Continuing my attention to the fantasy impact of players on new teams in 2009, I turn my attention to the NL Central, a division with plenty of little nuances for me to talk about. My intellect is stimulating itself. I’m a naughty, naughty man.
The above paragraph is a demonstration of why I’m not allowed within 100 feet of the cheerleaders at my university. Anyway, on to the players:
Kevin Gregg - Chicago Cubs:
I posted the following on the message board for Baseball Tonight, Baseball Instinct’s flagship fantasy league, the scoring system upon which I am basing my remarks: “His closer battle with Carlos Marmol is a more foregone conclusion than my hitting on a fat chick the night before the draft.” Truer words have never been spoken, and not just because a plastered Joe Telegen is likely to hit upon anything without a Y-Chromosome.
Marmol is the man, without a doubt. Supposedly Gregg has a chance, but that’s only because baseball has this bizarre reward structure when it comes to its relief pitchers. Guys go their whole careers without doing anything really impressive and yet get the chance to get saves, for some reason defying logic. Baseball is not a meritocracy in this way:
The list is endless; here’s some guys, some active, some retired, who pop into my mind at random: Gregg, Joe Borowski, Antonio Alfonseca, Brian Wilson, C.J. Wilson, Bob Stanley, Jason Isringhausen, Matt Mantei, Matt Herges, Hideki Irabu, Rick Aguilera (who, to be fair, was much better when NOT closing)…please, dear Baseball Instinct readers, toss in some names of your own favorite “why the hell did they get to close” guys in the comment field.
I’m saying all this to explain why Gregg was a guy the Cubs decided they needed to get as insurance, not to argue that they’re stupid enough not to recognize what they’ve got in Marmol. Something about Gregg, probably the raw quantity of saves in his past, screamed out “closer.” And “closer depth” he became. I don’t know whether Gregg will be entrusted with 7th or 8th inning duties enough to put up some holds; Aaron Heilman and Jeff Samardzjia can and should have something to say about that. I say only this: Carlos Marmol is a prime candidate to be a star in the World Baseball Championship this year for the strong Dominican Republic team. I hope I get to see the D.R. against the US during Baseball Tonight’s auction weekend, though I’m at the mercy of circumstance. Don’t place yourself at the mercy of circumstance by drafting Kevin Gregg or someone like him. He’s just a lucky stiff who has gotten to pitch the 9th inning in the past.
Willy Taveras - Cincinnati Reds :
From a fantasy baseball standpoint at least, you are about to witness something very special with this guy. He’s a one-trick pony. All he does is steal bases and “you can’t steal first,” as the adage goes. And yet, Willy Taveras is on his way to being a fantasy baseball MVP candidate.
I’ll explain by expressing my desire to see more direct interest given to a certain stat, one which doesn’t even have a proper name: “Stolen Base/Caught Stealing ratio.” In the turvy-topsy world of baseball statistical analysis, turned on its head by Bill James and his disciples, I’d like to argue briefly for this stat’s particular merit: SB/CS Ratio is a uniquely binary stat in baseball. To wit, when a baserunner is “caught stealing,” it is always the polar opposite result of a stolen base; the intent to steal a base is always reflected in the success/failure of this particular stat. This is significant when you think about the other ratios we stat geeks think about: K/BB, GB/FB, PO/E, etc. If you’re a batter, a walk is not the polar oppositional result of a strikeout, and vice versa is also not binary-opposed if you’re a pitcher. A home run isn’t the opposite of a strikeout either, if you think about it; a strikeout may or may not be the absolute worst-case scenario, so a ratio-styled stat can only help you so much.
A stolen base vs. a caught stealing, on the other hand, is relatively context-neutral (that’s a term I don’t usually buy completely, but here it’s safer). The distances between Taveras and the pitcher/catcher combo attempting to retire him are always identical, so it’s not like there’s an Arlington-equivalent or Safeco-equivalent for basestealers; whether a runner is caught stealing frequently or not reflects fairly well on his judgment.
My point in all of this is to reveal some amazing info about the Reds’ new centerfielder. You probably know or can at least easily discover that Taveras was baseball’s top thief in 2008 with 68. You probably also can easily figure out that his caught stealing total, only seven, was slight enough to qualify him as Ichiro-esque, as I like to call it, as he was successful more than 89% of the time. But add this remarkable piece of info to your Tavares considerations: He actually reduced the number of times he was caught stealing in 2008, from the nine he recorded in 2006 and 2007 while swiping only 33 bases each year. In 2005, his rookie season, it was 34/11. In other words, this relatively stable stat has improved or stayed identical for Taveras each year of his young career.
Now, what does this all mean to you, as a fantasy baseball owner? He’s heading to a manager who hates “clogging the bases” (that’s a little implicit shout-out to firejoemorgan.com), and should run him like crazy; to be fair, the Reds are going to need to find creative ways to score runs given their popless lineup. He’s demonstrated that his worst-case scenario with basestealing efficiency is pretty damn good. And finally, we can TRUST his numbers, because that SB/CS ratio reflects as little variable in result as one can get in this number-obsessive era.
So, I’m going to say this: 100 steals are within this guy’s capability in 2009. If he’s not in the lineup on a given day (and he’s missed at least 10 games and usually many more each year of his career), I’d put him in as a pinchrunner, so imagine what will come from the mind of a “baseball purist” like Dusty. And it does make some sense; if he can keep his caught stealings low enough, that easy base advance will make the Reds a better team. One last number crunch, this one by far my most simplistic: The guy stole 68 bases in 133 games in 2008. Extrapolation over 162 games, ceteris paribus: 83 steals. My point is: There are few offensive players with the chance to do something unique in 2009. Taveras is definitely one of them.
You know, I said he was a one-trick pony, but he’s really not; he’s a consistent run scorer, especially when given a full season worth of at-bats (which never happened when he was in Colorado, a set of circumstances that didn’t prevent him from posting run totals extremely similar to, say, Garrett Anderson). Don’t view this guy as a Juan Pierre, Michael Bourn-type. He’s a good baseball player, and one who can play for you every day, regardless of your scoring format. Go get him.
Mike Hampton-Houston Astros:
I quote Pete Townshend: “And I get on my knees and pray, we don’t get fooled again.”
I’m not sure why/if, whatever, anyone would consider rostering Hampton under any circumstance during the draft portion of the season. Let me keep this simple: If he had never had any of the health problems he’s encountered in the last 10 years, he still would have been next to nothing. His magical 1999, in which he rattled off a 22-4, 2.90 ERA and 1.29 WHIP was, genuinely, the only good season in his entire career. He struck out only 139 batters in 1997, a number so puny that his slightly above-average win, ERA, and WHIP totals were cancelled out in fantasy and obviously the products of luck in real life (Jamie Moyer’s prime saw some comparably tiny K totals, but Moyer’s qualitatives consistently left Hampton’s in the dust). He was extraordinarily lucky again in 2000, with another tiny strikeout total (151 in a full season) and a mediocre WHIP (1.35) suggesting that things could’ve been a lot worse. Since then, in those fleeting, ever-so-fleeting moments of health…he’s been a total trainwreck. So stop complaining about his health. He would’ve sucked if he had’ve been healthy for the entirety of the last decade.
This is all my way of telling you that I’d wait until McDonalds stopped serving people before I added him as a free agent, let alone spend a dollar on him or draft him in a straight draft. Seriously, I’d eat the vegetarian meal from McDonalds before I served him. That seems, comparatively, like a good usage of my time.
Finale:
The Cardinals, Pirates, and Brewers have left me with regrettably little to write about in the rest of this Location, Location, Location installment. It’s as if they decided to get together and continue the torment of Cubs fans everywhere by sucking up the joint, therefore handing the Cubs another division title that will wind up not meaning a damn thing. Call it “Operation Bartman.”
And no, Cardinals, Khalil Greene doesn’t do anything for me. And good lord does Ramon Vasquez make the Pirates look silly. And HEY, Jorge Julio, another perfect example of how certain players get the “closer” label for reasons escaping understanding. The guy’s still lucking out; witness the fact that he’s still being paid nearly a million dollars to play baseball in 2009.
