Hamilton

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Q.  Is Kendrys Morales one of the most average players in the major leagues?

A.  He made Fangraphs' top five, and that seems to be the consensus.  Here's an article on the subject.  The obvious implication is that he's a mediocrity.  For example, the article notes Paul Konerko's WAR at 2'ish and sighs, "it's too bad," since Konerko actually looks kinda good at the plate.

As our servant, the WAR statistic is useful.  As our master, it is a deceitful, exploitative tyrant.  As we observed in this article, real GM's consistently pay less for no-hit WAR heroes than fanboys expect, and real GM's consistently pay more for no-WAR hit heroes than fanboys expect.

Even if Kendrys Morales were a 2.0 WAR first baseman, that wouldn't prove, to the flexibly minded, that he was a mediocrity.  Any more than Billy Butler's WAR is the way that GM's judge his value.

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Q.  Is Morales in fact a 2.0 WAR first baseman?

A.  He is not.  

Fascinating peek behind the curtain from, not James in this case, but the Red Sox' VP:

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The phils new SP, John Lannan , is 2-5with a 6- plus era in Citizens bank park. How much stock do u give such things generally and how much does it mean for pitching in cbp for lannan facing the nats braves mets etc?

Asked by: PeteDecour

Answered: 12/16/2012

 

It doesn't mean anything, except it expands my respect for the Phillies a little.   If a player plays well against YOU, you'd be surprised how much that drives demand for him within an organization.     It's unusual that a team would sign a player who has pitched poorly against them.  

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Dr. D had to sit and digest that one for a minute.  I mean, it's definitely true; you think back over the past 20 years and it's hard to think of even a single exception.

And it's true, it seems, to a HUGE degree.

What is hard to figure, is how exactly this works within an organization.  Obviously you don't have six field scouts telling Jack Zduriencik, hey, Josh Hamilton hasn't hit very well in Safeco so far.  That isn't how it works.  

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Dr. K's point right here:

"The franchise value has increased from 48% over those nine years, but over the time period the value of the Rangers has increased by 120% and the value of the Angels by 417%*."

Lemme pull rank here a bit, as (apparently) the Seattle blogger most familiar with 7th-floor steering committees.  F-500 execs live and die by market share, live and die by the question of, "How are we doing compared to other people selling the same thing?"  

Dr. Kelly's point not only has traction; it's a point that has so much traction that it had buried jemanji in oblivion.  It hadn't even occurred that the appreciation had been so low for the Mariners.  48% over nine years is only 5.3% per year, and that is pitiful at these corporate levels, in this industry sector.  10%, 12% per year would be only marginally acceptable.  The Rangers have scored over 30% per annum, calculated straight-line in retro.

Bloggers and Warts Spiders talk "profit" when, in fact, yearly cash flow is a trivial consideration compared to appreciation.  The profit is when you sell (and that profit is fairly liquid, can be -- and is -- pulled at any time through bank loans).

For the Mariners it's a LITTLE different, because they're not EXACTLY a Seattle's Best Coffee that could be PUT TO DEATH by a Starbucks.  The Mariners, almost uniquely, face no competition for market from other MLB franchises.  But do you notice how hyper-sensitive the Mariners are even to the Sonics and Seahawks?  Who don't play, mostly, at the same time they do?

The execs can and do look at Kelly's issue -- 1.2x and 4x growth for AL West teams while they saw a piddling 0.5x growth over a decade -- and they panic, believe me.  Now I finally understand why the Mariners' puzzling willingness to bid on Prince Fielder last year.

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Jemanji:  Zduriencik looks kind of shrill this winter.  And who could blame him.  If he has decided it's time to stop playing for two years from now, it's okay by me.

Buster Olney, quoted by Grizzly:  Olney says that "industry rivals" view the M's as desperate this winter. That's a little frightening - we saw what happened the last time the M's had a front office in "desperation" mode.  Safe to say those "industry rivals" know a lot more about Jack's mindset and how frantic the club is than we netizens do.

Silentpadna:  Grizzly, I don't think it's safe to say that at all. Industry rivals are known to say things specifically for public consumption. If I'm GM of the Rangers and I sense the M's are about to make any serious in-roads, I might plant a suggestion like that into the rumor mill. That's a big part of the game these days.

Jemanji:  That's part of the game for sure, but I wonder whether savvy GM's aren't looking at Zunino, the Napoli visit, the calls the M's are making to everybody up to and including Randy Johnson, and seriously wondering whether Zduriencik's under the gun.

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From MLBtraderumors.com:

The Mariners are ready to pursue a big name free agent, but the stakes are high after the Chone Figgins fiasco. "They know they can't be wrong on the next one," said a source to Olney.

Dr. D is more-or-less as much a fan of Bruce Lee as the next amigo is.  So he was stunned to see a Chuck Norris interview in which Chuck discussed his relationship with Lee.

Point A:  Norris is, by all accounts, as "nice" a person as it's possible to be nice.  He's soft-spoken, gets along with everybody up to and including Sylvester Stallone, and seems to have devoted his life to spiritual causes.