Speedy Returns
Posted by Chris - 08/07/08 at 09:07 amTip of the cap to Giants beatwriter Andrew Baggarly for the news on Velez’s return. He’ll be replacing Brian Horwitz’s spot on the roster. Velez experienced a brief run of 121 AB’s earlier in the season before the Giants sent him packing to AAA Fresno in order to work some kinks out of his game. After a pretty good spring* Velez looked completely out of place at the major league level. He got picked off, made errors, never hit, and didn’t steal bags that well for a guy with blinding speed.
* A reminder to the future you when you’re all excited about Player X who’s having a great Spring Training showing, remember Velez and tell yourself that Spring Training stats don’t mean anything.By any metric you slice it, Velez’s time with the Giants earlier in the year was bad. He was worse than any theoretical replacement level player that you could dredge up from the depths of any AAA roster. To Velez’s credit, when he returned to the minor leagues he didn’t entirely melt down. He hit a respectable-ish (.308/.371/.503) over 39 games and 159 AB’s.
Still, if you ever needed any confirmation that the PCL might be a hitters league, check out Velez’s slugging. The good news is that Velez’s BB% in AAA was higher than it was when he was in the majors — 9% to 4.8% — but he’s striking out a little more in AAA when compared to his time in the majors — 17% to 14.3%. Velez also has a gaudy BABIP of .358 in Fresno, which isn’t so gaudy when you notice that he’s hitting line drives at a rate of 24%.
If you use MLE’s from Velez’s half-season in Fresno and translate it to what his equivalent performance in the MLB would be, you get the following. Also, a note, I’m using Dan Szymborski’s excellent zMLE spreadsheet for my translations.
League BA OBP SLG OPS AAA PCL .308 .371 .503 .874 MLB .283 .329 .428 .757
Keep in mind that this isn’t a prediction, just a translation of what Velez has done. But, if Velez could perform around the same level as his translation in his second trip with the Giants, it would be a huge upgrade from his origininal (.207/.244/.322) debacle.
What hurts Velez is his glove. He still lacks a true defensive position and the hopes that he might turn into a Chone Figgins may have been too high. What makes matters worse is that he’s been primarly playing LF in AAA Fresno — 23 LF, 18 2B, 1 RF — and the Giants won’t need him in the OF. When it comes down to it, Velez is most likely going to have to be a 2B to find a fit with the Giants, unless he’s purely a pinch-runner which seems to run opposite to what the Giants wanted Velez to get in Fresno, that being playing time. A mid-700 OPS left fielder isn’t good. And for those hoping that Velez will add some value with his legs, his 13 steals out of 21 attempts leaves a lot to be desired. That works out to a 62% steal rate.
The silver lining to bringing Velez back to San Francisco is that a potential trade is in the works. The Brewers have been rumored to have some interest in Ray Durham and Jack Taschner and the Giants might be preparing to make a move. Thus, they could need a warm body like Velez to stand at 2B for the rest of the season. But, I still think I’d rather give Denker a shot at playing 2B. Like Velez, he’s supposed to be weak defensively, but his bat might play a little at the MLB level.
After Velez’s first crash-and-burn with the Giants I posed the question of “Will he get another 250 AB’s in a Giants uni?”. I didn’t think so then and I still don’t think so now, but that’s a little less than half a season of AB’s and with Velez back in San Francisco, it’s possible. Stranger things have happened.
Comment Starter: Like the return of Velez? If not, who would you have called up?
July 8th, 2008 at 10:59 am
The return of Speedy McF*ckup should be entertaining.
July 8th, 2008 at 11:30 am
Don’t like the call-up. In fact, it makes very little sense to me at this time. I forget if it was Baggs or someone else, but there was a story yesterday that said “the Giants consider Velez a real prospect” or something to that effect, which made me simultaneously laugh and vomit. I know we’re desperate for good prospect stories in this org, but COME ON. Velez ain’t one.
And why now? There’s no pressing need for Velez. Why not wait until Ort is rehabbed or Schierholtz is ready to return? Hell, you could make a case that McClain would be a better fit for the big club, and I HATE the idea of calling him up!
The real news to me is the Brewers moves as reported in the Rosenthal story. If Rosenthal is right (not a given), the Brewers are going to go for broke this year with Sheets, Sabathia, and Fielder, and retool next year with comp picks. I love the strategy, and wish them the best. And if it’s true, then I could definitely see them picking up Taschner and Durham, which would be spectacular. Hinshaw kinda-sorta makes Taschner redundant, and we’ve got plenty of other arms waiting in the wings (howbout that metaphor, huh?). If Sabean and Co. moves those guys and get some salary relief and some prospects, that will tell me they’re serious about the whole rebuilding thing. I sincerely hope they are!
July 8th, 2008 at 12:42 pm
Oldjacket,
SMcFU is a great name for Velez. Love it. Welcome to the site.
Delorean,
You pretty much said what I was trying to say, but in less words and more concisely. I’ll +1 your hope for a Durham trade.
And don’t hate on McClain! Dude hits laser-bombs, what more do you want!?
July 8th, 2008 at 12:56 pm
Oh, and Velez is as much of a “real prospect” as any other 26-year-old in the minors is, that is to say, not much.
July 8th, 2008 at 12:57 pm
I don’t hate McClain at all. He seems like a good dude, and can mash (the ball, not the hooch). HOWEVER, if he gets called up, all that does is robs ABs from the Ortholtzes of the world, which is bad, mmmkay?
@OJ:
Speedy McFuckup is amazing. Didn’t someone else on McC call him Iron Glove von Pickoff or something? Also apt.
July 8th, 2008 at 1:02 pm
I agree that right now McClain doesn’t make sense with Bowker at first base. Last year he made a teeensy bit of sense but the Giants never called him up. Thumbs down.
I mean we’ve had Mark Sweeney play significant portions of time at first base. Sweeney! And not the good one.
Here’s a hypothetical: If McClain could play 3B (Which I believe he’s doing a little of in AAA) would you play him over Castillo? In the end, it doesn’t really matter between the two, but it’s an interesting question.
I’ll also admit that a big reason that I like McClain is that his story is kinda cool. I think if you translate him from AAA to the MLB, he’s OPS’ing just slightly over 800, which isn’t really starting material for a corner infield position.
Laser-bombs!
July 8th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
@Delorean
That was me too.
Maybe I should put “Coming up with Nicknames for Eugenio Velez” on my resume.
I orignally thought of Captain Pickoff Von Ironglove of the MentalErrorShire Irongloves, but decided that it was excessive.
The sad part is that I like Velez. He has decent pop in that bat for a waterbug. But the mental and concentration aspects of baseball seem to elude him (to say the least).
July 8th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
OJ, you have a gift! Fucking hilarious.
Chris: If you pinky-swear that McClain won’t take ABs away from Schiermeier, then you may park him at third.
July 8th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
Oldjacket,
I would totally hire you based on that resume.
Delorean,
Consider him parked.
July 9th, 2008 at 1:45 pm
[...] a good analysis of the Velez call-up on Chris’s excellent blog Bay City Ball. It gives me an idea for an MLE [...]