SB Nation - Brad James

Why the Rockies should have taken a flyer on Shawn Hill

RockiesMagicNumber — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 16:50:03 -0000

So this article became kind of moot yesterday when the stupid Padres picked up Shawn Hill, but you still get to enjoy my article on why we should've picked him up.

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Remember a couple months ago how much the Rockies were trying to land Tim Redding? We even went as far as to offer Willy Taveras - who of course, we later cut - to the Nationals for this pitcher.

Tim Redding

#44 / Pitcher / New York Mets

Height: 5-11

Weight: 225

Bats: R

Throws: R

Born: Feb 12, 1978

What on earth were we thinking?

Dan O'Dowd gets the strangest fixations on the crappiest pitchers. I'm not going to take the time to go through the past 5 years and point them out, but Tim Redding was the most recent O'Dowd ManCrush.

Redding isn't an AWFUL pitcher. He's a serviceable back-end starter. He pup up an ERA of 4.95 last season over 182 innings, and FIP supports his performance, clocking in at 4.93. He pretty much performed as well as you'd expect him to, defense or no. Redding used a mediocre combination of K9, BB9, and HR9 to build those numbers (5.93, 3.21, 1.34) along with a GB% of 39.8 (below average), and while none of them would impress anyone too much, he did have a K/BB ratio of 1.85 and a WHIP of 1.43. I'll be honest, those numbers aren't terrible, but why was O'Dowd so intent on picking him up? He would've also cost the team between $1.5-2.5M, pretty much guaranteeing him a roster spot, so if he stunk, there's not much we could do with him.

Especially when another Nationals starter was close by and could more than likely be had for a song?

Shawn Hill

#41 / Pitcher / San Diego Padres

Height: 6-2

Weight: 225

Bats: R

Throws: R

Born: Apr 28, 1981

Shawn Hill would come with a pile of baggage. Inside that baggage, you would find gauze, tape, bandaids, ibuprofen, ice packs, slings, and a little black book full of physical therapists' numbers. Over the past 3 seasons, Hill has put together 197.1 IP over 34 starts. Most certainly not impressive, but completely understandable when you consider the number of injuries he's had. He stunk up an ERA of 5.83 in 2008, but had a FIP of only 4.06. That .373 BABIP (compared to a career .324) really doesn't help things in that regard, as he was clearly tipping, or getting unlucky, but basically not pitching to his ability.

The upsides of Hill involve his sinker and the ensuing GB% that comes with it. Hill's sinker comes in at about 90 mph, and according to his Pitch F/X data, he gets around 11-12 inches of break on it (about 6 in the vertical, 10 in the horizontal - for comparison, Cook gets about 9 inches, roughly the same vertical but less horizontal). Take that and add in decent control and you get a Career 50.1%GB. Downright impressive, and it sounds to me like the kind of guy we should've been looking for. I know he's totally injury prone, but what if we could get 15-17 starts out of him? Who knows, maybe we could've worked some sort of healing magic over him to get him back in one piece.

However, instead of watching the bargain bin, we instead move forward with guys like Josh Fogg who can throw a splitter effectively enough, but don't have much of a future starting anymore. This far into Spring Training, we've seen a lot of our question mark guys kind of fizzle and look like the low end of what we were hoping (Smith, Hirsh, Fogg, Reynolds), and while we have seen some upsides (Morales, Chacin), it's sounding like we're in the market for more pitching depth for sure. Hill would've been a great addition, even if it was only for a dozen starts or so.

In reading this, you might've stumbled across the RMN method for valuing pitcher ability ©. For those of you who DIDN'T, I'll go ahead and break it down for you.

I'm firmly of the position that the things you can evaluate hard-and-fast for a pitcher are Strikeouts, Walks, and Home Runs. All have park effects related to them, but they're pretty much the only things that a pitcher can control. A really good pitcher also won't give up many hits, but there are a lot of variable that may make one pitcher look downright hittable and another one look like a lockdown ace.

So K9, BB9, and HR9 are the things I look at. First and foremost, I look at HR9, but that isn't enough to DQ a pitcher. I like to see a HR9 lower than 1.00. Next, I want to see K9 and BB9. A pitcher with a good K rate (6 and up), a good BB rate (3ish, lower), and by extension a solid K/BB (North of 1.5-1.6) will get a bit of forgiveness in a suboptimal HR9, because you're not seeing them put a lot of guys on base via BB to get driven in on those HRs, or they just strike everyone else out after letting someone on.

Finally, and this is the fun one: GB%. With our potential IF defense, GB% can make you forget a LOT of the unsatisfactory areas above, for obvious reasons. League Average GB% in 2008 was about 43% - think Zack Greinke, John Danks, Armando Galarraga, or Jeff Francis. Hill has a 50.1% career GB, so yeah, you can see where he might be someone to keep an eye on.

A few young pitchers to keep in the book-o'-cheap-trade-targets include Brad James from Houston, Jaime Garcia from St. Louis, Dallas Trahern from Detroit, Dallas Buck with Cincy, and Robert Mosebach with the Angels, just to name a few potential young groundballing pitchers. - Several of these pitchers may have swapped teams, I was going off of what Baseball Cube told me, feel free to correct me.

As long as we're on this short tangent, Mark Mulder might be a decent pickup, despite his probable inability to keep his arm on his shoulder. He has a strong history of groundballing, could come for a minor league contract.

Anyhow, the scrap heap isn't too full anymore, but who knows what other players will be released in the next 2 weeks here that we could use to fill out or terribly thinning ranks.

Astros Farm System Question #1- How Many Express Arms Will Make it to MMP?

farm_stros — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 23:11:41 -0000

The lack of talent in the Astros system has been well-documented. However, one source of hope at least for this season is the AAA pitching corps.

Heading out of Spring Training in 2008, the Astros had basically no chance of receiving any help by calling a young arm up from their AAA affiliate, Round Rock. By season's end, call-ups Jack Cassel and Fernando Nieve combined for only one win, pitching 41 innings in 20 appearances between them.

In contrast to last year's minimal production by call-ups and the bleak picture painted by most concerning the Astros minor league system in general, there is hope for improvement in the area of young arms at the highest minor league level this Spring.

The improvement begins with Bud Norris, who spent last season in Corpus Christi. He also participated in the Arizona Fall League. His 2008 was good enough that he received a major league training camp invite and has a chance to leave Florida with the big club most likely as a reliever.

After Norris, Felipe Paulino and Fernando Nieve are next in line. Both pitchers struggled with injuries in 2008. However, if they are healthy, they could contribute to the big club.

Another arm to look for getting a few starts in 2009 is Polin Trinidad. Trinidad, a lefty, split 2008 between Salem and Corpus Christi. It will be interesting to see if he starts at Corpus or Round Rock. My guess is Corpus. If the big league rotation struggles or is injured, Trinidad could get a chance to contribute. From all I've read, he is not overpowering, but he is crafty enough to get outs.

Chris Blazek and Sammy Gervacio look to be ticketed for the Round Rock bullpen this Spring. However, the lefty and righty have high K/BB numbers and could fill in the Astros bullpen as the year progresses. This is more likely for Gervacio since he is on the 40-man roster and the Astros already have two lefties in the bullpen in Wesley Wright and Tim Byrdak, not to mention Rule 5 draftee Gilbert de La Vara.

Longshots to contribute at the top level include Brad James and Josh Muecke. James pitched in Corpus in '08 missing some time to injury. Muecke was the most reliable starter at Round Rock. However, he faded as the season wore on. I have heard him mentioned as a possible bullpen candidate, although he has been mainly a starter in the minors.

With as many as eight candidates, the traffic of pitchers on Highway 71 between Houston and Austin this baseball season looks to be more active and productive than last.

Sutton hits game winning homer in Astros intra squad game

clack — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 14:06:41 -0000

OK, it's pretty lame to highlight performance in intra squad games, but we don't even have real spring training games to discuss (until later today anyway). And I have to admit that I am pulling for Drew Sutton, the Astros' AA second baseman. He showed good offfensive ability for a middle infielder last season, and you hope he can exhibit that ability this spring.

Rule 5 draftee Palmisano, RFer Pence, and defensive outfield whiz Yordany Ramirez also hit HRs. Cooper liked it:

"The kids all looked pretty good," the skipper said. "It shows me Sutton can swing it, and you know Hunter can swing it. We saw some great swings today. Yordany had a great swing and hit a ball and showed tremendous speed and athletic ability. It was a good day."

In a comment on the Ankiel - Bogusevic comparison the other day, I mentioned "the yips," which ended Ankiel's pitching career. Brad James mentioned the dreaded "yips" in describing his performance in the spring so far. Apparently he is having trouble getting the ball around the plate.

"It's hard to pitch to your own teammates," James said. "I don't want to hit someone, and then you start thinking too much, and then, obviously, I hit someone. It's like I'm scared of hitters. Instead of throwing to the catcher, I'm trying to throw away from the hitter."

Cooper is working with the young players, trying to talk them through issues like this. Hopefully, James can get through this soon.

Baseball Prospectus looks at the 11 best Astro farm hands

DyingQuail — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 17:37:50 -0000

The list, by Kevin Goldstein, of Baseball Prospectus (full article here):

1. Jason Castro, C
Three-Star Prospects
2. Brian Bogusevic, CF
3. Jordan Lyles, RHP
4. Bud Norris, RHP
5. Chris Johnson, 3B
6. Ross Seaton, RHP
Two-Star Prospects
7. Samuel Gervacio, RHP
8. Drew Sutton, 2B
9. Felipe Paulino, RHP
10. Chia-Jen Lo, RHP
11. Jay Austin, CF

I'll give you a hearty paraphrase from the article of the top three, but I encourage anyone who wants to read some top notch commentary like this (not to mention their array of proprietary stats and PECOTA projections), to consider getting an early Christmas present of a BPro subscription.

1) Castro: Goldstein notes that the good news about Castro is, "he's a good hitter who has a patient approach and a quick bat, with gap power to all fields. A solid defender with a plus arm," but the bad news is, "but he needs to improve his footwork behind the plate." So not a lot of bad. After Goldstein derided Castro's drafting, at the time, it seems that Castro has erased doubts in the more sabermetrically oriented scouting community. He's wasn't given an ETA, but we were warned to hold his numbers next year at High-A in context because it's a power inflationary park.

2) Boguesevic: Goldstein was very, very praiseworthy of Boggie, "He has a quick, quiet swing, with gap power that many believe will increase based on what they saw from his Tulane days. Once a burner, he's now a slightly above-average runner who plays a solid center field with an above-average arm." I mean, that's saying a lot; Goldstein also went into a lengthy discussion of Boggie's transition and how easy seems to have been. Boggie get's an ETA of sometime in 2009 -- Michael Bourn, get busy or get out.

3) Lyles: This is the guy I was most interested in reading about, because no one really knew about him on draft day. Goldstein's "the good" was very positive, "His fastball sits at an average velocity of 89-91 mph right now, and projects for plus, and he also has some feel for a curve and a changeup. His easily repeatable mechanics make for above-average command and control." The bad, was of course that he's a high-school pitching prospect, and this is the organization that coined the phrase, "TINSTAAP" (there is no such thing as a pitching prospect). Apparently the Astros are going to throw Lyles to the wolves at Low-A next year because we're taking an organizational approach to be more aggressive with our young arms. Goldstein, with the qualifier that's really too early to tell much, that Lyles should turn out to be a mid-rotation starter in a perfect world.

Interesting notes on some of the players (this was really hard to do, Goldstein just has so much insight to offer):

On Johnson:

He has excellent instincts at third base, with above-average range, soft hands, and one of the system's better infield arms.

On Seaton:

Seaton will join Lyles at Low-A Lexington, making the Legends rotation one to watch in 2009.

On Sutton:

"He'll begin the year at Triple-A, and because of the contract situations at the big-league level, chances are good that he'll start his career as a utility player."

Goldstien's final thoughts on the state of the Astros farm system:

The Astros system is one of the worst in baseball, but the addition of Bobby Heck from Milwaukee to head the scouting department and an intriguing 2008 draft gives reason for hope. True impact help from the system, however, is going to take years.

Finally, here's a link to a great interview on BPro radio with Bobby Heck providing additional insight our Top 11 prospect.