Out of the Past

"Uggla is more or less the same. Infact, he's even more of an anomoly. He has actually cut down on his K-rates, his LD rates are still on his career norm of 16% but his BABIP is 100 points under his career BABIP. You want bad luck, there's your bad luck. Almost all of his peripherals have improved this year, he's really not somebody I'm worried about. " ============================================================================= Nny, basically, proves that this "bad luck" thing isn't just coming from Tommy & Rich. It's just pretty true, at this point. Well one difference that should be noted is his infield fly ball percentage which has more than doubled from last year from 3.8% of his balls in play to 9.9% this year and given that infield flies are pretty much automatic outs this probably explains a good chunk of the decrease in his babip.

Do you think his 95 PAs this past month are more indicative of his true ability than his 1300 successful PAs in the minors? No. But the 95 PAs should not be ignored. I don't understand how some people can be as certain now that he'll have a successful MLB career as they were six weeks ago. Because 100 ABs is not enough of a sample size to make that kind of judgement. I'm honestly mostly just going to ignore it. My opinion on Bonifacio hasn't changed significantly because of 100 ABs, and neither has my opinion on Ross or Uggla. I don't think it's a good idea to ignore a player's latest work especially when it's at the MLB level. 100 ABs doesn't carry the same weight as 200 ABs or 400 ABs but they do have some weight (50% of the weight of 200 ABs, for example) and should not be put aside as if they didn't happen.

It was very windy but he definitely Hermidad that fly ball but even with the occassional misplay I think we could use his bat.

So from these plate discipline stats which is the be-all, end-all that a guy has good pitch recognition? O-swing % The guy who swings at the least amount of pitches outside of the zone is the most patient Right? Yes, I agree swinging at balls outside the strike zone would be an indicator of poor plate discipline but I also think a batter that doesn't swing at a high percentage of strikes (so gets a lot of called strikes) should be an indicator of poor plate discipline so I was just wondering whether there's a stat that supposedly encompasses everything.

http://www.fangraphs.com/winss.aspx?team=M...009&month=0 So from these plate discipline stats which is the be-all, end-all that a guy has good pitch recognition? I was thinking maybe the ratio of his swings on strikes to his swings on balls but you get surprising stuff if you do that but it makes sense to me.

Do you think his 95 PAs this past month are more indicative of his true ability than his 1300 successful PAs in the minors? No. But the 95 PAs should not be ignored. I don't understand how some people can be as certain now that he'll have a successful MLB career as they were six weeks ago.

Another Hammer homer...

Yes, Yunel.

In AA: Wilson out OPSed the league by .144 points. Maybin out OPSed the league by .089 points. Wilson had a better AA year but he was one year older. They can be compared.

I would hit Coghlan first (against both). He's going to OBP but his SLG is going to struggle, and he's the second fastest guy in the lineup behind EB (should steal 20ish bags). What kind of numbers (BA, OBP, SLG) do you think he'll put up? I was thinking maybe Escobar type numbers.

He doesn't have to look beyond his own team to find guys doing about as bad who aren't getting sent down or even losing many pa. Supposedly Fowler and Schafer are the players he compared his situation with so those are the players I compared him with.

"You look around the league there's a couple of guys who are right where I am and they're still getting a chance to play but you got to do what you got to do,'' he said. --- Cameron Maybin in Palm Beach Post I think he's talking about Schafer and Fowler and if he is then he's wrong because they've outplayed him. I guess he's not happy. Not by too much I think the numbers disagree with you. Fowler - .258 / .333 / .382 / .715 Schafer - .225 / .363 / .353 / .716 Maybin - .202 / .280 / .310 / .589 Runs created per PA: Fowler - .133 Schafer - .111 Maybin - .079 I think for rookie CFers Fowler and Schafer have done enough to stay in the lineup. The same cannot be said for Maybin.

"You look around the league there's a couple of guys who are right where I am and they're still getting a chance to play but you got to do what you got to do,'' he said. --- Cameron Maybin in Palm Beach Post I think he's talking about Schafer and Fowler and if he is then he's wrong because they've outplayed him. I guess he's not happy.

Willingham picking it up recently with somewhat steady playing time. Will always be a credible trade from the salary point though. We couldn't keep them. Hammer hit 2 homers today. OPS is now over .800.

A lot of you have been concerned about Ricky Nolasco this year. His 6.63 ERA would suggest that he has been downright awful, but really, he hasn't been all that bad. I was looking over some stats, and I noticed that he has a FIP of 4.08. FIP, for those of you who don't know, stands for Fielding-Independent Pitching. FIP basically tells you what a pitcher's ERA would be if he were pitching in front of league-average defense. Ricky's FIP is over 2.5 runs higher than his ERA--a significant margin. What does this tell us? 2 things. 1) Nolasco has been really unlucky 2) The Marlins defense has been bad, at least when Ricky is pitching. Also, to shed further light on Nolasco's misfortunes, his BABIP is asstoundingly high at .380. BABIP is Batting Average on Balls in Play. The average BABIP for a pitcher is about .300, so Ricky's .380 means he has been really unlucky and is not getting much help from his defense. So, don't worry about Ricky. He's not pitching great, but he's not pitching as poorly as one might assume. The bad luck will level itself out, and he will start to put up better numbers. He'll be just fine. This "stat" telling us that Ricky has a 6.63 ERA because of bad luck is a perfect example of a case where "stats" lie. I hate bad stats. They give good stats a bad name. Actually, the stats aren't lying. The stats don't actually say that he's been unlucky. Ok. The stat (FIP) didn't lie. The guy who said Ricky is having an unlucky year based on his FIP lied. It should be noted that he's not the only one who lies based on FIP. One stat guru in one of the baseball sites had an article last week saying a pitcher (forget who) was having an unlucky year because of the gap between his ERA and FIP. I guess FIP causes people to lie. Lie is a strong word. It's one thing to lie and anther thing to misread what the stat is actually saying. I originally said this was a case where "stats" lie and you went all technical on me so if you want to get technical then the guy is the one who lied by misusing the stat.

A lot of you have been concerned about Ricky Nolasco this year. His 6.63 ERA would suggest that he has been downright awful, but really, he hasn't been all that bad. I was looking over some stats, and I noticed that he has a FIP of 4.08. FIP, for those of you who don't know, stands for Fielding-Independent Pitching. FIP basically tells you what a pitcher's ERA would be if he were pitching in front of league-average defense. Ricky's FIP is over 2.5 runs higher than his ERA--a significant margin. What does this tell us? 2 things. 1) Nolasco has been really unlucky 2) The Marlins defense has been bad, at least when Ricky is pitching. Also, to shed further light on Nolasco's misfortunes, his BABIP is asstoundingly high at .380. BABIP is Batting Average on Balls in Play. The average BABIP for a pitcher is about .300, so Ricky's .380 means he has been really unlucky and is not getting much help from his defense. So, don't worry about Ricky. He's not pitching great, but he's not pitching as poorly as one might assume. The bad luck will level itself out, and he will start to put up better numbers. He'll be just fine. This "stat" telling us that Ricky has a 6.63 ERA because of bad luck is a perfect example of a case where "stats" lie. I hate bad stats. They give good stats a bad name. Actually, the stats aren't lying. The stats don't actually say that he's been unlucky. Ok. The stat (FIP) didn't lie. The guy who said Ricky is having an unlucky year based on his FIP lied. It should be noted that he's not the only one who lies based on FIP. One stat guru in one of the baseball sites had an article last week saying a pitcher (forget who) was having an unlucky year because of the gap between his ERA and FIP. I guess FIP causes people to lie.

Some people on this topic are saying that Coghlan should replace Boni. I agree with that, but the fact that they're teaching him left field makes me wonder. Are they planning on benching Cody again? He's been struggling lately and they could move Hermi back to right for a little while to kinda see how it works. No there would be a big shift Coghlan to LF Hermida to RF Ross to CF Maybin to AAA I don't think Hermida and Ross are in any danger. BINGO with Boni, you have a guy that is a switch hitter (when he even gets a hit) and a guy with speed that can pitch run and can be a defensive replacement at 3B and 2B at this point, Boni is more valuable to the club than Mayb He's more valuable to the team on the bench for sure. So if you put Boni on the bench who would start instead of him?

A lot of you have been concerned about Ricky Nolasco this year. His 6.63 ERA would suggest that he has been downright awful, but really, he hasn't been all that bad. I was looking over some stats, and I noticed that he has a FIP of 4.08. FIP, for those of you who don't know, stands for Fielding-Independent Pitching. FIP basically tells you what a pitcher's ERA would be if he were pitching in front of league-average defense. Ricky's FIP is over 2.5 runs higher than his ERA--a significant margin. What does this tell us? 2 things. 1) Nolasco has been really unlucky 2) The Marlins defense has been bad, at least when Ricky is pitching. Also, to shed further light on Nolasco's misfortunes, his BABIP is asstoundingly high at .380. BABIP is Batting Average on Balls in Play. The average BABIP for a pitcher is about .300, so Ricky's .380 means he has been really unlucky and is not getting much help from his defense. So, don't worry about Ricky. He's not pitching great, but he's not pitching as poorly as one might assume. The bad luck will level itself out, and he will start to put up better numbers. He'll be just fine. This "stat" telling us that Ricky has a 6.63 ERA because of bad luck is a perfect example of a case where "stats" lie. I hate bad stats. They give good stats a bad name.

I'd like to agree with you on this Benched because I'll be the most patient guy in the world with Maybin, but he has almost the same # of at-bats in the 2 spot as he does in the 8th, and aside from the K rate I'm not seeing much of a difference.... still very early though, not really enough at-bats to make the point yet... You beat me to it.. Maybin has more PAs batting 1st and 2nd (47) than batting 8th (43) and has struggled even more hitting at the top of the order. His struggles are not caused by where he hits. Batting 1st - 10 PAs / .311 OPS Batting 2nd - 37 PAs / .601 OPS Batting 8th - 43 PAs / .654 OPS

This is good news. It looks like Coughlan will get a real shot and Maybin goes where he belongs. Too bad Bonifacio belongs there or on the bench a hell of a lot more than Maybin. I agree Boni belongs in the minors or the bench however Maybin belongs in the minors. He certainly doesn't belong as a starter and he adds nothing on the bench plus he would benefit from additional seasoning in the minors. Righ now he looks overmatched. He's a swing and miss machine.

Matt Stairs

This is good news. It looks like Coughlan will get a real shot and Maybin goes where he belongs.

Where would we have gotten the money for his 900 million dollar contract (est.)? Last year and this year we could have easily afforded him with the revenue sharing dough.

With that lineup your 4 best hitters get the most ABs. Coghlan is not proven. If he proves he can hit then he can be moved up. Ah...but why not just have? 1. Hermida 2. Baker (proven to be a good 2 hitter) 3. Hanley 4. Cantu Not much difference between that and mine. In mine Cantu and Hanley could get more ABs than Baker. Baker is not a problem but Hanley and Cantu are better so I would rather have them get as many ABs as possible.

With that lineup your 4 best hitters get the most ABs. Coghlan is not proven. If he proves he can hit then he can be moved up.