Great article - and exactly what I've been seeing as the org paradigm under Z.
What I love is the smarts in working with what they had. They landed with a club with dreadful offense, dreadful defense, and tepid pitching. The pitching was the best part of the tri-corner, but even that wasn't great.
The combo of - improve the defense - and in doing so, improve the pitching was working within budget - and building on a (relative) strength by attacking a synergystic weakness.
Attached to that is a methodology best described as playing "The Weakest Link" -- where the primary moves have been to examine the worst performers on the roster, and find creative ways to get rid of them, even if the incoming replacements aren't ones to go all googly-eyed over.
Silva for Bradley
Hall for Kotchman
I view both as motivated "primarily" by what was being dumped, (useless garbage), for something with potential value. In both cases, the imports are not your "guaranteed winner" types. But, IMO, in both cases, the comparison of old/new versus hurts/helps is humongous.
I guess this is why I rankle at the Kotchman negativity. The focus is on what's he's not - (Dunn or Fielder or A.G.) - which are dreams -- vs. what he's not - Bill Hall -- which is, in fact, the reality.
Picking up from this thread: http://seattlesportsinsider.com/news/bat-first-shortstops
Also bouncing off the SI story, which should be read, but I think might emphasize the defense stuff (as the "flavor of the month") a little more than Z and Blengino actually do: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1166492/index...
One key quote from Blengino:
The Seattle front office's decision to focus on defense last winter was a pragmatic reaction to the market. "We had to figure out what we could do to get good quickly," says Blengino, 46, a former CPA who began as assistant director of amateur scouting under Zduriencik in Milwaukee. "You can't just putter around and be mediocre at everything. You have to find your soul as a club. And here, with Felix Hernandez at the top of the rotation and playing our games in Safeco Field, one of the biggest ballparks in the majors, we felt that given the relative availability of defensive players as opposed to offensive players, focusing on defense was a way that could pay dividends."
And other key quotes from Blengino and Z:
"Defense might be the new OBP," says Blengino, "but at some point it's going to be something else that will be underappreciated. It may be something that has nothing to do with the statistical perspective. A team that figures out how to get 250 innings out of a starter, for example, is going to have a huge advantage. Who knows what the next inefficiency in the marketplace is going to be."
But the shift hasn't happened yet. The defensive revolution is still young. And the Mariners will ride the wave as long as they can. "We're not smarter than anyone else, I can promise you that," says Zduriencik. "But I can promise that we'll always be trying to find that edge. We'll always try to be a step ahead."
So, a couple of things:
-- They view defense as ONE form of "new moneyball" and, particularly, the easiest way to "get good quickly."
-- They do not view defense as THE ONLY form of "new moneyball" and they will "always try to be a step ahead."
Seems to me that:
-- They emphasized defense to "get good quickly" IN SAFECO (Blengino always talks about how they want to fit the park), but also . . .
-- Overall, I think they are most interested in "pitcher-calming-defense," and they will look to offense once they make sure there are no disasters out there. They don't want pitchers pitching scared.
And also:
-- "Defense Moneyball" is obviously enough above the radar that it gets the big SI spread, but . . .
-- "Psychology Moneyball" is clearly part of the plan: find guys who were "outside the comfort zone" and try to get them back in a "comfort zone" (Snell, clearly; Kotchman, from Z's comments when he came in; maybe Cordero -- though Doc views him as never having been good in the first place)
-- "Fitness Moneyball" is the Dr. Elliot plan: find guys who have been training wrong and get them right.
-- and probably several more that we haven't picked up on yet
Comments
Every player they've added has been the type of guy that they think they can help in some specific way...or the type of player that they think can help other players. They got Jack Wilson to help all of the pitchers and possibly to help Jose Lopez become a better infielder. They got Griffey to help fix the clubhouse. They got Bradley because they think their team/media environment will kepe him sane enough to max out his value. They got Kotchman because they think he was playing without a comfort level (same reason they got Branyan) and they think they can fix that.
That sort of thing isn't being talked about in the papers, but it shows a top-down coherence in strategy that has always been lacking in Seattle...EVEN UNDER GILLICK!
The comment about 'The Weakest Link' made me realize that the M's are rebuilding the organization in a manner very similar to the Theory of Constraints.
In this management philosophy, you identify the biggest thing that is keeping you from reaching your goal, the constraint. Then you put the whole organization to work eliminating that constraint. At this point, a new constraint will have emerged as the biggest one, so you tackle it. From Wikipedia:
Assuming the goal of the organization has been articulated (e.g., "Make money now and in the future") the steps are:
1. Identify the constraint (the resource or policy that prevents the organization from obtaining more of the goal)
2. Decide how to exploit the constraint (make sure the constraint's time is not wasted doing things that it should not do)
3. Subordinate all other processes to above decision (align the whole system or organization to support the decision made above)
4. Elevate the constraint (if required or possible, permanently increase capacity of the constraint; "buy more")
5. If, as a result of these steps, the constraint has moved, return to Step 1. Don't let inertia become the constraint.
Zduriencik stepped in to an organization with deficiencies in a lot of different areas. They are tackling multiple constraints at the same time, clearly prioritizing the biggest ones, trying to move the organization towards their goal.
They couldn't fix the offense, defense, and pitching all at once, so they started with defense - it could be fixed quicker and more cheaply than the others. In light of TOC, you can see why they would be so adamant about not sacrificing defense for offense. To do so would be reducing your defensive 'capacity' and would cause defense to become the constraint again sooner.
That argument caught my eye.
Bill Hall:
.251/.309/.441/.750, 93 OPS+ hitter as of age 29.
Played SS, 3B and 2B, with some CF. Could probably handle 1B at a plus level.
Casey Kotchman:
.269.337/.406/.742, 95 OPS+ hitter as of age 26.
Plays a plus 1B. Is younger and cheaper than Hall. Hasn't proven to be significantly better.
Trading out Hall for Kotchman is adding a guy you hope might go back to his one good year as a hitter (where he had a 119 OPS+) for a guy that someone else is hoping can go back to his two good years as a hitter (where he posted 116 and 125 OPS+ numbers in consecutive years).
This isn't a slam-dunk win. This is a red-and-blue deck chair that's on sale that you can swap your green-and-black deck chair for. Just MO, though - I certainly hope Kotchman can give us more than I think he can, and the Hall-for-Kotchman swap won't just be a money saver, it'll be a performance-improver too.
As for the main point of the article, always seeking out new Moneyball avenues for maximizing our expenditures:
Great stuff. :D And I agree.
The As are also on to defense as a way to fill out their roster, and I believe they tried to hire Dr. Elliott before we did to pursue fitness as another Moneyball principle, as we have.
It's interesting to finally have a front office willing to get into these sorts of knife-fights over principles and unexploited advantages.
We won't win all of em, but at least we're not getting stabbed blindly in dark alleys any more...
~G
The second scenario doesn't work though.
They didn't save much in the Hall-Kotchman trade, and there was no need to take on Kotchman (he wasn't on a gauranteed contract) if it was just a dump of Hall.
The second scenario doesn't work though.
They didn't save much in the Hall-Kotchman trade, and there was no need to take on Kotchman (he wasn't on a gauranteed contract) if it was just a dump of Hall.
I love the Eliot move. Its just awesome.
Blengino quote about "waiting for proven metrics" concerns me a little. - "Who knows what the next inefficiency in the marketplace is going to be?"
He seems to be knowledgable in all areas of 'proven' sabmetrics, which means he is probably similar to a very educated fangraphs fan. In valuing defense properly and ignoring things like double plays and baserunning (that aren't mainstream sabermetrics yet), hes likely whiffed on analyzing Kotchman's true value. Blengino is a solid sabr analyst, but he'll never be ahead of the curve with that mindset.
Kotchman going to have to break out this season to make any sort of sense. With Sweeney going nuts, I just wish we could trade him away somehow and use that money for Washburn.