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Baseball Primer Newsblog— The Best News Links from the Baseball Newsstand
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Just don’t count on a Donna Douglas being underneath…
According to a major league source, the Sox met with the right-hander’s agent at the GM meetings earlier this week in Chicago.
It’s too early to gauge exactly how much interest the Sox have in Lackey, who went 11-8 with a 3.83 ERA for the Angels last season. They remain in the early stages of planning and fact-gathering and are expected to stay in contact with Lackey’s representatives in the coming weeks.
Although early estimates had Lackey commanding as much as $100 million over five years in free agency, those expectations already have been dialed back a notch. The 31-year-old right-hander is not considered on par with the class of the market last offseason, left-hander CC Sabathia, who signed a $161 million, seven-year contract with the Yankees.
He even may be just a hair below A.J. Burnett, with whom he shares virtually identical career stats…
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1. John (You Can Call Me Grandma) Murphy Posted: November 14, 2009 at 03:08 PM (#3387613)Behold...er!
What happens when a pitching staff isn't handled correctly due to too many.
Don't sign Lackey unless Wake can handle long relief. Can be spent better elsewhere.
I ain't no double-naught
Also, they finished third in the league in runs allowed in a hitters park. So what, exactly, is the problem?
Lackey hasn't hit 200 innings for the last two innings, but he's a good pitcher. If he can had for 5 years and $80-something million, I think he's a good idea.
Well, they have identical FIPs, and virtually identical ERAs. Lackey has a pretty big lead in ERA+ 117 vs. 110 b/c of the aforementioned stadium effects. Burnett has only 80 more IP despite pitching 2 more seasons, b/c of his mid career injury issues, and AJ is about 1.7 years older.
Burnett has better raw stuff, 8.5-9.5 K/9 over the last 3 years vs. just above 7 for Lackey, and has consistemtly lower BABIPs (Burnett is known as being quite hard to hit). Lackey has somewhat better control with a BB/9 right around 3 vs. 3.5-4 for AJ.
Over their whole careers Lackey has a durability edge, but the last 2 years Burnett has taken every turn and pitched 221 and 207 innings. Lackey has missed a month plus each of the last two seasons with arm trouble and only pitched 163 and 176 innings.
This is closer to a tossup than I would have thought (initial thoughts would have been Lackey was much better).
I think it really depends on what you think about their relative stuff/command aging well, and who's more likely to stay healthy. This is one for the scouts and medical staff really.
Lackey will cost a ton. It MIGHT be better to fortify elsewhere.
Sorry if I gorged someone's favorite head pacifier.
I gave you a hint in post numero uno, but if you're not a Twilight Zone fan, it might have gone over your head.
Not to be anal retentive about your choice of words, but that's demonstrably not true. Josh Beckett's career ERA+ is 117. Last year it was 122. Jon Lester bested his career ERA+ by ten points and upped his K rate to an elite level. I'm not going to argue that Penny and Smoltz and Dice weren't bad; they were. But pretending that Penny and Smoltz are even remotely the same pitchers they once were is silly. Brad Penny hasn't had anything approaching an ace-like season in years, and was even worse than this two years ago in LA. Smoltz had a shoulder injury; it's possible the Sox gave up on him too quickly, true. Matsuzaka is a head case and always has been who had a low ERA in 2008 through a fluky high strand rate. Both your "too many aces" statement and your "ALL performed their own standards" statement are untrue; beyond that, they're founded on the shaky reasoning that somehow having too many good pitchers causes good pitchers to pitch worse.
The problem the Sox really had was too many gambles on injured pitchers. That's sort of a problem. I'd really argue that, given that they lead the league in K/BB, were third in runs allowed in a hitter's park with a not-particularly-good defense, established Clay Buchholz in the rotation (finally), and saw Jon Lester emerge as an ace, the base assumption that the Red Sox had some kind of profound issue with their pitching is nonsense.
I think he was referring to 'getting' Repoz' reference.
Yeah. That.
It's amazing how often this fact fails to get mentioned when discussing him and free agency.
Really, if the choice is between waiting a year for Halladay or Webb, or signing Lackey this year, I'd probably wait a year. Same with Figgins and other potential position players who are FAs after 2010.
*Average. He makes $8MM in 2010 and $12MM in 2011.
There is no particular reason to think that either Halladay or Webb will sign with the Angels. Lackey is probably their best starter, he's still fairly young, and he is seen as a tough-guy competitor. Also, the key word there is "potentially." Finally, I don't think Moreno will want to lose Lackey to the Red Sox.
Or are you including Speier in your calculations?
There's no particular reasons why Lackey or Figgins will either. Their primary motivation this off season is going to be money and maybe returning to Anaheim a distant 2nd. My big thing is that there's already viable in house candidates for both Lackey and Figgins on the Angels, and the Angels should use them rather then spend what resources they have on two guys they can replace.
Will Webb and Hallady, etc. have multiple suitors? Yes, but so will Lackey and Figgins and I doubt there's any sort of Home Field Advantage for either free agent. If there were, they'd be more receptive to signing an extension like Abreu did already.
And Shredder: Fair enough. Looks like I was wrong about the payroll.
Huh? That they have both been in the organization for many years? That they are both respected and successful there? That the Angels' style of play really suits what Figgins does?
Look, if the Red Sox or Mets or whoever offer a lot more money than the Angels are willing to pay, then, yes, these guys will leave. You apparently don't want the Angels to keep them, which is fine. But one of many reasons it is different than Halladay and Webb is that if those guys hit FA, the Yankees will be involved. The Yankees are not going to be after Figgins, and I kind of doubt they will be after Lackey.
Did that matter for Torii Hunter? A.J. Burnett? Glavine? Maddux? Jeff Kent? Johnny Damon? Pettite? Clemens? C.C. Satbhia? A-Rod? etc.
Ever since free agency has been established, free agents usually place returning to their original organization on the lower side of things. Even Derek Jeter, Yankee that he is would have left the Yankees if the Yankees didn't sign him to that extension in Feb. 2001. In that sense Lackey and Figgins are the same way. Money drives their ambitions, not being Angels for life.
Look, if the Red Sox or Mets or whoever offer a lot more money than the Angels are willing to pay, then, yes, these guys will leave. You apparently don't want the Angels to keep them, which is fine. But one of many reasons it is different than Halladay and Webb is that if those guys hit FA, the Yankees will be involved. The Yankees are not going to be after Figgins, and I kind of doubt they will be after Lackey.
Concur. I'd be shocked if the Angels let both Lackey and Figgins go.
You are making a black-and-white judgment about a gray issue. And a lot of these examples aren't very good, for a lot of reasons. We will see.
Or that each year of a contract doesn't have to be the exact same amount.
Gained in all this. The team that signs Lackey is going to hate him by year 3.
Lackey is the one Angel I irrationally have the greatest distaste for mainly on the basis of mouthbreathing. Seeing him being relieved by Paplebon would tax my limits of mouthbreathing tolerance.
Strangely, I like reading them too and yet their meaning is never quite clear to me.
Doesn't say Lackey has rejected it. Even if he has, that assumes he gets a better offer. Otherwise, they may revisit.
It actually say "final offer this season", but I think you are correct in your interpretation. It doesn't rule out subsequent offers, or even Lackey accepting it, if he can't do better somewhere he wants to play.
Lackey's lifetime ERA in Anaheim: 3.72
Lackey's lifetime ERA in Yankee Stadium: 3.76
Lackey's lifetime ERA against the Yankees: 4.66
Lackey's lifetime ERA in Fenway: 5.75
Lackey's lifetime ERA against the Red Sox: 5.25
From the above, you can figure out what Lackey's approximate ERA has been against the Yankees in Anaheim (probably over 5.00), and then figure out what it might be against the Yankees in Fenway Park (where he's never pitched well up to now). It's hard to believe that Theo might not be noticing things like this.
They shouldn't. Unless the games missed in April count less than games in September.
I was thinking more along the lines of raiderjoe from footballoutsiders.
I envy your omniscience.
Are you sure it wasn't his twin brother?
Snapper: you really scared me with that one. i was wondering how lackey could be as horrible as AJ in the walks department. thankfully, your research was a bit off:
bb/9
03: 2.9
04: 2.7
05: 3.1
06: 3.0
07: 2.1
08: 2.2
09: 2.4
career: 2.6
he hasn't hit 3.0 since 06
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