Random Yankees Suck Video

Oh, Alfredo…if only you had pitched in the days before Hi-Def TV and Youtube. Check out the latest fan-spotted doctoring of the ball before MLB pulls the plug:

Please Stand By

We are having some rather serious technical difficulties here. Does anyone have a computer science degree that is better than my computer science degree? Because the endless cycle of rebuild-million-pitch-database/watch computer explode in flames/get new computer is what has lead to my retirement, which will probably last just as long as Rampage Jackson’s.

In the meantime, listen to this amazing prediction by Mike Blowers. And he doesn’t even try to call every single @$#@!! pitch like Rance Mulliniks – or say absurdities on air like Wakefield’s knuckler must be off because it’s not up in the mid-70’s as usual.

ETA: Geez…poke my head up for one second and the request line starts ringing: the pitch that Ichiro was thrown out for arguing last Saturday was almost exactly a quarter of an inch off the plate, and pretty much right at the belt. That’s not a textbook strike, but right at the belt is more than often than not called one.

The AAAA Bomber

Just in case you needed confirmation on how dead centre those fastballs that Randy Ruiz hit 600 feet (Ok, the furthest was only 422 feet according to Hittracker, and his first a mere 322, a classic Yankees fly-ball-no-it’s-out to the opposite field. For Video, here’s the first and second) were, here’s a lazily stolen graphic from Fox:

He might not see one of those for a while.

Alex Rios Given Away

So after days of speculation and presumably hours of intense negotiations over Alex Rios, the Jays have traded him for…err…squat. The Hardball Times crunches the numbers here, which point out in fancy ways that we’re trading him at his lowest value ever, he’s an underrated defender, and if you think the Jays are going to get some sort of magical, best-case scenario ever haul on the free agent market next year, you’re delusional:

In other words, Alex Rios is a bargain. The Blue Jays shouldn’t be looking to dump his salary on the waiver wire.

At least games will be easier to watch now that he’s not constantly pulling his brain-dead shenanigans or looking apathetic at the plate, but when a team starts giving away guys in their prime because they think 12 million dollars is an unreasonable amount to have an outfielder locked into for the next few years, they are not really trying to compete, let alone do so in the AL East.

This is also a fun time to pull out this J.P. quote from two State of The Franchises ago:

I think it’s our job to explore every possible option that’s out there…when you see the Santana’s of the world getting 150 million dollar and the Zitos’ of the world getting 120 million dollars, you realize the value of getting pitching and how tough it is. When we were presented with that, we thought long and hard. And obviously we value Rios more than we valued the other guy, and that’s why he’s still here.

When he famously and hilariously claimed that the Blue Jays were the ones to have pulled the plug on the Rios-Lincecum swap. Has anyone checked the waiver wire for Tim Lincecum lately? Maybe they can pick him up off the free agent wire for 12 million bucks. In 2047.

Can’t Hardly Wait

Asked on the Fan this afternoon what the general feeling in the clubhouse was about the team’s chances next year, Adam Lind tried to change the subject by saying nobody thought that far ahead, but “we just feel terrible for Roy”. I know he probably didn’t mean because it looks like Halladay is going to be here next season, but after last night’s typical let’s-make-Andy-Pettite-look-10-years-younger performance, I couldn’t agree more with that particular entendre.

So here’s the good news: Travis Snider’s back is feeling a lot better, thank you very much, as he won the PCL player of the week with a ridiculous 14-for-26 run, including 3 home runs and 7 doubles. So let’s drift off and think ahead to happier times, concentrating instead on obscure analysis of where batters tend to hit certain types of pitches so when Snider finally arrives in all his glory, we will actually be able to start cheering his lastest game-winning bomb as the catcher is still putting down the signs…

More on the Rolen/Encarnacion swap

Over at Baseball Prospectus Rob McQuown has deemed the Jays/Reds deal the worst deadline deal this season (hat tip: BDD) in favour of the Jays, giving it an “outside chance that this will be looked upon as a disaster of Liriano/Nathan proportions”. Probably nothing you didn’t already know, but worth a look if you’re into real stats like EqA and PECOTA…

Update: Rolen just got hit in the head in the worst way by Jason Marquis and left the game. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a pitcher so furious with himself for beaning an opposing player. What a completely unprofessional display of humanity!

The New Guys

It now seems relatively official that the Jays are getting back Edwin Encarnacion, Josh Roenicke, and Zach Stewart for Scott Rolen. There’s going to be a lot of crying that this is a sign the Jays are not going to attempt to compete next year, but come on – when you get three young, cheap, almost major league ready players with upside for a guy who at the end of last season wasn’t sure he was ever going to play again, how can that be a bad thing? It has been an absolute once-in-a-lifetime treat to watch Rolen at third base, but if you take off your Blue-Jay tinted glasses for a second, he’s a walking time bomb that is at his highest value in years right now.

If you still need some confirmation that 2010 isn’t a totally lost cause, just listen to J.P:

But if we keep Doc now I think that means we are trying to put together the best team possible for 2010.

Notice I didn’t say believe him, but doesn’t that sound nice? Anyway, here’s the skinny on who the Jays are getting back.

1) Edwin Encarnacion

The Good: He’s 26, with a career OPS of .793. Hit 26 home runs last year. Will cost less than half (4.75 -> 11 mil) of Rolen’s Salary next year. Makes announcers go nuts with clutch bombs.

(Ok, I was trying to find the time that he made Jeff Brantley look like a tool by hitting a walk off home run at the precise moment Brantley was going on about how he was not a clutch hitter — but that is almost as entertaining a broadcast of it instead of what has long ago been removed from Youtube by the MLB facist regime).

The Bad: He’s having a terrible season, batting .209 apparently because he can’t hit an inside pitch to save his life (or at least before he landed on the DL in April – he has hit an excellent 276/375/526 since his return at the start of this month). Sounds like bat speed to me – he’ll fit in nicely with Vernon. Defensively, he’s at -10 in =/- right now, bad enough for 30th in the league. And that’s where he’s been every year, so the Jays just went from one of the best defensive 3B of all time to possibly the worst in the majors. Work your magic, Butterfield!

2) Josh Roenicke

The good: Dude throws gas. He has a fastball that averages 96 with movement, and a Litschian cutter that comes in at 86 with so much break it’s almost a slider. The occasional curveball. He’s 26, and pitching effectively in the majors. Got off to a late start in his career because he started as a hitter.

The bad: He only really has two pitches and is therefore just a reliever, although the Jays amazingly now seem to be in need of them. For a full scouting report including a generally rosy report on his mechanics with one minor qualm, check out the one at Redlegs Baseball.

3) Zack Stewart

The good: Big, athletic former quarterback . Throws a hard sinker around 93 mph, an average slider, and a developing change. Here’s his official draft report, or from more recently, a video of him facing the Reds in April of this year – not great quality, but you can really see the dirty movement on his fastball a few times:

Keeps the ball in the park (2 home runs in ~90 innings this year) He has roared through the Reds’ system this season, posting an ERA around two in A and AA before ending up AAA at the age of 22. Good mechanics, doesn’t fly open. Originally slated to be the Reds’ future closer, he was starting this season until he got to AAA (likely to try and build up his innings slowly) and the Reds were apparently toying with moving him back to the rotation next year, where he pitched some in college as well.

The bad: Doesn’t strike a lot of guys out. Has had command issues (John Sickels gave him a B-/C+ because of them before this season), although they seem to be in the past. According to the Hardball Times: “[His slider] can lose some of its tightness at times and turn into a slurvy-type pitch”. There is a frame by frame-by-frame breakdown of his two main pitches halfway down this page that is really worth a look and I would totally rip off if I didn’t write there.

Rolen Traded

Spreading the word…apparently it is for Edwin Encarnacion and potentially Yonder Alonso, which would be a rather ridiculous coup by JP. I’ll keep babbling here about why if that is indeed the case, but you should probably just go to mlbtraderumours for updates.

Update: Maybe not…Ed Price says Rolen+Alonso is inaccurate. Which Twit do you believe?

Update: This is stupid. Every sports commentator is spewing out contradictory information within seconds of each other. Time for a nap, wake me up when it’s over.

How to topple the evil empire the Boston way

With brilliant SABR minds like Bill James in your front office, a wunkerkind of a GM, a few quality characters like our own Kevin Millar keeping things loose, and the willingness to spend what it takes for the last few pieces of the puzzl needed to go all the way.

Oh yeah, and drugs. Tons of them. According to the New York Times (hat tip: Baseball Digest Daily), both David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez are on this list that I absolutely can’t wait to see of players that tested positive for steroids back in 2003.

As for Ortiz, I’m just stunned that his overnight transformation from injury-prone Twins castoff to Best Clutch Hitter of All Time was in any way artificially induced, especially with the way his physique and numbers have stayed so consistent since MLB really started cracking down on steroids…

Ichiroed

Hello, all…this Bird isn’t dead, I’ve just been laboriously assembling million-pitch databases lately, only to see one computer after the other that I put them on promptly explode (no doubt overburdened by the sheer volume of baseball knowledge contained within).

I did manage to squeeze out my first foray into hit f/x at The Hardball Times, though – so you should go read it and let me know if you think there’s anything interesting that could be done on the Jays with just the month of data for the Jays that is available (I’m already trying to figure out Vernon).

But for now, here’s the 0-2 pitch that Ichiro just plunked into center field for his first (MLB) walk-off hit ever:

The yellow box is Ichiro’s specific strike zone as measured by the pitch f/x operators (not a league average like I usually use). Downs’ final pitch was almost exactly six inches outside (it looks like less on TV due to the angle) and six inches below his knees. Now I know you know how not even remotely a strike that is, but for some fun try standing in front of an imaginary plate and swinging at something 6 inches on the other side of it. From my normal stance, I can’t even reach that far with a bat – and I’m not halfway to first base when I start my swing. Absurd! Inhuman! Not fair! Completely impossible to fault Downs on this one – despite it being an 0-2 count, that curve could hardly have been more of a “waste” pitch if it was rolled into the dugout.

Under the Microscope

By request, here are the umpire calls for the last couple of games — first how Burnett was treated in his successful start against the Jays:

Of those two called strikes way off the plate, one of them is his big breaking ball, so it will have curved closer by the time it reached the back side of the plate (still working on a way to correct for this). The other one is a fastball to Adam Lind that is the Burnett’s only gift of the night. Now for Tallet:

One real gift for Tallet as well, and a lot more nibbling. That cluster of inside pitches just off the plate (where Tallet got 2 strikes out of 9) will often be called strikes, but hard to complain about calling the inside corner of the plate by the book.

Now for Saturday’s game, here’s Wang’s abridged outing against the Jays:

And then the Doc’s. As usual, getting a couple inches off the outer edge of the plate, but he might have been getting squeezed on the inside corner (when throwing his cutter to the mostly-lefty Yankees lineup):

Hiatus Ho

I’m out of here for a couple of days, but this site has much cuter graphics anyway. Halladay is apparently back on Monday. Vernon Wells is apparently the 58th worst regular, but attacking it with the “diligence of a lab chemist“. (No swearing, or chucking — what games are you watching?!)

And you’ll have to wait until I get back for proof, but this scout:

An American League scout who’s seen the Blue Jays thinks Wells’ biggest problem is his tendency to chase balls outside the zone. “I’ve seen him give away way too many at-bats,” the scout said.

Is just wrong. His eye is actually getting better with age. He just can’t drive low pitches to save his life these days so he gets behind in the count and it becomes all the more obvious that he never had any patience to begin with…

Update: Here’s the proof — from Inside Edge, the source behind those hot zones and the bestest baseball analysis site of all time that for some reason pays attention to the Jays more than anyone else out there, a lack of reach from Wells seems to be the problem. Lingering hammy, shoulder still out of whack, or the dreaded decline – any guesses?

Accardo’s New Pitch

Confession time: when Jeremy Accardo saved his first game of the year, I almost cried. Yeah, he got two outs on five pitches, but they were almost unbelievably straight down the middle, he was hit hard, and didn’t even hit 91 mph. He threw one slider, and none of his once-incredible splitter. Great. ANOTHER Jays pitcher completely broken, explaining why he’s been rotting in AAA after his mysterious forearm troubles and revamped delivery.

Then he came out in his second outing and threw his fastball at 95-96, with a nasty splitter like the old days, and struck out 4 rather quality Phillies. What the hell?! Turns out that pitch he was throwing on in his first inning was actually a new cut fastball:

In my completely unprofessional opinion, it looks like a really good one – hard and closer to the Rivera/Halladay style that moves straight from side to side than the Jesse Litsch version that was like a mini-slider and dropped and was inevitably figured out. The fact that every Blue Jays pitcher not named Roy that has thrown/learnt a cutter from Arnsberg recently has had serious arm surgery within the next few years is a little worrying, but considering that Accardo’s slider was a bit of a joke even during his excellent closer season, along with the return of his splitter this has to make him even nastier — at least until it fries his arm.

• I would vote Albert Pujols into the Hall of Fame right now, even if he is 10 years older than he says he he is and juiced to the gills – but it was a pleasant surprise to hear that that major leaguers consistently named Halladay as the pitcher they would most rather watch him face off against, as opposed to someone with more flashy stuff that just isn’t as good. Evidently the pros have more refined taste than your average media tool (even the Onion makes slam-dunk jokes about him being completely ignored).
• DJF sums up my feelings and repeats my profanity about the fake umps that have been behind the plate for too many Jays games lately. Undeniable appeal? Seriously? If watching their shtick was entertaining to you for more than a few innings, you care less about baseball less than Adam Dunn. Props to Darren Fletcher for getting crotchety and not playing along with Sportnet’s picture-in-picture infatuation with these bores. And why the hell do they make foul tip signs on every foul ball? Like I find myself yelling far too often at the dome these days with ever-increasing baseball curmudgeonness: siddown and watch the damn game. You might learn something.

Throw the Damn Curve

So how did Scott Richmond not only survive, but strike out 11 against a lefty-stacked Phillies lineup, when lefties have hit him on for an absurd .972 OPS this season? He finally ignored the completely overblown concept that as a righty you don’t throw breaking pitches to left handed batters (because they move towards rather than away from them) and just threw his normal repertoire to them instead of a majority of fastballs that were getting hammered. As Inside Edge put it earlier this year:

Although his breaking balls have been effective versus hitters on both sides of the plate, Richmond throws them less often to left-handed batters, even though lefties have pummeled his fastball for 13 extra-base hits. Nearly half his pitches to right-handed batters are breaking balls, but left-handed batters see a curve or slider just 35 percent of the time.

Richmond threw 40 fastballs, 15 curves, 21 sliders and 3 changeups to lefties tonight – almost the exact same 50/50 fastball and breaking pitch combination that has been dominating RHB so far this year. Although you would expect his changeups to be more effective against LHB, they are simply not his best pitch. His slider and curve are. He trusted them on both sides of the plate and dominated one of the best offensive teams in the league. Lesson learned, hopefully.

Sweet In the Middle

For a little pick me up in the middle of the latest Jays’ slide, check out John Dewans’ stat of the week, where the authour of The Fielding Bible gives the nod to the most defensive runs saved so far this year to Aaron Hill (13) – with Marco Scutaro (9) not too far behind.

A couple of weeks ago Dewan ranked the Jays second overall, and I will sing Brian Butterfield’s praises just as loud now as I did then. Hill, ok…we knew he was good as soon as he made us forget the O-dog out there. But Scutaro?!  Even if you don’t really believe in the accuracy of these fancy fielding metrics, or this sample size, the very same stats that haven’t liked him at all as long as they’ve been around are suddenly claiming he’s one of the best in the league.

Now if you’re the Precambrian type that  can’t quite wrap your head around anything but errors, 1) you don’t read this blog, and 2) he is also leading the majors with 1 error so far after tying the AL record for errors in a game (4) in 2007 and committing 9 in almost an identical number of innings in 2006. And this about-face in sure-handedness and range has come at the age of 32, when no middle infielder has any business at becoming any better at what he does.

If I was a real journalist stretching for a story, I would now say something like “and his added comfort in the field can only have helped his impressive performance at the plate”, implying that his new-found range and batting eye were somehow related. But that would be stupid.

Instead I’ll point out that even after regressing to the mean (i.e. assuming he goes back to playing at his usual level for the rest of the season), ZIPS predicts a .286/.378/.413 batting line from Scoot. How good is a .791 OPS for a shortstop, for a Blue Jays shortstop? Only one other Blue Jays SS in history has played 100 games and had a higher one (.805) . That was Tony Fernandez in 1987, the best offensive year of his career.

ETA: And Butterfield knows it, too: “In my mind right now he’s the best defensive shortstop in the American League and by quite a wide margin. … He’s been phenomenal, our MVP,” Butterfield said.”