Lincecum v. Giants

So, the Giants and Tim Lincecum have a bit of dispute regarding how much money he should get paid in 2010. The Giants think he should be paid $8 million while Lincecum thinks he should be paid $13 million.

Case For Lincecum:

Let's see, he's only the best, most exciting pitcher in the game today. His career ERA+ is 152, he turns 26 this year and he's only getting better. He's led the NL in Strikeouts and Strikeouts/9 IP the last two years. He led the league in Complete Games and Shutouts last year. He's won the last two Cy Young Awards.

The only other pitchers to win Cy Young Awards in Consecutive Years:

Sandy Koufax

Denny McLain

Jim Palmer

Roger Clemens

Greg Maddux

Pedro Martinez

Randy Johnson

I don't know about you, but to me that's a pretty impressive list. Point being, Lincecum is one of the greatest if not THE greatest pitcher of this generation. The Giants need to do everything in their capacity to keep him happy.

The (Very,Very,Very,Very,Very,Very........Very) Weak Case Against Lincecum:

Um he led the league in wild pitches in '08. The one time I saw him pitch in person he lost to Manny Parra. He's a .140 career hitter. Yes a very absurd argument against giving him what he wants that was cherry picked as much as it could.

Verdict: There's no way Lincecum can lose this case. Usually I would be against giving a player this much money but Lincecum is carrying whatever team he's playing for for the next decade-plus. If he wants $20 million , you give it to him, if he wants his own private jet (hand it over), if he wants to be owner, gm, manager (give him what he wants)

Hot Stove Rundown--Only 150 Days to Opening Day

So, today was the first full day of the Baseball off-season. But some baseball news did happen today

OMG!!!!! Tim Lincecum got caught with trace amounts of pot

Apparently this is a big enough story to make Lincecum #16 on Google Trends (as of 9 P.M. Pacific Time) and is splattered all over the front page of Ball Hype. Personally, I could care less whether or not Lincecum likes to smoke weed. I have a bad gut feeling that the media will try to blow this like the whole Michael Phelps picture where hes taking a bong rip. If he got caught with something like Crystal Meth, then it would be a big deal

but c'mon....its the off-season, he pitched better than everyone except Chris Carpenter in the NL in '09 and he Spring Training is still a few months away.....anyways thats my take on it...hopefully this is both the first and last day people talk about this

Jeremy Hermida traded to the Red Sox

Former First Round pick Jeremy Hermida has finished off the Florida Marlins portion of his career. As a top prospect big things were expected from him but he has been plagued by bad defense and has been an average player.

It may be speculative but I see either two motives behind this trade A) This is a minor first step for the Red Sox to re-tool after an early playoff exit and they see Hermida getting 200-300 plate appearances as either a back-up outfielder or someone to fill in at DH if Big Papi gets hurt or takes a day off B) Hermida is a stop gap option in case they are unable to retain Jason Bay and/or pick up an elite left fielder to replace Bay if they were to lose. Considering that Hermidas big league performance has been most similar to Jody Gerut and Ryan Church.......I definitely see option A is the much more likely scenario

Mark Teahen Traded To The White Sox.....maybe.....maybe not

This development has been a bit strange. First, its always odd when divisional rivals trade with each other. Second, there seem to be conflicting reports on whether or not this trade went down. If it does...it would mark another deal centered around an under performing 1st round pick.

Teahen was a former first-round pick (like Hermida) who hasn't had the greatest start to his career. Hes a versatile player with experience in both the infield and outfield. While the MoneyBall claim of him being the next Jason Giambi isn't going to come true.....his career should be rejuvenated by escaping the baseball purgatory of Kansas City.

He was traded for Chris Getz who struggled at the plate in his first full season. The White Sox also threw in Josh Fields who has gotten very little playing time since his rookie season in '07. The discussion of this trade may prove to be counter-productive if it turns out it isn't completed but its still interesting to speculate about either way.

Outsmarting the experts and why I would vote Chris Carpenter for the Cy Young Award

This is the second (in a yet to be determined amount of columns) where I use logic and reason to outsmart Joe Morgan. This time, instead of taking a broad brush the focus is going to be on the NL Cy Young Race. During his chat last Tuesday, the following question was posed:

Steve (Middletown, CT)

Who is your NL CY Young winner?

Joe Morgan

(11:17 AM)

I would give it to Wainwright, but there are a lot of people that believe that Carpenter deserves it. Wainwright pitched more innings, he was there the whole year. Carpenter had the injury. Wainwright led the league in wins and had more innings than Lincecum and Carpenter. ERA and strikeouts don't impress me as much as wins do. The name of the game is to win.

Admittedly, the Cy Young Award race is close and all 3 of the pitchers mentioned (Wainwright, Lincecum and Carpenter) have pretty strong cases. The problem I have is the way he reaches his conclusion.....i'll breakdown the segments and then mention why I would vote for Carpenter

a) Wainwright pitched more innings, he was there the whole year

Fair enough. Wainwright did lead the NL in innings pitched but didn't necessarily leave his Cy Young competition in the dust. Wainwright had 233, Lincecum 225 1/3 and Carpenter 192 2/3, all three have a long body of work and pitched more than enough innings to contend for the lead in rate statistics (ERA, SO/9, WHIP, etc.)

Using innings pitched for Cy Young Criteria isn't the best logic. For example, Bronson Arroyo was 4th in innings pitched with 220 1/3, but it would be absolutely absurd to vote for him and his 15-13 3.84 era 115 ERA+ season for a Cy Young Award over a more deserving candidate such as Carpenter on this basis.

b) Carpenter had the injury

Alright, he was injured but he only missed about a month. Granted this doesn't help his case but it isn't an automatic dis-qualifier. Still, Carpenter was very dominant and was healthy in the June/July part of the season when the NL Central was close and needed him to step up (which he did). Also, Lincecum only gets a passing mention here and he didn't even lose time to injury.

c) Wainwright led the league in Wins

That's nice...the Cy Young Award is around for the purpose of recognizing the best pitcher. While being a superior pitcher generally leads to more wins, that is not always the case. On a theoretical basis, pitcher A pitches 5 innings gives up 6 runs, leaves with a 10-6 lead which his bullpen holds on to and gets the win. Pitcher B pitches a gem throws 8 shutout innings but gets no run support and gets a no-decision or loss. Is pitcher A a better pitcher because he got the win? no.........while this is one start and a small sample size it does illustrate that having more wins doesn't make one a better pitcher

In a world where wins was used as the criterion for Cy Young voting....a league average pitcher like Jorge de la Rosa 16-9 4.38 era 103 ERA+ would be in this Cy Young discussion while Tim Lincecum's much better 15-win season would be ignored....obviously most people see through the absurdity of the win-total statistic and thankfully no one is dumb enough to vouch for de la Rosa winning a Cy Young for this reason.

To further demonstrate the absurdity of win-loss totals, i'll use my Brewers as an example. Braden Looper (1/2 of the two-headed monster i've named Jaden Loopan) led the Brewers in wins with 14. Was he the best Brewers pitcher this year? Would anyone be dumb enough to argue this? No and I really hope not. Looper gave up a ridiculous amount of home runs but also had a ridiculous amount of run support.

In comparison, Yovani Gallardo had a much better season, was the ace of the staff and ended up with a record of 13-12. Anyone with half a brain would realize that Gallardo is a much better pitcher than Looper and the differences in win-loss records had a lot more to do with one pitcher getting much better run support than anything else........a vote based on win totals could lead to a Looper-esque pitcher being backed for Cy Young Award and that is a scary notion.

d) ERA and Strikeouts don't impress me as much as wins do

Since I just finished a very long-winded rant about the weakness of the win stati'll focus on the ERA part of the argument. Since I don't necessarily hold high batter strikeouts against a player if they are productive hitters otherwise (i.e. Adam Dunn/Mark Reynolds) i'm going to divert my argument towards the ERA side.

While ERA isn't a perfect stat, it does a much better job of measuring pitching effectiveness than wins. It does cut pitchers some slack in some cases such as if they give up a big hit after an error for example but there are worse stats (Wins)....but it gives a reasonable portrayal of how good or bad a pitcher is

Carpenter 2.24

Lincecum 2.48

Wainwright 2.62

Also, even though he hasn't been in the Cy Young discussion at all (due to bad luck in W-L column) i'd like to recognize Jair Jurrgens for having an excellent season and having a better ERA than Wainwright.....he had to work much more for his 14-win season than Braden Looper and Carl Pavano had to work for theirs.

Personally, I depend more on the ERA+ statistic as a better metric and to give context to where these pitchers rank within the league (Carpenter 185+, Lincecum 173+, Wainwright 158 ERA+)........to wrap around to the initial argument, why do I mention these numbers.....well because the object of the Cy Young Award is to recognize the best pitcher and the ERA stats are able to give us a quick and dirty measurement of who pitched better, pitcher A, pitcher B or pitcher C

e) If I had a Vote for the Cy Young Award I would vote in this order and because:

1) Chris Carpenter-By every measurable metric, he has the most well-rounded and dominant body of work....the missed starts weaken his case but it only makes the race closer....but not cost him the award

2) Tim Lincecum- Lincecum is a beast, a freak of nature (in a good way) and one of the most exciting players to watch. If the season had ended in August I may have been swayed to place him #1. However he has two flaws in his body of work which drop him to second. First, he didn't quite measure up statistically to Carpenter. Second, even if he did what he did with the season on the line would have been used as a tie-breaker that he would have lost. He had a bad month (by his standards) a 3.38 era in September and most importantly got rocked in a crucial game against LA on the 20th 5 ER in 4 innings when the Giants were playing for their playoff lives. Carpenter on the other hand, was unbeatable in July (when St. Louis was fighting for NL Central Supremacy) and in August (when they were pulling away).

3) Adam Wainwright- I know it may sound like i'm being critical of him in this article. But he had an amazing season and a strong breakout year. Carpenter's and Lincecum's seasons were just better.

Vh1s top 100 songs of the 80s--and what it says about the 2009 baseball season

So i'm flipping through the channels after watching the Brewers lose again tonight.........grrrhhhh....but that's besides the point.....i stumbled across vh1 replaying their top 100 songs of the 80s and was randomly became curious whether any of the songs connect to the baseball season or anything else sports related in general........well here it goes

3- Duran Duran "Hungry like the wolf"---the Red Sox at the trade deadline

Having tasted the success of two World Series titles since '04 and after falling short in the ALCS to the Rays in '08....the Red Sox seem hungry to get to the top again.......they've done this by building up on an already strong team...by adding Chris Duncan, Adam LaRoche (until they could get Casey Kotchman for him), and Victor Martinez...with the possible exception of the Phillies the Red Sox had the best body of trade deadline work

19- Cyndi Lauper- "Time After Time" --Brewers starting rotation

Time after Time...the starting rotation seeming finds new ways to hit rock bottom. I thought it was hit when Mike Burns got pushed around by the Pirates..........then Jeff Suppan gave up 10 runs to the Nationals (and the first of TWO Josh Willingham grand slams)........not to be outdone Braden Looper did his part to turn a 7-1 lead into an 11-7 loss..........to the worst-hitting team in the NL (Padres)..........on the bright side only about 8 more months until 2010 opening day

29- Talking Heads - "Burning Down the House" -- to the Pirates and Indians management for completely throwing in the towel

as critical as I have been about the Brewers play as of late.....at least management is trying to win.....the same can't be said about the pirates and indians.......it's actually atrocious how much talent they've given away since June.....if you assembled a team based on the players they have given away ERR....traded in the last couple months......all they would need is a shortstop, third baseman and maybe a mid-rotation starter or to to contend for themselves.

31-Queen/David Bowie "Under Pressure" -- Yankees

So the Yankees are in first place......with their fans and management.....talking about the playoffs?! is not adequate.......I mean there are 9 year old Yankees fans wondering if they'll ever see the Yankees win ERR....sucessfully buy a World Series title in their life times....they're under pressure to win it for the children (and most likely Joe Girardi's job)

47- Twisted Sister "Were not gonna take it"--Tony Bernazard--ex Mets Executive

Mets management apparent response to Tony Bernazard's behavior.....lashing out at their double A team......and at allegedly at K-Rod (their ONE large contract that's actually been worth the money).........so they got rid of him....the Mets are still a joke

51 Ratt -"Round and Round" --the Media

For discussing two of the biggest non-stories of the summer ....round and round the clock....24 hours a day........these being a) Roy Halladay's trade to, oh wait the biggest deadline trade involved Cliff Lee.....but it was a good way to fill a couple of weeks and b) Brett Favre's non-return (for now) to the Vikings......i did hear he made a pretty sweet Sears commercial where he plays a customer that couldn't make up his mind

66 Depeche Mode " Just Can't Get Enough" --me and MLB Network

So I have about 120+ channels and about 119 of them go unwatched on a daily basis.......seriously, when I come home from work the first two things I do is a) turn on my laptop to watch the brewers on mlb.tv and b) turn on MLB Network to see what they're talking about and stay up to date with everything else going on in baseball

71- Rick James "Super Freak" -- Tim Lincecum

So appearently if your 5'11'' and 160...the odds are stacked against a pitcher from being a serviceable pitcher let alone a very dominant one.....obviously Lincecum missed this memo...and baseball is the better for it........seriously it is worth paying attention when he pitches because you never know what might happen........and the scary thing is he's only 25 so he's only getting better...when it's all said and done he's going to be the most dominating pitcher of this generation

90- Tone Loc "Wild Thing" -- Daniel Cabrera

Despite not pitching in the bigs since May and pitching only 40 innings this year....he STILL ranks 2nd in the National League in Wild Pitches

95- Debbie Gibson -- "only in my dreams" to the Orioles, Indians, Royals, A's, Nationals, Reds, D-Backs, Padres and their fans

According to coolstandings.com these teams have a .5 percent chance or less to talk about the
playoffs.........unless one of their managers gives a legendary Jim Mora-esque rant about how bad their teams are.......probably shouldn't talk too much here since the Crew has a 5.5 percent playoff chance and will likely join the .5 percent or less club sooner than later


well this has been an interesting experience.........I may have been too young to remember these songs when they came out (i was born in 1983).....but not too old to use the song titles to write about some baseball