DrungoHazewood

The one thing in spring data that has some real-ness is slugging. I have seen studies that show some correlation, at least slight, that massive jumps in power in the spring tend to carry over. So if Davis slugs .600 in the spring after slugging .326 last year I'd have some faith that will carry over, at least to some degree.

My assumption is that nothing is different until it is. He's still unplayable. But... most of my assumptions are based on data, on information. I don't know that there has ever been another case of a player completely and totally losing the ability to hit for multiple seasons and then being asked to come back and try again. Perhaps others would have recovered if only they'd been given 1500 PAs to try. I doubt it, but maybe?

I knew the general facts of a lot of that, but baseball-reference is always your friend.

What would you trade for John Means right now? What kind of prospect? You just made an argument that he was pretty good when teams didn't have a book on him, but didn't do so well in the 2nd half. Don't you think other teams consider Means a fairly promising guy who is probably a mid-range starter with a bit of variation/risk in his projection? I don't think I'd trade a number of good prospects for him, in fact I don't know if I'd do much better than a guy who might be John Means in 2-3 years.

No idea, but the first professional dynasty was the Boston Red Stockings who won the pennant in the National Association in '72-75. In '75 they went 71-8. And yes, as early as 1897 their fans got on a train for a key late season game and brought a band and invaded Union Park in Baltimore. I would have been screaming break up the Red Sox.

When you literally have no ground truth data you could convince yourself that a catcher with no homers who missed a month's worth of games but was perceived as a great "field general" was worth more than an RFer who hit .393 with 75 extra base hits. It sounds ludicrous today, but they were voting on how a player looked and was perceived and they put a lot of emphasis on how the team did. Also voting systems weren't (and still aren't) well conceived or exectued. Ruth had years where he OPS'd 1.252 and didn't get any MVP votes because there was a rule (either written or understood, not sure) that you couldn't win the award twice.

Prior to, say, 1980 even GMs, writers, etc had some pretty out-there ideas about valuing players. In the early days of MVP voting like the 1920s you'd often have player-managers get a lot of votes for leading their teams while playing. Catcher often got a similar bump. But one of the more egregious MVP awards was Roger Peckinpaugh in 1925. The Senators won the pennant, he was their 34-year-old shortstop in his last year as a regular. He hit .294/.367/.379 with 16 doubles and four homers, and by modern retroactive figuring was a +2 shortstop (although was +21 the prior year). He won the award. Also playing in the AL that year was HOFer Al Simmons (.387/.419/.599 with 129 RBI), HOFer Harry Heilmann (.393/.457/.569, 134 RBI), HOFer San Coveleski (20-5, 2.84), and the Browns' Harry Rice (.359/.450/.568). Mickey Cochrane was a catcher who hit .331/.397/.448. The Indians' Joe Sewell was another shortstop who hit .336/.402/.424 and struck out four times all year. Goose Goslin was Peckinpaugh's teammate and had a .931 OPS, 34 doubles, 20 triples, 27 steals. But none of those guys polled as well as the 34-year-old Senators shortstop who had a 2.6-win season but "led" them to the pennant. Also look at Johnny Bassler. I've mentioned him before, he was a catcher with a short career, but in the 1920s he had three straight top-10 MVP finishes in seasons where he had zero or one homers and didn't get to 500 PAs. In 1944 Marty Marion was the Cards' shortstop, had a .686 OPS, won the MVP award over teammate Stan Musial who OPS'd .990. In 1947 DiMaggio had a 4.9-win season and beat Ted Williams despite Williams' 9.9-win triple crown season. Luis Aparicio got a lot of down-ballot MVP support for 2-something win seasons. Dick Groat won the '60 NL MVP for being the shortstop on the pennant winning Pirates with a .766 OPS and 2 homers, despite being in the same league as Willie Mays (.936 OPS), Ernie Banks (shortstop with 41 homers, 117 RBI), Hank Aaron (40 homers), Eddie Mathews, etc. In '62 the writers thought a .720 OPS with 102 steals (Maury Wills) was more valuable than each of Willie, Frank and Hank OPSing 1.000. I love Boog, but he had a 5-win MVP season in '70 while Yaz was at 9.5. Don Baylor's '79 MVP was pretty nuts - ran away with it in a 3.7-win season when Singleton, Brett, Lynn, Rice, Porter, Bell, Grich and others were clearly better to a modern set of eyes. Stargell wasn't even in the same zip code as Keith Hernandez or Dave Winfield that same year unless you're giving him a 6-win bump for being a cool old dude to Pittsburgh fans.

I looked back starting in '19 for the last total nut job MVP voting performance. Like, less than three wins and finishing in the top 10. Looks like the last one of those was Jeter in '12. 2.2 rWAR, finished ahead of Verlander (8.0), and at least a half-dozen guys with 4-6 wins. Howard was pretty egregious the year prior, and several other years (probably worst in '08). In '10 Delmon and Vlad finished 10-11 for sub-two-win seasons. In '08 Carlos Delgado finished 9th in the NL with a 1.3 win season with six 6+ win players behind him. In '05 Delgado finished 6th with a 2.8-win season. King of all might be Dante Bichette's 1.2-win 2nd place finish in '95 before sportswriters had figured out park effects.

Okay. That year the O's outscored their opponents by 29 runs. They had the characteristics of an 84-win team, but due to sequencing, or bullpen leverage or dumb luck they won 89. If all of your starting nine plus your five pitching starters each were 1.6-win players you're not going to the playoffs. You're probably finishing under .500 unless you have an epic bullpen.

That's why I have all my little leadoff guys bat in the 9th, and only bring in Trumbo when the bases are loaded. What's that? No, I don't follow the rules.

In today's game you have about 13 roster spots devoted to pitchers. That means about eight relievers at any one time. There is no way on earth that you're going to have eight relievers and the back end of a starting staff average 1.6 wins per slot. The 2012 Orioles had an historically good pen and got about 12-13 wins out of pitchers who were primarily relievers. A typical team will get maybe half that. Or 1.0 or fewer wins for about 1/3 of the roster. The '19 Yanks won 103 games and had just three relievers worth 1.5 or more wins. Also you'll have the equivalent of three more roster spots that will be bench players and play half time or less. So in the end your regular position players and starting pitchers usually need to average over 2.0 wins to get you above .500.

In 2016 he signed a seven year lease and it's all paid up.

What Tony said. Two wins in full time play is about average.

In 2016 he had an .850 OPS overall. In late/close situations he had a .706. With two outs and RISP he had a .812. In tie games he had an .848. When the Orioles were behind he had an .825. In high leverage situations he had an .836. In the 8th inning he had a .726. In the 9th inning he had a .658. In low leverage situations he had a .705. It seems he was at his very best in moderate leverage situations in the middle of the game.

Don't need no fielding or baserunning when you gots all the RBIs.

All of these guys were listed as shortstops when drafted: Ron Gant, BJ Surhoff, Brian McRae, Brian Jordan, Gary Sheffield, Reggie Sanders, Marty Cordova, Chuck Knoblauch, Phil Nevin, Trevor Hoffman, Jorge Posada, Chipper Jones, Chase Utley, Michael Cuddyer, Hank Blalock, Adam Jones, Steve Pearce, Dustin Pedroia, Mark Reynolds, Pedro Alvarez, Anthony Rendon, Melvin Upton, Mychal Givens, Billy Hamilton, Brian Dozier, J.T. Realmuto, and Mookie Betts. And it's almost too unbelievable to be imagine him playing shortstop well, but also Derek Jeter.

Ah, spring training. Where eight plate appearances can make people forget about hitting .188 over your last 360 games.

Worst seasons of 45+ homers in history: Rk Player WAR/pos HR Year Age Tm Lg G PA AB R H 2B 3B RBI BB IBB SO 1 Jose Canseco 1.5 46 1998 33 TOR AL 151 658 583 98 138 26 0 107 65 5 159 2 Ryan Howard 1.8 48 2008 28 PHI NL 162 700 610 105 153 26 4 146 81 17 199 3 Mark Trumbo 1.9 47 2016 30 BAL AL 159 667 613 94 157 27 1 108 51 1 170 4 Richie Sexson 2.8 45 2001 26 MIL NL 158 667 598 94 162 24 3 125 60 5 178 5 Harmon Killebrew 2.8 48 1962 26 MIN AL 155 666 552 85 134 21 1 126 106 6 142 6 Khris Davis 2.9 48 2018 30 OAK AL 151 654 576 98 142 28 1 123 59 5 175 7 Ryan Howard 2.9 47 2007 27 PHI NL 144 648 529 94 142 26 0 136 107 35 199 8 Richie Sexson 3.2 45 2003 28 MIL NL 162 718 606 97 165 28 2 124 98 7 151 9 Greg Vaughn 3.4 45 1999 33 CIN NL 153 643 550 104 135 20 2 118 85 3 137 10 Prince Fielder 3.6 50 2007 23 MIL NL 158 681 573 109 165 35 2 119 90 21 121 Just three guys managed to hit 45 homers and still be below average.

All I'm saying is that scouting >>>>>>>>>>> game stats in the spring.

This is going to win the inexplicable post of the day award, but whenever I hear of a player with really long legs I think of Indians/White Sox third baseman Carlos Martinez. He only fielded .925 at third, mostly because his glove had to cover the equivalent area of a Zeppelin hangar door from the waist down.

Dude, it's South Beach. You have to make an appearance.

Urruita played the second half of last year for Saltillo where in about 300 PAs he hit .407/.467/.795, good for a 1.262 OPS. Anybody remember Dariel Alvarez, briefly made it to the O's in 2015-16, and tried pitching briefly in '18? He was also on Saltillo, he OPS'd .818. The whole team hit .309/.371/.511 and went 66-53. Sergio Mitre (Yanks, Cubs, Brewers) went 9-3 with a 5.59.

That's the kind of thing that talking heads will bring up all the time because Tom Davis needs to fill air time, but it's meaningless. Hess striking out three minor leaguers on February 26th is like a high school senior striking out three freshmen in the first scrimmage of the year. Small samples of data make the information less meaningful. Exhibition games make data much less meaningful. Unusual usage patterns make information less meaningful. Wide variations in talent level make information less meaningful. Weird park and weather effects skew the data. Spring training is the combination of all of that and more.

In the spring performance matters, but the numbers don't. Velocity matters. Spin rate probably matters. Sprint speed matters. Mechanics matter. Heath is huge. Batting average, on-base, slugging, ERA, K rate, wins, losses... doesn't matter a bit.

Anecdotal, I know, but it seems pretty common to read horrific stories of the life of hockey goons. Abuse by coaches who were former goons, being subject to hazing, continuous beatings, inevitable drug and alcohol abuse, becoming the haze-er, then eventually obvious signs of repeated concussions and brain trauma. I fully expect that fighting will be banned in the NHL in my lifetime. As a casual hockey fan it's very bizarre to have a normal team sport going on and then suddenly a fistfight that would get you arrested in almost any other context.