SB Nation - Miguel Batista

Whom Do You Like the Least?

Matthew — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 18:20:50 -0000

Miguel Batista has departed via free agency, Kenji Johjima's contract was voided and Carlos Silva was miraculously dealt away. So I am left to wonder, who is our whipping boy now? There are no bad contracts on the team, nobody whose performance vastly underwhelms their salary, or is horrible at defense, or is blocking a stud prospect.

I find myself not hating anyone on the team. The highest my disgust meter is rating is "mildly dislike". What about you? Who on the current 40-man roster is your least favorite, for whatever reason? I tried to include what I thought were the most likely candidates in the poll, but I also included a "Someone Else" option in case I missed the player in your mind.

Also, with Beltre gone in addition to the others, many a casual fan's whipping boy from 2009 is somewhere else as well. In the comments, I'd be interested to read what you think will be the player most dissed by sports radio callers.

Poll

My Least Favorite Mariner Right Now Is

A Brief History Of Mariners With Clubhouse Concerns

Jeff — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 23:06:39 -0000

Ken Griffey Jr.: Remember the stories going around back before he was traded a decade ago? Junior, from the sounds of things, got to be a real pain. Then time passed, he aged by ten years, his career aged by fifty, and he became arguably one of the best clubhouse influences in the world.

Miguel Batista: Issues developed as a Mariner, and he never quite fit in, particularly with the 2009 team. Had no negative impact, at least off the field.

Carlos Silva: Issues developed shortly before becoming a Mariner and carried over into 2008. Appeared to have been a factor in the clubhouse mess that year, but he wasn't the biggest one, and once the team got a complete overhaul, it seemed like he didn't do anything but kiss people.

Ichiro: Ichiro kind of always did his own thing and never quite fit in from the beginning. Like everything else, his habits because a source of some resentment and frustration in 2008, but the team has been able to win with him, and 2009 saw him become a different person around his teammates through Griffey's influence.

Carl Everett: Brought in more for his fire than for his bat, Everett provided little fire, less bat, and was gone by July with nary a whimper.

Jose Guillen: Perhaps the most batshit player the Mariners have ever had, Guillen's influence on the 2007 clubhouse was considered by most parties involved to be nothing but positive, and he was very nearly brought back. Biggest controversy was his support of playing veterans over young guys down the stretch, but that was not a sentiment unique to Guillen.

-----

To be sure, the Mariners have never had a guy quite like Milton Bradley. His personality seems to be among the most volatile in the league. But what we've been able to observe in the past is that, sure enough, clubhouse issues tend to be at their most negative when you're losing and at their most positive when you're winning, and the 2010 Seattle Mariners are being built to win, and win a lot. That's what Bradley wants. He wants to play on a good team. One should note that he has been on playoff teams before, so it's not like his acquisition precludes success. He just needs to be watched, and we have the support system in place to take care of him. He says it's "surreal" that he gets to play with Junior. That can only work to our benefit.

Bradley is, of course, a constant risk to get ejected if something goes against him on the field. A Google search for '"Milton Bradley" ejected' turns up more than 10,000 results, and everyone remembers what happened to him in San Diego. But Ichiro got ejected too, and the occasional early exit from a game isn't that big of a deal. Being argumentative on the field isn't the same as being difficult off of it, and besides, given Wak's whole spiel about trying to go a whole year without getting a player or coach kicked out, that may be a thing of the past anyway. What really matters here is that, even with Bradley's history, there's no guarantee that his personality is going to be a problem in 2010. We don't have Lou Piniella and dumbass alcoholics in the bleachers. We have Don Wakamatsu and soccer moms. I mean it when I say that this is literally the best place for a player like Bradley to land, and that's why this makes me so excited.

Tuesday Bullet Points

Jeff — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 03:31:07 -0000

The Mariners are allegedly one of a handful of teams going after Gregg Zaun, whose personal phone number you'll find programmed into any landline speed dial, right after poison control. Everybody's favorite 24/7 emergency catcher is 38 and still hasn't stopped hitting, and as a veteran switch-hitter with tons of experience and desirability who's used to moving around, Zaun makes a lot of sense for a Mariner team that wants to push its young backstops and may not be ready to promise Adam Moore a job. Cheap, decent, and forever tradeable, Zaun would be a small but significant asset to anyone, and he's expected to make his decision soon.

Type A FA Marco Scutaro was offered arbitration, so between this and his personally expressing interest in the Red Sox and Dodgers, you can go ahead and forget about him as a possibility, which is for the best. Not offered arbitration: Mike Cameron. By the time he retires, Cameron will probably have a stronger case for the Hall of Fame than Jim Rice, and nobody's going to care.

I used to think that my love of volcanoes and harp seals were the only feelings left from my childhood. I discovered a third when the Mariners hired Andy Stankiewicz as minor league field coordinator and I laughed out loud in my office. Oh, to be eight. We also hired ex-Indians/Lee/Sabathia pitching coach Carl Willis as minor league pitching coordinator, which may help, and may not help.

Jamey Wright is being pursued by the Royals and the Pirates, which is just about the saddest thing I've ever heard.

As an homage, the Mariners are waiting until 11:59pm to formally not offer arbitration to Miguel Batista. They're also drawing a big stupid goatee on the paperwork.

Tuesday Rockpile: Arbitration offer deadline is today - Rockies to decide on Betancourt

Poseidon's Fist — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 14:08:19 -0000

More photos » by Ben Margot - AP

Arbitration: some people get it, and some people just don't.

Browse more photos »

It is December 1, meaning today is the deadline for teams to offer arbitration, at least to qualify for draft pick compensation. Betancourt is likely the only Rockie to receive salary arbitration offer, writes Troy Renck, leaving Joe Beimel, Jason Marquis and Yorvit Torrealba free. Betancourt is a no-brainer. If he accepts arbitration, he'll make less than he would have made had the Rockies exercised his option, but if he declines and signs elsewhere, the Rockies will receive two high and shiny draft picks. Also, as WolfMarauder noted, Troy Renck also suggests the Rockies are interested in Fernando Tatis, Bobby Crosby, Rich Aurilia, Justin Duchsherer and Miguel Batista.

On a national scale, MLBTradeRumors has spent time inquiring the minds of beat writers everywhere to compile his Arbitration Offer Predictions For Free Agents.

Two highlights from FOX Sports Offseason Buzz: the Rockies will likely keep Ryan Spilborghs and the Diamondbacks are looking at improving via trade rather than free agency.

The Rockies received their postseason share (Renck). Their share of the player's pool totaled over $1.77mil. Just as the Rockies did with the family of Mike Coolbaugh, the Angels awarded a full share to the family of Nick Adenhart.

Samuel Deduno is a hot name on Rockies' farm (Harding). The 26-year old could be a strong dark horse to join the bullpen next season if the cards fall right.

Thomas Harding also writes that "about 200" broadcasters have applied for the job to replace Jeff Kingery in the radio booth. The club will decide sometime in "early 2010," which only tells us they are handing it out as a holiday gift.

Speaking of broadcasters, Chip Caray is out at TBS, a divorce reported as mutual. Hat tip to RhodeIslandRoxFan

It is certainly a bleak year for free agent pitching. The Hardball Times searched for someone to best compare top free agent John Lackey to, and you might like the comparison. Click under the fold to find out:

Clone Wars: John Lackey and Jason Hammel
That's right, Jason Hammel.

W ERA K BB WHIP K/9 BB/9 GB% HR/FB% FIP BABIP
John Lackey 11 3.83 139 47 1.27 7.09 2.40 44.9% 9.1% 3.73 0.309
Jason Hammel 10 4.33 133 42 1.39 6.78 2.14 46.2% 9.7% 3.71 0.337

Granted, the author isn't saying Hammel is as good of a bet to best Lackey next season, but for your value either in a fantasy draft pick or salary dollar, which pitcher would you rather have?

84-77, Game Notes

Jeff — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 07:49:43 -0000

More photos » by John Froschauer - AP

Hole In The Wall

Browse more photos »

And so we're to that point in the year where it becomes less about wanting to see these guys win at all costs and more about wanting to see them be happy. It's a transition that, I think, makes you more forgiving, and it's with that in mind that I'd like to congratulate Miguel Batista on a job well done. He made that ninth inning look easy.

We've flipped Batista a lot of crap for a long time. It'd be hard to say he didn't deserve it. From his poor performance to his laborious pace to his seeming aloofness and detachment from his teammates, he didn't do a whole lot to win anyone over. He just never really looked like he cared very much, and as a professional athlete, that's a bad attitude to convey. He never endeared himself to the fan base, and the list of people counting down the days until his contract expires would take longer to read off than the time between any two of Miguel's pitches.

But fanhood changes as the summer winds down and you realize you're not playing for anything. When you root for a competiting team, it's all about performance. It has to be. You're cutthroat about it, because you know you need the best performance to bring home a title. When you root for a team that's faded out of it, though, it becomes less about the numbers and more about the actual players. More about finding enjoyment in the fact that the players are still enjoying themselves despite being out of the race. It's a different sort of satisfaction, but a fulfilling one. Smiles and celebrations give us glimpses of personality, and nothing draws us closer to the players than when they come across as people.

After Miguel Batista struck out Taylor Teagarden to end the game, he leapt in the air and pumped his fists in a rare display of emotion. And where a few months ago I might've joked about it, tonight I just feel genuinely happy for him. Miguel Batista is a person. We have no reason to believe that he's a bad person, and a handful of reasons to believe he's a good one. There are any number of explanations for why he's done things the way he's done them, and just because he works slowly or doesn't participate in the bullpen hijinks is no reason to wish him ill. People are different. And Miguel Batista is a 38 year old reliever coming off a couple rough years. This very well could have been the final appearance of his career, and so for him to nail down a save in such dominating fashion...Miguel was able to close out a difficult chapter and perhaps a whole book with a fairytale ending, and no matter how frustrating he's been in the past, you have to feel good that he feels good. Every author knows the power of a strong conclusion.

Tomorrow afternoon, we're going to say goodbye to Ken Griffey Jr. Even if he's not actually going away. He's going to receive a rousing, thunderous ovation twenty years in the making. But while Griffey's will get all the press, there are dozens of stories in that clubhouse, stories at different stages, some building up and some winding down, but all of them changing. Though they're not all best-sellers, every single one of them means the world. Take a moment to recognize as many as you can, if only because every story in there has in some way affected your own.

A strong way for Ryan Rowland-Smith to cap off a year that wound up way better than anyone would've imagined back in May. RRS breezed through the better part of the first six innings, and though he got himself into trouble there in the seventh with the Elvis Andrus ground-rule double, he pitched himself two-thirds of the way out of the jam before letting Shawn Kelley finish the job. I've said it a million times before, but while pitcher wins don't mean much of anything to us, they mean a ton to the pitchers themselves, and so after losing his win late against Toronto the last time out, tonight RRS is probably one part relieved and two parts ecstatic that he was able to come away with win #5. I'm sure he would've rather taken care of the seventh inning himself, but realistically, this is just about how every pitcher wants to close out his season.

In twelve starts a year ago, RRS posted a walk rate of 8.7%. This year he trimmed it to 6.7% while slightly raising his strikeouts. Once the injuries were behind him, he answered every question.

RRS also happened to turn one of the more unusually impressive double plays I've ever seen. With men on the corners and one down in the top of the sixth, Marlon Byrd hit a comebacker on the ground that RRS fielded in midair, behind his back, and between his legs, before firing to second. It was a powerful reminder of the effectiveness of instant human reaction, which, when considered in conjunction with Jose Lopez's error problem on slower groundballs, causes me to entertain the unexpected possibility that Lopez's problem is that he thinks too much.

Before the game, David Aardsma and Mark Lowe apologized to Jason Vargas for costing him a win last night. Inspired, Alan Cockrell left notes in every pitcher's locker.

Sometime in the early going, Dave Sims mentioned the Mariners' positive record and negative run differential in the same sentence. I know sometimes it doesn't seem like it, but between things like this and all the previous on-air talk about UZR and OOZ and so forth, we have to have one of the more statistically-advanced broadcasts in baseball. I like Sims for always being so genuine and enthusiastic, but I think what I love about our broadcast the most is that it so rarely says anything stupid. Godspeed, Hendu.

Weed used to bother me. It used to bother me a lot, and even though, in my head, I knew that it wasn't meaningfully different from drinking, it still took ages to get over whatever obstacle it was and let my brain's reaction be my body's. With that said, one of my greatest regrets is that, even after five years, I still haven't come to terms with the fact that chasing after bad pitches is just part of Adrian Beltre's overall package. Intellectually, I know it's not a big deal. Every player has flaws, and it's not fair to ask them to be perfect. But for some reason, though I'm perfectly willing to accept, say, RRS' fly balls or Russell Branyan's strikeouts, I still respond to Beltre's fishing exploits the same way I did in 2005. "STOP! JUST STOP AND DON'T DO THAT!!" I don't know what it is about certain players that makes us always want them to be better, but I'm afraid that's a burden that Beltre's going to have to shoulder as long as he plays. Unless he maybe stops swinging at those God damn unhittable pitches.

Andruw Jones was once the premier defensive outfielder in baseball. Now he's a fat DH with the occasional spell at first base. He's 32. The way he bluffed towards third on his fifth inning double looked just like how Yuni used to bluff towards any groundball hit to his left.

Kelley got the job done in the top of the seventh, but realistically, Franklin Gutierrez is the reason Michael Young didn't pick up a three-run double. Young smoked a pitch to deep center field that kept slicing to the right, but Guti read it off the bat immediately, set off in a dead sprint, and arrived so quickly that he actually had to slow down before making the catch. This isn't a play I can do justice with words. There wasn't anything visually spectacular about it. He didn't have to dive or leave his feet or crash into the wall. It was just a display of how perfect instincts and awesome range can make a nigh-impossible play look almost easy. When Gutierrez ran it down, I thought "well I guess that wasn't as difficult a play as I thought," but the more I reflected on it, the more I realized that there aren't many other outfielders in the league who track that ball down. Gutierrez is just that much better than pretty much everyone else. And he has a bad knee.

Griffey's line drive home run just barely had enough to squeak out. Hopefully that means he saved up enough strength to hit another one tomorrow. If I have to watch another Mariner legend end his career with a double play I'm going to be mad as a wet hen.

80-76, Quick Game Notes

Jeff — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 23:57:31 -0000

More photos » by Darren Calabrese - AP

Teacher: Billy! What happened to you! Ruiz: Yes, Billy, what happened to you? Billy: I FELL

Browse more photos »

Not a lot to say, and not a lot of desire to say it on a beautiful afternoon. We lost. Oh no.

Ryan Rowland-Smith is probably mad at himself for letting the win get away from him, but truth be told, I don't know that he should've been out there to start the eighth in the first place. He'd already thrown 104 pitches through seven innings, and though that's fewer than he threw in each of his previous five starts, by the same token, that's an awful lot of labor on a guy who already missed a chunk of time and doesn't exactly have the most durable track record. Plus, there was nothing but righties due up. RRS admitted that he ran out of gas in that final inning, and as far as I know it wasn't until John McDonald doubled that Wak even got someone up in the bullpen. A tough way to spoil an otherwise effective and pretty typical start.

Wak's choice of arms in the bullpen didn't win him any fans, either - Miguel Batista wound up pitching, with Garrett Olson warming up. I doubt he would've done that in an important game, but it's still never pleasant to see. Why Olson didn't come in when Adam Lind pinch-hit is beyond me. I'm a fan of Wakamatsu, but that eighth inning left a sour taste in my mouth, and I'd like to hear his explanation for why he managed it the way he did.

It's really fun to hate Miguel Batista, and I'm right there with you, but you know why he's been able to make so much money? Because sometimes he throws pitches like this.

The first one - the Felix one - you saw a few days ago. The Batista one is from this afternoon, and PITCHfx clocked it at 97mph. Miguel Batista is like old Felix if you take away old Felix's slider, curveball, and change.

The first time we saw a Mariner do that crotch chop thing, we assumed it was vulgar in nature. Recently Geoff Baker's posted a bunch of material trying to trace it back to more wholesome Japanese origin. Today, when Mike Sweeney returned to the dugout after his home run, the gesture was accompanied by a clearly audible "suck my dick". I don't know if today was just a joke after the team caught wind of the discussion or something, but at least one time now it has been unequivocally juvenile.

Kenji Johjima has very quietly raised his batting line to .251/.298/.413, and his nine home runs would put him on a 21-homer pace over 600 PAs. What the team is going to do about him this offseason remains a mystery, but as of this writing he is almost certainly the best catcher in the organization.

79-72, Game Notes

Jeff — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 07:13:06 -0000

More photos » by Chris O'Meara - AP

Seattle Mariners' Ichiro Suzuki, right, of Japan, reaches out to high-five teammate Mike Carp while Tampa Bay Rays' Dioner Navarro, center, looks on with particular interest. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)

Browse more photos »

So I'll be writing the Mariners chapter again in the upcoming Hardball Times Season Preview. And as much as they probably frown on this sort of thing, should they ask for a brief review of 2009, I can already tell you how it's going to end: though the M's were well out of the race by the middle of August, they found a way to make those meaningless games down the stretch borderline watchable.

I don't know how better to summarize a team that's been both disappointing and so totally not disappointing at all.

Not really a banner night for Ryan Rowland-Smith, but for one thing, he's more than earned the right to have a start like this, and for another, he didn't see a lefty bat all game. Ordinarily a lefty starter doesn't see that many lefty bats to begin with, and lefties had accounted for just 26% of plate appearances against RRS on the season coming in, but 26% multiplied by the 25 batters RRS faced today comes out to six or seven, and that can make a pretty big difference.

I dunno, just a thought. Though an issue, righties weren't Ryan's only problem tonight, however, as he admitted that he didn't have his best stuff against a pretty good offense. He was better about getting his curveball over, an issue he recently lamented, but his fastball was hit or miss and he couldn't depend on his changeup. Only 13 of the 27 he threw went for strikes, including just two of his final 11, and without his best change, RRS had a tough time avoiding trouble. He allowed three runs through 5+ innings, and it very easily could've been a whole lot worse.

That said, considering RRS walked all of four batters over his previous five starts, I think it's safe to say this is more of a blip than a red flag. Nobody wants to see a guy have a game like this (except Trey Hillman on Monday), but it's not a problem unless it becomes a habit, and I'm inclined to pay more attention to RRS' entire 2009 body of work rather than a single off night. He'll be fine.

This was the first Mariners game I've been able to watch on MLB.tv in a week, and the first thing I saw when I booted it up was that damn Geico commercial with 3 Doors Down. It's like I never left. It's tempting to suggest that it's all just clever satire - the Geico cavemen are miserable beings, and 3 Doors Down is a miserable band - but I fear that would be giving the advertising department too much credit, and that rather than using their outlet to mock one of the more alarming success stories of the last decade of musicianship, they honestly believe that the combination of formulaic corporate lite rock with oversensitive business troglodytes is going to help them sell their own insurance, provided the potential customer is exposed to the commercial 14 times a game.

A lot of people like to make fun of YouTube commenters. I think all you need to know about them is that, of the last 62 comments left on the ad's page that express an opinion, 61 were positive.

In the early innings today, the entire Mariner bullpen lined up to shake the hand of a ball guy who gave a foul ball to a little girl by the wall. I think it's to the point where our bullpen has literally taken on a life of its own. As one unit, one peculiar unit that envelops all who tread near. I can imagine them all living together in a household similar to the ESPN studios during Y2K, and I can also imagine that it's all a very weird experience for people like Brandon Morrow and Garrett Olson who've worked both as starters and in relief.

Morrow: Hey guys.
Hannahan: Hey Brandon, welcome back.
Johnson: So Brandon, hey, I've been meaning to ask you.
Morrow: Yeah?
Johnson: What's it like?
Morrow:
Johnson: You know
Johnson: Out...there.
Morrow:
Morrow: Y'know
Morrow:
Morrow: I don't really...know.
Wakamatsu: Luke!
French: What's going on, skip?
Wakamatsu: Hey, Luke. Brandon's starting. You're going to the bullpen.
French: oh
French: oh god
Langerhans: You're shaking.
French: oh my god

In the bottom of the fifth, Adrian Beltre made a fine shorthop grab and throw to retire Gabe Kapler, and Dave Sims and Mike Blowers took the opportunity to point out just how spoiled we are by his play at third base. How spoiled are we? So spoiled that I doubt many of those who watched could recall the play he'd just made. Adrian Beltre has a .668 OPS and has been an above-average player.

Jose Lopez's tiebreaking homer in the 8th was his 25th of the season, and though little milestones like that don't really mean that much to us as fans, they mean a lot to the players, as evidenced by Lopez requesting the ball back from the fan who got it. However, the fan - pictured below - refused to cooperate.

Drayer says the fan turned down an offer of both an autographed bat and an autographed ball in exchange for the homer. Now, I'm trying really hard these days to be less judgmental. To judge people less often by their behavior or appearance observed in a small sample. With that in mind, it's possible that the man pictured is a genuinely good guy who's wanted to catch a foul or a homer his entire life, and that he plans to put this ball on his mantle and cherish it, or that he intends to take it home to present to his son or daughter as a surprise. Keeping the ball under the circumstances is a little selfish, but then we're all selfish, and we shouldn't pass judgment without knowing the whole story. It's entirely possible that the ball could bring more happiness to the fan or to someone he knows than it would to Jose Lopez.

On the other hand, Axe Factory featured enough reliable indicators of probable blockheadedness that I'd support the extreme measures suggested by Sims and Blowers on the broadcast. They used to settle these conflicts a little differently, don't you know.

Given that Griffey and Sweeney are the life of the dugout, I would wager that #3 hitter Jose Lopez enjoys his homers the least.

Miguel Batista has retired 11 consecutive batters.

Ichiro went 1-4 while Joe Mauer went 1-3. Though Ichiro's hit was twice as good as Mauer's, batting champ contenders don't get credit for style points, which means the chances now are even slimmer than they were this afternoon. Should Ichiro determine that he won't catch up to Mauer, an interesting backup plan would be trying to make all of his hits home runs.

Is This Sparta?

Graham — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 00:21:58 -0000

More photos » by Duane Burleson - AP

His hat is stifling. It narrows his vision. And he must see far. His glove is heavy. It throws him off balance. And his target is ninety feet away.

Browse more photos »

We've been hearing about the Mariner bullpen quite a lot this season. For a unit that was entirely comprised of question marks, it's held out particularly well, and is often cited as one of the prime reasons the Mariners have remained above .500 well into September. Perhaps no element of the team has defied expectations so much as the relief corps. With a week left in spring training, there was no closer. Late inning duties this year have been shared by a guy who was traded for a no-name last winter, someone who was a no-name last winter, a guy who's coming back from microfracture surgery in his pitching elbow, someone who isn't Tim Lincecum (he didn't last for very long), and Sean White, who is boring. Complementing the late inning boys was a random crop of AAA arms and Miguel Batista. One can only imagine how bullpen coach John Wetteland must have felt when presented with his men at the start of the year, but eventually he was able to turn them into a functional (albeit more than slightly insane) unit.

How? As the story goes, on an early-season road trip, Mark Lowe downloaded 300, which for those unfamiliar with it, is a ridiculously over-the-top movie about the Spartans at Battle of Thermopylae, which occurred during the second Persian invasion of Greece in late 480 BC (spoiler: they all die). He shared his enthusiasm for the film with Wetteland, and things snowballed from there. Members of the bullpen adopted characters from the movie, Spartan helmets popped up everywhere, and a grand ol' time was had by all. One wonders exactly how badly the relievers expected the team to do if they felt as though they identified best with a bunch of guys who all end up dead, but there's no denying it fueled an us-against-the-whole-damn-world mindset that the bullpen latched onto and used as inspiration to pitch their hearts out. The siege mentality was further reinforced when MLB officials decided to take their helmets away. Small wonder, then, that the bullpen has pitched their collective hearts out this year, keeping games just close enough for the struggling position players to scrape out more wins than losses.

This would be all well and good if the Mariner bullpen was actually as good as traditional numbers suggest. But they're not. They're not even average, despite all the one-run games and saves for David Aardsma. By using tRA-derived valuation statistics, they've been more than a quarter-century of runs below average, which turns out to be the worst mark in the American League. AL West rivals Oakland, on the other hand, are well over the +50 mark, which is a spread of almost seven and a half wins. By the numbers, they have answered the questions surrounding them in spring training, and the answer turns out to have been 'holy crap they're bad'. But this doesn't jive at all with their ability to keep them Mariners in business in close games. The team has won an absurd number of one run games, and generally has the ability to keep games close once the team turns over pitching duties to the bullpen. So what gives? Is the Mariner bullpen an above-average unit with an elite closer as the spearhead, or is David Aarsdma the equivalent of affixing a razor blade to a forty foot tall marshmallow and calling it a weapon? Or is the answer somewhere in between?

I hope it's the last option, because otherwise I've just spent a tonne of time collecting data for no good reason. Let's dig in.

Note: All data current as of 2:39 PM Sept 12th, 2009. Partial innings denoted as .3 for one out, .7 for two.

First, let's look at our cast of intrepid heroes and Denny Stark. Who's been leaned on the most? The quartet of Mark Lowe, Sean White, Miguel Batista, and David Aardsma have accounted for a little over half of the innings thrown by Mariner relievers this season, as shown in the chart below:

Figure 1: Innings pitched by Mariner relievers in 2009

Chris Jakubauskas and Shawn Kelley have also both seen significant time this year as well, and Kelley was thriving in a late-inning role until he suffered a rib injury in mid-May. Five arms have appeared in both the rotation and the bullpen, including Brandon Morrow, who began the season as the closer before a series of meltdowns got him demoted. Now that we have a pretty good idea of who's soaked up how many innings, let's take a look at their numbers in RA and tRA form:

Table 1: RA, tRA, rRAA, and pRAA for Mariner relievers in 2009

rRAA and pRAA are computed by taking the difference between league RA and tRA respectively and multiplying by innings pitched/9 for rRAA and expected innings/9 for pRAA, with Δ denoting the difference between rRAA and pRAA. As the column on the far right shows, Mariners pitchers have, by and large, far exceeded their expected value as far as defence/park-independent statistics are concerned. This is hardly a surprise, as the Mariners have the best defence in the game and play in a pitcher-friendly park. The biggest differences are in Sean White and David Aardsma's numbers, who between them 'should' be worth around 15 runs less than their actual numbers would suggest. Again, this isn't a surprise, as the pitchers likely to have the biggest negative difference between pRAA and rRAA are those who've been highly effective by ERA and associated metrics. The opposite should also hold true: the poor performers are likely to have been negatively impacted by their fielders.

In fact, the only relief pitchers who have a lower tRA than RA are Mark Lowe, Brandon Morrow, and Garrett Olson, and only Lowe has been part of the bullpen all season. The numbers are fairly remarkable - by using traditional numbers, the Mariner bullpen has been worth +6.4 runs total, and with pRAA, they've been at a rather alarming -25.9. Miguel Batista is particularly notable for having cost us almost ten runs over the course of the season, but he's had a couple of competitors for the suckiest bullpen arm award, with Jakubauskas and Stark (in ten innings somehow) pushing him all the way. Some (most) of the numbers in the table above has to have come from the defence, as Safeco Field isn't going to explain away the whole thing. But before we look at defensive contributions explicitly, I'd like to introduce the concept of leverage.

Most of you should be familiar with Jeff's lovely win expectancy charts, which appear after nearly every game. The idea of win expectancy is straightforward. For each game state (outs, score, runners, inning) we can figure out the likelihood of an average team beating another average team. Despite most teams not being completely average and entirely constituted of average players, win probability can be used as a measure of how important a given event was in terms of winning or losing baseball games. A walk-off home run? Worth a lot. A two-out walk with the bases loaded in the second when down by five? Not so much. In fact, for each game state, we know what the possible swings in win probability are. A team cannot possibly make a big impact in one at-bat when they're ten runs down, even if the batter hits a grand slam, but with the tying run at third with one out in the ninth, the situation can become critically important.

Table 2: 2009 AL relief leverage by
team, descending

Leverage is a measurement of just how important those situations are. Fortunately, the good people at Fangraphs keep track of this number for both teams and individual players. Here we are concerned with the average leverage a pitcher sees, denoted as pLI (the average is 1.00). In general one might expect bullpens to see higher leverage situations than starting pitchers, but as Table 2 to the left shows, this is not the case for most of the American League, which have seven teams below 1.00 and 12 below 1.10. The standout teams are the Boston Red Sox and the Seattle Mariners, with the latter leading the major leagues in bullpen leverage (the Dodgers and Cubs are also both over 1.20 in average bullpen leverage).

There are a number of reasons why we might see such a disparity in the stressfulness of situations seen by a bullpen. One such reason might be that a team is poor enough that they are regularly losing by large enough amounts to make winning improbably: this might apply to the AL's basement teams: Oakland, Kansas City, and Baltimore. Or the opposite could be true and the team could routinely be so far ahead by the time the manager goes to a reliever that their innings simply aren't worth very much, which is the route taken by the New York Yankees and their absurdly powerful offence.

Conversely, a team which finds its bullpen highly stressed will be in contention to win many games, one that relies on excellent run prevention to keep things close. That would be the Mariners. Their bullpen leverage index of 1.23 means that the runs saved or given up by Mariner relievers are worth 132% of those saved or given up by their counterparts in New York.

The same concept applies to individual pitchers on the same team. By multiplying innings pitched by individual pLI, we can see the relative importance of the innings a pitcher has soaked up, as shown below:

Figure 2: IP*pLI for Mariner relievers in 2009

As we can see, David Aardsma springs into the lead once important innings are considered. The top four of Aardsma/Lowe/White/Batista are now responsible for almost two thirds of leveraged relief innings, and the team total has jumped by more than 100 innings (this is insane, by the way). Aardsma and Lowe are entirely responsible for the team's jump in innings total, with the former experiencing the equivalent of 76 extra innings' worth of stress and the latter a robust +38, due to pLIs of 2.21 and 1.55 respectively. Brandon Morrow's adventures in Minnesota and Texas see him grab more innings, and poor Doug Fister, who made his debut at the end of a blowout game, has his contribution marked as wholly irrelevant and thus discarded.

We need to account for leverage when we look at value metrics like pRAA, and again this is a simple case of multiplication. Numbers multiplied by pLI are denoted with an apostrophe:

Table 3: pLI and leveraged rRAA and pRAA for Mariner relievers in 2009

Aardsma's performance is particularly notable, but apart from the fantastic contribution from our closer, what really stands out is how poorly Miguel Batista has been used. His pLI was just a tick below average, and this season he's been running a tRA of almost six. While his contract demanded that he be on the roster somewhere, the damage he's caused could probably have been mitigated by relegating him to mop-up duty rather than deploying him in relatively close games. Denny Stark and Chris Jakubauskas both saw their negative contributions decreased due to their throwing in less stressful situations, which would have left Batista all alone at the bottom if not for the increased impact of The Adventures of Brandon Morrow. The chart does show you why the Mariner pen is held in high regard by those watching, though. The important innings have gone to White, Aardsma, and Lowe, and by and large they just haven't allowed runs, to the tune of 44 runs saved by rRAA. Let's look at an overall comparison between rRAA, pRAA, and the leveraged numbers:

Table 4: rRAA, pRAA, and leveraged values for Mariner relievers in 2009

As shown in the table above, leveraging the numbers results in an increase in both rRAA' and pRAA'. This should go as a feather in the cap of Don Wakamatsu, as it demonstrates his ability use his bullpen arms (sans Batista) effectively - the most important innings have gone to the most able pitchers. It's really no wonder that those watching games and following closely think that the team has a good bullpen. Naturally, we pay more attention when we're in with a shot at winning, and in those situations, the relief corps just doesn't give up runs. It's hard not to be confident in the later innings when your top arms are that good at shutting the opposition's bats. But again, how much of this is the responsibility of the pitcher? pRAA' agrees that the bullpen is generally far better when the game's on the line, but still has the unit as well below average, and almost three wins less valuable than it would appear when simply looking at runs, which is a similar result to what we saw earlier when looking at unleveraged values.

The defence, then, has to have some responsibility for the perception of the bullpen as an elite unit. How much defensive support has each pitcher received? Is defence clutch in any way (the most likely explanation for this would be sensible use of defensive replacements)? Although you could probably figure things out from the numbers above, we like our graphs around here - the chart below shows the defensive support given to each pitcher per tRA's xRR, which is simply expected runs minus actual runs with park effects accounted for. Both plain xRR and xRR multiplied by pLI are shown.

Figure 3: Defensive support (standard and leveraged) for Mariner relievers in 2009 (click image for full size).

Aardsma and White have been the primary beneficiaries of the defence this season, but it's hard to argue in favour of defensive clutchness: Morrow didn't get much support, and Lowe has been a little better than his traditional line too. In fact, summing leveraged xRR and subtracting plain xRR leaves you with one extra run, which is a little surprising considering the average pLI of 1.23. Overall, the defence hasn't cared who's pitching or what the score is - it's just gone out and made plays no matter the situation. Despite some of it being explained away with leveraged numbers, I have to conclude that the greater part of the difference between 'common knowledge' and a quick statistical peek at our pen's numbers is due to Franklin Gutierrez and company.

All in all, I think it's pretty clear that although the bullpen isn't as good as commonly believed, it hasn't been as bad as simply looking at unleveraged pRAA would suggest, simply because the guys relied on when the games are on the line have been much better than those in mopup duty (surprise!). However, the bullpen has still been below average, and without the safety blanket of the best defence in the game to make them look good, we'd hear less about resilience and esprit de corps and more about fatigue and the need for mechanical tweaks.

If this is Sparta, it's been more Sellasia than Thermopylae.

72-65, Quick Game Notes

Jeff — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 07:45:54 -0000

More photos » by Ben Margot - AP

OH GOD NOT AGAIN

Browse more photos »

Maybe if I write really fast people won't notice that this is how I spent my Saturday night.

When I went through the PITCHfx data and saw that Luke French threw 63% strikes, I could hardly believe it, because I could've sworn he threw a lot more balls. Turns out maybe he should've, because the strikes he threw got pounded. Though I thought he was a lot better than his results the last time out, today he was awful - just awful - to the point that even the A's made him pay. Slider? Fine. Fastball? Kept missing. Change? Practically non-existant. How does a guy with French's fastball throw 37 pitches to righties and only five changeups?

A step back for a guy whose spot in next year's rotation is in no way guaranteed. While he's not a bad pitcher, I'd wager he doesn't have anyone's confidence right now, and that confidence won't come until he starts getting better results.

Jason Vargas, meanwhile - welcome back. Vargas was good with Tacoma, came up, had his ups and downs, went back to Tacoma, was good, then came up again. Tonight he worked in relief of French and threw 2.1 perfect innings, flashing more of that changeup I love so much (five thrown, three swinging strikes). I think it's a product of having spent so much of my life surrounded by praise for Jamie Moyer and Trevor Hoffman, but the changeup is my favorite pitch, so I love having a guy like Vargas who can use it whenever he wants to great effect. French may very well wash out. Garrett Olson may never improve. Vargas, though, I think is good enough to pitch in the bigs for a pretty long time, even if he doesn't get any better.

Rank of Michael Wuertz's swinging strike rate among all relievers:

2009: 1st
2008: 22nd
2007: 4th
2006: 1st
2005: 3rd

Seems like the Cubs could've used something like a ZiPS projection before trading him for pocket change. Wuertz has often been accused of falling in love with his slider, but considering his slider is literally the most unhittable slider in baseball, I think he can be forgiven, and if the A's handle this right, they'll be able to use him to trade for a lot more than they originally gave up.

Of the two feel-good stories we've plugged in at DH, I never expected Mike Sweeney to be the one to catch fire down the stretch. His homer today was longer than any Jose Lopez has hit all season.

I can't find an exact count, but on only something like 120 occasions has a player ever struck out five times in a game. BIll Hall just wants to be remembered.

Since he got so close today and I don't think I'm going to be around tomorrow, let's get this out of the way - congratulations, Ichiro, on reaching 2000 career hits. 2000 career Major League hits, anyway. People will always bring up his Japanese stats and some will insist that their exclusion is insulting, but the Japanese (A) don't play in the Major Leagues, and (B) don't play at a Major League level, so for our purposes, those stats are meaningless. What does hit #2000 mean? Nothing, really, at least nothing more than hit #1999 or hit #2001, but America loves a big round number as much as it loves its big round people, and to get there in fewer than nine seasons is one of those things that I don't think we're going to appreciate in full until Ichiro's gone.

We all take Ichiro for granted. Every single one of us. Let his big day be the one day we try - just try - to understand how extraordinary he really is.

Miguel Batista : Mariners :: appendix : humans. He doesn't serve a critical purpose and all he ever does is make you hurt.

56-51, Game Notes

Jeff — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 06:42:11 -0000

More photos » by Charlie Riedel - AP

Colon looks in, gets his sign, and readies for the pitch to CAT CAT THERE IS A CAT ON THE FIELD EVERYBODY PAY ATTENTION TO THE CAT

Browse more photos »

I've learned something about myself these last two nights. Honestly, I don't know why it never dawned on me until just now. And what I've learned is that, for all the talk about how offense is exciting and chicks dig the longball and the Rockies kept selling out because there was non-stop action, for me - and I'm only talking about me, here - while high-scoring games can be a fun change of pace from time to time, they rapidly lose their appeal as they start to drag on. Which, in turn, means that duration is a bigger determinant in how much I enjoy watching a baseball game than the level of offense. In terms of an equation:

Enjoyment = Aα + Bβ + Cγ + Dδ +…

There are a whole lot of different factors that can affect how much I enjoy watching a baseball game. Leverage. Significance. Whether the Mariners win or lose. And so on. All of those things are included above as separate variables. But what I've learned tonight is that

If α = level of offense and β = duration

Then B > A

The first two games of this series have taken something like seven combined hours to complete. I'm glad the M's came out on top of both of them, but rather than happy and enthralled, all I've been for much of those seven hours is bored and annoyed. Congratulations, Mariners - your wins have taken so long that at several points I've lost interest and felt like a bad fan for doing so. That's not how this is supposed to work.

Thank you for winning. Winning is neat. Now just please do me the courtesy of hurrying up.

Reflecting on his performance and then looking at the box score, Luke French pitched a better game than his line would suggest. Both home runs were on pitches I imagine he'd like to have back - particularly Gordon's, which came on a high-80s 1-0 fastball literally in the center of the zone - but outside of those, I thought he looked pretty good for what he is. Though both the TV radar gun and the PITCHf/x reported velocities seemed high, French still got some fastballs up there at 90+ and he seems to have "sneaky" heat, in that his fastballs look faster than they really are. I don't know what causes that sort of thing, but that was my impression, and by and large he was able to put it where he wanted.

As for French's secondary pitches - for one thing, he threw them a lot. 43% offspeed on the game. And for another, they were effective. 26 of 38 were thrown for strikes, six missed bats, and only one was hit particularly hard. What's interesting is that, where he came in having excelled with his slider, tonight it was his changeup that stole the show. Although I guess that was mostly the doings of Miguel Olivo, who swung at five changeups and missed four of them. Still, Olivo's a big league hitter, and French's change threw him for a loop. It's encouraging to see him working off that pitch pretty well since it was a big part of his success in AAA.

When you look at French's fastball and tendency to pitch up in the zone, you'd think he's always due to get shelled. But throw in a pair of good offspeed pitches and an ability to move the ball around the zone and you get a guy who's better than being just another Garrett Olson. Olson couldn't even throw strikes today with a giant lead. French threw strikes with more than two-thirds of his pitches. A skeptic might call him "Garrett Olson with command," but Garrett Olson with command isn't Garrett Olson anymore, and that's why I think French could be a pretty good piece. When you can locate and work against both lefties and righties, you've got an excellent chance of contributing at the Major League level. Though hardly spectacular, what I saw from French tonight only served to confirm my moderately optimistic expectations.

I can't get over how uncomfortable and awkward Olson looks in a baseball uniform. I know that sounds weird but you'll notice it too the next time you see him, and then that's all you'll be able to see for the rest of the season. I don't like to wear shorts. However, I get hot really easily, so I went to try on some shorts the other day, but when I put them on I didn't at all feel like myself. That's how I see Garrett Olson in a baseball uniform. Like he doesn't have any confidence in his image because he's wearing something he doesn't think suits his body.

I think it's high time we give this segment a new name.

As if the 222 games of Major League experience weren't enough of a clue that Koplove isn't going to be making any prospect lists, Dave Sims chimed in with - and this is an exact quote - "Didn't even know he was still bouncing around baseball. Thought he hung 'em up."

Any act of building is building to the future. This is like Mitch Hedberg/every picture is of you when you were younger all over again.

In the top of the third inning, Michael Saunders ripped a 3-1 low-inside fastball down the right field line for his first ever Major League triple. As a starter, Kyle Davies has a career 5.92 tRA over nearly 500 innings. I wonder if it still counts as your first career Major League triple if you hit it off a AAA arm.

As evidenced by the promotion at Kauffman today, 80s Night is a popular phenomenon for people of all ages. It gives them an excuse to wear clothes they'd never wear, use words they'd never use, sing along to songs they'd never sing along to, and generally just celebrate a memorable but nevertheless thankfully distant decade that hasn't stood the test of time. It's an opportunity for people college-aged or older to reflect on all the stupid shit they used to like so many eons ago, and for people high school-aged or younger to look at their parents and wonder what the hell was wrong with them. Now here's a thought: the Royals haven't won more than 84 games in a season since 1989, and they haven't made the playoffs since 1985.

Miguel Batista inherited a 10-4 lead and threw 14 strikes out of 28 pitches. Garrett Olson inherited an 11-5 lead and threw 20 strikes out of 37 pitches. Without being able to record catcher glove location prior to each pitch, we don't have a real good measure of pitcher command. Strike rate in blowouts, however, might be a useful proxy, because there's no good reason to nibble around the edges. Hey, by that test, guess which relievers of ours who pitched today don't have good command?

Yuniesky Betancourt as a Royal:

OSwing%: 22.9% (25.0% league average)
ZSwing%: 67.5% (65.7% league average)
Zone%: 63.2% (49.3% league average)

Over the last 30 days, Yuni's Zone% - the percentage of pitches thrown within the strike zone - has been the highest in baseball, 4% above Jason Kendall. Pitchers are clearly just going right after him, not the least bit afraid that he's going to deliver much damage. In Yuni's defense, though, at least his discipline looks to be quite a bit better. I'm not going to jump to any conclusions because there are sample size issues here to take into consideration, but as a member of the Royals, Yuni has swung at fewer balls out of the strike zone than the average Major Leaguer. If you remember what he was like as an M, that's just a little bit flabbergasting. For them, this is an encouraging sign of progress. And I actually think that's pretty cool.

Jack Hannahan got to play two innings in the field at short in relief of Jack Wilson, diving at but missing a groundball single. I'm surprised the Mariners are giving him the opportunity to work on his versatility at the Major League level, but I'm also ecstatic, because the prospect of Hannahan as a utility player tickles me in all the right places, and this way I don't have to watch any Chris Woodward. Hannahan's approach to hitting makes it really, really hard for me to believe he's as bad as his numbers, and should his plus defense translate to other positions around the infield, he could very well turn out to be quite the find.

A cat running around the living room: not interesting. A cat running around the street and the sidewalk: somewhat interesting. A cat running around the living room of someone who doesn't own a cat: more interesting. A cat running around a baseball field during the middle of a game: maximum level of interest. Whenever something like this happens, the critter invariably ends up drawing a greater ovation than pretty much anything that happens during the game, which makes me think that zoos have it all wrong. The key to making an animal interesting isn't so much presenting the animal itself as it is presenting the animal in a situation in which people don't expect an encounter. I'd find our zoo way less boring if I only saw animals in surprising situations.