I wanted to know what you guys thought of my argument on yet another stats v scouts propaganda instigated by Silva.

If any holes or inconsistencies are found can you guys point em out for me?  I try to be as succinct as possible in real life situations when this comes up and i can always use the help of AA.  My argument follows

I truly wish you could have an argument with the likes of Quine, Putnam or Hempel because your reasoning is laughable. Effort, work ethic, game savvy are all accidental generalizations that almost appeal to an authority and are not falsifiable which turns this into a Creationism vs Darwinian theory argument.

We will NEVER find the “perfect” statistic much like Quantum Mechanics may one day be falsified like Aristotilian Physics and Newtonian Mechanics.

For a few years win shares was a big one, then VORP, now WAR. Each one albeit imperfect was a MASSIVE upgrade over W/L, Saves, Errors etc which at one time were very useful in gauging player evaluation. The SABRmetric community is attempting to progress and understand baseball better while willingly admitting and discarding out-dated or flawed statistics. Why are some people SO fearful of progress?

I don’t believe WAR is the unified theory of baseball evaluation due to the relatively strong arguments against UZR and +/-. I agree a run saved against a run created can be equal (and there are strong arguments saying a run saved can be more important) but we can’t take these advanced defensive stats in isolation, they play into the entire picture.

Also, the SABRmetric community EMBRACES the scouting aspect of baseball as shown by explosion of Pitchfx. Go to amazinavenue.com or fangraphs and at least once or twice a week a thread is created discussing certain players pitch location and stuff for the game and in regards to the playoffs on fangraphs each Burnett start was broken down by pitchfx.

Finally, the Dan Murphy argument is the ultimate straw man. You create some blanket statement with zero research. UZR is a statistic that the creators emphasize is best utilized on a three year sample size. Murphy played about 2/3rds of a season at 1B and prima facie looked pretty good over there. It is a mild indicator of future success at 1B but were he to turn into Giambi, nobody would be surprised.

with many of the moves already proposed by many here (Harang, Polanco/Kennedy, Holliday)I felt I'd take a different stab at it looking towards 2011 and how to maximize our potential then.

Back-loading contracts wasn't allowed in the plan, but I do not see why lowering payroll in 2010 to around 95-100 million couldn't allow us for maybe 160 or higher payroll in 2011.

Thus my first move would be to work on shedding salary for players that won't be necessary for 2011 those being:

Francisco Rodriguez: 3 years/$37M (2009-11), plus 2012 option at 17.5 which will definitely vest.

Cubs: With all the talk of Castillo to the Cubs, and their problems at the back of the pen I would trade Frankie for Bradley rather than Castillo.  We take 2 years off the books, and I'd ask the Cubs to pay 4 million of his 2011 contract making it an 8 million dollar deal.  Were the Cubs leery of paying 33 million for BB-Rod from 2011-2012 I'd attempt make a flyer at one other team.

Astros: With Valverde leaving, and Mcclane never one to capitulate I'd ask for Bourn at first, but most likely being rejected I'd ask for JR Towles both of them making around 500K.  If both of these offers are rejected I'd go back to the Cubs asking BB-Rod for Bradley straight up which should get done.

This has a max savings for 2010 and 2011 of up to 22 million and if we take Bradley's entire contract we save about 3 in those two years, but have a lot more payroll flexibility going forward.

This can be done because BB-Rod still does have some value around MLB, he is still a pretty good reliever and may bounce back next year, unfortunately he is vastly overpaid constraining our 2011 splash.

Jeff Francoeur of  Non-tender saving us 3.4 mm

this is the one I hated doing but, it had to be done for this post to make any sense:

Carlos Beltran of
7 years/$119M (2005-11)

He is making 37 million from 2010-2011.  He will most likely be at least worth that much, and possibly a lot more.  The only team I can think of right now that may be interested is the Bosox.  Initially i'd ask for Bowden AND Bard but, I do not see Theo trading all those controllable years of pitchers for 2 years of an aging Beltran, but Beltran for Bowden straight up would get it done.

Pedro Feliciano lhp1 year/$1.6125M (2009)

Another one I would hate to let go of, but still being cheap and having a damn good 2009, Pedro has decent value.  I also worry that his prima facie stats (4 era 1.5 WHIP) may creep back in 2010 lowering his value.  Offer him to the Phils.  Or I'd offer him along with Nieuwenhuis for Brandon Wood with the hope that Wood can play 2B.

Luis Castillo 2b
4 years/$25M (2008-11)

Whoever will take him and and we will send 4 million.

This is what my hopeful line-up would be for 2010

C: Towles/Thole

1B: Murphy/Evans

2B: Wood

SS: Reyes

3B: Wright

CF: Pagan

LF:Bring back Willy Mo for 1/600k, and see if he can at least get some homers and trade him at the dead-line

RF: Kearns/Jenkins/Hinske whichever one would take the cheapest contract probably around 1/2 million

or

RF: Bradley

Bench:

Evans/Murphy

Towles

Joey Gathright

Counsell/Loretta/Aurilia at vet minimum

Nick Green at vet minimum

SP: Johan/Pelf/Bowden/Ollie then Nieve/Niese/Maine battle for 5th spots

BP: Green/Parnell/Misch/Robertson/Kelvim Escobar as a reclamation project/Stokes/Figgy

Taking Bradley's full contract and we get our 2010 payroll down to about 100 million.  With the money saved it will be used to re-sign Jose if he comes back healthy.  By the blessing of the Elusian gods hopefully one of Beckett/Halladay/Lee makes it to FA.   Beckett i'd do 5/85 Halladay 4/70 and Lee 4/70.  If we gotta raise Becks up to 90 or lee and halladay up to 75 then we make that move.

Our last order of business would be to sacrifice many a chicken in the hopes that Mauer makes it to FA.  Give him whatever he wants 8/180-190 if it takes that much.

A 2011 rotation of Santana/Big FA/Pelfrey/Bowden with Niese/Holt/ and Mejia looks pretty damn strong along with a core of

Reyes/Mauer/Wright/Wood/F! along with tejada thole evans and murph.

I understand a TON needs to fall right for those 2011 guys to make it to FA.  But, if a plan like this is made clear by management I would be willing to accept it much like I have with the Knicks.  Yes, there is a TON of speculation in this fanpost and I could have done more with filling in the 2011 team and figuring out the payroll, but that is way too much effort for me right now.  Pretty much, I just wanted to have fun with this and litmus test AA to see if the community would go along with a one year rebuild.