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From Kevin Kennedy's blog: Ryan Zimmerman, the Rookie of the Year third baseman for the Washington Nationals, is experiencing his first preseason caravan and enjoying it. Zimmerman hit .287 in 2006 with 20 homers and 110 runs batted in. That's what impressed me. It showed that he not only maximized his homers, but had other big hits as well. I've seen players hit 25 or 28 homers with only 72 or 76 RBIs to show for it.
The nerve of them -- waiting until there are no runners on base to hit their HR so they get all the glory to themselves.
Not like good old Ryan, who "maximized" his homers -- like, I guess, he was allotted 20 homers at the beginning of the year and spent them wisely -- and "had other big hits." Not like those selfish other players who hit 28 homers and only have 76 RsBi. Those types are assholes. That's why they never get any RsBi -- they're dicks, and their teammates hate them, so their teammates deliberately fail to get on base for them, so they never get any RsBI chances.
It's a vicious cycle. Or maybe Kevin Kennedy's just a dummy.
Edit: He most certainly is, in fact, a dummy, as several people have already pointed out: Zimmerman lost the ROY voting to Hanley Ramirez.
Because I'm not sure you're using the term correctly, Kevin Kennedy.
As a baseball fan for many years I've noticed the stolen base no longer seems like a real priority. What happened? In this age of great athletes why haven't these guys been stealing more? Where are the great base stealers like Ron Leflore, Tim Raines, Willie McGee and, of course, Rickey Henderson? — Robert Hannon
[snip] Speed and motion are offensive weapons that never go into a slump. [snip]
>> Scott Podsednik has been caught six of his last eight steal attempts. Isn't that a slump? Consider that prior to that, he had been successful 50 out of his last 59 attempts. If this were a hitter, it'd be equivalent to a guy hitting .330 for 400 at bats and then going for a Todd Helton-in-May-like 4 for 50.
It's fine to argue for the proper use of stolen bases, but why make such clearly erroneous, outlandish claims about them?
---
Part II:
I think there is one area that is critical to all teams that is being missed these days: the value of catchers. Catchers control much of the game but I don't think there are that many who do it now. What catchers stand out as examples of game controllers and is this becoming a lost art because too many pitching coaches and managers control the game? — John Fellner
[snip] When the Dodgers traded Paul Lo Duca in 2004, I said they were trading the heart and soul of the club, and not only because of his bat. It was his defense and leadership from behind the plate that would be missed the most. [snip]
>> People love criticizing that Lo Duca trade. Kennedy doesn't offer any evidence showing exactly how much losing Lo Duca's heart, soul, bat, defense, and leadership affected the Dodgers. I think he probably wanted to avoid doing any research. So did I, but then I did some anyway.
DODGERS RECORD BEFORE LO DUCA TRADE:
60-43 (.583), first place in NL West, 2 1/2 games ahead of San Diego
DODGERS RECORD AFTER LO DUCA TRADE:
33-26 (.559), first place in NL West, 2 games ahead of San Francisco
So after losing their heartiest, souliest player, the Dodgers sacrificed .024 of their winning percentage. (They also acquired Steve Finley and Brent Mayne for minor leaguers around the same time they lost Lo Duca, so maybe those two guys filled the heart/soul quotient.) They also managed to win their division and steal a game from the Cardinals in the NLDS.
As a post-script, in the small sample size of 213 PA for Florida last season after the trade, Lo Duca posted an OPS+ of 82. Which is fine for a catcher I guess, but not great compared to the 109 he recorded before the trade. This year he's bounced back and been pretty productive (again, for a catcher), with an OPS of .761 and presumably outstanding leadership.
The centerpiece of the trade for the Dodgers, meanwhile, Brad Penny, has been the team's best starter this year (although he's missed a few starts with injuries), with a 3.62 ERA and a WHIP of 1.26. Hee-Seop Choi and Guillermo Mota have both been pretty disappointing and Juan Encarnacion for some reason became amazingly good (.868 OPS and 15 HR?!).
I've forgotten what the point of all this was. Oh, right. How bad could a trade really be when the team that made it goes on to surpass expectations and win its division? Also, you're still going to harp on a year-old trade that didn't have a clear negative impact?
An excerpt from Kevin Kennedy's new book, "Twice Around the Bases."
"Age is just one of many ways players, teams, managers, scouts -- everyone involved in baseball -- try to get that little extra edge that will help them succeed and win, even though the rationale behind these decisions doesn't always make sense. Let's face it, a great player who comes up to the majors at twenty-five will produce more in a shorter time than a mediocre player who makes his big-league debut at nineteen or twenty."
True. I'd say that a great player who comes up at any age will produce more in a shorter time than a mediocre player who comes up at any age. (By the way, this excerpt is from Chapter One. So, this is his opening "grab the audience" salvo. Pretty compelling stuff.)
"While it doesn't take a genius to understand that, most teams still look for youth. That's why so many Latin American players coming in have changed their ages over the years. It's much easier to change or create a new birth certificate in a third world country, where records are not kept so closely. However, 9/11 has changed all that."
First of all, Kevin, how did you sit down and write a book about your life in baseball, and find yourself droning on about birth certificates in the very first chapter? And, moreover, though this has nothing to do with baseball: how in the world do you just drop a "9/11" reference like that and then just drop the subject completely? (He doesn't go back to it in the rest of the excerpt, at least.)
I am now officially excited to read this book, which I imagine to be 288 pages of the most boring and wrong-headed dreck ever bound in cloth.
I am going away until Sunday, FJM. Keep the homefires burning.
"That's why so many Latin American players coming in have changed their ages over the years."
i like that the syntax of this setence. as if anyone's age doesn't change over the years. KK writes with the precision of a fenway park urinal trough. which troughs i hear have been removed from the stadium. and no, i have yet to see them appear on ebay.
haha, check out my grammar! who am i to question another man's composition?
I can't believe you're actually going to read that. Bravo.
So it doesn't involve Joe Morgan, sadly, but it's worth checking out this site. A NCAA-style elimination tournament to determine "which ESPN broadcasting personality is the most totally loathsome and most deserves to suffer permanent paralysis of the vocal cords". Vote early; vote often; include reasons for your vote.
"If you were the GM of a smaller market team that could not afford to go out and sign a bunch of free agents how would you build your team? Would you go with position players or pitchers in the draft and try to develop them? Also, do you think small market teams are doing all they can to win or trying to make a profit? — Colin Adams
"I would definitely start with pitching. If you don't have pitching you won't be able to out slug anyone no matter how good your hitters are. Look at the Yankees for the first couple of months of the season. The pitchers dug a hole and the hitters couldn't get them out of it. The Dodgers in the 1960s and 1970s became a pitching-oriented organization and made drafting and signing pitchers a premium — and it won for them. In 1964, the Dodgers traded their top slugger, Frank Howard, and five other players to Washington for pitcher Claude Osteen and a utility infielder. They wanted Osteen to be their number three starter behind Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale. Pitching was so important to them that they traded six players for a number three starter! But Claude was a very good one."
Why would anyone, answering a question about low-revenue teams, which is clearly a 1990's/00's issue, cite the 1964 Dodgers? Are you kidding me? That's like being asked about the future of indie rock and citing The Cyrkle.
KK: I had two straight hitters bunt, a pair of suicide squeeze plays one after another on back-to-back fastballs. And both worked! We won the game, 2-1, beating a pitcher who was almost unhittable with speed and execution. I remember it well because Wilson and his teammates couldn't believe what we had done. We actually made it look easy. Believe me, as a manager, you love to win games like that. It's better than the walk-off home run. By a country mile.
Who cares in what manner you as a manager enjoy winning? Kennedy stops just short of saying "I will bunt and sacrifice and steal bases because I personally like those things, not because I have any evidence that they're helpful to winning."
Of course, Kennedy does believe they do help teams win -- that's the whole point of his article. His evidence? Two anecdotes.
Kevin, in my fairly limited (certainly compared to you) experience watching baseball, I have seen home runs win over 100 games.
Our third Joe Morgan of the Day, after our first Joe Morgan of the Day, Harold Reynolds, and our second Joe Morgan of the Day, Joe Morgan.
Our third Joe Morgan of the Day is Kevin Kennedy of FOXSports.com. This is not a good website, but that doesn't mean their Joe Morgans shouldn't also be fired.
Three days ago, Kennedy wrote an article titled "Breaking slumps and building confidence" (http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/3557282) in which he analyzes what the Yankees need to do to turn their season around. Let's delve into his insights from that article.
The key to winning is execution and good situational hitting. It's human nature to think that when you have great talent it will all work itself out. Usually, it doesn't.
If execution is defined as scoring more runs than the other team, then yes, I agree. I would argue that situational hitting is less important than regular, overall good hitting, as well as being less important than good pitching and also probably good fielding. Kennedy goes on to say that "usually," great talent does not "work itself out." To this I would say that great talent helps teams win more often than not. Would you rather have a team with great talent, good talent, or poor talent? All things being equal, I would choose the first.
Sooner or later it will rise up and get you.
This sentence immediately follows the passage I quoted above. I have no idea what he's trying to communicate here. What is "it"? Great talent? How is that going to rise up and get me?
Look at it this way. If Alex Rodriguez managed just a sacrifice fly in Game 4 of the ALCS last year instead of striking out, Mariano Rivera would have had a two-run lead in the final inning instead of one.
If Alex Rodriguez hits a home run, Rivera has a greater than two-run lead. Is it a better percentage play for A-Rod to cut down his swing and try to hit a sac fly? There's no evidence presented either way.
Cut down or your swing and get the run it. That's how you win the close ones.
The article actually does say "or" instead of "on" and "it" instead of "in," but that's nitpicking. Although the sentence is fun to say in its published form. Again, there's no reason to assume this is the only way to "win the close ones."
Another way to break out of the long-ball syndrome is to run, put people in motion depending on the situation and the count. Remember, speed never goes into a slump and you don't have to have burners to do this.
Speed never goes into a slump? It's only valuable to steal if you almost never get caught. If you get caught, say, three times in a row, that's already a pretty big slump insofar as it costs your team outs.
These are all reasons we use the word team. When a good ball club is losing it's usually an all-areas breakdown.
This is probably untrue. It certainly isn't substantiated.
The bottom line is that you can't stand pat when you're losing. You have to change the momentum somehow. Its much too early in the season for anyone to panic. I always felt that it took at least six weeks into the season to really analyze your ball club and know what you have and what you're lacking. But you can also win or lose a pennant in April. When you start losing, its a grind to get back in the race and it can take a lot out of a team. So you can't afford to give away games early.
Okay, so we can't stand pat. That means we have to change things, NOW! But wait, we also shouldn't panic. Relax: it takes six weeks to really analyze your ball club. But wait, we can win or lose a pennant in April! Conclusion: we should make dramatic changes to turn our momentum around while simultaneously not panicking and also relaxing.
The Yankees, for instance, are in a tough division. The Red Sox are the Red Sox, but the Orioles and Blue Jays are improved and you can't even take Tampa Bay for granted with Lou Piniella there.
Can't take Tampa Bay for granted! They have a manager!
Kennedy goes on to explain why the Dodgers are winning games.
One of the big surprises in the early going has been the L.A. Dodgers. After being criticized for a number of off-season moves, the Dodgers have played to a 12-2 start and it's more than just luck. There may be a different cast of characters doing it, but the Dodgers actually got some good talent to replace the players they traded or failed to sign ...
They took a lot of flak for that, but the bottom line is that they brought in good players, kept a core group and are winning. You can't ask any more than that.
What does keeping a "core group" have to do with it? Kennedy acknowledges that there's pretty much a "different cast of characters" in L.A. The roster overhaul has been fairly dramatic, especially going back to the Lo Duca trade last year. Does Brad Penny count as a member of the"core group"? Noted character guy Milton Bradley? It seems to me that the Dodgers are mainly winning more games than expected because a few guys are really raking and a few guys are pitching lights out. Jeff Kent and Derek Lowe come to mind. Will Kent finish the year with an OPS over 1.000? No. Will Lowe finish with an ERA under 2.00? No. But their performance either way likely doesn't have too much to do with any "core group" in the clubhouse.
Anyway, "You can't ask any more than that" is actually the sentence Kennedy chose to end his article.
