So Clint Hurdle has picked his staff for the All-Star game and no Melvin in sight

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=3399661

You know I can't say Im surprised...but how does the NL Manager of the year and manager of the NL leading Diamondbacks get overlooked in favour of Willie Randolph and Bud Black....two managers who might very well be out of a job, in Randolphs case maybe even before this game takes place 

Sigh its a real shame because you know, "THIS ONE COUNTS" etc ;)

I laughed my socks off at this, then went .

"Wait, it's serious"

http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/blog/big_league_stew/post/Why-the-Colorado-Rockies-should-sign-Barry-Bonds?urn=mlb,82263&post_comment=1&success=1

So what do you think? It's be great for all the other teams having that mastodon in the outfield but haven't the Rockies suffered enough?

I can't see him playing again frankly, who wants to take on that burden?

Surely, the only  possible opening for him is a DH, and hello! the Rockies are in the NL.

With Byrnes playing with a nagging injury, and playing just down right terrible overall, I figured it's about time some one actually went over all of our options at this point. Some people will start throwing out suggestions like DLing, Trading, or DFAing Byrnes with out suggesting a corresponding roster move to replace him in left field. I'm not going to mention the mistakes that were made after signing Byrnes to the extension (See Scott Hairston,  Carlos Quentin), and I'm not going to speculate on any player outside the current system that we could acquire via trade.

Unlike the last few years, we don't really have any good offensive prospects that are ready for the majors RIGHT NOW. Our best positional prospect, Gerardo Parra , is a 21 year old right fielder. He's not that different from the last young toolsy right fielder we traded away, Carlos Gonzalez. he doesn't have as much power as Cargo, but he's a more polished hitter overall. I've also heard he has an even better arm and is better defensively. He's playing for our Hi-A affiliate in Visalia, and will probably end up in AA by the end of the year. At the earliest, he should be ready by next year, and in all likelyhood, by the end of the 2009 season. There really aren't that many other outfielders in the system ahead of Parra that are  worthy of mentioning. I guess Cyle Hankerd is  worthy of note. He's really the only outfielder other than Alex Romero in the higher levels of our system worth mentioning.

So until then, if Byrnes doesn't pick up his hitting, we do need to find an adequate stop gap for LF until Parra arrives.

Here is who we have that can help us RIGHT NOW

1.) When Tracy comes off the DL, put him in left field. Or move Reynolds to LF, and have Tracy play third.. This seems like a very good option, especially if Tracy starts hitting with any kind of authority. This would give Tracy more playing time with out taking away from Reynolds or Jackson. Reynolds has played right field this year, and he has played left field in the minors. Tracy has also played some out field. This seems like the best, and most likely option at the moment.

2.)Either platoon or replace Byrnes with some combination of Salazar and Romero.  Neither of these guys has a lot of power, but they're both left handed bats with good speed, and great defense. Romero is three years younger than Salazar, and still has some decent upside.
Alex Romero's current statistics in Tucson
Career statistics

3.) Trot Nixon. He's hitting well in Tucson, and has been playing left field. His defense is questionable at this point in his career, and he really isn't that versatile either. A corresponding roster move would have to be made too. A platoon of Byrnes and Nixon would be one route.  Nixon's current stats with Tucson
]Nixon's Career batting splits

4.)Jamie D'antona. He's been hitting like a mad man this year(1.061 OPS). He's got decent power. He's versatile defensively, having played first, third, and catcher this year. I'm pretty sure he could be average in LF. He does have a very strong throwing arm. The biggest red flag I see with D'antona is extremely average dependant OBP. In 126 ABs, he's walked twice. However, he's K'd only 17 times. His BABIP is ridiculously high, so make of that what you will.
D'antona's current and career stats
Career splits

5.) Not that it's ever going to happen, but Barry Bonds. Yes, he's a headache, a clubhouse cancer, and he's old and poor defensively. However, he still has legit power, and great OBP. With Young and Upton to his right, it wouldn't hurt the team D too much.

Any one have some other ideas/suggestion/comments?

At the game on May 13th, fans were booing Eric Byrnes for his failure to get a hit in the game.

Continue reading this post »

Greetings Snakes fans,

Ignore my Braves hat - baseball fan, to baseball fans, I have a small question for the locals.  I'm thinking about doing something absolutely crazy, but I need some knowledge.

What's the general time it takes to drive to/from Las Vegas to Phoenix?  I am juggling the idea around to come by and see Chase Field while I'm out touring the west later this month.  Catch the Dbacks take on the Nationals, and then drive the night away back out to Vegas.

Google maps has it 291 miles from my hotel in Vegas to Phoenix, and they're listing it at just over 5 hours.  But only the locals could tell me the real stats.

I guess, what's the more optimistic travel times?  Are there a lot of cops on US-93 that would be hateful to a baseball fan rushing to get to a game?  Am I just simply nuts?

Any and all help would be greatly appreciated.

Jim hasn't had time lately to update this section of the site, so I thought I would lend a helping hand, and add a little "nuance" to things.  ;)

OPS+ since the begginning of the  2008 season:

Quentin 161  OPS+

Hairston 91 OPS+

Byrnes  70 OPS+

Unadjusted Raw numbers

Quentin:  149 PA's,  .288/.403/.568 9 HR  29 RBI  3 SB  2 CS

Hairston:   121 PA's  .229/.277/.431  5 HR  11 RBI   1 SB  0 CS

Byrnes:  159 PA's,  .226/.289/.377   3 HR  15 RBI  4 SB, 2 CS

Note:  Q plays in a very homer friendly home park, and of course Chase helps inflate offense too, while Petco is the most extreme pitchers park in baseball, so providing both OPS+ and the unadjusted numbers helps add a little depth and clarity to the comparison. (Jim, might I suggest adding OPS+ to your line as you update throughout the season?)

And finally, since the day Hairston was traded, July 28th,  here is the comparison between Byrnes and Hairston. (Q played very little after July 28th  last year so I didn't bother sticking him in here.)

Hairston  217 PA's,  196 AB    .255/.304/..526  13 HR  31 RBI  1 SB, 0 CS, 1 GIDP

Byrnes  392 PA's,  356 AB's,  .233/.306/.374  8 HR  39 RBI, 27 SB, 3 CS, 13 GIDP

Hairston aint all that, I agree.  He's not as good a hitter as I thought he'd become. But he's still a better hitter than Byrnes.  EB is a better fielder, by far, but Byrnes would have to play LF, CF, & RF all at the same time to earn that 3 yr. 30 million contract,  and be worth the difference between what they are paying him and what they could have been paying Q or Hairston.    Since the day he signed  that extension,  he's totally sucked, and the numbers prove it CONCLUSIVELY beyond any reasonable form of debate or argument.  He got that extension on the strength of a two month hot stretch in May and June that hoodwinked ownership into thinking he was better than he really was.  What a shame. What a waste.

Signing Byrnes cost this team Q, and cost this team Hairston, and saddled themselves with an albatross.   I'm sure he'll hit better than he has lately.......he's not as bad as his last 3 weeks, but look at those numbers over his last 400 times to the plate folks.  Get used to it, cuz it just won't get much better than that.  A little maybe, but not much.

I was just bored and thinking about our current personnel. We have 8 solid major league starters at every position all of which will probably be coming with a hefty contract someday. My question is who do you think will be gone first. Obviously O-Dawg is more than likely gone and EB will be done after 2011, so that leaves let's say 7 players that we'd love to see stay but will potentially not be with us within 5 years: Drew, Reynolds, CoJack, Upton, Young, Micah, Snyder, Miggy, Tracy (yeah I know that's 9, I kept coming up with names). Who's gone in the near future who stays? This is kind of a depressing thought process I'm asking of you, but it's a good off day discussion.

In my opinion I don't see Drew sticking around too long. He's played great but he'll more than likely be asking for much more money than we're willing to pay, plus he's very low on the list of priorities. I hate to say it but after his contract is up I don't think Drew will be with us any longer.

I've got to give a lot of credit to Chris Snyder's performance lately. When Snyder made an adjustment late last year he started showing some offense. What I saw last year made me think he could be a sleeper in this year's fantasy draft. After a slow start to the season, Snyder has really picked up his game. Anyone would be glad to take .279/.387/.471 from the catching slot. Just wish Montero didn't get so much pt.

We have given up a lot of unearned runs and not all miscues show up that way. So, let's take a look at our D. I'm going to list our starters based upon a scale from 1-10  according to what I feel is expected from a NL starter at their position. I'm going to use things such as: range, glove work, footwork, arm strength, arm accuracy (are they throwing to the most beneficial spot on the field), how many hits, extra bases, runs do they save/cost us. I'm going to use starters for now but feel free to use bench guys as well. My scale is based upon what I see them do on the field.

C Snydes  8.5

1b CJ 2.5

2b O-Dawg 9.5

3b Reynolds 4.5

ss Wolf 4.5

LF Bam Bam 9.0

CF CY 8.0

RF J-Up 3.5

I'm interested in everyone's opinion so please chime in. Again, I'm using what I see to determine my ratings. Let's try to use visuals as best we can.

Thanks

Do I really need to spell it out that he is hitting really poorly. Adam Dunn and Ryan Howard don't look that bad when they are at the plate. I don't mind if a guy strikes out a lot as long they are hitting bombs, but what Reynolds is doing is ridiculous. I don't know what is worse, his hitting or his fielding. He reminds me of the religious black guy from the move Major League. He can only hit pitches that don't move much.