Game 114, Mariners at White Sox
DMZ · August 11, 2007 at 3:05 pm · Filed Under Mariners
4:05. Batista vs Floyd.
Check out that M’s lineup. Wooo-wheeee, that is nice. Good work there, McLaren, don’t strain yourself thinking too hard or anything.
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486 Responses to “Game 114, Mariners at White Sox”
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Putz’s first pitch to field had the ghost of Arthur Rhodes written all over it. Has he been reading Rhodes’ “Art of the untimely homerun” (with a forward by David Justice)?
What irritates me the most about the M’s, is that McLaren is constantly being rewarded for bad behavior. I’m sick of Sexson playing, yet he gets a hit. “Oh he must be coming around!”, states a confident McLaren.
424 Anyone want to guess on the over/under of how many Rick Ankiel screenplays are being written right now?
427 And who will play him in the film?
Why not Costner or Quaid? Granted, they’re both in their late 40’s, but they have a lot of experience playing young ballplayers. You know if John McLaren was casting director he would value that veteran experience.
# 432
I understand all that. But Wherever he plays, (DH/LF/1B) I want him in there. I think he will end up being our Scott Rolen of the Cardinals. Having a sub-par year but coming through in the clutch with a kind of random consistency that will always make him dangerous.
#450
Well duh. But the fact is, hes STILL COLD.
Dont ever compare Raul to Rolen. You should be whipped.
random consistency ???
HAHAHA. Thanks Captain.
Yeah. Random consistency. I stand by my contradiction. Its more of a awkward emotional description then an accurate comment. Kinda like a vibe of sorts.
Oh man. Random consistency.
That’s awesome.
Random Consistency should be Raul’s Nickname. Like hes a walking contradiction of terms. Good Offense/Bad Offense, Good defensive play/ bad defense play.
I always thought “a kind of random consistency” made major leaguers untrustworthy rather than dangerous…or rather it makes them dangerous to your own chances if you count upon him in the clutch…
#461
It could probably work both ways. He is untrustworthy AND dangerous at the same time.
He’s never been a good defender. And yea, random consistency is exactly what we need now. It’s perfect timing, right in the middle of a playoff race.
#463
“…random consistency is exactly what we need now.” (sarcastic tone)
Yeah, I hear ya. But it also brings those unexpected miracle wins that make baseball great. I cant wait for the Mariners next big come from behind victory. Those are fun to watch, build character and confidence and keep you on the edge of your seat. Which from the perspective of a Fan, can be very exciting.
Yunys Grand slam was a nice Mariner moment, I thought. Anyone else agree?
Izturis 2-run HR in 8th makes it 3-2 Angels. Damn Twins! 🙁
Why did the Twins take out Silva? 7 innings, 2 hits, 88 pitches. HUH?
Now that I think about it, there was a poster at the last SABR convention titled: “Random Consistency….the Next Market Inefficiency?”. Nobody was talking to the author but hey, it appears like Beane was all over the idea given the 2007 Athletics…
The Halos are sooo lucky; they just miss Santana’s start and we will face him.
467 – The trainer came out and looked at him in the 7th inning. I don’t know what they looked at but they let him pitch to Vlad who hit into a DP to end the 7th. They pulled him between innings for precautionary reasons.
470-Thanks for the clarification. At least it wasn’t a head-scratching McLaren move.
418 – I don’t know of an article explicitly on the subject, but I’d encourage anyone to look at the numbers.
Hard for me to see Ibanez as only 8 runs better than a replacement player offensively. It seems like he is 4th among all AL LF’ers in runs created.
He is first among LF’ers @ 6.5 “clutch”.
He is first among LF’ers BA/RISP.
I don’t want to see him play LF but is it okay to want to see the leading RBI guy on the team (and one of the top 10 “clutch” hitters in the league) bat?
chiming in belatedly (a grand slam save?!?)
212–Ibanez injured a shoulder in spring which lingered into most of the year, had lower back problems and hamsting problems. He is also 35, and never was the fastest guy out there (you may recall he has had a history of hamstring injuries, and in fact “re-learned” how to run back in 2004, trying to protect his hammies)
Sexson–well, he hurt his thumb in July. somehow I don’t think that’s been the problem, though.
Apparently Adam Jones gets to play on Sunday. Raul at DH. Don’t know the rest of the lineup.
I just hope to god there’s a way to keep Sexson in the lineup.
/sarcasm
Just got on the site to read the USSM take of the game today, and from starting the comments backwards, I almost got confused and thought this was the AUTO Renegade blog. 43 comments, seriously??? You had 43 pieces of insight to share with everyone?? I really hope your account is booted. Sorry, but jeez, after the whole posting issue has been on the forefront of this blog, you went out and knowingly offered 43 useless comments. Wow!
[and there’s the ballgame]
#473: THT gives him roughly 7 RC for what is essentially non-repeatable skill….i.e. his BA is roughly 60 pts higher with RISP than overall this season. Clutch is neat and all but Ibanez’s is driven entirely by batting average which I think might make a lot of people bristle.
But lets ignore that issue for a moment. Context is everything with stats. Raul does have the 4th highest RC total for left fielders in the AL (12th highest for left fielders in the majors) but he also has the 5th highest number of PA for left fielders in the AL (12th highest for LFers in the majors). If his RC are normalized for 600 PA’s things look dramatically different. Looking at left fielders with at least 350 PA thus far (i.e. other starting left fielders; 19 of them), Raul’s normalized THT RC total would be 88 compared to the group average of 91 and he’d be ranked 12th out of 19. If you don’t honor his bonus for BA represented by THT’s clutch, then he’d have 78 RC over 600 PAs ranking him 16th out of 19 left fielders who’ve had at least 350 PAs.
Raul seems to have a lot of RC but then again he’s burned a lot of PA’s as well…. Factor in his defensive innings and he’s really resembling a black hole. Basically using the RC argument to defense Raul’s playing time essentially reduces his value down to an ability to have a hyperbolically higher average with RISP than overall. That’s a tenuous place to be as a major leaguer…
We can all see that he doesn’t belong in the outfield but I still can’t quite wrap my mind around the statistical argument against Ibanez in the Batting order.
He has been in a prolonged slump but his “win shares” are middle of the outfield pack and comparable to Abreu, M.Rameriz, Matsui, Guillen, etc. – I presume they are not coming with his leather.
I don’t know the statistical arguments for hitting with men on base not being a repeatable skill but Ibanez hit .337 RISP/.377 RISP 2 outs last year, .343 close & late in 2005.
I am just a casual observer of the games but when I see stats used that seem to contradict my observations I begin to question the application of the data.
Win Shares include defense.
Win Shares are not a good metric.
Also: there’s no evidence clutch hitting is a skill, much less something worth considering in putting together lineups.
And “.. when I see stats used that seem to contradict my observations I begin to question the application of the data.”
This is, by far, the hardest thing for people getting into this stuff to get over, and I sympathize, because I’ve been there before. But it should be the other way around. There are many, many people who for years swore that Derek Jeter was the best defensive shortstop they’d ever seen because he looked so good out there, never mind that you could look at the stats and see he just did not make as many plays as his peers.
You don’t want to be that guy. Don’t dismiss either side, but you should really consider that if the weight of evidence is against what you see, perhaps there’s something else you’re not seeing.
Jones in, Ibanez DH, Burke catching today. Turbo sits.
Is there any site that has the UZR for every Mariner?
Or one like here…
http://www.baseballthinkfactory.org/files/dialed_in/discussion/defensive_rankings_by_position_american_league/
Except up to date?
Can McLaren stop hitting Lopez 2nd vs lefties? He’s hitting .225/.273/.326 against them. That’s awful.
481 – This is good of course, but it only ever seems to be a product of some arbitrary “it’s Sunday so we give everyone a rest” logic. You know that if these moves actually made the team significantly worse then not only would we still make them, but we’d make as many of them as we can possibly make in the same game just because “it’s Sunday”. For that reason I’m not going to applaud the lineup today, it’s a symptom of the problem with how the team’s managed, it just so happens that when it comes to Sunday games blind adherence to arbitrary baseball rules makes the team better by default.
I don’t really care for Lopez hitting 2nd either. Why not try Jones there?
Checking the scoreboard… apparently the Yankees will never lose again.