Oh, Ichiro, sometimes I feel like we don’t deserve you
When I pulled these stats, Ichiro! had scored 19 times… and batted in 16 runs, which says something. A couple of things.
Anyway, I was curious, so I looked up players in similar problems. Here’s the stranded leaderboard:
Ramon Hernandez, 62 times on base, not counting FC, and scored 12 runs, 19% scoring
Brian Giles, 57 times on, 12 runs
Ty Wigginton, 41-9
Casey Kotchman, 68-15
Yadier Molina, 63-14
Jose Guillen, 58-13
Ichiro! 84-19
and while we’re here…
Kevin Kouzmanoff, 56-13
Yuniesky Betancourt, 49-12
That’s… interesting company. One of these things is not like the others.
Ramon Hernandez is totally immobile, bats 6/7 mostly
Brian Giles is totally immobile, bats 1/3 (!)
Ty Wigginton is totally immobile, bats 5/6
Casey Kotchman is totally immobile, bats 2,4,6/7
Yadier Molina is totally immobile, bats 5/6 (hee hee hee)
Jose Guillen is totally immobile, bats 4th
Ichiro! is a fast, smart baserunner and leads off
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The self control he must have to never throw anyone under the bus or show any frustration out there is perhaps his most impressive trait. Imagine how much more his teammates would dislike him if he actually said what was on his mind to the media. No wonder he appears to act like it is an individual sport sometimes, it is for self preservation. Can’t blame him for that. Hopefully Z can do right by him and send him out a winner in a couple years.
I’m honestly confused or maybe still half-asleep. You’re comparing Ichiro!’s runs scored (a vastly overlooked and underappreciated stat) to RBI ratio to other players’ times on base and runs scored ratio?
This stat is exactly what I was blathering on about a couple days ago.
So, you have to look at two ways:
1) Who are the goobers hitting behind him?
2) Is there a way to utilize his abilities better?
Well, obviously our 2,3, and 4 hitters have been horrific, to put it nicely. Okay, horrific is definitely TOO kind.
We basically currently have a 2 man offense. All offensive categories these two have a MASSIVE lead over the rest of the team.
We could petition the league to allow us to bat the following lineup:
Ichiro
Branyan
Ichiro
Branyan
Ichiro
Branyan
Ichiro
Branyan
Ichiro
Then, we would go back to stickball rules, with ghost runners, or maybe allow some pinch runners, when they came back up.
I’m not opposed to moving Ichiro down, or Branyan up, in order to put some runs on the board.
But we’re also stuck in a situation where we need to show off Beltre before the trade deadline, in order to get something for him. At this point the compensation we will get for his will be laughable.
Basically, Benoit Benjamin, circa 1993.
Oh, and if I hear one more idiot beat writer (Larry Larue, I’z looking at you!) say that Griffey is the problem on this team, I’m going to ban all paper products from my house. I’ll buy a bidet if I have to.
No, he’s comparing times on base to runs scored, to evaluate the other hitters.
Basically, Ichiro is doing his job, and then some, and the other 7 knobjobs on this team AREN’T.
To be fair, Yuni is more like a RAISINET.
OK, more awake now. I thought maybe that was the thrust of it. Well, I like the idea of batting only Ichiro! and Branyan although you can’t overlook Lopez’s clutchness. 🙂 So, obviously the powers that be can see this as well (couldn’t necessarily say that with the previous regime). Does that mean we start seeing a Rainiers parade a la 2004/2005? Our best hitters Tacoma/Seattle seem to all be at the same positions. So do we start playing people out of position or rotating 3/4 people through the same 2/3 positions? HELP!
That is until you remember he sucks otherwise…
I don’t get the lineup at all, a little while back you guys supported moving Frank up to #2 and I think, I’ve seen it once since then. It’s not something that necessarily gets numerical results, but more pitches earlier in the game can only be good. Oh well.
With these results, we’re smoking crack if we think we can compete for the division title. There are just too many under/non-producing bats in the lineup.
I enjoyed April, but I’m ready to get on with building for the future.
That brings back memories. Ghost runners were all the rage back when I was 8 years old and only had 2 other friends to play ball with. Of course, it often led to many bitter arguments on whether the ghost runner stole second, or scored from 2nd on a single, or tried to distract the pitcher with his mad dancing skills.
So yeah, Ichiro and Branyan should totally ghost-run for themselves and save the rest of the team the trouble of actually trying to hit.
It’s amazing how much better of a hitter Ichiro is above just about every other player on this team, and, as was noted above, the extraordinary control it must take not to lash out daily. Perfect example was his leadoff double tonight that led to nothing.
He obviously understands English very well, as he starts responding to questions before the interpreter translates, I have to think his not speaking English is to give him a safety net.
Thank you Ichiro, for being Ichiro.
Nice study DMZ.
Is it time to free Clement, and easy Griffey to the bench/AARP?
Some of the guys in your studies have left legs that weigh more than Ichiro.
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Check out classic Ichiro! footage! Batting against Nomo when he was.. what?.. 15 years old? The open stance is awesome!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DRl9t7f9oY
Oh, I know we don’t deserve him.
what is that word people use for someone who lucked into marrying a real looker? overchicked?
I hope I’m OK saying this. At a SABR meeting back in January, an M’s PR guy explained why Ichiro! uses a translator. He’s Ichiro! He’s not Michael Jordan in Japan he’s closer to Elvis. He has an image to protect. He can’t be heard speaking anything but perfect English. It would ruin his image. Just think what would happen if some kind of “Baseball has been berry berry good to me.” type of video clip got broadcast around the world.
Whadda ya expect? Every time someone starts struggling at the plate, Wak moves him up to #2. Other teams would move a guy who can’t hit down in the order, we move him up.
This is basically the same phenomenon as Russell Branyan batting .319, mostly in the 5-spot, with 24 extra-base hits (including 11 home runs), but only having 23 RBIs to show for it.
So it would not seem to require a rocket scientist to notice that maybe our two hitters should be separated by fewer than three outs, yes?
(You’ll note I didn’t say “our two best hitters”.)
Ichiro would have been 22 or 23 when that game happened.
In fact, when they pop up Ichiro’s stat box they show his number, name, and age (23) at the top of the stats box.
In the lower part of the stat box they put his birthday, height, and weight. And whatever the hell the bottom says.
That’s really interesting to me that there isn’t anything else there. No BA, no RBI, HR, etc.
Plus, there is no conceivable way that Ichiro weighed 156 lbs there… Is there? I mean that guy doesn’t look anything over 140.
Wow… Looking at those old Ichiro videos is great.
He still does the exact same thing when he hits as he does now. Same swing before approaching, same stretch, and same point-and-shirt-pull.
Hit stance has changed quite a bit, though. When the pitch comes in in 1996 he’s actually standing on one foot well before the ball is released, and they’re much further apart. But in the 1998 videos his stride has changed to be more similar to what it is now.
and he’s such a loner
Ichiro has driven himself in five times via the home run, so the mighty Caseys behind him have only sent him home 14 times all season. Incredible. His streak of 100-run seasons is in serious jeopardy through no fault of his own.
Um. How scary is it that for today’s lineup it IS Ichiro followed by Branyan??!
For that reason, I doubt he cares about it very much. Certainly not as much as he cares about his 200-hit seasons.
Since we’re looking at videos, I always find the Ichiro JASG pitching video fascinating, both because he’s so young and because his pitching mannerisms weirdly echo his batting “signature.”
Probably his blood type. That’s really important in Japan.