Frank Thomas' career in context

From a player likely to retire (Delgado) to a player that actually retired (Frank Thomas). This means on thing to me, time to hit up his Baseball-Reference page to see if we can place any context on his chances of being enshrined in Cooperstown.

In regards to the similarity scores, him and Delgado both have 3 players on their list already in the Hall of Fame, (In Thomas' case, those three are Mickey Mantle, Willie McCovey and Jimmie Foxx). Like Delgado, many of the similar players not enshrined are either active or haven't been retired long enough (Bagwell, Ramirez, Thome, Sheffield, Delgado, etc.)

Like Delgado, the fact that home runs were inflated in the 90s hurts in that it lowers the impact of home run totals regardless of how clean or not clean the given power hitter was. In terms of total home runs, Thomas is tied for last but isn't that far behind (all 4 players hit between 521 and 536 career home runs).

In context of OPS+, Thomas is third out of 4:

Mantle 172 OPS+

Foxx 163 OPS+

Thomas 156 OPS+

McCovey 147 OPS+

One thing that supports Thomas' argument is that for two consecutive years (93-94) Thomas won himself back to back MVPs. Thomas is square in the middle of discussion here as the other similar players already in won between 1 and 3 MVPs.

When you extend it out to Top 10 MVP finishes, it becomes even clearer that Thomas was a very valuable player for a very long time. He finished in the top 10 for MVP voting 9 times. That ties him with Mantle and allows him to outpace McCovey and Foxx.

If you read enough of my writing, it's quickly obvious that OPS+ is one of my favorite stats to use to measure how good a player actually is. Thomas passes the OPS+ with FLYING colors. In his first 8 seasons his lowest OPS+ was 174. In his EIGHTH best season he still hit 74 percent better than a league average player. He was so dominant during this stretch, he even had a Super NES game named after him in the 1990s. If that don't spell dominance I don't know what else does.

In their entire careers, Mantle, McCovey and Foxx had between 4 and 8 seasons with an OPS+ of 174 or greater. None of these players had all of these seasons in one uber-long dominant stretch. It seems a bit unfair that this run of Frank Thomas was obscured by the inflated power numbers of the 1990s but for those first 8 years he was one of the most dominant players in the game, he was THE Big Hurt. To put icing on the cake, out of the 4 Hall of Fame metrics measured by Baseball-Reference, Thomas is measured as a likely Hall of Famer in 3 of them.

Unlike Delgado, there isn't much of a gray area for Thomas, his body of work (especially that 8-year stretch in the beginning) screams first ballot Hall of Famer to me.

Carlos Delgado's career in context

It looks like Carlos Delgado's career could be coming to an end soon. Considering that this hinges on whether he gets an adequate offer for the 2010 season, the likelihood of his career being done seems more likely than not.

With that in mind, i'm going to take a look at his career to see whether he or not he can reasonably expect to get into Cooperstown one day.

Placed into historical context, three of the top 10 hitters most similar to him (Willie Stargell, Willie McCovey and Duke Snider are in the hall of fame).

The seven similar players not enshrined either haven't retired or haven't been retired long enough (Thome, Giambi, Bagwell) and/or face long odds due to being associated with steroid use(Canseco, Juan Gonzales).

For hitters for the last couple decades, it depends on how the hall of fame voters react to hitters from the 1990s/2000s. In addition to the rampant steroid use of this time, Delgado happened to play in an era where home run totals were inflated across the board. The 473 career homers Delgado had while outstanding doesn't stand out in his era had it been if he had been playing in the same era as Stargell, McCovey and Snider.

Still, he has a case for serious consideration, but not necessarily enshrinement. He was still one of the better players of the era as he was in the top-10 for MVP voting 4 times. Even when you adjust for the seasons he played and inflated offensive numbers, he still stands out above most of his contemporaries as he had a career OPS+ of 138 including 4 seasons with an OPS + over 150. Still, this places slightly below the similar players OPS+ Career totals of the Hall of Famers with similar resumes:

Stargell 147 OPS+

McCovey 147 OPS+

Snider 140 OPS+

He places middle of the pack in Top-10 MVP finishes (Snider 6, Stargell 5, McCovey 2) and doesn't hold up as well in seasons with OPS+ > 150 (McCovey 11, Stargell 7, Snider 4.

What does this say about Delgado overall? He definitely seems like a bubble candidate that will determine which context voters are going to place the offensive totals for the last couple decades. In historical context, he falls just short of the Hall of Famers from past eras with similar numbers, he never approached the eye-popping power numbers of the Bonds, McGwire's and Sosa's of the world but at the same time hasn't been connected to steroid use as these aforementioned players have but still had outstanding numbers. My guess, he gets in eventually (but not on the first ballot) unless he somehow becomes a poster child for steroid use between now and then.

My take on Todd Wellemeyer signing with the Giants

The Giants have just signed pitcher Todd Wellemeyer to a one-year deal.

This begs the question of will this be one of the more brilliant signings of the winter or just another space filler. At first brush, he strikes me as a one-year wonder ('08) that has come and gone. He's started more than 10 games in 3 seasons. He's had one average year ('07) one good year ('08) and one terrible year ('09).

According to his baseball-reference page his career has been similar to luminaries such as Joaquin Benoit, Willie Banks and Marvin Freeman.

For a better answer, it's time to consult Ron Shandler's baseball forecaster for further insight. He ain't repeating '08 but I see him as an inning-eater. Bad luck can be blamed for some of his struggles as his opposing H% was 35 (he was in the 27%-29% range the previous three years). This inflated his WHIP (although his decreased strike percentage helped out), his hr/fb and flyball percentages stayed within his historical norms.

Verdict: If he makes the rotation his ceiling would be 10 wins/4.5 era. He works as a stop-gap/innings-eater/likely to do better than your typical AAA player but not someone who's getting a long term deal or on very many fantasy teams anytime soon.

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)

Russell Branyan is asking for how much money?

So, Russell Branyan has made his living as the poster boy for the three true outcomes. Last year, he had his best season, hitting a career high 31 homers. According to mlbtraderumors.com, Branyan his trying to score a 3-year deal in the 20-30 million dollar range. While I do like Branyan as a player (with his 3-week homer binge with the Brewers in '08, how could I not?), giving Branyan that long of a contract for that much money= bad idea. Why?

Well, there are obvious durability concerns. He's only played 100 plus games three times. While the ability to hit a ball about a mile has always been there, doing it on a consistent basis has been his vice. One thing to note that Branyan's career is an example of how batting average is a weak metric for measuring batting performance (and probably cost him a few jobs in the way). Despite an all-time batting average of .234, he's hit for enough power and drawn enough power to have a career OPS+ of 113.

However, based on durability issues, the current economy (can't really give 30 million to anyone these days) and being not that young (contract would cover his age 34-36 years, if I were a GM of a team, I would not be able to sign off on giving Branyan that much money over that much time.

I wouldn't mind having Branyan on my team (say 1-year, 1-million) but not knowing when he'll get injured or when his hot streak starts and ends (there's at least one every year)....Branyan will definitely be one of those players playing to earn the next year's money in any given year.

Would I want him on my fantasy team? Not as a starter, best case scenario would be as a waiver-wire pickup and ride a 3-week hot streak. In general though, that low batting average hinders his fantasy value making him more valuable on a real team than a fantasy team.

Brewers vs. Hart, Arbitration Hearing Preview

So it looks like the Brewers are headed to their first arbitration hearing in 12 years.

Time to breakdown the (probable hearing):

According to mlb.com, the Brewers come into tomorrow's hearing with a 2-1 All-Time Record.

Brewers won their case against reliever Mike Fetters in 1995, but lost to reliever-turned-starter Jose Mercedes in 1998........Before that, the only arbitration hearing in Brewers history was with infielder Jim Gantner, in 1992. The team won that case.

First, i'll break it down applying to Corey Hart's body of work:

Case for Corey Hart:

The strongest part of his case is that he's a two-time 20/20 player thus proving himself capable with the bat and on the base paths. He put it all together in 2007 and it looked like he was headed upwards with his career and a solid complement to Braun and Fielder in the starting line-up. This momentum carried over to a strong first-half of 2008. His first half was strong enough to get the 33rd spot on the National League All-Star team.

Case Against Corey Hart:

Basically, things have gone less than smooth since appearing in said All-Star game. He followed up that All-Star appearance by having a less than stellar September .173/.192/.245 when the Brewers needed all the help they could get while they held on to dear life in the Wild Card race.

Not to outdo himself, he went 3 for 16 in the Brewers cameo playoff appearance against Philadelphia.

While 2009 wasn't an epic failure on this scale, it doesn't help his case. He missed a month-plus due to injury and was more or less an average hitter. Speaking of being a league average hitter, that seems to be his base ability level. In his four seasons of play his OPS+ has ranged from 98 to 101 in three of those seasons.

What about that 2007 season when he played better? Well, some of that can be attributed to luck as his BABIP was .327 that year a bit above his career BABIP of .311.

For something like arbitration and getting a higher salary than management wants to give a player it's about timing, timing and timing. Unfortunately for Corey Hart, he would have had a better chance to win after the 2007 season than he does tomorrow.

Precedence:

For kicks and giggles, let's see if there is any precedence we can see from the Brewers limited arbitration history.

Jim Gantner 1992- Gantner was coming off a '91 season with a line of .283/.320/.361 90 OPS+ and coming off his Age-38 season. Different position, different stages of their careers, this case doesn't really apply, plus the Brewers won this case.

Mike Fetters 1995- Fetters was coming off a very strong '94 season where he was 1-4 2.54 era 17 svs 198 ERA+. While he had no all-star appearances at the time, he was in the beginning of a strong 3 year run as closer. Despite Fetters coming off a much better season than Hart, the Brewers won this case.

Jose Mercedes 1998- As of now, Mercedes is the only Brewer to ever win an arbitration case against the team. Not my first guess. It does back up the argument that winning in arbitration is about timing. He was coming off his most (and only) productive season as a Brewer 7-10 3.79 era 123 ERA+ at around the same age as Hart (26).

Final Verdict: My prediction is that Corey Hart loses his arbitration case and the Brewers improve to 3-1 all time in this category. The first reason is that his general body of work indicates that the Brewers are getting a average player in this category, nothing special, nothing horrible (well usually) and 4.8 million seems to be too much to pay for this.

Second, precedence doesn't give him a very strong case. While Mercedes was around the same age when he won his arbitration case, the timing of the case was crucial as he played better in his arbitration year than in the past. The same can't be said about Hart.

New Name, New Focus, Same Attitude

So, I've been writing on this website/blog/forum for about eight months. I've written enough stuff to know what works and what doesn't. After seven months of regular writing and about one month of being on hiatus, i've learned that for myself, writing about baseball works, any other sport not so much.

Obviously, as a Brewers fan, there will be a slight emphasis on the Brewers but i'm also going to be giving my take on other going on's in the world of baseball. Also, 2010 is my first foray into Fantasy Baseball. I've always been told that I would be good at fantasy baseball and several people have suggested it to me and this year i'm taking the plunge into fantasy baseball. One of the sub-plots of this blog will be me documenting my journey into this world and to see how it goes.