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Again, I said it was pointless not a negative. If Chris Volstad has a decent 8 game run to end the season I still wouldn't plan on him cracking the rotation next year.
Not anymore I don't -- but I was fairly optimistic about Volstad when they got him... Like most Marlins pitchers, they rushed him into the rotation - and he was quite good as a 21 yo rookie in half a season. He then stagnated. It's happened to Marlins pitchers before - Sanchez took 4 years to develop into a solid mid-rotation guy; Andrew Miller (yeah, technically only a partial Marlin) never figured it out. Volstad always had decent - but non-stellar BB/K ratios and he's not horrid at keeping the ball down. Based on body type and arsenal, I was (wishfully, more than likely at this point) seeing a bit of Rick Reuschel in him.
However, he is still just 25. Most will tell you that his arsenal of pitches IS of major league quality. He just hasn't translated that into quality MLB pitching -- for the most part -- since his 14 starts as a rookie. If he can stick in the rotation and post a couple quality months - I'm not suggesting he gets a 6 year deal, but I would have no qualms about signing him to a 'prove it' contract this offseason and penciling him into the back-end of the rotation.
Well I would as much as I would anybody, because the Cubs are unlikely to have any better bets at that point.
Speaking of points, what is yours again? Is it that Chris Volstad is a longshot to be a star?
Fair enough. I'd certainly agree that he's a strong non-tender candidate this offseason, but as far as I can tell he has another option year. So if he finishes strong enough (unlikely), I see no harm in not giving him another "last chance" next season. Not giving him a rotation spot, mind you, but throwing him in the mix in the spring and letting him fight it out.
Chris Volstad is a longshot to be anything other than a crappy pitcher.
Like Carlos Zambrano is at this point?
You must not have been paying much attention to Z since May -- because he had been... He's now walking more than he K's, he lost his rotation spot to the immortal Wade LeBlanc - even after the Fish traded Sanchez. True - miraculously, we haven't yet seen the Fish tanks at Loria Stadium pay a price (much to everyone's disappointment), but I think if you gave me even money on who has a better career from here on out, I think I'd take Volstad.
But I'm not sure how saying Zambrano has been just as bad as Volstad is proof that Volstad should get a shot at starting when you also mention that Zambrano has lost his starting spot.
Well ... no one, including you, seems to be saying that Volstad shouldn't be starting at this point. I'm not sure what this argument is even about anymore.
Travis had a really nice run since he came back up -- his June up to basically the ASB was pretty lights out. His last 3 starts have been stinkers, but for 6 weeks - he was pitching as well as anyone in the Cubs rotation not named Dempster (you could say Maholm, too - but Maholm's run doesn't really overlap). I'm comfortable with Wood being among those back-end of the rotation options. Volstad has completely shat the bed, but still -- might as well let him get his brains beat in for the next 10 weeks just on the off chance something clicks.
Samardzija hit a wall a bit back - he's gotten somewhat back on track lately - but his sudden emergence looked like a mirage by mid/late-June.
Still - Jeff and Travis ought to be penciled for 2012.
Garza is the wild card here... I'd be more than willing to move him for a good price, but I've never been averse to signing him long-term... I'd just want it at a good price (i.e., the price you'd expect for a decent #2 or good #3 - not a nominal ace price).
I doubt there's any real hope of him breaking camp with the big club - but Arodys Vizcaino (rehab pending) ought to get a couple of 1st half starts.
Beyond that - the Cubs are really stuck with not a lot to work with... Bowden? Wells - though, he's almost certainly a non-tender. I've have always had this weird predilection for Germano, so I wouldn't mind him having a good few months and signing him on the cheap.
The Cubs are really stuck hitting the bargain bin in 2013 because there's really just nothing even close to ready in the minors... Jay Jackson has regressed to the point of likely being gone. Trey McNutt has stagnated in AA.
The only thing approaching prospectdom at Iowa is Chris Rusin, who looks like he's a fringe AAA lifer. Dallas Beeler has had a mildly decent year at AA and Nathan Struck has come on pretty strong... but Beeler probably needs another full season of minor league ball and Struck definitely does - neither looks like a future rotation front-ender. Eric Jokisch has improved his stock a bit.
The scary thing about the Cubs' deadline deals is probably that you can make a really good argument for Arodys Vizcaino and Kyle Hendricks as now being the Cubs top two SP prospects.
So you'd rather have a half-dozen oranges than six oranges, basically.
Nonetheless, I see no reason to think that the Cubs aren't doing exactly that, which is how Germano ended up on the team.
Since being traded Reed Johnson has started two games for the Braves and has hit .429/.556/.429 for them. According to WAR he has been worth -.2 WAR for the Braves so far. How so? Well, defensively WAR sees him as -3 runs and offensively he has been worth 1 run. He's started one game in left and one game in right. DRS sees Reed as -2 runs in left. In the game Reed started in left the Braves won 6-1 so apparently with an average fielder the Braves would have won 6 to -1.
What happened in that game in left?
Flyball out to left
Line drive to short left field for a single.
Triple to deep LF-CF
Line drive single to short LF
I'm guessing the triple is carrying a lot of the water here and to be fair Reed did look awkward on that play.
The point is that it's not absurd on it's face as you seem to suggest. To say that the Braves should have won 6 to -1 is like saying the Cubs actually won a game 1.3 - 0.9 which they actually lost 1-0 despite 11 hits and 2 walks in 9 innings. The run values based on linear weights don't always match the results.
Tony Campana (according to Carrie Muskat's Twitter feed)
Still, I'm not disappointed. At least this makes the last two months of the season interesting.
Who won the pre-season bet for number of players from opening day active roster who are still in the organization?
Well, I set the over/under at 16.5, and the following players are gone:
Byrd
KWood
Maholm
Johnson
Soto
Dempster
Baker
So, that leaves 18 of 25 who are still around. You can see who guessed what on this page - at first glance, Walt and I are the only ones who took the over, but there's still time left to go.
Someone read about all the success Connie Mack had with his famous $100,000 Infield. This should be pretty close to that.
C - Clevenger/Castillo
1B - Rizzo
2B - Barney
SS - Castro
3B - Vitters
LF - LaHair
CF - Campana
RF - Jackson
It might even project about as well as 2012's team. Are Castro and Barney arb eligible? Even if they are that would be a sub $10 million lineup.
EDIT: If I'm reading everything correctly (not a given) neither Barney nor Castro are likely to be super 2s so that would be a lineup making the minimum across the board.
Why is kids in scare quotes?
Might as well... Raley has been decent, though unspectacular, at Iowa and he'll be 25 next year. Looks like Randy Wells lite to me - doesn't really strike people out, but also doesn't walk bunches and generally keeps the ball in the ballpark.
Are you ready for a rotation next year of Jeff Samardzija, Travis Wood, Chris Volstad, Brooks Raley, and Casey Coleman... at least, until Arodys Vizcaino makes it back.
A few split-squads thrown in there?
He's a lefty, if that matters.
Will they ever win a game in August?
Castro Tracker 17/17
Camp, too. Not coincidentally, they're 1st and tied for 4th in the NL in games pitched (thru Fri, so Russell may be higher now).
Castro leads the majors in SS errors and is only one behind the leader, regardless of position (Pedro Alvarez).
In addition to him leading the majors in SS errors (tied actually with a guy who has played 36 less games there), he also leads NL shortstops in putouts, ML shortstops in assists and NL shortstops in defensive WAR.
Once again, I was totally serious that Starlin Castro was going to break a 100 year old record and have something like 60 to 90 errors this season. I mean I was constantly talking about how he was going to commit 60 errors all year long so I could see how you mistook my seriousness on this.
What is it that you hope to achieve with this line of dialogue?
I personally think Fleita just rose to a level over his head -- you really have to give him credit for building the Cubs' Latin development from nonexistent to something at least able to run with the big dogs, but his hike in the org chart seems to have been into a position that he wasn't really suited for.
Of course, it offers up the Chicago media another chance to bash Crane Kinney, as Rogers does in today's Trib... not that I really care about Kinney; he sounds like a douche, but it's just funny to read and hear the way that the local media has it out for the guy.
And the Crane Kenney hate continues to be maddening.
Triple and a double yesterday though!
But yeah, it looks to become the Cubs' Austin Jackson, he really need to cut down on his strikeouts... which is a bit scary.
The contract covers four years of arb (he will be a super two) and three of FA.
That seems like quite the deal for the Cubs.
42% of Jackson's strikeouts have been looking v. an MLB average of 24% (it's L/SO in this table). That was my impression anecdotally (which is why I looked it up). He's not swinging and missing or chasing bad pitches so much as he seems to have times where he just locks up and lets called strikes go by. I'd blame it on nerves, except for the huge K numbers in AAA (but I have no idea if it was the same issue there). I don't know what to make of it, but it strikes me as different than what we normally see in a high-K guy who swings at specific types/locations of pitches that he can't hit but can't lay off of.
Completely unfair, the Cubs are contractually obligated to have a 25-man major league roster.
What a pointless sequence of events that was - demoting Beliveau and DFA'ing Maine in the process, with both of those guys being better pitchers.
Blake Parker off the DL.
What makes you say that? Maine's minor league numbers are actually pretty good. Hinshaw's been walking 6 per 9IP pretty much since he hit pro ball. Comparisons to their limited major league careers aren't unfavorable to Maine, either.
Also, Jackson's sort of reined in the strikeouts over the past week. Still a frequent occurrence (8 in his last 7 games, to match 8 walks), but not so silly. I'll take it. He's been their best hitter over those 7 games. His defense looks solid, too. I imagine he's got some pretty gruesome slumps ahead of him in his career, but he's clearly talented. He looks like a more patient, lefthanded, and defensively sound version of Alfonso Soriano in that respect.
Vitters still looks staggeringly overwhelmed ... not so clearly talented.
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