SB Nation - Coco Crisp

Everybody Welcome Mike Cameron to the Red Sox Family

wolf9309 — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 17:41:46 -0000

In the first of two press conferences on Yawkey way today, the Red Sox welcomed outfielder Mike Cameron to the family.

With almost childlike excitement, Cameron, at the age of 36 still known for being one of the best defensive Center Fielders in the game, joined Theo Epstein and Terry Francona to discuss his role on the team.

Now I didn't manage to watch the whole press conference, I tuned in about halfway through it, so I'm sure I missed some good bits here, and would love anyone who did catch it to chime in with any other information they thought was useful.

The first and biggest thing that I noticed were that a lot of questions centered around where Cameron was going to play in the field- this has been a question here, with some people thinking he will be in left so that the Sox give Jacoby Ellsbury time to develop in center, and other people thinking it is vital to shore up the defense now, moving Ells to left and keeping Cameron in center.

Theo Epstein seemed somewhat non-commital, saying that he knows that Cameron plays great Center field and would also be capable of his plus defense all throughout the outfield.

Cameron himself was a little less reserved, saying that he certainly could take his skills to the corners and use what he has learned at center there, but also saying that he is looking forward to bringing his center field abilities over to the Red Sox. The other thing he was very unreserved about was he wants to win- he is here to win and he is going to play his hardest.

Personally, I would like to see something like they did with Coco Crisp when he and Ells were both around- keep Ells in left when Cameron is in the lineup, and if he gets a day off, move Ellsbury over to center and have Hermida come into left. This will give Ellsbury some chance to develop his skills as a center fielder- and with Cameron's veteran tutelage, while dramatically improving our defense in 2010.

One other thing worth mentioning was that Theo wouldn't specifically say that they were shutting the door on Bay, however did state that whichever team gets him will be getting a great ballplayer.

Remember, if you're on the internet but not a TV, you can still catch John Lackey's press conference live at www.MLB.com/LIVE. I may have to be off working, but I hopefully will be able to catch it, and if not, I look forward to everyone's thoughts on it.

Poll

Where do you think Cameron should play in 2010?

Mike Gonzalez an option for White Sox?

Eli Greenspan — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 23:52:20 -0000

More photos » by John Bazemore - AP

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INDIANAPOLIS- The White Sox need a reliever.

Bobby Jenks was a solid closer last season, but was not the dominant closer the White Sox had hoped for. Adding a top reliever would give the back-end of the bullpen some much needed relief and give Ozzie Guillen the option of moving Bobby Jenks out of the closer spot if necessary.

Free agent Mike Gonzalez is drawing considerable interest, but the soon-to-be 32 year old would be in a similar role in Chicago, rotation between the 8th and 9th inning. Gonzalez dominated lefties, holding hitters to a career .201 average.

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2009 - Mike Gonzalez	5-4	80	0	0	0	10	7	74.1	56	28	20	7	33	90	2.42	1.20

The White Sox are also looking to add a leadoff hitter and designated hitter, but are keeping a tight lip on who that may be. After adding Jake Peavy, how much money they have available is in question.

Vladimir Guerrero is an option, who is reportedly looking at a one year deal worth 7-9 million dollars. For the outfielder, Coco Crisp is an option and sources say Scott Podsednik could be had if all else fails. They are reportedly also looking at Johnny Damon.

Lefties, Lefties Everywhere

Charlie — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 06:47:35 -0000

More photos » by Chris Carlson - AP

Would another lefty hitter like Hank Blalock, right, be the best fit for the Pirates?

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Straight to the point today: one thing I find a bit strange about the idea of the Pirates pursuing Rick Ankiel and/or Hank Blalock is that both those guys are left-handed, whereas most of the Bucs' other options at first base and right field (Garrett Jones, Jeff Clement, Brandon Moss) are too. Steve Pearce is the only righty who might be in the mix right now at first and right, and I can't believe the Bucs are still taking him seriously. If the idea in pursuing an extra corner guy is to add an extra bit of upside and perhaps hope for a nice prospect at the deadline if the new player does well, I can't really fault the Pirates for not considering the player's handedness. But if the Pirates really are serious about seeing what they have in Clement, in particular, it would seem to behoove them to find someone whose skills complement his.

Admittedly, the pickings in that area are pretty slim. Two righty free agent outfielders who might make a bit of sense are Marlon Byrd and Coco Crisp. Byrd was a regular for the Rangers this year and has played pretty well for three straight seasons, so he might require the sort of multiyear contract to which the Pirates would probably rather not commit themselves.

Crisp is a subpar hitter, but he's not old, and he's an outstanding defensive player; he could certainly handle either left or center (if that were required) in PNC. Unfortunately, his throwing arm was poor even before he had surgery on both shoulders this year, so playing him in right wouldn't work. If he were added to the roster, the Pirates could work out some sort of time share where Lastings Milledge and Garrett Jones played every day but rotated between left and right (Milledge) and right and first (Jones), while Clement and Crisp formed some sort of weird semi-platoon at the other available positions.

...This is all really speculative, and Crisp obviously isn't ideal, but I'm trying to be creative here. Given the free agent market, I can see why the Pirates would be interested in Ankiel and Blalock, and I'm not opposed to signing either of them, if they'd be willing to play in Pittsburgh. But, as much as PNC is kinder to lefties than righties, it seems a bit strange to crowd the roster with lefties. Maybe a low-leverage trade or an inspired minor league free agent signing (Ernesto Mejia of the Braves, perhaps?) would be the right move here, with the righty Pearce's initial role being determined by how credible a major league option the new acquisition is.

Crisp Rumor Hardly Fresh

The Cheat — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 01:35:50 -0000

More photos » by Charlie Riedel - AP

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It's not even Thanksgiving yet, and it's already beginning to seem like the daily White Sox rumors are simply those that have trotted out in the past. Today, it's Coco Crisp, no longer as a not-living-up-to-his-contract CFer on the trade market, but as a just-coming-off-of-two-shoulder-surgeries free agent. The White Sox and Royals are said to be interested.

Crisp might be a good buy-low candidate for a team in need of a CFer, but the Sox have about $12M/yr tied up in their CF solution. And their true need lies at a corner outfield spot and DH, where Crisp's bat becomes a much bigger liability.

Elsewhere, the Sox are not among those teams listed as interested in Nick Johnson, who has become a bit of a cause célèbre around here.

Projected WAR and Contract Values for Free Agent Position Players

Jeff Zimmerman (TucsonRoyal) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 06:15:03 -0000

Combining a couple of my previous article on UZR projections (now updated with UZR/150 values) and the wOBA to WAR conversion, I have created a spreadsheet to project 2010 WAR values of most FA hitters and determine how much money should be spent for the player's production for a multi-year contract.

Here are the 20 top projected free agent position players:

Rank	Name	2010 Projected WAR	Position	UZR/150	OBP	SLG	PA
1	Matt Holliday	4.7	LF	5	0.376	0.510	646
2	Chone Figgins	3.0	3B	7	0.375	0.367	603
3	Adrian Beltre	2.9	3B	10	0.322	0.448	544
4	Joe Crede	2.6	3B	13	0.317	0.439	410
5	Troy Glaus	2.4	3B	2	0.351	0.436	461
6	Marco Scutaro	2.4	SS	1	0.362	0.376	511
7	Placido Polanco	2.3	2B	6	0.338	0.398	594
8	Jason Bay	2.3	LF	-10	0.367	0.486	622
9	Miguel Tejada	2.1	SS	-4	0.330	0.430	603
10	Mike Cameron	2.0	CF	5	0.321	0.420	582
11	Marlon Byrd	1.9	CF	0	0.335	0.433	513

13	Johnny Damon	1.8	LF	0	0.355	0.430	597
14	Felipe Lopez	1.7	2B	2	0.342	0.377	628
15	Nick Johnson	1.7	1B	-1	0.395	0.407	552
16	Mark DeRosa	1.7	3B	-1	0.335	0.416	543
17	Bengie Molina	1.6	C	0	0.288	0.421	486
18	Orlando Cabrera	1.5	SS	1	0.326	0.374	631
19	Coco Crisp	1.5	CF	3	0.342	0.386	430
20	Miguel Olivo	1.4	C	0	0.276	0.433	416

Instructions and assumption on using the spreadsheet after the jump.

Assumptions/Instructions

UZR/150 values were used.
Projected hitting values are from Chone's projected batting values. I didn't need to have BA included, but I kept it there to make the cut and paste easier from Chones projections page.
To calculate the the wOBA, I used (1.66 * OBA + SLG)/3 = wOBA where the 1.66 from determining what multiple helped to predict the wOBA best for all qualified 2009 hitters.
I used 4.4 million dollars per WAR as the rate to paid for all years the player signs. The user can feel free to change these values to what ever value they want.
Each player was projected to age by 0.5 WAR per year not matter what their age is currently. Most are over the age of 31, so I don't see this as a problem. If the user want to change these values in the cells, feel free.
To get the ideal contract value for the projected WAR, goto column Y on the spreadsheet. Columns Y, Z and AA are the values projected for a 1 year contract in 2009 using the above assumptions. These values continure for up to eight years. For example, a 6 year contract for Matt Holliday would be worth 90.4 millions dollars according to the methods I used in the spreadsheet.
Players can be added and values changed as the user see fit.

Let me know if you have any questions or comments.

Zack Grienke watching Royals' offseason moves

Eli Greenspan — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 00:02:12 -0000

More photos » by Charlie Riedel - AP

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Royals ace Zack Grienke did not hold back in expressing his disappointment over the Royals' 2009 season. The Royals really should listen to Grienke, considering he emerged as the face of the franchise after the 2009 season.

"We'll see when the offseason comes what all we do," Greinke said. "I thought we'd be better than we've been, but we kind of proved this year that we still need more than we have to compete."

Mike Jacobs was a flop, and the injuries to Alex Gordon and Coco Crisp certainly hurt their chances. Their prize from the 2007 offseason, Gil Meche, has put up three straight double-digit losses, and finished the 2009 season with a 5.09 ERA.

The Royals need to make an investment on an impact player, because Alex Gordon is struggling to live up to potential, and Billy Butler's biggest test will come next season, when we'll see if he can continue to swing a hot bat.

If the Royals have another disappointing season, and Grienke has another Cy Young-like season, we should expect to hear whispers of a Grienke trade.

Grienke isn't eligible for free agency until after the 2012 season, but he is looking to sign an extension if the team doesn't invest more in winning. If the Royals can't lure any top players on the free agent market, then they'll likely have to shop Zack Grienke for a boatload of young prospects.

Grienke will turn 30 during the 2012 offseason, meaning his value could be at its peak coming into the 2011 season. The Royals would be smart to consider making that move so they can start the rebuilding process, because right now they are in a state of funk.

Monday's Frosty Mug

KLSnow — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:01:31 -0000

by Ann Heisenfelt - AP

Carlos Gomez makes the wrong kind of contact.

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Some things to read while realizing you left your credit card in your other armor.

Thanks to Dan, Tyler and Rubie for filling in for me last week while I took a quick break to experience life in New York for a few days. Writing the Mug is no small feat, and all three of them did admirable work in my place, so be sure to stop by their sites today to thank them. It's good to be home. With that said, I'm going in for oral surgery in roughly an hour so I'm off again tomorrow, and I've lined up another of my favorite Brewer bloggers to fill in. I'm hoping to return on Wednesday but that will depend on how I bounce back and how coherent I am on Vicodin.

The Brewers, of course, saw fit to ruin a perfectly good day of my vacation by trading J.J. Hardy for Carlos Gomez. If you weren't around the site this weekend, you missed a lot of great content on the trade: Jordan weighed in with his disappointment, Jeff made the case for keeping Mike Cameron anyway, and Noah, writing his first weekend roundup, had a great collection of thoughts on the deal from around the web. With that said, there's still a bunch more out there:

The Transaction Oracle compared Gomez to Tom Goodwin and said, "Gomez's version of selectivity is staring blankly at a random pitch and then flailing at the next one."
Tom Powers of the St. Paul Pioneer-Press called Gomez "clueless" and said he "has the baseball instincts of an Icelandic grade-schooler." (h/t BBTF)
The Grand National Championships called Gomez "a Juan Pierre without all that incessant singles hitting."
TheJay has a look at the career paths of players who have made as many PAs as Gomez has at such a young age with such a low OBP. Not exceptionally pretty.
Aaron Gleeman says Gomez has gotten a bum rap, but also likes the deal for the Twins.
Miller Park Drunk has a roundup of other things people are saying about Gomez.
Meanwhile, despite Jeff's objections, Doug Melvin confirmed that the Brewers' decision to acquire Gomez means they won't make a push to retain Mike Cameron for 2010.
Nick's Twins Blog has an overview of the deal, including my scouting report for Hardy.
Twinkie Town has some questions about Hardy's defense (based largely on the comments of some frequent BCB'ers), and whether or not it's as good as advertised.
FanGraphs has a look at Hardy's defense, and rated him the third most valuable defensive player in baseball since 2007.
Along with the Red Sox (and presumably some others), the Reds confirmed interest in Hardy. Melvin didn't want to deal Hardy in the division, so he was forced to accept less from someone else.
The Ghost of Moonlight Graham called the deal a steal for the Twins.
Rubie Q called the deal "worst nightmare stuff."
Baseball-Intellect says the Twins got Hardy for "pennies on the dollar."
Sabernomics is having a hard time choosing a winner in the deal.
Jorge Says No! says this deal has the potential to be win-win.

As of this writing, 54% of voters in the poll on your right think the Twins won the trade, with just 13% picking the Brewers. Gomez is walking in the door with a large portion of the fans believing he's not worth much, and it can be tough to overcome that when you're carrying a sub-.300 OBP. This could be the deal that sinks Doug Melvin.

Now, the Brewers have to find a way to wisely spend the financial windfall. MLB Trade Rumors has the likely landing spots for this winter's top 50 free agents, and lists both Doug Davis and Jarrod Washburn as likely Brewers, and also lists the Crew as a potential interested party regarding Jon Garland. Meanwhile, they have Felipe Lopez as a Dodger, Mike Cameron as a Padre and Ben Sheets as a Ranger.

Beyond that, there's not a lot of Brewer news, unless you wanted to talk about the decision to decline David Weathers' option.

Around baseball:

D-Backs: Exercised Brandon Webb's option for 2010.
Dodgers: Declined Jon Garland's option for 2010.
Nationals: Declined Austin Kearns' option for 2010.
Phillies: Exercised Cliff Lee's option for 2010 and declined Pedro Feliz's.
Pirates: Designated pitchers Virgil Vazquez and Eric Hacker and catcher Steve Lerud for assignment.
Red Sox: Declined their option for 2010 on Alex Gonzalez.
Reds: Outrighted outfielder Danny Richar and first baseman Kevin Barker to AAA. Both will be minor league free agents.
Rockies: Declined options on catcher Yorvit Torrealba and Alan Embree.
Royals: Declined 2010 options for Coco Crisp, Miguel Olivo and Yasuhiko Yabuta.
Tigers: Removed outfielder Marcus Thames and catcher Matt Treanor from their 40-man roster.
White Sox: Bought out the final year of Jermaine Dye's contract.

I'm going to wrap this up quickly, because my pre-surgery meds are starting to kick in:

Miguel Olivo has been mentioned as a potential option for the Brewers next season. Beyond the Box Score has a comprehensive list of things he does well.
Phil Birnbaum looks at the possibility that younger umpires have more accurate strike zones.
Baseball Reference wants your thoughts to help improve their site.
Seventeen congressmen voted no on a resolution congratulating the Yankees for winning the World Series. One of them was Wisconsin rep Jim Sensenbrenner. (h/t Baseball Musings)

On this day in 1982, Robin Yount was the unanimous choice to win the AL MVP after leading the AL in hits, doubles, slugging, OPS, OPS+ and total bases, while playing shortstop for the AL Champion Brewers.

It's also a big day for Brewer birthdays:

Dave Bush turns 30.
Angel Miranda, who appeared in 116 games as a Brewer between 1993 and 1997, turns 40.
Dion James, who was the Brewers' first round pick in the 1980 draft, turns 47.
Teddy Higuera, arguably the greatest pitcher in Brewer history, turns 51. You should celebrate his birthday by purchasing the sponsorship on his Bref page, which is available for $10.

Drink up.

Friday Afternoon Quick Hits

Eli Greenspan — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 19:23:49 -0000

More photos » by David Zalubowski - AP

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The regular season is so exciting that I almost forget how exciting the offseason is!

The White Sox declined Jermaine Dye's 12 million dollar club option, as expected, paying him the 950,000 dollar buyout instead. Mark Teahen is expected to fill his spot. The highly respected veteran should not have trouble finding another gig.
Scott Merkin via Twitter is reporting that the White Sox likely won't bring back outfielder Scott Podsednik. He could emerge as an option on the other side of town with the Cubs.
The Royals declined options on reliever Yasuhiko Yabuta, Coco Crisp, and Miguel Olivo.
Cardinals GM Jon Mozeliak expects All-Star outfielder Matt Holliday to reach the open market, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch is reporting. Not really a surprise here, being a Boras client.
The Brewers are in the market for a starter, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel is reporting. They have varying degrees of interest in Mark Mulder and John Lackey, which is a good sign for Brewers fans.

Offseason Day 1 Quick Hits

Eli Greenspan — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:06:44 -0000

More photos » by Jeff Roberson - AP

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Let's take a look at some of the headlines making their way around the wire on this Thursday morning:

It appears as if the Nationals will remove the interim tag on manager Jim Riggleman and name him their permanent manager. The Nationals did contact Don Mattingly about an interview, but he respectively declined. Riggleman is very experienced and did get more than expected from the Nationals after taking over, going 33-42 to close out the season.
The Kansas City Star is reporting that the Royals likely will decline Coco Crisp's option, but have interest in negotiating a low-base salary for the 2010 season. Crisp, who has surgery on both shoulders this past season, is no guarantee to come back as strong as he was in previous years.
Joe Strauss of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch is reporting that the Cardinals and Scott Boras have discussed a the framework of a deal, reportedly in the neighborhood of 6 years, worth 96 million dollars. Seems like the first offer of many in what is expected to be a very long negotiating process. Boras has not been afraid to compare his client to Mark Teixeira, who signed an 8 year, 180 million dollar deal a year ago. I think more reasonable contracts to compare Holliday to are Vernon Wells' (7 year, 126) or Alfonso Soriano's (8 year, 134).
With Tim Wakefield's 4 million dollar option and Victor Martinez's 7 million dollar option, the Red Sox have to decided what to do with shortstop Alex Gonzalez's 6 million dollar option. Gonzalez hit .284 after joining the Red Sox, and was pretty sound defensively. The Red Sox could decline the option and hope to sign him at a reduced rate, similar to what the Giants did with Freddy Sanchez. They could always look to the Brewers and shortstop J.J. Hardy, who is also expected to draw interest from the Twins.

Fire Everyone! - Mark Shapiro

Jay — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 05:53:11 -0000

More photos » by Tony Dejak - AP

Is just developing a good process enough?

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This is the final installment in a 12-part series.

"A Hit Is A Hit" — The Sopranos, season one.

Christopher has been bankrolling a band called "Visiting Day", who are managed by his girlfriend Adriana. He plays the band's demo to his associate Hesh, an old-timer in the music business.

CHRISTOPHER: So?

HESH: I think it's ... not good.

CHRISTOPHER: Wanna be a little more specific?

HESH: There's good. And there's not good. This is not good.

CHRISTOPHER: Okay, maybe it's not your era — no offense, but ...

HESH: Kid, music is music, talent is talent. I don't care who you are. I seen it all. I seen heavy metal invented by Hendrix at the Bottom Line, he just got out of the army. I told him, "Kid, I don't know what you call it — talent, charisma, magic — whatever it is, you got it." These guys ... [gestures to the cassette] ... I'm sorry, they don't.

CHRISTOPHER: That Vito is a great guitar player, Hesh.

HESH: Good, fine, he's a great guitar player. However, there's one constant in the music business: A hit is a hit. And this, my friend, is not a hit.

CHRISTOPHER: But why?

HESH: Christ. Reasons we can never comprehend or codify, you pitiful schlepper.

Of all the installments in this series, this is the one where it's most tempting to beg off and admit, this might just above my pay grade. I'll be honest, I can't say with much confidence whether Mark Shapiro should be fired. What I can say is that there are definitely good reasons to fire him.

Before we get to that, better face up to some hard facts. If you're going to fire Shapiro, you have to believe that a better option is available. Chris Antonetti is the heir apparent, but you fire Shapiro and keep Antonetti only if you think that in keeping Antonetti, you preserve the best parts of Shapiro while rooting out his shortcomings. Heck, maybe that's actually the case, but I personally couldn't say. It doesn't seem likely. And if Antonetti was the instant front-runner for most any GM opening, what would that make Shapiro if he were available?

Shapiro's calling card is turning walk-year veterans into prospects who become multi-year contributors to the team — a truly staggering haul, including Grady Sizemore, Cliff Lee, Coco Crisp, Shin-Soo Choo, Travis Hafner, Milton Bradley, Franklin Gutierrez, Asdrubal Cabrera, Josh Bard and Kelly Shoppach. Add to that list, potentially, over the next several years, Matt LaPorta, Carlos Santana, Luis Valbuena, Michael Brantley, Lou Marson, plus a half-dozen significant pitching prospects, plus Mark DeRosa, Arthur Rhodes, Justin Masterson and Chris Perez. Even his least successful trade acquisitions — Alex Escobar, Jason Michaels, Brandon Phillips, Billy Traber, Andy Marte, Josh Barfield — have not been entirely bereft of big-league talent.

We've chanted that litany before, but it bears recalling because horse trading is one of the most important jobs of a GM, and it's notably one of the only jobs where success or failure is directly traced to his decision. Shapiro also has had an impressive run with third-tier free agent starting pitchers — Pavano made 33 starts and netted a decent prospect, Byrd completed three serviceable seasons, Millwood won the freakin' ERA title, and even Brian Anderson did okay for a couple of years. And while fans rightly bemoan the dead weight of Hafner's contract, Shapiro has not really made the big, crippling mistakes that befall most GMs — on the balance sheet, Hafner-Westbrook-Dellucci pale before Wells-Rios-Ryan.

If you're going to get rid of Shapiro and his like-minded colleagues, then you have to be willing to live without those exemplary skills — without his leadership, class, and intelligence, his deftness with trades and contracts, the respect he commands within the industry, and especially — especially — his willingness to take the public body blows when tough decisions need to be made. You can't assume that the next guy will excel in all of those areas. I am certain we'd miss those qualities.

Having said that, I can tell you why Shapiro should be fired in one word: Talent.

Baseball is never simple. As a rule, the world's most elite natural athletes cannot succeed as major leaguers. Hitting and pitching are simply too hard. Hitting at this level requires a knack that may be the hardest thing to quantify or characterize in all of sports, and if you don't have it, then all the talk or mechanics and approaches in the world can't save you, even if you have several NBA championships and MVP awards on your résumé. Pitching at this level requires a freakish combination of precise muscle control, huge arm-generated torque, resistance to elbow and shoulder injury under extreme stress, and intelligence.

Running a baseball club may be just as hard and just as unquantifiable; after all, more than a few titans of industry have tried and failed. A brilliant executive can't necessarily run a ballclub any better than a world-class athlete can hit a curveball. The brilliant executive can be an inspiring leader, managing and empowering his charges. He can define what kind of people he wants working in the organization, hire them, set expectations, evaluate them, act on them. He can fire people. He can order case studies and surveys of best practices. He can analyze statistics and devise processes, enact them, evaluate them, refine them, start over from scratch if need be. He can maintain outstanding communication with his staff, with his bosses, with the public. He can do all these things reliably, even predictably, because he simply has the tools and the skills.

For all that, however, the brilliant executive can't necessarily tell you whether it's better to overspend on Raul Ibañez or Kerry Wood. He can't necessarily devise a process to tell you that, and he can't necessarily hire the right person to tell you that, either. Nor can he devise a process to hire the right person to tell you that. It doesn't always come down to objective analysis or having a good process. Sometimes it comes down to talent: the talent to play, the talent to evaluate talent, the talent to develop talent, and the judgment to make decisions about talent.

Sometimes — often, maybe — it comes down to reasons we can never comprehend or codify, pitiful schleppers that we are.

Evaluating talent is a special skill, and here I can speak with some experience. Most of my professional life is centered around my ability to identify genuine talent — musical talent, IT talent, and even writing talent — people who reliably will perform at a high or exceptionally high level, just about 100 percent of the time. I have, on occasion, identified individuals with weak paper qualifications who later went on to excel in their field. In some cases, they thrived in part because I gave them an opportunity and aided their development. In other cases, their success was inevitable, and I just saw it earlier than some others.

I am not suggesting, by any stretch of the imagination, that I have the ability to judge baseball talent. Maybe, if I'd spent 20 years working as a baseball professional, learning from thousands of discussions with scouts and making and testing my own observations — maybe then, but perhaps not even then. For whatever it's worth, though, I can tell you that my ability to assess a person's talents is entirely intuitive. I have no ability to explain it, or to teach anyone else how to do it. I can be highly analytical in my assessments of people, breaking down facts and metrics, making rules and devising grading systems to create rankings — and I can teach these things by rote and by example. However, none of that has anything to do with being able to differentiate reliably between a high ceiling and a low ceiling.

I can't tell you for sure that it's the same for baseball, but I worry that it is. Most of the people reading this could be trained in the rudiments of being a low-level scout — doing your homework and measuring some kid's raw tools on the field. Skills are another thing entirely — evaluating footwork and positioning on defense, observing quality of command across a variety of pitches, intuiting the difference between a bad day and a chronic problem. Beyond these, another level, the crucial, game-changing question: Will this ballplayer develop skills beyond what he's showing today? How does he project to a different level at a different age, or even just to a different ballpark in a different league?

I have no doubt that great baseball scouts learned a lot from the great scouts who came before them, and I have no doubt that a gifted executive can learn immensely from a great scout, purely by his ability to listen and communicate and absorb. At the same time, I am quite sure that the greatest talent evaluators in the game are possessed of something that is innate and ineffable. And I am genuinely concerned that the Indians don't employ any of those people — and that, in fact, Shapiro may have favored others in the organization to the point where the best evaluators left.

Take a look at the AP report of Neal Huntington being hired away by the Pirates:

Huntington formerly was the assistant general manager to the Indians' Mark Shapiro, but dropped behind vice president of baseball operations Chris Antonetti and assistant general manager John Mirabelli on the front office depth chart two years ago.

Huntington accepted a different role in 2005, Shapiro said, because Antonetti's skills were in the management and administrative side, while Huntington's were in evaluation and scouting.

"My skill set and passion were more that of an evaluator, but they never technically took me out of the front office," Huntington said. "I was exposed to some incredible things -- rebuilding an organization and being involved in every decision, every tough decision, that was made."

And from the MLB.com report:

As an adviser to Shapiro and vice president of baseball operations Chris Antonetti, Huntington was involved in nearly all personnel and staffing decisions, as well as trade acquisition discussions. He also spent the majority of his time evaluating talent on both the Minor and Major League level.

When asked about Huntington, Shapiro responded: "[Huntington is] one of our chief evaluators and one of our strongest voices on every level," Shapiro said.

Here's a guy who was the highest-ranking evaluator in the organization and possibly the best, a guy with a master's degree in sports management from UMass, and essentially, he was passed over — well treated, perhaps, but pointedly not in line for a future role as GM. So too, perhaps, was John Farrell, who upon leaving Cleveland — quite amicably, as Huntington did — was quoted to say that he was looking to have a larger voice in an organization. Farrell had been a major league pitcher and a college pitching coach, and with the Indians he served stints as Farm Director and Director of Player Development. Despite his experience and impeccable reputation, Farrell too was not viewed as the future leader of the organization.

Years earlier, there was Tony LaCava, whom the Indians hired in 2002 as national cross-checker, essentially rescuing him from the sinking-ship Montreal Expos. As the Expos very recent Farm Director, LaCava naturally was instrumental in selecting the prospects to be received in the Colon deal, which is not only Shapiro's signature trade, but arguably the most successful trade of a veteran for prospects by any GM, ever. LaCava, too, was not retained in the Indians organization, moving on to the Blue Jays as Assistant GM in 2003, just one year later, while John Mirabelli continued his string of generally disastrous drafts.

Like Huntington, LaCava is going to be a GM sooner or later, yet he wasn't good enough to be Assistant GM in Cleveland. None of these guys were given large enough roles in the organization to keep them around, and no doubt the Indians were possessed of too much executive talent to keep in-house — a nice problem to have. Still, given how things have gone since, it's telling that the prince-in-waiting anointment, and present-day "co-GM" status, went not to an ace evaluator, but instead to Antonetti, a man whose background and skill set are more or less identical to Shapiro's.

For all the talk about being open to all ideas and all viewpoints, the major player-evaluation talent in the Indians organization was basically told that being a solid administrator was more important, and that their path to bigger jobs would have to be in some other, presumably less enlightened organization — and never mind that it doesn't matter how well administered your organization is if you don't know who the best talent is. (Is it any wonder, then, that when Shapiro hires a former catcher for a manager, he then populates his coaching staff almost entirely with other former catchers? All leaders lead by example, first and foremost.)

This is not to say that an executive without a scouting background cannot be an outstanding GM, but it's noteworthy that other organizations that have gone with the "Ivy League whiz kid" GM model tend to have a "wise old baseball man" figure hanging close by, advising the gifted non-scout executive. The Red Sox had Bill Lajoie attached to Theo Epstein; Allard Baird is in that role now, while Lajoie is now advising Huntington in Pittsburgh. The Rays put Gerry Hunsicker with Andrew Friedman, and down in Texas, Jon Daniels has access to no less than John Hart and Nolan Ryan. But when non-scout-gifted-executives Shapiro and Antonetti huddle to make the big decisions, who are the wise old evaluators in the room — Charles Nagy and Jason Bere?

Later that night, at home, Adriana and Christopher discuss Visiting Day's potential. Hip-hop mogul "Massive Genius" has told Adriana that the band's demos are promising.

CHRISTOPHER: You know how I use the technique of positive visualization?

ADRIANA: I know you talk about it. You're fairly negative a lot of the time.

CHRISTOPHER: I think you should mentally prepare for the possibility that Visiting Day sucks.

ADRIANA: What?

CHRISTOPHER: I think that ... the only reason you've gotten this far with Massive is ... he wants to be in your pants.

ADRIANA: Boy, oh, boy.

CHRISTOPHER: Look, I had some experts listen to the demo ... they crapped all over it. Sorry.

ADRIANA: Who, Hesh? That old synagogue cantor?

CHRISTOPHER: Silvio. Hey, he owned rock clubs in Asbury. You heard what Squid said. A professional engineer.

ADRIANA: What about my opinion? That it's good. That it's special. This is just a way for you to keep me down.

CHRISTOPHER: That ain't fair.

ADRIANA: What's wrong with it, huh? What's wrong with Visiting Day?

CHRISTOPHER: I don't know ... but it's a problem that you don't know.

This series of articles perhaps has only demonstrated the obvious, that a club this bad — which decides in June that it must not only tank the current season but the next season at the same time — has suffered multiple failures in more than one part of the organization. In any one area, we can talk about how much control that one group of people — coaches, scouts, trainers — really had, compared to the influence of the other groups and the whims of the fates. But a systemic failure points ultimately to Shapiro, who hired and is accountable for all of those groups, and the harsh truth is that every club must contend with the whims of the fates — or fail to contend with them, as the Indians have.

Amateur scouting has been a disaster since Shapiro took over; maybe time will reveal that it was fixed two or three years ago, but maybe not. Big-league scouting has been a mixed bag, with veteran acquisitions missing a lot more often than they hit — in Barfield's case, about four times more often. The training staff has won high praise from some in the industry, but they haven't stopped the Indians from being undercut severely by injuries to a half-dozen key players in just two years — in some cases, multiple injuries and disappointing rehab processes have afflicted a single player like Jake Westbrook over and over again. The farm system has been another mixed bag, producing too many players who dominate at Triple-A but can barely perform at replacement level in the majors. If all clubs were like the Indians in this regard, those MLE formulas might look a lot different.

We had a manager whose playing-time decisions often defied any imaginable logic or reason, who thought it was important to have Ramon Vazquez on his bench rather than future 30-30 man Brandon Phillips, and who thought it was a good idea to put Ryan Garko in the outfield, with a rookie flyball pitcher on the mound — scratch that, ever — and we had a GM who let him do these things. It's true that Shapiro fired Wedge, and he may be sincere in saying that bringing in a new manager is an exciting opportunity. Even so, Shapiro made it abundantly clear that he didn't think there was any real, qualitative reason why Wedge shouldn't continue to be the manager — his exact words were, "it's a cop-out."

We had extraordinarily bad — and sometimes historically bad — bullpens in 2004, 2006, 2008 and 2009. Those volcanic fiascos were, at least, largely Shapiro's direct creations, and at most, entirely the fault of Shapiro and people who were hired by Shapiro, and who generally have not been fired by Shapiro. They have turned too many contenders into also-rans, too many decent squads into train-wrecks, and too many season ticket holders into non-customers.

The sum of these observations is this one, frightening, inescapable conclusion: Shapiro has not given us any concrete reason to believe that he knows how to put people into critical positions who are capable of evaluating, developing and coaching real talent — the kind that can thrive at the major league level. Without people in key roles who are possessed of that kind of judgment and talent, it doesn't make any difference how good your organizational processes are or how much class-acting you do. We cannot contend on a diet of trade-acquired minor leaguers and recycled starting pitchers alone. If these things weren't clear five years ago, or even one year ago, they ought to be crystal clear now.

I am just a scribe, neither scout nor coach, not a baseball executive and certainly not a former major leaguer. So I don't really know what's wrong with the Cleveland Indians. But it's a problem if Mark Shapiro doesn't know either. And as much respect for him as I have, I'm not at all convinced that he does.