Ken Rosenthal: Coghlan for ROY

[Swifty]

What the hell have Gaby or Maybin done at the major league level?

Gaby, who our front office hates so this discussion is moot anyway, is just an old college product who is a butcher defensively and was kicked off the team for steroid use. Counting on that for anything is a dicey proposition.

Cam fell flat on his face when he was asked to just be decent, not a star. He's now up, hit a mammoth home run, and suddenly he's an inevitability again. Reggie Abercrombie killed one in Cincy too, and we all know what Cam's torrid September of '08 led to.

Does Cam have a future? Absolutely, but to ask him to come in and replace the player that's third on our team in OBP, that's leading the team in homeruns...that's just dumb.

[lou]

You're not just being a homer with Maybin, you're being utterly absurd with Gaby. He put up .850 as a 26 year old PCL'er, asking for merely a .100 drop is overly ambitious.
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And what's more, it isn't just OPS, we're losing the 3rd and 4th highest qualifed OBPs on the team. That can't just walk out the door.

Utterly Absurd huh.

Guess we'll find out. Gaby had a 41/44 BB/K in 318 AB. He's going to translate into a "solid unspectacular bat" at worst. I don't think asking for .270/.350/.400 is a lot. And this isn't even including the possibility they can lowball NJ on a 2/$8 contract and then dump Gaby and just sit on Morrison for two years. Or, just calling up Morrison in the middle of the year and he goes all Coghlan on us. Hermida = easily replaced. That side of this, is not going to be a problem.

I can accept Maybin maybe slotting a bit lower right out of the gates because of contact issues, so let's scale him down to .775. Is that acceptable with you?

Because if so, I'm then going to make up the offense like this.

2009 (rounding up a few PA here, but I don't think you'll argue the roundball here)
500 PA Bonifacio - .625 OPS
125 PA N. Johnson - .850 OPS
125 PA Carroll - .800 OPS
Total - 750 PA - .691, we'll scale it up to .700 OPS for simplicity.

Now we take Uggla's .825 which needs to be replaced, and round this with the .700 OPS the retarded Bonifacio/Johnson/Carroll playing time split has produced, and now we're at .775 over two positions - CF and whoever the 8th starter is.

So Maybin does half of this even scaling him down from your 'homer,' so now we just have to figure out how to get a .775 OPS out of left field. I'll take my chances figuring out a .775 OPS out of left field between Carroll, Bonifacio, some veteran 1B/LF, Bryan Petersen, Scott Cousins, and maybe even Morrison, versus paying $8 million for Uggla.

Sure, keeping Uggla would make the team better. I'm not arguing that. But if payroll is X, this is one of the better scenarios. Keeping the pitcher, keep some of the arbitration bats, ease in some of the kids. We have to play to our constraints. It fucking sucks, but the correct answer is making the best decision we can afford and deflecting the production around. We can replace this production. A lot of it is because Bonifacio was just that bad, but hey. It counts.

I can't wait till 2012 when we can stop having these arguments that really devolve down into minor payroll issues for mid market teams.

[Swifty]

You don't need to bold anything lou, I won't disagree Uggla's salary likely precludes him from being part of the 2010 squad.

Maybe I need to bold this for you Cameron Maybin's career minor league OPS .867. Cameron Maybin's career MLB OPS .717

You're asking a guy who by every measure sucked at the major league level for extended times (here and in Detroit) to come in and just hit like his absolute minor league ceiling. Yeah, that sounds really fucking easy.

The conclusions you are drawing are completely and utterly unrelated to the substantive matter you are arguing.

Yes, Dan Uggla's elite 2B production can reasonably be replaced by Chris Coghlan. However, that does not mean Cameron Maybin makes the lineup better, or even a wash. That Dan Uggla has to go, and that his release can be justified by an internal option like Coghlan does not therefore mean Maybin is the right answer to replace Dan just because he's better than Gaby.

Maybin has to play next year, there's no doubting that. Ideally, Maybin's playing in an outfield with Hermida and Ross, Coghlan's at second and Nick Johnson is back at 1B or Logan is at 1B. Putting Gaby and Maybin in the same lineup, while showing Hermida and Uggla and Johnson the door makes us so overly susceptible to all kinds of suck and what you're presenting as a certainty is, in many ways, the best case scenario.

[lou]

What the hell have Gaby or Maybin done at the major league level?

Gaby, who our front office hates so this discussion is moot anyway, is just an old college product who is a butcher defensively and was kicked off the team for steroid use. Counting on that for anything is a dicey proposition.

Cam fell flat on his face when he was asked to just be decent, not a star. He's now up, hit a mammoth home run, and suddenly he's an inevitability again. Reggie Abercrombie killed one in Cincy too, and we all know what Cam's torrid September of '08 led to.

Does Cam have a future? Absolutely, but to ask him to come in and replace the player that's third on our team in OBP, that's leading the team in homeruns...that's just dumb.

Please keep even referencing around Abercrombie. That is so delicious i could eat it all day.

Secondly, how the fuck did we replace Mike Jacobs HR this year? One of the best seasons ever for a left handed bat in Dolphins Stadium. The power. The awesome.

It's fucking Uggla. He has an .811 OPS. .357 OBP is pretty good. This isn't a world beater. .825ish can be replaced through gains elsewhere. .875ish we have absolutely no shot. He doesn't do that annually. Would we be better with him? YES. Would having a $50 million payroll produce a better team than a $40 million payroll? YES. But can you please stop complaining about this. You, for the most part, understand what is going on with the team's finances. Bitch about Loria all you want, but the discussion needs to be "how the fuck do we replace this offense with our resources." And a big part of that is going to be the promotions of Maybin, Gaby, Coghlan staying at .800, BC hopefully hitting his .800 over 2-3 times the AB, improvement from Bonifacio (even if he hits a .675 next year is improving things), etc.

It's going to be ok. I promise. The offense is will be good enough, with room for improvement/break out potential if someone like Maybin wants to take off. The pitching is still the issue. We need consistency. We need health. And we need those arms to grow up fast to turn into a real contender and not a solid 85 win club.
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You don't need to bold anything lou, I won't disagree Uggla's salary likely precludes him from being part of the 2010 squad.

Maybe I need to bold this for you Cameron Maybin's career minor league OPS .867. Cameron Maybin's career MLB OPS .717

You're asking a guy who by every measure sucked at the major league level for extended times (here and in Detroit) to come in and just hit like his absolute minor league ceiling. Yeah, that sounds really fucking easy.

The conclusions you are drawing are completely and utterly unrelated to the substantive matter you are arguing.

Yes, Dan Uggla's elite 2B production can reasonably be replaced by Chris Coghlan. However, that does not mean Cameron Maybin makes the lineup better, or even a wash. That Dan Uggla has to go, and that his release can be justified by an internal option like Coghlan does not therefore mean Maybin is the right answer to replace Dan just because he's better than Gaby.

Maybin has to play next year, there's no doubting that. Ideally, Maybin's playing in an outfield with Hermida and Ross, Coghlan's at second and Nick Johnson is back at 1B or Logan is at 1B. Putting Gaby and Maybin in the same lineup, while showing Hermida and Uggla and Johnson the door makes us so overly susceptible to all kinds of suck and what you're presenting as a certainty is, in many ways, the best case scenario.

You are such a fucking cherry picker with stats its not funny. Maybins time in detroit was rushed from single A. He had a bad April coming off a 21 year old AA campaign. He is never going to fucking hit. Chris Coghlan had a .731 OPS in AAA this April. Chris Coghlan had a .657 OPS in May for the Marlins. He fucking sucks. Never will hit in the bigs.

What you're assuming, is the worst fucking case scenario. I'm drawing conclusions on Maybin improving his BB/K at a higher level of competition this year and drastically improving his contact. And he looks "good" this September. Albeit it's September so assholes may be pitching, but he's showing he belongs. And he's going to make you look really fucking stupid next year. I'll take the over on .717. Anything you want.

The team you want costs $50 million. I want that team to. BADLY. It would be fantastic to sign NJ for 2 years and let Morrison really get ready, keep Uggla for 1 more season and shift him or Coghlan to 3B, and keep both corner outfielders with the entire pitching staff. But I'm not going to bitch about payroll when the team gets no money from parking, concessions, luxury boxes, and other bullshit. Maybe I sympathize with the front office to much, but our lease sucks. We need this stadium to be able to field these teams.

So I'm going to run under the assumption of a $40 million team until someone comes out and tells me we have $45 or $50 to spend. And at $40 million, we can basically replace the 2009 squad in a worst case scenario, and we have breakout potential with Maybin/West/Miller/Volstad to become a real contender if two of three of them become above average like Coghlan immediately. I'm happy with that. It's a competitive squad, and it's not hurting the long term.

[Swifty]

The arms grow up? The same arms you said would make us the class of the division right now?

Lou, you love looking at the future's best case scenario like an absolute certainty and yet on every inevitable short coming (I don't see any new banners at the stadium) it doesn't mean anything, next year we're even better. Do me a favor, go be a Cubs fan, this "just wait till next year" idolatry is really starting to get old.

You want to play the Jacobs game? Tell me how much better we would be if we didn't play Bonifacio for 4 months and instead replaced him with Jacobs, who despite his notable short comings, still found a way to post a .725 OPS. That's a hell of a lot better than Emilio's .613. Do I want a 1B OPSing .725, not especially, but I'd rather that than the .613. Maybe you'd rather the .613.

The last thing; I love love love love love your obsession with the .800 OPS. I love that you've penciled in 4 players who have yet to have a full ML season in for .800 OPSes (Gaby, Coghlan, I'm sure Gaby and now Carroll, who excuse me you're really going out on a limb there).

Since the 2006 tear down, guess how many unique .800 OPS players we've had?

8 - Hanley, Miggy, Uggla, Willingham, Jacobs, Hermida, Cantu, Ross

With a 9th pending how Coghlan finishes 2009.

Even more exciting, guess how many players we've had have multiple .800 OPS seasons since '06?

4 - Hanley, Miggy, Uggla, Willingham.

Sure seems to me like the magic .800 is easy to come by in Florida. Let's just pencil in the whole fucking lineup for it.

[Fish and Chips]

does anyone know how run created on base and runs saved on defense translate to ops?
i mean if uggla posts a .825 ops but has a -9.1 uzr and -5 on the bases(guessing here) and boner posts a .650 ops but has a +10uzr and +10 runs on the bases are they the same player? or even if gaby posts a .725 ops and even uzr and is even on the bases, will he have the same value as 2008 uggla?

ops is a huge part in a position player value, but if uggla's replacements can improve in spots that uggla's suck in, he can be replacable.

[lou]

The arms grow up? The same arms you said would make us the class of the division right now?

Lou, you love looking at the future's best case scenario like an absolute certainty and yet on every inevitable short coming (I don't see any new banners at the stadium) it doesn't mean anything, next year we're even better. Do me a favor, go be a Cubs fan, this "just wait till next year" idolatry is really starting to get old.

You want to play the Jacobs game? Tell me how much better we would be if we didn't play Bonifacio for 4 months and instead replaced him with Jacobs, who despite his notable short comings, still found a way to post a .725 OPS. That's a hell of a lot better than Emilio's .613. Do I want a 1B OPSing .725, not especially, but I'd rather that than the .613. Maybe you'd rather the .613.

The last thing; I love love love love love your obsession with the .800 OPS. I love that you've penciled in 4 players who have yet to have a full ML season in for .800 OPSes (Gaby, Coghlan, I'm sure Gaby and now Carroll, who excuse me you're really going out on a limb there).

Since the 2006 tear down, guess how many unique .800 OPS players we've had?

8 - Hanley, Miggy, Uggla, Willingham, Jacobs, Hermida, Cantu, Ross

With a 9th pending how Coghlan finishes 2009.

Even more exciting, guess how many players we've had have multiple .800 OPS seasons since '06?

4 - Hanley, Miggy, Uggla, Willingham.

Sure seems to me like the magic .800 is easy to come by in Florida. Let's just pencil in the whole fucking lineup for it.

For someone in law school, your reading comprehension is astonishing. First of all, I have Gaby at .800? Two posts up it's .750. Fail. Second, I have Maybin a lock for .800? I conceded you .775. I think he's going to be really good. But I can accept the fact I may be rushing his production a bit and can bring it down. It's better to roundball things at average production levels anyways. Third, I said Carrol "hopefully" hitting .800. Nowhere did I say he would do that. But if this season is even partially true against LHP, and he plays a bit more next year with some sort of OF platoon, I don't see why he couldn't be a positive contributor in some aspect and help make up some of the offense. Cause giving him AB over Bonifacio isn't an upgrade. Even the smallest offensive jump counts. And lastly if you can read at all I never declared Coghlan an .800 I said "remaining" an .800. Does this mean, "he will hit .800?." No. It means that could make up the production elsewhere if he can keep this level of offense. We are going to have to trust our youth to produce at some point. I don't see how you can across the board think all of them are going to fucking suck because Cam Maybin didn't hit in Detroit 3 years ago or April 2009, and Gaby Sanchez is 0-13 or whatever when he gets a pinch hit every 4th game after getting off a red eye from NOLA.

Second, I don't think we are a world series team next year. Or even "better." Never said that. Your cubs quib is taking it to far. But at $40 million, this team can easily replicate a 80-87 wins team, and IF IF IF IF, the pitchers were to break out in a Garza/Niemann kind of way, they'd be able to hang with anyone in the NL. I think that's a pretty big accomplishment for the front office if that's how it goes down. But go ahead and predict another 100 loss season, and only 70 wins for this year. You are totally killer at doing this. Remember before this season you said there was no way we'd repeat last year and you wanted to bet me?

Next, We didn't have the $3 million for Jacobs. And would I rather have Leo Nunez than a bunch more of Logan Kensing and Luis Ayala shithead relievers blowing even more games but thats not my point and we don't need to play that game. You're looking at the small picture. We are on pace for 776 runs in 2009. We scored 799 runs last year. This is an EPIC FAIL moment? To me, this is replacing the offense when we had a lot of player turnover. Offense is down, sure. Bonifacio is near 100% to blame, sure. Again, UNDERSTAND THIS FRANCHISE HAS PAYROLL CONSTRAINTS. We would have been awesome with Hammer and not Bonifacio, but we couldn't afford him. And that's besides the point (1) his back was fucked and wasn't a sure thing, and (2) no one, and I mean not even Ramp, saw this season coming. I think it's pretty fucking awesome we're going to score 25 or so less runs from last year, and we got rid of 55 HR from Jacobs, Willingham, and Gonzalez. And the $7.5 million in payroll we did not pay them. I would like an improvement which is what you are crying about, but if all we can do is tread water until stadium and Morrison/Stanton/Dominguez, then tread water.

Like I said. If we had payroll, we could be better. If that's your problem, that's your problem. But the front office is doing a damn good job with this payroll anchor around them, and we'll still be a "good" team that is very young and improving next year no matter what happens this offense. I want NJ and Uggla back to, at least for a year, but if we have to give serious AB to Gaby, some cheap "Chad Tracyish" veteran 1B, Carroll, and another try with Bonifacio, so what? We'll still probably hit enough to be good, and it's the pitchers growing up which takes us from 82 wins to 92 wins. It would be nice to have a more slamming offense to help with that gap, but again. Pay-Fucking-Roll. God willingly 2010 is the last year we have to do this, and in 2011 they keep everyone revving up for the stadium.

[nny]

10 runs is roughly 40 OPS points over 650 PA.

Oh and Uggla is a plus on the basepaths
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and (2) no one, and I mean not even Ramp, saw this season coming

If teal and black was still up I'd quote all my posts of saying Hammer's gonna go .950

[Ramp]

fwiw, hammer is slumping and is down to .930 now

[nny]

oh and

if we trade all of our arb bats, and get .720-.750 OPS from every starter sans-hanley who goes another .900+, with a bench of .650-.700 OPS bats, we're a slightly below average NL offense. Not a bottom dweller. And if Coghlan repeats 800, if Baker repeats 800, ect, up up up.

If we keep one 800 ops arb bat, that alone makes us an above average NL offensive team.

as lou said it all comes down to pitching.
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fish and chips:

http://baseballprospectus.com/statis...php?cid=468149

it's not perfect but it's a lot better than anything else to go off of

http://www.soflamarlins.com/forum/showthread.php?t=191 sums up 06-09 numbers
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we should also be looking at improved defense next year

LF: -14 UZR
CF: -4 UZR
RF: +4 UZR
3B: -4 UZR
SS: +2 UZR
2B: -9 UZR
1B: 1 UZR

If we call SS and 1b a wash, RF a wash with cody there, we're looking at an upgrade in CF, who knows what at 3b, and massive upgrades in LF and 2b just by moving Coghlan. We're at a -23 UZR as a team and 2b/lf combined go for -23. And that doesn't include massive defense from BC if he's starting, and what should be good defense from Maybin/Petersen/Gaby/et al if they start.

But I also thought we would be a good defensive team this year haha so who knows that's one of the issues with defensive stats at least is how much they fluctuate.
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fwiw, hammer is slumping and is down to .930 now

He's letting me down ramp

[Swifty]

And here we keep going Lou.

You don't have to spell it out to me, I understand there are payroll limitations. What seems to be completely lost on you is that you can't shed two productive players in our lineup in Uggla and Hermida, replace them with two inferior players in terms of 2009 production to realistic 2010 production and magically improve by 10 wins. Sprinkle your hypothetical pixie dust all you want, but the magic dominance you've projected has yet to come. Your legendary name1/name2/name3/name4/name5/name849219 posts have yet to produce any of the success you see as inevitable. 3 years ago it was Tucker/Thompson/Sinkbeil/Allison/RVH/Volstad/West leading us to the promised land, now it's Maybin/Stanton/Carroll/Dominguez/Gaby/Logan. Allow me to be skeptical of your sunshine lollipops and rainbows predictions. That these kids come with a pedigree does not mean they are inevitabilities.

The whole fucking point of having a guy like Hanley isn't to wait 4 fucking years when Maybin and Morrison and Stanton and Dominguez might be good. Doing that is a catastrophic waste of Hanley's abilities. We know he's good, we better win while he's still here being good. If we can't, there's no fucking point. You don't make a possibility like your Jacksonville trio the key to our success, you make a certainty like Hanley the key. You can't keep looking three years from now as the time when you have good players wasting away under the "treading water" scenario. The pitching wave blew up in our face...if Stanton suddenly K's too much to be useful, if Logan never regains his 2008 form and Maybin becomes tragically average (which, right now, would still be an improvement)...what then, do we start fawning over Skipworth and James and their 2014 arrival?

[lou]

Correction.

Now on pace for 785 runs - 14 less than 2008. EPIC FAIL.

[Fish and Chips]

swift there is a difference bewteen being skeptical and being a pessimistic.


i know you hated the FO with a fury, but the product they put on the field is winning, whether if they are winning in spite of the front office and the manager or not.

I think the marlins have a nice core of players for 2010, any team with the marlins payroll constraints would kill for a core of hanley, CC, Maybin, JJ, Ricky, and Baker. And that doesnt even include the arb. bats that they keep. So how are the marlins wasting 4 years of hanley's career? the marlins will compete next year, but just like lou said, the x-factor is the staff, not the lineup. Because the dropoff from the ops will be make up when the defense improves

[lou]

And here we keep going Lou.

You don't have to spell it out to me, I understand there are payroll limitations. What seems to be completely lost on you is that you can't shed two productive players in our lineup in Uggla and Hermida, replace them with two inferior players in terms of 2009 production to realistic 2010 production and magically improve by 10 wins. Sprinkle your hypothetical pixie dust all you want, but the magic dominance you've projected has yet to come. Your legendary name1/name2/name3/name4/name5/name849219 posts have yet to produce any of the success you see as inevitable. 3 years ago it was Tucker/Thompson/Sinkbeil/Allison/RVH/Volstad/West leading us to the promised land, now it's Maybin/Stanton/Carroll/Dominguez/Gaby/Logan. Allow me to be skeptical of your sunshine lollipops and rainbows predictions. That these kids come with a pedigree does not mean they are inevitabilities.

The whole fucking point of having a guy like Hanley isn't to wait 4 fucking years when Maybin and Morrison and Stanton and Dominguez might be good. Doing that is a catastrophic waste of Hanley's abilities. We know he's good, we better win while he's still here being good. If we can't, there's no fucking point. You don't make a possibility like your Jacksonville trio the key to our success, you make a certainty like Hanley the key. You can't keep looking three years from now as the time when you have good players wasting away under the "treading water" scenario. The pitching wave blew up in our face...if Stanton suddenly K's too much to be useful, if Logan never regains his 2008 form and Maybin becomes tragically average (which, right now, would still be an improvement)...what then, do we start fawning over Skipworth and James and their 2014 arrival?

First of all, I did not say we are going to improve by 10 wins. I have consistently said all of this is "replacing production" and how we can field relatively the same team next year with what we have, while shedding 2 of the arbitration bats. The improvement is going to come, if it does, from Volstad/Miller/West taking the next step and becoming 180-200 IP, low 4 era, starters or whatever. If they don't we're still going to hover around mediocrity. If they take the next step, the team will be a legit contender. And longterm, if Maybin/Stanton/Morrison/Dominguez/Cousins/Make fun of this all you want/Petersen turn into 3/4s the players projected of them, we're talking one of the best teams in baseball. You can't do much better than this on paper. You should be happy this front office has a grand plan and just doesn't wildly sign guys like Freddy Sanchez, Jack Wilson, Ian Snell, John Grabow, and then wonder why they've lost for 17 seasons in a row. Is that what you want? To sign all these complimentary players that are replaceable? Even to one year deals? You sign Chipper Jones. You sign Andruw Jones. You sign Tom Glavine. You don't sign Ryan Klesko, Kent Mercker, Steve Avery, and other solid players when they price themselves off your team even if they are good.

Second, Hanley will be 29 years old in 4 years. Exactly when we should have a team built around him in his prime. Hanley isn't 30 and exiting his prime. He's fucking TWENTY FIVE. Hanley is the key. That's why he is signed through 2014. You know as well as everyone here 2012 is the year they are building for now. Does that suck for us in the immediate? Kind of. We have to trade Uggla for "payroll matches revenue" reasons, or we have to get LF to some sort of Carroll/De Aza/Bonifacio/who the fuck knows combo next year and not keep Hermida for a measly low $3 million number? Yea that sucks when this team is probably keeping Ross, Cantu, Uggla, Johnson, Hermida, and acquiring even a Penny/Pavano/Legit 4/5 Innings Eater starter from being penciled in to 90 wins (that team is around $60 million), but they won't pay it. But at least they aren't tanking things like what the Pirates just did (even though I loved their trades, they have no shot at being good for 2 seasons. I guess they are wasting McCutchen's years and should trade him). They Marlins are at least fielding a team that has the breakout potential (see Maybin/Volstad/West/Miller/obvious minor leaguers who could make jumps from AA) with a mix of some veterans to be a contender if the pieces fall in line, at a very low salary where they aren't running a negative business. This is smart.

You aren't making good arguments. You can be skeptical and expect every minor leaguer to fail before proving you wrong, but at the same time you cannot ignore scouting and our long track record of "figuring shit out." We didn't lose 100 two years ago. We didn't struggle to win 70 wins this year. This is going to repeat itself, and every day is a day closer for corporate sponsorships, business' buying out sky boxes, and probably a quadrupling in attendance. That's when we can have the luxury of keeping a .811 OPS bat for $8 million while we give another year to a kid in AAA that projects to be just as good. But just hasn't proved it.

[nny]

Going by park factored wOBA (weighted on base average), we're tied with philly for best offense in the NL at the moment.

And that's with running Bonifacio at the top of the line up for 60% of the season

not to worried about next year's offense.