Talbot's Mind is Blown / Sowers Out of the Race
"I'm not a fly-ball pitcher at all," [Talbot] said. "I usually get a lot of groundballs ... This is blowing my mind."
Jeremy Sowers threw to hitters for the first time on Wednesday and will throw a simulated session Saturday. Still no word on when he'll get into Cactus games, but he's obviously out of the rotation race. He could factor into the bullpen race, though his stuff, from a relief standpoint, probably isn't suited for anything more than a long relief job.
almost 2 years ago
westbrook
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I’ll probably retire this avatar soon enough. I’ll toss my name into the hat for a potential avatar bet this spring.
Castro’s commentary on Brantley has me excited. Certain guys just have the ability to be top of the order batters. I know there’s absolutely no metric for this – and this is blasphemy around these parts – but when the top of the order gets going it provides more opportunity for everyone else who follows.
Maybe it’s because we were spoiled for years (and yes, I’m referring to the ’90’s), but Sizemore with all his talent and drive has never quite sat right with me as lead off. I believe it’s well established that there is a good argument to put him in the middle of the lineup. The reason to never bump him down in the order was we didn’t have someone to replace him. I would love to see Brantley followed by Droobs take over those two top spots.
This just goes to Castro’s next point of wanting a Gonzo replay regarding Sizemore with Brantley getting sent down only to get called up immediately. In many ways I’m completely on board with this – although I wish no harm for Branyan. I just don’t get his signing in the first place and I seriously doubt his ability to contribute to this team in any meaningful way. This season’s about the kids and letting them get adjusted – both LaPorta and Brantley. If LaPorta is going to end up at 1B and Brantley continues to show that he’s near ready – they should make the team in order to get their reps where they’ll eventually play and Branyan should go.
There, I said it. The team should eat the mistaken $2mil they spent just weeks ago and let the kids play. It won’t happen, but it should.
I just wanted to believe.
I believe it’s well established that there is a good argument to put him in the middle of the lineup.
No. There’s a commonly made, poor argument.
I might think differently than some…but is there really an argument that he should be batting anywhere except the 1 or 2 holes? I’ve never bought into the “Grady’s a natural 3 hitter” I hear at least 3 times a week from people like Bruce Drennan.
There is a vast misconception of what the ideal hitter in each slot really is.
People have an idea of what a leadoff hitter should look like, a two-hole hitter, a number-three hitter, a cleanup hitter. The cleanup hitter concept is pretty solid. The leadoff hitter idea is at best half-right.
The traditional two-hole and number-three hitter concepts, however, are just flat-out wrong. Because of that, no comment to the effect of “natural #2 hitter” or “natural #3 hitter” should be taken seriously.
The team should eat the mistaken $2mil they spent just weeks ago
Come on, you’re getting ahead of yourself. We don’t know what’s going to happen with Branyan’s health yet. It’s not a sunk cost until the player can’t give you what you paid for. Not to mention the potential additional return we could get in a summer trade. I think everyone would love Brantley to be the perfect leadoff hitter, but there’s not a huge rush in March 2010.
Steel Nick
I’m cynical with regards to this – the main benefit to Branyan’s playing regularly and Brantley in Columbus is managing Brantley’s service time in the majors. That benefit, however, may be offset in the near to mid term by having LaPorta play out of his future position for that time. Wouldn’t it be better to get him every rep possible at 1B? Especially if March 2010 doesn’t matter and any mistakes he makes can be ignored?
I just wanted to believe.
I think Branyan will be an everyday player in the sense that Sowers is a big-league starter. In name only. LaPorta should get plenty of reps at first either way, right?
Steel Nick
It just doesn’t add up to me – whoever is the 4th OF is going to get a ton of playing time then (if you add up LaPorta’s 1-2 starts a week at 1B plus his time off, as well as days off for Grady and Choo). I’d much rather LaPorta start a 1B 4-5 times a week while it doesn’t matter.
The more I think about, the less I like this signing. Russel Branyan is not going to determine our (slim) chances to make the playoffs – our SP is. We have multiple options in the minors to play 1B if need be. We have multiple players in the minors who can come up for the start of the season, keep Brantley’s clock low and not block anyone (or waste $2mil to do it – or if you want to nit-pick, the $1.6mil difference between league min and Branyan’s contract). I don’t think power is where this team lacks.
I just wanted to believe.
How much is really offset by LaPorta getting some, but not all of the reps at 1B at this moment? We know he’ll get plenty of time there before next opening day. I’m excited by Brantley almost as much as you, but he hasn’t even turned 23 yet, and really hasn’t shown the ability to hit like a corner OF yet, I just don’t quite understand the demand to see him right now.
I’m not convinced that Brantley will hit like a corner OF in the next few years (if ever). The closest comparable I place him is a leadoff hitter – a spot more associated with CF or MI positions. I think it’s unfair to place corner OF expectations on him (especially, power number expectations). As you point out, he’s only 23.
If the PTB determine he needs more seasoning down in AAA, that’s fine. They’re much more qualilfied than I am to make that judgement. My objection lies with the combo of bringing in Branyan which forces LaPorta to LF coupled with my belief that there’s at least some reason to see what Brantley can do if given the chance in the show. I think he earned that very chance by his showing last year.
I just wanted to believe.
Should we not overweight the OB component of Brantley’s OPS though as a leadoff hitter in the coming years? I feel that Brantley’s OPS will remain underwhelming for the majority of his career because of poor SLG numbers, but his OBP coupled with speed on the base paths and stellar defense should be more than adequate in any OF spot. At least that is my take.
Yea, my point is I am not going to get bent out of shape over poor OPS numbers from Brantley is he is sporting solid OBPs.
Still, production is production, and an underripe hitter is an underripe hitter. We can decide arbitrarily to give Brantley a total mulligan on home runs, but even so, a 700 OPS is not going to be acceptable.
Crisp had a 655 OPS in 2003. He got a starting job in 2004 largely because of injuries, but also because he was our starting CF. He put up a 790 OPS in 2004, good enough to stay in the lineup after Grady pushed him to LF at the start of 2005, where he then produced an 810 OPS.
Brantley doesn’t have Crisp’s pop, but he should get on base at a much better clip. My point is really that Crisp is a pretty good benchmark for all-around offense that’s good enough to hold down a lineup spot as a defensive specialist outfielder.
Brantley, with the 624 MLE last season, does not appear to be ready to put up those numbers just yet. He looks great and excites the fans, but fast guys always look great and excite the fans. Nook Logan looked great and excited the fans.
The numbers are not particularly dubious — the guy has not earned a big-league job yet. He isn’t going to be Grady Sizemore, and he’s definitely not the 2005 Grady Sizemore right now.
wOBA
Fangraphs uses wOBA, which overweights the on-base aspect versus slugging (since OPS sort of double-counts certain things, singles being both in your OBA and again in slugging, and also on-base is a little more important in run-scoring).
Brantley’s wOBA in AAA last year was .344. In AA and age 21 it was .372. So he has potential. And he walked more than he K’d last year. Not bad.
CHONE and Bill jame’s projections aren’t great for this year. Marcel projection is a little better.
Too bad he isn’t a great centerfielder. But, while it may take some adjustment time and he likely won’t ever be a power guy, he could be at least a league average corner eventually, even without power.
wOBA doesn’t over-weight OBP. It weights it appropriately to optimize wOBA’s correlation to run production.
I don’t think anyone here doubts Brantley’s long-term potential. If he can develop into a true high-OBP guy with speed, that’s a rare find.
Perhaps I was imprecise
but I think you got the idea anyway. It certainly emphasizes OBA more than OPS does, properly, sure, but nevertheless, the weight is added to on-base average
I didn’t mean it weighs it too high relative to its value in run production. OPS just treats oba and slugging equally and adds them together. In any event, i always preferred SLOB to OPS.
I also didn’t mean to imply folks doubted Brantley had some long term potential. Someone asked shouldn’t his oba be emphasized and I was just pointing out wOBA does that. Then I tossed out his minor league wOBAs and my own slight commentary.
Many folks don’t realize, but OPS+ actually deals with at least part of the OBP under-emphasis in regular OPS, so that’s not a bad start. None of these comprehensive stats are truly all that different from the others.
If wOBA is correctly weighting everything — and it basically is — then the point Roger Dorn was making was that he thinks Brantley should be graded on a curve, i.e., truly over-emphasizing OBP, ergo, wOBA would not be doing what he wanted.
i’m actually growing pretty sour on this whole “get laporta to 1B asap” line of thinking.
why the hell did the cardinals mess around with pujols at 3B and in the OF all that time?!
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