SB Nation User Blog: bleedjaxblue

Kershaw is official

bleedjaxblue — Sat, 24 May 2008 17:52:18 -0000

http://insidethedodgers.mlblogs.com/archives/2008/05/public_enemy_no_1.html

I imagine he won't get too many pitches in his debut, regardless of how he looks -- both Kuo and Park haven't pitched since their last 4-inning half-games the last time through the rotation, so they will likely finish off the game, depending on the circumstances, this time around.

Anyway, what are everyone's thoughts on what to expect from Kershaw this year alone? Personally, I wouldn't expect him to be much more than a back-of-the-rotation starter, with occasional big-K games and not too many hits, but way too many walks (and bad pitch counts), and a tendency to give up homers once he lets people on base. Anyway, I'm mostly writing this to make sure I get over the word limit.

How about this question: For this year alone, Scherzer or Kershaw?

I'm going Scherzer in a no-brainer.

Second question: Which one long-term?

I'll go Kershaw, but I think that mostly comes down to durability.

Anyway, continue to speculate below.

Inside the f'd up mind of Ned Colletti

bleedjaxblue — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 08:12:33 -0000

Many people on this board like to speculate who Ned is and what he's thinking or going to do. Right now, on Dodger Thoughts, there's an excellent interview that covers his plans for the upcoming season -- including thoughts on Andy LaRoche v. Nomar, Ethier v. Pierre, Hu and Abreu's position on the team, Kuo and Greg Miller, Clayton Kershaw, and much much more. You can check it all out here: http://dodgerthoughts.baseballtoaster.com/archives/897243.html

Or, I can give you some extended excerpts:

"Andy and Nomar give us two good options at third base....We're gonna let them figure it out. I think (Andy) is on the verge of being where (James) Loney and (Matt) Kemp were a year ago, where (Andre) Ethier and (Russell) Martin were two years ago. It's time to give him an opportunity to stick with the club and play as much as he earns....Nomar's got the versatility to play some first base as well. James is gonna need a day off here or there....It's probably the first Spring Training where (Andy) has had more than a legitimate chance to make this club. Most of the time a player has to make the club. He's almost gonna have to not make the club. It's a pretty good spot to be in." (interesting here, also, is that he refers to Ethier as being in the class of players like Martin, Kemp and Loney. it's, of course, completely untrue from a talent perspective, but it might suggest that Ethier's not going to be relegated to the bench by Pierre.)

"[I]n LaRoche's case, if he can be productive even part-time, I'd be willing to give him an opportunity to stay. Abreu, due to his versatility in the infield, perhaps the same. ... I think both players may have an opportunity to be here less than full-time."

"We need somebody with Abreu's versatility. We need somebody with (Chin-Lung) Hu's versatility - at least one or the other, if not both"

asked about the possibility of an Ethier-Jones-Kemp outfield (i.e., sitting Pierre): "It's a Joe Torre question, but it's not out of the realm of possibility....I like the competition of it. Nothing wrong with competition. When you have competition, you have a chance to be a better club. Just like at third base. Let the players decide who's gonna play and how often they're gonna play."

On Kershaw: "He's not somebody that we're going to delay his arrival... He may be here before he's completely ready, depending on injuries. But there's still some refinement for him, still some of the finer points of the art of pitching that he's still learning. He's not 20 years old yet. But he's got tremendous ability.""

On Kuo (then Greg Miller): "We had the same hope a year ago, after how he pitched at the end of the '06 season. He's another one that feels fine right now, but we'll have to wait and see. We could use him. We don't have many left-handed pitchers. Greg Miller's another one, another lefthander that's got a chance to make this club."

DeJon Watson on Miller: "He was in Arizona Fall League, and he's healthy. The velocity was back last year - he was anywhere from 92 to 97 (mph) the entire year. The command was the thing we were really trying to harness through the course of the year."

There's also info on Schmidt's recovery, Kershaw talking about his plans to refine his change-up this year (and also discussing command issues), a little talk about the possibility of Kershaw being promoted to the bullpen, and a little more talk on Delwyn Young and Hu making the team.

Anyway, this diary is already pretty massive. But it's a lot of "news." And spring is in the air! Can you feel it?

Community Minor League Report for 04-12-2007

bleedjaxblue — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 22:54:35 -0000

DrB hasn't started one yet, so I figured I'd put this up. And, since I'm the one starting, obviously I'm going to put the Dodgers minor league games in the diary header.

The Great Lake Loons (low-A) played a 7-inning double header today.

Josh Wall started the first, and not well. 3.2 IP, 7 Hs, 4 ERs, 2 BBs, 1 K, 1 HR and the loss. I don't know if anyone here still considers him a prospect in a meaningful way, but they shouldn't.

Clayton Kershaw got the call in the second and was MUCH better than his first outing, though the walk totals were still a touch higher than you'd like. All in all, he had 5.0 IP, only 1 H, 0 Rs, 3 BBs, 7 Ks, to earn the victory. He also picked two people off 1st base. Crazy.

Preston Mattingly played both games, only one at short, and was a combined 1-for-5 with a triple and 2 Ks. He also made a fielding error.

Josh Bell only played the second game and continued to struggle -- 0-for-2 with a walk and a K.

Francisco Lizarraga, who split the games between short and second, stayed right at .500 for the season, going a combined 3-for-6 with a double, K, and GIDP.

More updates to follow.

Anyway, who're some of the better pitchers starting today in the minors? Any exciting updates? Keep the info coming...

Kemp, Schmidt injured

bleedjaxblue — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 23:50:06 -0000

So I had Schmidt in my pool for preseason Dodger injuries (http://www.minorleagueball.com/comments/2006/12/19/164153/17/27#27) but definitely not Kemp.

However, if either/both of these two are injured for substantial periods of time, it will make for some interesting decisions.

If Kemp is out, does Loney get the call to play outfield in his stead? Little and Colletti's reasoning for keeping Kemp over Loney to begin with was the need for righthanded bats in the outfield, with Repko injured. If Loney is promoted, there's no obvious platoon, considering the other three OFers are LoGo, Ethier and Pierre (oh.....and Marlon Anderson and Brady Clark). On the other hand, it's not entirely clear who else would be promoted ahead of Loney. Delwyn Young (a switch hitter) is the most obvious promotion. Alternatively, LaRoche might be promoted, though it seems talk of him moving to the outfield temporarily has disappeared, so this seems unlikely. Perhaps Abreu will be promoted (which Little had talked about earlier) and Ramon Martinez will be moved to the outfield? In my book, all bets are off. I have no idea. But it will definitely make for some interesting drama. It's also quite disappointing, since Kemp was showing some major improvements in plate discipline this year (http://www.minorleagueball.com/comments/2007/4/7/152416/7628/2#2).

And, speaking of drama, we can ramp up the Billingsley talk again if Schmidt is hurt. When he left the game today, Hendrickson filled in and pitched quite admirably (in case you were wondering, Billz pitched two innings on Sunday). If you had to guess, Hendrickson would get the call over Billingsley, to avoid messing with his development. Of course, D.J. Houlton is still sitting in the minors, as is Chin-Hui Tsao (though he's more likely to be promoted as a reliever to replace Schmidt's roster spot).

Anyway, thoughts on who will be promoted, assuming these injuries are serious? And how many more Dodgers need to get injured before the logjam is resolved?

MLB.TV help on a Mac?

bleedjaxblue — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 05:07:44 -0000

I remember someone on the last MLB.TV thread saying they were able to get the MLB.TV player to go full-screen. The first Dodger game of the year is on tomorrow morning (joy!), and I can't seem to figure out how to maximize the window.

I have tried to watch the game on Firefox, Safari, Mozilla, Opera and Explorer. I have tried using Flip4Mac and Windows Media Player (I even redownloaded WMP 9). Right now, I can watch the game in normal (read, small) size with F4M, while I can't even get the feed to start with WMP. On NEITHER version can I get anything that resembles an indication that I could go full-screen.

Is there something else somebody could recommend doing? Is there anything that works for others? Is there something I should download?

I'm sorry to create a whole diary about this, but I'm getting desperate. It's Friday night, and I need to go out and get trashed. The last thing I want to do when I'm hung over tomorrow morning is try to squint at some tiny-@$$ screen or, worse, try to figure this $#!+ out then.

What the hell am I doing wrong?

Poll

Is there any reason to have a poll with this diary?

Philip Hughes

22 votes

Yes

0 votes

No

4 votes

Other

5 votes

31 votes | Poll has closed

BA's Top 10 Dodger Prospects

bleedjaxblue — Thu, 15 Feb 2007 06:38:29 -0000

Andy LaRoche
Clayton Kershaw
Scott Elbert
James Loney
Tony Abreu
Ivan DeJesus Jr.
Jon Meloan
Blake DeWitt
Josh Bell
Preston Mattingly

I'm shocked to see Ivan DeJesus Jr. so high. Isn't this guy's ceiling being an adequate defensive player with a bat that won't totally destroy the offense? Considering the last projection they gave of DeWitt was "Todd Walker-clone," I feel like that's a little too much focus on defense.

Poll

Which Dodger prospect was the biggest snub from the top 10 list?

Mike Megrew

0 votes

Greg Miller

58 votes

Other

8 votes

Kyle Orr

11 votes

Xavier Paul

5 votes

Justin Orenduff

27 votes

Cory Dunlap

6 votes

Bryan Morris

29 votes

Delwyn Young

22 votes

Chin-Lung Hu

43 votes

209 votes | Poll has closed

Pro/Con: Trading draft picks

bleedjaxblue — Sun, 11 Feb 2007 07:57:47 -0000

Reading through Jim Callis' latest chat where the issue was raised, I thought it might make an interesting off-season discussion to hear what people thought about baseball's rule which forbids clubs from trading their draft picks.

Good rule -- protecting franchises from their own short-term bad decision-making and from agents who would manipulate the draft -- or bad one -- not allowing clubs the flexibility to trade for what they need?

Do you think it will change to be like the other major sports in the future? And what kind of value do you think there would be for baseball draft slots, given how much more unpredictable MLB draft picks are than those in the NFL/NBA?

How do you think trading draft picks would change the game specifically?

Poll

Should Major League Baseball allow franchises to trade draft picks?

Other (just because someone always complains if it isn't there)

0 votes

Yes

40 votes

No

31 votes

Yes, but with some serious restrictions different than other sports (specify below)

17 votes

88 votes | Poll has closed

value in outfield arms

bleedjaxblue — Sat, 23 Dec 2006 09:56:23 -0000

I am wondering what people here think is the value of outfield arms. Specifically, how much does is it viable to put together an outfield with players that can't throw?

The particular case I have in mind is that of the Dodgers (not surprisingly, since it's my diary), who will be starting (I believe) Luis Gonzalez in left, Juan Pierre in center and Andre Ethier in right on the average day. They do have some backups with stronger arms (Matt Kemp, Jason Repko, James Loney, along with two three others who have weak arms), and I imagine Ethier and LoGo may be playing 7 innings more often than not, but the fact is, a lot of runners won't think twice going first-to-third or taking home on a shallow flyout given this array of rag-doll arms.

I don't want this to turn into an argument about GMs or how smart was to end up with this outfield, as the last diary I made turned into (and where I got the idea for this question), but simply on what people's thoughts are on what the likely damage will be given such a poor-throwing outfield. Is it viable? Do any fans of other teams remember having an outfield that bad, and what was it like? I just want to hear thoughts on the issue, because, to me, it seems like you're giving up a lot of runs if your outfielders can't hold runners -- probably as many, if not more, than you would having a Piazza-type catcher, given that it's the whole outfield.

I'll include a poll just for fun.

Poll

What should the Dodgers do regarding their outfield?

Change the outfield, regardless, because these three guys suck

16 votes

bleedjaxblue is stupid/uninformed, and these are not the people who will be opening day starters

3 votes

Stick with the current three -- their offense will make up for it

7 votes

Stick with the current three -- their arms are better than you think

1 votes

Get at least one new outfielder who has an arm in there -- SOMEONE needs to hold runners

14 votes

41 votes | Poll has closed

Dodgers shortstop of 2009 and beyond

bleedjaxblue — Tue, 19 Dec 2006 21:41:53 -0000

As a Dodger fan, I feel extremely blessed right now. Essentially every position in the lineup, along with a full rotation and bullpen, can essentially be projected out of high-probability prospects and young stars. That is, except for shortstop.

Through 2008, the Dodgers have Rafael Furcal signed. They also have some decent candidates in the farm system. People rave about Chin-Lung Hu's defense, though his hitting is more in question. Tony Abreu is a natural shortstop, but has been moved in second because he's always played alongside Hu; his hitting might be more advanced than Hu's, though it is still nothing to write home about. Lower in the minors, Ivan DeJesus Jr, Preston Mattingly and Juan Rivera offer some promise.

My question is, what will the Dodgers do come 2009? Will they re-sign Furcal? Sign another big-ticket free agent? Will it be Abreu or Hu? Will they sign a stop-gap for one of the low minor leaguers, who is the true Dodger shortstop of future (and if so, which one)?

My vote is for Abreu. I don't think Hu will ever hit enough to be given the position. DeJesus won't hit enough to be a regular, either, and I doubt Rivera ever makes the big leagues, period. Mattingly might be able to hit, but I'd be shocked if he can stay at short. Also, I don't think Blake DeWitt -- who played there some in the Hawaiian Fall League -- will be able to handle short, either.

Knowing Colletti, of course, I think guessing "big-ticket (and sh*tty) free-agent" is the smart bet.

Poll

Who's the Dodgers SS of the future?

Blake DeWitt

7 votes

other (just in case you have some scenario I can't imagine in mind)

7 votes

Ivan DeJesus Jr.

10 votes

Chin-Lung Hu

25 votes

Juan Rivera

1 votes

Tony Abreu

7 votes

Rafael Furcal

45 votes

Preston Mattingly

14 votes

big-ticket free agent (specify below if you'd like)

20 votes

136 votes | Poll has closed

Team-by-team run-down: What prospects need to prove

bleedjaxblue — Mon, 13 Nov 2006 08:43:58 -0000

I wanted to open up a diary where we could review, from your perspective, as a fan of a single franchise, what you were going into the 2007 season "hoping for" from each of your prospects. I'm not talking about posting a specific batting line for the year, but rather a reference to an area in which they must show improvement. On a related note, this diary is aimed more toward B- and C-level prospects than A-level prospects, unless you're genuinely worried about an aspect of that A-level prospect's game. I will start it off with a first post about the Dodgers to hopefully clarify what it is I'm looking for in this diary.