I don't know if Carl Pavano got a bad rap or if he's had a change of life or what, but the general consenus around here is that he is, for lack of a better term, a Grade A dude.
almost 3 years ago
Buckeye Brad
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Interesting stuff from Castrovince on what probably is a slow news day in camp in spite of every fan’s hunger to hear something about the team.
Jhonny likes not having to move around so much when playting 3B. Who would have thought?
Still, with the Grade A reference, why do a sense a front page piece coming from Andrew rating players against the USDA poulty grading system?
"It's hard to win when you don't score." Cliff Lee, 9/28/05.
You think Castro realizes that “change of life” is a phrase used almost exclusively as as euphemism for menopause.
Can someone also tell him that “uncomfortability” isn’t a word?
by JulioBernazard on Feb 14, 2009 12:39 PM EST up reply actions
What else would you use to adverbially describe something that had an elementary manner?
by Logodaedalus on Feb 15, 2009 12:37 AM EST up reply actions
so far my favorite part has to be the gigantic photo of Brandon Phillips outside the Goodyear Ballpark.
OOF!
by JulioBernazard on Feb 14, 2009 12:39 PM EST reply actions
Think about how bad the Cubs’ 2015 mural of Stevens will hurt
by Manhattan Tribe Fan on Feb 14, 2009 2:44 PM EST up reply actions
Them seeing DeRosa hoisting a certain trophy will hurt more.
Travis Hafner is overrated. Clarity is underrated. David Dellucci is David Dellucci.
by westbrook on Feb 14, 2009 3:06 PM EST up reply actions 3 recs
Yeah, uh, why do the Indians have a giant photo of Brandon Phillips? Were Grady and Fausto unavailable for pictures?
The best thing probably is to hit [Grady] 2nd -- Jay
by Buckeye Brad on Feb 14, 2009 6:23 PM EST up reply actions
I’m assuming it’s in anticipation of the Reds sharing the facility with them next year.
You know Selig? Ombudsman.
you know, i looked up Phillips numbers the other day. not that impressive really. his HR numbers are somewhat inflated by his home park, but a 92OPS+ last year, .324 wOBA…those aren’t actually good. His defense would be nice, but offense, not so much.
Yeah his value rockets up when considering how many runs he saves defensively. One of the better second baseman in the NL if not all of baseball.
He’s above average, but not by much. He’s never been a Top 5 second baseman in any season, but he’s a solid player for a contending team to have.
Over the past three years fangraphs has him as the 9th, 3rd and 15th most valuable 2B. That sounds about right. That .312 OBP last season is brutal, though.
You know, it’s funny, when a guy is on your team, you mostly remember his worst season. When he’s on another team, it’s his best season that sticks in your mind, remembering what he’s capable of.
isn’t this sort of how we treat all memories?
So 2009.
by Gradyforpresident on Feb 15, 2009 12:35 PM EST up reply actions
Well if you relate it to in-group bias it would be reverse. In general we (fans and supporters of the Indians) would have a bias toward positive memories of players currently on our team vs. players currently playing for another team.
I think in general most supporters of the Indians will have a bias against what Phillips does simply based on in-group bias. The one’s over at cleveland.com aren’t really fans, well not supporters anyway since all they do is rip on what the team does. I think LGT represents a truly more objective group of fans, but certainly I’d say we tend to be more supportive of the team and organization and thereby are subject to a bit of in-group bias (as any natural human being would).
I went a bit too far in saying that he is one of the better second baseman in all of baseball. I’ll agree with Jay’s sentiment that he’s above average but not by that much (in comparison to a guy like Utley, for example, who is substantially above avg.).
I disagree — clearly Phillips’ performance as a non-Indian has been overrated by the average Indians fan, and this is quite understandable given the stab at 30-30. So was Sean Casey. Some idiots still want that guy back, pining for the Triple-A batting champ.
I think we are arguing different things here. “average Indians fan” I’m assuming includes the majority of people who rip the owner and FO for not signing CC or Adam Dunn. They also tend to be the most vocal and therefore yes it would sound as though the avg. Indians fan think Phillips is a HOF. I don’t count these people as supporters of the Indians. I think it would be better to simply look at the sample size that LGT offers, as I think we can agree that the vast majority of people posting here are avid supporters of the team and organization (i.e. we want the best outcome for this team and are willing to consider the positive aspects of its construction and identify reason’s why they are a contending team and a well run organization on the whole).
Also your point about the overvaluing of the 30-30 has more to do with “overvaluing” the two stats and ignoring other stats. The fault is in not understanding the value of these stats and has nothing to do with him playing for the Indians then being traded the to Reds.
In-group bias for Clevelanders is to remember the negative. Their judgments tend to anticipate the worst. Accentuate the negative, says the Forest City fan.
Honestly, I think all fans are guilty of this at one point or another. I can scarcely remember anything good Nagy ever did, and I’ve looked more than once.
Well, yeah … I could have believed that in a more innocent era. What actually happened is that Nagy allowed 14 out of 33 batters to reach base — that’s a .394 OBP by the way — and nine of those 14 reached scoring position safely.
It took a whole lot of luck, phenomenal defense, and a couple of timely groundballs from Assenmacher and Jackson to prevent those 14 Nagy baserunners from scoring, and Nagy wasn’t responsible for any of those things. He does get full points for a few inning-ending groundballs and for not allowing any homers, but the exceptional thing that happened that night was not Nagy’s pitching.
innocence lost. yeah, i was going to add a mention to the baserunners, etc. (and was secretly hoping that you wouldn’t), b/c mussina clearly outpitched nagy that day. i think, though, that part of the story about that game was that nagy was going on short rest, no? crap, nope. he pitched on the 9th and then, this game, on the 15th. what a loser.
keepin’ odd hours, jay? it’s pushing noon for me.
Stuck in the Chicago airport, flying out at 6:30 a.m. Flew back from San Francisco today, but weather delays kept me from any hope of making a connecting flight back to Philly. “Hey Jaysie” was posted at 4:00 a.m. last night, but it was only 1:00 a.m. in California.
Ah, but the fact that Nagy was outpitched by Mussina yet he recorded the “W” (yes I know what these are really worth, but I also assume that that meatball Mussina overvalues them) proves that Nagy did do something good in proving the point that Mussina is a loser!
Unless I don’t understand baseball at all – and I’m open to that possibility – Assenmacher and Jackson could have negated only three of those 14, right? Meaning that Nagy hadda be doin’ a hell of a Houdini imitation to get out of all that trouble.
No. Pitchers do not control whether balls in play become outs, except when they can generate huge numbers of groundouts or infield popups. Nagy got ten of those, which is good but hardly great.
So Nagy did about 15-20% of the Houdini imitation. I’d say it was about 30-35% luck and 50% ridiculously good defense. About that defense:
- 3B: Matt Williams won his 4th Gold Glove that season.
- SS: Omar Vizquel won his 5th of an eventual 11 Gold Gloves that season.
- 2B: Tony Fernandez had won four Gold Gloves as a shortstop.
- CF: Marquis Grissom was coming off four straight Gold Gloves.
- C: Sandy Alomar had won one Gold Glove.
I’d rather not hear about Fernandez’s defense in context with that postseason from here on out, thanks.
by Manhattan Tribe Fan on Feb 16, 2009 4:27 PM EST up reply actions
Yes. It is a rational response to rooting for the Indians between the years 1960 and 1994. Also a part of being a citizen of Cleveland during said years.
As I recall from Phillips’ time with the Indians (which wasn’t a tremendous amount, granted), but his defense wasn’t ALL that strong (i.e. I did not think of Omar Vizquel, Ozzie Smith, or Robbie Alomar when I saw him) because, while he could make the spectacular play like the three I mentioned, he often bungled the routine play, unlike those three, who could probably do it in their sleep, so while I thought he had the physical tools to be a great defensive 2B, personally, I didn’t think he was a great defender.
I thought he was a good defender and had the potential to get better (not sure he’s become more consistent with his defense or not while with the Reds), but I wouldn’t put him in Vizquel/Smith/Alomar’s class, certainly not at this point in his career.
I too think his offense is a bit inflated by GAB, and I also heard he became a bit pull-happy again last season, which took down his numbers a bit from the previous season. That was the same problem he had here, not willing or able to consistently use the whole field (and he often struggled with the breaking ball, which seems to be more of a staple in the AL, especially in presumed fastball counts), and if he doesn’t keep on it, he could fall back into that bad habit. In our more neutral ballpark, I think his offense would decline further where he would be, at best, a solid offensive 2B, but not noteworthy as he appears to be down in hitter-friendly Cincinnati. Would his solid offensive ability and potentially great, but inconsistent, defense be that much better than what Cabrera is projected (and is showing moreless) to be (less power, but a higher OBP, and equally spectacular and more consistent defense?
I’m not so sure – I think we’re not in bad shape, even with the loss or mishandling of Phillips (after all, he did help to get DeRosa here, through Jeff Stevens :-).
Just my 2 cents.
The "cream of the crop" doesn't always rise to the top.
The defensive metrics have him as being very good the past couple of years. The managers also thought he was very good last year as he was awarded a gold glove. Interestingly, he didn’t rate that well his first season in Cincy so maybe he was still overcoming these consistency problems you noticed.
Wisdom from cleveland.com:
Cleveland78, you’re a moron. Let me correct that. Moron (with a capital M).
And the same goes for anyone else who tosses out Brandon Phillips’ name. You’re like the girl from junior high who never grew up.
That place is really growing on me.
Do they have any idea that we follow them like they’re our own private reality show?
by Jay on Feb 15, 2009 10:25 PM EST up reply actions 2 recs
I was thinking this earlier in the “understanding that the Yankees’ contracts hurt the Indians makes you a smarter/better Indians fan” thread. I know I knock those guys and think that, in fact, they are worse fans because of their self-inflicted knowledge gap. But it is funny that they are our necessary, bizzaro parallel.
Is calling someone a moron with a capital M more respectful?
I can’t figure this out. Is it worse to be a Moron or a moron?
Those people from the village Mor sure are idiots….
by Logodaedalus on Feb 17, 2009 12:22 AM EST up reply actions
Oh, yeah, forgot about that.
The best thing probably is to hit [Grady] 2nd -- Jay
by Buckeye Brad on Feb 14, 2009 8:02 PM EST up reply actions
I found this really amusing
You might remember last spring as the spring Masa Kobayashi made his first foray into American life and became instantly enamored with Wal-Mart. Yesterday I asked his interpreter, Toshi Nagahara, if Masa had made his way to the Goodyear Wal-Mart yet, and Nagahara said, “He was there the first day.” Sure enough, I step into the local Supercenter after leaving the complex yesterday, and there’s Masa at the express line.
Travis Hafner is overrated. Clarity is underrated. David Dellucci is David Dellucci.
by westbrook on Feb 14, 2009 2:13 PM EST reply actions 4 recs
I can see it now…
Cleveland, OH – Indians pitcher Masa Kobayashi was put on the disabled list yesterday after a freak accident at Wal-Mart where he was hit by falling prices.
by woodsmeister on Feb 14, 2009 8:43 PM EST up reply actions 7 recs
You’ve seen one too many Wal-Mart commercials.
The best thing probably is to hit [Grady] 2nd -- Jay
by Buckeye Brad on Feb 14, 2009 11:10 PM EST up reply actions
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