SB Nation - Chris Bootcheck

Wednesday's Frosty Mug

KLSnow — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 13:40:04 -0000

More photos » by David Zalubowski - AP

I'm hoping we'll have a picture of Rick Peterson without a Mets hat soon.

Some things to read while earning your cat-holding privileges.

The Brewers made Rick Peterson's hiring official yesterday, and he immediately turned his sights to Yovani Gallardo and Manny Parra.

Peterson also tweeted about his new gig, and was welcomed into the fold by Seth McClung (more on McClung later today). Miller Park Drunk also welcomed Peterson, and started him off with a cheat sheet on Brewer pitchers.

Now, perhaps the Brewers will get started on the task of acquiring some pitchers for Peterson to coach. Dave Cameron of USS Mariner has the Brewers trading J.J. Hardy to the M's for Brandon Morrow, and Matthew Pouliot of Circling the Bases has a hypothetical trade sending Prince Fielder to the Red Sox for Jacoby Ellsbury and Michael Bowden. Meanwhile, over in Speculationville, Roguejim wonders if J.J. Hardy might be a fit for the Pirates.

Could Jody Gerut end up as a bargaining chip in a trade? Amazin' Avenue lists him as a player who may be undervalued this winter due to a low BABIP in 2009. Gerut posted a .230/.279/.376 line last season, but hit a much more respectable .272/.341/.447 in August and September.

Wherever pitching help might come from, there doesn't appear to be much of it on the horizon in the minors. Baseball America has their final minor league pitching leaderboards up, and the only Brewer mentioned (Evan Frederickson) is among the leaders in a category you don't want to lead (walks allowed). Frederickson, a sandwich pick in the 2008 draft, walked 82 batters in 97.1 innings for Wisconsin this season, and has posted a 5.22 ERA in the minors.

Perhaps Josh Butler will be the exception, though: After playing all over the minors and in the majors this season, Butler is blogging from the AFL (FanShot) His first post covers his wild season, AFL teammates, food and weather.

We've covered the list of reasons why Felipe Lopez should be offered arbitration and the opportunity to return, but Miller Park Drunk has the counterpoint: the list of reasons why Lopez doesn't fit into the Brewers' plans and will almost certainly not be back.

Around baseball:

Braves: Pitchers Buddy Carlyle, Jorge Campillo and Vladimir Nunez have been removed from the 40-man roster and will become free agents. (h/t Rowland's Office)
Mets: Released reliever Ken Takahashi.
Pirates: Reliever Chris Bootcheck rejected an outright assignment and is now a free agent.

Because of the arbitrary nature of the cutoff line for Super 2 players, there's good news for the Diamondbacks and bad news for the Giants today. Slugger Mark Reynolds fell three days short of the service time required to be a Super 2, will not be arbitration eligible and will remain under team control for four more seasons. Tim Lincecum, on the other hand, was over the cutoff by about a week and will be arbitration eligible this offseason.

Three managerial vacancies remain, but at least one team has eliminated Ned Yost from contention: The Indians are believed to be conducting second interviews with four candidates, but Yost is not one of them. Manny Acta is the only finalist for the Indians' job that is also a candidate for the Astros' job.

Over the last few seasons, baseball has shifted heavily toward emphasizing young players and prospects, but here's a reminder on the importance of not looking too far ahead: Lookout Landing has a list of 44 players who appeared for the Mariners in 2008. Less than two full years later, only ten of them are still with the organization. Things can change pretty fast.

Livan Hernandez spent the end of the 2009 season with the Nationals, and despite the fact that he's long past the prime of his career, he'll likely be looking for work again this offseason, because he needs the paycheck. Hernandez reportedly has serious financial issues that could lead to the foreclosure of his home in Miami.

Unfortunately, despite the fact that the postseason has had some pretty exciting games and interesting storylines, the top story once again is terrible umpiring, and a call Big League Stew is calling "the worst call of all time." I keep hoping that maybe, someday, Major League Baseball will be shamed into action on this issue, and do something to either correct inept umpires or put effective umpires in their place. It's likely a pipe dream.

I've spent a fair amount of time lately discussing the Arizona Fall League, partly because there's not much baseball being played lately but also because I find it fascinating. If you're having a hard time getting into it, maybe you should check out Geoff Young's look back at the 2001 AFL, which featured a bunch of future productive major leaguers...and Bill Hall.

Speaking of prospects and development, Derrick Goold has a nice conversation starter about age as it relates to prospects, and when one becomes too old to be considered one (h/t BBTF). In last year's Community Prospect Rankings, we ranked a couple of older players (Brad Nelson and Tim Dillard), and I'm guessing Adam Heether might sneak into this year's list as well.

Finally, this link isn't really baseball related, but I'm dropping it in today because I think it's important, and if you or someone you know coaches youth or high school sports I hope you'll read it: Driveline Mechanics has a look at overtraining in high school sports and its consequences.

Happy birthday today to Gabe Gross, who posted a .797 OPS over 2+ seasons as a Brewer and turns 30 today, and to Franklin Stubbs, who was virtually worthless as a Brewer and turns 49.

Drink up.

Pirates Dump Denny Bautista, Craig Hansen, Chris Bootcheck

Charlie — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 21:22:23 -0000

They're all off the 40-man.

Sorry there's no picture for this post; the only photos that come up in SB Nation's widget when you search for these players' names are shots of hitters homering off them.

Bautista and Bootcheck are no surprise. The big news here is the removal of Hansen, who was one of four players acquired in the Jason Bay deal. Hansen has a nerve disorder that could take years to heal, which is bad enough, but there's also the fact that he was hardly a reliably great pitcher even before that was diagnosed. Perhaps he'll wind up back in the Pirates' minor league system, but they were probably wise to take him off the roster.

These moves should allow the Pirates to move Jose Ascanio and Evan Meek from the 60-day DL back to the 40-man roster. (Hansen was already on the 60-day DL and was not occupying a roster spot; the same is true for Tyler Yates, though I can't imagine he'll be protected.)

Dodgers Look To Plunder Their Way To Postseason

Eric Stephen — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 19:00:25 -0000

More photos » by Don Wright - AP

The Pirates' record run of futility has led to some light crowds at PNC Park.

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The Dodgers handed one opponent their 100th loss on the season by beating the Nationals last night, but they won't get the opportunity to do the same to Pittsburgh. The Pirates are 56-95 heading into the four-game series at PNC Park starting tonight. The Dodgers are close to clinching both a playoff spot and the division, and are facing a team in a complete tailspin in these Pittsburgh Pirates:

The Pirates have lost six straight games, and 23 out of their last 26, the Pirates' worst streak since 1890. No other team has had a 26-game run that bad this season.
The Pirates have also lost 42 of their last 55 games. No other team has had a 55-game run that bad this season.
They have also lost 55 of their last 75 games. No other team has had a 75-game run that bad this season.
Since the All-Star break, the Pirates have been outscored by 126 runs. That is two runs per game!
The Pirates are more respectable at home, with a 37-40 record on the season, but they are even struggling at PNC Park too, losing 21 of their last 30 home games
If Rodney Dangerfield played the Pirates, he would get respect.

The Dodgers have won 46 of their last 60 against the Pirates, included 26-6 in their last 32 games at PNC Park.

Jon Garland has pitched well as a Dodger so far (2.33 ERA, 3.97 FIP, 4.16 x-FIP in four starts), but take a look at the opponents he has faced:

Opponent	Frequency	OPS+ (NL Rank)
Arizona	twice	90 (13th of 16)
Pittsburgh	once	89 (14th of 16)
San Francisco	once	82 (15th of 16)

Its not Garland's fault that he has had such an easy schedule. After all, all you can do is play the teams on your schedule. The schedule is determined by Major League Baseball, not by Bill Snyder. However, a look at Garland's Dodger schedule makes it seem like he's the new guy at the office, the owner's son with the corner office and no real responsibility. To Garland's credit, he has pitched six innings or longer in 20 of his last 21 starts, with a 3.32 ERA and 4.23 FIP during that span.

If you are looking for strikeouts, tonight might not be your night. There are 139 pitchers that have thrown at least 90 innings this season. Here are how tonight's starting pitchers stack up in the strikeout department:

Pitcher	K/9	NL Rank
Jon Garland	4.58	125th (of 139)
Jeff Karstens	4.42	133rd (of 139)

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette beat writer extraordinaire Dejan Kovacevic noted the Pirates are "hoping to get 4-5 innings out of Karstens. After that, [manager John Russell] will choose from Donnie Veal, Denny Bautista, Steven Jackson, Chris Bootcheck or Eric Hacker." Karstens hasn't started a game since June 5, but has a 5.83 ERA and 4.91 FIP in 26 relief appearances since then. Opposing batters are hitting .276/.351/.483 off Karstens this season, or in other words, the league is Hunter Pence against him.

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Today's scoreboard watching

4:05 pm
Braves (Javier Vazquez: 14-9, 2.77 FIP) at Nationals (John Lannan: 9-12, 4.83 FIP)

The Dodgers can clinch a playoff spot today with a win OR a loss by Atlanta

5:10 pm
Cardinals (Chris Carpenter: 16-4, 2.80 FIP) at Rockies (Aaron Cook: 10-6, 4.66 FIP)

The Dodgers' magic number to clinch the NL West is three. Aaron Cook returns from the disabled list to make his first start since August 21.

**********

Check out Xeifrank's simulation of today's game here.

Don't forget to RSVP for True Blue LA Day at Dodger Stadium, on the next-to-last day of the regular season, October 3 against the Rockies.

Get your guesses in for our today's "One, Two, Three Strikes, You're Out," here.

Game Time: 4:05pm

TV: Prime Ticket

Baseball Reference Preview

2009 In Review: Indianapolis Indians

Charlie — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 22:18:32 -0000

More photos » by David Zalubowski - AP

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This will undoubtedly be the most controversial of the minor league reviews I've written, because it involves perhaps the two most controversial Pirates right now, Garrett Jones and Neil Walker.

A note before we begin: I believe minor league stats matter, and I believe minor league stats, and particularly AAA stats, are very valuable tools. See here for a good primer on Minor League Equivalencies, which Bill James showed closely approximate major league statistics. I also believe that what you did over the last month generally matters a lot less than what you did over the past two or three years.

Let's begin by comparing the Indianapolis statistics of two players:

Andrew McCutchen: .303/.361/.493

Garrett Jones: .307/.348/.502

These are very similar numbers, and yet my attitudes toward these three players throughout the season were very different. I loved McCutchen, but was actively hostile to Jones.

Neither of these lines look particularly good in translation. For example, if you adjust Jones' AAA numbers to Pittsburgh, you get .259/.295/.410, which is pathetic. (Remember, that's not a prediction of what he'd do in Pittsburgh, it's a translation of what he actually did.)

Of course, translating minor league numbers to the majors often makes players look pathetic. The reason they're in the minor leagues in the first place, at least in theory, is that they aren't good enough to play in the majors yet, so it's only natural that translating their numbers would make them look bad.

The reasons why I clamored for McCutchen and not for Jones, then, are twofold. First, McCutchen is 22 and Jones is 28. Players generally improve until they are about 27 or so, and then they start to go downhill. So there was good reason to think that McCutchen might actually outplay his equivalency as he improved throughout the year (which is, in fact, what happened); there was no reason to think Jones would do so, at least not judging from his numbers. Also, McCutchen is an outstanding defensive player, whereas Jones has no real defensive value. McCutchen can post a .750 OPS and still be valuable, whereas Jones can't.

Obviously, Jones, who has hit .301/.366/.607 for the Pirates so far, has exceeded any reasonable expectation. But why did it happen? It's not like the equivalency was "wrong"; remember, the equivalency is a translation, not a prediction, and the existence of outliers like Jones doesn't disprove it. He's hit for a higher OPS in the majors than he ever did at any minor league level, which is really strange given how old Jones is. Possible explanations:

1) Genuine improvement. At this point, this explanation deserves some attention, since 19 homers in 239 at bats are very hard to explain away.

2) "He learned it on the plane." I'm copping the title from a message board poster many years ago who was trying to understand why Tike Redman hit so well after being promoted in 2003. There was nothing in Redman's minor league history to suggest that he really was the sparkplug he briefly seemed to be in the majors, so the opinion of this poster was that if Redman had learned anything that caused his great half season in 2003, he must have learned it on the plane from Class AAA Nashville. Of course, Redman hadn't learned anything on the plane, which was exactly the point--his 2003 performance was a huge fluke. A complete fluke isn't as likely for Jones as it was for Redman, whose excellent half-season was driven mostly by batting average. But it's certainly worthy of consideration. For example, Jones' major league equivalency suggests he would have been a .259 hitter if his stint in Indianapolis had actually been in Pittsburgh. If he'd hit .259 in Pittsburgh but generally retained his power, that would make a lot more sense to me given his minor league profile.

At this point, the smart money has to be on a blend of "genuine improvement" and "he learned it on the plane." This isn't so bad for Jones, but I do think the Pirates should probably pencil him into the lineup next year rather than writing that name in ink. Besides, even if his hitting for the Pirates this year has mostly been legitimate, players who develop late often have very short peaks.

We should also be wary of Neil Walker, who has parlayed one great month at AAA in two years there into a big league callup. Walker's profile, going back years and including his terrible .311 OBP at Indianapolis this year, suggests he has no idea how to control the strike zone, and big league pitchers will have little trouble exploiting him. He does have legitimate power, with 47 extra base hits at Indy, but not so much that he's worth the effort. He currently compares unfavorably to players like Tony Batista or Pedro Feliz, who both play good third base defense and have excellent power but frustrate their teams with .250 batting averages and .290 OBPs. Walker currently has less power than either of them, so he should stay in the minors for now. The fact that Andy LaRoche isn't exactly tearing the cover off the ball is neither here nor there; he's very probably a better player than Walker right now, and Walker needs to prove, at the very least, that his terrific August represented real improvement rather than simply one great month.

In the second half of the year, Indianapolis' lineup also featured Jose Tabata (who did what he does, hitting for average and little else) and Jeff Clement, who tailed off badly after a strong start after coming to the Bucs in the Jack Wilson deal.

Indianapolis' best pitcher was... well, actually, it was Tom Gorzelanny, who had already exhausted the Pirates' patience and is gone now. After that, it was Daniel McCutchen. No Relation pitched well enough to overcome some rather glaring issues with flyballs, and earned a spot in the Pirates' rotation, where his flyball issues quickly reared their ugly head--he's allowed three homers in his first two starts, although he's pitched pretty well otherwise. Elsewhere, Brad Lincoln took some time to adjust to AAA after a great start at Altoona, and he finished his season with two great AAA starts. Virgil Vasquez, meanwhile, pitched like the decent AAA pitcher he is. The best pitcher out of the bullpen was Chris Bootcheck, who mowed down International League hitters before running into a wall in the majors.

Bucs Promote Diaz, Bixler, Karstens, Hacker, Veal

Charlie — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 00:07:22 -0000

More photos » by David Zalubowski - AP

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The Pirates will promote catcher Robinzon Diaz, infielder Brian Bixler, and pitchers Jeff Karstens, Eric Hacker and Donald Veal in time for the game tomorrow.

With rosters expanded and Indianapolis' season now over, the promotions of Diaz, Karstens and Veal were no-brainers. Diaz played fairly well in an extended stint with the Pirates earlier this season and only got sent down in a roster crunch. Karstens pitched very well in Indy and was just there to rehab a back injury anyway. And Veal hopefully won't pitch much with the Pirates, but he's a Rule 5 pick.

Bixler's just a disaster and I wouldn't be upset if he never played for the Pirates again, but here he is. Hacker isn't very good, but at least he can start and therefore has the requisite smidgen of upside that all mediocre starting pitching prospects have until they're tried in the bullpen. I'd bet on major league hitters tearing him apart, but with several batting practice pitchers in the bullpen already (Chris Bootcheck, Steven Jackson, Virgil Vasquez, Denny Bautista, Phil Dumatrait), I suppose it can't hurt to give Hacker a handful of innings.

Pirates Promote Chris Bootcheck

Charlie — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 01:02:46 -0000

Hey all, just checking in here from Utah. Regular updates will resume Monday. In the meantime, I'll address a couple bits of news:

The Pirates have placed Donnie Veal on the DL and have promoted Chris Bootcheck. It's nice to see Bootcheck, who's persevered through years in the minors, get a shot he deserves after striking out 55 batters in 42.7 innings at AAA. The Donnie Veal saga, though, just goes on and on. He's now only thrown 24 innings in a season he could have spent developing. I continue to fail to understand the point of the Pirates keeping him around. It can't be helping him, and it probably won't help them, either.

Also, the Bucs have signed their 4th-round draft pick Zackry Dodson. Dodson wasn't near the top of my list of the best arms the Pirates drafted this year, but he'll be another good addition to a system suddenly bursting with interesting teenage pitchers.

Speaking of pitching prospects, lost of the Pirates' recent acquisitions have pitched well in their most recent starts, including Tim Alderson, Nathan Adcock, Brett Lorin and Casey Erickson. Erickson--acquired in the all-Eric trade involving Eric Hinske--is a good candidate for a late-season promotion, as he now has a 1.81 ERA and three times more groundouts than flyball outs in 64 Class A innings this year.

News Roundup: Relief Shuffle

Charlie — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 06:24:07 -0000

Thanks to everyone for keeping up with things in the diaries. I spent the weekend in DC where I didn't use a computer for almost three days, so that was wonderful. But updates should be regular this week.

-P- As poorboywilly recently noted, the Pirates have placed Donnie Veal on the DL with a "groin strain" that will surely take the maximum amount of minor league time to rehabilitate. The Post-Gazette reports that new acquisition Steven Jackson will likely join the roster today, and that someone else, perhaps Chris Bootcheck, will join the roster later in the week so that Tom Gorzelanny can be sent back down to continue starting. Neal Huntington describes the Veal move as "admittedly an aggressive placement on the DL," which is unusually honest for him, and unusually brazen. He's pretty much admitting he's flaunting the rules that allow the Bucs to keep Veal in the minors to "rehab" his injury, despite Veal's being a Rule 5 pick. Not that I mind; this is exactly what Huntington should do. I'm just not sure why he's admitting it.

-P- The same article notes quotes Huntington saying that "Some of our defensive metrics right now have Nyjer Morgan as the best outfielder in baseball." I'm not sure what internal defensive metrics the Pirates have, but it's not just them. Morgan actually has the highest UZR of any player--not outfielder, but player--in baseball right now. UZR has him at +11.8 runs, which pretty much cancels out any offensive shortcomings you'd care to name. (Say what you want about his sparkpluginess, but a .702 OPS generally doesn't get it done for a corner outfielder.) The best defensive corner outfielder by UZR last year was Carl Crawford, who finished at 19.6 runs.

I know speed is an extremely important factor in good outfield defense, and Morgan has always had plenty of that. But I've been very pleasantly surprised at the way he's become more than just a burner out there. He's played left very intelligently this year, and it's hard to remember instances in which he looked raw. Last year, it seemed like there was one of those every game. Morgan deserves some major credit for really learning things at a relatively late baseball age.

-P- I got to listen the Friday and Sunday games this weekend on satellite radio, and while they were mostly pretty dreary (you can add Edwin Maysonet to the list of anono-bots sent by evil forces to kill the Pirates), it was interesting to hear that Andy LaRoche was batting second. Based on what he's done so far--he had a .379 OBP before today--that's a really good spot for him. Craig Monroe batting cleanup, though?

-P- Jim Tracy is the Rockies' interim manager now.

Wednesday's Frosty Mug

KLSnow — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 15:42:50 -0000

Some things to read while wondering how much rice one could get for Mike Cameron.

Obviously, the Cameron trade is still a hot topic around here: As of this writing, we've already had 344 comments on an astonishing nine posts since Thursday discussing the topic. (UPDATE: It's actually more like 425 and eleven posts, as I missed two FanShots.)With that said, Jeff brought a new point to the table last night, and even if you're completely sick of the conversation, you should go read it for the insight on the unique economic plight caused by a $200 million payroll.

View From Bernie's Chalet notes that the financial flexibility gained from a Cameron trade would allow the Brewers to continue to pursue Brian Fuentes. That argument works if all of the following is true:

1) The savings on Cameron won't be immediately handed to Kei Igawa.
2) The improvement created by adding Fuentes to the bullpen is greater than the loss created by replacing Cameron with Cabrera in center field.
3) Fuentes won't sign with any of a half dozen other teams that are reportedly interested in him, including the Yankees.

Meanwhile, it's possible the Yankees are pursuing Manny Ramirez, which might force them to move Johnny Damon or Hideki Matsui back to center and leave them without a place to play Cameron. It is about the money, stupid isn't thrilled with that premise.

Also, rumor has it Mark Teixiera is getting close to making a decision. If he signs with the Red Sox, Brewed Sports thinks it will set off a series of moves ending with J.J. Hardy in Boston and Mike Lowell and Manny Delcarmen in Milwaukee.

Three minor league notes to pass along today:

The Baseball America Prospect Blog has started a project to evaluate catcher defense. Click the link to see how close Jonathan Lucroy is to the top and how close Angel Salome is to the bottom in caught stealing percentage.
Project Prospect has Alcides Escobar #1 over Mat Gamel on their list of top five Brewer prospects.
2008 Brevard County Manatees Stephen Chapman, Taylor Green, Brent Brewer and Charlie Fermaint were all among the leaders in errors in high A ball.

Gabe Kapler's play in Los Angeles was voted This Year in Baseball's top play for 2008, with over 12 million voters weighing in. There's video of the play at the link.

On the hot stove:

Cardinals: The team is one of several talking to Brian Fuentes, and may also be interested in Takashi Saito, Kenshin Kawakami and Koji Uehara.
D-Backs: CEO Jeff Moorad chatted with fans Tuesday and made it sound like the team is still in the market for a fourth starter.
Mets: Are treating newly acquired reliever J.J. Putz as a one-year acquisition, despite his $9.3 million club option for 2010.
Pirates: Signed reliever Chris Bootcheck to a minor league deal.
Tigers: May be getting ready to sign Matt Treanor, who has a history with Dontrelle Willis.

Also, this isn't team specific, but does relate to a free agent: Rocco Baldelli's diagnosis with a mitochondrial disorder may have been incorrect, and his condition may actually be treatable. That could raise his value a fair amount.

In an era where baseball seems to be spreading across the globe, it's weird to have two stories on the same day going in the other direction: the Astros are closing their academy in Venezuela (h/t Crawfish Boxes) and Major League Baseball is ending its affiliation with Hawaii Winter Baseball.

Hope springs eternal...except in Seattle. Washington is the only state in a recent ESPN poll voting that their favorite MLB team won't compete in 2009.

Oh, and what if this whole oil thing had gone the other way?

Drink up.