Crooked Pitch

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Today’s pitch count is 10.

1. For the second straight time Rich Harden walked more hitters then he struck out Wednesday night. In those two games he’s given up nine earned runs in 10.1 innings. In related news, Harden hasn’t won a game sine May 12th.
2. David Ortiz hit another home run on Wednesday night. He has three over his last seven games and is batting .363 over that same time period.
3. The Phillies bullpen screwed Joe Blanton big time on Wednesday.  Blanton struck out ten and walked two over seven innings and only gave up two earned runs. On the other hand J.C. Romero and Chan Ho Park combined to give up five earned runs in the final two innings. Blanton has pitched well as of late. Over his last seven starts he’s 3-1 with a 3.42 ERA and 44 strikeouts with ten walks.

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I’d like to welcome Hans Horn from The View From The Dugout. Hans took me up on an offer to write a guest post. He’s also a first generation American, loved baseball at an early age and grew up teaching himself about the all aspects of game. Whether debating the importance of a thinking catcher, analyzing peripherals to uncover a great sleeper, or just taking in a pitchers duel with a dog and a beer, he enjoys it all.

Where have you gone David Ortiz? Can the protection of Manny “I’m On Fertility Medication” Ramirez really have been that big an impact on your game? Last I checked, Kevin Youkilis is hitting.

That Ortiz has shown no power to date is well known. He has yet to hit his first home run of the year. His On-Base Percentage is higher (.338) than his Slugging Percentage (.328). And he’s hit almost as many Infield Fly Balls (9) as he has Doubles (10). This is not the Big Papi we are used to.

But a closer look at the way teams are pitching him and how he is responding is equally shocking. In his most productive years, 2005-2007, Ortiz saw fastballs 56.9%, 54.6%, and 51.9% of the time. This year, he’s seeing the heat 54.5% of the time. The difference is where they are throwing them.
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Today’s pitch count is 8.

1. When the Giants signed Jesus Guzman away from the A’s, they guaranteed him an invitation to spring training. In 415 minor league at-bats last season, Guzman batted .349/.404/.545 with 26 doubles and 17 home runs. He tore up the Venezuelan League recently and if he continues tearing it up this spring the Giants will need to look at getting him some big league at-bats. As a 3B/SS he might not take too much playing time from Pedro Sandoval, who also tore up the Venezuelan League (see above link), and the mix at shortstop got even more jumbled with the addition of Edgar Renteria. There are many questions left to be answered on the left side of the Giants infield.
2. I can’t wait to see Mark Prior climbing draft boards now that the Padres have signed him to a minor league deal. How many times over the next few months are we going to read, “If Prior is healthy…”? His average draft position is sure to be on the rise, but if you’re crazy enough to draft him you deserve the angst he’ll cause you by May. Prior is best left to the waiver wire until he make a few starts at the big league level. He just isn’t a draftable commodity.
3. As someone who just drafted Alex Gordon and Billy Butler this graph showing how probably Royals hitters are to hit a certain number of home runs in 2009 is a must read. To end the suspense… Butler’s chance of hitting 20 dingers is 15.4% and Gordon’s is 35%. There are other hitters in this study, so go check it out.
4. Scott Kazmir has put on 20 pounds in the off-season, but in a good way. The extra weight is due to hitting the gym.
5. The Dodgers are expected to cut Andruw Jones today. He’s been seen around the ATL quite a bit lately. Is he the answer to Braves need for a left fiedler?
6. You can add Miguel Montero to the list of catchers the Red Sox are interested in obtaining. Montero has pretty good pop, but has yet to show he can hit for any kind of average. And he’d probably platoon with Bard anyway, so this might not vault his fantasy value as much as you’d think.
7. One of the hottest sleeper candidates last season at the pitcher position was Ian Snell. That didn’t quite work out. His name is popping up again this off-season. Pat Lackey shares with us why that is.
8. Fantasy Ball Junkie has an interesting post about the five most fantasy significant transactions so far this off-season.

Immediately making changes in the off-season, the KC Royals and the Florida Marlins swap players. First baseman Mike Jacobs is joining the Royals and relief pitcher Leo Nunez is on his way to Miami.

Jacobs hit 32 home runs and drove in 93 in 2008 for the Marlins but the fantasy goodness stops there. He only batted .247 and had a very low 67 runs. His run total is low because this guy never seems to get on base, which is proven by his .299 on-base percentage.

Expect Jacobs to split time between DH and first base, which leaves this question. What do the Royals do with Ryan Shealy and Billy Butler now that there is a third person to take up at-bats?

Before Monday night’s game, Red Sox DH, David Ortiz was mired in a deep slump. He was batting .068 (3 for 44) and was even taken out of the lineup for the ESPN Sunday Night baseball game against the Yankees. You probably couldn’t have convinced many people to sell you Papi low, even at this point. but, at least they wouldn’t have laughed at you… for long.

However, before Monday’s game, Papi texted Terry Francona “asking” to be in the lineup.

“He actually texted me - and this is no joke, I actually thought I was texting my daughter - and he was like, ‘Hey, dad’ or ‘Hey, pop’ or whatever it was,” Francona said. “I texted him back and I was like, ‘What number is this?’

“All of a sudden, I get back, ‘Mine, (expletive).’ Now I’m getting (upset), so I call and it’s David. I was all mixed up, because the last one said, ‘Put me in, (expletive).’ And I can’t figure it out. I was actually kind of relieved. If David gets hits or not, at least I don’t have a 14-year-old talking like that. The good news is my daughter’s not speaking like that, and David wants to play.”

Papi went 2 for 5 with 2 singles and is now hitting .104. These are two signs that all David Ortiz fantasy baseball owners have been looking for. The first is that he’s anxious to get out there and keep swinging. The second is that the base hits are starting to come now.

Maybe you can buy low on Papi by saying his power is still down…

It’s going to be a busy week for the teams in MLB as the deadline looms on the exclusive negotiating period with their free agents. When the clock strikes midnight tonight, free agents can talk to any of the teams about a contract for next year and years to come.

So what does this mean for the Red Sox? It means that they better hope their contract offer of 3-years $36 million is good enough for Lowell or they risk the potential of losing him. I fully expect Red Sox general manager Theo Epstein to be burning up the phones of Lowell’s agents, the Levinson brothers, all day today.

It will be interesting to see what happens with other free agents like Alex Rodriguez, Jorge Posada, Mariano Rivera, Barry Bonds, Francisco Cordero and others.

There is a fantasy baseball impact on this as well as many of you out there participate in fantasy baseball leagues. Some of you participate in AL-only and NL-only leagues as well as mixed leagues. With some of this AL and NL-only leagues being keeper leagues, your hoping that your star free agent on your team doesn’t switch leagues. I’ve had this happen to me when Jim Thome was a free agent with the Indians. He ended up signing with the Phillies and it hurt my team for the following season.

Today also marks the start of the big four awards in MLB, the AL & NL Rookie of the Year, the AL & NL Cy Young, the AL & NL Manager of the Year and the AL & NL MVP’s. This is how the schedule breaks down this week and next.

Nov. 12: AL and NL Rookies of the Year
Nov. 13: AL Cy Young
Nov. 14: AL and NL Managers of the Year
Nov. 15: NL Cy Young
Nov. 19: AL MVP
Nov. 20: NL MVP