Zack Greinke Steps Closer to Inspirational Third Place Finish in AL Cy Young Race

by Freneau on Aug 8, 2009 10:56 PM EDT in Kansas City Royals News

That felt good. And now Greinke can inspire us all with a third place finish in the AL Cy Young race.

OK, maybe that's too positive. But a laughable fourth place finish now seems more likely. Maybe Wakefield is catchable now.

I love pitcher wins! Best start ever!

Nice rebound start by Zack, both in the game, and overall.

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Whatever

I’ve learned to take joy where I find it. Let’s drink!

"red bull is amaZing" -Coco Crisp

by grantfunk on Aug 8, 2009 11:04 PM EDT via mobile reply actions

What about saves? That's a quality stat

I love the quality Saturday fans behind us who thought Soria was garbage because he gave up 2 home runs and were sure KC would the game.

by sterlingice on Aug 8, 2009 11:13 PM EDT via mobile reply actions

Mike Jacobs, July: 8 for 50 (4 HR)
Mike Jacobs, Aug: 7 for 13

Iceman is on a roll and he should hit at least .215 this month.

Graduate with a B.S. from the Dayton Moore School of Stats Analysis

by BHWick on Aug 8, 2009 11:44 PM EDT reply actions

good to see the bats come alive. is it just me, but do the A’s just have more random fucking guys that come out of nowhere? who the fuck is tommy everidge? or cliff pennington (besides a role player on the jordan-led bulls teams). they really piss me off. oh, and they also suck.

Kansas City Royals - rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic since 1994.

by Home Run Tony Cogan on Aug 8, 2009 11:51 PM EDT reply actions

Moneyball

I could handle some random guys who draw walks like the guys who randomly show up in Oakland.

Or if that’s too pricy, some guys who will have 2 ML quality years (at the most) and go back to AAA, like John Rodriguez and Bo Hart on the Cardinals

Graduate with a B.S. from the Dayton Moore School of Stats Analysis

by BHWick on Aug 9, 2009 12:00 AM EDT up reply actions

they're not doing too good lately

not that beane isn’t an outstanding gm…he’s been very good at leveraging hudson and mulder into haren and then a lot of pieces that are going to be ready to contribute soon…how different would things have been if we could have made good trades with dye, damon, beltran? very frustrating.

Kansas City Royals - rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic since 1994.

by Home Run Tony Cogan on Aug 9, 2009 12:20 AM EDT up reply actions

the Coliseum is a sinkhole for offense

if they had a park that could generate more offense and wasn’t 80% empty every night, they’d probably generate some more life with a mix of good OBP guys, assorted random parts, and washed up veterans

that Chavez contract must be killing them. $11M for 31 PA, $12M in 2010, and they’ll buy it out after that. No idea if Chavez will play full time at any time in the future

Maybe the A’s could have kept an ace pitcher and dealt Chavez

Graduate with a B.S. from the Dayton Moore School of Stats Analysis

by BHWick on Aug 9, 2009 12:26 AM EDT up reply actions

yeah, it goes to show

that all GM’s make mistakes, sometimes huge ones.

the royals are on pace for 75 wins per WAR; I guess they’ll end up with right around 62-65. that seems like a huge dfference between projected and actual; I would assume that is mostly b/c of baserunning, although random variance probably has something to do with it.

Kansas City Royals - rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic since 1994.

by Home Run Tony Cogan on Aug 9, 2009 12:34 AM EDT up reply actions

and pythag is probably still directly on target for the Royals

Graduate with a B.S. from the Dayton Moore School of Stats Analysis

by BHWick on Aug 9, 2009 1:18 AM EDT up reply actions

Here's a cool update to the pythag process:

http://grittyandclutch.blogspot.com/2009/07/tinkering-with-pythagorean-expectation.html

But here’s the problem—we’re wondering if WAR @ 75 is overrating the team. That’s horrendous.

by Justin Bopp on Aug 9, 2009 1:29 PM EDT up reply actions

WAR vs record

Thinking about this a lot recently. WAR is measured inidivual performance relative to rest of baseball, and at FanGraphs they haven’t yet put in league adjustments.

Bt teams as a whole don’t play thr test of baseball, they mostly play in their league.

This isn’t a problem with WAR, which intended primarily as a measure of individual player value.

Moreover, given the talent differential between the leagues, it isn’t surprising that a “75” win team against the whole lg would be considerably worse vs. Mostly AL

I'm not a sabermetrician, but I do play one at Driveline Mechanics.

Can't get enough of me? Check out my Twitter feed.

by Matt Klaassen on Aug 9, 2009 1:12 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions

Chavez' career

is just about over. He’s had five surgeries in the last three years and has microfractures throughout his body. Think of him as Oakland’s version of Sweeney. It’s sad to see. When he was healthy, he was one of the best third basemen in the game, on offense and defense.

Oakland may suck, but they are what the Royals should be at this point. A scrappy, up and coming team with a solid pitching staff. Their young rotation has players that could equal or surpass the Zito/Mulder/Hudson tandem in Braden/Anderson/Cahill/Gonzalez. And Justin Duchsherer is coming back soon too.

by CaseyRoyal on Aug 9, 2009 11:44 AM EDT up reply actions

Everidge

was called up to replace “Stick a Fork in me, I’m Done” Giambi. He’s a career minor leaguer, but not a bad hitter.

by CaseyRoyal on Aug 9, 2009 11:30 AM EDT up reply actions

OBP and EB rankings

(EB = expected bases (TB+HBP+BB/AB+BB+HBP+SF))

OBP (min. 100 PA as a Royal, and not being on the DL)
Butler: .357
Callaspo: .352
Teahen: .340
DeJesus: .330
Maier:. 311
Jacobs: .306
Bloomquist:. 304
Buck: .292
Olivo:. 271

EB
Butler: .525
Olivo: .488
Jacobs: .486
Callaspo: .485
Buck: .477
Teahen: .472
DeJesus: .464
Maier:. 401
Bloomquist: .391

Numbers for the unqualified on the Roster
Pena: .356 OBP/.500 EB
Gordon: .326 OBP/.393 EB
S-Key: .215 OBP/.342 EB
Anderson: .300 OBP/.300 EB

Numbers for the albatross on the DL
Guillen: .317 OBP/.430 EB

The AL averages going into Saturday were .334 OBP and a .479 EB

In other news, our ‘sluggers’ don’t get on base, our OBP guys don’t slug, and this team only scores runs against some of the worst offensive teams in the AL.

Graduate with a B.S. from the Dayton Moore School of Stats Analysis

by BHWick on Aug 9, 2009 1:33 AM EDT reply actions