On the Record: Better pitchers available that could be had for free instead of Eveland

[CA-ORIOLE]

Tony, you absolutely did say that his velocity was improving..I quoted you and called you out on it and you didn't respond.(post 48 in that thread)

And yes, his wFB was better...after 29 IP. That's not even worth mentioning.

And who cares if he had solid triple A numbers? He was 28!!! He was in his 5th stint in the PCL and he had more AAA stints in the Int'l league. If he can't go into AAA and be a good starter at this point in his career, he should retire.

Maybe BBREF is wrong the guy started in the PCL at the age of 22 and was dominant there after being dominant in AA at 21. He had one stint of 26 innings in the IL. Other than a a few innings of rehab in A+ ball, the the rest was all PCL. The point is this guy showed good ability at an early age in the high minors minors. His overal Mil trakc record is very good. It's not the picture you're trying to paint that it took him 5 years to master AAA/PCL.

That all being said, I realize he's not the pitcher he was at 22 and this is more about what the scouts see and like about him at this point in his career.

Also, in some of your other posts you keep saying Slowey was free. He cost a PTBNL and I don't think that player has been announced yet. I also read that we were negotiating for Slowey.

[weams]

Maybe BBREF is wrong the guy started in the PCL at the age of 22 and was dominant there after being dominant in AA at 21. He had one stint of 26 innings in the IL. Other than a a few innings of rehab in A+ ball, the the rest was all PCL. The point is this guy showed good ability at an early age in the high minors minors. His overal Mil trakc record is very good. It's not the picture you're trying to paint that it took him 5 years to master AAA/PCL.

That all being said, I realize he's not the pitcher he was at 22 and this is more about what the scouts see and like about him at this point in his career.

Also, in some of your other posts you keep saying Slowey was free. He cost a PTBNL and I don't think that player has been announced yet. I also read that we were negotiating for Slowey.

Did someone say RECORD?

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Oh, sorry wrong thread.

[El Gordo]

Arguing over this trade is like arguing whether three shrimps would provide more nutrition than one escargot, to a starving man.

[Barnaby Graves]

Ok...I'll bite, basically to illustrate the root of the problem with this thread.

How would you know that Eveland isn't good depth? Who is better? Jakubaskas? Some more expensive pitcher that would take away from the ability to sign an actual impact player? How would you know that Eveland isn't better than anything we have in AAA? And don't give me some weak WAR number and think you've justified something because WAR is descriptive, not predictive and if you can't tell me anything about what or how he throws and how it might fit with our team and ballpark then you can move right along.

1) I know he is not good depth because he is not a good player of baseball, which is the game that the Orioles play.

2) If your alternatives are "Jakubaskas and Expensive Theoretical Man" then sure, I guess Eveland is our only choice. But those aren't alternatives and Eveland wasn't our only choice.

3) If he's better than whatever we have in AAA that speaks more about AAA than Dana Eveland

4) Your point about WAR is nonsense. WAR is a function of FIP's variables anyway, i.e. BB/K/HR etc. Unless you're going to justify his poor returns there by calling those stats "weak" too. I'm not really even sure what point you're trying to make by saying "WAR is descriptive, not predictive" since every data point ever collected for anything, ever could be maligned as "just descriptive."

5) Find me the magical predictive stat showing Dana Eveland being worth something to us next year.

6) Here's what he throws: fastballs with declining velocities, offspeed pitches with poor efficacy, not enough first strikes, and too many walks. I hardly said he wouldn't fit in with our team :rofl:

Point being...don't look at his numbers and tell me "OH NOES, WE SUX AGAIN."

What wellspring of optimism do you draw from that shows Dana Eveland is a good acquisition? See, I tend to use numbers because they quantify the things happening on the field, which is what I'm most concerned with. Unless the Orioles can start winning games by convincing everyone not to look at the numbers showing us with less runs than our opponents.

Especially when his stuff is better than most if not all of the fodder in the minors.

Prove it. Numbers, videos, something.

When we have 2 guys go down in April, you'll be really happy you have Eveland in there instead of some guy you've never heard of that's never pitched above AA.

And they'll do the same job, with Eveland doing it for more money.

This transaction is such a minor blip that it's comical how much overreaction is going on.

These minor blips tend to turn into moderate ones because we always give way too much playing time to bad players.

[allstar1579]

1) I know he is not good depth because he is not a good player of baseball, which is the game that the Orioles play.

2) If your alternatives are "Jakubaskas and Expensive Theoretical Man" then sure, I guess Eveland is our only choice. But those aren't alternatives and Eveland wasn't our only choice.

3) If he's better than whatever we have in AAA that speaks more about AAA than Dana Eveland

4) Your point about WAR is nonsense. WAR is a function of FIP's variables anyway, i.e. BB/K/HR etc. Unless you're going to justify his poor returns there by calling those stats "weak" too. I'm not really even sure what point you're trying to make by saying "WAR is descriptive, not predictive" since every data point ever collected for anything, ever could be maligned as "just descriptive."

5) Find me the magical predictive stat showing Dana Eveland being worth something to us next year.

6) Here's what he throws: fastballs with declining velocities, offspeed pitches with poor efficacy, not enough first strikes, and too many walks. I hardly said he wouldn't fit in with our team :rofl:

What wellspring of optimism do you draw from that shows Dana Eveland is a good acquisition? See, I tend to use numbers because they quantify the things happening on the field, which is what I'm most concerned with. Unless the Orioles can start winning games by convincing everyone not to look at the numbers showing us with less runs than our opponents.

Prove it. Numbers, videos, something.

And they'll do the same job, with Eveland doing it for more money.

These minor blips tend to turn into moderate ones because we always give way too much playing time to bad players.

And you decide who is a good baseball player on what basis? "He obviously stinks, just look at his stats" is not a valid answer.

What other alternatives could we have had for 400k while giving up a player we are doing to DFA in the coming weeks and a low A pitcher with injury concerns and a mediocre repertoire? Waiting for names...because people keep throwing out names that would produce the same or better, but all of these names are multi-million dollar guys, so value for value, they are in fact not equal are they? Again, no one is trying to say, that's it, our team is complete we got our CY Young winner. All this was was a depth/BP move.

Yes, it does in fact speak more about AAA than Dana, but that is exactly why you bring in guys that are better than what you currently have. I know it's been a long time since we've seen a team IMPROVE but that's how it is done.

It is absolutely not nonsense. If it is, then you tell me right now, on record, what his WAR is going to be this upcoming season. Yes every data point ever collected can be described that way. That is why moneyball didn't work people. I don't know why so many people swear by it. Some of the best GMs in all of baseball came from moneyball backgrounds and realized that they had to balance scouting along with statistics for them to work effectively. There is no predictive stat, that is my point. You need to look at scouting reports, or be able to scout him yourself if you want to know what you are talking about. If you are just going to throw out some numbers you googled 10 minutes ago you are faking an argument you don't know much about.

Here, I'll give you the cliffs notes. He throws a FB that has been declining velocity for years, but he added sink to it last year in order to overcome that problem. Hence the 3.03 ERA last year (helped by park effects). He's also been mixing in a cutter more and more the past couple years to make up for the fact that his FB and CH have gone from a 9mph gap to a 5mph gap. In 2009 he had a solid season starting 29 games in OAK (again park effects) but he threw to a low 4 ERA with over 100k. In 2009 he had a terrible year marked by a sharp decrease in FB thrown, while his GB% his HR allowed also went up which means whatever pitch he's using to get GB was a work in progress that he was leaving up and getting hit out of the park. He's gotten his GB% back to where it was 55% or so, while dropping the HR% in half, so that means he's gotten a better feel for that sinking FB.

Basically he's learned how to be an effective GB pitcher.

http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=5508&position=P

Mechanics look fine.

http://www.pitchingclips.com/players/dana_eveland.htm

No they won't. Eveland makes the same thing these guys you've never heard of will make.

We give playing time to bad players because we don't have any better ones. Eveland is better than our current depth. Even using some "predictive" stats Bill James projects Eveland to pitch about 60 IP with a 4.27 ERA, which would be better than most we got from our team last year.

[olehippi]

We can argue the merits or stupidity of the Eveland trade ad nauseam, but I think the general consensus is that the likelihood that he will help the Orioles in any significant way is minimal. This looks like, as some have suggested, a re trade that happened because one/some of the newly hired coaches/scouts said Eveland was worth a gamble...and a couple of minor league players withous much upside. But IMO, we are just as likely to get similar, and perhaps better, results from guys already in the organization, like Chris Tillman, or Troy Patton, both of whom are younger than Eveland and sport similar minor and major league numbers..

[Roll Tide]

I can tell you why it should shift to neutral from slightly not in favor. Vazquez, Colon, and Bedard are all going to cost upwards of $4m per year. Eveland makes $400k. That is $3.6m to spend on IFA, put towards Cespedes, sign Fielder, or whatever it is that they decide to do with that money.

Sorry but Angelos operates under the spend $400 and pocket the 3.6 million. Money he saves wont be spent elsewhere.

[allstar1579]

We can argue the merits or stupidity of the Eveland trade ad nauseam, but I think the general consensus is that the likelihood that he will help the Orioles in any significant way is minimal. This looks like, as some have suggested, a re trade that happened because one/some of the newly hired coaches/scouts said Eveland was worth a gamble...and a couple of minor league players withous much upside. But IMO, we are just as likely to get similar, and perhaps better, results from guys already in the organization, like Chris Tillman, or Troy Patton, both of whom are younger than Eveland and sport similar minor and major league numbers..

I've been preaching the same thing all offseason, but an extra guy to throw in that mix isn't going to hurt anything. If anything it's another cheap arm to replace an expensive one. I'm good with that.

[allstar1579]

Sorry but Angelos operates under the spend $400 and pocket the 3.6 million. Money he saves wont be spent elsewhere.

In the grand scheme probably not, but at some point they have to spend something this offseason, and the less spent on stupid older RP the better.

[OrioleMagic]

Can we not give DD and his advisors the benefit of the doubt on this at least until we see Eveland pitch 10 games as an Oriole?

Here is the issue as I see it. We have a faction on the board that are conclusively saying Eveland sucks and shouldn't have been acquired. We have another faction that say, maybe the O's scouts (or whoever) know something that we fans don't... let's see what happens... we only lost two no-name prospects from the bottom of our list.

Which one is more extreme?

[Barnaby Graves]

And you decide who is a good baseball player on what basis? "He obviously stinks, just look at his stats" is not a valid answer.

I bow to your mastery of circular logic. It's not a valid answer because you say it's not a valid answer. His stats don't matter because you say his stats don't matter.

What other alternatives could we have had for 400k while giving up a player we are doing to DFA in the coming weeks and a low A pitcher with injury concerns and a mediocre repertoire? Waiting for names...because people keep throwing out names that would produce the same or better, but all of these names are multi-million dollar guys, so value for value, they are in fact not equal are they?

Do you own homework and slog through the thread like I had to. There are PLENTY of alternatives. And to be specific, my horse in this race is Brandon Dickson (assuming his availability since I can't get on the phone with GM Suchandso to discuss it).

Not to mention "all of these [alternative] names are multimillion dollar guys" is just flat out wrong.

Again, no one is trying to say, that's it, our team is complete we got our CY Young winner. All this was was a depth/BP move.

Sure, I just doubt he makes very good depth.

Yes, it does in fact speak more about AAA than Dana, but that is exactly why you bring in guys that are better than what you currently have. I know it's been a long time since we've seen a team IMPROVE but that's how it is done.

We're not going to improve it with a 28 year old that walks a guy like every other inning.

It is absolutely not nonsense. If it is, then you tell me right now, on record, what his WAR is going to be this upcoming season.

Predicting WAR is stupid but I'll gladly go on record as saying BB/9 higher than 4.5, K/9 rate lower than 5.5, HR/9 around 0.6. Whatever WAR precipitates from that would probably put him at around 0.0.

Yes every data point ever collected can be described that way. That is why moneyball didn't work people.

huh

wat

i

I don't know why so many people swear by it. Some of the best GMs in all of baseball came from moneyball backgrounds and realized that they had to balance scouting along with statistics for them to work effectively.

Yeah! No kidding! Good scouting and good data analysis are both important! (As if this somehow disproves something about exploiting market inefficiencies, i.e. I can tell you didn't read the book and don't understand the point anyway).

There is no predictive stat, that is my point. You need to look at scouting reports, or be able to scout him yourself if you want to know what you are talking about. If you are just going to throw out some numbers you googled 10 minutes ago you are faking an argument you don't know much about.

Says the guy glossing over a career of poor pitching by pretending the numbers are irrelevant.

Here, I'll give you the cliffs notes. He throws a FB that has been declining velocity for years, but he added sink to it last year in order to overcome that problem. Hence the 3.03 ERA last year (helped by park effects). He's also been mixing in a cutter more and more the past couple years to make up for the fact that his FB and CH have gone from a 9mph gap to a 5mph gap. In 2009 he had a solid season starting 29 games in OAK (again park effects) but he threw to a low 4 ERA with over 100k. In 2009 he had a terrible year marked by a sharp decrease in FB thrown, while his GB% his HR allowed also went up which means whatever pitch he's using to get GB was a work in progress that he was leaving up and getting hit out of the park. He's gotten his GB% back to where it was 55% or so, while dropping the HR% in half, so that means he's gotten a better feel for that sinking FB.

Basically he's learned how to be an effective GB pitcher.

http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=5508&position=P

Mechanics look fine.

http://www.pitchingclips.com/players/dana_eveland.htm

He threw less than 30 major league innings last year, hardly enough of a sample size to determine whether he's suddenly become an effective groundball pitcher and not NEARLY enough to negate the fact that he has a terrible habit of walking batters throughout his entire career.

Not to mention that other than declaring his mechanics "look fine" from a video (when you can't actually substantiate this), you didn't show me anything you couldn't get from 10 minutes of Googling. So are you, too, "faking an argument you don't know much about"?

No they won't. Eveland makes the same thing these guys you've never heard of will make.

I'm probably wrong here, unless he gets a major league contract. As an aside, I'd prefer the minor leaguer's lack of service time, but if Eveland does well this year and we're "forced" to pay him some cash next year, that's an issue I wouldn't mind having.

We give playing time to bad players because we don't have any better ones. Eveland is better than our current depth. Even using some "predictive" stats Bill James projects Eveland to pitch about 60 IP with a 4.27 ERA, which would be better than most we got from our team last year.

I think Bill James is wrong here, for reasons stated above.

If I haven't emphasized it enough, here it is again: Eveland walks a ton of guys and I don't think his resurgence is indicative of improvement in that regard. I think there's better opportunities out there, but I don't really care about Martin or Henson so at the end of the day I'm left wondering why I typed all of these words about Dana Eveland in the first place. We didn't venture much, we probably won't gain a whole lot. It's a step up from getting Steve Trachsel.

[SrMeowMeow]

Can we not give DD and his advisors the benefit of the doubt on this at least until we see Eveland pitch 10 games as an Oriole?

Here is the issue as I see it. We have a faction on the board that are conclusively saying Eveland sucks and shouldn't have been acquired. We have another faction that say, maybe the O's scouts (or whoever) know something that we fans don't... let's see what happens... we only lost two no-name prospects from the bottom of our list.

Which one is more extreme?

Neither side is being extreme. Even the fiercest critics are also saying that this move is a miniscule blip in the course of our franchise. Which is why I don't understand why this thread exists.

However, no, I'm not going to give the front office the benefit of the doubt on a move that looks utterly pointless. They have to earn that back from me.

[weams]

I bow to your mastery of circular logic. It's not a valid answer because you say it's not a valid answer. His stats don't matter because you say his stats don't matter.

Good scouting and good data analysis are both important!

You do know that Allstar1579 is a scout right? I mean, not like Stotle but nonetheless...

[Barnaby Graves]

You do know that Allstar1579 is a scout right? I mean, not like Stotle but nonetheless...

And? Being a scout does not make you some end-all be-all disseminator of baseball knowledge.

There is nothing to explain away or mask Eveland's poor walk rate.

[SrMeowMeow]

And? Being a scout does not make you some end-all be-all disseminator of baseball knowledge.

There is nothing to explain away or mask Eveland's poor walk rate.

No, but it is pretty idiotic to accuse a scout of not valuing good scouting.