Where's Hobbes when you need him?
Bad News on Calvin "Pokey" Reese. After getting a second opinion from Dr Andrews, they did surgery on the his shoulder. He's out til at least the All-Star break, and I would bet longer than that.
The question now becomes what do the M's do about the shortstop postion? Valdez is pretty clrealy not the answer. Not that I'm in to making judgements after only a month, but he's never shown much in the minors either. Lopez is still hurt, so he's not a solution.
Here's your options:
1. Willie F. Bloomquist: Career OPS: 644. Um, no.
2. Ramon Santiago: Career OPS: 600. Also hitting .236 with the Rainiers.
3. Michael Morse: 286/342/448 for Tacoma. Not a lot of power so far in AAA, but good average and patience. He hit well in AA last year (in between the two suspensions). Hmmmm.
4. Make a Trade.
Morse is supposedly brutal defensively, but the M's desperately need offense right now. Why not bring him up and go with an offense/defense platoon with Valdez? What's the harm? You start Morse's arbitration clock a little early? The pitching staff revolts from the bad defense?
This team needs a shake-up. Why not give it a shot?
posted by Tad @ 8:38 AM
2 comments
2 Comments:
I know that you have been chomping at the bit before to critique the Wilson Valdez-for-Pokey shuffle, but I must respectfully disagree with a couple of the premises of the let's try Morse approach.
First, how good did you expect Pokey Reese to be, exactly? Pokey Reese's absence is NOT the fundamental flaw of the Mariners. After all, Reese's career major league OPS is .659.
Secondly, you cannot quote Morse's statistics as if they were in a major league environment. The stat line he has put up so far in Tacoma (keeping in mind that the PCL is a hitters' league) is roughly equivalent to a .615 OPS in the majors. (By comparison, Valdez during his last season in the minors splitting time between AAA Albuquerque and AAA Charlotte, hit about .310 with a raw OPS of .725, which works out to a rough MLE of a .607 OPS.)
I think we need to worry about other things than shortstop for 2005.
I am in no way saying that Morse is the answer, However he did put up a MLE OPS of 803 in Birmingham last year and a 733 in San Antonio. Valdez has never hit that well at any level. His best part season line was a 724 MLE OPS at Carolina in 2003. Further Valdez minor league value is tied mostly to his BAvg, where Morse's is in secondary skills.
From BP's Pecota Forecasts for 2005
Weighted Mean:
Morse 242/288/392
Valdez 253/281/326
90th%
Morse 280/331/460
Valdez 291/327/380
Valdez projects to a better batting average, but Morse is better at getting on and getting them in. Not to go all Hubie Brown here, but Morse has upside, at least offensively, that Valdez doesn't have.
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