Berkman signs with Rangers for 1yr/$10MM

[PuffyPig]

Originally Posted by MikeThierry

I really don't mind the Dodgers paying for a mentally weak twerp in Grienke. I've always thought he was overrated. If the Doyers want to overpay and waste money on an average pitcher, that's ok. I would rather be a mid-market team and be smart with their money. Do what the Rays do. It's worked for the Cardinals all these years.

EDIT: As you can tell, I can't stand Grienke. His face is too punchable for my liking.

Greinke an average pitcher?

He's averaged a 5.7 WAR over the last 5 years according to Fangraphs.

And I wouldn't compare the(2012) Cards $110M payroll to the Rays $64M anytime soon.

[westofyou]

Originally Posted by MikeThierry

I really don't mind the Dodgers paying for a mentally weak twerp in Grienke. I've always thought he was overrated. If the Doyers want to overpay and waste money on an average pitcher, that's ok. I would rather be a mid-market team and be smart with their money. Do what the Rays do. It's worked for the Cardinals all these years.

EDIT: As you can tell, I can't stand Grienke. His face is too punchable for my liking.

Nice...

[MikeThierry]

Originally Posted by PuffyPig

Greinke an average pitcher?

He's averaged a 5.7 WAR over the last 5 years according to Fangraphs.

And I wouldn't compare the(2012) Cards $110M payroll to the Rays $64M anytime soon.

Yes he's overrated. He had an outlier season in 09 but has been less than inspiring before and since. You can point out his WAR all you want, I would rather go by what the stats actually say instead of using a formula that has a [bias] for strike out pitchers. For example, according to Fangraphs Kyle Lohse had a 3.6 WAR last season compared to Wainwrights 4.4. There is no logical explaination that you could point out that Wainwright had a better year than Loshe last year though. I guess if strike outs are the end all when it comes to pitchers, as sabermatricians seem to allude to, then Wainwrights you're guy last year. I would have taken Lohse. It's another example where WAR, esp. pitching WAR has it's limitations.

I wasn't really comparing the payrolls of the Cards and Rays. I was comparing the approach. The Cardinals have a little bit of flexibility to spend but they have to be smart. They've also rebuilt the minor league system in recent years and seemed to rely more on their farm like the Rays do. The point I was making is that small and mid-market teams are forced to be smart with their money, both of which the Cards and Rays do.

[PuffyPig]

Originally Posted by MikeThierry

There is no logical explaination that you could point out that Wainwright had a better year than Loshe last year though.

Lohse had a better season as his BABIP was 53 points lower. When you normalize BABIP for both pitchers, Wainwright comes out ahead. Their BABIP's are historically about the same and within the usual range of all pitchers.

Unless you don't believe in "BABIP", that's as logical as it gets.

[PuffyPig]

Originally Posted by MikeThierry

I wasn't really comparing the payrolls of the Cards and Rays. I was comparing the approach. The Cardinals have a little bit of flexibility to spend but they have to be smart. They've also rebuilt the minor league system in recent years and seemed to rely more on their farm like the Rays do. The point I was making is that small and mid-market teams are forced to be smart with their money, both of which the Cards and Rays do.

Cards have really only rebuilt their minor league system over the last few years.

They also consistenly spend in the bottom of the top third of money in the majors.

The Cards built their teams in the 2000's mostly with trading for free agents to be, such as Edmonds, Rolen, Renteria,etc, or signing FA's, such as Encarnacion, Vina, Furcal, Carpenter, Lohse, Izzy etc. They were certainly not a team that was built through the draft.

I think you are confusing what they may become over what they have been.

[MikeThierry]

Originally Posted by PuffyPig

Lohse had a better season as his BABIP was 53 points lower. When you normalize BABIP for both pitchers, Wainwright comes out ahead. Their BABIP's are historically about the same and within the usual range of all pitchers.

Unless you don't believe in "BABIP", that's as logical as it gets.

Actually I do believe in BABIP. I'm just going by what actually happened on the field, including the BABIP that they had last year. Normalzing a stat doesn't tell the story for what happened that particular year. So what if Lohse had a BABIP that was 53 points lower. IT ACTUALLY HAPPENED! Doing things like that take away from what a player accomplishes. Now, there's no way in heck I would take Lohse over Wainwright going forward. Waino is probably going to be back to his normal Cy Young quality pitching being two years removed from that injury. However when talking about who had the better year last year, it doesn't make sense to "normalize" BABIP.

[MikeThierry]

Originally Posted by PuffyPig

Cards have really only rebuilt their minor league system over the last few years.

They also consistenly spend in the bottom of the top third of money in the majors.

The Cards built their teams in the 2000's mostly with trading for free agents to be, such as Edmonds, Rolen, Renteria,etc, or signing FA's, such as Encarnacion, Vina, Furcal, Carpenter, Lohse, Izzy etc. They were certainly not a team that was built through the draft.

I think you are confusing what they may become over what they have been.

How did they trade for their players though? Many times they traded minor league players or players they developed through the system to get that talent (IE Edmonds aquired by trading Adam Kennedy, Rolen aquired by the Cardinals trading Plácido Polanco, Mike Timlin, and Bud Smith). They got Waino through trading JD Drew, who the Cardinals drafted. The point is that they developed those players and put them in a situation where they could trade. There's multiple ways to skin a cat, which the farm system is for. You can either hold onto talent or trade for it. Reds fans know this first hand with the moves they've made the last two years. You wouldn't have been able to do those moves if you didn't have the farm system in place.

[cincyinco]

Originally Posted by MikeThierry

I


EDIT: As you can tell, I can't stand Grienke. His face is too punchable for my liking.

Funny, I feel that same way about some of the Cardinal players...

[OnBaseMachine]

Originally Posted by cincyinco

Funny, I feel that same way about some of the Cardinal players...

But especially their fans.

Its pretty annoying having to constantly read "Cardinals this, Cardinals that" in all of Mike's posts.

[westofyou]

Originally Posted by OnBaseMachine

But especially their fans.

Its pretty annoying having to constantly read "Cardinals this, Cardinals that" in all of Mike's posts.

It's like listening to a grandmother go on and on about her grandchildren.

Bumper-stickers should be issued

"My Grandchild pitches for the St. Looey Cardinals."

[MikeThierry]

Originally Posted by OnBaseMachine

But especially their fans.

Its pretty annoying having to constantly read "Cardinals this, Cardinals that" in all of Mike's posts.

Then ignore me. I don't give a damn if the examples I give are situations that closely mirror those in which I've seen locally.

[PuffyPig]

Originally Posted by MikeThierry

However when talking about who had the better year last year, it doesn't make sense to "normalize" BABIP.

Normalizing BABIP is an attempt to take luck out of the equation.

You don't think that make sense?

[OnBaseMachine]

Originally Posted by MikeThierry

Then ignore me. I don't give a damn if the examples I give are situations that closely mirror those in which I've seen locally.

The thing is, we don't give a damn about the Cardinals. This is a REDS board.

And woy's analogy is so perfect.

[MikeThierry]

Originally Posted by PuffyPig

Normalizing BABIP is an attempt to take luck out of the equation.

You don't think that make sense?

I'm not going to deny it has its uses. It would make sense if you're trying to analyze how a player will do going forward. It doesn't make sense though when talking about past performance and comparing it to others performance that particular year.

[PuffyPig]

Originally Posted by MikeThierry

How did they trade for their players though? Many times they traded minor league players or players they developed through the system to get that talent (IE Edmonds aquired by trading Adam Kennedy, Rolen aquired by the Cardinals trading Plácido Polanco, Mike Timlin, and Bud Smith). They got Waino through trading JD Drew, who the Cardinals drafted. The point is that they developed those players and put them in a situation where they could trade. There's multiple ways to skin a cat, which the farm system is for. You can either hold onto talent or trade for it. Reds fans know this first hand with the moves they've made the last two years. You wouldn't have been able to do those moves if you didn't have the farm system in place.

But this issue wasn't whether the Cards (like the Rays) had decent farm systems.

The issue was whether the Cards and the Rays were following the same model.

The Cards model in the 2000's was to trade for or sign expensive FA's or FA's to be, sometimes using prospects to aquire those players.

The Rays model was to rely upon cheap, young talent, and trade them away when they got expensive for cheap, young talent.

The Cards and the Rays approach was actually the complete opposite.