The Polaroid Random Thoughts Baseball Thread

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Polaroid
All teams are about winning although it may not seem that way if you're a fan of the Astros or Cubs. Using Saber stats (or more generally taking advantage of market disequilibriums) is what all teams should be doing to improve their chance of winning whether it be taking advantage of underpriced OBP/defense or actively scouting players in China/India. The Yankees have such a large revenue stream that they can get away from doing it yet still being a contender every season.



You can definitely put a price on how much the Yankees throw away each year on bloated contracts to aging players.
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So like I said, the Yankees are about winning and not Saber stats. I think we all agree that Jeter shouldn't lead off, and his fielding has gone down. The rules dont apply to them and Boston. They just throw more money to fix the problem, or to block the other from getting a player. What's 16 Mil next year to them if they get A Ramirez from the Cubs?

I'm not sure what all this WAR is about, seems pretty worthless. I have seen every Cubs/White Sox game but 5 each and Dunn has a -1.3 WAR on Fangraphs. He has been far worse than that.

There are teams like Oakland that outperform the talent they have. Problem is, they have little talent and have no money to get prime talent.
 
Herman
Player A is Aramis Ramirez, B is Rolen
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A Ram i didn't think deserved it 2 weeks ago. He has been on fire for 6 weeks now and should be there. Nice to see McCutch make the team.
 
FairWarning
So like I said, the Yankees are about winning and not Saber stats. I think we all agree that Jeter shouldn't lead off, and his fielding has gone down. The rules dont apply to them and Boston. They just throw more money to fix the problem, or to block the other from getting a player. What's 16 Mil next year to them if they get A Ramirez from the Cubs?

I'm not sure what all this WAR is about, seems pretty worthless. I have seen every Cubs/White Sox game but 5 each and Dunn has a -1.3 WAR on Fangraphs. He has been far worse than that.

There are teams like Oakland that outperform the talent they have. Problem is, they have little talent and have no money to get prime talent.
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OK but the choices aren't either 'winning' or 'sabermetrics'

You can do both, which is what the Yankees should be doing. The Rays won the division last year by using their brains and not their wallets. Imagine what the Rays or A's could do with a $200 million payroll....it wouldn't include paying Derek Jeter $17 million a year at age 37-39 I guarantee you that. The Yankees waste probably 50% of their payroll on garbage. A-Rod is no longer worth $30M either, for example.
 
Herman
OK but the choices aren't either 'winning' or 'sabermetrics'

You can do both, which is what the Yankees should be doing. The Rays won the division last year by using their brains and not their wallets. Imagine what the Rays or A's could do with a $200 million payroll....it wouldn't include paying Derek Jeter $17 million a year at age 37-39 I guarantee you that. The Yankees waste probably 50% of their payroll on garbage. A-Rod is no longer worth $30M either, for example.
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The Rays HAVE to do it that way, the Yankees DON'T. If the Royals had $200 mil to spend, they still couldn't do it. The draw of NYC as a media market is a draw to players. Adam Dunn put up great Saber stats while playing on last place teams. This is the best team he's been on and he is batting .170. Saber people look for a bounceback, I call it fat and happy.
 
And when TB can't afford David Price anymore, they Yankees will pay him his market value.

How many titles did the great Billy Beane win anyway?
 
FairWarning
I'm not sure what all this WAR is about, seems pretty worthless. I have seen every Cubs/White Sox game but 5 each and Dunn has a -1.3 WAR on Fangraphs. He has been far worse than that.
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WAR is a way of rating a player in terms of his production to the team rather than pretty meaningless statistics like AVG and RBIs. -1.3 WAR is pretty bad over half a season - that ranks him as the second worst batter in MLB. To put it another way to make it more understandable, let's assume that he is bad all season all season and finishes at -2.0 WAR - that means that having him on the team as opposed to a league average OF has cost the team 4 wins (and if you think about it, that's huge for one bad player). Even having an OF of Triple-A quality in his place all season would have produced an additional 2 more wins for the Sox.
 
FairWarning
And when TB can't afford David Price anymore, they Yankees will pay him his market value.
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And, assuming he is a type A free agent, they'll receive the Yankees 1st round draft pick and a sandwich pick (assuming that the CBA remains unchanged which I think is unlikely) and then they will start the cycle all over again.
 
FairWarning
Adam Dunn put up great Saber stats while playing on last place teams. This is the best team he's been on and he is batting .170. Saber people look for a bounceback, I call it fat and happy.
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He didn't always put up good saber stats, but he put up very consistent stats - from 2005 to 2010 his HR numbers were 46, 40, 40, 40, 40, 38, 38 and his RBIs were 102, 101, 92, 106, 100, 105, 103. His saber stats varied wildly (mostly due to some terrible fielding) but his "ESPN stats" were incredibly consistent. This year he is still walking a heck of a lot but striking out an insane amount of times (even for him). He is getting killed by fastballs for whatever reason and pitchers have realized this and are throwing them to him more than ever.
 
FairWarning
Adam Dunn put up great Saber stats while playing on last place teams. This is the best team he's been on and he is batting .170. Saber people look for a bounceback, I call it fat and happy.
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He didn't always put up good saber stats, but he put up very consistent stats - from 2005 to 2010 his HR numbers were 46, 40, 40, 40, 40, 38, 38 and his RBIs were 102, 101, 92, 106, 100, 105, 103. His saber stats varied wildly (mostly due to some terrible fielding) but his "ESPN stats" were incredibly consistent. This year he is still walking a heck of a lot but striking out an insane amount of times (even for him). He is getting killed by fastballs for whatever reason and pitchers have realized this and are throwing them to him more than ever.
 
Polaroid
And, assuming he is a type A free agent, they'll receive the Yankees 1st round draft pick and a sandwich pick (assuming that the CBA remains unchanged which I think is unlikely) and then they will start the cycle all over again.
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and assuming the the yanks sign him before arbitration in December or TB offers him arbitration and he still signs with the Yanks
 
Polaroid
And, assuming he is a type A free agent, they'll receive the Yankees 1st round draft pick and a sandwich pick (assuming that the CBA remains unchanged which I think is unlikely) and then they will start the cycle all over again.
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I'm not saying what the Yankees are doing is right or wrong, but it works for them. Unfortunately for the Rays, they will never draw and probably have to continue to trade players like Garza away.
 
Polaroid
He didn't always put up good saber stats, but he put up very consistent stats - from 2005 to 2010 his HR numbers were 46, 40, 40, 40, 40, 38, 38 and his RBIs were 102, 101, 92, 106, 100, 105, 103. His saber stats varied wildly (mostly due to some terrible fielding) but his "ESPN stats" were incredibly consistent. This year he is still walking a heck of a lot but striking out an insane amount of times (even for him). He is getting killed by fastballs for whatever reason and pitchers have realized this and are throwing them to him more than ever.
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He came in way out of shape. When a hitter cannot get around on a fastball anymore, game over. Pitchers dont mind walking him because he is slow. Similar players who dropped off the deep end at 32 - Rob Deer and Russell Branyan (Dunn's prime was wayyyy better). This will be a very interesting offseason for Mr Dunn.
 
The more i think about Rolen making the AS team, the more I am puzzled by it.
 
baseball america's top 50 midseason prospects...

Here's a listing of our midseason Top 50 prospects. Prospects have to have not used up their rookie eligibility or currently be in the big leagues to be eligible. Also, 2011 draftees are not yet eligible.

1 Bryce Harper, of, Nationals
2 Mike Trout, of, Angels
3 Matt Moore, lhp, Rays
4 Julio Teheran, rhp, Braves
5 Manny Machado, ss, Orioles
6 Martin Perez, lhp, Rangers
7 Shelby Miller, rhp, Cardinals
8 Jesus Montero, c, Yankees
9 Jameson Taillon, rhp, Pirates
10 Brett Lawrie, 3b, Blue Jays
11 Jacob Turner, rhp, Tigers
12 Jurickson Profar, ss, Rangers
13 Manny Banuelos, lhp, Yankees
14 Drew Pomeranz, lhp, Indians
15 Devin Mesoraco, c, Reds
16 Arodys Vizcaino, rhp, Braves
17 Wil Myers, of, Royals
18 Carlos Martinez, rhp, Cardinals
19 Tyler Skaggs, lhp, Diamondbacks
20 Desmond Jennings, of, Rays
21 Dee Gordon, ss, Dodgers
22 Hak-Ju Lee, ss, Rays
23 Jake Odorizzi, rhp, Royals
24 Aaron Hicks, of, Twins
25 Leonys Martin, of, Rangers
26 Dellin Betances, rhp, Yankees
27 Mike Montgomery, lhp, Royals
28 Wilin Rosario, c, Rockies
29 Travis d'Arnaud, c, Blue Jays
30 Matt Harvey, rhp, Mets
31 Jason Kipnis, 2b, Indians
32 Brett Jackson, of, Cubs
33 Gary Brown, of, Giants
34 Robbie Erlin, lhp, Rangers
35 Zack Wheeler, rhp, Giants
36 Kyle Gibson, rhp, Twins
37 Anthony Ranaudo, rhp, Red Sox
38 Taijuan Walker, rhp, Mariners
39 Zach Lee, rhp, Dodgers
40 Jarrod Parker, rhp, Diamondbacks
41 Jonathan Singleton, of/1b, Phillies
42 Brad Peacock, rhp, Nationals
43 Jarred Cosart, rhp, Phillies
44 Randall Delgado, rhp, Braves
45 Anthony Gose, cf, Blue Jays
46 Nolan Arenado, 3b, Rockies
47 Allen Webster, rhp, Dodgers
48 Matt Szczur, of, Cubs
49 Jedd Gyorko, 3b, Padres
50 Paul Goldschmidt, 1b, Diamondbacks
 
Hunter Pence goes to the Phillies and Houston get two of the Phillies top 3 (plus a PTBNL) prospects. That deal might be as bad as the extension they gave to Ryan Howard.
 
Polaroid you cold-blooded mutherfucker go wish Cali well in her kitty cat thread.

Amazing how I can be reprimanded over and over to be nice to someone, but all you can do is spit out numbers.

You really don't have a soul, and the kicker is, you don't care that you don't have a soul.

People who middle line make me nervous and I don't trust them. Show some emotion. Go one way another. Be drastic.

I'd rather have a beer with a Kato or a Bateman than drink with a middle-liner.
 
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