Dan (windowless office): Should we ignore the Hit List while interleague play is going on? It's making a hash of the standings...will it make a hash of the List as well?
JJ: Good question. The past few years have seen a considerable advantage for the AL when it comes to interleague play, and those results have shown up in the AL's dominance of the Hit List. This year the NL looked much stronger early on, but the AL now holds a 48-40 record in interleague play, and they've actually got four of the top six spots on the most recent Hit List. Just as I've been skeptical about the early season scoring dip, I've retained a good deal of skepticism when it comes to those who say the balance of power has shifted to the NL. I see the interleague results as more of a correction than anything else.
johnpark99 (Boston): Jay, for a while now, your Hit Lists have had the A's ranked significantly higher than the Angels, even though the Angels have the division lead. What is the right interpretation of your rankings? Do you mean to say that you expect the A's will take the division by season's end, or do you simply mean to say that you think the A's are a better team than the Angels despite their records?
JJ: Ah, the eternal A's-Angels battle on the Hit List has provided me with plenty of material for columns. Right now what you're seeing on the Hit List and the adjusted standings is all based on the fact that the A's have outscored their opponents by 55 runs -- nearly one per game -- while the Angels have been outscored by two runs. The latter owns the largest discrepancy between their predicted record and their actual one at 7.7 games.
In other words, the Angels have been more lucky than good, and that's not necessarily the kind of thing you can bank on over time. That doesn't mean that I necessarily think the A's will take the division, because I don't expect the Angels' offense to keep underachieving to the extent that it has, but I do think the gap between the two teams is closer than the standings make it appear.
B. Bavasi (Seattle): Any jobs for me at BP?
JJ: Sure, Bill! Given your height you should be an ace at cleaning the leaves out of our office's rain gutter. We haven't been able to convince anyone else to go up there ever since Steven Goldman fell off the roof.
David (NJ): We know the way it was handled was wrong but were the Mets right in firing Willie Randolph?
JJ: Well, as botched a job as it was, I don't entirely disagree with the decision to dismiss Randolph. As Rob Neyer pointed out at ESPN, there's a good argument to make that he's not the right manager at the right time for this club, even given its flimsy construction.
Managers aren't solely tacticians. They're leaders of men (some very boyish men at times). Different managers have different styles, but some seem to be better at protecting their teams by placing themselves in the line of fire and drawing the attention away from the struggles of their clubs. Ozzie Guillen is a good example of this now, as batsh*t crazy as he may seem, there's a method to his madness. Joe Torre does the same thing while exuding an aura of pure calm. Bobby Valentine, Casey Stengel, Leo Durocher, Tommy Lasorda - the styles can vary but that function is an important one.
Randolph didn't handle that aspect of the job very well. The Mets have carried a very negative aura around them since last year's collapse, and not even the acquisition of Johan Santana could erase that. At some point Randolph should have just said strong words to the effect of "Don't connect this club to last year's mess, it's a new day and we've moved on so you should too." Instead he played the race card and in doing so started the countdown on his own sell-by date.
Lots of Dodgers and Yankees questions in there, and A's and Mariners as well. Check it out.
• As for the Hit List, I took aim at the aforementioned notion of the shifting balance of power between the two leagues right in this week's title: "AL 75, NL 51." The Junior Circuit won 27 out of 38 games in the three days since that chat, and now occupies five of the top seven spots on the list, with the Red Sox taking over the top spot and the Yankees moving up to number seven. Excerpt a few of the more interesting entries:
Blue Jays (#11) Where's Shea Hillenbrand to Tell Us the Ship Is Sinking Now That We Really Need Him? With five losses in a row and 13 in their last 17, the Jays fall below .500 and into the AL East basement as the the cracks in their facade of sanity start to show. A.J. Burnett stirs up controversy by suggesting he'd welcome a trade to the Cubs -- who could possibly want out of this mess? -- and GM J.P. Ricciardi trashes Adam Dunn on a radio call-in show. Yeah, when you rank 13th in a 14-team league in SLG, with every position save for catcher and right field slugging under .400, you wouldn't want anything to do with a slugger like Dunn.
Brewers (#13) Stop and Smell the Box Score: Let us pause from any rational evaluation of the Brewers' ups and downs to simply appreciate the wonders of a single game containing a no-hit bid by David Bush (5.73 ERA entering the game) that ends after a hit by Lyle Overbay, the man he was traded for in 2005, and also includes an inside-the-park homer by Prince Fielder (the man who replaced Overbay), Russell Branyan's 10th homer in 20 games since being recalled, and a two-out, ninth-inning grand slam by Joe Inglett that caps a six-run rally and turns a rout into a squeaker. I mean, seriously, who writes this stuff?
Giants (#22) Following an 0-5, 7.61 ERA start and a brief exile to the bullpen, Barry Zito looked as though he was making progress towards thinking about possibly pondering the idea of maybe getting it together at a date to be named later. That was because he posted a 3.49 ERA in May, struck out more hitters than he walked, and even stuck around long enough in a ballgame to collect a win. But just when you thought Zito might settle into a comfortable mediocrity, he's back to his old ways: a 9.00 ERA in just 17 innings over four starts in June, not to mention an 8/17 K/BB ratio. Yes, Mr. Sabean, that $18 million club option in 2014 is starting to look like a real bargain.
Mariners (#29) Two Down, One to Go: the Mariners fire GM Bill Bavasi, architect of what may well be the first 100-loss team with a payroll above $100 million. Never the sharpest tool in the GM shed, Bavasi erred drastically by fundamentally misjudging last year's club; though they finished 88-74 they were outscored by 17 runs, and hardly just a blockbuster away from a run at the AL West flag. Not content to stop there, the team cans manager John McLaren, on whose watch they went 66-88, and they may be poised to ditch designated albatross Richie Sexson, who's hitting just .220/.294/.380 and hasn't homered since May 24.
Fun stuff, no? Though Gibbons' firing didn't happen in time to make this week's list, the appearance of arch-nemesis Hillenbrand suggests I was feeling the bad vibes coming from Toronto. And while I'm scratching my head wondering why Riccardi hasn't been fired as well, from a Hit List standpoint he is truly the gift that keeps on giving.
• Up and down the Hit List I made reference to the 2008 Replacement Level Killers, the subject of this week's Prospectus Hit and Run. Picking up on an idea I first used for It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over and then applied to last year's most egregious offenders, I took a look at the players whose lousy play and whose teams' complacency or lack of a suitable alternative threatens their shot at the playoffs. The starting nine, using Value Over Replacement Player (VORP) and Wins Above Replacement Player (WARP), the former to get a more accurate sense of hitting contributions and the latter to better account for defense:
C: J.R. Towles (-7.6 VORP, 0.4 WARP) and Brad Ausmus (-5.8 VORP, 0.1 WARP), Astros 1B: Daric Barton (-2.7 VORP, 1.0 WARP), Athletics 2B: Adam Kennedy (-2.3 VORP, 0.4 WARP) and Aaron Miles (-0.4 VORP, 0.4 WARP), Cardinals SS: Chin-Lung Hu (-9.7 VORP, -1.0 WARP) and Angel Berroa (-1.4 VORP, -0.1 WARP), Dodgers 3B: Mike Lamb (-11.6 VORP, -0.3 WARP), Twins LF: Garret Anderson (-1.4 VORP, 0.3 VORP), Angels CF: Andruw Jones (-8.3 VORP, 0.1 WARP), Dodgers RF: Jeff Francoeur (-1.0 VORP, 0.5 WARP), Braves DH: Travis Hafner (0.2 VORP, 0.2 WARP), Indians
Given center field's particular relevance around these parts, I'll fill that one in:
CF: Andruw Jones (-8.3 VORP, 0.1 WARP), Dodgers In his free agent walk year, Jones played through a hyperextended elbow and wound up with a spot on the 2007 Killers. Nonetheless, the Dodgers figured the 31-year-old would rebound, and signed him to a two-year, $36 million deal, one that appeared to force Juan Pierre into richly-deserved (and richly compensated) fourth-outfielderdom. Then Jones showed up to camp looking rather plump, and he performed so miserably that when a torn meniscus forced him to undergo surgery, Pierre's return to the lineup--shifting to left field, with Matt Kemp in center--came as a relief. Not that Pierre has been producing (2.5 VORP, 1.1 WARP), but at least Dodger fans have been spared the daily drama of reading Joe Torre's lineup.
Dishonorable Mention: Melky Cabrera (2.5 VORP, 0.5 WARP), Yankees. Cabrera's ascension into a full-time role last year helped shore up an aging, porous Yankee outfield while pushing Johnny Damon over to left and Hideki Matsui into limbo. The 23-year-old Melkman looked as though his long-awaited power surge had finally arrived when he got off to a .299/.370/.494 start in April, but since then he's lost his way at the plate, hitting just .229/.278/.312. His defense (-4 FRAA) has been a step down as well, Tuesday night's stellar catch notwithstanding.
Anyway, the point of the whole exercise is that there's still time for teams to address these issues, but sometimes that simply means letting a veteran play through their struggles. Sooner or later, though, a reckoning has to come; for the Yankees that may mean moving Johnny Damon back to center field and Hideki Matsui back into left.
For the Dodgers that may mean biting the big Juan for the rest of the year while remaining optimistic about the fact that their biggest problem, injuries, clearly points back to their GM. As I noted in the chat, the Dodgers lead the majors with the most dollars and highest percentage of payroll lost to the DL, and the guys who are filling it up -- Jones, Rafael Furcal, Nomar Garciaparra and Jason Schmidt -- are Stupid Flanders' marquee free agent signings. It's tough to think he's going to dodge the bullet if the Dodgers finish at .500 or below because of all that. Furthermore, if I'm Frank McCourt, the minute that the Mariners or some other team calls to ask permission to interview assistant GM/scouting guru Logan White, I put the caller on hold, fire Colletti and promote him to GM myself. No reason the Dodgers should lose their best and brightest homegrown front office talent anymore than they should their players.
I have but a few simple rules in life. One is never to be arrested while wearing adult diapers. Another is never to write a book where I'll be forced to defend charges of casual racism and homophobia on a media tour. So on the latter note, it's been several months since I got my snark on at Deadspin. A tip from Alex Belth sent me there yesterday to read Pat Jordan's hilarious trainwreck of an attempt to profile Jose Canseco on the eve of his forthcoming book, Vindicated. Jordan captures the clueless Canseco prattling around his empty life:
I tried to picture Jose writing his book and his movie. Hunched over, his broad shoulders casting a shadow across his desk like a raptor's wings, his brow furrowed in concentration, his massively muscled body tensed in anticipation of that torrent of words about to flow out of him like urine for one of the many steroid tests he'd been forced to take during his baseball career. I wondered, just how does Jose write? Like Shakespeare, with a quill pen on parchment? Like Dickens, wearing a green eye shade while seated at a clerk's desk? Like Hemingway, standing at a lectern in Finca Vigia, with a stubby pencil and unlined paper? Like Thomas Wolfe, in his Victorian house in Ashville, pounding away on a tall, black, manual Underwood? Or maybe the words flow out of Jose in such a torrent, 10,000 an hour, that he can relieve himself adequately of his thoughts only by tap-tap-tapping on a lightning fast computer, like Stephen King?
Anyway, as Heidi said, Jose is writing a book, and a movie, about his life, which he will star in, as himself. Jose is also going to star in a Kung Fu martial arts movie. That's what Rob told me. "Jose is fielding offers," said Rob. Rob is Jose's lawyer and agent. He's a Cherokee Indian from North Carolina. In the four years that Rob has been Jose's agent, Jose has racked up about a half-a-million dollars in legal fees. Rob hasn't been paid anything yet, although he said that Jose did give him his five World Series rings, worth about $50,000, as a down payment.
Heidi, Rob told me, is Jose's girlfriend/publicist. She's a "cute, little, junior college graduate, who lives with Jose," said Rob. "She likes to let Jose think she's working hard for him when really all she is doing is fucking things up for him." Rob said Heidi lives with Jose without paying anything, which may be literally true, but not figuratively. The price women pay for living with Jose is actually quite high. All those boring days and nights during which Jose rarely speaks, except to say, "Where's the Iguana?" because of Jose's fervent belief that when "women talk only bad things can happen."
...After a little prodding, Rob did admit to me that as of the moment no actual offers for that Kung Fu movie have come Jose's way, which, considering his fielding prowess (he once camped under a fly ball which hit him in the head and bounced into the bleachers for a home run), might be a good thing. Still, Jose spends his days at his house in Sherman Oaks, California, off the Ventura Freeway near the San Fernando Valley, home of the porn industry, waiting for producers to call to inform him that the time is ripe, America is now hungry for a Kung Fu movie starring a steroid-inflated, Cuban, ex-baseball player in his forties. In anticipation of that call, Jose showed off his martial arts moves to the man who choreographed "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon." The man watched Jose's 250-pound body spin and kick and leap into the air for a few minutes and then he told Jose that his moves "were stiff, not very fluid, and you don't kick very well." Jose told Rob, "That guy doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about."
Rules for living number three and four: don't hire a lawyer who will discuss my financial affairs with a reporter, and keep those martial arts movie ideas under wraps.
Whether or not you're tempted to put any stock in Canseco's desperate attempt to grab headlines by trying to extort the likes of Alex Rodriguez and Magglio Ordoñez, or if you're simply up for a bit of schadenfreude, Jordan's piece is well worth your time. The man has a hard-boiled style, a deadpan sense of humor and a knack for catching those second acts of athletes for whom the cheering has stopped, not all of them as tawdry as that of Canseco. One of the best -- a piece I blogged an eternity ago -- is his New York Times Magazine profile of Rick Ankiel, told like a ghost story from beyond the grave by a haunted soul who went through a similar, career-ending bout of wildness 40 years earlier. Jordan devoted an unflinching book to his own demise, A False Spring and even wrote about his own second act in A Nice Tuesday.
Belth recently linked to Jordan's Fortune profile of the unlikely jock-to-stock savant story of Lenny Dykstra and offered some choice outtakes form the original manuscript (Nails, incidentally is everywhere this month via an HBO Real Sports segment, a Ben McGrath New Yorker profile, and a New York Times profile of his son Cutter, a touted high school prospect whom Alan Schwarz presents as a possible first-rounder this June).
And if that's not enough Jordan, you can look forward to the upcoming release of The Best Sports Writing of Pat Jordan, an anthology of the pugnacious freelancer's work edited by Belth, now slated for a mid-April release from Persea Books. I'm itching to get my hands on a copy.
The Red Sox remain #1 on the list, with the Mets second and the Padres, who swept the Dodgers in three straight this week, running third. I couldn't get Thursday night's San Diego-LA game on Extra Innings for some reason, and pulled away from the computer and the in-progress Hit List with the Dodgers carrying a 5-1 lead into the bottom of the eighth. When I checked back in just before bed and saw that five-spot staining the bottom of the ninth, I was not a happy camper; the absence of hamstring-addled Takashi Saito appears to have caught closer-in-waiting Jonathan Broxton at a bad time (11 earned runs in his last 5.1 innings), though given that the inning began with an infield single and an error on Nomar Garciaparra, it's not like he acted alone.
Perhaps it was all karmic payback for my vociferously summoning enough anti no-hit mojo to prevent Curt Schilling from finishing his job against the A's earlier that day; I was texting, emailing and IMing my friends, who loathe the Big Schill every bit as much as I do, in order to prevent the deal from going down. To quote a Deadspin commenter, "If Schilling gets a no-hitter, it will give new meaning to the word 'insufferable.'"
I wasn't alone in trying to do so; oddly enough it was a Sox fan who first invoked the Chatter curse by emailing Baseball Prospectus' internal list to alert us to the no-hitter in progress; when I counted last fall on the occasion of Anibal Sanchez's no-no, no fewer than 15 potential no-hitters had been jinxed during my time in BP. Like just about everyone else, I was resigned to the no-hitter's inevitability by the time it reached the ninth, so it was more than a pleasant surprise that Shannon Stewart lined a two-out single into rightfield to end Schilling's bid. To my wife's horror, she had barely walked in the door to find me jumping up and down like a rabid monkey, shouting "Take that, Fatty!" A Great Moment in Schadenfreude History somewhat spoiled by being made aware of my childish behavior. Oh well.
In any event, the Yankees rode their 6-2 run back into the Hit List top ten at #9, one spot below the Dodgers. Special guest stars include the late James Brown, C. Montgomery Burns, Ghostbusters, Win Remerswaal, and Bob Barker. Not pictured: Roger Clemens' fatigued groin, about which enough has already been said, at least until the aftermath of this afternoon's game. Check it.
