Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Preseason/Week 1 Power Rankings
Remember these?
1) The Slamduncansteins, Stephen Rhoads.
Mean: 2.14
Range: 1-3
Mode: 2
Strengths: 5-tool players like Phillips and H. Ramirez; 'xtrordnery (sic) upside of pitching staff
Weaknesses: Downside of pitching staff; saves out of 'pen?, RF.
Analysis: This team has plenty of potential on paper, provided that key players like Phillips and Hanley Ramirez are able to improve on their stellar 07 results. This team put a lot of its eggs in one basket by taking risks on pitchers like Hernandez, Hughes, McGowan and Gallardo. Every one of those starters has legitimate ace-material, and if those four have the kind of year some analysts are predicting, and scouts have been expecting, it could be the best pitching staff in the league when combined with Peavy and Halladay, aces in their own right. The two questions in the pen are whether Rivera-lookalike Joakim Soria can replicate his 07 results as a closer, and more widely whether there will be enough save opportunities out of the three closers. Matt Kemp in RF is another high-risk high-reward player, but may not provide sufficient power out of the gate to keep his starting role. Potential for huge upside on this team includes: Hughes, Hernandez (do you know how old he is? look it up. he's a true bad-ass. it's even tattooed on his body in spanish. "bad ass"), McGowan, Gallardo, Kershaw, Longoria and Kemp. Potential for huge downside includes: Hafner, Hunter, Halladay, Lowell and C. Cordero.
2) The Railroaders, Adam Krueger.
Mean: 3.00
Range: 1-7.
Mode: 2,3,4 (tie)
Strengths: HR power, 4 ace potential
Weaknesses: Downside risk of pitching staff, boom-or-bust offense
Analysis: Drafting A-Rod over Santana with the first pick of the draft saved Adam from years of ridicule. While it certainly would not have been as bad as the infamous Seattle Seahawks Defense move of 2006 (1st round, 3rd pick, just FYI), it would have hampered his overall team in a big way. Drafting A-Rod in the first round allowed Adam to compliment A-Rod with Prince Fielder. This is certainly the most potent 1-2 HR punch in The HotBox (sic). Josh Beckett's injury is a source of worry. Eric Karabell noted in his most recent column that even before the injury, he did not consider Beckett to be a top 10 starter, and cautioned readers against drafting him too early. His primary source of worry was that Beckett's career year in 07, coming after horrible results in 2006, would be followed by a regression towards career numbers. If Beckett is able to put together a similar year in 2008 though, Beckett-Oswalt-Zambrano-Myers has 4 ace potential. Sources of concern would be whether Wainwright will have a huge year, as some expect, whether Owings can put 2007 behind him, and whether Billingsley can build and improve on his 07 results. Potential for huge upside on this team includes Cano, Francouer, and Uggla. Potential for huge downside on this team includes Beltran, Hawpe, Thomas, Burrell and Orlando Cabrera.
3) The Ass Fuckers, Matt Larson
Mean: 3.86.
Range: 1-7.
Mode: 4
Strengths: Speed, BA, closers
Weaknesses: HR power, injury-risk of pitching staff.
Analysis: The Ass-Fuckers are a strange team. To be sure, there is a lot of upside with respect to the pitching staff. Bedard and Carmona are a legitimate 1-2 punch, and Hudson, Greinke, Snell and Garza are decent upside back-of-the-rotation starters. But if I were Larson, I would be concerned by the injury risk that Carmona and Bedard present. Bedard spent the last part of the 2007 on the DL with a oblique muscle strain. In fact, in 4 full seasons of being a starting pitcher, Bedard has never topped 200 innings pitched. Carmona is even more worrisome. After a failed attempt at being a reliever for the Indians, the 24 year old started 32 games last year with the Indians, throwing 215 full innings. This is all well and good, except for the fact that he threw 75 innings total in 2006. As Heyman of SI has demonstrated, young pitchers who throw more than 30 innings in excess of their previous year's total (assuming they are on an escalating innings total, and haven't topped out at higher number before), show a remarkable injury rate the following year. If my memory serves me correctly, the number was around 50%. This is the reason for innings limits for guys like Hughes, Joba, Buchholz, Liriano (uh...), etc. Now, Carmona threw 150 innings more in 2007 than he did in 06. That is a huge red flag, and if he blows out his shoulder this year it will be no surprise. Just remember you heard it here first. Thus, I give the Ass Fuckers a mixed review. There is tons of upside with the pitching staff, and great solid production from Reyes, Crawford, et al., but, as Bernanke put it, "there remain significant downside risks to growth". Upside potential: Garza, Greinke, Snell, Hudson, D. Young (especially Young, this was a great pick), Kinsler. Downside potential: Bedard, Carmona, Mauer, Matsui, and Byrnes (all for injury reasons).
4) (tie) Team Prince, Stephanie Prince.
Mean: 4.14.
Range: 3-6.
Mode: 3
Strengths: The entire lineup; deep bench
Weaknesses: Pitching staff, relievers
Analysis: Stephanie is listed "higher" in rankings (over Leslie) because of a higher Mode and a smaller Range. In my mind, Team Prince made some of the best moves of the draft, consistently finding top talent in lower rounds, and showing a remarkable tendency to take players that I was planning on taking the following round. God damn it. Nevertheless, this team may have the best lineup top-to-bottom, with significant potential off the bench. The lineup consists of: Johjima, Pujols, Roberts, Braun, Jeter, Dunn, Sizemore, Berkman, Thome and Bay, and you can substitute in Andruw Jones, Nick Markakis and Chone Figgins. Good lord in heaven. Although I thought that Team Prince slotted Pujols way, way, way too high (that elbow is made of string cheese, duct tape and chewing gum right now), and thought that he posed too great of a risk to be taken with a top pick, Stephanie made up for it by building a lineup of consistent top performers. Here is the biggest problem with Team Prince (seriously, can we get a name?): pitching. Webb and Wang are groundball pitchers. While I'm not familiar with Webb's K/9 rate, and I believe it's higher than Wang's, you have two pitchers that rely on the defense for outs, not the strikeout. This is fine, but its a bigger disadvantage when one of the 5 pitching categories is Ks. I would also be concerned by relying on Matsuzaka for #2 starter production. His 07 results were less than stellar, and whether he improves or declines in the following year is an open question. It is generally the case, however, that Japanese starters have fared far worse in the second year of MLB ball than the first. Personally, I don't think this is the case, since a lot of those pitchers relied on the "newness" factor, or a strange delivery (Nomo comes to mind) to garner results, whereas Dice K is simply a better pitcher, but I would feel more comfortable if Dice K was my 6 or 7 starter. The picks of Gil Meche and Kuroda were genius, esp. the latter, and solid results from them could negate the significant downside risk of Webb-Dice-K-Wang. Joba will be money in the bank though, you can count on that.
4) (tie) The Master Batters, Leslie Rietveld.
Mean: 4.14.
Range: 1-6.
Mode: 4
Strengths: Middle IF, pitching staff
Weaknesses: 1B, corner OF, injury risk
Analysis: This team reminds me a lot of The Slamduncansteins. It is possible that this team could boast six aces this year: Hamels, Verlander, Lincecum, Liriano, Escobar and Penny. Unlike the Slamduncansteins, though, the risk of this team is less that the pitchers will fulfill their expected potential, but more that the pitchers will be able to replicate 2006 and 2007 results without succumbing to injury. Hamels and Liriano are of particular concern, for obvious reasons. Lincecum is a beautiful pitcher. Watch his pitching motion in slow-motion video (somewhere on the interwebs), and you'll be blown away. Sheer beauty. He can hit the upper 90s with his fastball, and he is shorter than 6 feet. I love the upside potential of Lincecum and Liriano, but I would be worried that they will be injured again or unable to produce. Even though it was only one outing, Lincecum was hit very hard yesterday. Regardless, this pitching staff is one of the best in the league, with the potential to be the best. Verlander headlining the rotation is fantastic - he is my guy for the AL Cy Young this year. Despite all of this, the offense of the Master Batters leaves tons to be desired. Ibanez-Rios-Butler-Gonzalez are the apparent starters in the outfield, 1B and DH, but I can't see any one of these hitting more than 30 HRs this year. This will be a challenge. The speed and 5 tool production out of the SS and 2B may be enough to make up for it though, and the selection of Fukodome could be enough to vault this team into the upper echelon. Potential for upside: Lincecum, Liriano, Fukodome, Loney and Street. Potential for downside: Hamels, Lincecum, Liriano, Dye, Ibanez, Butler, Gonzalez
6) The Muscley Armed Paper Boys, Christian Conant.
Mean: 5.14.
Range: 1-7.
Mode: 5
Strengths: HR power, bullpen, RF glut.
Weaknesses: Better hope the Tigers don't go on a cold streak, LF dearth, pitching staff
Analysis: The MAPB are not the sixth best team in the league. I would rank them far higher, but I think that since they aren't the runaway favorites, they are stuck in the middling middley middle. The MAPB pose an impressive HR-RBI threat with Ordonez-Ortiz-Guerrero-Cabrera, especially as Ortiz and Cabrera are expected to have bigger years in 2008 than they did in 07. The glaring problem with this team is that the starting lineup, as such, has 4 Tigers in it. Now, this would be a huge problem if the Tigers weren't expected to compete with the Yankees for the MLB scoring title. But they are, and so this isn't the biggest deal in the world. A rough week for the Tigers though will generally mean a rough week for rape-bait MAPB. The team does benefit, however, from a glut of RFers (Ordonez, Abreu, Vlad). This should allow the MAPB to upgrade other positions if they deem it necessary. One position that could use an upgrade is LF. I love Randy just as much as the next guy, but this is an 8 team MLB league and Randy Winn shouldn't even be on anyone's bench. The pitching staff could be decent-to-good for the MAPB, or it could be a complete disaster. I expect Sabathia will post similar numbers (probably a slight decline) to what he did in 07, but the rest of the rotation is suspect. John Maine was wildly inconsistent in 2007, especially in the latter half. Jered Weaver has been steadily declining since his breakout year in 06. Bonderman's overall numbers have never matched expectations in the ML, he was done early in 07 due to shoulder trouble, and he got lit up today. AJ Burnett is the Carl Pavano of the Blue Jays. Joe Blanton is an inning eater, but that's about it. And Ted Lilly turned some heads in 07, but I still have significant doubts about this dude. Each one of these pitchers could turn it around in 08, and they all have significant potential, but the odds of them all coming together at once would seem low to me. If they do, watch out. Significant upside potential: Bonderman, Burnett, Cabrera. Significant downside potential: C. Pena, all 6 starters behind Sabathia, Ordonez.
7) The Honey Nut Ichiros, Greg Aldin
Mean: 6.43.
Range: 1-9 (yes, you read that correctly. someone gave him a 9, and 8 was left blank).
Mode: 7,8
Strengths: Pitching staff, bullpen
Weaknesses: Of-fense! clap clap clap! Of-fense!
Analysis: (drunk impression) I'll be honest. Can I be honest? Can I be real with you here? I just feel like there's so much bullshit, people are never reaaaal with each other anymore. You know? Can I just be up front with you? (ok, done). Greg's offense is shittier than Larson's balls after a night at the gay clubs. This is an offense that boasts Shane Victorino, Jason Kubel and Juan Pierre (who shouldn't even be starting for the Dodgers) from the typical power spots of RF, DH and utility. David Wright, ok, that's good. Russell Martin. Mm hmm, that's nice. But when those two are your big heavy hitters, your only power threats, you've got trouble in Tinseltown, biotch. We all know his pitching staff has crazy-good upside potential, provided that Cain can leverage a decent ERA into a good W-L record (doubtful, have you seen the Giants offense?), and provided that Harden and Sheets don't get hurt again (doubtful). What bothers me about this team is that its like The 2007 The Shinebox, where Greg drafted a bunch of WRs and ended up getting fucked nine ways over on virtually every other position. I just don't believe that you can ignore the offense, and expect to win. This is an 8 team league, and the difference between his pitching staff and other good staffs is not that marked so that he will be able to win games on the sheer force of pitching. In a deeper league, or an AL only league, etc, perhaps. But if I owned the Ichiros, I'd be looking to unwind this gamble as fast as possible and get someone who can hit the ball. Upside potential: Cain, Harang, Shields, Young. Downside potential: Sheets, Haren (watch for worse numbers this year - Arizona isn't a pitcher haven like Oakland), Cain, Harden.
8) The Cunning Linguists, Nason.
Mean: 7.29.
Range: 5-8.
Mode: 8.
Strengths: Speed, 5 tool players, bullpen
Weaknesses: Depth of starting rotation, depth of lineup, downside potential.
Analysis: Had Nason given himself a 1, his Mean would have gone up to 6.5, and assuming that his predictions corresponded with the results of the Power Rankings, or at least assuming that he gave Greg a 7, he would have moved into a tie with Greg for 7th with a Mean of 6.5. Nason didn't stock up on pitchers, but he also didn't exactly load up on the heavy hitters either. To be sure, J-Roll, Holliday, Upton and Tex. are straight-up legitimate superstars. Those four are going to be enough to move Nason out of the 8 slot and keep him at least in contention all year long. The Upton pick was brilliant; Tex is in a contract year; Rollins is as 5-tool as they come, and Holliday was an MVP candidate last year who plays in Colorado. Need I say more? Yet...The pitching rotation is suspect. Lackey has already had health problems this spring, and I wouldn't bank on him posting similar numbers in 08. Smoltz is near the end of his career, but certainly capable of putting up decent enough numbers. Buchholz won't be able to provide the consistency you would necessarily want, or the innings, but has huge upside potential. Arroyo-Francis-Maddux are really second to third tier pitchers. Pedro is Pedro, who knows what will happen? This is a rotation very similar to the Ass Fuckers. All could go well, but things could very well go horribly awry. Smoltz, Maddux, Pedro are all old; Buchholz is very young, you get the idea. And then you take a look at the outfield. JD Drew has no business starting in The HotBox, let's be honest. Ellsbury played out of his mind in the playoffs, but he also played out of his range. You can't expect him to produce similar numbers in 08, even if his speed/average will be above-average for our purposes. Sheffield and Chipper Jones are both walking DL stints. Jones has even stated that it is his goal, his target, to play 150 games. I don't believe Sheff has even played this spring. Thus, this team is one that can expect things to come together nicely, but very infrequently. I imagine, unless changes are made, that the buzzwords for The Cunning Linguists in 2008 will be inconsistency, flashes of brilliance, and shallow. Upside potential: Upton, Buchholz, Ellsbury, Pence (great pick). Downside potential: Soriano, Drew, Ellsbury, Sheffield, the old pitchers.
1) The Slamduncansteins, Stephen Rhoads.
Mean: 2.14
Range: 1-3
Mode: 2
Strengths: 5-tool players like Phillips and H. Ramirez; 'xtrordnery (sic) upside of pitching staff
Weaknesses: Downside of pitching staff; saves out of 'pen?, RF.
Analysis: This team has plenty of potential on paper, provided that key players like Phillips and Hanley Ramirez are able to improve on their stellar 07 results. This team put a lot of its eggs in one basket by taking risks on pitchers like Hernandez, Hughes, McGowan and Gallardo. Every one of those starters has legitimate ace-material, and if those four have the kind of year some analysts are predicting, and scouts have been expecting, it could be the best pitching staff in the league when combined with Peavy and Halladay, aces in their own right. The two questions in the pen are whether Rivera-lookalike Joakim Soria can replicate his 07 results as a closer, and more widely whether there will be enough save opportunities out of the three closers. Matt Kemp in RF is another high-risk high-reward player, but may not provide sufficient power out of the gate to keep his starting role. Potential for huge upside on this team includes: Hughes, Hernandez (do you know how old he is? look it up. he's a true bad-ass. it's even tattooed on his body in spanish. "bad ass"), McGowan, Gallardo, Kershaw, Longoria and Kemp. Potential for huge downside includes: Hafner, Hunter, Halladay, Lowell and C. Cordero.
2) The Railroaders, Adam Krueger.
Mean: 3.00
Range: 1-7.
Mode: 2,3,4 (tie)
Strengths: HR power, 4 ace potential
Weaknesses: Downside risk of pitching staff, boom-or-bust offense
Analysis: Drafting A-Rod over Santana with the first pick of the draft saved Adam from years of ridicule. While it certainly would not have been as bad as the infamous Seattle Seahawks Defense move of 2006 (1st round, 3rd pick, just FYI), it would have hampered his overall team in a big way. Drafting A-Rod in the first round allowed Adam to compliment A-Rod with Prince Fielder. This is certainly the most potent 1-2 HR punch in The HotBox (sic). Josh Beckett's injury is a source of worry. Eric Karabell noted in his most recent column that even before the injury, he did not consider Beckett to be a top 10 starter, and cautioned readers against drafting him too early. His primary source of worry was that Beckett's career year in 07, coming after horrible results in 2006, would be followed by a regression towards career numbers. If Beckett is able to put together a similar year in 2008 though, Beckett-Oswalt-Zambrano-Myers has 4 ace potential. Sources of concern would be whether Wainwright will have a huge year, as some expect, whether Owings can put 2007 behind him, and whether Billingsley can build and improve on his 07 results. Potential for huge upside on this team includes Cano, Francouer, and Uggla. Potential for huge downside on this team includes Beltran, Hawpe, Thomas, Burrell and Orlando Cabrera.
3) The Ass Fuckers, Matt Larson
Mean: 3.86.
Range: 1-7.
Mode: 4
Strengths: Speed, BA, closers
Weaknesses: HR power, injury-risk of pitching staff.
Analysis: The Ass-Fuckers are a strange team. To be sure, there is a lot of upside with respect to the pitching staff. Bedard and Carmona are a legitimate 1-2 punch, and Hudson, Greinke, Snell and Garza are decent upside back-of-the-rotation starters. But if I were Larson, I would be concerned by the injury risk that Carmona and Bedard present. Bedard spent the last part of the 2007 on the DL with a oblique muscle strain. In fact, in 4 full seasons of being a starting pitcher, Bedard has never topped 200 innings pitched. Carmona is even more worrisome. After a failed attempt at being a reliever for the Indians, the 24 year old started 32 games last year with the Indians, throwing 215 full innings. This is all well and good, except for the fact that he threw 75 innings total in 2006. As Heyman of SI has demonstrated, young pitchers who throw more than 30 innings in excess of their previous year's total (assuming they are on an escalating innings total, and haven't topped out at higher number before), show a remarkable injury rate the following year. If my memory serves me correctly, the number was around 50%. This is the reason for innings limits for guys like Hughes, Joba, Buchholz, Liriano (uh...), etc. Now, Carmona threw 150 innings more in 2007 than he did in 06. That is a huge red flag, and if he blows out his shoulder this year it will be no surprise. Just remember you heard it here first. Thus, I give the Ass Fuckers a mixed review. There is tons of upside with the pitching staff, and great solid production from Reyes, Crawford, et al., but, as Bernanke put it, "there remain significant downside risks to growth". Upside potential: Garza, Greinke, Snell, Hudson, D. Young (especially Young, this was a great pick), Kinsler. Downside potential: Bedard, Carmona, Mauer, Matsui, and Byrnes (all for injury reasons).
4) (tie) Team Prince, Stephanie Prince.
Mean: 4.14.
Range: 3-6.
Mode: 3
Strengths: The entire lineup; deep bench
Weaknesses: Pitching staff, relievers
Analysis: Stephanie is listed "higher" in rankings (over Leslie) because of a higher Mode and a smaller Range. In my mind, Team Prince made some of the best moves of the draft, consistently finding top talent in lower rounds, and showing a remarkable tendency to take players that I was planning on taking the following round. God damn it. Nevertheless, this team may have the best lineup top-to-bottom, with significant potential off the bench. The lineup consists of: Johjima, Pujols, Roberts, Braun, Jeter, Dunn, Sizemore, Berkman, Thome and Bay, and you can substitute in Andruw Jones, Nick Markakis and Chone Figgins. Good lord in heaven. Although I thought that Team Prince slotted Pujols way, way, way too high (that elbow is made of string cheese, duct tape and chewing gum right now), and thought that he posed too great of a risk to be taken with a top pick, Stephanie made up for it by building a lineup of consistent top performers. Here is the biggest problem with Team Prince (seriously, can we get a name?): pitching. Webb and Wang are groundball pitchers. While I'm not familiar with Webb's K/9 rate, and I believe it's higher than Wang's, you have two pitchers that rely on the defense for outs, not the strikeout. This is fine, but its a bigger disadvantage when one of the 5 pitching categories is Ks. I would also be concerned by relying on Matsuzaka for #2 starter production. His 07 results were less than stellar, and whether he improves or declines in the following year is an open question. It is generally the case, however, that Japanese starters have fared far worse in the second year of MLB ball than the first. Personally, I don't think this is the case, since a lot of those pitchers relied on the "newness" factor, or a strange delivery (Nomo comes to mind) to garner results, whereas Dice K is simply a better pitcher, but I would feel more comfortable if Dice K was my 6 or 7 starter. The picks of Gil Meche and Kuroda were genius, esp. the latter, and solid results from them could negate the significant downside risk of Webb-Dice-K-Wang. Joba will be money in the bank though, you can count on that.
4) (tie) The Master Batters, Leslie Rietveld.
Mean: 4.14.
Range: 1-6.
Mode: 4
Strengths: Middle IF, pitching staff
Weaknesses: 1B, corner OF, injury risk
Analysis: This team reminds me a lot of The Slamduncansteins. It is possible that this team could boast six aces this year: Hamels, Verlander, Lincecum, Liriano, Escobar and Penny. Unlike the Slamduncansteins, though, the risk of this team is less that the pitchers will fulfill their expected potential, but more that the pitchers will be able to replicate 2006 and 2007 results without succumbing to injury. Hamels and Liriano are of particular concern, for obvious reasons. Lincecum is a beautiful pitcher. Watch his pitching motion in slow-motion video (somewhere on the interwebs), and you'll be blown away. Sheer beauty. He can hit the upper 90s with his fastball, and he is shorter than 6 feet. I love the upside potential of Lincecum and Liriano, but I would be worried that they will be injured again or unable to produce. Even though it was only one outing, Lincecum was hit very hard yesterday. Regardless, this pitching staff is one of the best in the league, with the potential to be the best. Verlander headlining the rotation is fantastic - he is my guy for the AL Cy Young this year. Despite all of this, the offense of the Master Batters leaves tons to be desired. Ibanez-Rios-Butler-Gonzalez are the apparent starters in the outfield, 1B and DH, but I can't see any one of these hitting more than 30 HRs this year. This will be a challenge. The speed and 5 tool production out of the SS and 2B may be enough to make up for it though, and the selection of Fukodome could be enough to vault this team into the upper echelon. Potential for upside: Lincecum, Liriano, Fukodome, Loney and Street. Potential for downside: Hamels, Lincecum, Liriano, Dye, Ibanez, Butler, Gonzalez
6) The Muscley Armed Paper Boys, Christian Conant.
Mean: 5.14.
Range: 1-7.
Mode: 5
Strengths: HR power, bullpen, RF glut.
Weaknesses: Better hope the Tigers don't go on a cold streak, LF dearth, pitching staff
Analysis: The MAPB are not the sixth best team in the league. I would rank them far higher, but I think that since they aren't the runaway favorites, they are stuck in the middling middley middle. The MAPB pose an impressive HR-RBI threat with Ordonez-Ortiz-Guerrero-Cabrera, especially as Ortiz and Cabrera are expected to have bigger years in 2008 than they did in 07. The glaring problem with this team is that the starting lineup, as such, has 4 Tigers in it. Now, this would be a huge problem if the Tigers weren't expected to compete with the Yankees for the MLB scoring title. But they are, and so this isn't the biggest deal in the world. A rough week for the Tigers though will generally mean a rough week for rape-bait MAPB. The team does benefit, however, from a glut of RFers (Ordonez, Abreu, Vlad). This should allow the MAPB to upgrade other positions if they deem it necessary. One position that could use an upgrade is LF. I love Randy just as much as the next guy, but this is an 8 team MLB league and Randy Winn shouldn't even be on anyone's bench. The pitching staff could be decent-to-good for the MAPB, or it could be a complete disaster. I expect Sabathia will post similar numbers (probably a slight decline) to what he did in 07, but the rest of the rotation is suspect. John Maine was wildly inconsistent in 2007, especially in the latter half. Jered Weaver has been steadily declining since his breakout year in 06. Bonderman's overall numbers have never matched expectations in the ML, he was done early in 07 due to shoulder trouble, and he got lit up today. AJ Burnett is the Carl Pavano of the Blue Jays. Joe Blanton is an inning eater, but that's about it. And Ted Lilly turned some heads in 07, but I still have significant doubts about this dude. Each one of these pitchers could turn it around in 08, and they all have significant potential, but the odds of them all coming together at once would seem low to me. If they do, watch out. Significant upside potential: Bonderman, Burnett, Cabrera. Significant downside potential: C. Pena, all 6 starters behind Sabathia, Ordonez.
7) The Honey Nut Ichiros, Greg Aldin
Mean: 6.43.
Range: 1-9 (yes, you read that correctly. someone gave him a 9, and 8 was left blank).
Mode: 7,8
Strengths: Pitching staff, bullpen
Weaknesses: Of-fense! clap clap clap! Of-fense!
Analysis: (drunk impression) I'll be honest. Can I be honest? Can I be real with you here? I just feel like there's so much bullshit, people are never reaaaal with each other anymore. You know? Can I just be up front with you? (ok, done). Greg's offense is shittier than Larson's balls after a night at the gay clubs. This is an offense that boasts Shane Victorino, Jason Kubel and Juan Pierre (who shouldn't even be starting for the Dodgers) from the typical power spots of RF, DH and utility. David Wright, ok, that's good. Russell Martin. Mm hmm, that's nice. But when those two are your big heavy hitters, your only power threats, you've got trouble in Tinseltown, biotch. We all know his pitching staff has crazy-good upside potential, provided that Cain can leverage a decent ERA into a good W-L record (doubtful, have you seen the Giants offense?), and provided that Harden and Sheets don't get hurt again (doubtful). What bothers me about this team is that its like The 2007 The Shinebox, where Greg drafted a bunch of WRs and ended up getting fucked nine ways over on virtually every other position. I just don't believe that you can ignore the offense, and expect to win. This is an 8 team league, and the difference between his pitching staff and other good staffs is not that marked so that he will be able to win games on the sheer force of pitching. In a deeper league, or an AL only league, etc, perhaps. But if I owned the Ichiros, I'd be looking to unwind this gamble as fast as possible and get someone who can hit the ball. Upside potential: Cain, Harang, Shields, Young. Downside potential: Sheets, Haren (watch for worse numbers this year - Arizona isn't a pitcher haven like Oakland), Cain, Harden.
8) The Cunning Linguists, Nason.
Mean: 7.29.
Range: 5-8.
Mode: 8.
Strengths: Speed, 5 tool players, bullpen
Weaknesses: Depth of starting rotation, depth of lineup, downside potential.
Analysis: Had Nason given himself a 1, his Mean would have gone up to 6.5, and assuming that his predictions corresponded with the results of the Power Rankings, or at least assuming that he gave Greg a 7, he would have moved into a tie with Greg for 7th with a Mean of 6.5. Nason didn't stock up on pitchers, but he also didn't exactly load up on the heavy hitters either. To be sure, J-Roll, Holliday, Upton and Tex. are straight-up legitimate superstars. Those four are going to be enough to move Nason out of the 8 slot and keep him at least in contention all year long. The Upton pick was brilliant; Tex is in a contract year; Rollins is as 5-tool as they come, and Holliday was an MVP candidate last year who plays in Colorado. Need I say more? Yet...The pitching rotation is suspect. Lackey has already had health problems this spring, and I wouldn't bank on him posting similar numbers in 08. Smoltz is near the end of his career, but certainly capable of putting up decent enough numbers. Buchholz won't be able to provide the consistency you would necessarily want, or the innings, but has huge upside potential. Arroyo-Francis-Maddux are really second to third tier pitchers. Pedro is Pedro, who knows what will happen? This is a rotation very similar to the Ass Fuckers. All could go well, but things could very well go horribly awry. Smoltz, Maddux, Pedro are all old; Buchholz is very young, you get the idea. And then you take a look at the outfield. JD Drew has no business starting in The HotBox, let's be honest. Ellsbury played out of his mind in the playoffs, but he also played out of his range. You can't expect him to produce similar numbers in 08, even if his speed/average will be above-average for our purposes. Sheffield and Chipper Jones are both walking DL stints. Jones has even stated that it is his goal, his target, to play 150 games. I don't believe Sheff has even played this spring. Thus, this team is one that can expect things to come together nicely, but very infrequently. I imagine, unless changes are made, that the buzzwords for The Cunning Linguists in 2008 will be inconsistency, flashes of brilliance, and shallow. Upside potential: Upton, Buchholz, Ellsbury, Pence (great pick). Downside potential: Soriano, Drew, Ellsbury, Sheffield, the old pitchers.
I guess this makes him Cy Young?
"The Detroit Tigers have the greatest offense in the history of baseball" - Mr. Scott-Kazmir-for-Victor-Zambrano, Steve Phillips, Baseball Tonight, 3/31/08.
7 IP, 0ER v. the Tigers.
Brian Bannister is the greatest pitcher of all time.
7 IP, 0ER v. the Tigers.
Brian Bannister is the greatest pitcher of all time.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)