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"Hysterical Blindness" - noun - "Loss or blurring of vision following a highly traumatic event ..." There are some who are ALREADY projecting the 2011 Mariners to win 80 or 81 games in 2011 based on the current roster. They can whip out WAR charts or OPS graphs or player projection lists and create a myriad number of scenarios which explain why the train wreck of 2010 was really an illusion and why the talent currently on the Mariner 40 man is significantly better than the 101 loss team from last year. "Rob Johnson is gone!" - (who hit 60 points better than Adam Moore, who is still here). "Kotchman is gone!" - (whose career 91 OPS+ is 7 points higher than Smoak's career 84). "Griffey is gone!" - (who only had 108 ABs and wasn't there for the final 4 months of stinkage). "Lopez is gone!" - (whose career .697 OPS is replaced by B.Ryan's .655 OPS - all generated in the EASY league). What you don't hear a lot of is:
"Branyan is gone!" - and his .802 OPS The reality is Ichiro and Gutz are the only two players on the Seattle roster to *EVER* post a 100 OPS+ while playing in Seattle. The Wilsons posted 68 and 62 OPS+ numbers in 2010. They combined for 21 walks and 109 Ks in about 600 PAs. They fanned 5 times for every time they drew a walk. That was way BETTER than the 8/63 split for Adam Moore - (whiffing 8 times for every walk). Justin Smoak only fanned 4 times per walk (8/34). In 2010, the club added Figgins (OBP machine) and Bradley (OBP machine), to help address their league worst OBP (.314) from 2009. The 2010 club finished dead last (again) with a .298 OBP. However, the club did manage to dump the team leader in Ks (Branyan with 149), and INCREASE team strikeouts from 1093 to 1184. In 2010, every move they made seemed to have exactly the opposite impact as desired. Pick up some patient contact hitters to boost OBP - lose 16 points of OBP. Drop the guys with high K rates and poor K/BB ratios (Branyan, Beltre, Cedeno, Hall), and watch the team Ks explode and the team K/BB ratio get worse. The ugly, (and IMO irrefutable) truth about the Seattle Mariners organization is that they are the worst team in baseball in nearly every aspect of hitting. Last in average, OBP, slugging, HRs, triples, doubles (and obviously, XBHes), runs, 2nd worst in Ks and walks, (and easily worst in K/BB ratio). They don't develop hitters. They turn decent free agent hitters into disasters in short order. They've had serious problems with base running blunders. v At catcher, the rookie with the better hitting stats is gone, but Olivo, (whose career OPS+ with Seattle is 45), is the projected savior. At first, Smoak takes over for Kotchman - a likely upgrade - assuming Smoak doesn't revisit his .439 OPS he displayed in his first 16 games in Seattle. In fairness, it is highly unlikely that Smoak will have another stretch with 23 strikeouts and only one walk ... but you've gotta ask yourself, exactly what were they doing with the kid who was walking every other game in Texas that resulted in him walking only twice in his first 25 games with the Ms? At second, I get the optimism regarding Ackley. But, how much is REALLY expected out of the kid who hit .776 in AAA in 2010? Wasn't everyone hoping for a 100 OPS+ from 2B in 2010? Figgins delivered an 84. If Ackley isn't ready, (and Figgins moves back to third), Brendan Ryan and his .650 OPS replaces Lopez?!? At short, there are the Wilsons, neither of which managed to post a .600 OPS. The potential upstart here is Ryan. 'Nuff said. At third, Figgins likely moves back, and we can only hope the switch doesn't result in another 3 month adjustment period. In left, the combo of Saunders and Bradley returns. The 86 and 80 OPS+ figures from the two are assumed to be low ball figures. Of course, this is probably only because the club has such a wonderful history of batters improving the longer they stay in Seattle. In Center, there is Gutierrez. In 2009, he posted a 105 OPS+. In 2010 ... 87. Well, the 2010 WAR for Gutzy was 2.3 ... EXACTLY what he generated in 2008 with Cleveland. Okay, the defensive runs saved numbers from 2009 were off the charts bizarro - and his 2010 numbers are much more reasonable. But, death-to-flying-things killed more rallies with his offense than defense after May. After posting .861 and .792 in April and May, his final 4 monthly OPS totals were: .654 - .469 (ouch!) - .611 - .626. You know who also had two good months and 4 bad months? Kotchman. Sorry - the truth is, Gutz ended with an OPS 50 points higher than Kotchman. But, if "50 points better than Kotch" is your standard of excellence, then the only competition you're in is with Pittsburgh for the 2012 #1 overall. In Right, the ageless wonder, Ichiro - the best hitter returning (113 OPS+) - who is 37. Not sure which is more disturbing here, the reality that your 113 OPS+ guy is the only returning 100 OPS+ player on the roster - or that the concept that Ichiro is immune to aging is almost universally accepted as fact. The DH position is currently divided between Cust and Bradley. Certainly, Cust is an improvement over Griffey. But, of course, if Cust loses the same 130 points of OPS that Bradley lost when moving to Seattle at age 32, he'll hit a robust .700 in 2011. ============== The above is not intended to be a prediction - but a demonstration that for every glowing, positive, optimistic picture one can paint for 2011, there is an equally plausible and defensible pessimistic counter. In truth, I have already stated my prediction that the Ms will have "only" four black holes offensively in 2011, (compared to 7 in 2010). That's improvement - but certainly not the Polyanna perspective of those dreaming of a .500 season. The hard truth is -- it is VERY rare for a team to gain 20 wins in a single season. Seattle did this only two years ago, (24 wins, actually), so it doesn't FEEL implausible. People have forgotten after the 63 win crash of 2004, the club added Beltre and Sexson and managed 6 more wins the next season. THAT team had 4 decent hitters, (Sexson - 144; Ibanez - 115; Ichiro - 113; and Winn - 100), and finished last in OPS and 13 in runs scored. This club is minus Lee and adds Olivo and Ryan ... but the 2011 club is going to improve TWENTY (20) games?!? Seriously?!? Over at LL, they ballparked -0.5 WAR for the entire bench. Well, let's take a look at how many negative WAR players each year - and total negative WAR generated by each roster since 2004 and the top two negative WAR providers.
2004 - 12 - (4.1) - Willie B (1.2) -- Edgar (0.7) So, over the past 7 years, the BEST season had 8 guys with negative WAR generation with a minimum of 2.1 total negative WAR value. Even if the club improves, it is HIGHLY likely they will have at least 10 guys with negative WAR contributions, which will likely total 4 or more negative WAR. And note that this list is NOT dominated by scrub bench players. Most seasons, the bulk of the negative WAR came from full-time starters (at least full-time for a large chunk of the season). I find it sadly hilarious that part of the optimism is based on the concept that we have replaced Rob Johnson (plus 0.3 WAR in 2010) with Olivo - the title holder for largest single season negative WAR generation for the club since 2004. Okay, Olivo is no longer a struggling rookie - (well, actually he was carrying an .812 OPS with the ChiSox before moving to Seattle in 2004, so he really wasn't a struggling rookie UNTIL he got to Seattle, but I digress). The ugly truth about Seattle is this ... they are a bad ORGANIZATION. It is *NOT* simply a case of Seattle choosing talent poorly. They have repeatedly and consistently taken talent in from elsewhere, it performs worse in Seattle, then gets better after leaving. Even after park effects are computed this is still the case. It is not the talent selection nor the park that is to blame for the woes of an organization that routinely chops 30 to 40 points of OPS+ off players production, (both home and away). In 2009, Seattle had 3 large negative WAR players who left. Here are the 2009 and 2010 WAR results:
Player --------- 2009 -- 2010 Sorry, but given the track record, it is foolish not to EXPECT multiple players from performing severely under "normal" or "reasonable" projection levels that would be expected were they playing for any other organization. The problem is, they don't actually make EVERY player worse. So, when a Branyan or Ibanez succeeds, the default assumption is that you just need to "choose" guys "like" Branyan or Ibanez or Sweeney. Except, nobody knows what it is that makes the (few) success stories successful. Why did Branyan and Ibanez succeed, while Bradley completed folded from day one? Why did Beltre suck so badly that first year, then put together three 'decent' years, only to suck horribly his last? And after hitting .919 in Boston in his first season after leaving Seattle, did Beltre actually cost himself a potential Hall of Fame career (and 30 points of OPS+ per season), by signing with Seattle and spending the heart of his peak years in the absolute worst hitting organization in all of baseball? If I included Beltre on the above list - he jumped from 1.1 WAR to 6.1. When you repeatedly see 2.0 WAR skews from imports and exports year after year after year, at some point, you have to take responsibility for the results. Seattle has been - and likely still is - CAUSING hitters to fail. Blaming the park is a cop-out, because some players have ended up with reverse park effects, (Olivo), or results that don't mesh with perception. (Lopez ends his career with the Ms with more XBHs at home than away, despite having almost 100 more trips to the plate on the road.) The perception is that Safeco suppresses HRs for right hand bats. But, Lopez seems to have only lost singles. I cannot tell your whether Olivo, Smoak, Ryan, Ackley, Saunders, Cust or somebody else will be the guy(s) generating negative WAR. But, the past seven years says with near certainty that one (or probably several) of them will do just that. For me, the UPSIDE for 2011 in Seattle is that WITHOUT adding Beltre and Sexson, the club manages to add 5 or 6 to the win column. With a rotation of one, a bullpen of none, and an offense of ... let's not even go there, an "expectation" of 81 wins has got to be described as fantasy. Could variables change that could allow that possibility? Of course. The most important one is that Seattle stop making hitters worse. But, since few accept that as a reality (does the club?), nobody is trying to fix that. As long as the club blames the park for the problem - and not the approach to playing in the park - I see little chance of things changing. Just as an exercise, go through the top 12 batters for Seattle in 2010. Add 30 points of BA to EVERY ONE of them. How many of those BAs would appear more normal than the ones they ended with? Because, I'm betting the 2010 projections for those top 12 batters likely had every last one of them pegged closer to their final BA+30 than their final BA. A normal team will have three guys hitting ABOVE norm, 3 below and 3 normal. When you go oh-for-twelve - with EVERY hitter about 30 points below projection, the problem is NOT player selection. I do not know if the cause is philosophy, coaching, or infield grass height. But, until that problem is remedied Seattle will remain the worst hitting club in baseball, and every hitting projection for every year will end up looking wildly optimistic by season end. The purpose of government is to set the minimum standard of behavior for a society, backed up with the power and authority to police and punish those who fail to meet those minimum standards. The purpose of Religion is to encourage people to exceed those standards voluntarily. Adopt-a-player(s):
Kenn Kasparek - 2010 - 7-4; 3.50; 17-GS; 115.2-IP; 104-H; 15-HR; 26-BB; 64-K; 1.124-WHIP; 5.0 K/9; 2.46-K/BB (High Desert - A+)
Brian Moran - 2010 6-1; 1.46; 32-G; 55.2-IP; 49-H; 0-HR; 7-BB; 65-K; 1.006-WHIP; 10.5-K/9; 9.29-K/BB |