SB Nation User Blog: Torgen

Fun with the 09 schedule

Torgen — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 18:24:42 -0000

The '09 schedule is out, so let's take a look.

Interleague: We visit Atlanta in the middle of a 9 game road trip during the May preview. In June we host the Marlins and the Reds, visit the Nats, and have a home-and-home with the Phils.
Division Rivals: We don't play Tampa until June 29th, meaning they're the Canada Day game (at home!). We have 2 home weekend series with Boston and one with NY, the latter being a 4 gamer.
West coast swings: a 5 gamer in May and a 6 gamer from the end of July to the start of August. We only play 2 games in Anaheim. Both the Oakland series are on the weekends, which is a pain for me personally because I can easily go to those games whenever they are in the week, but I can't go elsewhere on the west coast for weekday games.
The stretch: We host Baltimore and Seattle for 7 total on the last homestand of the season before going on the road for 6 in Boston and Baltimore.
Off days: April 20, May 11 (travel day), 28, June 1, 15, 22, July 2, 13-16 (ASB), 20, 30, August 3 (travel day), 6, 13, 17, 27, September 17, October 1.
Home opener: 4 games against Detroit, April 6-9. Nice choice, putting the opener in a weatherproof stadium.

RISP

Torgen — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 06:20:05 -0000

We all know about the team's poor performance with RISP, to the order of a .234 AVG (although perhaps we didn't notice our opponents' even worse performance, a mere .225). But who's really to blame?

Limiting our view to just the regulars, we get:

Player	AVG w/ RISP	WPA
Eckstein	.340	-0.92
Barajas	.282	0.03
Wells	.265	-0.42
Wilkerson	.265	-0.29
Scutaro	.259	-0.90
Hill	.255	-1.04
Zaun	.225	-0.01
Rios	.215	-0.25
Stewart	.211	-0.85
Inglett	.208	0.50
Stairs	.205	-1.03
Thomas	.200	0.02
McDonald	.200	-0.12
Mench	.188	-0.65
Rolen	.186	-0.30
Overbay	.180	-0.43

Some interesting stuff in there. For example, on Sunday Wells got booed for popping up with the bases loaded and two out, when he's actually been one of the best on the team. Also fun is that Eckstein has 17 RISP hits but only 16 RISP RBIs.

Jays close to adding Eckstein?

Torgen — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 16:29:25 -0000

According to (among other things) http://toronto.bluejays.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20071213&content_id=2324652&vkey=news_t or&fext=.jsp&c_id=tor, the jays are close to a deal with Eckstein. No terms given.

Obviously David X would replace the PMoD as starting shortstop. Well, unless some kind of Royce Clayton thing happened. If we add X, does that mean we're done with Sparky?

Hill got Hitched

Torgen — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 09:22:03 -0000

According to the Fresno Bee, Aaron Hill married Elisabeth Kenfield over the weekend in Monterey.

Interestingly, this was a footnote to a story about MRSA prevention in Visalia schools: http://www.fresnobee.com/columnists/griswold/story/193768.html

Stairs: 2 years, 3.25M total

Torgen — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 20:00:29 -0000

http://www.cbc.ca/sports/baseball/story/2007/11/02/jays-stairs.html

If Johnny Mac is going to be an everyday player at his salary, then I'm guessing Stairs will be too.

2008 tentative home schedule is out

Torgen — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 09:45:13 -0000

and it's pretty bad, although not "no weekend home series vs. Red Sox or Yankees" bad. The Jays have 3 wraparound series, all in the first two months. Also, the Jays only face the Rangers twice at home, although considering how they seem to have our number, maybe that's a blessing in disguise.

An interesting feature is that Monday September 22nd is an off day between home series (vs. the Red Sox and Yankees). Hopefully that won't get used for a one game road trip to make out a game rained out elsewhere, because an off day at home that's not a travel day should be highly beneficial. Also, it comes in the middle of a 9 game homestand.

Gibbons to return next year

Torgen — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 18:58:21 -0000

http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Baseball/MLB/Toronto/2007/09/14/4496273-sun.html

Was J.P. watching Halladay's September starts the last two years? The answer is clearly no.

Griffin says Moneyball is over

Torgen — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 18:01:13 -0000

http://www.thestar.com/Sports/article/255769

Basically his claim is that the typical Moneyball draftee, an unathletic guy with a high OBP, is the kind of guy most likely to take steroids because to them, steroids would be the difference between making it to the show (and major league minimum salary) and not (and minor league minimum salary), and that steroid testing has eliminated those players from the field.
In other words, he doesn't understand Moneyball, makes false assumptions about the typical Moneyball draftee (who is, by definition, someone good enough to draft but that everyone else is ignoring for some stupid reason), and uses that false predicate to criticize Billy Beane, who knows more about baseball than Richard Griffin and has used it to run a baseball team successfully for years. Thanks for playing, Rich.

Johnny Mac: 2 years, $3.8M total

Torgen — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 20:18:01 -0000

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20070911&content_id=2201598&vkey=news_mlb&fext=. jsp&c_id=mlb

Myself and Hugo had a bit of discussion on this matter during last night's game thread. Are we paying $2M a year for a utility infielder, or has J.P. decided we only need to be strong 1 through 8? (Or is there some secret master plan to turn Johnny Mac into an Ichiro-style slash-and-dash lefty, like I jokingly suggested?)

Glaus linked to Steroids

Torgen — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 20:02:31 -0000

SI report

In the wake of the reports that Rick Ankiel got HGH while he was recovering from surgery come reports that Glaus got anabolic steroids during a period when he was battling shoulder injuries. Is this a case of players trying to use PEDs to get back to their own natural abilities quickly after getting injured, or using the injury as a chance to take something without worrying about getting tested?