Well presented, Spec.
The Figgins issue has always been just as we see it today. He is a mediocre infielder being payed for the '07 season where he had atronomically good luck (BABIP) and an '09 season where he had an outlier number of walks. Minus those two seasons (even minus just the '07 season), he is simply Kennedy's equal. Not much else.
Z sold his General Managerial soul last year by backing Figgins and praying for value this year. Might still happen. I'm not holding my breath. He had a window to ship Figgy this winter. It may have closed.
We need a bat at #2 in the line up. I'll still root for Figgy. I won't bet much, though. I think the #2 hole guy is playing 2nd base for Tacoma.
But even with a hot Ackley up....Can Wedge even thiink about dropping Figgy in the lineup? Bad pat mojo there.
June can't get here fast enough.
Ackley at 2nd. Rodriguez at third and batting 7th....and somebody warm and with a potential bat hitting against lefties and playing center (assuming Guit remains "crappy")...Such is the stuff of my dreams.
moe
Except for the numbers on the paycheck and the number of months the club is obligated to keep writing them, I see not much difference among Figgins, Wilson, Kennedy and L-Rod.
They are all guys on the back side of 30, with spotty offensive histories, gravitating toward the vacinity of .265/.340/.380 (only difference is L-Rod has shown the possibility of a higher SLG, but hasn't proven it in the majors).
Kennedy had an awful year in 07, but his BABIP was .238, so it was partially bad fortune. Exclude that year, and downgrade the speed a few notches (but he's always had double-digit SBs when he's gotten the playing time), and Kennedy is really Figgins' equal. In fact, how about a table?
| Year | Figgins | Kennedy |
| 2003 | 90 | 98 |
| 2004 | 103 | 100 |
| 2005 | 101 | 96 |
| 2006 | 85 | 86 |
| 2007 | 117 | 50 (mulligan) |
| 2008 | 82 | 82 |
| 2009 | 100 | 110 |
| 2010 | 79 | 84 |
Of course, a lot of those years they were even on the same team with about the same number of PAs. It's almost eerie, except for 07. Kennedy is two years older, but other than that . . .
Wilson, of course, brings the glove, but is obviously not as comfortable at 2b as we thought (see Baker: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/marinersblog/2014704968_jack_wilso...). Offensively, he'll be a notch or two below (mostly because he's never had the OBP). Wilson is the same age as Figgins.
L-Rod has that .493 SLG in AAA last year, and has looked solid at the plate so far. He is also the youngest at 31. Doc's right that he's worth a look, but he has his long history of not being very good working against him (1000 MLB PAs, career OPS+ 74).
Figgins has demonstrated that's he not a middle infielder, so the main thing he's bringing to the table is OBP. Well, so far it's .115, and .000 with RISP (in 9 PAs -- killing us).
I think that Z had already decided that Wak was a mistake when the dugout dustup occurred. Wak was a writeoff, but Figgins still had potential value, from Z's perspective at the time. Not the case now. Z won't get another mulligan on the manager.
In which case, he's going to want Wedge to start treating these four as interchangable parts, not as Figgins and his three utility guys.
Comments
Right, Moe.
1. Ackley's bat, even with growing pains, will be an upgrade over who's playing now.
2. Draft will bring either the perfect RH high-OBP bat at the position of greatest need (3b -- i.e., Rendon), or a stud starter (Cole).
3. The trade value of Wilson and Aardsma may well rise out of the dumpster, and then Z could pull off some of his magic.
4. I would not rule out a Figgins DFA at this point, especially if Kennedy and L-Rod look decent. Z's future will ride with Wedge, Ackley and Smoak (and Paxton, Franklin and the #2 pick), not the Figgins deal.
5. I also would not rule out flipping Bedard to a contender (http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2011/04/erik-bedard-the-available-ace.html), maybe even with the understanding that they re-sign him at the end of the year. Hard to tell what they'd do given the relationship, but the potential for a bidding war is there.
Before somebody jumps in and mentions it....I'm well aware that we're dealing with terribly small ('11) samples right now concerning Figgins (and Langerhans and Saunders, etc). However...you can looks at past numbers and try to extrapolate some sense of value/future performance.
Figgins, according to some folks, had a "hot" 2nd half, last season. OK..that hot half resulted in a .286 BA....but only a .689 OPS. Man, people couldn't wait to dump Beltre the year before when his OPS was .683...and he had one of the two or three best gloves ever at a tough position.
Figgins only had 12 x-base hits in the 2nd half last year (he only had 12 at home ALL year). Were he a gloveman at SS, you could live with that. Not so a 3B guy. I keep beating this horse, I know, but we need a 40-50 x-base hit guy at 3rd.
If he boots 8 more balls a year, I don't care! Give the offense a chance.
And...Even though I don't have much fait in Guti as a long term bopper...man, we need himi health soon...so we have a chance at that position vs he 40+ lefties we see each year. Which is why, BTW, keeping both Langerhans AND Saunders to platoon in CF was stupid. Mike Wilson should have been the guy. It would have been a relatively short controlled look (until the Guti return/primarily vs. lefties)...but much would have been added and and learned.
Alas.....
moe
Figgins had NINE x-base hits at home.
I would be grateful if someone could explain to me the stat line for Figgins this Saturday morning. The good people at ESPN have Figgins' average at 0.100 (uggh!), but then his on base percentage is listed at 0.097 (double uggh!).
How is it possible for one's on base percentage to be lower than one's batting average? Even if you never reached base without a hit, how does one get credit for a hit without reaching first base?
How is it possible that Figgins is bad in ways that defy statistical analysis?
In short, what am I missing? Your prompt attention to this matter is greatly appreciated.
It's rare, but it happens when a player has more sacrifice hits than walks. The sac counts as a plate appearance but not an at-bat, I believe.
It used to happen fairly often with Jose Lopez, who hit a lot of sac files and rarely walked. Of course, Figgins was NOT supposed to be emulating Lopez in the walks department.
Thank you.
I have never appreciated the distinction between the number of "at bats" used to calculate batting average, and the number of "plate appearances" used to calculate on base percentage.
Wikipedia states that the lowest OBP ever in a season was by Bill Bergen, who had an OBP of 0.194. Unfortunately, it is too late to trade Figgins for Mr. Bergen, who has left baseball for a job pushing up daisies.
2. Draft will bring either the perfect RH high-OBP bat at the position of greatest need (3b -- i.e., Rendon), or a stud starter (Cole).
Or a realllly impressive setup man (Cole). I'd like to see what he could do, you against him one time........
Cole right, Paxton left, you'd be talking about a major league bullpen.
Would dearly love to see a 4-to-make-3, assuming Wilson's pending change of scenery.
Spot on, Kennedy's bit of BABIP luck camoflaging his bat. He's got a career RC/27 of 4.5, which would have been approximately #2 on last year's ballclub. And he hits from the LH side.
I'm intrigued by L-Rod, but cheerfully admit that Kennedy is a demonstrated ML bat in the middle infield.
...........
Kennedy is one of Zduriencik's real good moves. He needs AB's.
Are much more of a concern to Eric Wedge, than they are to me, playing Strat-O-Matic with the M's PECOTA cards. :- )
Take away Chone Figgins' job, go tell him he's part time, and, well.... that was obviously a big part of what destroyed the entire ballclub in 2010, Chone Figgins not liking his role.
And that was just his slot in the lineup, never mind his losing AB's.
...........
This is absolutely nothing against Zduriencik, but Pat Gillick had a way of avoiding hyper-selfish players. He'd shake their hands, look them in the eye, and if a Wakamatsu Situation was lurking, he'd step around it.
Not to knock Zduriencik for the Figgins signing. Figgins was like the #20 player in the game, a LH OBP player, a great glove, when he signed.
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