Franklin non-tendered
The M’s will not offer contracts to Ryan Franklin, Cha Baek, and Jamal Strong, making all three free agents. Gil Meche, however, will be offered a contract.
A Tale of Two Offseasons
It is the best of times, and it is the worst of times.
Before the confused e-mails begin to roll in, let me specify: skies are dark if you’re a Mariner fan, but somewhere, there is joy in Mudville. The Texas Rangers may be about to cap off a productive offseason with a run at Kevin Millwood.
Unsatisfied as most are with the M’s performance this winter, the fact that a division rival has markedly improved amplifies the disquiet. The Rangers’ signing a coveted starter would make the pill all the more bitter.
It’s always darkest before the dawn, and tomorrow is the shortest, darkest day of the year. Perhaps things will shift, and lighter days will lead to more lighthearted posts.
But as it is, I just had one thought when I saw Mike Bauman’s argument for why Cuba should get a spot in the World Baseball Classic:
Playing this tournament without Cuba would be like proceeding with the American League West schedule without including the Seattle Mariners.
… “it would cause roughly the same result”?
Today’s roundup
Late update: Greg Dobbs is designated for assignment (!) to make room for LHP Jake Woods, claimed off waivers from the Rangers.
“Mariners bust budget to sign lefty” reads the PI headline. Except there’s nothing in the article about them busting their budget. The article does offer this ray of hope:
…indications are the Mariners want Reed more than they want Clement or Arroyo.
And from the humor department:
Franklin could be retained as insurance and as someone who could push Meche for a spot in the rotation. Or he could be non-tendered, thereby becoming a free agent. Given that he’s averaged 200 innings the past three seasons, he would be a hot commodity as a free agent.
I guess though that might depend on what you think “hot” means.
Art Thiel blasts the team for not re-signing Freddy Garcia, which along with other decisions forced them to overpay for Washburn, who Thiel is not so big on.
However, o’er at the Seattle Times, Bob Finnigan says Reed’s on the market as the team continues to look for pitching:
Even with Jarrod Washburn in the rotation, the Mariners are still in the trade market for another starting pitcher.
And while outfielder Jeremy Reed may be the leading candidate to go in any deal, the Boston Red Sox aren’t the only possible destination.
An industry source maintains that the New York Yankees are another possible trading partner.
Um, technically, any team is a possible trading partner. I’m just saying that if you’re going to grant anonymity to a source, shouldn’t you at least get something interesting out of them?
Larry Stone writes up the team’s line (“M’s believe Washburn is good fit for Safeco“) and ends the article with:
The team is engaged in ongoing trade talks involving Jeremy Reed, who could yield another starting pitcher. Bavasi indicated that any other acquisitions are likely aimed at improving their depth  “players that can back up or threaten some of the guys we have  in a good way. There’s a lot of fine-tuning to go through.”
They want someone to come in and threaten Everett, and someone else to get Everett’s back, and so on down the roster? That seems needlessly wasteful.
Corey Brock gets in the best lines of the day though o’er at the NT:
Jarrod Washburn can certainly empathize with what Seattle Mariners fans went through in 2005.
The 31-year-old left-handed pitcher, who on Monday agreed to a four-year contract for $37.5 million, said he was continually puzzled as to why the Mariners did not fare better last season.
No no wait, it gets even better:
“Every time we played against the Mariners last season I couldn’t believe they were not winning more games,†said Washburn, who played the past eight seasons for the Angels.
“The lineup they have – starting with Ichiro at the top – they’ve got some talented guys.â€Â
Ahhhh, that’s quality humor in arrangement there.
To Three Nights in August Author Buzz Bissinger
Mr. Bissinger,
You don’t know me, but I’m a big fan. I think “Friday Night Lights” is one of the best sports books I’ve ever read, and I’v enjoyed seeing other work appear in “Best American Sports Writing” yearly anthologies, and then there’s that Pulitzer you won way back when. So when I got a copy of “3 Nights in August” I was excited and happy. But in the preface, I can’t believe what I found:
In the fallout of Michael Lewis’ provocative book Moneyball, baseball front offices are increasingly being populated by thirty-somethings whose most salient qualifications are MBA degress and who come equipped with a clinical ruthlessness: The skills of players don’t even have to be observed but instead can be diagnosed by adept statistical analysis through a computer. These thirtysomethings view players as pieces of an assembly line; the goal is to quantify the inefficiencies that are slowing down production and then to improve on it with cost-effective player parts.
This is jarring an error and as poor a generalization you could make. That you may wish to strike a contrast with LaRussa is no excuse. Read more
Outfield flies, Safeco Field, Jarrod Washburn
We’ve discussed the Washburn deal to death in the past few days, so, if you’re checking the blog for our thoughts on the signing, those threads are a good place to start.
However, since the deal is now official, I want to expound on a point that is basically the major sticking point between those who like the signing and those who don’t. Jarrod Washburn has some really severe home/road splits in two of the past three seasons. Supporters of the Washburn signing repeatedly point to his road ERA as a sign of his true talent level, and the argument goes that taking him away from Edison Field will significantly help his performance.
However, as Jeff Sullivan demonstrated over at Lookout Landing, the entirity of the difference between Washburn’s home/road performances has been in the ratio of home runs per fly ball that he’s allowed. At Edison Field, 11.3 percent of his flyballs have left the yard. On the road, just 8.9 percent of his flyballs have gone for home runs. The league average is 11 percent, so it would appear that the abberation here is the road HR/FB ratio. However, his home HR/FB ratio is actually a little higher than we’d expect as well, because as we’ll see in a second, Edison Field significantly neutralizes home runs.
Thanks to the great batted ball information the guys at the Hardball Times have, we can break down the differences between Safeco and Edison on a per-outfield-fly basis.
Per OF Fly Safeco Edison Difference Fair Outs 3.30% 1.30% 2.00% Foul Outs 13.80% -25.00% 38.80% Singles -21.00% 20.00% -41.00% Doubles -11.00% 1.70% -12.70% Triple -30.00% -17.00% -13.00% Home Run -11.00% -10.00% -1.00%
Here’s what the table says, essentially. A flyball is 3.3 percent more likely to be caught in fair territory than in an average ballpark. It is 1.3 percent more likely to be caught in Edison Field than average. So, Washburn was clearly not pitching in a park that was detrimental to flyball pitchers.
Below that, we have the break down for each hit type per flyball. You’ll see the huge positive number for singles and the large negative number for triples and home runs. Essentially, what this tells us is that flyballs in Anaheim are far more likely to end up as a single than in most parks, but far less likely to end up as a triple or home run. Essentially, Edison converts homers and triples into singles and outs. Which is why, as a whole, it’s pitcher friendly.
Safeco has a very similar home run to fly ball factor, but it destroys all other types of hits in a way that Edison can’t match. Essentially, the real effect of Safeco on run scoring isn’t as much in its home run prevention, where its above average but not earth shatteringly so, but in singles/doubles/triples prevention, where its a monster. Safeco also has the added bonus of generating flyballs (5.6 percent more than an average park), so not only does it turn flyballs into outs, but by creating more flyballs than normal, its compoundings its advantage.
Safeco is a great park for flyball pitchers. But Edison Field is a pretty good one for pitchers, too. And, when looking at the real reason Washburn struggled at home versus his road performance-HR to FB ratio-Safeco offers a minimal improvement.
Safeco should help Jarrod Washburn. But Edison should have helped Jarrod Washburn too.
Bronson Arroyo
Because those annoying Reed-for-Arroyo rumors won’t go away, I figured I’d do a quick explanation of why such a trade would be a terrible idea. One in a long series of terrible ideas, unfortunately.
Arroyo is actually a similar, though right-handed, pitcher to Jarrod Washburn, who we’ve discussed to death the past few days. Their overall profile is very similar.
Extreme flyball pitcher. 30 percent of the batters Washburn faced hit outfield flies, 9th most out of 216 MLB pitchers who faced at least 300 batters. He’s a more extreme flyball pitcher than every Mariner except Julio Mateo (the most extreme flyball pitcher in the majors).
Slightly above average walk rate. In fact, his percentage of batters faced that drew walks (7.75%) is almost identical to Roger Clemens (7.76%). Command isn’t a big problem for Arroyo. He throws strikes.
Pitch-to-contact starter. He struck out 11.38% of the batters he faced. Ryan Franklin’s mark was 11.16%, for comparison. Among those same 216 pitchers with at least 300 batters faced, Arroyo ranks 196th in strikeout rate.
Essentially, Arroyo has one skill; throw the ball over the plate. He doesn’t miss bats, and he doesn’t induce groundballs. He’s a use-your-defense guy who relies on his outielders to run down an awful lot of balls in the gaps and hopes that his flyballs don’t leave the yard too often.
It’s not a reliable package, as Franklin should have taught the organization. In cases where the team’s outfield defense is spectacular, and when matched with the right park, these guys can be superficially useful, as Franklin was in 2003 and Aaron Sele was in 2001. But their shelf life is short, and they’re surviving on the backs of their more talented teammates.
To make matters even worse, to acquire Arroyo and his flyball proclivities, the M’s would have to part with Jeremy Reed, who, at worst, is able to cover center field competently (I’m not sold on him being a great defensive CF yet, but he’s clearly not bad). In replacing Reed, the M’s would almost certainly have to settle for a defensive downgrade, whether it be Willie Bloomquist, Preston Wilson, or pretty much any other available center fielder. If you like the idea of replacing Reed on the open market, you may want to ask yourself why the Yankees, who are currently starting Bubba Crosby in CF, looked at these same options and said “no thanks”.
So, remove Reed from CF and replace him with Bloomquist, for instance. Now you have an outfield defense of Ibanez (average to poor), Bloomquist (poor), and Ichiro (great). Not exactly Winn-Cameron-Ichiro. In order to succeed, Arroyo requires fantastic defensive outfielders behind him. In order to acquire Arroyo, we have to remove a big part of what would be the team’s outfield defense. Not exactly the best way to make sure Arroyo’s strengths are maximized, is it?
If the M’s are determined to have a veteran pitch-to-contact innings sponge at the back of the rotation, Arroyo isn’t even superior to Jason Johnson. Johnson, a free agent, is basically a groundball version of Arroyo. Throws strikes, doesn’t miss bats, but induces groundballs instead of flyballs. Oh, and he doesn’t cost us Jeremy Reed.
Ideally, the M’s would just get over their hangup with marginal starters who depend on their defense for their value and actually acquire pitchers with some real talent, but that apparently is asking too much. So, in the vein of lowered expectations, I’m simply asking that if the M’s are going to pay several million for a replacement level contact pitcher, let’s make it the guy who doesn’t cost us Jeremy Reed, okay?
Please.
Meet-up Wrap-up
The book event with Baseball Prospectus’ Jonah Keri was last night, and was thoroughly enjoyable. It was good to see some folks again, and good to meet others for the first time.
— We heard about (and saw the table of contents for) the forthcoming BP book Baseball Between the Numbers, about which Jonah is enthused. If he’s excited about it, then so am I.
— Jonah brought photocopied handouts of the latest PECOTA projections for Jarrod Washburn. Unfortunately, he’s now facing federal charges for distribution of obscenity. [rimshot]
— I got a bunch of great post ideas from the attendees, including a summation of Bill Bavasi’s record so far and the role of “intangibles” in player evaluation.
— Guests Jon Paul Morosi of the P-I and Larry Stone of the Times listened in, no doubt preparing parallel features on myself and Jonah.
Due to the unexpected outburst of a Dixieland band, a brief softshoe did materialize. No karaoke, though. Many thanks to everyone who showed up.
The 3.20 ERA
Any article you read on the signing of Jarrod Washburn, and any comment defending it, is going to reference his 3.20 ERA last year. In fact, we’ve already seen numerous comments to the effect of “the guy had the fourth best ERA in the American League last year, and that’s more important than his strikeout rate”. The assumption, of course, is that the 3.20 ERA is somehow indicative of a skill Washburn will bring to Seattle. His fielding independant numbers don’t support that assertion. But the fact remains that he did have a 3.20 ERA last year. How’d he do it?
Well, let’s take a look inside Washburn’s season.
Washburn faced 740 batters over the course of the year. 243 of those, 32.7 percent, reached base. The AL average was 32.5 percent. So, we can conclude that Washburn was not significantly better than average at keeping hitters from reaching base.
How about how many bases they got initially? Of the 184 hits he allowed, 129 of them were singles, 31 were doubles, 5 were triples, and 19 were home runs. 70 percent of his hits allowed were singles, compared to just 67 percent of as the league average. That’s not huge, but it’s significant. While he allowed a league average number of baserunners, the fact that he kept more of them to singles than we’d expect helped keep runs off the board. So, there’s part of the lower-than-expected ERA, but certainly not all of it.
So, we know he put an average amount of guys on base, but he allowed a well below average number to score. So let’s take a look at his strand rate. Of the batters he put on base, how many did he leave there when the inning ended? Well, Washburn had the highest LOB% of any pitcher in the AL. He stranded a remarkable 81.8 percent of his batters. The league average is 70 percent. That’s just an enormous difference, and the driving force behind Washburn’s low ERA.
With nobody on base, batters hit .279/.337/.428 against Jarrod Washburn. With runners on, when the league hits about 13 percent better than in non-runners on situations, they hit .267/.315/.408. That’s about a 20 percent swing from his actual performance with runners on to the league average. With runners in scoring position, it got even more extreme. He allowed hitters to bat just .238/.310/.385 in the 122 at-bats he had with RISP, and only 31 runs scored. If you replace his RISP performance with his nobody on performance, he would have given up 12 more runs than he actually did.
Overall, Washburn allowed about 24 runs less than we’d expect based on his baserunner totals and opposing batters lines. Half of that is due to his performance with runners in scoring position. The other half is a combination of the above-average singles allowance and the above average performance with runners on base in non-scoring position situations.
If you believe Washburn’s 3.20 ERA is indicative of any kind of repeatable skill, you are arguing that Jarrod Wasburn has three abilities:
1. The ability to give up singles instead of doubles and triples.
2. The ability to pitch better with runners on base.
3. The ability to be dominant with runners in scoring position.
That’s what you’re hanging your hat on, folks. And guess what? There is no evidence that any of those are repeatable skills.
Washburn’s career singles to hit ratio is 63 percent, below the 67 percent league average, and well below the 70 percent mark he posted in 2005. Even if you don’t believe in the DIPS theory, which has consistently shown over and over to be accurate, Jarrod Washburn has never shown the ability to be an exception and limit the hits he allows to singles. 2005 jumps off the page as an anomoly.
How about pitching better when men are on base?
2005:
None on: .279/.337/.428
Runners on: .267/.315/.408
Scoring Position: .238/.310/.385
2004:
None on: .250/.289/.411
Runners on: .300/.358/.496
Scoring Position: .303/.372/.492
2003:
None on: .250/.295/.333
Runners on: .266/.328/.464
Scoring Position: .250/.316/.427
2002:
None on: .226/.271/.379
Runners on: .250/.313/.368
Scoring Position: .232/.313/.299
Not a skill, folks. Washburn has never shown an ability to pitch better with runners on base. This isn’t a problem unique to him, either. Nobody pitches consistently better with runners on for long periods of time.
Jarrod Washburn did post a 3.20 ERA last year. No one denies that. The question we’ve been posing is how consistent are the skills that he showed that led to that 3.20 ERA? The answer: not at all. Washburn posted a low ERA thanks to putting men on first base and leaving them there. That’s not a recipe for success, and its not one he can repeat.
The Goatee Conspiracy
Eric Blankenship wrote in with this explanation for recent Mariner moves, which I present for your consideration and amusement:
—
As you know, Bill Bavasi’s slender mug is home to one of the finest and most meticulously groomed goatees on earth. Most of us have been guilty, at one time or another, of losing ourselves for seconds on end within his goatee’s perfect matrimony of shape and linearity. Obviously, Bavasi is a man who takes great pride in his goatee and the goatees of others. Some people even say Bavasi is obsessed with the goatee, but only because they lack the necessary faciluties required to fully comprehend the sheer divine magnitude harbored by the goatee. Read more
Times reports Washburn deal is done pending physical
I am refusing to post the link, because I refuse to believe that this is happening. If I refuse to acknowledge what Derek just called “the worst offseason [he] can remember any team having in recent memory,” it is not real. We can have a fun gathering tomorrow night, and we will all be just soggy with effervescence and good cheer.
I am happy in my happy place.