Ahhh, Saturday
DMZ · March 25, 2006 at 1:25 am · Filed Under Mariners
PI: Reed’s injury leaves M’s with a gap in center and Reed injury shakes up infield.
Times: Baek had a good outing.
The Times manages to go through a series of scenarios to cover CF:
– Bloomquist plays
– Ichiro moves over
– Borchard plays center (yeagh) or right
– Lawton plays center (OH GOD NOOO)
– Trade for someone
Despite having a couple possible internal options like Bohn. Ah well.
The short version is nobody knows, but they seem to think it’ll be Bloomquist.
TNT: M’s could pursue Thomson. But there’s no room in the starting rotation! Where would he go? Wait… oh yeah.
Cut: Dave Burba, Fernando Vina.
Gotta love the Seattle press. I love how, when going though the drawbacks of all our center field options, the only one they can come up with for Willie Bloomquist is “no one to back up second”. Give me a break.
I wait with baited breath to see what option the team decides to go with… It’s almost like a set-up. A trap to test the savvy of our management.
In my dreams, the second Hargrove says “We’re going with Willie” Howard Lincoln would jump out from behind a bush and yell “A-HAH! You’re fired!” And then Jeremy Reed would come out from behind him grinning and ripping his fake cast off.
(I think the Times link is messed-up, DMZ)
Again, it’s really late at night, so I will forgive you. Both the Baek and Thomson links go to the same article (about Thomson).
Anyway, looking at Thomson he seems to be a middle of the road type starting pitcher. He’s not particularly good at anything. His K/9’s fluctuate between mid-high 5’s to low-mid 6’s. His GO:AO ratio over the last three years indicates an above average groundball tendency, but not substantially dominating. And his BB/9 rates are a solid low-mid 2’s.
But he doesn’t dominate anywhere. He just does everything “okay”. Could he benefit from Safeco? Sure. Could he benefit from the solid Mariners infield defense? Definately. Is a 33 year old pitcher worth Gil Meche or Julio Mateo? I think so.
It wouldn’t be a huge trade. It’d be one of those under-the-radar trades that might have some measure of reward. More then Mateo or Meche anyway.
Really, why is Lawton in CF going to be worse than Winn? We all saw Winn improve in CF, and Lawton has decent speed (and his arm can’t be THAT noodly if he spends time in RF).
The TNT actually is suggesting Everett. Now THAT is something where I’d want to avert my eyes.
You just know with the Bloomy lovefest that he will be placed in center and stay there no matter how bad he hits. Things are starting to go down hill. Add to that Sherill’s shoulder (no one knows yet) which will probably end up being bad since he has the lucky M’s logo on his uniform.
I think we should just stick Bohn or Choo in center. Why not… it’s not like they are going to kill the M’s season.
Oh well, let’s see how much self-motivation Ichiro can take before a nervous break-down,
#3: Lawton was rated as one of the worst right fielders in baseball last year by the Dewan system. Its hard to imagine being one of the worst defenders at a corner position and then blossoming when moved the wrong way on the defensive spectrum. I bet some devout supporters of defensive metrics might further argue that Lawton has no business even being the outfield at this stage of his career.
Myself, I suspect a conspiracy. The powers to be realized that the fanbase would reject Bloomie over Lopez at second so they sent Everett into the clubhouse to break Reed’s wrist and thus open a spot for Bloomie in center. I now realize that this has nothing to do with baseball. It has everything to do with the invasion that will begin on June 16 when the alien that has been living in Bond’s head (and you thought he was a statistical anomaly because of the cream!)since 2000 will join forces with fellow advanced scout Bloomie to signal the time is right to land the mothership in centerfield at Safeco (where else would be spacious enough?). Trust no one-not Lincoln, not Bavasi, not Hargrove. Just ask yourself, who brought in Everett? Who tried so desperately to trade Reed? Who’s been lying about the M’s profit thus allowing money to be redirected toward invasion preparation? Finally, why is the M’s farm system in such disarray? Clearly, scouting efforts were diverted from scouting players to tactical advance scouting in support of the invasion. People, now that you know beware of men in black suits…..
This is insane. No, noth the alien story, the though of WFB starting center field.
Since we’re on the topic of Willie the versatile, anyone needing their spirits lifted should cruise over to ESPN classics sometime and catch *Utility Man: the quest for Cooperstown*. It’s a delightful *documentary* chronicling the Sklar brothers’ satiric quest to get the ultimate utility man, Jose Oquendo (*The Secret Weapon), inducted into baseball’s Hall of Fame. Oquendo, while listed as a second baseman by mlb’s historical stats, played all nine positions (sporting a career ERA of 12.00!) and was the glue that held several championship teams together.
I laughed, I cried, I temporarily forgot my angst about the M’s first 8 weeks…… God I love baseball…its more than a game.
Here’s to hoping Willie can one day have a career OBP of .346.
It has to be Borchard, even if he tanked with the White Sox, it worth the risk to see if a change of scenary will benefit his playing. Have to keep Bloomquist in the infield for a little stability. Lawton might work for a month — might, but heavens above, KEEP EVERETT OFF THE FIELD!! Great depth on the bench, way to go Bill
Seems to me the CF decision comes down to how you value Borchard vs. Bloomquist as defensive players. You know Bloomquist won’t help you offensively. The percentage bet is that Borchard won’t either, although when he does it will be with some power versus Willie’s gritty scampering to first base. Haven’t done any numbers but my gut is it would be close to a wash on offense if they both play to past form.
Which leaves the question: which guy makes the smallest defensive hole in CF? The idea that you can’t use Bloomquist because then you don’t have a back-up for second base doesn’t make any sense to me — if Lopez goes down it seems likely they’re going to put Bloomquist at 2nd no matter where he’s playing at the moment and move other people accordingly. For just a game or two of rest you can always move Willie to 2nd and Borchard (or someone) to CF without causing a system-wide trainwreck. I wouldn’t mess with the corners, though — as the Times put it this morning, ‘that might weaken two positions, not just one’.
I guess ill be very confused if Ichiro! doesnt play center until Reed’s return. He has already all but said, he would be willing. If there is a silver lining what a perfect excuse and a wonderful opportunity for the great experiment……
Ahhh man terry (#5) you are making miss the x files.
I’m watching the Reds play the Twins and I think the M’s should definately trade Willie for Francisco Liriano if given the chance… 😛
that might weaken two positions, not just one
But it might weaken them less. Right is the place in Safeco to put your weakest defensive outfielder, so I don’t mind putting Borchard or Ibanez out there.
And again, it’s not just about whether Borchard or Willie will be weaker with the glove. Willie’s significantly weaker with the bat.
We’ll know, by who they decide to put in CF, where this team is going this year. WFB will equal 90+ losses, Ichiro will equal .500 and possible contention.
Ichiro’s gotta stand up and be willing to take CF for the good of the team. He allegedly showed us with Team Japan that he could be a leader. I’d like to see him show himself a leader with the Mariners and do this.
I guess I don’t know what Borchard’s defense is like in CF. I think Dave has seen a lot of the White Sox’ farm system in action, so perhaps he could shed light on that. (Check that, on further review, Dave has already commented in “Bye Bye Matt Thornton” that Borchard has become “a bit of a liability in center at this point.”)
So, if Borchard isn’t going to help much in center, it sounds like he still has better than average range for a corner outfielder. It seems to me that left field is vast enough in Safeco that Borchard could give you a pretty big boost there over Ibanez, and Ichiro is probably the best bet to field center effectively. After so much talk about wanting to play on a team that competes, I don’t know how Ichiro could say no if he was asked. Of course, that doesn’t mean they’re actually going to bother asking him.
To me its an absolute no brainer:
LF: Borchard (simply for defensive reasons) until he hits himself back to the bench. Hopefully he can carry the position until Reed is back.
CF: Ichiro!
RF: Ibanez
I think Bavasi deserves a pat on the back for the swapping of junk with Chicago last week. Just 6-8 weeks of good defense out of Borchard would make that trade look extremely one-sided.
Should one be worried about a Cameron-Beltran type collison if Ichiro plays CF?
At least in right field he only has to be concerned with one team mate crashing into him.
Could there also be another option….. what about last week of spring training cuts around the league?
“Should one be worried about a Cameron-Beltran type collison if Ichiro plays CF?”
I don’t think you should ever be worried about that sort of thing, even if you’ve got Cameron and Beltran in the same outfield. That was a once-in-a-long time freak play that was really scary, but rare. Those guys could play another 20 seasons together and never have that happen again. Planning around such freak occurences is generally a bad idea.
And now we really see just how stupid the Reed for Bosox pitching trade would have been.
Couple quick questions about the pitching staff….
1. Has Foppert pitched himself back to Tacoma?
2. Why is Piniero pitching for San Antonio today?
Also, a little poorman’s Baseball Prospectus stat of the day:
Mike Hargrove had a career OBP of .396 for his 11 season career (makes you wonder how he could love willie so much).
#1 “I wait with baited breath…”
Would that be worms or leaches, John in L.A.? I think you mean you are “bating,” or holding your breath, as in “abate.” At least I hope so.
And now we really see how stupid the Reed for Bosox pitching trade would have been.
It’s amazing no one presented this as analogous at the time.
Lemme put that another way: now we see confirmation of how stupid the Reed for Bosox pitching trade would have been.
No….today’s Red’s game confirms how stupid the Reed for Bosox pitching trade wouldve been.
The fact that Reed looks to be injury prone wouldve made the trade more risky for the Bosox.
THAT BELTRAN-CAMERON COLLISION (See #s 17 & 19) – Another factor that probably contributed to the collision–besides freakishness–is the fact that we had a CF and a former CF. (IIRC, a CF is entitled to any ball he can reach, and others should back off.)
IMO, Cameron forgot that he was no longer a CF, and, therefore, did not back off.