Disqus - Latest Comments for PWHjort

Re: WANTED: Guest Posts

PWHjort — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 16:49:44 -0000

Hi, my name is Peter and I write for http://www.braveslaunchpad.com/, I'd be willing to do a season preview of the Braves for you. Email me at phjort@gatech.edu if you're interested. Thanks.

Re: Merry Christmas, Braves Fans. You Got Coal in Your Stockings!

PWHjort — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 00:23:27 -0000

And not to add to the dejected-ness (is that a word, by the way?), but another rotation option just got pulled from the table. Brad Penny signed with the Red Sox. Though it wouldn't have been thrilling to have him in Atlanta, it's better than Jo Jo Reyes. By the way, another near-miss was Tazawa. Though you can hardly blame Wren for that one, every Japanese player has a man-crush on Matsuzaka and wants to play in the wretched city of Boston. Reminds them of their home country, it's really cold and nobody wants to talk to you.

Re: So… Now What?

PWHjort — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 21:34:00 -0000

Speaking of doing your research, Ankiel made 15 fewer plays than the average center fielder given the same situations last year. This isn't opinion, the actual fielding bible data states he made 15 plays fewer than the average center fielder, which ranks 31st among qualified center fielders. That's terrible. Absolutely awful. You may think he has a canon arm, but he allowed 36 extra bases in 77 opportunities last year while only making 4 kills. You saw half of them in 1 game. Just because you think he is a good fielder because you saw him on Sportscenter making 2 incredible plays in 1 game (yes, they were incredible plays, but he only made 2 other plays like that all season, the average center fielder makes 6-8 more than Ankiel made last season), doesn't mean he's a good fielder. Sportscenter distorts the truth. Those were awesome plays but because someone made an awesome play doesn't make him an awesome fielder. He does have a strong arm but that doesn't translate to successfully cutting down on runners taking extra bases on him in this scenario, as per the data I just conveyed. I don't care what any writer you, or the baseball community at-large, deems an expert, the fact remains that Ankiel made 15 fewer plays than the average center fielder last season and anyone who sees that number acknowledges that he's at best a below-average center fielder. I'm taking my information from the statistics section of Bill James' website by the way. If you want to argue with Bill James go ahead but he is the father of baseball academia, it would be hard to argue against this data. Show me a season of above-average defense from Ankiel and I'll re-consider my position that he's a terrible outfielder. We haven't seen one yet.

Re: So… Now What?

PWHjort — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 17:08:11 -0000

Ted, I meant to say Ankiel is a left-handed hitter and we're in need of a right-handed hitter, my mistake. I agree with you on the saving aspect. Names like Matt Holliday and John Lackey are surfacing on the free agent market next year and savings now equal spending later. Diaz murdered left handed pitching in 2007 (OPS over 950), so if he can sustain those numbers he'd be an excellent outfield platoon player.

Re: If Smoltz Walks Out… He’s Taking My Battered and Bloody Heart With Him

PWHjort — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 14:16:26 -0000

That'd be all of them. Seriously, are the Yankees ever NOT in on a big-time free agent?

Re: A Tribute To The Professor

PWHjort — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 15:57:28 -0000

David, the typo was a tribute to your last name.

Re: Burnett Likely A Brave Sooner Than Later

PWHjort — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 21:02:25 -0000

My friends and I always joke that everyone's a former Florida Marlin, pointing out the fact that the Marlins usually sell their team as soon as they get good. While this is a joke, there's some truth to it. There's a LOT of former Florida Marlins out there: Josh Beckett, Mike Lowell, Mark Kotsay, Javy Vazquez, A. J. Burnett, Gary Sheffield, Vladamir Nunez, Livan Hernandez, Gregg Zaun, Ryan Dempster, Edgar Renteria, and Moises Alou are just a few I can name off the top of my head. Maybe over-exposure to the NL East is the reason I see so many "former Florida Marlins" all over the place, but I believe there are probably more "former Florida Marlins" out there than there are of any other team. It does kind of seem like something is up ever since Wren took over: Kotsay, Burnett, Vazquez, Dempster, ....hmmmm.

Re: Burnett Likely A Brave Sooner Than Later

PWHjort — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 15:07:12 -0000

Faceyman, I sincerely believe that the Braves can play above-500 ball in 2009, but to compete with the Mets and Phillies in 2009 is going to be very tough. There are ways the Braves can win in 2009, but the Phillies starters can't have good years, Delgado has to start as slow as he did, and we'd have to beat the Mets and Phillies every time we played them. Then there's the Marlins. They've got a good, solid core of young pitchers and an extremely powerful offense. Hanley Ramirez is the best shortstop in the game, even with Rollins and Reyes in the same division. All in all it's doable, but not easy. This is coming from a guy who was certain the Braves would win the world series in 2008 pre-season. Now, the goal of this rotation rebuilding experiment is to win the world series in 2010 behind hopefully Burnett, Jurrjens, Hudson, Hanson, and Vazquez. The bullpen will be good and our big time hitting prospects will be about ready for at least part of 2010. 2010 should be a very exciting year for the Braves. I'm not saying we can't win in 2009, but the possibility of a world championship is much greater in 2010.

Re: Javier Vazquez Trade: Brilliant or Bust?

PWHjort — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 18:56:31 -0000

Jon Gilmore's draft page: http://www.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/events/...
Jon Gilmore's minor league stats:
http://minors.baseball-reference.com/players.cg...
Santos Rodriguez stats:
http://minors.baseball-reference.com/players.cg...

Basically, Flowers was the prize of the package, Lillibridge and Gilmore are filler, and Santos Rodriguez is the wild card. He could turn out to be the next Mariano Rivera or the next Elmer Dessens, we won't know for another 6 years.

Re: Braves Set to Pick Up Vazquez

PWHjort — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 21:46:01 -0000

Looks like 2 prospects we can't use and 2 prospects at the bottom level with mediocre ceilings and mediocre results thusfar. Maybe not all we could've gotten for Flowers, but from our standpoint we didn't give up much.

Re: Tears of Joy

PWHjort — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:58:41 -0000

I love Paul Johnson. What a turn around from last season.

Re: What To Expect From Jurrjens and Campillo in 2009

PWHjort — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 22:55:08 -0000

Eric, I certainly could try to predict a pitchers' future performance using this or many other techniques. It wouldn't work 100% of the time and since we'll never know until the end of a pitchers' career weather or not it is a fluke, it isn't practical to do so. Otherwise, everyone would be doing it. Like you said, since Cole Hamels has proven that he can produce numbers consistent with those his rookie year, I could almost certainly predict the outcome of that study. There are a few pitchers in the MLB that benefit from an abnormally low BABIP or from stranding a large number of baserunners. It is generally agreed in the Sabermetric community that these abnormal rates make the pitchers' actual numbers unsustainable and therefore at some point their numbers will deteriorate. Daisuke Matsuzaka and Justin Duchscherer are two such pitchers. The purpose of this study was to determine weather or not Campillo and Jurrjens fall into this category or they're "for real", so to speak. I focused on these two only in order to answer that question. Do you have a question of your own you'd like me to answer? If so, don't hesitate to email me at PWHjort@gmail.com and I'll do my best to try and answer it with a blog post.

-PWHjort