he gets to 400
right now I have Kong with 1.1 wins over Konerko (by the way I do wins over replacement)
I would think that Konerko, if he lasts to 400 would pass Kong and Kong would remain the worst 400+ Homer guy
But it could be close, a couple 100 OPS+ seasons (which is around where I set replacement level for 1B/Dhs) could net Konerko 400 HRs without letting him gain that 1.1 wins he needs to beat Kong.
It never has, and yet that doesn't seem to stop Floyd.
2008: ZiPS projected ERA = 5.87; actual ERA = 3.84
2009: ZiPS projected ERA = 5.11; actual ERA = 4.06
2010: ZiPS projected ERA = 4.78
Is it his declining k-rate?
As I write this, they have two arb-eligible players yet unsigned - John Danks and Tony Pena. I hope that Danks gets a multi-year deal, and they go year-to-year with Pena.
Most projection systems don't like Buehrle. I think PECOTA had something like a 5 year run of predicting a Buehrle implosion. I think it's that, as you note, he doesn't have a very impressive K-rate, and he also gives up his share of HR. I'm not sure, but I also don't think that most of these systems consider his ability to completely destroy the running game - for his career, base stealers are 40 for 95 against him, and that doesn't include his pickoffs.
And that probably actually underestimates Buehrle's ability to hold runners - something like 2/3 of his starts have been pitched to either AJ Pierzynski or Sandy Alomar, neither one of whom is a particularly good thrower.
A backup outfielder? Isn't that what Mark Kotsay and Andruw Jones are?
Kotsay is backup 1B.
Jones is backup DH.
Ozzie will make it work. Somehow.
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