MLB championship chances tier

another item from “random ideas from laying in bed”. There’s still plenty of time before spring training to change this, and some teams are hurt because they haven’t filled the obvious hole and will get to it. Also, I can’t fake caring about the AL right now.

top tier – legit championship level teams

* Phillies – well, duh.

* Cubs – They won 97 games with no one having a career year, and are only losing Kerry Wood of any significance with obvious plans to add more. (No, by the end, Jim Edmonds was not significant.) They’re going to be fine.

* Mets – insta-bullpen. Except K-Rod might have some issues and unless you’re a desperate team for bullpen help (and the Mets are), it’s tough to have much faith in Putz. The career peak for closers is short and it may already be over. But they were a near 90 win team that’s already fixed a major weakness, that’s enough to be here.

2nd tier – teams with question marks that still could compete

* Diamondbacks – Everyone overrates the Diamondbacks so I might as well. I don’t think their young talent made as much progress as figured last year. Chris Young was 24 and has time to improve, but he also hit 248/315(!!)/443 in 625 at bats last year. So bad. I keep forgetting Orlando Hudson is a free agent (and a big money one, probably), which won’t help. You can pretty much surround Webb/Haren with nothing and be a contender to me, and they actually have some here.

* Dodgers – I’m least sure about this one. Where do you rate a playoff team that’s lost it’s offense MVP and it’s top start and it’s unclear if either are coming back? Penny and Maddux (who weren’t much good) and Furcal (who was) are gone too. I tend to rate them hihghly because there’s younger talent that might actually not be blocked in some places. But who knows.

* Marlins – they won in 1997, and won six years later in 2003, so here we are in 2009. Team is already on an upswing and just needed better run prevention. Like pitchers having insane years, which has also happened here before. This is as good a reason as any.

3rd tier – long shots, but at least they have hope

* Brewers – everyone knew last year was the all or nothing year, and I wasn’t so sad to see CC going to DHland to confirm it. However, if they had any young pitches decent or better besides Gallarado, they’d be one level up. Gallarado was pretty awesome before getting hurt and I think he’s legit, but they kinda need 11 other pitchers and I don’t know that there’s another above average pitcher here. There’s enough average guys to make them interesting, but they really could use someone at the end of the bullpen.

* Cardinals – As could they. They’ve got the hitting too, and while there’s no one that scares me like Gallarado, they seem to be slightly better as a group. (I still have trouble believing in half of them, but okay.) Since Kerry was linked to the Indians, the most important free agent for this division is Brian Fuentes. One of St. Louis or Milwaukee ought to end up with and immediately move up a level, and the other is going to end up with a big hole and a leap of faith to believe Trevor Hoffman or Juan Cruz could fill it.

* Rockies – Not as good as they were in 2006, not as bad as they were in 2007 when half the team got hurt. Then again, with no Matt Holliday, I don’t know what the idea is for offense. They could probably make up for some of it by starting a league average CF this year, as opposed to Willy Taveras.

* Astros – I never know what to make of this team. They finished better than they actually were, again, but then the finish is all that matters. I don’t know that they’re going to be any better this year with Berkman, Tejada (who really fell off the second half), and Carlos Lee moving one more year past their peak.

4th tier – no hope

* Braves – Atlanta going after AJ Burnett surprised me, because it doesn’t feel like they’re at the point in the team’s cycle where spending a lot on a free agent pitcher makes sense, and they’ve been shedding payroll for years. They do finally have Mike Hampton’s deal off the books (as bad as the signing was, no one gives the Braves ‘credit’ for taking crazy salary responsibility in their trade, which turned out to be over 10% of their total salary the last three years for a guy who barely played.) They’re missing Teixeira, and while Chipper is obviously not done, he can’t be expected to put up the same numbers as last year. I don’t expect to put the Braves in this category, because they’re the Braves, and I expect them to win more than 72 games next year for pretty much the same (empty) reason, but I can’t make a case for them winning a pennant.

* Padres – it’ll be interesting to find out if a divorce moves a team sale along faster than a tax evasion scheme. They – the current ownership and the MLB – surely want the Cubs deal to get done soon so maybe they can talk one of the losers into taking this mess. Not sure what’s going to be left, it’ll be almost as bad as…

* Nationals – so, legit, they’re going with the Orioles Way here? Not the famous one, the one from this decade where they have not enough good players but decide to spend crazy on one name player to “change the image.” And they keep losing anyway, because they’re still bad. I still will be shocked when Texiera turns out to be years older and in the next Mitchell Report (though I guess Manny makes more sense here.)

* Giants – or maybe it was the Giants plan first? I don’t know. They’re still bad.

* Pirates – they MAY be moving in the right direction here

* Reds – almost surely not. Did you know they’ve only lost 100 games once?

the case for RJ

Now that Ryan’s resigned, the chances of this happening go down quite a lot. I still think it’s worth pursuing, because…

* Randy Johnson was actually pretty good last year. Look past the record, and you see a 44 year old start who managed 30 starts, 2 complete games, and a 117 ERA+. Those are better numbers than Lilly and Z last year.
* The Cubs lead the league in Ks in 2008. The Cubs lead the league in Ks every year. Unit would help keep this gong.
* No one likes to remember this, but Jason Marquis is still a member of the Cubs. They’re paying him NINE MILLION DOLLARS for 09. This must be fixed.
* Everyone says Randy Johnson is a miserable person. Either being a Cub all year will cheer him up, or the pressure of the fans will cause him to have 4-7 “Don’t talk back when I’m talking to you!” incidents. Excitement either way.
* Until something happens to distract, the 2009 season is going to be miserable. If they’re bad or average, it’ll be a downer after where they were last year. If they’re good, everyone complains about how little being good means if you don’t do it in the playoffs. I’m sure Z will do something wacky or everyone will get obsessed with every pitch thrown on the outside to Kosuke, but why not have an extra amusing event built into the season?

Johnson is at 295 and is really only coming back to get 300 to boost his HOF chances. This alone is funny, because at no time can he ever really admit this publicly even if everyone knows it to be true (it ruins the image), but because he’s inevitably going to get 300 with a team he’s only won 5 games with. I would really enjoy a countdown to 300, the look back at all his memorable Cub wins when he gets there, the absurd debate about what cap he’ll wear in the HOF (absurd because who cares what cap they’re wearing) and all the other pomp & circumstances that come with reaching an established but arbitrary round number.

Plus, five wins means it’s going to happen right around my birthday, when I hit a very similar round number, and the symmetry would be fantastic. And it’d be far better than just waiting for October.

I am not emotionally prepared to go thru this again

I despise you, Ken Rosenthal. Even if you’re right.

The Yankees could move Cano. The Marlins could trade Dan Uggla. The free-agent class will include Orlando Hudson. But the Orioles’ Brian Roberts, a switch-hitting leadoff man, still would be a unique commodity in a crowded second-base market.

A large number of teams could seek to upgrade at second, including the Diamondbacks, Cubs, Padres, Dodgers, Mets, Cardinals, Indians and White Sox. Several of those clubs have long coveted Roberts.

Meanwhile, Sisyphus started pushing that boulder up a cliff again.

you and me both

Mark DeRosa’s blog entry, tonight:

You’ve got to let this flow over you and consume you for a couple hours. You have to. “Z” was pitching a great game, he’s feeling good, the double play gets turned, we go back into the dugout and the whole game is different. Our offense is able to relax and it’s different.

But when you find yourself down 5-0, a team that has a 1-0 lead in the series, they’re able to relax, Billingsley is able to pound the strike zone, their hitters are a lot more patient, a lot more calm. They’re trying to have good at-bats and tack on runs. We’re trying to press to get the score tied and take the lead. For me, this is terrible. I don’t know — I’ll be up for awhile tonight.

Part of me doesn’t want to sleep tonight – just pull a chair out to the patio and stare at the stars until sun rises. The rest of me wants to sleep and not wake up until 9 pm Saturday.

and even more

I think I may be getting excited for this. Hard to tell, what with more posts in three hours than in some three week stretches.

– I hate doing predictions, because they’re so useless and no one really cares about them, they just care about what actually happens. But I think the Phillies are a deeper team than the Brewers (Gallardo is unhuman for coming back this soon and is going to be lots of trouble for the years to come, but it’s a lot to ask him here, and I don’t trust another Brewers pitcher not named CC), I think the White Sox exhausted themselves to make it this far and the Rays will end them (last person on the bandwagon, I know) and the Red Sox/Angels is way too hard to call with the Red Sox injuries and the Angels being on cruise control all year. Anything could happen there and I wouldn’t be surprised.

– the Ramirez/Fukudome “there’s only one October” commerical? hilariously hilarious. The Cubs have to win the World Series so I can see that all month. Does Aramais really use a Macbook. I’d think he’d want something with more RAM.

yea, that was horrible.

– it’s going to be SO COLD. 50s and 40s, for the first time since fall. I don’t know what it’s going to be like when it’s 10PM in Game 2, but it’ll be a factor.

– bigger factor: Felix Pie making the roster instead of Micah.

I think this means Fukudome’s starting, someone’s going to pinch hit for him if they need it, and Pie’s there to take his spot (or take CF with Reed moving over.)Now I’ve got it.If DeRosa could go, they’d just use Fukudome for defense, so Mark’s not doing too well. Maybe he can update us on his (better than I was expecting) MLB blog!

DeRosa’s injury is surely worse than they’ve been letting on. I don’t blame them for not giving out info, because it’s the right stragey, but it makes me worry other injuries (Soto) might not be as minor either.

This is all just setting the stage for Mike Fontenot to take over the playoffs and steal the hearts of a nation. I can’t wait.

– WGNRadio.com used have a link to a special radio player which had an adjustable buffer allowing you to match the delay on the TV. Watching the game with the radio doesn’t work as well nowadays with the dump delays, and my TiVo adds another couple seconds at times. I really wish I had the device or knew what it was called, because I’d so prefer to here Pat & Ron over Dick Stockton (bad again last night.) I’d even take the ESPN radio crew over what they’ve been doing on TV.

I won’t be able to watch the early portion of today’s Phillies/Brewers game, but that’s fine – between GameDay Audio and 620 from Milwaukee coming in pretty clear here, I’ll be all set.

the obligatory playoff preview

I’m with the those who say playoff baseball is as much random chance as anything else. I don’t believe it takes anything away from the champions, because everyone has a chance to the rules of the game before they play it, but it’s different enough from the regular season that you shouldn’t be surprised when the team that struggles to make it in the playoffs succeeds or the one with the great record falls, and quick.

For most of the second half of this season, I’ve been worried about the Cubs being the latter. The 2008 Cubs regular season was the best in my lifetime; they surpassed the ’84 Cubs sometime in August, and the other teams aren’t close. As much as I enjoyed that, I kept thinking back to another Lou team, the 2001 Marniers, and how it all came crashing down in a blink of an eye. Regular season success doesn’t guarantee you anything.

Most Wins, NL
2007: 90 (Colorado, Arizona)
2006: 97 (Mets)
2005: 100 (St. Louis)
2004: 105 (St. Louis)
2003: 101 (Atlanta)
2002: 101 (Atlanta)
2001: 93 (Houston)
2000: 97 (San Francisco)
1999: 103 (Atlanta)
1998: 106 (Atlanta)

In the previous ten years, only the 99 Braves, the 04 Cardinals and the 07 Rockies made it to the World Series. Accounting for last year’s tie, there was a 27.5% random chance the best team makes it out the NL. 30% did, which doesn’t say much for being the best team.

I’ve had these numbers in the back of my head for a few months, and visions of Webb, Haren and RJ shutting the Cubs down just as easily as last year. Thankfully, Arizona took care of themselves so the Cubs wouldn’t have to try, but that doens’t mean I’m not fearful of being crushed even harder this year.

At least I was, until the series in Milwaukee against Houston. The Astros had plenty of excuses (some valid) for their performance, but the way the Cubs absolutely crushed them while breaking away from the division. They Cubs were so dominant when they need to be, they seem significantly better than the rest of the NL teams. The Brewers and the Phillies had to fight to make it in the last week and the Dodgers would’ve been fifth in the NL Central. The Cubs are a step ahead, a big enough step to outweigh the numbers.

Maybe even a big enough step ahead to avoid all the expecations, all the hype (each paper will have a story a day about a possible Chicago/Chicago World series, and it’ll be five stories if they make it to the LCSs) and everyone trying to capitalize and monetize the Cubs success. I love baseball, I love the Cubs, but I know I’m going to hate a billion things going on around it the next three months.

—-

Look, a break. Like this thing is coherent or focused at all.

1: Dempster vs Lowe

Derek Lowe’s line for the last 7 games:

44.1 IP
27 H
4 R
8 BB
27 K
0.81 ERA

If the Cubs can steal this game, this series is going to be a rout. It turns to the Cubs advantage for Game 2-4, but this as tough a start as the Cubs are going to get.

Game 157: Cubs 9 – Mets 6 (10)

box
Cubs 96-61
Mets 87-71

POTG: 3B A Ram (2 R, 2 H, 2 RBI, 3 BB, HR)
very close: RP Cotts (1.1 IP, BB, 3 K, 0 R, 0 H, 2 marooned)
Runner Up: LF Soriano (2 H, 2B, RBI, BB), SS Ryan Theriot (3 H, 2 R, SB, still over 300), B D Lee (2B, 2 R, RBI, 3 BB), RF DeRosa (2 H, 3 RBI, HR), CF-LF Johnson (2 H, RBI), C Blanco (2 H)

That was the one of the best games of the season, even if you only picked up right before Z was pulled out of the rotation. Big scores and comebacks and the other team making comebacks and relievers walking tight wires and living to tell the tale. Of course, it was completely meaningless for the Cubs and there might be 20 people besides myself who watched the game in Chicago (there’s a rumor there was a slightly more vital game), but it still was pretty great.

A completely crushing loss for the Mets. FanGraphs has them peaking at 91.1% win chance before the Cubs started there rally back from 5-1 and a 93.% after Murphy’s triple to lead off the 9th. The Mets had runs on 1st and 3rd with no outs in the 7th, 1st and 3rd with no outs in the 8th, and 3rd with no outs in the 9th and scored all of 1 run. And that’s Keith Hart, Jeff Samardzija and Bobby Howry, not guys who’ve been lightning the world on fire.

This doesn’t make up for 1969, but this sure is some good vengence for 2004 and the Victor Diaz game. Hopefully Harden kills them tommorow (or they continue comitting suicide), and then they burn Shea to the ground.

the startling, scary truth

thru 118 team games, AVG/OBP/SLG (OPS)

Player L: 269/369/399 (768)
Player H: 277/313/482 (795)

Player L can be quickly identified as the beloved Kosuke Fukodome. He’s still credited for walking 10% of the time, but it’s more like 7% in the last couple months.

Who’s Player H?

Continue reading “the startling, scary truth”