Do The Right Thing

I like Angel Pagan a lot, but the just thinking about the return of Moises Alout makes me happy from an offensive standpoint. I do understand the step back in defense the Mets will be taking, but as good as Pagan has been, Alou is a just a beast.

Over the last four seasons, he has dropped an OPS+ of 131, 138, 132, and 138. Sweet. As good as Angel Pagan is, Alou is miles ahead offensively. For me, Alou is more the passable enough in left with solid defense everywhere else with the exception of first, so it is hardly a concern.

The Mets are rolling right now and their starting pitching has been sparkling for the most part and the only real blemish with this team right now is Carlos Delgado and his 64 OPS+. That is horrific and Delgado really needs to be dropped. Enter in the real problem, which is Willie.

Mets manager Willie Randolph said it's premature to consider reacting to first baseman Carlos Delgado's slump.

For now, Delgado remains in the fifth spot in the Mets' lineup.

"It's too early for me," Randolph said. "A lot depends on how the team is doing."

If Willie insists on batting Castillo second and will continue to be stubborn with Delgado, there are not many options out there. Castillo, his 61 OPS+, and his inability to hit a ball out of the infield have no business being anywhere but 8th and Delgado is just a diminished player at this point, but we know how this story is going to play out....at least in the early chapters.

Reyes OPS+ 114
Castillo OPS+ 61
Wright OPS+ 207
Beltran OPS+ 100
Delgado OPS+ 64
Alou OPS+ kickass
Church OPS+ 127
Schneider OPS + 88

The weird thing is Willie did drop Delgado last year and had dropped Castillo this year. There were some moments of clarity, but he inevtiably goes back to his stubborn ways and thinks the players are still capable of their yesteryear production. If you come to grips with that, the most optimal lineup should be Reyes, Church, Wright, Beltran, Alou, Delagado, Schneider, and Castillo.

I do not buy into balancing the out the lineup and spreading out your big guns. Your best players should be at the top and the bad hitters should be at the bottom. For me, it is simple. For others, not so much. I truly hope Willie comes to grips that Castillo and Delgado are done and does the right thing. He should not wait for a complete disaster to take action, but make sensible decisions when they are the obvious and right thing to do.

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Frank Thomas is a big, big man.

Last night was a ugly game. Very ugly. However, I did enjoy watching Zambrano and Marmol. Zambrano striking out Wright with back to back filthy pitches in the first was fun to watch and watching Marmol strike out Anderson with a frisbee was fun as well.

Other than that, ugly, ugly, ugly.

Wright is awesome.

Know who had a hotter week than the Braves' Chipper Jones? OK, nobody had a hotter week. But in the interest of spreading things around a little, let's give some credit to the Mets' David Wright, who hit .522 in his team's six games, with a sick .633 on-base percentage and nine RBIs along the way. Wright was so good for the Mets -- who, by the way, went 5-1 -- that he overshadowed the re-emergence of shortstop Jose Reyes (.429, two homers, two RBIs, two stolen bases). Reyes scored seven runs in the six games, two more than he had in his first nine.

Tim Marchman talks Yankee baseball.

Hole In The Two Hole?

Hmmmm....

This was one of those quiet acquisitions — other than Johan Santana's reaction to it in Minny — that can make a huge difference in October. Ruben Gotay had been filling in admirably for the injured Jose Valentin, but now the Mets have a slick-fielding veteran for the playoffs. (Castillo's record of 143 straight games without an error at second was equaled by Placido Polanco on Sunday.) A willing two-strike hitter, Castillo is the perfect guy to have in the 2-hole behind Jose Reyes. Castillo is hitting .326 since coming to New York in a deal that cements the Mets as the favorites in the NL.

I like the deal, but it cements the Mets as the favorite? Castillo does all that for the Mets?

I think what Paul LoDuca did last year is nice and all, but I'm quite partial to guys who can hit rather than situationally hit. Not that situational hitting is bad. I think it absolutely has its place and a team should know how to do so in case they need to grind out a run. But as a a way of life? I just think having a flat out better hitter is not exactly a bad thing when it comes to the two spot.

There seems to be a perception that a certain type of hitter needs to be batting second. While that might be necessary in certain types of lineups, good lineups that have a very good hitting deep into the lineup probably do not need to manufacture runs a lot. And if a team does not need to manufacture runs a lot, why have a situational hitter smack in the middle of speed and power? Reyes has been proficient at scoring runs no matter who hits behind him and the numbers seem to suggest that. Omar and Willie's ideal #2 hitter is probably a bit unnecessary as their ideal #2 hitter lives and breath to move Jose over.

This link and the below blurb are courtesy of David who emailed me.

Its from the National Severe Storms Laboratory--go figure. Anyway, runner on 2nd, no outs, the probability of scoring a run is 0.633 and expected runs that inning are 1.13. Bunting the runner to 3rd but giving up the out--probability of scoring a run only rises to 0.667, a pretty marginal increase. But the expected runs that inning drops down to 0.96. So the probability of scoring a run rises by 0.034, while the expected runs drops by 0.17. And this is based on tens of thousands of observations. So given that Castillo is batting .300 and has some astounding number of infield hits {and conversely outs}, what exactly is the benefit of the sacrifice?

On the other hand, with the bases loaded and one out, as in the top of the 7th as I write, the probability of scoring a run is 0.678 and expected runs are 1.57...and we got bupkis.

Of course many will point to things not in the box score or things that cannot be quantified that a player of Castillo's ilk would contribute. If you look at Ruben Gotay's VORP and Luis Castillo's VORP, Gotay is ahead 13.3 to 8.5. But that is not fair right? Castillo brings defense to the table which was the biggest reason he was brought over and VORP does not account for defense.

WARP1 does and Gotay's WARP1 is 1.4 and Castillo has a 1.3 WARP1 with the TWins and a .2 WARP1 with the Mets. So they are basically even then, right? Not really. WARP1 rewards playing time. So, for any player that had their playing time minimized due to injury, benching, or whatever would be negatively impacted in regards to WARP1. Gotay has 64 games played and 137 at-bats versus Castillo's 77 games played and 382 at-bats. This is not to rip the move of acquiring Castillo. I think he has value to a club like the Mets and they got him for free.

However, it is entirely possible Gotay is more valuable right now than Castillo even when their defense is factored in. Of course this assumes Gotay's offense is for real and to what capacity his offense if for real. He is obviously not a .350 hitter, but he looks like the real thing and has a pretty impressive swing. I do wish the Mets would reconsider giving the #2 to a situation hitter this year and definitely next year.

The Mets could easily roll with a Reyes, Beltran, Wright, Delgado, Alou, Green, LoDuca, Castillo lineup (a balanced lineup like Willie likes) and probably be better off. If Milledge or Gotay see some playing time, they fit nicely into the #2 hole. I do not think a slap hitter batting second really gives them their best opportunity to score runs. However for the rest of the season, Gotay should be seeing more playing time right now to keep a potentially valuable bat warm. Castillo and Gotay are both going to be valuable should the Mets make the playoffs and hopefully both get used in the correct spots.

Just an aside...not to belabor the point, but if the Mets are willing to sacrifice offense for defense at second, why is the lack of offense and defense not dealt with in right?

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More on what Bobby Jenks has done this season (stolen for a Rob Neyer's comments on his blog)

How rare is it to retire 41 consecutive batters in today's American League? Assuming an avg OBP of 0.337 (as Casey Stengel or Baseball Annie would say - "you could look it up"), then the odds are roughly 1 in 20.8 million chances. Assuming 30 teams multiplied by 162 games - you would expect to see this event randomly occur every 4200 years or so. If you assume the pitcher is pitching with supreme confidence and the hitters are totally bewildered and as such then lower the expected OBP all the way down to 0.300 then it is much less rare - would happen every 460 years or so. I know unwashed writer Neyer is a bit of a stat geek so I thought this tidbit would be appropriate here. (not trying to label anyone here - god forbid!)

I'm just going to take his word for it. It's fucking special.

Good win. Good lineup. Seven tough outs and excellent defense with the exception of left and first.

Pedro is chugging along the comeback trail and though he is making progress, it is unclear exactly how much of impact he might have. At this point, it is still asking a lot to expect much from him. He simply does not have all that much time to get back into the swing of things after such a long layoff of not picking up a baseball. Of course it is Pedro and his guile may be enough for him to effective.

Barry says one more year, but why stop with one? He is on pace to finish the season with 768 homers. That is 32 away from 800 for those of you who are mathematically challenged. Of course he has no shot at Oh's 868, but DHing for the another two seasons should propel him well into the 800s which is just insane. It would be really hard to retire if he does not manage to hit #800 in 2008.

I'm not sure Posada or Pudge would be the perfect catcher for the money they would command. I still think the two headed catching beast of Castro and LoDuca would be just fine since I expect this Met lineup to be pretty deep. Of course that is dependent upon them actually being OK with sharing time.