Fahey looked great at shortstop last night!

[snatch311]

Uh, Eddy Garabito is as good or better offensive player than Brandon Fahey. He hit .307/.384/.398 last year.

He has had a .779 OPS at Ottawa. .863 at Colorado Springs.

So far this year he's hitting .292/.357/.364 with 12 steals.

[Sports Guy]

So now we have three guys who have never seen Eddy Garabito play SS, saying that he's essentially the same player or better than Fahey.

Guess you don't believe you can form an educated opinion based off of scouting reports and stat analysis?

[ScottieBaseball]

Maybe we can get Travis Driskill back!

I almost put you on my ignore list for that one.

[Sports Guy]

No problem. Show me that stat analysis (defensive) and scouting reports that say it.

1) go to thebaseballcube.com and look the 2 players.

2) Garabito was in our organization for years...You mean to tell me you never read anything about him? You never read thr threads about him? You never read Tony's analysis of him?

That NEVER happened?

[DrungoHazewood]

Why didn't you tell Earl and Whitey that ?

They might have won a few more each if you were around to council them.

Tell Jim, Dave, Mike, and Pat that they didn't need the Blade- they might have won 4,5, or 6 more with a better hitting SS.

First of all, no one in their right mind would argue that having a guy with a .450 OPS isn't hurting the offense.

Second, Belanger was a GREAT fielder. According to ancetodal evidence he was about one step below an ancient Greek God, and according to the numbers (like BP's rate) he was almost as good as Ozzie.

This was also the 1970s, when the All Star shortstop was often a guy like Freddy Patek. Guys with .600 OPSes. It was a different game, a different environment.

This is 2006, where an average shortstop has an OPS over .700. Brandon Fahey, last time I checked, was a good shortstop - not a legendary one. So he's not even in Belanger's league - he's about as good a hitter, but can't touch his glove.

And Earl... in 1982 he had a choice. He could play Kiko Garcia (another Fahey equivalent) at shortstop, or he could play Cal Ripken there. He decided that instead of keeping Cal at a corner and playing the no-hit glove at short he'd put Cal at short and try the easier task of finding another big bopper to put at third. Don't try to tell me that Earl's dream was to have a .500 OPS at short. As soon as he found someone who could hit he put him there against all conventional wisdom.

[DrungoHazewood]

So now we have three guys who have never seen Eddy Garabito play SS, saying that he's essentially the same player or better than Fahey.

I've seen Eddy Garabito play and saw nothing to differentiate him from Fahey. I've also seen the objective evidence (stats) and they say he's better.

[Tx Oriole]

Cider, have you been in the cider? He may have looked good last night but he is just not a full time SS. He would not be the answer at SS if Tejada gets traded. IMO

[now]

I think a .050 point OPS advantage Millar/Conine have about breaks even with Fahey's range advantage over Tejada.

This is the kind of numbers approach that a discussion like this needs.

Years ago as a Strat-O-Matic addict I compiled a chart to help me make starting lineup decisions based on precisely this issue. I used Bill James weights for importance of various fielding positions relative to each other and relative to offense. Those charts of mine are now long gone but as I recall, the differential of .050 OPS value for a great fielding shortstop over a poor one sounds about right. (The value difference of great vs. poor fielding at 1B, on the other hand, was much less, on the order of .015 OPS.) Of course, what I had easily available was a numerical rating for each player's defense to go by: from 1 to 4.

So what we need to make sense of an issue like this is a formula for plugging in, say, fielding wins, and assessing the defense/offense tradeoff in terms of total wins. It would also be helpful to have a rate-based "fielding number" that could be added to OPS...then comparing various lineups would be a simple matter of adding up 9 of those: OPSPF.

[DrungoHazewood]

Ya mean like Wayne Gross and Todd Cruz?

You mean Wayne "nearly .800 OPS in 1984" Gross. Yea, him.

Gross + Ripken >>> Ripken + Kiko

[Tx Oriole]

And only two of those teams the ChiSox are champions. Cards are pretty good may be the WC. Diamnondbacks are in the hunt but the rest are losing.

[DrungoHazewood]

Got me there. But Earl wasn't manager then. How about Glen Gulliver in 1982 when Earl made the switch and Todd Cruz the following year? Not pretty.

Gulliver only played 50 games in '82, yet had 37 walks and a .363 OBP. He never developed like many hoped, but he still got on base better then most of the current O's lineup.

Cruz clearly couldn't hit. He was a shortstop playing third in a pinch. Earl always liked to have a few defensive specialists around and he was one of them. That was fine when you had 10-man pitching staffs. A luxury you can't afford when you keep 12 or 13 pitchers.

[DrungoHazewood]

You mean the objective evidence when some guy who is paid to watch the game, charts grounders and makes the "objective" determination on which ones should have been caught and which ones shouldn't have been caught and stuff like that?

No, I meant the hitting.

Garabito, from what I've heard and seen, is an average fielding shortstop. Fahey is probably a little above average. That's worth about half a win a year, maybe a win on the outside.

For Fahey to be worth more than a single win a year over Garabito he'd have to be far, far better with the glove and I've seen nothing that indicates that.

[snatch311]

I've never seen Garabito play? I watch games constantly on MLBtv. He was in the majors last year. Knowing that he was a former o's farmhand, AMAZINGLY, I decided to watch him play. He looked fine to me. I have read reports that he was above average defensively according to scouts. His offensive numbers suggest that he is a better hitter than Fahey. A few years ago, people were calling for Garabito to get a chance to play on this very board. .625-.700 OPS middle infielders with average speed grow on trees. It's like finding .750-.800 OPS corner guys.

[osfan83]

All this discussion about Miggy being more valuable as a SS will be mute in a year or two. If he continues to play defensivly like he has this year, he will not be a SS for very long.

I'm sure the Nats though Soriano's bat was much more valuable at 2b, but how long can you tolerate a a fielding liability at middle infield postion?

Miggy has little range this year, if he is injured, then he should be DHing, if he's not, his days are numbered at SS.

[snatch311]

I caught Garabito twice. I saw his debut, I think in interleague? Probably at second base. I also remembered when he started against Baltimore. I'm about 95% sure he went deep against us. You're right though, I have never seen him play at shortstop, which is why I said he looked fine defensively. As far as scouting reports go, I haven't read anything on Eddy for over a year. I'm just going based off of recollection from when people wanted him to start over Cruz.