Archive for ESPN Insider 2012

Despite spring proclamations of hope and what could be possible, not every team has a serious chance of capturing the World Series title this year. For some clubs, the lack of talent on the field makes that an unrealistic goal for 2012. However, that doesn’t mean that they can’t have a successful season, especially if they set their sights on things that they can accomplish this year. So, let’s take a look at outcomes for nine expected non-contenders that would make 2012 a worthwhile campaign, even if it doesn’t end with a run at the playoffs.

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When it comes to spring training statistics, there are so many problems with the data – small samples, inferior competition, hilariously small ballparks – that the numbers generally are just not worth even looking at. In most cases, March numbers can simply be thrown away without a second thought.

However, there are a few instances where spring training performances might actually tell us something. Most famously, Jose Bautista finished the 2009 season with a surprising burst of power, and he carried over that surge into spring training in 2010. The continuation of his revamped approach and swing in spring training could have helped clue us in to the fact that Bautista had undergone a dramatic transformation.

That doesn’t mean you should start reading too much into every player’s results over the next few weeks, but there are a few players worth keeping an eye on as the exhibition games get underway.

Jeremy Hellickson, SP, Tampa Bay

It’s a little weird to say that the 2011 Rookie of the Year had a performance that raised a lot of red flags, but after carving up minor league hitters left and right on his way to the big leagues, Hellickson’s strikeout rate took a nosedive in the Majors. It wasn’t even just a struggle adjusting to MLB hitters – his strikeout rate actually got worse as the season went along, ending the year with just a 2.94 K/9 in September.

However, Hellickson’s swinging strike rate of 9.7% – a measure that has shown to have some predictive power when it comes to forecasting future strikeout rate – was actually quite good, placing him among the likes of Max Scherzer, Ricky Romero, and Gio Gonzalez. Given that his minor league strikeout rates and his swinging strike rate both suggest that he should get more whiffs than he did in 2011, be on the lookout for an uptick in strikeout rate by Hellickson in spring training. As David Appelman showed back in 2008, there is some correlation between a spring training change in a pitcher’s K/9 and his regular season strikeout rate.

Matt Wieters, C, Baltimore

The prospect who inspired a list of Chuck Norris-style facts hasn’t exactly lived up to the billing to date, and the most disappointing part of his Major League performance so far has been his overall lack of power – a career .415 slugging percentage is not what the Orioles envisioned. However, there’s still reason to believe that Wieters has more thump than he’s shown, and he may have begun to tap into some of the natural loft in his swing as the 2011 season came to a close. After hitting just seven home runs in the first three months of the season, Wieters launched seven in September alone, and 24 of his 47 hits in the final two months of the season went for extra bases.

The fact that he was able to sustain a well above average contact rate while also driving the ball more frequently suggests that Wieters still has the skills to be a dominant offensive force, and the final two months of 2011 could be a harbinger of good things to come in 2012.

Brian Matusz, SP, Baltimore

While Wieters ended the year on a high note, his battery mate did the exact opposite, giving up 17 runs in just eight innings in September, closing a miserable season in the worst way possible. Matusz’z problems have been tied to a loss of velocity – his fastball averaged 91.5 MPH during his rookie season of 2009, but was just 88.5 MPH last year – but he was getting pounded even as he got his fastball back over 90 at the end of the year.

Keeping an eye on his velocity in spring training will be important, but Matusz will also need to show that he can command the ball in the strike zone with regularity. He doesn’t have the power repertoire that will allow him to get away with poor location, so if he’s going to work his way back into Baltimore’s rotation, he’ll have to show he can hit his spots and throw strikes consistently. Keep an eye not only on the radar gun when Matusz takes the mound, but the percentage of pitches he throws for strikes – if he’s going to get back to what he was a few years ago, it’s going to come because he remembers how to get ahead of hitters once again.

Mike Moustakas, 3B, Kansas City

When the Royals promoted Moustakas in June of last year, they did it to help show Royals fans that they had a bright offensive future, with Moustakas and fellow rookie Eric Hosmer forming a corner infield duo of impact power bats. However, Moustakas had just one extra base hit in his first month in the Major Leagues, and then didn’t hit a home run in either July or August. His isolated slugging marks during his first three months in the Majors were .053, .064, and .061 – marks that only look normal if you’re Juan Pierre or Luis Castillo.

However, Moustakas was a different beast in September, collecting a total of 11 extra base hits that included four home runs. His first three months in the Majors suggested he might need more time in Triple-A before being handed a full time big league job, but with the way he closed the season, Moustakas showed that the Royals hope wasn’t all misplaced. The Royals will likely want to see Moustakas driving the ball in March like he did to finish 2011, but more than just raw home run totals (which can be easily inflated in the Arizona air), keep an eye on the percentage of his March hits that go for extra bases. If he’s consistently getting the ball into the gaps, then there’s a decent chance that his late season power surge could carry over into 2012.

Brent Morel, 3B, Chicago

Morel’s story is a bit like Moustakas’, only far more extreme. His quality glovework has always been ahead of his offensive game, and he’s never profiled as much of a power threat in the minors, but his total lack of punch – he entered September with just two home runs on the season – was a real problem for the White Sox last year. Morel spent the first five months of the year just repeatedly beating the ball into the ground, but during the last month of the season, his results took a complete turn – he launched eight home runs in 103 plate appearances and posted a .329 ISO, the eighth best mark in baseball during September. For comparison, that put him right between Miguel Cabrera and Carlos Pena.

That wasn’t the only drastic change for Morel in the season’s final month – he also drew 15 walks after taking just seven free passes in April through August. One of the league’s least patient and least powerful hitters ended the season by performing like a middle-of-the-order slugger, taking pitches with regularity and driving the ball over the wall when he got ahead in the count. It was the most dramatic change of the season, and was completely out of character with what Morel had done previously in his career. Keep an eye not just on Morel’s spring training power, but also his willingness to take the free pass – the rise of both were connected in September, and if he’s still willing to let pitches go, he has a much better chance of sustaining his late season power boost.

What with the terribly conspicuous signings of Albert Pujols and C.J. Wilson this offseason, it’s easy to forget one important thing about the Los Angeles Angels (of Anaheim): they’re saddled with what may be the most burdensome contract in all of baseball. That contract belongs to, of course, Vernon Wells.

To grimly remind Angels fans, Wells was acquired from the Blue Jays in January of last year in exchange for Mike Napoli (he of the .444 wOBA in 2011) and Juan Rivera. Oh, and the Angels received a mere $5 million to defray the cost of Wells’s contract. And speaking of cost, the Halos will pay Wells $63 million over the next three years.

Last season, Wells authored the worst numbers of his career, which raises the possibility that his contract will worsen from “thoroughly ill-advised” to “boondoggle of unimaginable dimensions.” To be sure, Wells is an intelligent, self-aware, funny, and occasionally excellent ballplayer, but he’s not worth what he’s being paid. That’s not his fault, but it’s reality. To put a finer point on it Wells, according to WAR, provided $1.4 million in on-field value in 2011 while being paid more than $26 million. Suffice it to say, that’s not a sound investment.

So the question for the Angels, who have legitimate designs on a championship this season, is not whether Wells will somehow be worth the money — he won’t be. Rather, the question is whether he can help them toward their greater goals. The answer, with a caveat or three, is yes.

First, the depths that Wells reached last season must be acknowledged: there’s simply no glossing over a batting line of .218/.248/.412. In large part, the problem was that Wells’s line-drive rate cratered to a career-worst 12.3%, which was also the lowest figure of any qualifying hitter last season. While there’s usually some year-to-year fluctuation with line-drive rate, this level of decline is troubling. But regard these splits …

vs. RHP in 2011 .187/.213/.356 11.3 LD%
vs. LHP in 2011 .284/.320/.531 14.5 LD%

Wells’ overall numbers hide the fact that he was utterly feckless against same-side pitching but highly effective against lefties. For his entire career, Wells has been substantially better in platoon-advantaged situations, and, while everything else at the plate seemed to fall apart last season, his ability to hit for power against left-handers remained intact. And therein lies his value going forward. But he has to be deployed in just such a conservative manner.

Far too often, organizations are reluctant to treat bad contracts as “sunk costs.” That is, a player with a large and expensive pact, even if demonstrably ineffective, continues to play regularly because … well, because of the imagined mandates of that large and expensive pact. That makes no sense, obviously. Players should play because they help the team win, not because they’ve been promised a sheik’s ransom.

Taking the wise tack with a bad contract normally means releasing the player, but with Wells it’s obvious he can still help a team, provided his role is carefully limited. In his current straits, that means endeavoring never giving him a high-leverage plate appearance against a right-handed pitcher. Wells, as mentioned, can hit lefties, so he’d make for a useful platoon partner with DH Bobby Abreu, who, tidily enough is about as bad against lefties as Wells is against righties. Wells can also man center in an emergency and perhaps be a defensive asset at the corners when needed.

The Angels will be a better team if top prospect Mike Trout is an every-day outfielder alongside Torii Hunter and Peter Bourjos, but Wells, even with three other righty-hitting outfielders on the roster, still has a place on this team. Pair him with Abreu (at least until Kendrys Morales proves to be healthy and effective) and let him play the corners on occasion when a lefty’s on the bump for opposition. Realize, though, that Wells is no longer a major-league regular. He’ll never again provide value on the dollar, but he can help.

The Washington Nationals, despite being linked in the media to almost every high-dollar free agent, have had a somewhat quiet winter. As such, it’s tempting to dismiss them. After all, an 80-win team whose primary offseason addition is a Type-B free agent (Edwin Jackson) isn’t redolent of “contender.” In the Nats’ case, however, that’s precisely what they are: a contender.

To be sure, the Nats can’t be considered the favorites for a playoff berth, in part because they have the misfortune of playing in a division in which only one team — the Mets — can be brushed aside as a non-factor. But they’re in the fray, which is more than can be said for the remainder of recent franchise history.

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After getting mostly ignored by the Baseball Writer’s Association of America, Ron Santo was finally elected to the baseball Hall of Fame by the veteran’s committee this summer. Santo’s enshrinement was a victory for those who had championed his case for years, and suggested that perhaps even the folks in Cooperstown were coming around to the growing appreciation for the value of defense at the offensive-oriented corner positions. Just a few months after his election, however, several clubs have apparently decided that quality defense at third base is a luxury item after all.

The Tigers have gotten the most coverage for their decision to move Miguel Cabrera back across the diamond to a position he was deemed too big to play back in 2008. However, the Angels are also toying with the idea of giving first baseman Mark Trumbo some playing time at the hot corner after he was displaced by the signing of Albert Pujols, and the Marlins acquisition of Jose Reyes means that Hanley Ramirez – never known for his focus on defense to begin with – will grudgingly move over to third base. In all three cases, a team with hopes of contention in 2012 is showing some willingness to sacrifice glove work at third base in order to upgrade their offense. There’s no doubt that Pujols, Fielder, and Reyes will help their new teams win more games, but just how bad might we expect the new third baseman to be, and would these teams just be better off abandoning the experiment and finding another way to get those bats in the line-up?

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While the offseason nears its end, there are still several contending clubs that have some glaring holes on their rosters.

Whether it comes through promoting a player from the minors or picking out of the bargain bin of what remains in free agency, these five clubs each will need to be creative to get production from a roster spot that could prove problematic in their chase for a playoff spot in 2012.

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Having lost 95 or more games in three of the last four seasons, the Seattle Mariners have moved into full-scale rebuilding mode. Their big offensive upgrade of the winter was 22-year-old Jesus Montero, and the team is currently penciling in players with less than a full year of experience at second base (Dustin Ackley), third base (Kyle Seager) and left field (Mike Carp), plus wherever Montero ends up playing. General manager Jack Zduriencik is preaching patience, letting the fans know that they should expect to take some lumps this year, but that the fruit of going young will pay off with a steady rise up the standings as the kids mature.

Zduriencik can point to the Texas Rangers, who slowly stockpiled talent for years and saw their win total rise every season from 2007 through 2011. However, a more thorough look at recent history suggests that teams don’t usually follow this model of taking a slow, methodical rise from good to bad.

That isn’t to say that teams that lose with a bunch of young players don’t improve as those guys develop, or that the strategy currently being employed in Seattle won’t work in the long term. However, the evidence does show that improvement often comes from a big unexpected leap forward, as opposed to a steady rise.

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When this week began, the American League Central was an eminently winnable sort of division. Sure, the Detroit Tigers won 95 games last year, but their Pythagorean record was a more modest 89-73, and in 2012 they’ll be without one of their best hitters in Victor Martinez. That meant an opportunity for an up-and-coming squad like the Cleveland Indians or Kansas City Royals.

But then the Tigers, despite solemn promises that they wouldn’t spend the money, lavished upon Prince Fielder a nine-year, $214 million pact. And now you can write in Detroit’s name at the top of the standings. Use ink if you like.

Sure, the idea of having Fielder, Miguel Cabrera and Delmon Young wield leather at the same time for the same team is enough to haunt one’s dreams, but the powerhouse offense plus a strong rotation fronted by AL MVP and Cy Young winner Justin Verlander is more than enough to overcome those pratfalls in the field. The Tigers, barring a series of minor miracles, will win the division. And that changes things for everyone else in the AL Central.

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The Los Angeles Angels have had the splashiest offseason of any team. The Texas Rangers return an impressive core and may yet add the likes of Yu Darvish and perhaps even Prince Fielder. The New York Yankees, in the span of an hour or two this past Friday, upgraded their rotation by a notable margin. The Philadelphia Phillies return the most vital parts of last year’s 102-win outfit. The Boston Red Sox, despite the upheavals of 2011, have a tremendous amount of talent on the roster. Still and yet, the best team in baseball headed into the 2012 season might just be the Tampa Bay Rays.

That they’re in this discussion is not especially noteworthy. After all, the Rays, despite a basement-level payroll, have made a history of defying expectations: they’ve made the playoffs in three of the past four seasons, and in 2008 they notched a pennant. They achieved all this even though, over that same span, they traded away or lost to the market core performers such as Carl Crawford, Carlos Pena, Matt Garza, Scott Kazmir, Jason Bartlett, Rafael Soriano and Johnny Damon, among many others. Yet the Rays, despite roster turnover, financial constraints and a home in baseball’s toughest division, keep on winning. In 2011, the Rays won 91 games, earned the same number of Pythagorean wins and of course seized the AL wild card in white-knuckled fashion. So why might the Rays be even better in 2012?

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With prospective owners lining up around the block to bid for the Los Angeles Dodgers, we thought it’d be helpful to shine a light on just what kind of team they’d be buying. While the franchise’s history and large fan base offer value on their own, the team will be more profitable if the new owners can turn them into winners in a hurry. So, how far away are the Dodgers from being contenders?

Let’s start with the good news. The team has two franchise building blocks in Matt Kemp and Clayton Kershaw, young stars who are already performing at an elite level. There aren’t many teams in baseball that have two young players of this quality, and they are certainly capable of forming the foundation of a championship team.

The bad news is that those two performed about as well as anyone can realistically be asked to in 2011 and the team still won just 82 games, finishing in third place in the NL West. If the team is going to contend, it will have to get better performances from the supporting cast because they can’t realistically expect to get much more from Kershaw and Kemp than they got a year ago.

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