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ashbury

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Everything posted by ashbury

  1. ashbury
    WAA has been around a long time. It's fine. Using 0.0 to determine bad players isn't.
  2. ashbury
    Oy, even when I label it as satire... OK, so let me back up. The un-satire version is, calling a player a negative because his WAA is below zero is just as arbitrary as the cutoff point for WAR, because analytics are not especially developed for the purpose of constructing .500 (average) teams. And since this digression already has gone on long enough, that's all I plan to say about it here. Next on my to-do list: a nice collection of stew, roast, baking, boiling, fricassee, and ragout recipes for Irish children... oh wait, I got scooped already.
  3. ashbury
    Mod note: This seems about to turn the corner to saying who may and may not post, which leads to bickering, and without assessing blame I ask that it stop.
  4. ashbury
    Those teams that are adept at teasing out the signal from the noise in the forecasting realm will run circles around those teams that believe there is certainty to be had in any of the numbers. We fans at home are certainly entitled to play along with the celebrity panel.
  5. ashbury
  6. ashbury
    Nope. I want a new stat, Wins Above Mediocrity. WAM of 0 should be around 4 WAR, not 2. If your nine starting hitters (counting DH) plus at least four rotation starters and your closer aren't contributing at least 0 WAM, the laggards sporting a negative WAM should be jettisoned, or you likely don't have a 100-win caliber team, especially since the rest of your roster can't be contributing many WAM almost by definition. And since I was attempting a little bit of satire with that thought, I'm going to leave it at that. The idea of labeling a major league player as a negative is more than a bit arbitrary.
  7. ashbury
    The goal of any team is to win the World Series, not simply play .500. An everyday player who is not at least 2 WAA is a negative.
  8. ashbury
    Try a bite of raw onion after minty Crest. It's... different.
  9. ashbury
    I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that one of those needs will be "pitching". And if we're not in contention that year, someone else will have such a need.
  10. ashbury
    Come to a chapter meeting sometime, if you're in the vicinity. Cigars are banned from the venue, though you could probably smuggle whiskey if that's really your thing on a Saturday morning, but you'll likely hear more stories and laughter than you seem to be expecting. And obviously the chapter's name is meant with reverence.
  11. ashbury
    Depends on what you believe SABR thinking to be.
  12. ashbury
    Remember, folks, you heard it here first!
  13. ashbury
    I forgot about the idea (perhaps necessity) of a buyout, and frankly it reduces my interest in going for that. It amounts to guaranteeing him $14M, in the hope of a $20M kind of 2019 season from him and another in 2020 at the incremental cost of the option, and that's just enough more risk to tip me away. The actual deal suits me better in that case. Though, now, I'm wavering just before I click Post...
  14. ashbury
    That sounds low for an option year. Maybe the shine is off of Pineda after several mediocre years leading up to his surgery, but he used to be viewed as a front-of-the-rotation starter. So the deal as it is currently constructed amounts to $10M guaranteed money to the pitcher, in hopes of a $20M kind of season from him in 2019. That is not a long term contribution to our window of contention, but is better than a "stop-gap" and amounts to a Jack Morris kind of deal (different circumstances of course), where the long range plan is to have someone at that same caliber to step in, in 2020 and beyond. But I agree, this deal shoulders most of the risk on the player's behalf, and I would have liked a team option for 2020 at, say $14M or so. If he pans out, the team wins, and even from his perspective he still collects $24M, with the ability to go for another big payday after that. If he doesn't pan out, the parties part company on good terms. Oh well. As stated above, the player wasn't open to that.
  15. ashbury
    Quad Cities, near the end of that video clip? I love that ballpark!
  16. ashbury
    Bumping this one just to offer kudos for the foresight - are you our mole in the Front Office? Actual discussion of Pineda now belongs in the Article about his signing: http://twinsdaily.com/topic/28173-article-twins-sign-rhp-michael-pineda
  17. ashbury
    Mod note: TD has an article on the subject of Michael Pineda now - please continue the discussion of that player there. http://twinsdaily.com/topic/28173-article-twins-sign-rhp-michael-pineda/
  18. ashbury
    Mod note: TD has an article on the subject of Michael Pineda now - please continue the discussion of that player there. http://twinsdaily.com/topic/28173-article-twins-sign-rhp-michael-pineda/
  19. ashbury
    Comparing a contract for a player who has bargaining power versus that of a player still under team control is not very relevant to anything. Bryan Shaw would be the fourth shortest pitcher on the roster, were we to have signed him. That's about equally relevant.
  20. ashbury
  21. ashbury
    One of the intangibles that scouts supposedly used to look for, in addition to all the tools and so forth, is the "good face". Ben Rortvedt IMO (not that I have the faintest clue what they actually look for) has the good face - he looks mature above his age. Personally I think it's likely a worthless observation, but I still like this photo (borrowed from his Adopt-A-Prospect page) which was a pretty typical look you'd find from him.
  22. ashbury
    April 23 - onto the 10-day DL May 9 - reinstated May 30 - onto the 10-day DL June 27 - to GCL for rehab July 1 - to FSL for rehab July 26 - returned to Boston After he returned to Pawtucket, he performed as in the past. Who knows what the evaluators were seeing, during that last month of supposed rehab that dragged on and on. So, ten games of low leverage innings, ending in failure like this due to physical issues combined with some unspoken dissatisfaction, makes sense if you're keeping a 22-year old like DIaz, who's understood to be not ready. I don't see the same excuse when it's a 25-year old starter whose limited upside is pretty well demonstrated already. And I still have seen no answer to what the Twins gained from all the monkeying around during the draft, to end up with this outcome, instead of just drafting Haley in the first place. What a waste of a 40-man spot. We might have used it to keep Stuart Turner, for instance - which arguably would have been better for his development, playing at AA or AAA, instead of rotting on Cincy's bench for a year. Or we should have just traded Turner (or similar) to Boston for Haley, and at least been able to option him. $50K isn't much, but the Haleys of the world don't cost much in trade either, and the inability to option someone is a large hidden cost.
  23. ashbury
    I do not make that proposed trade for Cole instantly. I ask them for a medium-grade SS prospect in addition, and then failing that I ask for some International Free Agent cap money. I don't want them thinking I'm some barracuda by accepting their offer too fast - they might wake up and back out of it, saying "hey, waitaminnit."
  24. ashbury
    I'm not real fond of W-L, but Slegers did have himself a nice AAA. season. For a little closer look at the game-by-game results, Baseball-reference.com provides a version of Bill James's "Game Score" in their game log, where a score of 50 and above represents something fairly close to a quality start, and Aaron had 15 of those in his 24 starts at Rochester, 4 so-so games with scores 40-49, and 5 stinkers below 40. Perhaps more importantly, he got 4 of those 5 stinkers out of his system by early June, and compiled a nice streak of 11 games of 40+ scores, most of those being 50+. That's the kind of consistency I imagined the front office was looking for before they would call him up, and they did indeed add him to the 40-man for a spot start in August, and then invited him for September as well. Come to think of it, 15 good starts and 5 stinkers comes pretty close to that 15-4 W-L, with the fluctuations happening to basically cancel out, but I still trust game scores a little better. I don't hype him as a future ace, obviously, but I see his upside as rotation workhorse more than just fifth starter.
  25. ashbury
    You have to have 11, before you can have 12. That's just math.
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