Jackson Holliday 2024

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, ChuckS said:

I think there are numerous examples of players coming up and struggling, then getting sent back to Triple A to work on things and coming up different players. Whether you want call that something other than rushed, "not ready" or "in need of more development", I won't argue semantics 

Now maybe they need that to experience that failure in the majors sometimes to know what they need to go back down and work on.   That could be a valid point to make.  But saying that there is no such thing as rushed takes the possibility for additional development that could have occurred in the minor leagues, out of the equation.  

No it doesn’t.  Needing additional development and being rushed are 2 different things.

And btw, that additional development could happen at this level.

Edited April 23 by Sports Guy

[ChuckS]

8 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

No it doesn’t.  Needing additional development and being rushed are 2 different things.

And btw, that additional development could happen at this level.

Okay.  You must have a different definition of what it would mean to rush someone in this context. 

Not going to argue semantics with an absolutist. 

[RZNJ]

12 minutes ago, ChuckS said:

I think there are numerous examples of players coming up and struggling, then getting sent back to Triple A to work on things and coming up different players. Whether you want call that something other than rushed, "not ready" or "in need of more development", I won't argue semantics 

Now maybe they need that to experience that failure in the majors sometimes to know what they need to go back down and work on.   That could be a valid point to make.  But saying that there is no such thing as rushed takes the possibility for additional development that could have occurred in the minor leagues, out of the equation.  

Good luck.  He doesn’t believe promoting someone before they’ve developed enough to succeed in the major leagues is a thing or equates to being rushed.   You have zero chance of getting through to him.

[Sports Guy]

Just now, ChuckS said:

Okay.  You must have a different definition of what it would mean to rush someone in this context. 

Not going to argue semantics with an absolutist. 

Did you think Cowser was rushed last year?

An advanced 23 y/o college bat with 850ish MiL at bats (at the time of the call up) and a career 900ish OPS in the minors. 
 

Was that a player who was rushed?

[ChuckS]

6 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Did you think Cowser was rushed last year?

An advanced 23 y/o college bat with 850ish MiL at bats (at the time of the call up) and a career 900ish OPS in the minors. 
 

Was that a player who was rushed?

Not definitively.  But I can provide other examples of it. 

Jonathan Schoop was promoted to the big leagues after less than half a season in Triple A where he put up middling numbers as a 21-year-old. He was TERRIBLE in his first full season in Baltimore, posting a sub-600 OPS.  Do I think he was rushed and would have benefited from another 300-500 at bats in Norfolk? 

Absolutely.  But I'm sure you will have a different take on it. 

[RZNJ]

2 minutes ago, ChuckS said:

Not definitively.  But I can provide other examples of it. 

Jonathan Schoop was promoted to the big leagues after less than half a season in Triple A where he put up middling numbers as a 21-year-old. He was TERRIBLE in his first full season in Baltimore, posting a sub-600 OPS.  Do I think he was rushed and would have benefited from another 300-500 at bats in Norfolk? 

Absolutely.  But I'm sure you will have a different take on it. 

Good example.  But since being rushed doesn’t really exist I can’t wait for the double talk coming your way.

[Aristotelian]

Whether he was rushed or merely expedited or accelerated, he made his debut at a very young age with very little minor league experience, and the results thus far have been terrible. 

[Hallas]

44 minutes ago, ChuckS said:

Not definitively.  But I can provide other examples of it. 

Jonathan Schoop was promoted to the big leagues after less than half a season in Triple A where he put up middling numbers as a 21-year-old. He was TERRIBLE in his first full season in Baltimore, posting a sub-600 OPS.  Do I think he was rushed and would have benefited from another 300-500 at bats in Norfolk? 

Absolutely.  But I'm sure you will have a different take on it. 

Take this how you want it, but Schoop was up here for 1: a lack of better options, and 2: because despite the fact that he was an offensive zero in 2014, his defense was almost good enough to make him a passable regular despite that.  It's hard to call him rushed if he's providing positive value.

 

A second point of nuance that I'll bring up is that it might be worth considering minor league park effects.  This was pre-Walltimore, and pre-baseball change to the MLB baseball.  The park effects in Norfolk were so severe that for hitters, your MLE OPS was almost identical to your actual OPS.  So while his Norfolk numbers weren't great, the awful hitting environment there suggested that he might be ready for Major League pitching anyway.  (He probably wasn't, but again, lack of better options.)

 

If Holliday ends up being a +10 or +12 runs above average defender over the course of a whole year (and he very well might be, his OAA is already far above average) then you probably live with a .600 OPS from him, especially considering how big of a black hole 2B has been for the past 2 years.  But of course he's far below that threshold at this point.

 

I don't think any of this indicates that Holliday was rushed.  Machado had worse minor league numbers than Holliday at close to the same age, skipping AAA all together despite only putting an 850ish OPS there, and Machado put up a 1.3 wins in 1/3 season and 5 wins in his first full season.

Edited April 23 by Hallas

[Tony-OH]

1 hour ago, Sports Guy said:

1) I’m saying that would be an example of being rushed and to me, it’s basically the only example.

2) I don’t think this has anything to do with being rushed.  Rushed is putting a guy in a position where they can’t succeed because they aren’t ready. I don’t believe that happens.

Holliday was clearly not rushed. Cowser was clearly not rushed last year. 

Wait, how do you assess if a player is ready or not if not for how they perform at the major league level?

How do you assess that a player was not rushed when he's putting up historically bad numbers to start off a career?

Now I agree with you that Elias has a better feel for when he should go back down or not, but I don't think Holliday has proven anybody wrong who thinks he was rushed. His performance so far if anything has proven them right. 

Can he right the ship and prove them wrong, sure, but so far, anyone who says he was absolutely ready have been proven wrong. He's not been just unlucky, he's been terrible at every measurable attribute we have for hitting. 

There is also a misnomer that players can not learn anything else at a previous level. That's just wrong. Having statcast data now shows there is major league caliber stuff in AAA, it's just often not consistent. 

Plus, the ability to just relax a little work on the things the major league coaches have him working on in a less stressful environment can also be a plus. He has 147 AA PAs under his belt that he put up a respectable .899 OPS, but he's also a kid who had a 105 PA stretch last year in High-A ball where he put up a .183/.362/.232/.594 slash line where he had two extra base hits and basically only got on base by walking against bad command High-A ball pitchers. 

Holliday has a tremendous amount of talent, and he's going to be fine in the long run, but I disagree that sending him back to AAA will do him no good. Will having him set more futility records to start a major league career be helpful? If we get swept in a series and he goes 0-for does that mean he's now hurting the team?

I'm ok with leaving it up to Elias/Hyde to make that decision, but I would have zero issues if they sent him back to reset for bit. 

[LookinUp]

2 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

No it doesn’t.  Needing additional development and being rushed are 2 different things.

And btw, that additional development could happen at this level.

Without getting into the semantics of whether or not he was rushed, I think getting to the major leagues and having better advanced scouts and better players expose your weaknesses can be a very real thing. I think that's part of what's happening with Jackson.

I also think he could identify those weaknesses and work on them in AAA. Not that it absolutely needs to happen there, but that it almost certainly can.

I do think there can be downside to failing miserably, in the spotlight, over time. He's a kid. A prodigy, yes, but still a kid. The O's wouldn't be wrong to figure out how to protect him and help him get over this hiccup.

[LookinUp]

Saying all of this, if Holliday gets a hit and a walk tonight and looks comfortable, I'm not necessarily making the change. If he looks totally lost still, I would. Tonight.

[Sports Guy]

Just now, ChuckS said:

Not definitively.  But I can provide other examples of it. 

Jonathan Schoop was promoted to the big leagues after less than half a season in Triple A where he put up middling numbers as a 21-year-old. He was TERRIBLE in his first full season in Baltimore, posting a sub-600 OPS.  Do I think he was rushed and would have benefited from another 300-500 at bats in Norfolk? 

Absolutely.  But I'm sure you will have a different take on it. 

When people say a player was rushed, it usually  means the player has no chance to compete, is in over their heads, confident shot to hell and may not recover.

What you are saying isn’t that.  You are saying they could use more seasoning iyo.

Again, this may be semantics but rushed is usually a negative connotation that comes with ruining a players career.  
 

So no, I don’t think that exists unless it’s an example like I said.,going from HS to the majors or something over the top like that..which doesn’t happen.

[Malike]

I think he gets more games. They gave Cowser 77 PA last season, Holliday isn't halfway there yet.

[Sports Guy]

47 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Wait, how do you assess if a player is ready or not if not for how they perform at the major league level?

How do you assess that a player was not rushed when he's putting up historically bad numbers to start off a career?

Now I agree with you that Elias has a better feel for when he should go back down or not, but I don't think Holliday has proven anybody wrong who thinks he was rushed. His performance so far if anything has proven them right. 

Can he right the ship and prove them wrong, sure, but so far, anyone who says he was absolutely ready have been proven wrong. He's not been just unlucky, he's been terrible at every measurable attribute we have for hitting. 

There is also a misnomer that players can not learn anything else at a previous level. That's just wrong. Having statcast data now shows there is major league caliber stuff in AAA, it's just often not consistent. 

Plus, the ability to just relax a little work on the things the major league coaches have him working on in a less stressful environment can also be a plus. He has 147 AA PAs under his belt that he put up a respectable .899 OPS, but he's also a kid who had a 105 PA stretch last year in High-A ball where he put up a .183/.362/.232/.594 slash line where he had two extra base hits and basically only got on base by walking against bad command High-A ball pitchers. 

Holliday has a tremendous amount of talent, and he's going to be fine in the long run, but I disagree that sending him back to AAA will do him no good. Will having him set more futility records to start a major league career be helpful? If we get swept in a series and he goes 0-for does that mean he's now hurting the team?

I'm ok with leaving it up to Elias/Hyde to make that decision, but I would have zero issues if they sent him back to reset for bit. 

He wasn’t rushed because the org and everyone who saw him felt he was ready. He’s mature, he’s confident and has dominated the minors.

So, unless you want to ignore all of that, I don’t see any logical argument that he was rushed.

[Can_of_corn]

Just now, Sports Guy said:

He wasn’t rushed because the org and everyone who saw him felt he was ready. He’s mature, he’s confident and has dominated the minors.

So, unless you want to ignore all of that, I don’t see any logical argument that he was rushed.

He's not 26 like Stowers.