By Chris Quick on August 4, 2010
Sanchez has been solid on defense this year, but the Giants are going to need a little more oomph out of his bat. His current .302 wOBA — using the original Tango formula and not the FanGraphs’ version — leaves much to be desired. In our graph I’ve also included the league average for wOBA. The league average 2B this year in the NL currently sits at a .328 wOBA. So, it’s hard to make the argument that, positionally, second basemen are worse than the league average hitter. Sanchez owns a career batting line of .268/.313/.319 as a Giant.
Posted in Giants, Plots | Tagged freddy sanchez, wednesday graph
By Chris Quick on August 2, 2010
I’m a bit late on responding to the Giants deadline deals, but I wanted to briefly write a few words about the two relievers the Giants picked up.
Giants Lose: OF John Bowker, RHP Joe Martinez
Giants Get: LHP Javier Lopez
I guess this means the quest for the LOOGY is over. I’ll state up front that I don’t really love this trade for the Giants. My gut reaction is that the Pirates did very well while the Giants got a guy that throws baseballs with his left arm.
First, what the Giants lost: John Bowker has been a bit of a poster boy for the ‘Let the Kids Play’ movement. That’s despite already being 27-years-old — Bowker turned 27 this July, he’s playing in his age 26 baseball season — and never really hitting well over a couple of brief major league stints. Of course, Bowker’s appeal was his revamped hitting approach that he exhibited in 2009 while playing for the AAA Fresno Grizzlies. Yet, he struggled again in this season in less than 90 at-bats. It’s hard to totally write off Bowker at this point and I think the Pirates did well to acquire him. In addition to Bowker, the Pirates netted personal BCB favorite, Joe Martinez. The Pirates always seem hungry for starting pitching and hopefully Joe will get a crack. I think his upside is a +2 win starter in the NL — meaning a league average starter. He’s not a flame-thrower but he’s got good control, some groundball tendencies, and a nice 2-seam fastball. That might not sound glamorous, but if he’s a league average SP it becomes quite valuable. Considering that the Pirates will now control both Bowker and Martinez until 2015, I think it’s a solid pick up.
In return the Giants landed 32-year-old Javier Lopez. Lopez owns a career 4.30 FIP across 8 seasons and 282 innings. He’s a side-arming, baseball slinging specialist. His fastball doesn’t break 86 mph often and he’s primarily a two-pitch guy with a fastball/slider combo. His career walk-rate is 4.17 walks per 9 vs. a strikeout-rate of 5.54 strikeouts per 9. Underwhelmed yet? Lopez, being a LOOGY, is somewhat tough on left-handed batters. He’s held them to a slash line of .242/.336/.350 over his career. Going forward, for better or worse, he’ll be the go-to guy in the bullpen for tough LHBs. Lopez is also a FA at the end of this season, effectively making him a rental.
Bottom line: Can I say meh? Meh. Lopez is a nice addition to the bullpen, but not one that I would give up 4 years of control of both Bowker and Martinez for. Furthermore, I wonder if the Giants really had to trade for a guy with Lopez’s skill-set. Shouldn’t any GM be able to cruise the minor leagues and find a slinging lefty like Lopez on the cheap? I’m not so sure the Giants didn’t already have Javier Lopez in their system in the form of Geno Espineli (a side-arming south paw in Fresno). A quick look-see on minor leauge splits tells us that Espineli has held LHBs to a 3.37 FIP over his minor league career. Run that through the MLE conversion and it comes out to a 3.90-ish FIP against LHBs. Lopez owns a career 3.80 FIP against LHBs in the majors.
—
Trade #2
Giants Lose: RHP Daniel Turpen
Giants Get: RHP Ramon Ramirez
Ramirez is a much better reliever than Lopez and the Giants got him for much less. Go figure.
Daniel Turpen was drafted by the Giants in the 8th round of the 2007 First Year Player Draft. Currently pitching for AA Richmond, Turpen has posted a 4.09 ERA to go with a 7.5 K/9 and a 3.4 BB/9. Almost every minor league system has 10 Daniel Turpen’s floating around at any time. He’s the definition of a trade-able, low upside reliever. I’d love to know what the Red Sox saw in him. Ramon Ramirez is a right-handed reliever that works primarily off of a low-90′s fastball and a slider. He had an excellent 2008 with the Royals (2.84 FIP, 71.2 IP) and was then sent to the Red Sox in the Coco Crisp trade. Since joining the Sox, Ramirez hasn’t had the same success. He posted a 4.46 FIP last season and currently has a 4.62 FIP this year. Getting out of the AL East should help Ramirez some and he’s decent insurance for any one of Bautista/Mota/Casilla. The Giants will control Ramirez until 2013, making him a bullpen candidate down the road if he doesn’t crack this year’s ‘pen.
Bottom Line: Not bad. Ramirez is obviously better than Turpen right now and the Giants are in the ‘right now’ mode. It’s also a bonus that they’ll have him under control for a couple of more seasons if they want him.
Posted in Giants | Tagged bullpen, javier lopez, joe martinez, john bowker, ramon ramirez, relievers, Trades
By Chris Quick on July 29, 2010
*From 1901-2010
I’m in love with the new Baseball-Reference WAR data. WAR, or Wins Above Replacement, is the uber-stat that attempts to encompass the total value of what makes a player, erm, valuable. With the development of FanGraphs and other saber-slanted websites, WAR has become a pretty well known statistic. If you’re new to the game, check out the glossary section of the site for a definition.
One of the components of WAR is fielding. Now that BB-Ref is providing WAR data, I’ve been having a good time running various queries. Best WAR seasons, best baserunning seasons, best fielding seasons — and today’s post, the worst fielding seasons in Giants’ history. A few words before we jump in and have fun. Baseball-Reference’s fielding component for WAR comes in the form of Total Zone. It’s expressed in runs above (or below) average. Also, when considering defense at a position we must realize that a -10 run first baseman isn’t the same as a -10 run shortstop. The shortstop is a much more athletic group when compared to your average group of first basemen. So, we can assume that if we moved a SS to 1B he would be very good, if we moved a 1B to SS, he wouldn’t do so hot.
Now, let’s check out the 10 worst fielding seasons — as measured by the Total Zone component of BB-Ref WAR — in Giants’ history.
A graph plus the data table. Click the graph to enlarge. It looks much better at full resolution.
A good mix of Giants past and present. A few words on some of the names on our list.
- #1 on our list is Bobby Murcer’s 1975 season which clocks in at -22 runs below average just on defense. Bobby Murcer is known for a few things in his baseball career. First and foremost, from a Giants’ perspective, is that he’s the player the Giants traded for when Bobby Bonds was sent to New York in the offseason of 1974. Bonds went on to have maybe his finest season that year when he hit .270/.375/.512 (151 OPS+). For the Giants Murcer had a fine year on offense batting .298/.396/.432 (127 OPS+) but, as our graph and data table show, his defensive numbers in the outfield were terrible. Oddly enough, Murcer — a gold glove winner in 1972 — scores poorly by Total Zone throughout his career. He owns a career mark of -97 runs below average in the outfield. It’s almost as if the Gold Glove Award doesn’t do a good job of assessing good defense. Hmmm.
- Ron Hunt was never considered a strong fielder and his 1970 season and the -20 runs (nearly negative 2 wins) he accumulated on defense was a career worst. Hunt, a career 2B, played primarily 2B in ’70 but he also saw some time at 3B. Hunt — the master of getting hit by pitches– has maybe one of my favorite baseball quotes of all time, “Some people give their bodies to science; I give mine to baseball,” And to back that statement up he ended his career with an astounding 243 HBPs. To this day, he owns the record for most HBP in a single season with 50(!) in ’71 with the Expos. The HBP magnet only played 3 seasons with the Giants from 1968-70.
- Maybe my favorite player on the list, Dick ‘The Mule’ Dietz, shows up for his 1970 season and the -20 runs on defense that accompanied it. Dietz’s season is really a tale of two different skill-sets. On offense Dietz was incredible — batting .300/.426/.515 (152 OPS+). It’s probably the best offensive year ever for a Giants’ catcher. However, on defense, Dietz was another story. His -20 runs is damaging, but also consider some of the traditional stats that, I think, tell a story. Dietz made 14 errors, 25 passed balls, and caught only 19% of base-stealers. Dietz gave up 92 stolen bases that year while only throwing out 21 runners. Even more amazing is he was still worth +4.5 wins that year — even docking him nearly 2 wins by defense — he was an All-Star and still remains one of my favorite Giants of all-time. You have to wonder if Dietz would have been moved over to first base if he hadn’t played with McCovey.
- Hey look, a Marvin Benard sighting. His -19 runs below average on defense in ’99 is our most recent Giant to make the Butcher List. I have to admit, I’ve got a soft spot for Benard. He was generally acceptable on defense — a career +2 runs by TZ — and he had a couple of average to above-average years (’98, ’99, and ’01) on offense. He was most likely stretched as a CF and the Giants didn’t help themselves by primarily playing him there. He would have most likely done much better in a corner spot.
- You’ve got to feel for Johnnie LeMaster. He was futile on offense — career OPS+ of 60 — and his defensive numbers don’t stack up. Since he was a SS, we should note that he was playing in a more athletic peer group than the OF/1B group, but LeMaster scored poorly across the board over his career on defense. In fact, by BB-Ref’s WAR, he’s -7 wins below replacement level for his career. His -15 run defensive season in ’82 was paired with an OPS+ of 51. And yet he still appeared in 130 games and collected 436 at-bats.
An interesting list. Dick Dietz’s season in 1970 in particular is notorious for it’s defensive problems. Total Zone is really handy when we’re trying to examine historical players that fall past the scope of current defensive metrics like UZR.
Comment Starter: Anyone on the list surprise you? Anyone you think should be added to our Top 10?
Posted in Giants, Plots | Tagged bobby bonds, bobby murcer, defense, Dick Dietz, graphs, Plots, total zone
By Chris Quick on July 26, 2010
Taking a week long break from baseball can leave you feeling refreshed. We all love the game — living and dieing most nights by the final score — but sometimes, over the long grind of a season, it’s nice to take a step back and unwind a little. It helps to put things in the proper perspective. Of course, coming back to the Giants as they play some of their best baseball on the year is a nice thing, too.
While on vacation — and absent any sort of TV or website-checking device — I wondered; had the Giants made any deals? It seems clear at 56-43 and heading into the trade deadline, the Giants are poised to make a couple of moves. Most reports state that the team is looking for a LHP and another bat to add to the lineup. I’m not necessarily a Sabean-basher or supporter, but the general idea of Brian Sabean wheeling and dealing makes me slightly nervous. Yet, the team is certain to make a move and with their current record, it’s not an outlandish idea.
Ignoring the potential LHP acquisition — Will Ohman seems acceptable if cheap — let’s talk about a few hitters the Giants have been linked to.
* Jose Guillen, OF – I love the idea of picking up an outfielder and moving Huff back to 1B. It improves the overall defense and it should keep Huff fresh. However, Jose Guillen is not the outfielder you are looking for. Guillen has had a resurgent year at the plate (.347 wOBA) after posting a .304 wOBA in an injury plagued 2009 campaign. Despite advanced medical skills, Guillen isn’t a good bet to actually help the Giants. Never a strong fielder, Guillen is more of a DH these days. He’s unlikely to be an upgrade over Burrell and he’ll cost prospects in a trade. Mega-pass on Guillen.
*Jorge Cantu, “3B/1B” – Cantu is a little like Guillen in the fact that he’s an average-ish hitter with a cast-iron skillet for a glove. He’s logged over 2,600 career innings at 3B to go with a -14.8 UZR/15o . That’s not good. Cantu’s down year this season on offense (.315 wOBA) should drive down his price. But with his skill-set, I’m not sure why the Giants would really want him. Pass.
*Corey Hart, OF – My original Do Not Want. If the Brewers are smart, they’ll sell high on Hart. Hart’s career has had an up-and-down flight path. He was a 4-win player in ’07 when he posted a .380 wOBA. He followed up his breakout ’07 with back-to-back disappointing years — 1.1 wins in ’08 and 0.7 wins in ’09. Hart is on pace for another 4+ win season (currently sitting at 2.1 wins) as the result of a huge power surge. He’s hitting nearly 70 points of ISO over his career average (.277 vs .209). Hart’s power is legit and he’s always show the ability to drive the ball but his plate approach (6.6% career walk-rate) is below average. He’s not a particularly strong defender, either. Because Hart is having a good year, he’s going to cost more than Guillen or Cantu. He’s a better player, but most discussions with the Brewers seem to indicate that they want Jonathan Sanchez. Filling one hole by digging another doesn’t seem like a solid strategy for the Giants. Pass on Hart for a couple of reasons.
So, really, my strategy is that I don’t want the Giants to do anything. Or at least, not make moves for any of the above three players. That’s easy to say, but the Giants are in a position where they probably should upgrade the team. The problem with Guillen/Cantu is that neither is an upgrade. Hart’s price should scare away the Giants and Brian Sabean has stated he’s not going to trade a SP in the major league rotation. For all his warts, Adam Dunn is semi-interesting. He’s having another solid season (.396 wOBA, 3 WAR) and his defense at 1B — by UZR and some other metrics — seems to be non-horrible this year. The Nats might be willing to move him, but like Hart, he could be expensive. Though, after the recent Dan Haren trade, you never know.
Comment Starter: Your ideal trade target, please.
Posted in Giants | Tagged adam dunn, jorge cantu, jose guillen, Outfield, Trades
By Chris Quick on July 16, 2010
Dear readers,
I’ll be away from BCB for the next week or so because of vacation. I’ll be, as they say, going off-the-grid at least until next Friday. Looking forward to catching up on my summer reading (Catch-22 by Joseph Keller and a short story collection of sci-fi legend Philip K. Dick). In the meantime, feel free to watch all the tortuous Giants’ baseball that you can stand. I’ll be back to talk about it soon.
Posted in Off Topic
By Chris Quick on July 15, 2010
Another ‘who saw this one coming’ move from the Giants.
MLBTR:
The San Francisco Giants’ official Twitter feed reports that the club signed left-hander Dontrelle Willis to a minor-league contract with Triple-A Fresno on Wednesday. The Giants are Willis’ third team this season, after he was designated for assignment by both the Tigers and Diamondbacks within the last two months. No matter where he has played in 2010, Willis’ struggles have continued — he has a 5.62 ERA in 15 appearances (13 of them starts) and only an 0.84 K-BB ratio.
Oh, how far you’ve fallen, D-Train. At one point in his career Dontrelle Willis was one of the most promising young pitchers in baseball and one of the most entertaining.
At 21-years-old he won the NL Rookie of the Year Award for his 2003 season (160.2 IP, 127 ERA+, 3.45 FIP). From 2004-06 he put up WAR seasons of: 2.8, 6.2, and 2.9 wins. Quite good. That’s production that any rotation would love to have. However, as they often do, things change in baseball. Since 2007 Dontrelle has been almost a total lost cause. On field his control went from average, to disastrous. Since 2008, he’s only pitched 127 innings while walking 8.7 batters per 9. There are no words to describe how bad that is. Off the field he was charged with a DUI in ’06 that was eventually reduced to a lesser charge with probation and community service work. He also missed a large portion of his ’09 season dealing with anxiety issues.
As a minor league signing, Willis carries almost zero risk. If he pitches well in the minors, the Giants might consider pitching him at some point, but for now he’s rotation filler for the Fresno Grizzlies. Stuff-wise Dontrelle has lost some zip on his fastball. He works around 88 mph these days rather than the low-90′s he was with the Marlins.
A graph:
It will be weird seeing him in a Giants uniform if he makes it that far. The signing has that going for it. He was born in Oakland and that probably influenced him to sign with the G’s.
Bottom line: No risk, AAA filler, will have to drastically fix his control if he wants a MLB career.
—
Update: It’s hard to believe that he’s only 28-years-old. Feel like he’s been in the league for much longer.
Posted in Giants | Tagged control issues, dontrelle willis, free pitching, walks
By Chris Quick on July 15, 2010
While we wait for the Giants to start the 2nd half of the season tonight against the Mets, let’s check out some links from around the Giants blogscape.
* Triples Alley has an excellent piece up on AT&T Park and it’s affect on hitters. Go read it, now. It dispels some of the myths of AT&T being purely a pitcher’s haven. How the Giants sell the park to prospective free agents should be thought out, because while it does favor pitchers, it’s not Petco and free agent hitters need to know that.
* The guys at Raising Matt Cain have a nice little break down of where we’re at as we head into post-All-Star break baseball. The article starts off with a pretty telling stat:
If we set 90 wins as a target to win the NL West, then the Giants have to play .581 ball (43-31) the rest of the way. That’s a tall order. The Giants were 13-9 in April, but 27-28 in May and June. This nice little 7-4 run before the Break was encouraging, but the club has yet to show it can sustain a long winning stretch. The Giants best win streak is FOUR games.
A winning% of .581 from here on out to reach 90 games is indeed a tall order. When I last ran the numbers, it was actually .602. Mark is right that the 7-4 run before the break put the team in a better position. Still, a .581 winning% to reach 90 games is going to be hard.
For fun, here’s is the team’s 2nd half record from 2009-1999.
Year W L W%
2009 39 35 0.527
2008 32 35 0.478
2007 33 43 0.434
2006 31 41 0.431
2005 38 37 0.507
2004 42 31 0.575
2003 43 24 0.642
2002 46 28 0.622
2001 44 30 0.595
2000 51 26 0.662
1999 36 38 0.486
* And a bit of self promotion, I wrote a blurb for Rob Neyer’s SweetSpot blog on the keys to the Giants’ second-half. It’s nothing shocking, the Giants will need Pablo to start hitting, Posey to keep on hitting, and the pitching to stay healthy and productive.
Posted in Giants | Tagged att park, links, second half
By Chris Quick on July 14, 2010
Click for mega-size
In 2009, Pablo Sandoval emerged as an offensive force for the Giants. For a team that sorely lacked any kind of hitter that you could qualify as ‘good’ or ‘non-terrible’ Sandoval’s wOBA in ’09 of .396 was one of the best things about the year. He hit for power, walked at a league average rate (for a guy that swings from head-to-toe, it was encouraging) and all at the young age of 22-years-old. Sandoval’s future seemed bright. Unfortunately for the Giants, 2010 has not been so kind to the one called Panda. At the All-Star break, Sandoval’s current slash-line stands at: .263/.322/.382 and by any advanced offensive metric (wOBA: .304, OPS+: 85, Batting Runs: -6.3 runs) his reversal of good fortunes has been shocking.
Today’s graph highlights 6 key statistics of what should be important to Sandoval’s success as a hitter. Our components are: BB% (walk rate), K% (strikeout rate), O-Swing% (found on FanGraphs.com, swings taken outside of the standard strike zone), O-Contact% (also at FanGraphs, contact made outside of the zone), ISO (Isolated Power), and BABIP (batting average on balls in ball). You’ll also notice empty outlined black boxes, those are the league averages for each season.
The weird thing about Sandoval’s 2 seasons is that outside of 2 statistics (ISO, BABIP) a lot of his numbers are very similar. He’s walking at nearly the same rate, striking out at nearly the same rate, and he still swings outside of the zone a lot — as well as making contact outside of the zone a lot. Sandoval’s ability to hit for power as determined by ISO has plummeted from a robust .226 in ’09 to a below average .119 in ’10. Even if you’re more of a traditional fan, I think you’ll agree that Sandoval hasn’t squared many balls up this year. The other key Sandoval category is BABIP. Because of Sandoval’s style — high contact — his BABIP is going to determine how useful he is. Coming into this year (and during his time in the minors) he has consistently put up above average BABIPs.*
* I’ll take a second here to state that hitters do have more influence over their BABIP than their pitching counterparts. I’ve set the league averages at .300 for our graph, even though some hitters can routinely put up .300+ BABIPs and some far below.
I’ve always feared that Sandoval could have a bad BABIP year and look worse than he actually is. Having a bad BABIP year while losing all of his power has really sapped Sandoval’s offensive game this season. It’s possible that Sandoval could be suffering from some bad luck, but his loss of power most concerns me. If Sandoval’s BABIP dips closer to the average .300 and he’s still hitting for above-average power, he’s a useful if not a very good player. Whether or not Sandoval needs to make an adjustment to the league or it’s a vision related problem or something else, the Giants drastically need him to bounce back in the second half. If he doesn’t, it’s going to be a hard climb to make.
Posted in Giants, Plots | Tagged pablo sandoval, power, wednesday graph
By Chris Quick on July 11, 2010
Hi Blog,
I just got back watching a couple of Giants games in the District. We were in D.C. for the Saturday and Sunday games and it marked the first time that I’ve seen baseball in D.C. — and in the new Nats’ stadium. A few quick observations from my vantage point and a few pictures to round out the post.
- Buster Posey? Yeah. He’s pretty great. Posey has clobbered the ball all month long and it didn’t stop against the Nationals. In the 2 games we saw, Buster went 5-8 with 1 2B, 1 3B, and 1 HR to go along with 5 RBIs. He also hit 2 singles and drew a walk. I’m still getting used to seeing a catcher hit a triple. I’m not sure what that was about, but I don’t think it’s premature to rename the MVP Award to the ‘Posey’.
- Jonathan Sanchez had a classic bad Sanchez start. He threw around 30 pitches (maybe more? I wasn’t keeping track) in the first inning and it went something like this: walk, stolen base, walk, double (run scores), strikeout, wild pitch (run scores), groundout. Sanchez can be maddeningly inconsistent at times and he didn’t have his best stuff in this one. Still, I generally like Sanchez a good bit and I have hope he’ll eventually get things figured out. Even if he doesn’t, he’s still a valuable member of the rotation.
- The Nats’ ballpark is pretty nice. Good sight lines, some nice food (Five Guys, Hard Times Cafe, decent brew selection) and the presidents race is pretty goofy in a good way. My only knock is that the park is a little … bland? There’s an overwhelming tone of gray and nothing really stood out to me architecturally. Still, not a bad place to catch a couple of games. I’ll definitely be heading back.
- Aaron Rowand takes a lot of abuse from G’s fans — and some of it is deserved — but his game-tying home run off of Tyler Clippard on Saturday was awesome. Rowand GAMER’d the heck of a 3-2 change up, blasting it into the LF seats to tie the game. I’ll make a deal with Rowand. If you start hitting lots of home runs, I’ll hate your contract a whole lot less.
Pics, or it didn’t happen.
Posted in Giants | Tagged aaron rowand, buster posey, frank howard, photos, travelogue, washington d.c.
By Chris Quick on July 2, 2010
After watching the team drop it’s 7th straight game tonight, I got to thinking: How well do the Giants have to play from here on out to win 85 games in the NL West? Generally, most tend to peg the NL West Champion at 85 wins.
Well, here we go.
Team W L Total Remain C-W% 85W% 90W%
Padres 46 33 79 83 0.582 0.470 0.530
Dodgers 43 35 78 84 0.551 0.500 0.560
Rockies 42 38 80 82 0.525 0.524 0.585
Giants 40 39 79 83 0.506 0.542 0.602
D-Backs 31 48 79 83 0.392 0.651 0.711
Total = total games played
Remain = games left to be played
C-W% = current team winning%
85W% = the needed winning% over that team’s remaining games to reach 85 wins
90W% = the needed winning% over that team’s remaining games to reach 90 wins
Depending on how you project the division, 85 games might seem on the low end. That’s why I added the 90W% to the mix. In 2009, 2 teams finished with at least 90 wins (Dodgers: 92, Rockies: 90) and currently, both the Padres and Dodgers appear to be able to reach that 90 win mark. Looking at our data table, if we think the Giants can win the division with just 85 wins, then the team will need to play .542 baseball from here on out while the Padres need to play at .470 or worse. To get to 90 wins, the Giants need to play at a winning percentage of .602 for their remaining games — that seems like a very steep order to me. The best winning percentage of any month this year for the club is their April (.591) and they’ve played much closer to .500 baseball over the past couple of months.
It goes to show that wins are wins. Whether they are at the beginning of the year, or at the end. The Padres hot start has allowed them a little wiggle room if they come back to earth. The Giants, on the other hand, are going to have to play pretty solid baseball for the rest of the year to have a shot.
(Also, those poor, poor, D-Backs.)
Posted in Giants | Tagged depressing, how many wins
