Even Mike Harmon gets it.
"Mike Harmon is a Yahoo! Fantasy Sports expert" according to Yahoo. He's one of the guys that has me contemplating starting up my own fantasy website just so that people will have something worth reading. If you read a lot of fantasy sports columns, his are the ones that involve the largest number of synonyms for "hit" when discussing home runs. In a Mike Harmon column, a hitter "bashed 20 taters" or "crushed 17 dongs". A hitter never "hit 25 homers" in his columns. He's not among the worst, btw, but regardless - generally doesn't get it.
And yet, in his review of right-fielders...
Moises Alou, SF
Alou leaves the North Side of Chicago to reunite with his father in San Francisco. The 38-year-old slugger established a new career-high with 39 home runs last season. He reached the 100-RBI mark for the fifth time in his career and topped 100 runs for the second time. Alou will miss Wrigley Field, where he launched 29 of his 39 home runs. Additionally, his batting average was 92 points higher at home than on the road.
When even mediocre fantasy sports columnists see things that a team's GM doesn't see, you know you have a problem...
posted by Eric @ 9:54 AM
5 Comments:
Personally, I'd rather Brian Sabean had done these things...
Signed Jeremy Burnitz on a one year, 2 million dollar contract to play right field. Average savings per season, 4 million.
Named Yorvit Torrealba the starting catcher, and Dustin Hermanson the closer. Average savings per season...heck, off the top of my head, about 9 million?
Signed Garciapparra instead of Oldmar Vasquez. - 1.75 million
Not paid Pedro Feliz an average of 3.05 million to be a utility player, then found a utility player that will play for what utility players usually make. Average saving per season...I'll call it 2 million.
Found someone who'd give up a B level prospect for Marquis Grissom. Savings -- 2 million.
After doing those things, Sabean would be looking at 15 million in yearly payroll he could spend on...well, only a couple more million would have put him in Beltran territory, but I'd have settled for Steve Finley. If he signed Finley for about that 10 million the Tigers paid him, he'd have had enough left to upgrade to Magglio over Burnitz.
Then, left-handed hitting be damned, I'd have kept Mohr over Tucker.
I can dream, can't I?
Some interesting ideas in here, Daniel. Working from the top-down:
Steve Finley: I know the Giants went hard for him, and offered him more money than the 2 years, $14M that the Angels (not Tigers) paid him, but he wanted to go Southern California. And honestly, Steve Finley exists to hurt the Giants. If we'd signed him, he'd finally wake up and realize he was 40, miss 85 games and hit .220 / .285 / .410 for the remaining games.
Nomar Garciaparra: I'd have loved to see him signed, but ... $1.75M?? The Cubs are paying him $11M for this year. It bears mentioning that I'd rather have paid $11M for Nomar for one year and backed him up with Deivi than $13M for three years of Omar, but that's neither here nor there.
Burnitz to play right field: Take away Coors and Burnitz is pretty mediocre at this point in his career. His last few non-Coors stints:
2004 (road stats): 270 AB; .244 / .327 / .448
2003 (Dodgers): 230 AB; .204 / .252 / .391
2003 (Mets): 234 AB; .274 / .344 / .581
2002 (Mets): 479 AB; .215 / .311 / .365
There are worse players than Burnitz, to be sure, and I think I'd probably rather have Burnitz for $2M than Alou for $13M over two years. As a 36-year-old, left-handed average outfielder, I don't think Burnitz would have been a great fit for the Giants. The only way I'd have been into this idea would be if he were platooning with Grissom in CF. I'd like that. Burnitz doesn't have big platoon splits, although he does have a small bias, but just getting Grissom out of there for the ABs against RHP would be worth it, and Burnitz is probably as good a defender at this point as Grissom.
Grissom: I don't agree with trading him for a B-level prospect (unless a B-level prospect in your book means more than in mine). I've said this 100 times and I'll probably say it 100 more while Grissom is still a giant, but ... he's a powerful weapon. He's just not the type of weapon they perceive him to be. He's a spectacular fourth outfielder. He can still play CF and should start against lefties or pinch-hit when a lefty reliever is brought in. Over the last three years his line against lefties is brutal:
422 AB; .325 / .369 / .616 (31 HR)
He can contribute 200 really great ABs to a team. It just undermines those 200 ABs to let him stand in there for 350 really terrible ABs when a lefty isn't on the mound.
Yorvit: Couldn't agree more.
Hermanson: Couldn't agree less.
Mohr: I'd have preferred they keep him. Strongly.
Feliz: I can't discuss this rationally. It should have been Feliz that went to Coors, not Dustan Mohr. Then I could have drafted Feliz in my fantasy league and watched him hit .310 / .345 / .550 with 39 homers. He'd be the new Vinny Castilla!
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