It Might Be Dangerous... You Go First

The Day After

2010-08-17T09:41:00.000-07:00

Waking up today made yesterday's events even more surreal.

The two most notable deadlines in baseball, the trading deadline and the signing deadline, produce a lot of action, and typically there is a flurry of activity in the final 20 minutes. Of course, there needs to be a foundation of communication for those final 20 minutes to be worthwhile, which we had established with all of our remaining draftees.

With about 20 minutes to go we received word that AJ Vanegas had decided to attend Stanford. This was a disappointment, especially since we thought so highly of him and his family, but we understood his desire to fulfill that dream. We knew it was a longshot from the beginning, but we still tried to make a compelling case. Our signing bonus offer would have placed AJ among the top ten picks in the country, but that didn't sway his decision. It was clearly never about the money for AJ, and that is admirable.

With about eight minutes to go until the deadline, we heard from John Barbato, our 6th round selection, and within a minute had agreed on a deal that would pay him 1st round money to pass on his commitment to the University of Florida. This was a big and unexpected win. It was expensive, but we feel as though we got a top round talent.

As for Karsten Whitson? I don't think anyone is happy this morning - not the player, not the agent, not the team, and not the fans. With that being the case, it's justified to question how we ended up there.

We had every reason to believe that he would be signing within a few days of the draft (and I mean every reason). Then other people got involved and slowed the process down. Nevertheless, we were still confident that we would get a deal done, especially due to all of the conversations that had taken place before the draft. Once it continued to drag on, we knew that the deadline was the only way that it was going to happen.

When the deadline approached, despite feeling somewhat taken advantage of, we did what every team does in order to get a deal done: we improved our offer to the last dollar. At the end of the day, it was an over slot offer that would have placed Karsten just behind the 8th pick in the country and comfortably ahead of the 10th. However, Karsten did not do what every single other first rounder (who didn't have an issue with their physical) did do: agree to a deal.

At 11:59 eastern time last night, we had over $5 million of offers on the table to three high school players, and they all turned down the money, two of them due to a strong commitment to school. We even had two offers to high school right-handers that would have paid them both like top ten picks in the country! Surreal indeed.

The good news is that, despite having a winning Major League team, we'll have a top pick in next year's draft as compensation, and the industry believes that the 2011 draft class will be much stronger. Also, as in Major League free agency, when someone doesn't take your money, you find another player or basket of players to acquire with that money. A straightforward example is when the Nationals were unable to sign Aaron Crow a few years ago with the 9th overall pick and then the following year took Drew Storen as compensation. Crow is now in A ball with a 5.40 era, while Storen is in the big leagues with a 2.61. So, we didn't sign Whitson, Vanegas, and Dwyer, but now we'll be able to put that money toward other investments either in the draft, internationally, or at the big league level.

Hey, given our organization's track record in the first round, maybe it was time to take a year off!

Seriously, at the end of the day, we were unexpectedly able to sign a handful of players in the 2010 draft in over slot deals, including Cates, Barbato, and Dore. We can also be opportunistic going forward since we expected to spend a lot more money yesterday. Lastly, it doesn't change the fact that from 2007-2009 only the Yankees and Red Sox spent more on amateur players than we did. We planned for that trend to continue in 2010, and we'll plan for it again in 2011.

Signing Deadline

2010-08-16T16:21:00.000-07:00

Midnight eastern tonight is the MLB signing deadline for drafted players, so it'll be an active day on the transaction wire.

For our part, last week we were able to come to agreements with two picks: 3rd round RHP Zach Cates and 8th round OF Jose Dore. Both were signed for well above slot money, but we expected that on draft day when we selected them. Nevertheless, it's good to have them signed and in the organization.

We're still working on a handful of other players, including 1st round RHP Karsten Whitson, 6th round RHP John Barbato, 7th round RHP AJ Vanegas, and 15th round OF/1B Sean Dwyer. While we're hopeful to sign these guys, signing more than one of them would be an incredible outcome for us. Whitson, like most of the top half of the first round, has elected to wait until today to make a decision, and the other three were all expecting significant dollars to pass on college, which is the only reason they were available when we took them. Their talent dictated much higher positioning in the draft.

We'll see what tonight brings, but we're not expecting much until the final hour before the deadline.

Two Items

2010-08-04T12:12:00.000-07:00

Two quick hits for today:

If you're wondering about the August waiver rules, and you know you are, I wrote this piece two years ago to help explain the process.
Ever wonder why hitters can't seem to hit Mariano Rivera even when they know what's coming? Here's an interesting video that attempts to explain the phenomenon.

Acquiring Tejada and Ludwick

2010-08-03T16:12:00.000-07:00

Most teams approach July's trading deadline with the following plan: let's add meaningfully to our Major League team without trading any member of the Major League team and also holding onto our top prospects. Typically, that's easier said than done, and this deadline had an added degree of difficulty due to the dearth of impact players available.

All of that made acquiring both Miguel Tejada and Ryan Ludwick all the more exciting for us.

Fortunately, our team performance over the course of the first four months not only put us in a position to add at the deadline, but also exposed some of our needs. While our offense has been better than many expected, it could still be better. Owing to our defense and our pitching, we don't necessarily have the need to score five or more runs per game in order to win consistently. To that point, incredibly we're 12-11 when scoring just three runs, and we're actually a pretty good 9-17 when scoring either one or two runs. Much to our frustration, we still haven't figured out how to win when we don't score... we're 0-5 when that happens.

While those results speak volumes about our pitching and defense, there is good news and bad news. The bad news is that while the results haven't been as bad as most teams in those situations, all of those games add up to 52% of our contests. The good news? We're 41-9 when we score at least four runs.

Note to self: score at least four runs more often.

In attacking that problem, we had to notice that we've been much more efficient against LHP this year than RHP. Without even adjusting for our ballparks, we rank 6th in the National League against LHP, so we're an above average offense even before the adjustments. Against RHP, though, we're 11th before adjusting for the parks, which probably makes us close to average. (True, I'm not divulging the statistic we're using for these rankings, so you're just going to have to trust me.)

While the more obvious solution would have been to acquire LHH's, both Tejada and Ludwick have had much success against RHP, and they have the added benefit of providing our lineup a little more balance. This should make it tougher to match up against us and make us less vulnerable to any particular starting pitcher. Yes, both Tejada and Ludwick are decorated veteran hitters with playoff experience, but they also are versatile defensively, play positions of need, and have repeatedly been called some of the best teammates in the game. To acquire one would have fired us up, but to get both...

Now, nothing comes for free, and we did have to part with some solid prospects to make this happen. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised to see both Corey Kluber and Wynn Pelzer pitching in the big leagues as soon as 2011. However, I have two thoughts on that. First, I'm proud of our scouting department and player development staff for finding and developing guys in the 4th and 9th rounds in 2007 that could make this type of contribution to our organization. Second, I hope that every year we're forced to pay such a price to further a pennant run. Sign me up.

Often times the trading deadline appears to be a no-win situation. If you don't do enough to help your team, it can actually hurt the psychology of the team. If you tinker too much, people also get upset. Bottom line: if you don't get into October, some people will inevitably point to what you did or didn't do at the deadline and find culpability. We, however, prefer to judge decisions in the time and under the circumstances in which they were made. Under that criteria, we're thrilled with the additions and look forward to watching this team down the stretch.

Interleague Success

2010-06-24T17:27:00.000-07:00

Well, it's been a while since we've been able to write that...eleven long years to be exact.

1997: 8-8
1998: 6-7
1999: 11-4

Hey, this interleague thing isn't so bad.

2000: 5-10
2001: 6-9
2002: 8-10
2003: 8-10
2004: 8-10
2005: 7-11
2006: 7-8
2007: 6-9
2008: 3-15 ouch
2009: 5-10

Yes, the last time we finished with a winning record in interleague play was actually 1999, and the last decade had produced a painful 63-102 record for us against the American League. 2002-2007 wasn't so bad, but it had gotten ugly the past couple of years. This year, therefore, we're more than happy to take the 9-6 tally and the four series wins.

There are a lot of theories about why the National League, in general, has struggled against the American League over the years - the dedicated roster spot for the DH, some higher payrolls, just more talent overall. We don't necessarily know the answer, but we do know we're pleased to buck the trend.

More Signings

2010-06-22T15:36:00.000-07:00

Here are a few more signings for today:

#5 Rico Noel
#11 Brian Guinn
#19 Tyler Norwood
#29 Mykal Stokes
#31 Oscar Garcia
#37 Chase Marona
#41 Bryan Altman
#43 Mark Hardy

A number of these guys (Stokes, Garcia, Marona, and Altman) have already seen action with either Eugene or Arizona, as both teams began their seasons. With Noel and Guinn signed, we now have our top five college (including JC) position players signed.

Video for Rounds 11-20

2010-06-18T10:03:00.000-07:00

Here's a little more video on some of our guys.

The Short-Season A Eugene Emeralds opens tonight! Check out the roster here. In addition to the 2010 draftees, we have a number of young talented players trying to make the jump, including pitchers Keyvius Sampson, Adys Portillo, Matt Lollis, and Pedro Martinez and outfielders Luis Domoromo and Rymer Liriano. The Arizona League Padres will start play on Monday.

Signing Update

2010-06-16T14:35:00.000-07:00

Today we announced that we've come to agreements with 20 of our drafted players. It's good to have two of the top four (our top two position players) already in the fold. We're also close on a few others that could be done before the opening of the short season this weekend, so I'll post those as they become official.

Signings include:

#2 Jedd Gyorko
#4 Christian Bisson
#10 Houston Slemp
#12 Chris Franklin
#17 Wes Cunningham
#18 Dan Meeley
#20 Paul Bingham
#21 Connor Powers
#22 Tyler Stubblefield
#24 Rocky Gale
#27 Matthew Branham
#33 Daniel Ottone
#34 Xavier Esquivel
#36 Rob Gariano
#38 Noah Mull
#39 Adam Schrader
#40 Justin Echevarria
#42 Cole Tyrell
#44 Robert Sabo
#50 Gunnar Terhune

We're well aware that many other conversations will take a while, and some will not result in agreements, but we're very happy with where we are just one week post-draft.

Video for Rounds 6-10

2010-06-16T11:35:00.000-07:00

This video includes RHP John Barbato, RHP AJ Vanegas, OF Jose Dore, and OF Houston Slemp. 9th Round pick Josh Spence from Arizona State didn't really pitch this spring due to an elbow injury, so there's no video of him.

As you many be able to tell, Barbato, Vanegas, and Dore were all considered to be talented enough to go in the first few rounds of the draft, but they slipped a bit in the draft due to signability concerns.

Video for Rounds 3-5

2010-06-15T11:56:00.000-07:00

Zac Cates

Christian Bisson

Jablonski (Rico) Noel

Putting a Face to a Name

2010-06-14T14:36:00.001-07:00

We have video!

Over the course of the next week or two, I'll be posting video on some of our draftees. These are not professionally edited highlights. Rather, they are sample clips taken by our scouts, which I thought we'd share. Because of that, some players will definitely have more than others, though it won't necessarily correlate with where they were taken in the draft. Enjoy!

Today's installment: Karsten Whitson and Jedd Gyorko.

Karsten Whitson

Jedd Gyorko

Rounds 31-50

2010-06-09T14:43:00.000-07:00

If I don't do it now, I'm not sure when I will.

Round 31
Oscar Garcia is a junior centerfielder from Northwestern State. He's a very good fundamental player who does all the little things well. While his slash line of .375/.469/.526 is impressive, it's his 41 to 12 walk to strikeout ratio that is truly unusual. He had just 12 strikeouts in about 275 plate appearances.

Round 32
William Scott from Walters State began our run of pitchers. A right-handed starter who is a converted outfielder, William's fastball is up to 92 mph. He also throws both a curveball and a slider, but his changeup might be his most advanced secondary pitch as of right now. He's committed to Kennesaw St.

Round 33
Daniel Ottone is a 6'4" right-hander from Western Carolina who worked out of the bullpen the last two seasons. Daniel generates a lot of groundballs with his fastball that runs between 91 and 94 mph.

Round 34
A four-year reliever and spot starter for Loyola Marymount, Xavier Esquivel has a fastball that will bump 92 mph. He'll also mix in a good curveball and changeup. A bulldog on the mound, Xavier has an aggressive approach that we like.

Round 35
Michael Ellis is a right-hander from Fleetwood Park Secondary School in British Columbia. Still just 17, he has a projectable 6'2" frame and has been pitching for the Canadian National Team. Despite his youth, he has a good feel for pitching, as he can change speeds and move the ball around the zone.

Round 36
Rob Gariano is a senior right-hander from Fairfield University. A starter throughout his college career, Rob also pitched as a starter and reliever in the Cape Cod League last summer where he struck out 31 and walked six over 26 innings of work. A great competitor, Rob has good command of three pitches and a fastball that normally goes between 89-93 mph.

Round 37
Allen Marona is a junior college pitcher from Northwest Shoals in Alabama. A converted SS who is new to pitching, Allen struck out 69 hitters in 39 innings this season with a fastball that will touch 93 mph.

Round 38
Noah Mull is a senior left-hander from Wheeling Jesuit University in West Virginia. This year he struck out 81 hitters in just 56 innings, but what also intrigues us is his ability to drop down and throw sidearm. Nothing like a little bit of funk in the 38th round to keep you going.

Round 39
Adam Schrader is a senior right-hander from Southwest Minnesota State. Adam is a good strikethrower, and his 6'3" frame is very projectable.

Round 40
Back to position players! Justin Echevarria is a senior catcher from SUNY Stony Brook. An experienced receiver, Justin has thrown out more than 40% of attempted basestealers over the course of his past three seasons.

Round 41
Bryan Altman is a senior infielder from the Citadel who has also spent some time behind the dish. Over the past two seasons, Bryan has hit 20 homers and 38 doubles in just under 500 at-bats.

Round 42
Cole Tyrell is another senior infielder who has seen some time at catcher in the past and could see more in the future. At the University of Dayton this year he hit .326/.392/.558.

Round 43
Mark Hardy is a senior left-hander from the University of British Columbia. At 6'4" Mark has good downhill plane to his pitches and generates lots of groundballs. His delivery also creates some deception, so he could be a tough at-bat for left-handed hitters.

Round 44
A redshirt junior, Robert is a right-handed starter for Kent State. Now two years removed from labrum surgery, Robert works very quickly and sets a great tempo for the game by attacking the strike zone with all three of his pitches.

Round 45
Michael Fagan is a left-hander from the San Diego Jewish Academy who has set all kinds of strikeout records in high school. This year he punched out 103 in just 46 innings and has close to 500 for his high school career. He's currently committed to Princeton.

Round 46
Dominick Francia is a centerfielder from St. Paul's Episcopal HS in Alabama. A left/left player, Dom has very good speed and instincts for the game, which helped him go 25 for 25 in stolen bases this season. He's currently committed to Louisiana Lafayette.

Round 47
Kraig Kelley is a third baseman from Collinsville HS in Oklahoma whom we listed as a catcher. A good athlete who is also a quarterback, Kraig's arm strength is plus, and at just 17 years old, he's younger than most draftees.

Round 48
Daniel Child is a right-handed starter from Jesuit HS in Northern California. At 6'5" and 235lbs, he has an XXL frame for a 17 year old. Daniel's primary pitch is a hard sinker that will touch as high as 94 mph. He's currently committed to Oregon State.

Round 49
Elliot Glynn is a junior left-handed starter from the University of Connecticut. A crafty lefty, Elliot uses his sinker to generate a lot of grounders. Last summer on the Cape he posted a 2.02 ERA in 40 innings of work.

Round 50
And then there was one. Gunnar Terhune is a senior centerfielder from UC Santa Barbara, but he's a product of St. Augustine HS here in San Diego. A versatile defender, Gunnar also stole 17 bags this year for the Gauchos.

Exhausted. Happy, but exhausted.

This draft was truly a potpourri. We drafted some big-time high school arms, middle of the diamond speed players, some athletic junior college arms with upside, a few polished bats... a little bit of something for everyone. Now it's time to get them signed and get them out to either Eugene or Arizona to start their professional careers as Padres.

Rounds 21-30

2010-06-08T18:16:00.001-07:00

It was a long day - it feels like we got Karsten Whitson a week ago...

Round 21
Connor Powers is a senior first baseman from Mississippi St with big power. Over the past two seasons he's hit 35 homers in 110 games while playing in possibly the toughest conference in college baseball. At 6'3" and 240lbs he's also an intimidating presence in the box.

Round 22
Tyler Stubblefield is a senior infielder from Kennesaw State in Georgia. A versatile infielder and an efficient basestealer, Tyler was 20 for 20 in stolen bases this spring while also hitting nine homers.

Round 23
Xorge Carrillo is a junior catcher from Arizona State who has been drafted on two other occasions. Originally from Tijuana, Xorge attended Central Arizona for two seasons, where he caught our 9th round pick Josh Spence, before transferring to ASU. A very solid receiver, Xorge should help the development of our young pitchers.

Round 24
It's a run on catchers! Rocky Gale is a senior catcher from the University of Portland. Rocky led the Pilots this year with a .347 average, but more impressively, he threw out 18 of 23 runners attempting to steal. 18 of 23.

Round 25
Josue Montanez is an 18 year old left-handed pitcher from Ramon Vila Mayo HS in Puerto Rico. With a projectable 6'2" frame, Josue works primarily with a fastball and a curveball.

Round 26
Cory Hahn is a centerfielder and left-handed starter for Mater Dei HS in Santa Ana. A good athlete, Cory is a good defender who runs well, has some surprising power, and is a good strikethrower as a pitcher. At this point he's committed to Arizona State.

Round 27
Matt Branham is a senior right-hander from the University of South Carolina Upstate. At 6'4" and up to 92 mph, Matt has struck out more than one hitter per inning over the past two seasons while throwing lots of strikes.

Round 28
Joe Almaraz is an 18 year old 3B from Lady Bird Johnson HS in Texas. A left-handed hitter, Joe hit .390 this season while also showing the tools to play good defense at 3B. An instinctual player, he has an advanced feel for the game.

Round 29
Mykal Stokes is an outfielder for Orange Coast College. A graceful athlete, Mykal is a good defender in the outfield who also has some easy power.

Round 30
Donald Snelten is a 6'6" left-hander from Lake Community HS outside of Chicago. Very projectable and just 17 years old, Donald has a fastball that runs up to 90 mph, good spin on his breaking ball and some feel for a changeup. That mix helped him strike out 64 hitters in just 36 innings. He's committed to the University of Minnesota.

Another 20 rounds tomorrow, but we're feeling good about where we are at this point. We received some really pleasant surprises in the early rounds, and we went after some very high ceiling players a little later. This was our strategy at the outset, but it worked out as well or better than we could have anticipated.

Rounds 11-20

2010-06-08T15:38:00.000-07:00

Deep breath...

Round 11
Brian Guinn is an athletic infielder from UC Berkeley. A switch-hitter and two-year starter at Berkeley, he's more of a slasher at the plate with a chance to disrupt the defense. He also played in the Cape last summer.

Round 12
Chris Franklin is a senior right-hander from Southeastern Louisiana who also plays 3B. We see him as a pitcher, however, with a good fastball up to 93mph and the makings of a tough slider. In college he's been the type to play most of the game at 3B and then take the mound as a reliever, so it'll be interesting to see what he can do when focusing just on pitching.

Round 13
Miguel Pena is a 19 year old left-handed starter from San Jacinto JC in Texas. A good strikethrower he has a solid fastball up to 91 mph and a changeup, but his curveball is his money pitch. He was drafted in the 5th round by Washington last year out of high school but elected to attend JC and re-enter the draft.

Round 14
Tommy Medica was a catcher at Santa Clara University before a separated shoulder in a home plate collision forced him out of the position. A former Team USA catcher, he's an advanced bat with strength who can do damage.

Round 15
Sean Dwyer is a left-handed high school outfielder and first baseman with an advanced feel for hitting. A great worker who is mature beyond his years, Sean is already stronger and more polished than most high school hitters. On ability alone he would have gone much higher in the draft, but he is currently committed to attend Florida Gulf Coast.

Round 16
Connor Hofmann is a left-handed hitting centerfielder from our backyard - St. Augustine HS here in San Diego. A plus, plus runner and excellent athlete, Connor is committed to the University of Oregon.

Round 17
Wes Cunningham is a senior first baseman and outfielder from Murray State. In his three years as an everyday player he hit .380, .411, and .408, and during the same stretch went from hitting two home runs to hitting 22.

Round 18
Daniel Meeley is a 20 year old outfielder from Connors State in Oklahoma. A good bat, Daniel hit .443 this year with 21 homers. He's committed to Oklahoma University.

Round 19
Tyler Norwood is a 6'4" 19 year old right-hander from Southern Union CC in AL. He only spent minimal time on the mound in high school, but his velocity has continued to climb as he has been pitching. This year he showed a fastball up to 93 and the makings of a good slider and changeup.

Round 20
Paul Bingham is a senior infielder from Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Despite being 6'2" and 200 lbs, he is a plus, plus runner. That impact speed led to 42 stolen bases this year in just 47 games.

Rounds are going quickly now. I'll try to post rounds 21-30 at some point before the end of the night.

Rounds 6-10

2010-06-08T13:10:00.001-07:00

It was time for some upside! Most of these guys could be difficult to sign, as their talent dictates a higher round selection, but we felt that it was the right time to take them.

6th Round
John Barbato is a 6'3" RHP from Varela HS in Florida. The coach's son, John's fastball has touched 95 mph and normally works around 92. He complements it with a tough downer curveball and a good changeup. He has the arm speed, delivery, and repertoire of a starter. Currently, he has a strong commitment to the University of Florida, but we'll see what happens.

7th Round
AJ Vanegas is a 6'3" RHP from Redwood Christian HS in Northern California. An AFLAC All-American, AJ has top of the rotation stuff with a fastball up to 96 mph, two solid to plus breaking balls and a feel for the changeup. AJ hasn't been on many mock drafts due to his commitment to Stanford, but he's definitely a first round talent.

8th Round
A 6'1" outfielder, Jose Dore led the state of Florida in homers as a junior. A hamstring injury this spring slowed him, but that didn't hide his multiple tools. A solid defender and runner, he's not just a power bat. He's currently committed to Florida State.

9th Round
Maybe the third time is a charm for Josh Spence. A LHP from Australia, Josh was selected by the Diamondbacks in the 25th round out of Central Arizona in 2008 and then again by the Los Angeles Angels in the 3rd round out or Arizona State in 2009. After returning to ASU, he missed his spring season with an elbow injury. When healthy, he can really pitch with a great feel for changing speeds and frustrating hitters.

10th Round
A left-handed hitting centerfielder out of Eastern Oklahoma JC, Houston Slemp has the chance to incorporate both speed and power into his game. Houston was an all-state football and baseball player in high school before starting his college baseball career at Arkansas.

Jablonski (Rico) Noel

2010-06-08T11:00:00.001-07:00

Bisson is really fast. Noel might be faster.

Rico is the CF for Coastal Carolina, and in his past 125 college games, he has stolen 104 bases. That's silly. Possibly more importantly, we think he's the best defensive centerfielder in the entire draft and is a perfect fit for PETCO.

A right-handed hitter, Rico is another guy we think has great makeup. With Gyorko, Bisson, and Noel, we have some small strike zones!

Christian Bisson

2010-06-08T10:24:00.000-07:00

A junior second baseman from the University of Kentucky (and originally from Ontario), Chris is a player with exciting speed. Combining last summer on the Cape and this spring in the SEC, Chris has stolen 68 bases in 93 games. Wiry strong, he also has some strength and will get his share of extra base hits.

Another player with great makeup, he's absolutely driven to succeed. After not playing much as a freshman at Kentucky, he became the first UK player since 2000 to earn back-to-back All SEC honors.

Zach Cates

2010-06-08T09:52:00.000-07:00

We love pleasant surprises!

Zach Cates is a newly converted pitcher from Northeast Texas CC. A former catcher, the 6'3", 200lb right-hander has a fastball than runs 90-95 to go along with a nasty changeup. Just 20 years old, this spring was Zach's first full season to concentrate on pitching, and he struck out 92 in just 69 innings.

We feel he has the chance to be a starter and should continue to develop as he spends more time on the mound.

Jedd Gyorko

2010-06-08T09:20:00.000-07:00

We got ourselves a bat.

Jedd is a junior shortstop from West Virginia University who has done nothing but rake for three years. At 5'10" and 195lbs, Jedd is a strong infielder with right-handed power. This year he had 48 extra base hits in just 236 at-bats while only striking out just 24 times. Furthermore, last summer he hit .326/.386/.488 with a wood bat in the Cape Cod League.

A driven, hard-nosed player, Jedd is the type of grinder with the makeup to will himself to the Major Leagues. We were hoping all night that he might still be there when we picked today, as we feel he's one of the more polished bats in the draft.

Karsten Whitson

2010-06-07T17:06:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you have to take your shot.

Karsten is a 6'4", 215lb right-hander from Chipley, FL with a fastball that runs between 90 and 95 mph. His main secondary pitch is a relatively polished slider that has been unhittable at the amateur level. While he has shown some feel for a changeup, he just hasn't needed to use it much up to this point, but we anticipate that he'll have a solid one going forward. A great competitor, Karsten pitches with an attitude, and I mean that in the best way possible.

As this year's big league team illustrates, we're going to win here in PETCO with great pitching, and we feel Karsten has the chance to pitch at the top of a rotation. Like any high schooler, it is going to take a while for him to develop fully, and we'll have a defined plan to increase his workload over the years to prepare him for the rigors of an ML season.

This pick doesn't come without risk, but that goes for any amateur player. In this instance, though, we have the chance to develop a dominant starting pitcher.

Now it's time to sit back and watch the next 40 picks and continue to strategize for tomorrow.

Draft Day!

2010-06-07T11:00:00.000-07:00

There's just nothing like waking up on draft day.

In the past the draft lasted two days, and it was akin to an 800 meter race - an absolute sprint but realistically too long to sprint without nearly collapsing before the end (at least for me). There was no time allotted for each pick, so when the team in front of you finished announcing their selection, it was immediately time for you to announce yours. Even a 15 second pause was an indication that a team had just been plucked - losing their intended selection just before they picked. This pace lasted for two straight days, and it was frenetic.

Over the years the format of the draft has continued to change. The first change was allowing a full minute in between picks in the first round or two. It doesn't sound like much, but to those of us who were accustomed to the sprint, it was excruciatingly slow. In the last year or two we went to five minutes for each first round pick, and then a minute or two for the next couple of rounds before the rapid fire. Five minutes is an eternity in a draft room.

The biggest changes, though, have been to the schedule. Last year we did just the first two rounds on the first day, as compared to roughly 20 rounds in the past. This year? Just Round Round One (including the compensation round). That means that all of the teams will be working through the night to reload for the faster pace tomorrow.

This new schedule has some strategic implications, as it gives teams, especially those with multiple picks, the time to assess where they are and where they want to go. In the past, teams attempted to run through all of those possible scenarios in the week leading up to the draft to the point of exhaustion. When you have close to 900 players on your draft board, the possibilities are simply too numerous to model, but you can do your best to narrow it down. Tonight all of us will have a better opportunity to streamline our strategy once the top 50 players are off the board.

For my part, I'll do my best to blog live from our room as we're making selections. As we get deeper into tomorrow, I'll have to start grouping the selections and providing some information during our breaks, which come approximately every ten rounds. Keep the questions coming, and I'll get to them over the next few days.

Good Article

2010-05-20T13:22:00.000-07:00

I normally don't provide a lot of links (I know I should provide more), but I just came across an article about Jon Garland from Marc Normandin of BP that is worth sharing.

While the article is specifically about Garland, it actually is a good commentary on our pitching in general. What's particularly astute is that Marc points out that while Garland's ERA will likely rise, his SIERA (BP's advanced pitching metric) may actually continue to go down. Regardless, his value is real.

This is an individual example that is similar to the team examples I posted yesterday. The general theme? Our guys are having a lot of success, and while luck is always a significant factor especially over such an abbreviated time frame, there are some underlying reasons for the success to date.

UPDATE
After posting this, I saw another article about Jon Garland on FanGraphs. It's like dueling banjos!

The different perspectives are legitimate, but the most interesting part is that both articles share a common takeaway.

At the Quarter Mark... Well, Almost

2010-05-19T13:41:00.000-07:00

I had been planning on writing a season-to-date review at some point. My first thought was 20 games, but I figured that was too small a sample. Then I thought maybe it would be better after 1/5th of the season, but it seemed odd to try to split the season into quintiles, and I was swamped with work anyway. Conclusion? The quarter mark...until I realized that I'll be traveling on the day after our 40th game. So, here's a quick quarter review after the first 39 games. 40 isn't even a perfect quarter anyway.

The team currently sits atop the NL West with a record of 23-16. Better than that, though, is that we seem to deserve the distinction. According to Baseball Prospectus' Adjusted Standings, our record ought to be either 23-16 or 24-15, and they measure it three different ways - actual runs scored versus runs against, equivalent runs scored versus runs against, and adjusted equivalent runs and runs against. All of that dovetails with our actual +41 run differential so far this season.

In contrast, last season we had two decent months - May and August - in which we finished right around .500. However, in each of those months we had a negative run differential. That happens to everyone - sometimes there are a bad couple of games in there that can skew the month - so it's not necessarily a death knell, but it doesn't provide a warm and fuzzy feeling. On the other hand, we may only be 8-8 so far in May, but we have a +12 run differential for the month. I'd rather have a better record, but if we're going to be .500 over a stretch, this is the kind of short-term .500 I prefer.

Part of the reason for our internal optimism throughout the winter and spring was that in contrast with the first five months of the season, in September/October last year we went 18-11 with a run differential of +17. That +17 made the 18-11 more real, so it's great to see the team build on that through the first month and a half of this season. I'm not sure exactly when, but at some point it becomes a trend.

There are a number of other ways to evaluate this season to date that could provide either comfort or caution. The good news, again, is that most of these evaluations provide comfort. For instance, if you want to win the division, you generally need to play well within the division. After all, it accounts for 72 of the 162 games, and a win for you is a loss for someone else in the division. Last year we went 33-39 in the NL West. So far this year we're 13-10.

Another way to look at it is home/road. It's hard to win on the road, and only the best teams win consistently on the road. Really good teams - ones that win 90 or more games - typically finish at least 39-42 on the road and more often than not slightly over .500. Last year we were 33-48. This year we're 11-7.

This next one ties back to run differential. While one run games can often go either way, the best teams usually win a majority of games decided by at least five runs. This year we're just 7-7 in one-run games. We certainly hope that gets better, but I'm glad we're not 23-16 overall and 13-1 in one-run games, because that success would be completely unsustainable. On the other hand, last year we were just 10-32 in games decided by at least five runs. This year? We've already won seven, and we're 7-3 overall. In fact, we've only lost one game by more than three runs in our last 30 contests! When we lose, we don't lose by much, and we've shown the ability to win comfortably. That's a good combo.

I intended to get into our pitching (tops in the NL in ERA), our defense (second in MLB in defensive efficiency), and our hitting (um...not as good as our pitching and defense), but I'll have to address those in a later post.

The bottom line is that it appears as though we deserve our run differential, and consequently, deserve our place in the standings. That's a reassuring feeling at the almost quarter mark. The challenge now is to keep it going, because there's still a long way to go.

Four Good Wins and More

2010-04-20T07:58:00.000-07:00

The only bad part of the past four games is that I wasn't in San Diego to enjoy them. Last time I wrote, I was hopeful for a series win against Arizona, and we managed to do a bit better than that. Then in the opener against San Francisco Clayton Richard had a great start against Matt Cain, and we enjoyed a walkoff. Not only was it the 4th win in a row, but it was also the 4th game in a row in which we've gotten a good start from our starter, stayed in the game, and managed to score late off the other team's bullpen. Our hope throughout the winter and spring was that we had a staff full of starters who would keep us in games and a bullpen that could preserve leads. It won't work all the time, but it's fun when it does.

For my part, I've been all around the Southeast for the past four or five days. There are always a few variables when doing amateur scouting that keep life interesting. Pitching schedules are a big one. Booking advanced travel, and even packing with a purpose, can be pointless as schedules always seem to change from week to week, guys will only throw an inning or two, and even game locations can change. Due to all the above, I usually try to have a few position players worked in as anchors in my schedule, because I should be able to see them regardless. Unless, of course, it rains like it did yesterday. It happens.

As I've told my wife, going on these scouting trips has taken me to places that she'll never see...and really has no reason to. You may think you have lived a full life, but have YOU ever been to Caldwell, Idaho? Or eaten at a Denny's in Nampa on the way there?

The reality is that most of the time you just don't see a whole lot. Like the drive from Columbus, GA to Jacksonville, FL or from Hoover, AL to Hattiesburg, MS or even from San Diego to Phoenix. There just isn't a whole lot there. Sometimes, the ubiquitous signs from Walgreen's, Subway, and Starbucks can get depressing. Isn't there anything different? But then, every once in a while, you come upon something unique:

I wasn't brave enough to ask exactly what "N-Stuff" entailed. But seriously, how great is this?

Travel is Overrated

2010-04-16T03:37:00.000-07:00

I just landed in Atlanta (approximately 3am San Diego time) after a brutal red-eye flight. I normally don't have an issue with red-eyes, and I figured that this one would give me an extra evening at home with my kids before I left, so I didn't hesitate to book it. When I saw that I had an exit row window seat, I figured I was in good shape. Then I boarded the plane.

First and foremost, my exit row was the first of two successive exit rows, which equals no reclining. That's a tough realization at 11pm before you even begin to taxi. Getting some sleep in an upright and locked position was going to be a challenge. Next nice feature? Bulkhead...against the bathroom. Now add in that my row was adjacent to the flight attendant station, which meant that the lights were on the entire time, and it was clear that my luck wasn't changing.

Did I mention that Atlanta is only a stopover? Yeah.

In any event, it was a tough game against the Braves on Thursday. They did a great job of getting key hits with two outs, and we just weren't able to cash in on some big chances despite good at-bats and hard contact. Sometimes that'll happen, but it's a little more frustrating when it wouldve meant a series win against a good team, and the Braves are a good team. Their lineup really doesn't have any outs (guys like Escobar, Heyward, and McLouth hitting at the bottom of the order), and their rotation is full of guys who can pitch like #1's on any given day.

Speaking of rotations, we've faced a tough run of starting pitchers in our first nine games. It's not an excuse, because we have to get it done regardless, but we've had just two, or maybe three, games against guys who would be considered less than a #1 or #2 on most teams. The off-days were a devil in disguise for us for the first week and a half.

Now we have a divison rival coming to town with some good crowds expected at PETCO, which would be the perfect time for a series win. I just hope to get a little bit of sleep between now and then.

CY to the 15-Day

2010-04-12T19:35:00.000-07:00

Today we officially placed Chris Young on the 15-Day DL retroactive to April 7 (since he hadn't pitched since April 6). The rule states that a Club can place a player on the DL and back-date the placement up to seven days assuming he has not performed in a game.

Chris felt some discomfort in his shoulder following his six inning performance in Game Two of the season. With our off-days we could have maneuvered our rotation and delayed CY's next start until the weekend, effectively skipping one turn. That was Option #1. Alternatively, we could have a spot starter for just one start, likely on Sunday the 18th, and have an extra person on the team in the meantime. That option also had the additional benefit of being conservative with CY's shoulder so early in the season. With those advantages, Option #2 became the clear choice. Hopefully CY will be back in the rotation in another ten days or so. In the corresponding move, Adam Russell was recalled from Portland.

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of Waiver Claims

2010-04-08T10:52:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we lost Chad Huffman on waivers to the Yankees. You never enjoy losing a player, as you put him on your roster at one point in order to protect him. Nevertheless, these transactions always have multiple sides.

The Good
We're now at the point where we're losing good players in these situations, which speaks well of our organizational depth. Ok, I admit that's a pyrrhic victory of sorts. The main "good" to take from this situation is the acquisition of Aaron Cunningham (and even the re-acquisition of Scott Hairston). Aaron, in all candor, moved ahead of Chad on the corner OF depth chart, and the play of both Blanks and Venable didn't help either. Furthermore, we feel we have a couple of good corner OF's in AA San Antonio this season in Sawyer Carroll and Kellen Kulbacki. These guys now will have an increased opportunity. Here's hoping they take advantage of it.

The Bad
We lost the player. And, he's a pretty good one. Chad was a 2nd round pick in 2006 out of TCU and has been a successful minor league hitter throughout his pro career, posting an OPS over .800 in each season. While crushing lefties early in his career, Chad had his most successful year yet against RHP during his first season in AAA in 2009. He always controlled the strike zone and also hit for some power - a combination we like. We think he'll be a good Major League hitter.

The Ugly
The Yankees! In all seriousness, the last two guys we've lost on waivers this winter/spring, Mike Ekstrom and Chad Huffman, have been claimed by two of the best teams in baseball - the Rays and the Yankees (and the Rays also claimed Jose Lobaton late last season). At least they're both in the AL. They really don't need our help! Then again, it does reflect the relative, and growing, attractiveness of the players in our system.

This wasn't an easy decision, as we feel good about our 40-man roster at this point. We talked about a number of different guys and worked through various scenarios - who had the best chance to clear waivers, what depth did we have, what depth did we anticipate needing during the year, etc.

We hate to lose good players. Additionally, we hate to lose good people, and Chad is a tremendous clubhouse guy. Getting beyond the selfish aspect, we're excited for Chad. We truly wish him the best with the Yankees and will be rooting for him to make it to New York and contribute to the big league team.

An Organizational Win

2010-04-07T13:00:00.000-07:00

There's nothing quite like winning to get me back to writing!

On numerous occasions I've wanted to get back into the flow but just couldn't for one reason or another. Now that the season is underway, however, no excuses are valid.

Though it was slow to progress, it was a productive off-season as we were able to add a number of pieces to the Club to solidify our depth. Those moves combined with the continued maturation of our player development system should make it easier for us to navigate the inevitable injuries and other obstacles that will come our way over the course of the season. Last night was a perfect example...

We entered spring training relying heavily on our back four relievers and maybe most importantly on our one tough left-hander, Joe Thatcher. However, Joe battled a sore shoulder through spring training, so we decided that it would be best for him to start the year on the disabled list. Though we had a number of good right-handed options in Adam Russell, Ryan Webb, Ernesto Frieri, Radhames Liz, Greg Burke, Luis Perdomo, etc, we turned to left-hander Cesar Ramos, a starter throughout his career, and asked him to assume that spot in the pen. Last night he entered the game with the bases loaded and just one out to face Stephen Drew, a situation that he has never faced in his baseball career. He made two excellent pitches resulting in a weak groundball to short for a big out. Exhale.

It's easy to say that Chris Young deserves the game ball for last night's win with six innings of one hit ball against a tough lineup, because he probably does. Or maybe Everth Cabrera gets the game ball with a single, double, triple, stolen base, and four rbi (damn, that was a good night). Cesar Ramos, though, may have gotten the biggest out of the game. Given the circumstances of his spot on the team, it also may have been the most gratifying performance from an organizational standpoint.

Hopefully we'll have many nights like this one where we get key contributions from multiple players. That was what made us successful over the final two months of last season and even the past few weeks of spring training, so it was good to see it carry into the early season.

Congrats to Cesar on his first hold (and Jed on his first win). It's always good to get that first one out of the way.

Winter Meetings

2009-12-07T11:57:00.001-08:00

The baseball industry woke up to snow this morning in Indianapolis, but that's done nothing to cool the Hot Stove. Rumors are already flying around the lobby, and it's just getting started.

The important thing to remember during this week is that rumors are just that - rumors. Most of what you read or hear this week won't come true, so don't get too worked up about it. In fact, most of the news coming out of here won't be entirely reliable. Even this. In fact, you're wasting your time right now by reading this sentence.

Ok, so you get the point.

Actually, this week in baseball news can be highly entertaining, if that's the way you choose to take it. So settle in, if you're reading this back in San Diego, be happy you're not in Indy, and enjoy the rumors. Just don't take them too seriously.

Roster Moves

2009-10-09T10:10:00.000-07:00

October is a month full of roster moves, and we started ours yesterday. We added RHP Eulogio DeLaCruz to the 40-man roster and released RHP's Shawn Hill and Cha Seung Baek and OF Cliff Floyd.

We traded for DeLaCruz toward the end of spring training last year and because he was out of options, we were forced to outright him to the minor leagues when we needed a roster spot early in the season. Fortunately for us, he cleared waivers and had an excellent season in AAA, posting a 2.56 ERA as a reliever in 44 appearances in the PCL. Eulogio's fastball will run as high as 98mph which he complements with a plus changeup. If we had not added him back to the 40-man roster, he would have been eligible for minor league free agency after the World Series. Still just 25 years old, he has a lot of career in front him.

The three players we released all spent the bulk of the year on the 60-Day disabled list, meaning they did not count toward the 40-man limit on the Major League roster. However, shortly after the World Series we must reinstate those players to the active roster, at which time they DO count toward our limit. Furthermore, both pitchers would have been eligible for salary arbitration this winter, and Cliff Floyd was set to become a free agent. So, though we didn't necessarily need the roster spots today, we do anticipate needing them come November. Releasing these players does not prohibit us from re-signing them; however, should we re-sign them they would not be allowed to appear in a Major League game for us until the middle of May in 2010.

Like other teams, I'm sure we'll have more moves as the next month unfolds.

Last Week

2009-10-06T11:07:00.000-07:00

Emotions are intense in the final week of the regular season. Teams vie for playoff spots, some veterans may be playing their last games, and young September callups are doing everything they can to make an impression. Off the field, however, emotions can run even deeper.

This is an incredibly competitive industry, one in which we get graded with a win or a loss 162 times a year and a team's merits or failures get debated via many media. That creates a stressful environment, but it also creates a very close bond with both our colleagues and our competitors. Because we're all fighting for the same prize, traveling to the same remote sandlots, and staying in the same roadside hotels, we all can empathize with the sacrifices, the joys, and the disappointments. Despite the intense competition, this empathy makes baseball a distinctly human industry.

When I first got the job with the Dodgers, I received many congratulatory calls from people around the league, most of which were filled with encouragement and advice. The call from Bill Bavasi, then GM of the Seattle Mariners, was different. Bill's father, Buzzie, had been the Dodgers' GM in both Brooklyn and Los Angeles, and Bill had been the GM of both the Angels and the Mariners, so I actively sought his advice. I told him that the reality of being the Dodger GM hadn't sunk in yet, and I was having trouble putting it into perspective. Bill's great sense of humor never failed him, and he responded, "Relax. We all have two press conferences in these jobs. The second one just isn't scheduled yet." I couldn't help but laugh.

During the final week of the season every year, though, it's difficult to laugh. Every year there are dozens of people let go by teams: scouts, player development staff, managers, Major League coaches, and GM's. Behind every one of those people are parents, kids, and spouses who can't imagine that anyone thinks their son/dad/husband didn't do a great job. There are also the competitors from other teams, who in these moments, are reduced simply to friends.

When I was let go by the Dodgers, I received more calls than when I was hired. The outpouring blew me away and continues to be one of the most cherished memories in my career. Though this is a tough business, it really is a deeply personal one.

KT's departure is an excellent example of this. His contributions to this organization are too lengthy to list, and the respect for him comes from all directions. Though these situations are always difficult, this one has been as gracious as any I can remember - partly because of the manner in which it has been handled by ownership and partly because of the person KT is.

One of my close friends turns to Hyman Roth every year at this time and simply says, "This is the business we chose." Not to over-dramatize it, but it's true. We all know the rules when we sign on. That reality, however, does not take away from the personal relationships, relationships that run far deeper than any job.

As difficult as this week is for many people around the game, the good news is that we'll be rooting for other past colleagues, friends and peers in the coming weeks as they chase that feeling of high achievement. The part of us that empathizes with the sadness this week will also be able to relish in the glee later this month, and that humanity makes this a great game.

Tonight

2009-08-17T22:13:00.000-07:00

We sign Tate, Williams, Sampson, and Reyes, Headley hits a two-out rbi double in the 9th, and Blanks with a walkoff...

That makes for a great day.

Signing Update

2009-08-17T21:40:00.000-07:00

And we signed Jorge Reyes from Oregon State just under the wire also...

Signings

2009-08-17T19:17:00.000-07:00

We just announced the signings of first-rounder Donavan Tate, second-rounder Everett Williams, and fourth-rounder Keyvius Sampson.

Still two hours to go!

Quick Hits - Minor League Version

2009-08-06T13:58:00.000-07:00

Some notes from our affiliates:

AAA Portland

After coming back from Tommy John surgery last season to pitch in Lake Elsinore and the Arizona Fall League, Cesar Carrillo began the year with AA San Antonio. After his first seven starts he had a 6.52 ERA in 38.2 innings. Since that time, however, he has looked more like the Carrillo of old, posting a 3.17 ERA over 82.1 innings while both his fastball (up to 95mph at times) and command (walks from 4.0 per nine down to 2.2 per nine) returned. He has since been moved up to AAA Portland where he has a 4.09 after his first two starts.
Eulogio DeLaCruz made a handful of starts for AAA Portland after being sent down, but then we moved him to the bullpen where he has thrived. In 34.2 innings he has six saves to go along with his 2.60 ERA. Routinely touching 97 and 98 mph and having allowed just two homers in 51 innings in the hitter-friendly PCL, Eulogio is a power back-end bullpen prospect.

AA San Antonio

While Carrillo was turning the corner from TJ surgery, Ernesto Frieri was busy being the most consistent starter on his staff for the second consecutive season. A 40-man roster member, Ernesto is currently 10th in the Texas League in ERA (3.52) while also holding down the 4th spot in strikeouts (86).
Toward the end of June we promoted former compensation round pick Cory Luebke to AA since he was leading the Cal League in ERA (2.34). Since his promotion he's had to battle a hamstring injury, but that hasn't stopped him. The left-hander has a 1.10 ERA after his first four starts.

A+ Lake Elsinore

2008 2nd round pick James Darnell tore up the Midwest League to the tune of .329/.468/.518 before joining A+ Lake Elsinore. After a short adjustment period, James is now hitting .305/.384/.603 for the Storm. For the year he now has 17 homers, 47 extra base hits, and 75 walks in just 363 at-bats.
Signed out of Garden City JC, Aaron Breit began the year in the Lake Elsinore pen after splitting time in the rotation and the pen in Fort Wayne in 2008. After posting a 3.15 ERA out of the pen, the 6'4" right-hander moved into the rotation and didn't miss a beat with a 3.07 ERA in seven starts. For the year he now has a 3.11 ERA in 75.1 innings with 67 hits, 30 walks, and an impressive 94 strikeouts.

A Fort Wayne (best record in baseball at 75-34)

Trying to hit against Simon Castro may be hazardous to your health. The hard thrower is currently leading the league in strikeouts with 125 in 108.2 innings and just 30 walks, but what's particularly impressive is that he just keeps getting better. His ERA's by month: 4.32, 4.11, 3.12, 2.67, 1.80. Over his past seven starts he has a 2.55 ERA in 35.1 innings with 50 strikeouts and just 31 baserunners allowed.
Alexis Lara had a rough start to the season pitching out of the Ft Wayne pen. When the weather began to turn, however, so did Alexis. Since June 1 he has a 1.41 ERA with 48 strikeouts and just 24 baserunners allowed in 32 innings pitched. Both Castro and Lara routinely throw from 92-95mph.

SA Eugene

Left-hander starter Nick Greenwood currently leads the Northwest League in ERA with a 1.66 in 48.2 innings. In his nine professional starts, he has allowed more than one earned run just twice, and he has yet to allow a homer. Lefties, in particular, are miserable in the box against Nick, as they've gone just 6 for 58.
Signed out of the Dominican in 2007, Edinson Rincon was the rare player who made his US debut at just 16 years of age. Now 18, Edinson is playing in short-A with mostly college draftees. He must not have noticed, because he's hitting an astonishing .331/.430/.536 and is in the top five in the league in average, on-base, and slugging.
I'm breaking the mold and going with three highlights from Eugene, because I can't leave out middle infielder Vince Belnome. Hitting .319/.444/.550, Vince leads the Northwest League in homers, rbi, and runs, is 2nd in extra base hits, and 3rd in on-base and slugging. A left-handed hitter, Vince has also hit lefties at a .964 ops clip.

Rookie Arizona

First baseman Cody Decker went on an absolute rampage in July slugging .778 en route to a season line of .343/.417/.694. The UCLA product is currently leading the AZL in homers, extra base hits, slugging, and rbi, and he's also third in both runs and hits.
One of our major Latin American signings in 2008, Adys Portillo skipped the Dominican Summer League and began his pro career here in the US at the age of 17. Adjusting to the competition wasn't easy, and after his first four starts he had a 6.92 ERA in just 13 innings. Since then, however, Adys has shown why he belongs with a 3.20 ERA and 21 strikeouts in 25.1 innings.

Dominican Summer League

Another one of our prominent signings in 2008, Luis Domoromo has had a solid start to his career with a .387 obp, 37 walks, and six triples. The left-handed hitting 17 year old has also posted a .765 ops against RHP. Remember, the offensive stats in the Dominican are similar to the Cape Cod Leauge in the US - pitching generally rules.
Keeping the nature of the Dominican offensive statistics in mind makes the performance of Yair Lopez even more impressive. The 6'3", 17 year old outfielder had a .900 ops in July to bring his season totals to .293/.419/.420 with 15 extra base hits, 14 stolen bases, and 38 walks in just 181 at-bats.

Quick Hits

2009-08-04T13:40:00.000-07:00

Here are a few notes about some young players on our big league club:

Many of you may have seen Kyle Blanks hit majestic home runs to leftfield in Cincinnati and again the other night in Petco, but going out to the beach in right-center like he did last night? Not many right-handed hitters have done that (Manny Ramirez is one). As one person gleefully said last night, "This is like having a brand new toy!" As a starter, Kyle is hitting .250/.375/.525 with 10 extra base hits and 13 walks in 96 plate appearances.
In the last month (since July 5) Will Venable is hitting .312/.354/.506, which includes a handful of appearances as a pinch hitter.
Knock on wood... Mat Latos and Tim Stauffer have combined for a 2.62 ERA over 44.2 innings with a WHIP under 1.00. Furthermore, in their seven full starts (Tim had a 1-inning start in Washington that ended with a rain delay) neither one has yielded more than two runs in an outing.
In the last month (since July 5) Joe Thatcher has faced 27 hitters and has struck out 13 of them. Thirteen. Meanwhile, just five have reached base. On the year he is holding left-handed hitters to a .212/.289/.333 line.
In the last month (since July 5) Kevin Kouzmanoff has hit .309/.324/.557, banging out 16 extra base hits in 105 plate appearances. Furthermore, his OPS by month so far this season is: .603 in April, .652 in May, .737 in June, .795 in July, and .833 in August (ok, so it's only three games, but it fits the trend so I couldn't resist).

Tomorrow I'll provide similar notes on some of our minor leaguers, but I have one just for zino since he doesn't like any of our bats. :-) All of our minor league teams combined had the following rankings against the other 29 organizations as of late July, despite not playing in any ballparks that are particularly friendly to hitters:

Batting Average: 3rd
On-Base: 1st
Slugging: 5th
OPS: 2nd
Runs/Game: 4th

There are other categories, but as you can see, our organization is in the top five in all of the major ones. Just in case anybody thinks we have a bunch of slow-pitch softball players, we're also 1st in strikeout-to-walk ratio. Our system has accomplished this while many of the high performers were moved to more difficult levels mid-season and guys like Blanks and Venable were promoted out of the ranks.

As I wrote last time, this is going to be fun to watch.

Peavy to the White Sox

2009-07-31T15:00:00.000-07:00

Today, just seconds before the 1pm pacific trading deadline, we acquired LHP Clayton Richard, LHP Aaron Poreda, RHP Adam Russell, and RHP Dexter Carter from the White Sox for RHP Jake Peavy. The final minutes were quite a whirlwind, but in the end it got done.

Here's a quick breakdown of each guy:

Clayton Richard - A 25 year old, 6'5" left-hander out of the University of Michigan, Clayton has spent the entire 2009 season in the Majors with the White Sox. Between 14 starts and 12 relief appearances he has compiled a 4.65 ERA in 89 innings. Particularly tough on left-handed hitters, Clayton has limited them to a .643 ops over his 137 innings in the big leagues. A good strike thrower who also gets more than his share of groundballs, Clayton will move right into our rotation in San Diego.

Aaron Poreda - The first round pick of the White Sox in 2007, Aaron made his Major League debut earlier this season out of the bullpen for the Sox. However, he had spent essentially his entire minor league career as a starter, and that's how we see him fitting with us in the long term. A power left-hander at 6'6", 240 lbs, Aaron has thrown up to 96 mph and generally sits in the 93-94 range. Like Clayton Richard, Aaron is a good strike thrower who also generates groundballs. Over the course of this season in the minors (AA and AAA) he has a 2.54 ERA with 78 k's in 74.1 innings. He'll be reporting to AAA Portland where he'll be part of that rotation.

Adam Russell - At 6'8", 250 lbs and possessing a fastball that runs as high as 97 mph, Adam can be an intimidating presence on the mound. Moved to the bullpen full time in 2008, Adam has split the past two seasons between AAA and the ML (3.07 ERA in AAA and a 5.19 ERA in the ML in 26ip). Like Poreda, he'll report to Portland where he'll go into the bullpen to complete a trio of potential back end bullpen types with 96-97 mph fastballs - Webb, DeLaCruz, and Russell.

Dexter Carter - A 13th round pick in 2008 out of Old Dominion, Dexter is currently leading the South Atlantic League in strikeouts with 143 in 118 ip (meanwhile, our own Simon Castro is leading the Midwest League, the other A league, in k's). Dexter is 6'6", 200 lbs and has a fastball that runs anywhere between 87 and 93 mph. So far as a professional he has a combined 2.80 ERA in 184 innings with with 147 hits and 57 walks allowed while striking out 232. Not a bad start to a career.

In summary, we needed a frontcourt to be able to compete against some of our 2009 draftees.

In all seriousness, we're very excited about the return here. In the past week we've added four young pitchers with Major League experience and power arms (Gallagher, Richard, Poreda, and Russell). In trading someone like Jake, we did not want to have to take all A-ball prospects who inevitably carry high risk and don't show up in Petco for years to come (if they do at all). Instead, we have guys who can contribute either immediately or very soon and who have the chance to be part of our Club for many years going forward. We may have to reload, but that doesn't mean we have to take years to do it.

We need look no further than 2009 to illustrate just how important starting pitching and particularly depth in starting pitching is to winning in the Major Leagues and especially in Petco (we're currently second to last in the NL in ERA for starters). The playoff caliber clubs here in San Diego from 2004-2007 all had solid starting staffs, and two of them (2006 and 2007) led the NL in starter's ERA. We need to get back there, and we believe we can.

Doing it without Jake, of course, makes it challenging. He has been nothing short of a tremendous pitcher for the Padres. We're incredibly fortunate to have had him here, and it was a difficult decision to trade him, as I'm sure it was a difficult decision for him to approve the trade. After all, though this is a business, it is a personal one, not only for us, but also for the players, their families, and all of the fans.

That having been said, though we're not yet all the way to where we want to be, this deal was a significant step toward giving us a better chance to win in 2010 and beyond. Our concentration of talent made us deeply vulnerable to the unexpected, so it's important for us to build quality balance - an imperative that we've been aggressively pursuing and that this deal helps us achieve. We're certainly a younger team, but we're very excited about the potential of these players, especially as many of them (Blanks, Latos, Cabrera, etc) are beginning to show what they can do at the ML level.

It's going to be fun to see what these guys can do.

Hiatus

2009-07-28T11:30:00.000-07:00

I guess three weeks is enough, and I couldn't leave you hanging as we approach the deadline.

Today we announced the acquisition of Sean Gallagher as the player to be named later in the Scott Hairston trade with Oakland. I know many of you attempted to post comments in the past couple of weeks regarding Sean, but I did not publish them as it was not official until today. I didn't think it was fair to Sean or the A's to add to the speculation. However, now that we can talk about it...

Sean is a 23 year old right-hander with 144 Major League innings under his belt. At 6'2", 235, Sean has shown a big fastball, which combined with his minor league dominance (a 2-something ERA at all four full-season levels: A, A+, AA, and AAA) helped him get to the big leagues with the Cubs when he was just 21 years old. His fastball can be overpowering (90-96) at times, though our scouts have also seen him in the 88-92 range.

Spending most of 2008 in the Majors with Chicago and Oakland, Sean pitched 115.1 innings, giving up 118 hits and 58 walks while striking out 103. The strikeouts are particularly impressive for a 22-year old rookie, and it was encouraging that he was able to hold both left-handed hitters and right-handed hitters below an .800 ops. He did miss three weeks toward the end of the season with shoulder inflammation but came back to make four appearances in September. This year he has been on the DL since early June with a knee issue. We're not sure whether he'll be able to pitch again this season, but regardless we're expecting him to be at full strength in plenty of time for spring training.

This acquisition gives us another Major League ready starting pitcher with big potential upside.

Scott Hairston to Oakland

2009-07-05T19:44:00.000-07:00

Today we traded OF Scott Hairston to the Oakland A's for RHP's Ryan Webb and Craig Italiano as well as a player to be named later.

Ryan Webb is a 6'6" 23 year old pitcher currently with AAA Sacramento. Originally a 4th round pick by the A's out of Clearwater Central Catholic HS in Florida, Ryan has been a starter throughout his minor league career until this season in AAA (though he has made two starts). Ryan has always been a good strike thrower with an above average arm (fastball that runs 90-94) who generated plenty of ground balls. His already plus velocity has jumped even higher this summer in the pen, touching as high as 99 mph. We really like Ryan's upside.

A 2nd round pick in 2005, Craig Italiano is a 6'4" 22 year old pitcher currently with high A Stockton in the Cal League. Like Webb, he also has a power arm, pitching as a starter between 91 and 95 mph. Having missed most of 2006 (shoulder tendinitis) and 2007 (skull fracture), Craig hasn't had the same pro experience as most 2005 draftees. He split the 2008 season between the Midwest League the Cal League, posting a 3.78 ERA with 112 strikeouts in 100 innings. His walks have been on the high side, but that's not unusual for a young power arm.

Unfortunately, I can't divulge any information on the player to be named later, but when the time comes, I'll write a breakdown of him as well.

While trading Scott is difficult and not without risk, especially given his excellent production this season, this move provides us with some young power arms with big upside - a real need for us - while also allowing for other young players to continue to amass Major League at-bats in our outfield.

Dodgers in Town

2009-07-03T10:22:00.001-07:00

So tonight is the return.

It's not really my place to comment - after all, he's not our player and we have a game to win - but I'm interested in hearing your thoughts. What will the reception be? What should the reception be?

Player of the Month

2009-07-01T18:40:00.000-07:00

At the conclusion of every month we name both a Player of the Month and a Pitcher of the Month in the minor leagues. Mike Wickham, our Director of Minor League Operations, sends out the ballots to both front office and field staff, and my guess is that it's usually a pretty lopsided vote. In fact, I'd be surprised if more than two players or two pitchers receive any votes at all in any given month.

This month, however, is different.

June was witness to a slew of remarkable offensive performances (as well as pitching performances) in our system. I think it's a tough call, as a number of players are deserving of the award. Therefore, I'm putting you to work. The stats are below (arranged by level and then alpha) and the poll is on the right.

Kyle Blanks, AAA .370/.478/.630 in 66 pa's
Craig Stansberry, AAA .330/.417/.394 in 108 pa's
Brian Joynt, AA .358/.400/.593 in 88 pa's
Lance Zawadzki, AA .381/.474/.567 in 114 pa's
Logan Forsythe, A+/AA .345/.477/.540 in 109 pa's
Danny Payne, A+ .316/.464/.605 in 97 pa's
Beemer Weems, A+ .319/.479/.444 in 90 pa's
Sawyer Carroll, A/A+ .344/.443/.611 in 106 pa's
James Darnell, A/A+ .370/.452/.593 in 93 pa's
Dan Robertson, A .358/.400/.494 in 86 pa's
Blake Tekotte, A .348/.446/.609 in 107 pa's

Those are some serious numbers!

Of course, these aren't all the relevant stats, but it gives you a quick overview. I expect you to provide some reasoning in the comments section!

High Desert

2009-06-29T09:58:00.000-07:00

Lake Elsinore opened a three game series last night in High Desert, which is known for some high-scoring contests. Well, after eight innings last night Lake Elsinore was leading 28-14.

Guess how many home runs Elsinore hit in order to score 28 runs... go ahead, guess.

Exactly one. That's right - one homer, 28 runs. So how does a team score 28 runs with just one homer? 27 hits, 13 walks, and five High Desert errors. That is absolutely nuts. If you thought it wouldn't get crazier in the 9th inning, think again. How about this:

Sawyer Carroll - Home Run
James Darnell - Home Run
Matt Clark - Home Run
Felix Carrasco - 6-3
Danny Payne - Home Run

So, we score 28 runs with one homer over eight innings and then hit four homers in a span of five hitters.

I think Jayson Stark would have a field day with this one.

Going Too Fast?

2009-06-26T09:31:00.001-07:00

Hector: I think that the strategy to promote too soon has backfired greatly with Antonelli, Headley and LeBlanc.

Careful with Blanks...

Hector,

It's always a tough balance.

Antonelli blitzed through HA and AA before struggling last year at AAA. In hindsight it may have made sense to leave him at AA at the beginning of 2008, but he certainly appeared ready for the PCL.

Headley was a very different case. He had a full year in HA Lake Elsinore, a full year in AA San Antonio and nearly 300 pa's in AAA Portland. That's not really an accelerated progression. In fact, what was keeping him down in AAA more than anything was the fact that he was learning a new defensive position.

Leblanc pitched about 150 innings between HA and AA and now has almost 200 in AAA. That isn't terribly unusual for an advanced college starter, and he's still in the development process now.

The other thing, and possibly more importantly, is that sometimes guys need to be pushed in order to progress. For instance, had we left Leblanc at AA he could have continued to get everyone out with his changeup without needing to locate his fastball effectively. He needed to get to a level with more advanced hitters that would force him to make an adjustment to his game. Similarly, Chase had a .939 ops in AAA after having a 1.023 in AA, so he needed to start facing ML pitching in order to keep getting better.

Remember, regardless of the preparation they receive in the minors, young players will almost always struggle early on in the Majors, often for two or three seasons, before hitting their stride. Adrian Gonzalez hit .229/.272/.401 in 2004 and 2005 combined for the Texas Rangers, and there are countless other examples. Just like any other job, there's only so much you can do to prepare before actually doing the job.

Minor League Promotions

2009-06-25T15:59:00.000-07:00

Here are some moves effective for tonight's games:

LHP Cory Luebke from Lake Elsinore to San Antonio
Cory is leading the Cal League in ERA and innings pitched, 3rd in K's, and was the starting pitcher in the All-Star Game.

3B Logan Forsythe from Lake Elsinore to San Antonio
Logan is leading the Cal League in OBP, 10th in average, and has a .976 ops with 61 walks (which I believe is the most in all of minor league baseball).

LHP Nick Schmidt from Fort Wayne to Lake Elsinore
Nick has a 2.79 ERA in 51.2 innings with 59 k's, and has allowed just one earned run in last his 31.1 innings.

3B James Darnell from Fort Wayne to Lake Elsinore
James is leading the Midwest League in OBP, 4th in SLG, 5th in average, and has a .329/.468/.518 line overall.

1B Matt Clark from Fort Wayne to Lake Elsinore
Matt is 2nd in the league in RBI and doubles and 3rd in extra-base hits. He will split time at 1B/DH with Felix Carrasco.

OF Sawyer Carroll from Fort Wayne to Lake Elsinore
Sawyer is 5th in the league in hits and 9th in average. He's turned it up since April, though, hitting .351 and slugging .524 since May 1.

OF Yefri Carvajal from Lake Elsinore to Fort Wayne
Yefri is just 20 years old (Carroll just turned 23), so this is more about pushing Carroll than anything else. Yefri was holding his own in the Cal League (actually hit .304/.333/.451 in May), but with Carroll coming the everyday at-bats are in Fort Wayne.

3B Justin Baum from Lake Elsinore to Fort Wayne
Justin only had 136 ab's in Elsinore, and with the other 3B moving, Fort Wayne offers a chance to play more regularly.

OF Chadd Hartman from Eugene to Fort Wayne
Chadd is moving up due to Carroll and Clark leaving and Decker going on the DL.

LHP Steve Garrison placed on rehab assignment with Peoria, AZ
Steve continues to progress with his rehab and should be facing hitters soon.

Sometimes it makes sense to leave a player at one level for the entire year to let them enjoy success. These players, however, were performing at such a high level that it was time to challenge them at the next level. There is a fine line between challenging players and rushing them, but we feel that all of these guys are ready.

Five posts in one week! Who's with me!

Kevin Kouzmanoff and Mark Twain

2009-06-25T10:58:00.000-07:00

Kevin Kouzmanoff has had a good couple of weeks. Actually, his .327/.351/.636 in the last 14 games is better than "good". How did this happen? He didn't suddenly get bigger or stronger. Pitchers haven't suddenly pitched him differently. So what is it?

Back in 2007, Kouz's rookie year, he had a rough start. On May 14 he had an OPS of .424 with just one homer in 105 plate appearances. For the rest of the year he hit .308/.363/.510 for an OPS of .873 while hitting 17 homers (one every 25 pa's). Great things were on the horizon.

Then Kouz again stumbled a bit out of the gates in 2008 with an OPS of .682 on May 14 and one homer for every 59 plate appearanes. After May 14 he had an OPS of .751 with 20 homers (one every 25 pa's). That was more like it.

This year? Kouz had an OPS of .550 on May 14 with one homer in 133 plate appearances. Since that time he has an OPS of .811 with nine homers (one very 16 pa's).

So, to summarize his last three seasons:

Up to May 14: .221/.260/.316 with one homer every 83 pa's
Post May 14: .278/.325/.483 with one homer every 23 pa's

Is there something about May 14 that we should know? Any astrologers out there that can shed light on this? Is this a simple coincidence, or is it because as Mark Twain supposedly said, "History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme."

Unfortunately, we don't have the answer (and I'd be leery of any hard causal theories), but we are happy that May 14th has passed and the post-May 14 Kouz, he of the .808 OPS, appears to be in the house.

Signing Updates

2009-06-24T16:35:00.000-07:00

In the past few days we have come to agreements with:

3rd round pick - Jerry Sullivan, RHP from Oral Roberts
5th round pick - Jason Hagerty, C from the University of Miami
7th round pick - Miles Mikolas, RHP from Nova Southeastern

Next week we'll try to work on the even numbered rounds.

Scoreboard Watching

2009-06-24T10:46:00.000-07:00

It's not often that we scoreboard watch in June (yes - everyone scoreboard watches even if they don't admit it), but I found myself glued to milb's gameday app last night.

See, June is playoff time in the minor leagues, because from AA on down the first half winner earns a playoff spot. We were thrilled when Fort Wayne, our Midwest League affiliate, clinched the first half title back on Sunday, but we're greedy.

Two weeks ago San Antonio was five games behind Midland with 14 games to play in the first half. Pulling a Rockies, the Missions went on a tear, including taking three of four from Midland over the weekend to take a one game lead for the first half title. One series remained in Corpus Christi.

After three innings in Corpus the Missions trailed 5-1, while Midland was up 4-0 in their game in Frisco after four. It was looking like we might be tied at the end of the night, but then the Missions closed the gap to 5-3 with two in the fourth before taking the lead 7-5 in the 5th on Lance Zawadzki's grand slam. The excitement was short-lived, however, as Corpus scored four of their own in the bottom of the 5th to regain the lead 9-7. With Midland in control of Frisco, San Antonio had to handle matters themselves. The Missions chipped away at Corpus with one in the 7th and one in the 8th to send the game into extras where they scored three in the top of the 10th to pull out an unlikely victory. Still up by one game.

Enter Tuesday.

Into the 7th inning stretch Midland was tied with Frisco 1-1 and San Antonio trailed Corpus 2-1. High drama. Then, in a span of about 10 minutes Midland gave up two in the bottom of the 7th to go down 3-1, and San Antonio scored one in the top of the 8th to tie it up at two. In both the 8th and the 9th Midland got runners on base, while Mitch Canham led off the San Antonio 9th with a double. Thank goodness for gameday mini.

In the end, Midland couldn't push any runs across, so Frisco held on to the 3-1 lead: San Antonio wins the first half. For good measure, though, about 30 minutes later Mitch Canham led off the 11th with a solo homer and the bullpen finished off their 5.1 hitless innings to "earn" the win and the title. All it took was 12 wins in 15 games.

The end result is that two of our three full-season affiliates who play with this format, San Antonio and Fort Wayne, won their respective first half titles. Meanwhile, the third team, Lake Elsinore, had four pitchers in the All-Star Game last night (Luebke, McBryde, Pelzer, and Oland) combine for five innings, three hits, one run and six strikeouts. Though they didn't win the first half, they do currently hold a seven game lead in the Wild Card.

All of this attention begs the question: is winning really the goal of player development? After all, the primary objective of any minor league system is to develop quality Major League players, and you don't get any points for minor league victories. However, as Vince Lombardi said:

Winning is not a sometime thing, it's an all time thing. You don't win once in a while, you don't do things right once in a while, you do them right all the time. Winning is a habit. Unfortunately, so is losing.

That does not mean that we have our A-ball managers matching up left-on-left in the 6th inning or that we manipulate rosters to get wins. Skill development comes first. It does mean, however, that we want to win. We want our young players to learn how to win, and we want them to expect to win. In our minds, that is part of their development.

Congrats to both Fort Wayne and San Antonio as well as our entire player development staff.

One Year Later - Rounds 16+

2009-06-23T11:38:00.001-07:00

Round 16 - Thomas Davis, Fort Wayne, 1.42 ERA, 19 ip

After starting this season with a 1.42 ERA in 19 innings out of the bullpen in Fort Wayne, Tom went on the DL in mid-May.

Round 17 - Derek Shunk, released

Derek, a senior infielder out of Villanova, had a .346 obp and a .341 slg in Eugene last summer. This spring we had to make some decisions among the utility infielders for both Lake Elsinore and Fort Wayne, and Derek ended staying back in extended spring training. We released him toward the end of May.

Round 18 - Nick Vincent, Lake Elsinore, 2.97 ERA, 36.1 ip

A reliever at Long Beach State, Nick started nine games last summer (including one in Portland), because we thought he could handle the load. This year he has been a workhorse in the Elsinore pen, walking just 10 and striking out 38 en route to finishing 14 games (two saves).

Round 19 - Robert Lara, Fort Wayne, .214/.277/.306

Assigned to Arizona, Robert had a huge first summer, hitting .344/.490/.484. He hasn't gotten consistent playing time yet this season in Fort Wayne (just 28 games played out of 70). He has, however, helped out on the mound twice, pitching two shutout innings while striking out five.

Round 20 - Jason Codiroli, Eugene

Jason tied for 5th in the Arizona League in 2008 in hits (56) and was 4th in OBP (.422) while also leading the team in stolen bases (15). A centerfielder, Jason is off to a hot start in Eugene going 5 for 12 with two leadoff homers.

Round 21 - Joey Railey, Eugene

An infielder out of U. San Francisco, Joey split time last season between Arizona and Eugene. This year he opened the season on the Eugene roster and has played one game so far.

Round 22 - Chris Wilkes, Eugene

A 6'4", 250 lb right-hander, Chris was not a high-profile pitcher in high school, but he was a quarterback. Nevertheless, he adapted quickly to pro ball and had a fantastic rookie season - 1st in the Arizona League in wins (7), 4th in innings (61.2) and 8th in ERA (3.21). In 10 starts he was 5-1 with a 3.06 ERA and on the season he struck out 45 while walking just five. This season the 19-year old was targeted for Eugene, though he did make three appearances for Lake Elsinore due to some injuries on the staff.

Round 23 - Nick Conaway

Nick was the closer at Oklahoma during the 2007 season but had surgery during the winter of 2007/2008 and didn't pitch in the spring. We ended up not signing him last summer.

Round 24 - Eric Gonzalez, Lake Elsinore, 1.80 ERA, 5 ip

A pitcher for the Spanish National Team, Eric tore up the Arizona League in 2008 - 1.19 ERA with 34 strikeouts in 22 innings. That earned him a promotion to full season Fort Wayne to begin 2009, and after 38.2 ip with 38 k's, we recently promoted him to Lake Elsinore. So far he has made two appearances for the Storm with a 1.80 ERA covering five innings.

Round 25 - Logan Power

Logan decided to return to Ole Miss for another year. I believe he went undrafted this spring.

Round 26 - Dean Anna, Fort Wayne

An infielder from Ball St, Dean split the 2008 season between Eugene and Arizona hitting a combined .232/.341/.351 with 11 steals in 12 attemps. So far this season Dean has split time between extended spring training and Fort Wayne, where he has 44 ab's in 13 games covering 2B, SS, and 3B.

Round 27 - Aaron Murphree, released

A left-handed hitter out of the University of Arkansas, Aaron played the 2008 season in Arizona where he hit .250/.376/.421. Due to the plethora of outfielders we had scheduled to go to Fort Wayne and Lake Elsinore, Aaron was released at the end of spring training.

Round 28 - Nick Schumacher, Fort Wayne, 1.23 ERA, 22 ip

A senior out of Wayne St in Michigan, Nick split the 2008 summer between Arizona and Eugene, compiling a 4.02 ERA in 40.1 innings. He began this season in extended spring training before getting the call to Fort Wayne where he has a 1.23 ERA in 22 innings. Over his career he now has 56 k's and just nine walks.

Round 29 - Omar Gutierrez, released

After just three appearances in Eugene (6 ip, 0 er, 9 k's) after the draft, Omar went to full-season Fort Wayne (he was 23 years old) to fill a role in the pen. He got caught in the numbers game for A-ball relievers this spring.

Round 30 - Bobby Verbick, retired
A right-handed hitting outfielder, Bobby had a nice debut in Eugene last summer, hitting .257/.402/.431. He decided to retire midway through spring training in March.

Round 31 - Sean Gilmartin

We knew Sean would be a tough sign, and he decided to enroll at Florida State. Though primarily an outfielder in high school, Sean had a strong freshman season on the mound for the Seminoles, going 12-3 with a team-leading 3.49 ERA.

Round 32 - Kyle Heyne, released

Kyle spent most of the 2008 season in Eugene, where he had a 4.19 ERA in 38.2 innings. Due to the competition for A-ball bullpen spots, he was released at the end of spring training.

Round 33 - Daniel Robertson, Fort Wayne, .321/.400/.462

Sometimes it just works out. Dan was the Northwest League MVP in 2008 while setting a league record with 114 hits and finishing first in the league in average (.377), runs (59), total bases (150), and obp (.443). Not a bad debut. Dan hasn't really missed a beat this season in Fort Wayne putting up an .862 ops while striking out just 18 times in more than 200 plate appearances.

Round 34 - Matt Gaski, released, signed by the New York Mets

An infielder out of UNC Greensboro, Matt played the 2008 season in Arizona. We released him at the end of spring training, and the Mets signed him a few days later.

Round 35 - Logan Gelbrich, Lake Elsinore

A solid receiver out of USD, Logan spent 2008 in Eugene hitting .240/.358/.310 while splitting time with Emmanuel Quiles behind the plate. Logan remained in extended spring training this year and recently joined the Storm where he's played in one game.

Round 36 - Jake Shadle

A right-handed pitcher, Jake didn't sign and enrolled in Green River Community College.

Round 37 - Matt Means, retired

Matt pitched 16 innings last summer and decided to retire prior to spring training.

Round 38 - Zach Herr, Fort Wayne, 4.22 ERA, 32 ip

A left-handed reliever out of Nebraska, we signed Zach later in the summer so he only made nine appearances for Eugene, posting a 3.12 ERA in 17.1 ip. This year his ERA doesn't tell the whole story, as he's given up just 28 hits and 10 walks while striking out 38 hitters in his 32 innings. Zach has a good breaking ball that is tough on lefties, and he's struck out 14 of the 37 he's faced so far this season.

Round 39 - Gary Poynter, Arizona

A right-hander with a quick arm, Gary split the 2008 season between Arizona and Eugene with a 4.18 ERA over 32.1 innings. Unfortunately, he broke his wrist early this spring, and it required surgery. He's now back on the mound and pitched one inning on Sunday for Arizona.

Round 40 - Colin Lynch, Fort Wayne, 1.35 ERA, 6.2 ip

After leading the Arizona League in appearances last summer, Colin stayed in extended spring training before getting activated in Fort Wayne in early June. So far he's made five appearances, yielding just one run.

Round 41 - Zach Dascenzo

Rather than signing, Zach decided to enroll at Ohio Dominican University.

Round 42 - Brad Brach, Fort Wayne, 1.69 ERA, 32 ip

Brad may have been the last player we signed out of the 2008 draft, but once guys step on the field that doesn't mean anything. The right-hander reliever out of Monmouth has dominated so far as a pro, compiling a 1.82 ERA over 54.1 innings. He's also struck out 76 while allowing just 54 baserunners. As Fort Wayne's closer, he already has 17 saves.

Round 43 - James Tunnell

Rather than signing, James decided to enroll at Lipscomb University.

These 2008 draft roundups certainly don't cover everyone in our system or even everyone at the A-ball level. There are players we've signed internationally and players for whom we've traded, so at some point I'll have to recap those as well. Nevertheless, it's always interesting and instructive to take a look back.

Roster Moves in Bulk

2009-06-19T12:02:00.001-07:00

We've had a busy week with the Major League roster, and today is the denouement (more or less). Here goes:

Purchase the contract of Kyle Blanks
The big man is coming. Kyle has been playing some outfield (15 games) along with 1B in AAA Portland, and he's hit .283/.393/.485 with 12 homers. He won't be supplanting Adrian at 1B, but we believe there will be some ab's for him during interleague play next week.

Purchase the contract of Eliezer Alfonzo
Eliezer is leading the Beavers in both OPS (.887) and slugging (.565) while catching 41 games. With Nick Hundley going on the DL, Eliezer should get some time behind the plate with Henry Blanco.

Recall Wade LeBlanc
Wade was with the big Club a few days last week but didn't have the opportunity to pitch. Tonight, however, he'll be the starter against the A's. Wade has a 4.08 ERA in 57 innings in Portland, giving up 56 hits and 17 walks while striking out 47.

Reinstate Everth Cabrera from the 60-Day DL
After breaking a bone in his hand in Philadelphia, Everth had surgery and missed two months. In the last few weeks, though, he has made rehab stops at Lake Elsinore (.391/.500/.522) and Portland (.333/.379/.407). It certainly appears as though he's ready to go.

Place Chris Young on the 15-Day DL
This has been well-documented in the mainstream media, but Chris has been battling some shoulder soreness for the past three or four starts. We decided it was time to let the soreness settle down before the injury cascaded.

Place Nick Hundley on the 15-Day DL
Nick was hit on the wrist with a pitch a little more than a week ago, and it's been slow to respond to treatment. Rather than continuing to try to fight through it on a daily basis, it made sense to bring Eliezer and make sure that Nick didn't have to play with discomfort for an extended period.

Place Cliff Floyd on the 60-Day DL
Cliff's shoulder continues to be a burden for him. Surgery is an option.

Josh Wilson claimed on waivers by the Seattle Mariners
In order to create room on the roster (both 25-man and 40-man) for Everth Cabrera, we placed Josh Wilson on waivers. The Mariners claimed him, so we won't have the option of having him available to us in AAA. Josh had a prior outright, so even had he cleared waivers, he would have had the option to elect free agency. Josh doesn't have any options remaining, so the Mariners must keep him on their 25-man roster.

Arturo Lopez claimed on waivers by the New York Mets
We needed to create a few 40-man roster spots today - Kyle Blanks, Eliezer Alfonzo, and Everth Cabrera (60-Day DL doesn't count toward the 40-man) - so we had some tough choices to make. As I wrote in an earlier post, often times the decision comes down to which player has the best chance to get through waivers. We took a shot with Arturo, but the Mets claimed him. He still has options remaining, so the Mets can option him to the minors.

We now have a total of 10 players on the Major League DL: Cha Seung Baek, Cliff Floyd, Luke Gregerson, Scott Hairston (starting rehab in Lake Elsinore this weekend), Shawn Hill, Nick Hundley, Jake Peavy, Luis Perdomo, Chris Young, and Mark Worrell. As a team we've now amassed 507 DL days, and the season is only 76 days old. In fact, we've had six or more players on the DL on 61 of the 76 days. At some point any team's depth gets tested, and I'm afraid we're well beyond that point (especially since our projected #1, #2, and #3 starters are all on the DL). Nevertheless, this is a great opportunity for some of the younger guys to gain experience, prove they belong, and establish themselves.

One Year Later

2009-06-18T12:05:00.000-07:00

As many of you know, I prefer to focus on process as opposed to outcomes since outcomes can often be misleading. Nevertheless, outcomes make the news (and determine who gets to play in the World Series), so we can't ignore them completely. With that in mind, following is a glance at the players selected in the top 15 rounds of the 2008 draft approximately one year later. I'll look at the later rounds in a future post.

Before I start, I just want to add a little perspective: the Midwest League has combined for a hitting line of approximately .254/.322/.376 so far this season. It's a very tough place to hit.

Round 1 - Allan Dykstra, Fort Wayne, .209/.389/.358
During spring training this year, our player development staff felt it was important to rework part of Allan's swing despite his solid performance at the conclusion of last season in the Cal League: .292/.469/.458 in about 30 pa's. As with any significant change, it was probably going to get worse before it got better, so they decided to start Allan in Fort Wayne. His eye continues to be excellent as evidenced by his 51 walks, and we're confident that he'll continue to see better and better results.

Round 1C - Jaff Decker, Fort Wayne, .283/.447/.510
19 years old, an ops greater than .950, 2nd in the league in OBP, more walks than strikeouts. Silly. Downright silly.

Round 1C - Logan Forsythe, Lake Elsinore, .323/.474/.516
The numbers speak for themselves again. Despite playing in one of the tougher hitting environments in the Cal League, especially for a right-handed hitter, Logan leads the Cal League in OBP, is 8th in average, and has 58 walks to just 45 strikeouts in about 300 pa's.

Round 2 - James Darnell, Fort Wayne, .330/.471/.526
Don't let yourself read these numbers without being astonished. All three of these guys are in rarefied air. James is leading the Midwest League in OBP, is 5th in slugging, and 6th in average. Like both Decker and Forsythe in front of him, he has more walks than strikeouts (56 to 49). These three guys are doing more than any of us could possibly have imagined.

Round 3 - Blake Tekotte, Fort Wayne, .236/.321/.339
This performance line has surprised me a bit, especially because Blake hit .285/.379/.456 in Eugene last summer. Nevertheless, I believe Blake could have a big 2nd half partly because he has hit .316/.437/.491 in June and seems to be warming up with the weather. Further, his 15 steals lead the Tin Caps, and he continues to play a very solid centerfield.

Round 3C - Sawyer Carroll, Fort Wayne, .311/.407/.450
Sawyer's already impressive line might be outrageous had he not hit .215/.342/.292 in April. His OPS marks have increased each month from .634 to .891 to 1.045, and he's also stolen 14 bags.

Round 4 - Jason Kipnis
Jason returned to Arizona State for his junior year, and the Cleveland Indians selected him in the 2nd round of the 2009 draft.

Round 5 - Anthony Bass, Fort Wayne, 2.17 ERA, 66 ip/58 h/23 bb/48 k
Not to be outdone by the hitters, Anthony ranks 2nd in the Midwest League in ERA. Used exclusively in the bullpen in Eugene where he compiled seven saves and a 2.10 ERA last summer, Anthony moved back into the rotation and has been a stalwart this year. He's allowed just two earned runs in his last 33.2 innings of work.

Round 6 - Cole Figueroa, Fort Wayne, .357/.500/.571
Bothered by a troublesome knee earlier in the season in Lake Elsinore and having to spend time rehabbing back in Arizona, Cole recently joined the Tin Caps and has played shortstop the last four games.

Round 7 - Adam Zornes, Fort Wayne, .142/.242/.319
Adam's had a tough season. He's only caught 30 games and has just over 100 ab's, so the numbers aren't necessarily indicative of his ability. A good defensive catcher with some power, Adam hasn't found his stroke quite yet.

Round 8 - Beamer Weems, Lake Elsinore, .300/.471/.393
An excellent defensive SS, Beamer has surprised some people with the bat. Playing in High-A and still just 21 years old, Beamer is 2nd in the Cal League in OBP right behind Logan Forsythe.

Round 9 - Kyle Thebeau
Kyle returned to Texas A&M for his senior season and went undrafted this year.

Round 10 - Andrew Albers, Arizona
Andrew, a left-handed pitcher, injured his elbow and underwent Tommy John surgery this spring. He will miss the season.

Round 11 - Tyson Bagley, Eugene
6'8" and a hard thrower, Tyson threw 40 innings last year for Eugene with a 3.57 ERA. This spring he stayed in extended spring training and is expected to return to Eugene.

Round 12 - Matt Clark, Fort Wayne, .267/.356/.496
Like a few others in front of him, we had to overpay to get Matt away from LSU, but we've been rewarded so far. Matt leads the team in homers (11), RBI (50), and total bases (117), while also ranking 2nd in the Midwest League in extra-base hits (32) and doubles (21). He splits time with Allan Dykstra at 1B and DH.

Round 13 - Erik Davis, Fort Wayne, 3.43 ERA, 42 ip/38 h/18 bb/40 k
Pitching in both the rotation and the pen as he did last summer in Eugene where he posted a 2.70 ERA in 26.2 innings, Erik has been very steady. So far he has a 3.57 ERA as a reliever and a 3.26 as a starter.

Round 14 - Robert Musgrave, Fort Wayne, 6.92 ERA, 40.1 ip/53 h/17 bb/37 k
Robert's performance was a bit of a mystery, especially since he dominated last summer in Eugene with 66 k's and 11 bb's in 42 innings. We may have found the culprit, though, as he is now on the DL nursing a strain in his oblique. He'll take it slowly, as that can be a touchy injury, but we do expect him back in the not too distant future.

Round 15 - Brett Mooneyham
As expected, Brett enrolled at Stanford where he had a 4.14 ERA in 67 innings of work this spring.

One obvious question here is: why so many guys, especially college guys, in Fort Wayne rather than Lake Elsinore and aren't their numbers inflated by playing against weaker competition?

There are two answers to this:

1) There were players, in our estimation, who were already in our system and deserved the opportunity to advance to Lake Elsinore, so even though a number of the players from the 2008 draft were fully capable of going to high-A, there weren't enough at-bats to go around. Furthermore, players have jumped from Low-A straight to AA (Will Venable is one), so getting someone everyday at-bats at Fort Wayne would not slow down their advancement in the system.

2) The demographics of the Midwest League are not what you might expect. Just 25% of the players on Midwest League rosters were born in 1988 or later, whereas 55% of the league was born in 1986 or 1987. So, by and large, this is not a league for high school drafts. Though it's technically a low-A league, the talent may very well be on par with the other high-A leagues.

Last year we believed there was an unusual amount of talent among the college hitters, so we targeted them aggressively in the draft. So far, that strategy seems to have paid off, as we're getting exceptional performance from a number of them and have the top two in OBP (by a wide margin) in both the Midwest League and the Cal League. Let's hope they can keep it up as they move through the chain.

Peavy to the DL

2009-06-12T17:37:00.000-07:00

Today we announced that Jake Peavy will be placed on the DL for his ankle injury. In order to let it heal he will wear a cast for at least the next couple of weeks.

Rounds 31-50

2009-06-11T13:13:00.000-07:00

31st Round - Matt Jackson, RHP from University of South Alabama

32nd Round - David Erickson, RHP from University of Connecticut

33rd Round - Jonathan Berger, RHP from San Diego State

34th Round - Joshua Cephas, RHP from Southern Nazarene

35th Round - Adalberto Santos, OF from Oregon State

36th Round - Dylan Tonneson, C from Cal Berkeley

37th Round - Gaspar Santiago, LHP from Ranger JC in Texas

38th Round - Kyle Loretelli, CF from Cal State Stanislaus

39th Round - Christopher Ahearn, SS from Catawba College

40th Round - Thomas Porter, RHP from Elon College

41st Round - Dane Hamilton, 3B from University of New Mexico

42nd Round - Ray Delphey, RHP from Alonso HS in Florida

43rd Round - Chadd Hartman, OF from University of Central Florida

44th Round - Ryan Skube, 2B from Mountain Ridge HS in Arizona

45th Round - Derek Landis, RHP from Iowa Western Community College

46th Round - Mykal Stokes, CF from Orange Coast College in California

47th Round - Zack Thomas, LHP from Cy Fair HS in Texas

48th Round - Andrew Ruck, CF from Sinclar SS in Ontario

49th Round - Brett Holland, RHP from University of Texas at Tyler

50th Round - Brett Basham, C from University of Mississippi

Sorry for not including individual info on all of these players (and my apologies to them), but I'm out of gas. Feel free to ask questions, and I'll tell you what I know.

I'm looking forward to seeing a lot of our picks in either Eugene or Peoria later this summer after sleeping for about a week.

Rounds 21-30

2009-06-10T15:28:00.000-07:00

21st Round - Kendall Korbal, RHP from Blinn College in Texas

20 years old and 6'6", 210 lbs, Kendall has a fastball that reaches 93 and the makings of solid secondary pitches. He could end up as a starter or a reliever with power stuff.

22nd Round - Cody Decker, 1B from UCLA

A senior first baseman from UCLA, Cody banged 20 homers this season. He doesn't have the height of the rest of our draft class, but he attacks the ball and can hit it a long way.

23rd Round - Jeffrey Ibarra, LHP from Lee University in Tennessee

A California native and standing 6'6" and 180 lbs, Jeffrey is a left-handed reliever with a low 3/4 arm angle making him tough on left-handed hitters.

24th Round - Ben Davis, OF from University of Southern Mississippi

No flashbacks here...Ben actually goes by "Bo". A senior centerfielder, Bo plays with a lot of energy and hit .371/.488/.649 this spring.

25th Round - Ty Wright, OF from Georgia Southern

A 6'0", 235 lbs left-fielder, Ty was the Georgia Junior College player of the year in 2007 and a Second Team All-American in 2008. He combined to hit .365/.457/.658 over his past two seasons at Georgia Southern. Ty plays hard and has some serious strength.

26th Round - Kevin Winn, 2B from Louisiana Tech

Kevin had a big senior season at La Tech hitting .380/.440/.606 while striking out just 11 times. His father is Earl Winn, a scout for the Twins, and his brother plays in the Phillies organization.

27th Round - Cameron Monger, OF from University of New Mexico

Despite being a solid 6'2", 205 lbs, Cameron runs the 60 in about 6.3 seconds. He didn't get to play all that much this season at New Mexico, but he can impact a game with his speed.

28th Round - Vince Belnome, 2B from West Virginia University

A junior left-handed hitting 2B, Vince was a Third Team All Big East selection in 2008 as a sophomore and this year hit .417/.520/.655.

29th Round - Robert Poutier, RHP from University of Virginia

A 6'4", 190 lb reliever from UVA, Robert has pitched 54.2 innings over the past two seasons, yielding 49 hits and 20 walks while striking out 73. He has a nice FB/SL mix.

30th Round - Babawande Olabisi, OF from Stanford

A terrific athlete, Wande hasn't had much of a chance to play at Stanford, amassing just 23 ab's over the past three seasons. Nevertheless, he can really run and has plenty of strength. Wande was born in Lagos, Nigeria before moving to Saudi Arabia where he played for the 2000 Little League World Series team. He is a member of the royal family of the Urhobo tribe in Nigeria. Here's a good article.

That's it for today. We still have some work to do tomorrow, but we're pumped how everything has fallen so far. We feel we have a lot of upside in this draft, and we're happy to add so much size and power. If a basketball or football game breaks out in Peoria, AZ, we'll be ready.

Rounds 11-20

2009-06-10T11:58:00.000-07:00

11th Round - Andrew Madrigal, RHP from Mt. San Jacinto in California

A two-way player at Mt. San Jacinto, Drew hit over .400 while also putting up a big year on the mound. 6'2" and 200 lbs, Drew is an athletic strike thrower who has been up to 94 mph with a solid slider. He struck out 138 in 106 innings.

12th Round - Brayden Drake, 3B from Missouri St

A senior, Brayden is a hard-nosed infielder with a solid line drive bat. He's a good enough defender to move around, and he's a tough out hitting over .400 this season while slugging .695.

13th Round - James Vern, 1B/OF from Texas Christian University

At 6'3" and 225, James is athletic enough to play out in LF as well as 1B. James hit 15 homers this season and slugged .679.

14th Round - Nick Greenwood, LHP from University of Rhode Island

A left-handed starter at URI, Nick has excellent command along with a solid changeup. He has started for the past two years, going 184.1 innings with 185 hits, just 40 walks, and 169 strikeouts.

15th Round - Matt Lollis, RHP from Riverside Community College

Back on our theme. Matt is 6'8", 260 lbs, and he's just 18 years old. Despite the size, Matt has good feel for the strike zone and runs his fastball up to 94 mph.

16th Round - Griffin Benedict, C from Georgia Southern

Son of former Major Leaguer, Bruce Benedict, Griffin has been a four-year starter at Georgia Southern and shows great intangibles. A left-handed hitter, Griffin controls the strike zone and hits to all fields, but he's also belted 26 homers over the past two seasons.

17th Round - Jorge Reyes, RHP from Oregon State

6'3" and 185 lbs, Jorge has been a high profile pitcher at Oregon State for the past three seasons. He has a good sinker in the low 90's along with a solid slider.

18th Round - Shuhei Fujiya, RHP from University of Northern Iowa

An Irvine native, Shuhei attended Orange Coast College before heading to Northern Iowa. 6'3" and 175 lbs, Shuhei does not yet have a lot of experience on the mound but shows a good delivery with an easy, quick arm.

19th Round - Chris Tremblay, SS from Kent State University

A senior infielder, Chris is a solid defender and has hit over .350 over the past two college seasons combined. This year he played SS with a dislocated finger - like the toughness.

20th Round - John Wooten, 3B from Eastern Wayne HS in North Carolina

At 6'3" and 195 lbs, John has already shown big, big power. He's a good athlete, and as he continues to get bigger and stronger he could end up being dangerous with the bat.

10th Round Pick

2009-06-10T10:13:00.000-07:00

Ryan Hinson, LHP from Clemson University

It was about time we took a lefty. A 6'2", 220 lb reliever, Ryan has also started in the past. In the bullpen his FB has been up to 94 to go along with a solid slider.

The draft is really going fast right now, so I'm not going to be able to continue posting after each pick. There are a few breaks, so I'll try to do so roundups along with a recap at the end of the day.

9th Round Pick

2009-06-10T10:04:00.000-07:00

Chris Fetter, RHP from University of Michigan

A 6'8", 230 lb starting pitcher, Chris had a huge spring after seeing a jump in his velocity up to 94 mph. In 94 innings this season he walked just 17 and struck out 103. At 6'8" you could say he has good "downhill plane".

8th Round Pick

2009-06-10T09:53:00.000-07:00

Nate Freiman, 1B at Duke University

A 6'8" first baseman, Nate has monster power. This year, his senior year, he had 19 homers and just 24 strikeouts. As you can imagine, he makes a nice target over at 1B.

7th Round Pick

2009-06-10T09:42:00.000-07:00

Miles Mikolas, RHP from Nova Southeastern in Florida

A 6'5" 220 lb starting pitcher, Miles has a fastball up to 94 with a good curveball. Is anyone sensing a trend?

6th Round Pick

2009-06-10T09:31:00.000-07:00

James Needy, RHP from Santana HS in California

A San Diegan, James is a 6'5" starting pitcher with a FB in the low 90's with feel for both a breaking ball and a changeup. It's nice to get a local in the mix, but this one was all about talent.

5th Round Pick

2009-06-10T09:22:00.001-07:00

Jason Hagerty, C from the University of Miami

Jason is a strong switch-hitting catcher with some power. He has also spent time at 1B, but we see him as a catcher.

4th Round Pick

2009-06-10T09:06:00.000-07:00

Keyvius Sampson, RHP from Forest HS in Florida

Keyvius is a very athletic right-handed starter with a fastball that ranges from 90-96 mph and a very good changeup. This season he posted a 0.83 ERA, pitching 59 innings, giving up 19 hits and 14 walks while striking out 113. We believe he has big upside as a starting pitcher.

Tonight

2009-06-09T19:51:00.000-07:00

With just three rounds under our belt we have a long night in front of us tonight. The good thing is that we have the opportunity to digest what has transpired and create a comprehensive plan for tomorrow, which will be rapid fire. The bad thing is that the draft at this stage is much more unpredictable.

Nevertheless, we're very happy with our first day. We've been excited about selecting Tate for weeks, were pleasantly surprised that Williams was still there, and were happy to add a starter with both athleticism and stuff.

Thanks for all of the comments so far. We're excited that you're excited.

3rd Round Pick

2009-06-09T19:11:00.000-07:00

Gerald Sullivan, RHP from Oral Roberts Univ

Jerry is 6'4", 200 lbs and has been a starting pitcher for the past two seasons for Oral Roberts while spending his summers in the Cape. An excellent athlete, he has a FB that ranges from 90-94 and complements it with a solid SL and a CH.

2nd Round Pick

2009-06-09T18:23:00.000-07:00

Everett Williams, OF from Austin McCallum HS in Texas

This is another highly athletic HS outfielder who we think can really hit. He's about 5'10" and 200lbs and is another potential 5-tool guy.

Tate Video

2009-06-09T15:45:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Scott Singer from Workhorse Video Productions for making this video available.

1st Round Pick

2009-06-09T15:20:00.000-07:00

Donavan Tate, OF from Cartersville HS in Georgia

There has been a lot of speculation surrounding this pick over the past few weeks, but Tate has always been in the front of our minds. He is a potential 5-tool player who plays in the middle of the diamond and is probably the best athlete in the draft.

We're taking our shot.

Draft Day

2009-06-09T12:12:00.001-07:00

We finished our annual Draft Day breakfast, and we're currently in our final discussions.

Today is going to be a slower first day than normal since we're only getting through three rounds. Nevertheless, we're going over a number of permutations to make sure that we're set up to act quickly regardless of what happens in front of us in each of the rounds. The anticipation is painful.

Just like last year I'll be posting after each of our selections.

Gerut for Gwynn Jr

2009-05-27T15:23:00.000-07:00

I'm back! Ok, so it's a day later than expected, but I ended up taking my kids to Legoland yesterday. All the time on the road can be rough on the family.

Anyway, according to the comments, the Gerut for Gwynn swap seems to have been on many minds over the past week or so. In addition to Tony being an outstanding defensive CF with above average speed, there are a handful of elements in a deal like this:

Age - Tony Jr is just 26 years while Jody is playing this year at 31. Jody certainly isn't old, but we are committed to getting younger where we can. We've had 32 players currently in our organization who have competed for us at the ML level this season, and 25 of them are in their 20's (Chris Young just turned 30 on Monday, so we just missed out on 26). Only four of those in their 30's are full-time starters: Brian Giles, Chris Young, Heath Bell, and David Eckstein. Furthermore, 13 of the players are 26 years old or younger, and Tony Jr fits into that group.
Service Time - Building on the age element, Tony Jr has just over one year of Major League service (players become free agents after six full years), whereas Jody will be over the five year mark at the end of this season, thereby making him eligible for free agency at the end of 2010. As we try to rebuild the foundation for long-term success, we have to take this into account.
Money - Nobody likes to talk about it, but the fact is that dollars must factor in our decision making. It doesn't mean that we're just looking to move payroll, but every team has to evaluate the cost of each of player on their roster. In this case, Jody was making $1,775,000 this year compared with Tony Jr's $405,000. That spread will likely increase next year as Jody will once again will eligible for arbitration.
Other - It would be silly to ignore the fact that Tony Gwynn Jr's father is Tony Gwynn. Such an affiliation, however, is never the impetus for a move. When weighing options that are similar, it can probably tip the scales but no more.
Other Players - I saved this for last, because it may be the most important piece of this transaction. Most deals are not just simply about the player you're trading away for the player you're acquiring. In addition to the standalone deal, there is often a ripple effect on the roster, and in this case that ripple effect may have precipitated the move. Ok, in English... Jody Gerut is a productive offensive outfielder who can play all three outfield positions and is cost effective in relative terms. Well, that also describes Scott Hairston and possibly Drew Macias (who are both younger and have less service time than Jody). This move was about creating at-bats for others like Hairston, Macias, and even Headley as much as it was about the straight-up deal.

So, in summary, though we gave up a good player in Jody Gerut, we got younger, created more cost flexibility, and have provided more opportunity for other players who have a chance to be with us for a longer period of time. It's not without risks, but that's the rationale.

Yesterday

2009-05-22T03:55:00.001-07:00

Yesterday was a big day for the Padres in many respects, and unfortunately I was unavailable to read, publish or respond to any of your comments. I am still in Birmingham (at the airport now at 5:30am) and, contrary to the caricature, I don't even have a computer with me on this trip. Therefore, all comments with have to wait until I return late this weekend.

That being the case, expect me to get to all of your questions on Monday and Tuesday.

Tournament Time

2009-05-20T16:00:00.001-07:00

We're coming into the final turn for this year's amateur draft, which means many of our scouts and front office personnel are bouncing all over the country to get a final look at some of the top players. That's what brings me to Hoover, Alabama.

For the third year in a row I'm here in Hoover at the SEC Tournament, and we're currently between games two and three (of four in the day). The day starts early with the first game at 10am, and the hope is that the last pitch will be thrown sometime before 2am. It's a long day of baseball.

Nevertheless, it's worth it. The SEC is often loaded with talent. In last year's draft we selected Logan Forsythe (Arkansas), James Darnell (South Carolina), Sawyer Carroll (Kentucky), Cole Figueroa (Florida), Andrew Albers (Kentucky), and Matt Clark (LSU) all in the first 12 rounds or so. The Padres haven't been alone.

In just the past three or four years many top prospects and some young big leaguers have played in this tournament, including guys like David Price, Pedro Alvarez, Matt LaPorta, Pedro Borbon, JP Arencibia, Reese Havens, Luke Hochevar, Jess Todd, Lance Lynn, Chris Coughlan, Casey Weathers, Gordon Beckham, and Padres Chase Headley, Wynn Pelzer, and Nick Schmidt. That's why the crowd is filled with Crosscheckers, Scouting Directors, and General Managers.

The second half of this day one should be a good one, as a number of highly touted players will be on the field. I just hope it's over before sunrise.

Roster Moves

2009-05-15T16:30:00.000-07:00

Busy Friday.

Today we optioned RHP Edwin Moreno, released RHP Duaner Sanchez, placed SS Luis Rodriguez on the 15-Day DL, recalled LHP Joe Thatcher, purchased the contract of RHP Greg Burke, claimed SS Josh Wilson on waivers, and transferred RHP Cha Seung Baek to the 60-Day DL. Whew.

Joe Thatcher has pitched well this season in AAA Portland, going 14 innings with 12 hits, five walks, and 17 k's. What's particularly good is that Joe has held left-handed hitters to a .557 ops and right-handed hitters to a .661. His ground ball ratio has also been 4:1, so all that indicates that his cutter looks more like the 2007 version.

Greg Burke will be making his Major League debut, and it's a good story. A non-drafted free agent, Greg began his career in 2006 splitting time between the rotation and the bullpen with both of our A-Ball teams. Once again an A-ball swing man in 2007, Greg posted a 5.23 ERA. Then came 2008. Greg made the move to the AA pen, and everything clicked. He notched 23 saves for AA San Antonio on his way to a 2.24 ERA in 84 innings of work. He hasn't missed a beat in AAA this year with seven saves and a 2.25 ERA across 16 innings.

Josh Wilson is a 28-year SS who has over 1700 plate appearances in AAA and about 350 in the big leagues. Most recently with the Diamondbacks, Josh does everything pretty well - solid defense at SS, good runner, and has a little power. He gives us some needed veteran depth at the SS position with the injuries to both Everth Cabrera and Luis Rodriguez.

The move of Cha Seung Baek should not materially change his return, as the 60 days began at the beginning of the seaon, and we don't anticipate his return before the beginning of June.

Looking at Brian Giles

2009-05-12T12:10:00.000-07:00

I was in the midst of posting this response in the comments section, and I figured it was better suited as a post...

John,

I know a lot of people have been raising questions about Giles recently, as he's had a miserable start to his season.

I know he's 38, but this is also a very small sample that may not be indicative of anything.

In 2005 Giles hit .145/.294/205 over 100 or so pa's from early April to early May.

In 2006 Giles hit .115/.303/.135 in roughly 70 pa's from late June through early July.

In 2007 Giles hit .175/.273/.330 in more than 100 pa's from early Sept until the end of the season.

In 2008 Giles hit .218/.365/.308 in more than 70 pa's in late April through mid-May.

The point is that just about anything can happen to just about anyone over a span of 150 plate appearances, and in fact, something similar has happened to Giles in each of the past four seasons.

Here's another example: in 2003 when I was still in Oakland, we had the reigning AL MVP, Miguel Tejada, playing shortstop. After his first 120 pa's or so of the season, he was hitting .157/.229/.287 - the reigning MVP! By the end of the season he was up to .278/.336/.472 - right in line with his career norms.

Though Brian hasn't swung the bat the way all of us are accustomed to seeing, he has had some bad luck and his approach has improved. In the first 15 games Brian walked just four times and struck out 10. That is unusual for a guy who walked more than he has struck out over the course of his entire ML career. However, in the past 16 games Brian has walked nine times and struck out five. That's more like it and could be a sign that he's seeing the ball better. Then again, that could just be small sample sizes playing tricks on us...

The real point is that we're generally better served by looking at the body of work over a longer time frame than we are by focusing on the last 100 pa's. Furthermore, bad streaks get exacerbated early in the season because the numbers on the scoreboard look so terrible. If a player has a tough stretch in July that takes his average from .280 down to .255, it doesn't get nearly as much attention.

All of that doesn't mean that we're blind to changes of skill level, especially as players age. However, it does mean that players with long track records of success ought to be given more leeway before making irrevocable decisions.

Injury News

2009-05-12T10:59:00.000-07:00

Cha Seung Baek - After making two rehab appearances in Lake Elsinore and one in Portland, Cha Seung felt some elbow soreness and was removed from the game. This is different than the previous injury for which he was rehabbing.

Walter Silva - Walter has already made two appearances for Portland, going a total of 7.1 innings and yielding three runs. He should be very close.

Mike Adams - Mike is progressing well and threw a full bullpen yesterday. His first simulated game against hitters could come later this week, which keeps him on target for a return hopefully sometime in June.

Matt Antonelli - Matt started experiencing some discomfort around his knee toward the end of spring training and had a difficult time getting rid of the pain. Fortunately, he's been pain free for a while now, has been playing nine innings in extended spring training games, and will be activated in AAA Portland today.

Steve Garrison - A left-handed starter, Garrison was on his way to AAA this year after posting a 3.82 ERA in AA San Antonio as a 21-year old. His season ended in August (if I remember correctly), and he had shoulder surgery. Fortunately, he's been up on the mound already a handful of times, is progressing well, and is scheduled for his first simulated game against hitters tomorrow. We're hoping that he'll be ready by July.

Kellen Kulbacki - After having shoulder surgery on his non-throwing shoulder in the off-season, Kellen aggravated the injury in spring training. He was activated in San Antonio over the weekend and is 2 for 8 is his first two games.

Brian Joynt - Brian had some lower back pain that kept him out of some spring training games, but he is back playing nine innings in extended games and has already played 3B, 1B, and the OF. Barring any setbacks, he should be ready to go shortly.

Lance Zawadzki - Lance was actually activated in Lake Elsinore a few weeks ago after just about two weeks in extended spring. He's hitting .338/.407/.688 in roughly 85 plate appearances for the Storm. He's 4th in the Cal League in homers and slugging percentage despite the late start.

Jackson Quezada - After not pitching in big league camp, Jackson started pitching on the minor league side and was pitching in extended spring training games until just a couple of days ago. He is now resting and not on an active pitching schedule.

Matt Latos - After rolling his ankle in minor league spring training, Matt was a few starts behind his colleagues. He made some appearances in extended spring before being activated about two weeks ago in Ft. Wayne. So far Matt has made two appearances for the TinCaps going 11.2 innings with four hits, three walks, and 12 strikeouts.

Jaff Decker - Jaff was activated just over two weeks ago in Ft. Wayne and he's made his presence felt. Through his first 15 games he's hitting .317/.548/.659. That's ridiculous.

Update

2009-05-11T11:37:00.000-07:00

Over the past two weeks I've been up and down the East Coast, up and down the West Coast, and spent at least a little bit of time in between. Throughout that time our Major League Club has played poorly. And it's been frustrating.

People often comment about how much fun our jobs must be, and sometimes I'll respond with, "It's fun when you win." Well, we haven't been winning, and it hasn't been much fun.

Nevertheless, this is part of the reason for this blog - times like this. It's also a time for us to analyze what has gone awry. So what has happened?

We started out hitting a solid .254/.336/.433 over our first 12 games, but we've managed just a .232/.305/.367 line since then, so we're now at .240/.316/.391 as a team. A .316 obp isn't going to get it done. We're better than that.

One of the things that happens when teams aren't scoring a lot is that individual hitters tend to press, thinking that they have to be THE guy to break the team out of the collective slump. Unfortunately, this often exacerbates the problem.

This self-inflicted pressure is never more evident than when the pressure ought to be on the pitcher - when there are two men in scoring position (2nd and 3rd or bases loaded). Pressing hitters will get jumpy in this situation rather than let the game come to them. We've had 53 chances so far this season in those situations and we're hitting an abysmal .109/.283/.152 with just 16 rbi. In contrast, the National League has combined for a .264/.359/.436 line in those hitter-friendly circumstances. Basically, we've missed out in a big way on the best chances that we've created.

Additionally, a portion of the bad numbers has come from bad luck. The National League as a whole has a batting average on balls in play of .238 on ground balls, .144 on fly balls, and .710 on line drives. That's a reasonably good proxy for where we ought to be; however, we're hitting just .204 on grounders and .105 on fly balls (.708 on liners is on par with the league). Brian Giles, for one, has been hit particularly hard in this area, hitting just .130 on ground balls and .500 on line drives. A long season is a good thing.

Similar to our hitting, our pitching took a turn after the first 12 games. We posted a 3.79 ERA as a team in the first 12 and we've had a 5.24 since. The good news is that we were back to a 3.74 in the past seven days. In general our walks are too high, and we're spending too much time pitching from behind in the count, but I continue to have faith that this will improve.

One of the things that every team has to deal with is injuries, and we've certainly had our share. There is a strong correlation between our DL numbers on a daily basis and our winning percentage, but it's tough to ascertain whether or not a causal relationship exists. Since April 20 we've had six players on the Major League DL and seven since April 27. While we haven't lost a #1 starter, a closer or a cleanup hitter (knock on wood) to the DL, it does get to a tipping point where the sheer volume hurts. In essence, we have seven players currently on our team - nearly 30% of our active roster - that were ticketed for AAA. Day in and day out that ends up taking a toll. Of course, we're not the only team having to deal with such an issue.

It is often said that you're never as good as you look when things are going well and never as bad as you look when things are going poorly. Our season to date has typified that axiom. Now we have to forget about the last couple of weeks and get out of the trough of the rollercoaster.

Week in Review #3

2009-04-29T07:42:00.000-07:00

I've been on the road since late last week doing amateur coverage on the East Coast, so I'm once again delinquent with my week in review. Quite frankly, it wasn't a great week to review anyway.

Hitting
Overall, we were 2-5 since I last wrote. Offensively, we hit .258/.321/.395 as a team, which isn't too bad, but we reached the critical four run threshold just three times (going 2-1 in those games). For the season we're 10th out of 16 in the NL in runs scored and have a 103 OPS+ (100 is the baseline and anything above 100 is above average). Both of those marks are fine, but we think we can do better.

Pitching
Our pitching had a tough week. As a team we posted a 6.36 ERA pushing the season total from a 3.83 to a 4.74 overall. That isn't going to cut it in the long run. We did keep our opponents under four runs three times (2-1 in those games), but we didn't do a good enough job in the other games to give our offense much of a chance.

Our bullpen has been quite strong, despite a few lapses, with Bell, Meredith, Gregerson, Moreno, and Mujica combining for a 3.10 ERA so far. Bell, obviously, has been outstanding, and if the rest of the young guys can continue to settle in, we like the depth there.

Roster/Injuries
We made a couple of roster moves this week, designating both RHR Eulogio DeLaCruz and RHR Mike Ekstrom for assignment in order to make room for LHR Arturo Lopez and RHS Chad Gaudin. Though we haven't had a lefty in our pen so far this season, that wasn't the sole reason for bringing up Arturo. He had a great spring this year and continued that performance into the first few weeks for Portland striking out 15 in 14.1 innings of work. We signed Gaudin in order to build him up as a starter after the Cubs released him at the end of spring training hoping that he might be ready by early May. He made two appearances in Portland without yielding a run and when we needed him earlier than anticipated, he did the same for the Major League club last night in Colorado.

Overall, injuries have become an issue for us early in the season. We currently have seven guys on the DL (already 129 DL days as a team and we're not even out of April), all of whom have either been on the team or were expected to be on the team except for Mike Adams. We knew we were taking risks with a couple of the guys due to injury history, but we've also run into some bad luck especially in our rotation. Fortunately, Cha Seung Baek started a rehab assignment last night in single A, and Mike Adams is feeling good and appears to be ahead of schedule.

Minor Leagues
Portland (11-9) - Kyle Blanks continues to pace the Beavers with a .319/.430/.528 batting line and just hit his fourth homer of the season last night. Between stints on the ML club, Drew Macias has hit .321/.446/.453 in AAA while also registering more walks than strikeouts. After yielding a run in his first appearance of the season, Greg Burke has thrown up nothing but zeros en route to a 0.90 ERA. Even better, Joe Thatcher is still sporting a perfect 0.00 ERA after 8.2 innings.

San Antonio (8-10) - Mitch Canham, Craig Cooper, and Eric Sogard still lead the offensive charge for the Missions, while Cooper's 26 hits are good for the Texas League lead. Luis Durango also is leading the Texas League in his category of choice - stolen bases. On the mound Stephen Faris has a 1.99 ERA while also pitching the 2nd most innings in the league, and Evan Scribner, the reliever acquired last season for Tony Clark, has a 1.04 ERA, striking out 11 hitters in 8.2 innings.

Lake Elsinore (10-9) - In his first stint with a full-season club last year in Ft. Wayne, 1B Felix Carrasco banged 16 homers, though he also struck out 162 times in 450 plate appearances. This year, however, Felix has maintained his power numbers while cutting his k rate by an outstanding 33%. All told he's hitting .286/.416/.444 for the Storm. A supplemental pick in last year's draft, Logan Forsythe continues his hot start as he's reached base in all 17 games he's played while compiling a .323/.455/.484 line. The rotation is still the big story in Elsinore as the five starters (Hefner, Kluber, Luebke, McBryde, and Pelzer) have ERA's ranging from 2.35 to 3.86 and have combined to strike out 106 batters in 89.1 innings compared to just 23 walks - all this in the hitter-friendly Cal League. In the bullpen, Bryan Oland has been stellar racking up six saves and striking out 14 batters in 11 innings.

Fort Wayne (14-4) - Yes, they finally lost a game, but Ft Wayne continues to play well. After a handful of games in extended spring training, we activated OF Jaff Decker this week and he is hitting .250/.429/.563 through his first five games. Reliever Brad Brach has five saves already but more impressively has allowed just one baserunner in his eight innings on the mound.

Like I stated at the beginning, this wasn't our best week. Nevertheless, we're 11-9 to start the season with a schedule that has included a bi-coastal three city road trip and opponents like the Dodgers, Giants, Mets, Phillies, and the surprising Pirates. It doesn't get much easier this week as we get four more with the Dodgers starting tomorrow and no off-days in site. Fortunately, after that we get to play 13 of our next 19 games at Petco, so if we can stay away from more DL time it could be a nice stretch.

Welcome Back Burke

2009-04-21T17:44:00.000-07:00

Today we re-acquired INF Chris Burke from the Seattle Mariners for cash considerations.

When we signed Chris over the winter, we thought he had a legitimate chance to contribute to the big league club, especially because we believed that he had been better than his numbers indicated in 2007 and 2008. Chris then came to camp and had a solid spring training, but we had signed David Eckstein in the interim and Everth Cabrera showed us what he was all about. Feeling that Chris might have a better opportunity elsewhere, we allowed him to pursue a chance to join the Mariners rather than staying on with us in AAA.

With Cabrera missing the next two months, Chris is back and will now assume a role closer to what we originally intended.

Week in Review #2

2009-04-20T09:59:00.000-07:00

I'm exhausted!

What a week of games for the Pads, resulting in a 4-2 record through New York and Philadelphia. To summarize the week one way: our four wins came from Peavy, Meredith, Meredith, and Mujica. Here's a quick and dirty recap:

Monday - Jump out on top 5-1, lose the lead giving up four runs with two outs in the 5th, but take the lead 6-5 on a balk and hang on to win.

Thursday - Down 3-0 after the first with Peavy on the mound but claw back to win 6-5.

Friday - Down 5-0 after the first and 7-1 after the 4th with Young on the mound. Put up two in the 5th, two in the 6th, and four in the 8th to win 8-7.

Saturday - Tied 3-3 after seven, take the lead 4-3 in the top of the 8th, lose the lead in the bottom of the inning, and then get four in the 9th off a dominant closer.

Sunday - Take a 4-2 lead into the 8th, give up one on a pinch hit homer to take a 4-3 lead into the 9th, and then lose on a walkoff homer.

Are you joking me?

The Good
Offensively, we scored 34 runs in six games (Kouz's 9th inning homer accounting for the sweetest three), but more importantly, we scored a lot of those after falling behind in games against some very tough pitching... including a guy who had notched 47 consecutive saves. After hitting .285/.349/.467 for the week, our offense has a .777 OPS, which is above the NL average of .755. In fact, Hairston, Adrian Gonzalez, Hundley, Gerut, Eckstein, Rodriguez, and Headley all currently have an OPS above the league average. That'll work.

On the pitching front, it wasn't pretty but we battled. Our cumulative ranks are still solid - a 106 ERA+, a 3.83 team ERA and 3.12 for the pen (good for 3rd in the NL). Furthermore, our walks went down a little this week as expected despite facing some stacked lineups.

One more good thing - Chase Headley's throw to home with the game on the line to nail Greg Dobbs. Nice.

The Bad
I can't complain about a 4-2 week through New York and Philly, especially considering how dogged our guys were. The only real bad part was a team 5.37 ERA; however, our underlying stats - 54 hits in 52 innings and 20 walks - weren't that bad. The big bad number... we gave up 11 homers. Hopefully the coming week with one game in Philly, two in San Francisco and three in Petco will treat us better.

Overall
Forget about all of the above numbers, because that was one of the most exciting weeks a team will ever have. The week was filled with emotion - opening New York's new stadium, Harry Kalas passing and the ceremonies at Citizen's Bank, Lidge receiving the Rolaids award, sellout crowds everywhere - and yet our guys maintained a tremendous focus. What a week.

Minor Leagues
It was just as good a week in the minor leagues, as we've driven our cumulative minor league record to 26-16 (that equates to a 100-win season over 162 games).

Portland (7-4) - Kyle Blanks has taken his hot spring into the regular season, hitting .350/.480/.575 through the first 11 games. Not to be outdone, Will Venable (.341/.420/.591) and Chad Huffman (.294/.415/.559) have helped to pace the Beavers. On the pitching side, the team has a 3.13 ERA, good for 3rd in the hitter-friendly PCL. Chad Gaudin made his first start in the Padres organization, pitching 3 2/3 shutout innings as he was limited on a pitch count.

San Antonio (4-6) - Mike Baxter (.375/.457/.600), Craig Cooper (.395/.465/.605), Eric Sogard (.333/.478/.556), and Mitch Canham (.393/.485/.500) are off to blistering starts for the Missions. What might be more impressive is that the foursome has drawn 25 walks and struck out just 16 times. Cesar Carrillo yielded just one run in six innings to lower his ERA to 3.27, and he's now generated 22 groundball outs compared with just six flyball outs. Brandon Gomes has been dominant in the pen, yielding just three hits while striking out 13 in seven innings of work.

Lake Elsinore (5-6) - Recovering from an 0-5 start, Elsinore has taken five of its last six (it was way too corny to say they "stormed" back). Logan Forsythe continues to lead the way offensively with a .303/.425/.424 line, but Lance Zawadzki helped inject some life after being activated from the DL and going 5 for 8 with three walks and three stolen bases. The pitching has been oustanding so far with a 3.00 team ERA, and this week the starters - Kluber, Hefner, Luebke, McBryde, and Pelzer - were downright ridiculous. Highlighted by Cory Kluber's two starts (13 innings, just four hits, one run, no walks, and 13 strikeouts), the starters posted a combined 1.53 ERA: 35.1 ip, 21 h, 4 er, 2 bb, and 44 k's. That's not a typo... two walks and 44 strikeouts.

Fort Wayne (10-0) - The TinCaps seem to have adjusted well to their new name and new stadium. James Darnell leads the Midwest League with a .541 obp and his overall line is .304/.541/.609. Additionally, Matt Clark, Allan Dykstra, and Blake Tekotte all got it going to some degree this week. The real story in Ft Wayne, though, has been the pitching. Of the 13 pitchers on the staff, seven of them still have an ERA of 0.00, and the team as a whole is sporting a 1.30. Of the starters, Anthony Bass and Stiven Osuna have yet to give up a run in 22 combined innings of work. The bullpen as a unit: 0.89 ERA, 41.2 ip, 20 h, 8 bb, and 50 k's.

Overall, the first two weeks have been great for the organization. The coming week will be a real battle for the Major League club, as the next three days are about as rough a schedule as I can remember: night game in Philadelphia on Monday as part of a wrap-around series, cross-country flight in the middle of the night, night game in San Francisco on Tuesday, and to top it off... day game in San Francisco on Wednesday. That off day on Thursday will be well deserved.

The best part is that we get to come home, albeit for only three days, over the weekend.

Three Questions

2009-04-17T10:33:00.000-07:00

I left San Diego on Wednesday night for a quick amateur scouting trip, so I haven't been in the office, but there have been a few excellent questions that deserve some attention. I'll respond relatively quickly here (I have to get to another three games today), but I'll try to follow up early next week. All questions are paraphrased.

Question 1 from seemingly everybody: Why on earth are you carrying 13 pitchers?

13 pitchers is a lot, no doubt, and we're not viewing it as a long-term solution. Until we start pinch-hitting pitchers for pitchers, however, it's fine. There are three principle reasons for carrying 13 pitchers for the time being: 1) we have a whole host of new relievers that we didn't have during much of spring training, so we're trying to learn as much about each of them as possible, 2) some of these relievers don't have roster flexibility (in other words "out of options"), and 3) we have some starters from whom we're not going to expect six innings every time out there so we must expect to fill in some innings. As a cherry on top, the schedule calls for us to play 16 games in the first 17 days on the season, which is rigorous coming right out of spring training. It's an unusual roster construction, but it works for now. Building on question #1...

Question 2 from Friarworks: Why has Frankie DeLaCruz only pitched one inning in ten games and isn't that bad for his development?

Bud has had a tough balancing act to start the season. Not only are we carrying a number of new pitchers as mentioned above, but also seven of our first ten games have been decided by three runs or fewer. Of the three that were decided by four or five runs, one of them was a one-run game until the 7th after which Perdomo got the opportunity to pitch the 8th (the final inning), and the other was 4-2 until the bottom of the 8th when we scored three to go up 7-2 and Moreno got the 9th. The fact is that Bud is trying to break in DeLaCruz, Gregerson, Moreno, Perdomo, and even Mujica to some degree, and DeLaCruz so far has gotten the short end of the stick. Actually, even Cla Meredith only had two appearances before yesterday's game.

Therefore, it's the job of our pitching coach and bullpen coach to make sure that each guy continues to stay fresh while also maintaining their availability. Bud is certainly aware of the days off in between appearances, and I'm sure he's been trying to find a good spot to get DeLaCruz in there. To have a guy get one inning in ten games is certainly not ideal, but I'd rather that than have too many opportunities where we're behind in games or our starters are getting knocked out in the 2nd.

Question 3 from WebSoulSurfer: Why would you designate Travis Denker for assignment? Weren't there other, better candidates than a 23-year old infielder with hitting skills?

This is a great question, because there isn't a science behind a lot of roster moves. In general we'll have a debate among a group of our Major League scouts as well as front office personnel to decide on the move when we have to make an irrevocable decision like this one.

We agree with WebSoulSurfer that Travis is a very good prospect. We were happy to claim him on waivers from the Giants during the winter, and we're disappointed to lose him. I expect that he'll be a good big leaguer either as a 2B/3B bat or even as an everyday player. In this particular case, though, Travis had a couple of things working against him: 1) the most value he can bring would be at 2B and both Matt Antonelli and Eric Sogard are excellent prospects in their own right playing that position in AAA and AA respectively, and 2) as stated in both previous answers, our pitching is unsettled. Basically, we've wanted to keep as much pitching depth as possible until we have a better sense for the look and shape of our ML pitching staff (remember, too, that this decision had to be made a week ago after just four games).

I mention all of that, but as the group discusses the merits of each player under considerition, the decision often comes down to one thing: which player does the group believe has the best chance of making it through waivers? In this case, the group determined it was Travis, and unfortunately we lost him.

Week in Review (Plus One) #1

2009-04-14T12:20:00.000-07:00

This offseason I thought about implementing a weekly review once the season started. It's week number one, and I'm already a day late. Not to be deterred, I'm pushing forward.

The Good
Heck, we're 6-2. That's good.

Offensively, we won every game in which we scored four runs or more, and overall we posted a .238/.330/.419 batting line. Too many fly balls led to the low average, but we drew our share of walks and had some timely extra base hits to boost both the obp and slugging. Individually, there are a handful of guys off to hot starts (Gerut, Hairston, Hundley, Blanco).

On the pitching front we've posted a 2.88 ERA as a team, good for 3rd in the NL. The bullpen, however, has a 1.17 ERA... just three earned runs in 23 innings and those runs all came in one inning. So, our bullpen guys have made 22 appearances, and exactly one of those appearances led to a run. That's ridiculous.

The Bad
Fortunately, not a lot to report. There are a few guys who will definitely contribute more offensively as the season continues, but as with any lineup we'll likely have some guys swinging it well and others not so well in any given week. As a pitching staff, especially in the pen, we've walked too many hitters. We've walked 30 in 72 innings as a staff, but our rookies (Moreno, Gregerson, DeLaCruz, and Silva) have walked 14 in just 20.2 innings. A lot of that has to do with big league nerves, which should dissipate to some degree. Also, in rebuilding this pen during spring training, we opted for more power arms and knew that we would have to live with some walks.

Overall
This past week followed a simplistic model of successful Padres teams from the past few years in Petco: be at or near the top of the league in pitching and in the middle of the pack in offense. We've arrived at those results a little differently, but we're there nonetheless. Peavy, Young, and Bell - our vets - all pitched extremely well and have set the tone for the rest of the guys.

Eight games is just exactly that: eight games. However, 6-2 is certainly better than the alternative.

Minor Leagues
Our minor league teams are currently 10-9 overall with Fort Wayne (4-0) leading the way.

In Portland (3-2), Emil Brown (.996 ops), Chad Huffman (1.086), and Will Venable (1.087) all had great starts, and the pitching staff has a 2.45 ERA through five games.

San Antonio (3-2) has posted a .314/.412/.497 batting line as a team. Mike Baxter (1.084 ops) and Mitch Canham (1.275) and a few others have excelled, but Eric Sogard (1.472) has been downright silly.

Lake Elsinore (0-5) is off to a rough start, though they've had some tough luck and faced some rough matchups. The first three nights of the season were against three first round picks (Scherzer, Roemer, and Parker), so that won't continue. Logan Forsythe (.912 ops) had the best week offensively and struck out just one time.

Fort Wayne (4-0) has been devastating on the hill with a team 0.97 ERA. Meanwhile, Northwest League MVP Dan Robertson has started with a .455/.571/.727 line and Drew Cumberland is at .412/.444/.588.

I hesitate to include some of these numbers, because quite frankly they don't mean much of anything after just a few games. However, I felt it was important to start talking about some of these players.

The real purpose for this weekly review (we'll still see if I can actually get around to doing it every week) is to create a forum to talk about the week, so please hit me with your questions. Additionally, if there's anything that you'd like to see from this review in the upcoming weeks, please let me know.

Claiming Luis Perdomo

2009-04-10T16:47:00.000-07:00

This afternoon we announced that we claimed RHP Luis Perdomo off waivers from the San Francisco Giants. He should be in uniform for tonight's game...against the Giants.

Luis has bounced around a bit in the past ten months. Originally signed by Cleveland out of the Dominican Republic, Luis started last season in the Carolina League for the Indians. After making a successful move to AA, Cleveland traded him to St. Louis for RHP Anthony Reyes. Between his two AA stops he threw 33 innings, giving up 30 hits and 13 walks while striking out 39.

The Cardinals decided not to protect Luis on their 40-man roster this winter, and the Giants selected him in the first round of the Rule 5 draft. After a strong start this spring Luis ultimately lost the battle for a spot in the Giants' pen and was the last player designated before Opening Day. Featuring a hard sinker up to 94 mph and a tough slider, Luis reminds me a little of a younger Luis Vizcaino.

To make room on the 25-man roster we have optioned OF Drew Macias to AAA, so we'll be going with 13 pitchers in the immediate term as we evaluate our different bullpen options. To make room on the 40-man roster (since we were already at 40), we have designated infielder Travis Denker for assignment. Because Luis was a Rule 5 selection back in December, we will be under the same Rule 5 restrictions as if we had selected him in that draft - we cannot send him to the minors without him passing through waivers and being offered back to the Cardinals for $25,000.

Opening Day #2

2009-04-10T15:00:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was Opening Day for each of our full-season minor league affiliates:

Fortunately, we took three out of four games yesterday with the only loss coming in a 6-5 game in Lake Elsinore in which the Storm had to face big league starter Max Scherzer. Some highlights included six innings of one run ball from Josh Geer in AAA and Stephen Faris in AA, six innings of shutout ball from Anthony Bass in Ft. Wayne, and two or more hits from Emil Brown, Eliezer Alfonzo, Mitch Canham, Luis Durango, Cedric Hunter, Brad Chalk, Drew Cumberland, and Sawyer Carroll.

In looking over the rosters you'll probably notice that Matt Antonelli, Kellen Kulbacki, Matt Latos, and Jaff Decker are all missing. Though all of the above have had to start the year on the DL, we expect them to be back active again relatively soon.

Poll Results

2009-04-08T14:58:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago there was a comment asking me to elaborate on the poll results rather than simply take them down. With that in mind I posted the poll asking you to predict how many games we would win this season, and based on the tenor of the off-season I wasn't necessarily expecting a feel-good outcome. That's ok - that's why this blog exists.

First of all, for those of you who voted that we would win 65 or fewer games - I've contacted Google for the list of your ip addresses, and you're all banned from the blog. :-)

Of course, I’m kidding. Fortunately, a similar portion of you expect us to be in contention for the division title this season. Which brings me to the main point: making preseason predictions is an imprecise exercise. There is so much right now that we don’t know – injuries, performance, even roster composition – that will greatly impact the final standings.

For example, using their PECOTA system, Baseball Prospectus predicted that we would win 78 games in 2006. We won 88. In 2007 the system predicted 86 wins. We won 89. In 2008 the system predicted 78 wins. We won 63. Furthermore, recent World Series teams like the '08 Phillies, '08 Rays, '07 Rockies, and '06 Tigers weren't even supposed to make the playoffs! Here’s the thing: Baseball Prospectus, and particularly PECOTA, is about as good as it gets. They are VERY good at what they do. The problem is simply a massive amount of uncertainty. That may be the problem, but that’s also the fun.

Imagine a season in which everything is perfectly predictable, and I can imagine something that isn’t worth following.

On the other hand, imagine a season with a lot of unknowns – young players, new faces, unproven talent – and you have the real MLB season. Those unknowns create the great stories, the disappointments, and the achievements…the good stuff.

So, I won’t blame any of you for being pessimistic, but just remember that nothing is preordained. As for those of you who voted that we would win 95 or more games, I want you to identify yourselves. Optimism is a great characteristic.

Spring Training Evaluations

2009-04-03T11:22:00.001-07:00

Warning: Evaluating players in spring training can be hazardous to your baseball well-being.

Back in the spring of 1997 I was just starting my first season as the advance scout for the Cleveland Indians. Excited to get to the ballpark every day to get some looks at the players I'd be writing about all summer, I didn't let even one day pass without taking copious notes. However, later in the spring Dan O'Dowd, then the Assistant GM of the Indians, told me, "The biggest mistakes we make on player evaluations are in spring training." Suddenly, my neatly designed notebook and game charts didn't elicit so much pride.

The regular season wasn't very old before I realized that Dan was exactly right, as players were doing things I hadn't seen even a glimpse of just a few weeks prior. The fact is that the game is fundamentally different in spring training than it is when the regular season opens. Here is a list, albeit not exhaustive, of the reasons that spring training performance is unreliable:

Sample size - always a killer
Ballparks - the ball jumps in Arizona almost like pre-humidor Coors Field
Game conditions - teams play primarily day games with a "high sky" in Arizona
Competition - Major Leaguers play early in games and minor leaguers in the late innings, so someone can pad their stats by playing in the late innings
Preparedness - some players are coming off of full winter ball seasons while others are coming off of surgery
Game plan - teams don't really try to win spring training games, so players aren't always put in the most advantageous situations
Varying objectives - some players are working on adding a new pitch, while others are trying to make a team

For all these reasons and more, spring training is a terrible time to evaluate personnel. Of course, that doesn't stop us from doing it, and by "us" I include fans, field staff, and front office. The fact of the matter is that we must make some evaluations in spring training, because we need to get our roster down to 25 players and some of the players under consideration haven't previously been with the organization. Perilous indeed.

When we (remember, I mean everyone) watch baseball games we are constantly processing who's good, who's bad, who could be better, etc. I'm not even sure that there is an "off" position for that switch, but we have to do everything we can to mute that voice if it appears in the month of March. Taking it one step further, if the player doesn't absolutely need to be evaluated for some irrevocable decision at the conclusion of March, then he probably shouldn't be.

Here's some OPS evidence from this spring for the Padres which should give all of us a little caution:

The team leader in OPS was Adrian Gonzalez with a 1.110 - so far so good
Coming in 2nd was Kevin Kouzmanoff with a 1.030 - not completely crazy
And next, coming in just under 1.000 - David Eckstein with a .996

Folks, if David Eckstein flirts with a 1.000 OPS this year, our offense will be better than we expect. Speaking of our overall offense:

Five of our 13 position players had an OPS over .900
Nine of our 13 position players had an OPS over .800
11 of our 13 position players had an OPS over the 2008 NL average of .744

Yahtzee! Get ready for the run barrage in Petco in 2009.

With all of these guys raking, who was below the league average and came in last among the Padres in OPS for spring training? Brian Giles with a .636.

I could go into all the pitchers, but I think you get the point. Spring training is a fabulous time of year to enjoy baseball, just don't try to evaluate it. On Monday afternoon all the Padres players will have an OPS of zero and all of the pitchers will have 0.00 ERAs (let's hope the latter lasts longer than the former). Then we'll be able to start evaluating again.

Get Ready for Opening Day

2009-04-02T12:44:00.000-07:00

As I'm cleaning up my office in Arizona to head back to San Diego, I just packed away this year's edition of Ducksnorts (available now!). If you want some good reading to get you ready for Monday's opener against the Dodgers, I highly recommend it (once you get past the foreword). Once again, Geoff Young did a great job of putting last season into perspective and providing analysis on the season to come.

It appears as though Geoff won't be doing quite as much posting this year, so take the opportunity to get his analysis in the Ducksnorts annual.

Also, Tom Tango is running a community forecast for Major League playing time. You can either vote with your head or your heart on this one. I recommend submitting your forecast BEFORE opening up the results so that no biases (other than your own) creep in to the results. I'll be checking the tallies on Monday morning.

Roster Coming Into Focus

2009-04-01T13:03:00.000-07:00

As we get ready to pack up and head back to San Diego tomorrow, our roster is beginning to come together. It can be tough to keep track at this time of year, so I figured I should give you the latest version.

After a number of moves in the past 48 hours - acquiring RHP Edward Mujica from Cleveland, optioning OF Drew Macias, reassigning RHP Greg Burke, OF Emil Brown, 1B Kyle Blanks, and C Eliezer Alfonzo and releasing RHP J.K. Ryu and LHP Justin Hampson - we now have 13 healthy pitchers in our Major League camp:

Heath Bell
Kevin Correia
Eulogio DeLaCruz
Luke Gregerson
Shawn Hill
Arturo Lopez
Cla Meredith
Edwin Moreno
Edward Mujica
Jake Peavy
Duaner Sanchez
Walter Silva
Chris Young

We anticipate starting the year with 12 pitchers, so at least one of these guys will likely be headed to AAA. Nevertheless, this list provides a pretty good idea of what we're looking at for next week assuming that Cha Seung Baek won't be able to start the year on the active list. Amazingly, just four of the 13 (Peavy, Young, Bell, and Meredith) pitched for the 2008 Padres in the big leagues and only six were even in the Padres' organization.

As for the position players, we have 13 roster players remaining in camp (in alphabetical order by position):

C Henry Blanco
C Nick Hundley
1B Adrian Gonzalez
2B David Eckstein
2B Edgar Gonzalez
SS Everth Cabrera
SS Luis Rodriguez
3B Kevin Kouzmanoff
OF Cliff Floyd
OF Jody Gerut
OF Brian Giles
OF Scott Hairston
OF Chase Headley

This group of 13 is the mirror image of the pitching staff - just four of the 13 (Blanco, Eckstein, Cabrera, and Floyd) did NOT play for the 2008 Padres in the big leagues. Since we plan on carrying 13 position players, this could very well be the group on Monday in Petco.

There's always a flurry of roster activity in the final days leading to Opening Day, but I wouldn't be surprised if our 25-man roster came from these 26 players.

The Additions Continue!

2009-04-01T10:01:00.000-07:00

Late last night we agreed to acquire RHP Edward Mujica from the Cleveland Indians for cash or a PTBNL.

A 24-year old from Venezuela, Edward has spent the bulk of the past three seasons between AAA and the Majors where he was used both as a closer and a setup man. Edward complements a 90-94 mph fastball (sitting usually around 92) with both a slider and a split-finger fastball. This move brings another plus arm to our pen, and this one comes with excellent command - just 2.2 walks per nine over his professional career.

We believe Edward should be a good fit for our bullpen and our ballpark.

We still have a handful of days before Opening Day, so anything can happen, but with all of the recent additions we feel more comfortable with our pen than we did just a few weeks ago.

Eulogio De La Cruz

2009-03-25T16:50:00.000-07:00

It's no secret that we've continued to look for arms this spring, and today we added another in 25-year old right-hander Eulogio DeLaCruz in a trade with the Florida Marlins.

Eulogio has been both a starter and reliever in the minor leagues, though he worked primarily as a starter last season in AAA Albuquerque. Originally signed by Detroit out of Santo Domingo, the Tigers traded Eulogio to Florida in December '07 as part of the Miguel Cabrera/Dontrelle Willis deal.

Described by our scouts as a "little bull with a big arm" DeLaCruz has supposedly thrown 100 mph. Most of the time, however, he sits between 93-97 mph with his fastball, which he complements with both a CB and a CH. He has just 16 innings at the big league level (and they weren't very pretty), but we believe he's big league ready. And now for my standard ending... we're excited to have him.

In all seriousness, Eulogio adds some power to our pitching staff that should be helpful regardless of the role. He'll be joining our camp sometime before the end of the weekend.

Minor League Camp Videos

2009-03-25T10:29:00.000-07:00

For me, one of the best aspects of spring training is having all of our minor leaguers in one place at the same time. Yesterday I finally had the chance to get away from big league camp and watch our two A-ball games against the Texas Rangers. These are the players that you (and I) don't get to see very often, so I thought I'd try to take some video.

This is my first attempt, so please excuse the different camera angles, the various zooms, and the shoddy editing. Just think Blair Witch.

The first video is Michael Watt, the young left-hander we received from the Dodgers in the Maddux trade last year.

This next video is left-hander Allen Harrington, our 13th round pick in 2007 out of Lamar. Allen pitched well immediately after the draft and was off to a very strong start in 2008 in Ft. Wayne - 58ip, 55 hits, 10 walks, and 53 k's with a 3.59 ERA - before elbow discomfort caused him to miss the rest of the season.

This last pitching video is Anthony Bass, our 5th round pick in the 2008 draft. Anthony put up a 2.10 ERA for Eugene last summer after signing and struck out 41 batters in 34 innings. It's too bad I didn't get him against any right-handed hitters, because that is when he can really use his slider, but I wanted to limit each video to two batters.

I didn't capture much with our hitters for two reasons: 1) I kept trying out different angles to see what might work the best, and 2) Matt Antonelli, Cliff Floyd, and Emil Brown were all hitting every inning to get in some extra work (minor league camp affords such flexibility). However, I did get this quick clip of Logan Forsythe, one of our compensation picks in 2008 and the 46th pick overall. You can't see it (nice angle, Paul), but he's facing Blake Beavan, Texas' #1 pick in 2007 and the 17th pick overall.

As you might be able to tell from the left-fielder's reaction, there wasn't much doubt about this one.

I hope you like the footage.

More Transactions

2009-03-23T16:17:00.000-07:00

Today we announced another seven spring training roster moves along with the signing of RHP Shawn Hill.

Of the roster moves we made today, five of the seven players - Josh Geer, Scott Patterson, Matt Antonelli, Will Venable, and Joe Thatcher - spent part of the 2008 season in the big leagues, and I suspect that many of them will be in a position to appear again at some point in 2009. The other two players were first year 40-man roster catcher Jose Lobaton, and non-roster invite Chad Huffman, who had a terrific spring in his first Major League camp.

One thing to remember here is that even though the Opening Day roster carries some prestige, it is really just one out of 183 days in the season. We can change the roster the very next day, so it's not as though we're not setting a playoff roster that is locked for a period of time. We often forget how much our rosters change between March and September, but the reality is that any team's 25-man roster is usually composed of around 32-35 players who cycle in and out based on injuries and performance. Many of today's cuts will be among that group of 32-35.

Additionally, today we signed former Washington Nationals starter Shawn Hill to a minor league contract and invited him to big league camp. Shawn made his Major League debut in 2004, but he really established himself in 2007 going 97 innings over 16 starts with a 3.42 ERA. Having battled through some arm problems, Shawn has made 37 ML starts and compiled a 4.93 ERA.

Luke Gregerson

2009-03-23T11:34:00.000-07:00

Today we acquired RHP Luke Gregerson as the player to be named later from the Cardinals in exchange for Khalil Greene.

A 6'3", 200 lb reliever out of St. Xavier University, Luke was named a Texas League All-Star in 2008. Using a nasty slider and a good sinker that generates a lot of groundballs, Luke's career totals to date are: 2.72 ERA, 172 ip, 128 hits, 61 walks, and 196 strikeouts (and 48 saves). With the sinker/slider combination, Luke has been particularly tough on right-handed hitters, who have managed just a .504 OPS against him in his pro career.

We came into this spring knowing that a number of bullpen roles would be up for grabs, and with the recent loss of Mark Worrell for the year to elbow surgery (the other player acquired for Khalil) there are fewer guys in the mix. Our scouts believe that Luke could factor in our pen sometime in 2009, so we're excited to add him.

Roster Moves

2009-03-18T11:24:00.001-07:00

Yesterday we made our second series of significant roster moves by removing 12 players from big league camp.

Cesar Carrillo, Jackson Quezada, Mike Ekstrom, Travis Denker, Luis Durango, and Wade LeBlanc were all optioned to the minor leagues - in other words, they are still on the 40-man Major League roster, but they've now been optioned to one of our minor league clubs.

Matt Buschmann, Pete Ciofrone, Chris Britton, Cedric Hunter, Sean Kazmar, and Mitch Canham were all reassigned to minor league camp. That simply means that they were all on minor league contracts to begin with, so they don't need to be optioned down to the minors.

As you may have noticed around MLB, the pace of similar transactions accelerated at the beginning of this week. Part of that is because cuts are often done on Sundays and Mondays, part is because of players returning from the WBC (we have three more players back in camp today), and part is because the rules prohibit teams from optioning first-year roster players - players added to the 40-man for the first time this winter - until a certain date in spring training. You've probably guessed that the date just passed.

Often times these are younger players who aren't expected to compete for Major League jobs, so as the spring continues they lose playing time to the veterans. The fact is they're often better off getting back into minor league camp where they can get more work in and prepare for their seasons. Therefore, for the young guys being optioned or reassigned at this point is not necessarily a reflection of their performance in Major League camp.

Bullpen Addition

2009-03-15T09:54:00.000-07:00

Today we added right-handed reliever Duaner Sanchez to our bullpen mix.

Duaner Sanchez was released at the beginning of the week by the Mets making him a free agent once he cleared release waivers. Upon clearing we signed him to a minor league contract, and he should be reporting to Major League camp shortly. From 2004-2006 Duaner pitched 217 1/3 innings with a combined 3.31 ERA and had established himself as one of the better setup relievers in baseball.

Then, on July 31, 2006 Duaner was in a car accident as a passenger in a taxicab that separated his shoulder. After missing all of the 2007 season and part of 2008 with the injury, Duaner came back to pitch 58 1/3 innings at the big league level, posting a 4.32 ERA. His pre-injury fastball velocity has not returned, but he still features an excellent changeup and is a fearless competitor on the mound. Duaner's experience as a setup man could help our pen tremendously.

Pre-Arbitration Players

2009-03-06T09:23:00.000-08:00

Every year around this time you'll see stories stating that a team reached agreement with about 20 players on one-year contracts. Must have been a busy day.

Compensation Tiers
The fact is that Major League players are separated by three compensation tiers: 1) Free Agents - players with six or more years of Major League service, 2) Arbitration-Eligible Players - players with between three and six years of Major League service, and 3) Pre-Arbitration players. I would guess that most of you know how the first two work (if not, you can check out my arbitration primer here), so I'm going to focus on #3 which normally doesn't get much attention.

Pre-Arbitration players are those players who have accumulated fewer than three full years of Major League service time (172 days counts as a full year even though the season is actually 183)... except those players in the top 17% of the two year class, which is usually around two years and 130 days. How did that exception get in there? That's collective bargaining for you. Nevertheless, as a quick rule of thumb just think: any player with less than two years and four months of big league time is pre-arbitration.

How Service Time is Calculated
Major League service time does NOT include all time spent on the Major League 40-man roster. It only includes time spent on the Major League 25-man roster, both active and disabled. So, a player who is on the 40-man roster in spring training, gets optioned to AAA in March, and then gets recalled to the big leagues for the month of September will accumulate 30 Major League service days (September only). On the other hand, a player who is placed on the Major League disabled list in spring training and misses the entire season will actually be given a full year of service time.

Salary Guidelines for Pre-Arbitration Players
Why am I writing about this? Well, the free agents sign for whatever they can get on the free market, arbitration eligible players must come to a mutually acceptable agreement with their teams or have their salaries determined by an arbitation panel, but pre-arbitration players get paid whatever the Club wants to pay them... with a couple of caveats:

The salary must be at least the Major League minimum salary ($400,000 in 2009)
The salary must be at least 80% of the prior year's compensation

Therefore, by rule, every Club has the right to pay each of these players the Major League minimum as long as the amount satisfies caveat #2 above. However, no Club actually does this.

Rather, Clubs actually "negotiate" each and every one of these deals with the players' agents in order to come to an agreement. I write "negotiate" because at the end of the day it's a pretty one-sided negotiation - the Club maintains all the leverage. It's the absolute reverse of me negotiating with my son over how much time he gets to play on the computer, "Two more minutes, Trevor. How about five, dad? Ok, three. May I pleeeaasse have five minutes? Four. Five, and then I'll let you read me a book." The kid is good, I tell you.

In any event, the player's only recourse is to refuse to agree to the contract in which case his contract will be "renewed" by the Club at a salary of the Club's choosing. Taking a renewal is basically the player's way of saying he doesn't agree with the amount that has been offered, though such a stance doesn't serve any practical purpose (it was once thought that taking renewals would help a player in arbitration but the data doesn't support such a claim).

This structure has given birth to 30 unique payroll scales. Some teams pay their players purely on service time accrued, other teams pay strictly on performance, some pay well above the minimum and some don't venture far from $400k. In the end what is most important is the consistency within any system. Players want to know that they're being treated fairly compared with their peers (don't we all?), and in this case their "peers" refer to their teammates. As they gain more service time, the "peer" group will expand to include players around the league.

The reason I'm writing about this today is that we're coming up on MLB's renewal deadline. In our case, we set our own deadline of the first pitch of the first spring training game, which was a week ago. After all, once the games start, that is where everyone's focus should be.

It's Really Starting

2009-02-26T09:32:00.000-08:00

Today we play our first official Cactus League game, which marks the beginning of our spring training season. The title of this post, however, refers more to my daily routine than to the big league team, as I'll see eight games over the next four days starting with a tripleheader today.

I start today with our Major League game, which I'll leave early in order to hurry over to a local high school game before it begins to see a high profile pitcher. Near the conclusion of that game, I'll jump back in the car and head to Arizona State for the ASU/Missouri matchup that most of the scouting world will see.

It'll be a long day, and the quality of play will vary dramatically, but it should be productive. Oh yeah, it'll probably be fun, too.

Pads Win!

2009-02-25T15:31:00.001-08:00

I don't care what time of year it is or even if the game doesn't count, it always feels good to win.

We yielded a game tying homer with one out in the top of the ninth, but managed to get some baserunners aboard in both the 9th and 10th. With two outs in the 10th, Travis Denker drew a walk, and then Luis Durango entered the game as a pinch runner and promptly stole second base. As it turns out, the SB probably wasn't needed as Kyle Blanks laced a gapper into deep right-center field to end the game (after just missing a homer down the line to LF).

Ernesto Frieri gets the win after a scoreless top of the 10th.

Lineup Changes

2009-02-25T13:59:00.001-08:00

The starters have all left the game, so we now have the following around the diamond:

Eliezer Alfonzo, C
Kyle Blanks, 1B
Travis Denker, 2B
Chris Burke, SS
Pete Ciofrone, 3B
Emil Brown, LF
Drew Macias, CF
Cedric Hunter, RF

We're Definitely Not in Petco

2009-02-25T13:45:00.001-08:00

The Pads have taken a 3-2 lead through five innings largely because we've gotten the leadoff man on in each of the five innings.

Scott Hairston and Kevin Kouzmanoff have led the way with Hairston going 2-2 with a double and a walk and Kouz going 1-2 with a 2-run opposite field homer and a walk.

Though they weren't 1-2-3 innings, Cla Meredith, Chris Britton, and Wilton Lopez all pitched scoreless frames with the help of a couple of double plays.

Through Two

2009-02-25T12:46:00.000-08:00

Through the first two innings the Pads are down 2-0.

After a scoreless inning from Peavy in the 1st, Heath gave up four hits and two runs in the 2nd, though Chase Headley did throw out a runner at home.

Offensively, both Hairston amd Edgar Gonzalez led off with singles, and Kouz mixed in a walk, but we haven't been able to capitalize.

Meredith has taken the mound for the top of the 3rd.

First Game... Kind of

2009-02-25T09:09:00.000-08:00

Today we finally have our first game, but it's not an official Cactus League game so you won't find it on MLB.com. Rather, it's the annual charity game that we play against the Mariners.

Nine different pitchers will each get one inning today:

Jake Peavy
Heath Bell
Cla Meredith
Chris Britton
Wilton Lopez
Mark Worrell
Scott Patterson
Mike Ekstrom
Oneli Perez

The starting lineup:

Scott Hairston, CF
David Eckstein, 2B
Adrian Gonzalez, 1B
Kevin Kouzmanoff, DH
Chase Headley, LF
Edgar Gonzalez, 3B
Will Venable, RF
Nick Hundley, C
Luis Rodriguez, SS

I know Tiger Wood is back out there today, but so are the Pads.

Full Squad

2009-02-20T18:02:00.000-08:00

Everyone has reported to camp, and we're currently in the indulgent stage: all of the pitchers look great on the side, our hitters smack homer after homer during batting practice, and (knock on wood) nobody has been injured. Nevertheless, I'm not satisfied.

All winter we wait for the day that pitchers and catchers report. After months of being in the office and trying to acquire players through many different channels, we finally get back out on the field and see these various players side-by-side. The problem is that it takes about a day or two of watching pitchers fielding practice (pfp) and bullpen sessions to start itching for the rest of the position players.

Once the position players do arrive we have a big team meeting before the first full squad workout (this happened yesterday), and then early in the workout I realize yet again that the action really doesn't start until live bp (which happens tomorrow). Live bp is when our hitters dig in against our pitchers, and the staff and front office assume the umpire's spot to get a close up view.

I enjoy live bp, because it forces me to appreciate every year just how good these guys really are. Quite frankly, you can get a little numb watching on tv and even in the stands - it can look so easy. However, when you're right there, just a few feet from the batter's box, the velocity, the bite, the command... it always reminds me why I stopped playing a long time ago.

Of course, after about a day or two of live bp I want to start playing games. Then after about a week of those, I want to start playing games that count. And so it goes when spring training whets the appetite.

Nevertheless, I'm still looking forward to live bp.