2013 Trade Deadline Talk

[Mainge]

But Hech at least provides amazing defense. Dietrich is just average to bad on both ends.

He has potential to be above average offensively.
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I can live with Hech hitting .240 if he provides amazing defense like has been. At least he's bringing something to the table. It would be different if he was average or subpar with his glove.

Stop with the averages, guy.

[Todd]

Are the defensive sabermetrics liking him more than they were?

[Miamarlin21]

He has potential to be above average offensively.
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Stop with the averages, guy.

omg I was just saying an example. Fuck.

[Mainge]

It's a pointless example. Might as well say you're okay with him hitting .banana on offense.

[Miamarlin21]

Well he doesn't walk and doesn't hit for power so I don't know what fucking stat you want me to use.

[Mainge]

OPS at least. Because him not walking and hitting for power is important.

Average in a vacuum is always bad. I'm just doing you a favor.

[Miamarlin21]

Well his .596 OPS is considered, awful, right?

[Mainge]

Really awful.

[Miamarlin21]

But his .283 BABIP is a little encouraging, right?

[HUGG]

there's nothing statistically encouraging about him offensively

there are some things encouraging about him if you actually watch him hit though
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well the fact his LD% this season is higher than his minor league career LD% and his K% this season is better than his minor league career K% could be considered encouraging I guess

[Mainge]

But his .283 BABIP is a little encouraging, right?

No.

[Miamarlin21]

Ugh. I just can't get a fucking grip on BABIP. I don't know why but I just can't.

[Todd]

.300 is about average.

[emkayseven]

Ugh. I just can't get a fucking grip on BABIP. I don't know why but I just can't.

saw this post, then came across an article by Manny Acta who's apparently writing for ESPN now (and who by the way is worse at writing than managing). I'll get to that in a minute.

The idea behind BABIP is basically that pitchers don't have control over balls in play - they only have control over strikeouts, walks, and home runs (BABIP calculation doesn't include home runs). "Average" is usually somewhere around .300 - of course it varies from year to year and has even varied over the decades, and differs, like everything else, from one league to the other. But .300 is the nice "round" BABIP people like to think about.

Fast hitters tend to have very high BABIPs, and guys who are free swingers and don't strike out a lot (think: Vlad Guerrero) do as well. Both of these make sense, since fast guys are more liable to get an infield hit, free swingers aren't going to take lots of walks OR strike out a lot, so their batting average will be very close to their BABIP.

The overall idea is not necessarily that a batting average higher/lower than a BABIP will even out - it's that, over time, BABIP will even out, unless there is some underlying circumstance like an extremely fast runner or a good bunter, etc., and that any extreme high or low BABIP is likely due to luck. Some hitters will have high career BABIPs, some will be low, depending on what type of player he is, but any strange deviation from that is likely luck.

A great example of that is Andrew McCutchen last year. To this minute, his career BABIP is .324 (which includes last season). Last year, his BABIP was .375. That's way too high, so there's an expectation of regression, since no one (besides Ty Cobb) can maintain a BABIP that high. Last year his slash line was .327/.400/.573. This year his BABIP is down to a more normal .333, and his slash line has followed at .304/.375/.498.

Anyway, back to my "original" point: in talking about Starlin Castro, Manny Acta says this:

The Cubs made it very clear that they see Starlin Castro as part of their future when they gave him a seven-year, $60 million extension in August 2012, so they can't be happy to see him hitting .248 with little power or OBP.

The good news is that some of this is bad luck. Castro's line-drive rate (19.9 percent) is about the same it has always been, but his batting average on balls in play of .296 is well below his career average of .327.

So, what's the problem? For starters, a .296 BABIP is around average. But Starlin is kind of speedy, so he could be expected to have a slightly higher career BABIP.

But take a look at his career numbers. His rookie season, he had a .346 BABIP. The next year it was .344. Those numbers are simply unsustainable. Through 2010, here are the players who had career BABIPs higher than .344:

         Name	        BABIP  	First	Last
1  	Ty Cobb	        0.362  	1905  	1928
2  	Ichiro Suzuki	0.355  	2001  	2010
        Rogers Hornsby	0.355  	1915  	1937
4  	Rod Carew	0.353  	1967  	1985
5  	Derek Jeter	0.352  	1995  	2010
6  	Joe Jackson	0.351  	1908  	1920
7  	Billy Hamilton	0.350  	1888  	1901
8  	Pete Browning	0.347  	1882  	1894
9  	Ed Delahanty	0.346  	1888  	1903
10  	Miguel Cabrera	0.344  	2003  	2010
        Dan Brouthers	0.344  	1879  	1904

Doesn't seem like Castro would fit there, right?

His next season - last season - he had a more modest .315 BABIP. His slash line was .283/.323/.430. Given that his peripherals didn't change much - there was very little variance in his K rate and BB rate from the previous two years - we can say that last season was probably his "norm."

This year, sure, his BABIP is down. It's still around .300. He's probably been a little unlucky, and his slash line is .246/.282/.354. Given that his BABIP of .315 was the lowest of his career last year, I'd say luck does have something to do with this year. But remember when I said his K and BB rates barely changed last year despite a 30 point drop in BABIP, meaning that last season was likely just luck evening out? Well, this year is a different story.

K%
2010   14.0%
2011   13.4%
2012   14.5%
2013   18.4%

BB%
2010   5.7%
2011   4.9%
2012   5.2%
2013   3.7%

Something's wrong, and it's not his BABIP.

[marlinsfan24]

This is news of the trade offer the Pirates made last week to the Marlins I learned from a source yesterday. I am not going to make up rumors or sources ever, as that's not how I want to run Marlin Maniac. You can probably verify from emkay and miamarlin21 that I am not going to post anything fraudulent.

http://marlinmaniac.com/2013/08/05/m...carlo-stanton/

The Miami Marlins had no intentions to trade Giancarlo Stanton before last Wednesday’s trade deadline, and just because they didn’t, it doesn’t mean a teams did not try their hardest to acquire the slugging right fielders services.

A team source revealed to Marlin Maniac that the Pittsburgh Pirates made the Marlins a strong offer for Stanton’s services, that had the Marlins front office contemplating pulling off a Stanton trade. This is consistent with the report from Rob Biertempfel of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review from last week:

The Pirates made repeated attempts to work a deal for Stanton and, according to another source, made an offer that caught the attention of Miami’s front office. However, Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria does not want to shed the team’s lone superstar.

The source told Marlin Maniac that the Pirates offered the Marlins a compelling offer, which included both cost-controlled major league players and a top pitching prospect. The Pirates offered the Marlins rookie pitcher Gerrit Cole, outfielder Starling Marte, and prospects James Taillon and Stetson Allie for Stanton, Steve Cishek, and Justin Ruggiano.

This rumor contradicts what Clark Spencer reported on Twitter shortly after the deadline and the package makes a lot more sense than the package Page Q reported a few days ago.

The Pirates caught the eye of the Marlins front office enough with an offer that they seriously entertained the offer and brought it to owner Jeffery Loria. Loria had already decided from before that he was not interested in trading Stanton before he has a chance to offer Stanton an extension to be a Marlin for the long haul.

According to the team source, the Marlins plan on offering Stanton a contract extension of 8-years worth approximately $140 million after the season. If Stanton declines the deal, the Marlins will then try to trade Stanton.

The package is obviously a hefty one, with the Marlins also sending out Cishek and Ruggiano to join Stanton in Pittsburgh. Both teams would have given up a lot, with the Pirates set on trying to win in 2013 and the Marlins building for a perennial winner a few seasons down the road.

We will take a look at the players and prospects that the Marlins would have gotten in return if the team were to accept such a package later today, but for now, let us know what you think. Was this a deal that you would have bit on for Stanton or would you have wanted more in return for Stanton and the team’s closer.