Comments on: Plays and Notes from Games of Sunday, 9/18/11

By: Johnny Twisto

Johnny Twisto — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 22:31:41 +0000

Good question JA. Anderson was a very high draft pick too, so he had a good pedigree. He hit for a higher BA with fewer Ks than Luzinski when both were at Eugene, and those tend to be positive indicators for prospects. I wonder if anyone here remembers watching him and can clue us in as to why his skills didn't seem to translate to the majors.

By: John Autin

John Autin — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 17:06:11 +0000

@40, Kahuna -- You got me to looking at those '72 Phillies, which sent me off on a "young Luzinski" tangent (he was the best hitter on that team). It's fun to look at his minor-league seasons, age 18-20, when he was always among the 3 youngest hitters in his league, and to see where he was among the league leaders.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=luzins001gre

http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/leader.cgi?type=bat&id=28e4f460&sort_by=HR

http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/leader.cgi?type=bat&id=770d3c04&sort_by=HR

http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/leader.cgi?type=bat&id=12e068a5&sort_by=HR

I wonder why Mike Anderson didn't "make it"? -- he was a stud along with Luzinski on the 1971 Eugene Emeralds, led the PCL in OPS at age 20. He played a number of years in the majors, but didn't do much.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=anders002mic

By: Kahuna Tuna

Kahuna Tuna — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 15:04:14 +0000

No one player, no matter how good, is going to be able to lift a mediocre team to the world series. Rogers Hornsby in 1924 had a WAR of 13-and his team finished 65-89. Barry Bonds had WARs over 12 three times. Steve Carlton, 1972: 12.2 WAR + 0.4 oWAR + -0.2 dWAR for a total of 12.4 WAR. The entire Phillies team that season had 12.9 pWAR, 3.2 oWAR, -3.6 dWAR for a team total of 12.5 WAR. It would be crude to say that Carlton had 99.2% of the team's above-replacement value, but certainly you'd have to acknowledge that even his incredible season couldn't lift an otherwise awful team to the postseason.

By: kds

kds — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 06:12:40 +0000

@29 I think $3.58M/WAR is a little low for the average of a free agent contract covering 2005 to 2011. If it was higher then Beltran probably did return expected value, or more on his contract.

By: Mike L

Mike L — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 00:45:20 +0000

One more comment. Since there's some piling on Beltran, mostly because of his big contract, how about a little love for Kerry Wood, who signed for a lot less than he could get to return to Chicago, and just said he would only re-sign with the Cubs, or retire. There's a man not worried about hurting his bargaining power.

By: Mike L

Mike L — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 00:20:10 +0000

@36, JA, you said it best last. It's not easy to win a championship. Baseball isn't like basketball where a star can be surrounded by a handful of quality role players and have a chance to win it all. No one player, no matter how good, is going to be able to lift a mediocre team to the world series. Rogers Hornsby in 1924 had a WAR of 13-and his team finished 65-89. Barry Bonds had WARs over 12 three times. Beltran was and is a very good player. He's not a transcendent star. But he's better than Paul O'Neill (hurts me to say that) and O'Neill has four championships.

By: John Autin

John Autin — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 21:46:47 +0000

"The net result is still no championship." -- Priceless. Let's round up all the dead stars who never won a title and spit on them. "If Beltran was such a great player, why was he not even in the top 10 for MVP more times than twice during his career?" -- Two-part answer: (a) Well-rounded players usually fare worse at awards time when compared to guys who do one or two things extremely well -- just look at the 2006 NL MVP vote. (b) Who said he had lots of MVP-caliber seasons? Who, for that matter, said he was "great"? Besides pointing out the absurdity of knocking Beltran for that one pitch, I've mainly said two things about Beltran: (1) The Mets signed him at the height of his desirability, for quite understandable reasons; and (2) They got their money's worth -- more, if the pitcher he was dealt for pans out. You seem to think that a major free agent should win a championship -- end of story. That's just unrealistic. A handful of huge free-agent deals are signed every year, but there's only one WS champion. The math doesn't work. They could all play every game at a superstar level, but they can't all win.

By: Johnny Twisto

Johnny Twisto — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 21:44:52 +0000

The offer to play for the Yankees was not made up, that was actually reported back in 2005 to several media outlets. I did not say it was made up. You said you hated him because he's only about the money. You also said you hated him because he offered to play for less money. Conclusion: You don't have any reasons to hate him (or strongly dislike him). You just hate him. That's perfectly fine, IMO. You should really leave it there.

By: Mets Maven

Mets Maven — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 21:35:32 +0000

Sorry, Bill Dahlen as well.

By: Voomo Zanzibar

Voomo Zanzibar — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 21:33:33 +0000

Poor, poor Metropolitans' fans.