Cedric Mullins as a CF

[Sports Guy]

8 hours ago, Moose Milligan said:

IMO, need to see where he’s at this time, next season. 
 

(Yeah, CoC, if there’s a season, I know, I know.)
 

The history of baseball landscape is littered with guys that had one amazing year and could never capture that glory again.  I want to believe Mullins is for real but even if he goes wire to wire with an amazing season he still needs to do it again next year for me to have 100% faith. 

Of course.  If this was 2019 and he was coming off his solid career numbers and was a lot younger, you would feel differently.  But 2019 and 2020 happened. He did get older, so there is more skepticism.

It’s just like Means.  The 2019 first half occurred..so did the decline in the second half.  The beginning of 2020 happened, as did the end.  You need to see more of a sampling of him.

[BRobinsonfan]

18 hours ago, OrioleDog said:

After a couple highlight plays along with the hitting on the weekend, Savant has him as MLB's #3 overall OF in OAA today.

The too good to be true part of this breakout is if he was fielding that brilliantly but hitting like Kiermaier/Phillips, that would still be attractive in its own respect.    If he were hitting like this but still scuffling to adjust to second decks in MLB ballparks or whatever, same deal.   

Two-way players are gold.

I agree the Betts/Ichiro we are being reckless with baseball gods.    Young good Adam Eaton is one I'll toss - plus in a couple years he can be traded for GIolito and Dunning.

It's way too early for Ichiro comparisons and talk of being a franchise player. But Mullins is performing  well and justifying, at least for now,  the "heir apparent" status bestowed on him a few years ago.  This could just be an extended hot streak, or he could be a valuable piece of the puzzle moving forward.  Either way, the odds of him becoming the second coming of Ichiro Suzuki are almost nil.  

[interloper]

On 6/7/2021 at 9:54 AM, Sports Guy said:

See this is what I’m talking about.

People are trying to comp him to Betts and now Ichiro.

Ichiro is one of the best all around players ever and is an easy HOFer.  Betts is on his way as well.

Mullins was able after thought prior to April.  He had a “normal” May and now all of a sudden, we are comping him to HOFers?

Its crazy.  Just enjoy Mullins for what he is doing now and let’s see if he can keep it up this year and next year.  If he can provide us a real sample size that he can keep this up, at that we can start making this statements.   But right now, we are about a month plus one series.  

I merely said he's starting to look like him with how hot he is. Just the fact he would approach that level for a limited amount of time is beyond what I ever thought possible from the player. Obviously I don't think he will become Mookie Betts.

[interloper]

Y'all really have a way of twisting what people are saying around here. I didn't say he was Mookie Betts and the other poster didn't say he was Ichiro. Mullins is on fire, it's fun to say he looks like historically great players while he's on fire. The mental gymnastics required to actually think people are saying he is as good as those players is pretty wild. But hey - message boards!

[Sports Guy]

18 minutes ago, interloper said:

Y'all really have a way of twisting what people are saying around here. I didn't say he was Mookie Betts and the other poster didn't say he was Ichiro. Mullins is on fire, it's fun to say he looks like historically great players while he's on fire. The mental gymnastics required to actually think people are saying he is as good as those players is pretty wild. But hey - message boards!

Your words were with a few more bombs, he looks less like BRob and more like Betts.

How exactly do you expect people to take that?  If it’s not what you mean, don’t say it in a way where anyone would read that and think you are comping him to Betts.

Its not like you said, when he is hitting his best, he looks like Betts.  

Scott threw 10 pitches the other day and struck out the side.  He just have been Mariano Rivera that day!

I mean come on, if you want to look at a player when he is play at his highest level and throw out names of HOFers and MVPs, that’s a bit over the top.  That’s taking the smallest of sample sizes and comparing them to great players who do it all the time.

What AS would have comped Mullins to when he had a 730 OPS in May?

 

[SteveA]

On 6/7/2021 at 12:25 PM, Philip said:

I got a tremendous amount of very negative feedback when I lamented the prospect of seeing Mullins in a Yankee uniform( and yes i agree) But after reading this morning’s Athletic article About the needs of the various teams in the AL East, it’s not at all unlikely that Cashman will call Mike. I would hate to see Cedric in a Yankee uniform, but they’ve got a lot of stuff to offer, they’ve got some stupid pride, and they’ve got some desperate need in the outfield.

I was thinking that the Indians might want Santander, But Mullins might be more desirable right now. He’s had a good stretch, and it could be argued that this change is real, on the grounds that he is eliminated 1/2 of his hitting so he can focus on the other. Right or wrong, that is certainly a plausible argument that his improvement is real and lasting.

Do the Yankees have "a lot of stuff" to offer?

I don't trust  Yankee prospects.   They don't seem to live up to their billing either with the Yankees or with other teams.   With the exception of Aaron Judge, their farm system hasn't produced much.    

[SteveA]

15 hours ago, Moose Milligan said:

IMO, need to see where he’s at this time, next season. 
 

(Yeah, CoC, if there’s a season, I know, I know.)
 

The history of baseball landscape is littered with guys that had one amazing year and could never capture that glory again.  I want to believe Mullins is for real but even if he goes wire to wire with an amazing season he still needs to do it again next year for me to have 100% faith. 

As long as you apply that strict a standard to the guys you would get back in a deal.   

[SteveA]

32 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Your words were with a few more bombs, he looks less like BRob and more like Betts.

How exactly do you expect people to take that?  If it’s not what you mean, don’t say it in a way where anyone would read that and think you are comping him to Betts.

Its not like you said, when he is hitting his best, he looks like Betts.  

Scott threw 10 pitches the other day and struck out the side.  He just have been Mariano Rivera that day!

I mean come on, if you want to look at a player when he is play at his highest level and throw out names of HOFers and MVPs, that’s a bit over the top.  That’s taking the smallest of sample sizes and comparing them to great players who do it all the time.

What AS would have comped Mullins to when he had a 730 OPS in May?

 

Mookie Betts had a .768 OPS in April.

[Frobby]

Mullins would have to post an OPS under .730 the rest of the year for his overall OPS to fall below .800.    So, that’s pretty strong.  Adam Jones only topped .800 twice in his illustrious career as an Oriole.   

[GuidoSarducci]

9 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

Way to avoid answering the question.

Have you stopped beating your wife ?
 

[wildcard]

2 hours ago, interloper said:

Y'all really have a way of twisting what people are saying around here.

Nailed it!!!

[Ruzious]

9 minutes ago, wildcard said:

Nailed it!!!

Yup, and that is one of the hazards of posting on a message board.  Nobody's going to notice I said "poor man's" Mookie.  They just see the Mookie.  But it's all harmless fun.      

[Hallas]

13 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

The problem is, you leave off the rest of it..hasn’t done anything is only part of the sentence..the rest of it is “to show that he is a guy you build around”

5 weeks of good baseball is nothing in terms of figuring that out.

I don't think the second half of that statement matters too much unless either 1: you don't think he can ever prove that he is a build-around player, or 2:  you think his year to date is no different from 0 weeks.  If you need to see him for a full season to be fully convinced, then 35-40% of the season should definitely be enough to tilt some narratives and be cautiously optimistic.

 

IMO the second criteria and the first are a bit more intertwined than you would think.  If he needs more than a full season to prove his worth to you as a build-around player, its going to be really hard for him to ever reach that bar.  He's not going to be a UFA until 2026, when he's 31.  Even if he performs well, injury and aging will take hold sooner rather than later.

 

Finally, you keep bringing up his may and saying we are basing our optimism on 5 weeks, but we aren't cherry picking his .937 April, or his 1.200 OPS June.  His overall OPS over the season to date, 10 weeks into the season, is still .923, including his less impressive May.  It doesn't make sense to cherry pick a SSS period of reduced performance while simultaneously saying that you need a bigger sample.

[Sports Guy]

13 minutes ago, Hallas said:

I don't think the second half of that statement matters too much unless either 1: you don't think he can ever prove that he is a build-around player, or 2:  you think his year to date is no different from 0 weeks.  If you need to see him for a full season to be fully convinced, then 35-40% of the season should definitely be enough to tilt some narratives and be cautiously optimistic.

 

IMO the second criteria and the first are a bit more intertwined than you would think.  If he needs more than a full season to prove his worth to you as a build-around player, its going to be really hard for him to ever reach that bar.  He's not going to be a UFA until 2026, when he's 31.  Even if he performs well, injury and aging will take hold sooner rather than later.

 

Finally, you keep bringing up his may and saying we are basing our optimism on 5 weeks, but we aren't cherry picking his .937 April, or his 1.200 OPS June.  His overall OPS over the season to date, 10 weeks into the season, is still .923, including his less impressive May.  It doesn't make sense to cherry pick a SSS period of reduced performance while simultaneously saying that you need a bigger sample.

Of course the second part of that statement matters.  It’s absurd to say otherwise.

And it’s a SSS regardless.  All I’m saying is that for half of this season, he hasn’t been that good.  I’m not saying he hasn’t had a good year but since the context of the conversation is hes a guy you build around and I assume people aren’t dumb enough to build around a 730 OPS guy, they are absolutely looking at the SSS of April and so far in June.

[Frobby]

1 hour ago, Sports Guy said:

Of course the second part of that statement matters.  It’s absurd to say otherwise.

And it’s a SSS regardless.  All I’m saying is that for half of this season, he hasn’t been that good.  I’m not saying he hasn’t had a good year but since the context of the conversation is hes a guy you build around and I assume people aren’t dumb enough to build around a 730 OPS guy, they are absolutely looking at the SSS of April and so far in June.

The whole “build around” concept is a bit of a misused term here.    Nobody ever built a team around Al Bumbry, but we were very happy to have him in our starting lineup for a decade or so.    I doubt anyone ever said “Al Bumbry is an untouchable,” yet there he was, playing his whole career with the Orioles.   

I don’t know exactly how good Mullins will be  long term, but I do know there’s one huge takeaway from the first 60 games of this season: he’s a WAY better hitter left-on-left than he ever was right-on-left.    You can take that to the bank.   And that makes him a significantly better player than he was up until now in his career.   As I said in a prior post, he’d be hard pressed to finish below .800 OPS this year.   Longer term, I think there’s a reasonable chance he settles in at .770+.   And that’s a really nice CF.