Olerud363

If JPs play was due to injury then I have no clue why Mottola was fired. I'm not surprised. But I would of expected it to be in the context of Pete Walker also getting fired. Despite my rantings I still give AA a little credit and have to file this in the "there are things we don't know" category.

J.P, Melky, Thole, Boni, Izturus. The c/2b/lf combos really underperformed. That's a third of the team. Is it Mottola's fault??? I have no idea. But there was about 1/3 of the team that just crashed... and brought the offense down with it.

I don't see it as black and white. In my humble opinion people (fans and front office) need to stop thinking in terms of "have" or "do not have" tools. It is shades of gray. Is .196 .227 .350 or whatever the best J.P. can do?? Obviously not. I don't know the details... but maybe the star hitters will always do good no matter who the hitting coach is. The hitting coaches job is to get the guy who is a poor hitter a little better. Get JP up to .240 with a .290 on base average. Get Lawrie to improve instead of regressing every year. Get Boni's on base percentage over .300 at least. Get Thole hitting a bit. Rasmus did OK... but k/bb wasn;t good.

Arencibia??

The Toronto Blue Jays were 8th out of 14 teams in the American league in terms of runs scored. One national league team (Cards I believe) beat them. If they hit their pitchers instead of Lind/EE they would not beat several of the national league teams they did beat.

I don't mean to start topics that are allready covered. Perhaps I didn't explain the point I'm trying to make here?? As fans we can't go out and scout players (atleast regularly), we can't be inside the clubhouse... but if someone makes a statement like "If you are towards the bottom runs in Starters ERA you have no chance at all". We can go on the internet and see if that is true. The 1993 Blue Jays were an interesting example because... well for one that was the last time we won. So if the GM of our own team doesn't seem to know the nature of our last playoff team?? I don't know that is... concerning. The 2010 Yankees did not have great starting pitching, In 2009 the playoff bound twins were 3rd last in starting pitching. There are teams like this, similiar to the 93 Jays that make the playoffs every couple years. In 2008 the Blue Jays were first by a wide margin in starting pitching. They did not make the playoffs.

Myself and others have brought up this in more detail. Izturus, Melky, Arencibia, Bonificia did the damage on the offensive side. Replacing these guys with average players would have a huge impact. Ortiz, Lincoln, Romero, did the damage on the pitching side. The thing is no one was great pitching... but no one was awful either. Even Morrow and Johnson didn't have crazy negative WAR. So unless you get a number one pitcher it's going to be hard to improve upon what can be reasonably expected for next year. Neither is more ideal historically... There both equal. But by assuming pitching is the "major" problem he's gonna end up making the pitching better but crash the offense.

I'm not claiming he's worth 20 War. I like Gibby better anyway. My view is a successful organization needs to be strong at 1. manager 2. general manager 3. ownership/president (with president position becoming even more important with coorporate ownership). For it to work you need all 3. Farrell leaving didn't cost the Jays a win. Gibby is fine too. I like him and he hope someday gets a good blue jays team to work with. But when the sox got Farrell they then had strength at field manager, general manager and ownership.

http://sports.nationalpost.com/2013/10/02/blue-jays-vow-to-turn-rotation-into-a-strength-next-season/ "I think the one certainty is, if you’re towards the bottom rung [in starters’ ERA], you have no chance at all." In 1993 the Toronto Blue Jays had 3 guys get on base over .400, had the top 3 hitters in the league, and had a great bullpen, leading the league in bullpen era by quite a bit. The relievers had a 3.30 era, starters 4.63 and were tied for 5th last. You get into a lot of semantics here... I mean maybe 5th last, or 6th isn't bottom of the rung.. and the WAR was a bit better then that. But it should be entirely obvious there's more than one way to skin a cat. It's very unlikely a team can make the playoffs being 2nd last in starters ERA. But it's unlikely this exact same group will be 2nd last again... there will be some natural improvement. It just worries me that AA doesn't seem to understand that teams win by scoring more runs then the other guys. Jays need more wins. There are mutliple ways to get them. It doesn't matter if they come from Brian McCann or Ervin Santana. It doesn't matter if they come from Tanaka or Utley (with Lawrie on second). It just irritates me that AA has these seemingly simplistic dogmatic views, instead of viewing this situation as a complicated puzzle with multiple solutions.

Fluffy mainstream article, perhaps a load of crap... I don't know. Hope you guys give Jeff Passan some crap.. I certainly get it when I bring Farrell up.... http://sports.yahoo.com/news/manager-john-farrell-proving-to-be-the-difference-for-red-sox-050728453.html Money quote "That's not factoring in all the other things. Every player on a team has a range of possible performance outcomes. Everyone has a high end, a low end and the most likely outcome in the middle. And if more players are performing toward the top half of that range, and the manager has something to do with that, the manager is absolutely valuable. It's still players first. You have to have talent to win. But I dismiss that a manager can't be more than his strategy."

You add in Thole, some of the other scrubs that were at 2nd, c, left.... those positions were -5. That is OK news if AA recognizes this. If you could go from -5 at 2nd, c left to +5 that's 10 wins. How did it work out for pitchers?? Intuitively I don't believe jays are as weak in starters as AA thinks. Everyone was kind of mediocre and even JJ who crashed, had OK peripherals, so there is no obvious route for dramatic improvement. Or is there??

The Jays have more information on Bautista then other teams. If every team got access to Bautista and could run him through tests you would be correct. If the Jays are confident Bautista will bounce back and be healthy, in order to get value, they need to convince the other team he is healthy. If the Angels are convinced Pujols is healthy, are you automatically convinced??

He could sink lower. It's not random though. Not every player has a 50% chance of being better/worse. If a player has a 75% chance of being better next year, but the market is valuing him at previous years performance (or even lower because of attitude or something) then that player is being sold low.

According to Nox there is no such thing as selling low on baseball players. Obviously it's not black and white. If Atlanta sold low on Escobar for laziness then it opens the door for players being sold low for all kinds of reasons.

If a player can become undervalued for reason of homophobic slur then they can become undervalued for other reasons. We have the same small group participating in the market and if they are prone to undervaluing because of homophobic slur they could reasonably be prone to undervaluing for other reasons.

Assuming your projection models are good and the other guys projection models are equally good and there is no information you know that he doesn't and the other guy trusts that there is no information that you know that he doesn't. So assuming there is a fair open market and there is no psychology involved then yes you are correct and we can replace gms with trading programs.

This post was complimentary to Stoeten. He brought up some good points about Bautista. Apparently Jerry Howarth and Blair had some negative thoughts on Bautista and his attitude. Ussually someone here picks up on these tidbits and starts a thread. No one did so I started a thread... The original info was from Stoeten so I gave him credit... Given how much I've been complaining about Stoeten... it's bit ironic that I read his blog so much. I think you missed the point of the thread. It's about Bautista and comments on Bautista from Howarth and Blair. Since I agreed with Stoeten on this issue (and since I didn't even know about until he brought it up) I linked him... not sure where the problem is here. Maybe you meant this for the other thread?? That one is definately about bitching about Stoeten.

If he is only talking about radio call-in stooges he should clarify that... he needs to say... "And I do say, those of you who follow the team night and day, have followed the team for 20 years or more, search the web for internet feeds of low a ball, know the rosters of all the minor league teams... for those of you who track bbref WAR and fangraphs WAR and average them with a third WAR that you invented... for those of you who were born Sunday October 24th 1993 and missed it by one day... for those of you who still drink Labatt's, for those you who dress in blue every single day... to those I say... you are strange folk with too much time on your hands, but your negativity is understood as part of your deep fanatism... I don't share that negativity, but I do respect it... derogatory comments such as "sourpuss" and "muffins" are indeed not aimed at you but only aimed at radio call-in stooges. I hope there is never a misunderstanding on this. -- yours in deep respect -- Stoeten."

http://blogs.thescore.com/djf/2013/10/02/questions-about-jose-bautistas-leadership/#more-19348 I know, I know, I'm going on and on about Stoeten's articles. But he does do a good job of bringing up the issues of the day... and he sometimes has a good point... So I am a pathetic insufferable sourpuss. Spending my life reading Stoeten's blog and then complaining about it. Here he talks about Bautista. And he is right. It would be ridiculous to sell Bautista low. So unless you believe he is just going to crash further, Bautista is exactly the kind of guy you want to build around now. The time to trade him would of been 2 years ago. You gotta think he is under valued right now (2 injury prone seasons) and the best hope for Blue Jay near term victory involves Bautista playing 150 games and getting near 40 homers and 100 walks... What do you guys think?? Trade Bautista?? Could we get value trading a player while labeled injury prone and bad-attitude??

I don't think AA understand Bill James. Bill James isn't about stats... it's about people, about society, about how to think. All you need is times on base, power, (for hitters), number of plays made (for defenders), strikeouts, walks, homeruns (for pitchers)... Those are the only stats you need. Assuming that you have some intelligent people (and scouts) who believe in those simple stats, and are willing to engage in longer conversations to intrepret those stats properly. Were the stats produced in Colorado?? Or in Sandiego?? What other factors need to be considered?? Injuries?? Age?? Extreme tendencies?? Is there reason to believe the above stats don't tell the entire story (extreme ground ball pitcher, infield defender playing behind flyball staff). The complicated stats capture the logic of "shooting the s***". Bunch of guys in a room discussing this stuff. 1. use simple stats and shoot the s*** as long as you have logical people in the room. 2. use complicated stats. So if AA has the right guys in the room, he doesn't need to use complicated stats (Bill James is a better writer or "s***-shoter" then stat-guy). Or if he doesn't want to discuss things in depth then he should use advanced stats. The worst is using the wrong stats and having the wrong guys in the room. Which some are speculating is the Toronto Blue Jays situation.

WARNING: I've said it before, and I'm saying it again, so skip the rest this you've read more than 5 of my posts. I keep bringing Stoeten up because to me Wilner and Stoeten represent the worst of Blue Jays culture. 4 years ago I liked both. Stoeten was the edgy guy who wrote a great honest blog, very critical of elements of blue jays culture (ripped Gaston), Wilner fiesty in his own way (famously went toe to toe with Gaston). Now both are cheer leaders... why?? It's just the world in general. I think there are a lot of politics involved... Anybody who's worked their way up the coorporate ladder knows this. Does Beeston bring Wilner/Stoeten into his office and says "toe the line of your f'n fired"?? In Wilner's case... maybe. In Steoten's case as far as I know there is no direct connection between Rogers and the online SCORE website... but he schmoozes in the same crowds... and knows not to burn bridges. So I think in Stoeten's case he's an intelligent guy, may know that the Score gig won't go on forever, and needs to make sure he's in the good books of certain people.

http://blogs.thescore.com/djf/2013/10/01/prospecting-b-a-s-league-by-league-top-20s/ Stoeten's latest. He regurgitates a baseball america report that shows the blue jays are refilling the cupboard while using his article to take shots at the negative "Muffins", "Trolls", and "Suckholes". As a regular reader here, I have been following debates about the Bluefield guys for a couple of months. I didn't need Stoeten via baseball america to tell me about D.J. Davis. My major complaint about this organization isn't that they are crashing to zero, it's that they go on forever in this 75-85 win zone.... Never having everything go right at once. The present strategy leads to more of the same in my opinion. What are the chances R.A. Dickey, Buerhle, Bautista, EE, Happ, Nay, Davis, Lugo, Dejonge, Tarado play together?? What would the chances of been that Synd, Nicoloino, Marisnick, D'arnaud, etc, Nay, Lugo, Dejonge, etc, played together? What if they sold more (Bautista, EE, Romero, etc at relatively high points) to get an even larger base of prospects, moved those prospects along, then used that very deep pool to get the right pieces for 2015?? These are the questions people are asking. It's not mindless negativity. It's about looking closely at cycles, and trying to figure out how the Bluefield cycle is ever going to mesh with the current "all-in" cycle. It gets complicated because then you get people arguing that attendance would of crashed without the hype, that 75 win "hyped up" seasons are way more valueble then 75 win "development" seasons. I don't know. Personally I don't need a hyped up "all-in" 75 win season. I'd watch more games in a development 75 win season. So it seems in the end you get to this point, where everything is done for the casuals. For the casuals who read Stoeten's blog (and are just being introduced to the Bluefield guys), for the big fat Beestly casual who runs things, And guys like Stoeten and Wilner just assume that anyone who doesn't agree with them are casuals with mental illness. "Stop crying Muffins, take your meds and let me introduce you to Bluefield. Bet you never heard of that?? It's all right here in Baseball America!"

Understandable. Like JP Arencibia I am what I am. If you've read 5 of my posts you have the entire story. On base percentage, cronyism. Beeston sucks.

Good point. Part of the puzzle is to get a bunch of guys together at their peaks. Guys like Bautista are still usefull off-peak... But not JP. The problem with JP is if he's not at his best he is a disaster. If he's at his best he's sort of passable if everyone else has a good year and you can hit him 9th, and he has like the 8th most plate appearances on the team.

Apparently he's started looking at the OPS, in the in-game interview Sunday he claimed several times that JP is a .700 OPS guy and that's where he needs to be. Wonder if he realizes a .220 .270 .430 with bad defense and baserunning is a lot different then .250 .330 .370 with good D??