Hideaki Wakui Scouting Report

Seibu Lions 27 year old right-handed pitcher Hideaki Wakui has exercised his domestic free agent option, which allows him to sign with other interested NPB teams. The Lions are not said to be interested in bringing him back, meaning he will end up elsewhere. Wakui is an interesting pitcher because he is still in his prime, meaning he started very early in the Ichi-gun to already have his option (he made his debut in his age 19 season in 2005), which tells us, without even having to double check, that he was very highly regarded coming out of high school and quickly found a role on the Lions. While his debut season was a disaster (as far as hits and homers go, which made his ERA over 7), Wakui quickly settled in as a dependable and very good starter. From 2006-2011, Wakui threw over 170 innings each year, with an ERA under 4 each year (only even close in 2008, with an ERA of 3.9). However, the Lions moved him to the closer role in 2012, and he really wasn't that effective, with a 4.60 kwERA and 122 ERA -. In 2013, Wakui was in the rotation early on, but was moved back to the bullpen, pitching in some low leverage roles before righting the ship and pitching in higher leverage situations before the season was over. It was an improvement, with a 3.89 kwERA and 109 ERA -, but it wasn't the same Wakui as we saw in 2006-2011.

I won't spend time looking at his delivery because I already did that in my breakdown of the Lions' deliveries.While his head is straight at the time of release, it appears that there is some arm drag as his body is closer to the plate than a pitcher normally is by the time he lets go of the ball. Because of this, his posture isn't that great, which could cause him to jerk the ball. In his actual delivery, he uses a large leg kick and hesitation to get deception, and hides the ball with a very slight body twist after the pause.

Before trying to take a look at what exactly went wrong with Wakui, first let's take a look at what Wakui is currently. Below is a quick summation and look at his pitches. Each GIF, excluding the change/fork GIF, is from a pitch this season. All 2013 pitch data comes from Michael Westbay and ScoutDragon, while all data 2012 and before comes from NPB Tracker.

Wakui's slider averaged about 80.4, a full MPH tick below what it was in 2011-2012.

Like most pitchers, Wakui has two different fastballs, a 4-seam and a moving fastball. His 4-seam averaged 88.2 MPH in 2013 and he threw it about 46 % of the time.

Here is Wakui's low moving fastball, something that works like a sinker. This is used a lot less frequently, less than six percent of the time. This averages about one MPH lower, at 87.2 MPH in 2013.

His curve is a slow curve, averaging about 69.7 MPH, and thrown about 7.3 percent of the time

The data says that Wakui throws both a change and a fork, but for our purposes here, I combined them. He threw the changeup just over six percent of the time in 2013, and the forkball just over 5 percent of the time. The changeup is about three kilometers slower, at about 79 MPH.

Now that we have taken a look at what Wakui is at this point and what to expect from him, I think looking at why he regressed from dependable starter to mediocre reliever. Anecdotally, it appears that the slider has lost a lot of sharp downward movement, but things like movement from year to year can be really hard to quantify without Pitch F/X data, so I thought I would look at location. First, here is a breakdown of Wakui located all his pitches in 2011, his last full year as a starter, where he had a 99 ERA - and 4.32 kwERA (he had actually seen a drop off of strikeouts that year, signally the start of his regression). Each square is broken down by percent, and it is from the pitcher's perspective, so the far right would be the arm side part of the plate for Wakui:

If Wakui was going to throw a pitch outside of the zone, it was going to be low and glove side, like a slider. His most common location overall is glove side and middle, though if he was going to go high in the zone, it was more likely to be arm side. This isn't too unusual, as it is traditional fastball/slider locations for a right-hander. Compare this to his 2012 graph:

As a reliever, Wakui increased his fastball usage, which helps explain why there is an increase in middle to high arm side pitches. However, instead of throwing the changeup less as a reliever, he threw it more in 2012, subtracting his slider usage more, which helps explain the difference in low and glove side pitches (a disappearance almost). However, it is tough to see him increasing low arm side pitches. It appears that overall, he was working higher in the zone more across the board. How about in 2013?

Obviously there is a huge difference in pitches thrown low and glove side out of the zone, with a heavy increase. There are less pitches high and arm side as well, going for more glove side pitches in general. While he saw a slight bump in slider usage in 2013 compared to 2012, but it was still lower than it was in 2011.

Hisashi Takeda Scouting Report

Hisashi Takeda is the latest NPB player to earn the international free agent option, meaning that he has the opportunity to sign with a MLB team if he chooses to do so (and assuming a team wants to sign him. He is in the middle of a two year deal, but from my understanding, he can get out of it by signing with an international team. I believe he is making about 2.5 million dollars this season. He says that he has no interest in living overseas, but this has been said before). Takeda is a right-handed reliever (no career starts in the NPB) that has served as the Nippon Ham Fighters closer since 2009. The 34 year old has been really good since taking over the job as well, giving up just 2.34 runs per 9 innings.

The problem is that much of Takeda's success seems to be batted ball related, as he has a 4.44 kwERA over that time with a 14.7 % strikeout rate. He has given up homers to just 1 percent of the batters he has faced, and walked just 6.6 % of hitters, meaning that while he doesn't strike anyone out, he doesn't give up homers or walk people either. This means that he gives up a lot of batted balls, and it appears that he is getting an unusual number of them turned into outs. This year he has a 59 ERA -, but is striking out less than 13 percent of batters faced, over four percent worse than league average (not adjusted for starters or relievers). So while it is hard to argue with his run prevention abilities, it is difficult to tell how much of it is him just taking advantage of the often run starved NPB environment. The first and most natural reaction seems to be to write off Takeda as a MLB prospect because he is not missing bats at a lower level so it is unlikely that he will miss bats at a higher level. However, I'll dig a little bit deeper than that.

From a scouting perspective, the first thing that stands out about Takeda is his height and size in general. He is listed at 5-7 and 161 pounds, laughably small for any professional athlete, especially for a successful pitcher.

Takeda compounds the lack of height with a really low release point thanks to the way he spreads out, as this photo from the Fighters' official site shows:

It is almost as if he takes advantage of his height by getting even lower. The photo also shows his somewhat bizarre arm action as he comes forward, a somewhat jerky motion that eventually comes over the top. Here is what it looks like from behind.I don't know who to compare it to because I am pretty sure that it is unique.

His arm angle is really standard, but it is still a low release point because of his height and the fact that he gets so low. In this case, the low release point may help him, as it isn't an angle hitters are used to seeing, and he is not in danger of leaving the ball up, because even though he doesn't get on top of the ball in a traditional manner, the ball would actually have to go up to be high in the zone. I think this helps explain his miniscule home run rate. Evidently, his arm angle is not easy for lefties to see because he has reverse splits when it comes to both batting average and strikeouts to walks.

Takeda is known to throw a fastball that gets up to 91 MPH on his best days and averages about 87. When watching him, I saw a lot of 138-139 km/h (about 86 MPH):

The following are GIFs of the rest of his pitches:

2-seamer:

73 MPH slider:

Curve

Fork/Splitter

 

The whiff on the fork is especially amusing, and it appears to be his best pitch. I do like his curve because it isn't too loopy and slow, though I think the slider is too soft and doesn't differentiate between the curve as much as you would like. For his fastball velocity, he seems to use it well, going arm side with the 2seam, and glove side with the 4seamer. Even at the NPB level, his fastball is more successful than the velocity would let on.

Because of the lack of fastball velocity and strikeouts, I don't think Takeda is a real MLB prospect, and I think his game wouldn't translate very well, though funnier things have happened, and it is really hard to quantify how the unique delivery and deception would play in a different league.

Yoshihisa Hirano Scouting Report

Yoshihisa Hirano is a 29 year old right-handed closer for the Orix Buffaloes. Once a reasonably effective but uninspiring starter (105 ERA - in 2006 and 104 ERA - in 2007, not park adjusted), Hirano has become one of the more effective relievers in the NPB, with a 2.53 kwERA over the last 4 years. In 2012, he walked just 5 batters in about 80 innings, while still striking out a batter per inning. I haven't heard rumors of him coming to United States, but the numbers are interesting, even if they don't quite match those of Kyuji Fujikawa's, who is 4 years older.

Hirano has okay size, listed at 6-1 185, and has an interesting delivery, mainly when he comes set with a pause that looks like this:

It isn't a long pause, but he brings his hands up high almost above his head.
The rest of his delivery is pretty standard other than his wrist, something he bends backward, like he is curling it or rolling it:

 This seemed quite unusual to me, something I wasn't really used to seeing.

However, Masahiro Tanaka also has the wrist bend:

Tanaka and Hirano's deliveries are strikingly similar overall, though Tanaka has less of a pause. Hirano has a better body as well, looking leaner and more athletic. I looked at some other notable pitchers, and they didn't seem to have quite the same wrist bend as Tanaka and Hirano.

Clayton Kershaw:

Fellow Japanese natives Yu Darvish and Hiroki Kuroda:

 I don't pretend to know anything about the pitch by pitch mechanics of pitching, but from what I understand, usually pitchers cock their wrists on sliders. However, the Hirano screenshot above is not on a slider, and it seems that he does this wrist curl with every pitch. I don't know what it means exactly, but he has always had good control (or low walk rates), so it is not like he is struggling to command everything he is throwing like a slider, but it may give him (and Tanaka) more movement on his pitches.

I took the Yahoo data from Hirano's last two outings to get a better idea of what he throws, which turned out to be one good outing and one bad outing. 28 of the 36 pitches he threw turned out to be fastballs, averaging 92 MPH and getting up to 94 MPH. So it is a decent and a big league capable fastball, but isn't a plus MLB fastball.

Hirano also threw a few forkballs at 82-84 MPH and 79-82 MPH slider.

Here is what Hirano's forkball grip looks like

The pitch doesn't break as much as it just never seems to get there. Anecdotally, he buried it well (occasionally he would spike it), and would throw it to fellow righties.

It seems that he has only the 4-seam fastball and not a moving fastball, but it does have a little run and he located it glove side a lot, coming into lefties on occasion, but also getting a little arm side tail away from lefties.

In other video I've seen of Hirano, he has broken out a curveball at about 66-68 MPH, but the movement and location of it showed why it isn't a pitch he features.

Overall, I think Hirano has pitches that will at least work in the big leagues. He is a reliever because that is what the numbers show he is, but the previous ability to throw a lot of innings at a time has some value and can give MLB teams some flexibility if they are interested. If he comes to the States, it won't be as an elite back of the bullpen pitcher, but as a piece of a bullpen that can go long or pitch in short spurts. Since he is a guy that has become accustomed pitching at the end of the game and being elite, he may have no motivation to come to the United States (basically, it is usually unhelpful to predict what a play does want or doesn't want to do), and the Buffaloes will definitely want to keep him, but he does seem like a guy that is worth keeping an eye on. Guys that throw strikes and don't walk people with fastballs over 90 MPH and an off-speed pitch that they can throw to left-handed hitters have value on MLB teams.

Scouting Oh Seung-hwan

According to recent rumors, MLB scouts have been watching 30 year old (turns 31 in July) Korean right-handed reliever Oh Seung-hwan. The Samsung Lions' closer has a career ERA of 1.64, 2.18 kwERA, and 2.20 FIP in the Korea Baseball Organization.

Samsung's park plays neutral (not my park factors) in the KBO, so we don't have to worry about that. According to my FIP WAA measure, he was worth 1.75 wins above an average pitcher in 2012, which was better than Scott Proctor (who has since retired after struggling in AAA in 2013) and Yoon Suk-Min, a starting pitcher who is represented by Scott Boras and rumored to be coming to the MLB some time soon. So statistically, he looks like the real deal comparatively, striking out 33 % of Korean hitters in his career.

Physically, he isn't real tall, but has a pretty broad frame, looking somewhat big, but not hefty or overweight. In fact, he is listed at just 5.84 feet (about 5'10) and just over 200 pounds. Despite this, he seems to get good plane on the ball, with some downward movement on some of his fastball. 

According to Naver, Oh features a 90-97 MPH fastball, with a slider he throws 80-89 MPH, and an occasional curve at 71-79 MPH. When high, the fastball is pretty straight (which seems to be his preferred location) and the general average I saw was about 93 MPH. It seems to me that he throws a separate fastball and sinker, and features one or the other depending on the outing (at least it seemed this way based on video). I am not real impressed with his slider movement wise, as it does get glove side, but doesn't break sharply. It bites more downwardly than sideways, and does a good job of changing eye levels at least. His curveball doesn't have great vertical depth, and is a little slow, but he gets it to move glove side.

The Naver scouting reports also say he throws an occasional two-seam fastball to lefties, which sounds like a cutter to me. I never saw one in the videos I watched of Oh. They question his ability to use a breaking ball other than a slider, which may lead to platoon splits in the MLB (so far this year in the KBO, he has struck out 11 lefties and walked 0, for whatever small sample size KBO splits are worth). Even though the scouting report doesn't mention it, I also saw him throw some arm-side changes at 86-87 MPH. It isn't a big part of his repertoire and he doesn't seem to have much control over it. 

His heat maps suggest that he likes to keep the ball arm side for the most part. Mechanically he is relatively simple (though he has a high leg kick), but perhaps jerks the ball a little bit too much with a violent over the top motion. While walks have never been a problem for Oh in his career, in videos I saw him struggle with command, it was because he was missing glove side by jerking the ball too much. His stride is somewhat normal, but the delivery is really quick (especially with runners on base, as he ditches the leg kick). His landing point isn't always consistent or smooth. At the time of release point, his back seems relatively upright, but is leaning to the left a bit.

The elbow (2010 and college) and shoulder (2009) injuries are going to rightfully scare some teams. Though, since he has been a reliever for the entirety of his KBO career (as far as I can see), it is doubtful that he has had to endure the high pitch counts that have become somewhat notorious in the East Asia. At 31 years of age at the time of signing, he will be on the "downslope" of his career, but he has a track record of professional dominance, a big league average to plus fastball, a useable breaking ball and mechanics that shouldn't bring up any major control problems. He looks like a big league reliever to me, one that can at least fit in a MLB bullpen and get a lot of right-handed hitters out.

Is Bruce Rondon Ready to Be a MLB Closer?

Bruce Rondon has been the subject of one of the more discussed storylines of the 2013 spring training, as the Tigers have insisted that they are going to use the rookie as their closer this year. Despite having a reputation of being an extremely hard thrower, the announcement was widely scorned because of Rondon's lack of experience. So far in spring training, his struggles have been widely documented, and he has struggled with control. I watched one of his outings on MLB Network and took some notes, and wanted to see if he was a pitcher that the Tigers should trust in close situations.

He is a big beefy right-handed pitcher, but perhaps has a little more athleticism that you would expect, (though obviously he isn't Austin Jackson on the mound). I think he provides a little bit of deception in his delivery, but nothing too major, or anything that seems especially hard to repeat.

He faced 4 righties and 2 lefties from the Braves, all MLB caliber or close to MLB caliber players. Here are the results, velocity, and location for all of his pitches in his inning of work.
I don't think his fastball is flat, it moves, and had a little arm-side tail at times. When down it could be a really nice groundball pitch, and could work as a sinker.

It seemed that maybe he wasn't finishing his delivery. He really fell off the mound a couple of times. Just from watching, his release point may not have been real inconsistent, but his body finishing point really was. I would think this would be a little concerning when it comes to injury than control.

 The slider did not look impressive for the most part. The break just wasn't very hard, mainly vertical. However, he threw one great one to B.J. Upton that bounced and was chased, only to pull the ball, not land consistently, and yank the next one past the catcher. Rondon also seems to have a separate change that breaks arm-side. He had absolutely no control of this and it moved well off the plate arm-side.

He was obviously hit hard by Justin Upton and Tyler Pastornicky, as both of the flyballs were deep flyballs. The control issues, lack of quality breaking ball, and fastball being hittable are all the problems that Rondon was said to have. Let's look at the data though.

His average pitch was 92.63 MPH. Out of all pitchers that have thrown at least 500 pitches since 2007, that number would be tied for 5th best. The names ahead of him aren't big names (besides Chapman, Cleto was a relatively big name in prospect circles from 2 years ago, and Villarreal is a teammate), but it is clear that Rondon is an extremely hard thrower, with elite velocity. He hits 99-100 MPH, or at least has in other outings, and didn't do so in this one, so one could imagine that it could get even harder.

He threw an average of 96.69 MPH on his fastball. That is tied for Tom Wilhelmsen for the 22nd best since 2007. Rondon averaged 84.5 MPH on his off-speed/breaking pitches. This obviously isn't elite, especially for sliders, and even for a changeup. Speed differential is overrated, but Rondon has it. I would rather him just have a 89-90 MPH breaking ball.

He got 4 swinging strikes, solid for 24 pitches. Amazingly, he got just one called strike. 11 of the 24 pitches were balls, just a 54.2 strike percentage. Obviously this is the problem. The 50 % swing rate is above average though, meaning that even though he threw a lot of balls, he got hitters to swing.

Here is his heatmap (remember, I am not distinguishing between balls and strikes and it is from a catcher perspective: 

8	1	1
1	4
2	4	3

As mentioned above, it didn't look like he was finishing his delivery, and was throwing mainly arm-side. He threw low and high about equally, usually throwing the fastball high and off-speed low (though sometimes the opposite).

I sort of wonder why Brayan Villarreal isn't getting more talk when it comes to be the Tigers' closer. He throws harder than Rondon (at least his averages are better than Rondon's was in the outing discussed above) and was really successful in the Majors last year. He had the platoon advantage more than league average, but even if he faces more lefties, his numbers should still be solid. For what it is worth, and it isn't worth much because projection systems are terrible at projecting rookie pitchers, Villarreal is projected to do much better.

You can see the raw stuff Rondon has. He should be a really nice reliever in the future. Whether or not that future is a month from now is the question. I think Rondon could hold his own and be an above replacement/non embarrassing reliever in the big leagues now. However, I would want to see him get some more seasoning, work on his breaking pitches, and see if he can tinker with his command/delivery a little more before bringing him into high leverage spots on a consistent basis.

2012 Manhattan College Scouting Report

Manhattan College's baseball team made the college regionals in the past summer, and here is my scouting report on some of the players on the team. They had no one drafted, so I am obviously didn't include any seniors.

Sophomore, so will be a junior, RHP Scott Mcclennan was the starter I saw. He has a 3/4ths delivery and it looks really awkward as his arm is not going with his body. He has a mid 80s fastball that for the most part isn't straight, and it seems to have some sink. His change has some arm-side tail and is anywhere between 76 MPH-82 MPH. He was really changeup heavy, relying on the pitch the most.
Curveball is a little different, some two plane break, pretty slow at 69-71 MPH. He seemed to use it heavily the second time through the order. Since it isn't real swing and miss stuff, Mcclennan was obviously pitching to contact. Coming off the mound, he was not a great athlete and has sort of a large build.

Anthony Vega, the centerfielder is a track star at the school, but I never really got to see him display his speed. The junior didn't get drafted, so he will be a senior for 2013. He is a left-handed hitter that doesn't seem to have the quickest bat or a swing that generates a lot of power, as he seems to want to go the other way. Despite the good build, there may just be too much swing and miss in his bat, especially with the lack of apparent power. The arm is not great out in the field.

Kyle Murphy played 1st base and will be a senior for the 2013 season. He is a right-handed hitter with corner outfielder build, but I got him at 4.41 to first (2 stolen bases all year). He has a good baseball body, but evidently not a ton of athleticism. He seemed to be a solid defender though. His swing is smooth and fluid, working well with his body, but it isn't very quick and the path isn't great (which could be why his statistics were pretty bad in 2013).

Ramon Ortega is also going to be a senior and is a catcher that is a large individual. He may not stick behind the plate and be confined to a 1st/DH role. I don't like his swing, but his frame alone will give him the ability to hit for some power (but it comes with swing and miss). The arm behind the plate doesn't look great.

Joe Mcclennan has a good glove and reaction times at 3rd base. He seems to have arm strength, but he wasn't always accurate. A big looking player, he would take a walk, but doesn't take advantage of the high pitch like you would want him to (his numbers bear that out as well, with a decent K/BB and OBP but not much power). He also seems like he is not much of a runner.

Yoandry Golan has no power, but the 2013 junior has a really good glove at shortstop. Statistically, he got better as a sophomore, especially his peripherals. He doesn't seem to have great athleticism or quickness, but just has great range and anticipation. His arm isn't great, and he really has to be great with on defense to stand any kind of chance professionally.

Jacob Marchus will be a Junior and is the team's closer. He has some fantastic ERAs, but not because of his K/BB but because he hasn't given up a homer yet. This certainly seems like an impressive feat, even with more repressed offense in the college game. While college stats in general aren't predictive, I would bet K/BB is more predictive than HR rates. Marchus has a very underwhelming right-handed fastball that seemed to sit at 86-87 MPH. He did have good changeup movement at about 83 MPH and also has a slow curve. He has a weird delivery that you actually see a lot in minor league and college lefties, with a high leg kick but no real stride or any kind of fluid motion. That just isn't big league or prospect stuff, and he doesn't even seem to have great pitchability or control.

Evaluating the Andrew Bailey trade

The Oakland Athletics sent Andrew Bailey and Ryan Sweeney to the Red Sox for Josh Reddick, Miles Head, Raul Alcantera

Andrew Bailey has a 7.2 WAR over his 3 year career, a 2.4 WAR average. He will be in his first year of arbitration in 2011. He has a sparkling -4.096 PE and -3.426 adjusted PE.  He has a spectacular TR of 13.52, and FIP - of 67. So for the past 3 years, Andrew Bailey has been one of the elite relief pitchers in the game. There is some cause for concern though. It seems there has been some regression. In 09 he had a WAR of 3.9, then a 2.4 in 10, and just a .9 in 2009. His PE was -2.37 in 2011, -2.75 Adjusted, and a FIP - of 73, and a SIERA of 2.99. These numbers are hard to complain about, and as long as the regression doesn't continue, they are still really good. There is also the point of small sample sizes, he pitched just over 40 innings in both 2010 and 2011.

Ryan Sweeney had a .8 WAR in 2011, with a 1.53 WAR average over the past 3 years. He is also arbitration eligible. In his career, he has a 1.5 D-WAR, with an above average Range Factor and Fielding Percentage. He did struggle in 2011, costing his team 3-5 runs above average. Offensively, he has a .342 OBP, 1.746 O4S, 95 OPS +, .196 Secondary Average, and .096 ISO. He has 4.5 Runs Created per Game and a .461 Offensive Winning Percentage. He made 1.4 million dollars in 2011.

Josh Reddick has a 1.9 WAR in 403 PA, not quite a full season. Adjusted for 600 PA, it is a 2.86 WAR. He isn't arbitration eligible yet, so he will make around half a million dollars in 2012. While proving to be an excellent defender, his offensive statistics are very poor so far. He has an O4S of 1.576, OPS + of 86, and .464 Offensive Winning Percentage. However, he has better Secondary Average and ISOs then Sweeney, at .227 and .168. This certainly gives you hope (along with his WAR projection) that he will be better than Sweeney. On the other hand, his AAA statistics are very unimpressive in over a full season of work, with just a .748 OPS, projecting to a poor .682 OPS in MLB.

Miles Head has never been above A ball, and has decent but not over impressive statistics at a .351 OBP, 1.85 O4S, and .172 ISO. He does walk almost 10 percent of the time. At first base, he is about average, perhaps a little bit better according to Range Factor.

Raul Alcantara is a similar story, he hasn't played above A-ball, but he is a starting pitcher. In 26 starts, he has an unspectacular .0369 PE, although his FIP is lower than his ERA. But even if his PE is an even 0, that doesn't translate well, and his lack of strikeouts (6 K/9IP) is concerning. However, his ERA is nice, and his K/BB ratio is a very very good 4.2. He is just a contact pitcher. Some have been very successful, and he can be if his HR/9IP stays at .1.

I give the nod to the Red Sox in this trade, it appears that Reddick is the best player in the trade according to WAR, but his poor offense concerns me for the A's. Sweeney is almost certainly a downgrade (especially with declining defense) from Reddick, but they add Bailey, who is a (although declining) solid closer. Although prospect gurus seem to like Alcantara and Head, their numbers make it hard for me to fall in love with them. Of course, who wins the trade will depend on how they do, but I still think the Sox have a slight edge.

The Travis Wood-Sean Marshall trade

The Cubs traded Sean Marshall to the Reds for Travis Wood, Dave Sappelt and Ronald Torreyes.

Marshall had a 2.5 WAR in 2011, and a 1.7 WAR average over the past 3 years. This is a bargain at a 3.1 million dollar salary for 2012, but he is a free agent afterwards. In 2011, he had a -3.75 PE, and -4.15 Adjusted PE. For his career, his PE is .33. In 2011 he pitched like a closer-type, but for his career, he has not very good reliever numbers. That is because earlier in his career, he was used many times as a starter. The Reds are probably not going to use him in this role, so it makes sense just to look at 2010 and 2011, the two years where he only pitched as a reliever. Those two years, he put up FIP - of 55 and 46, and SIERA's of 2.34 and 2.20. This is much better than their previous 9th inning man, Francisco Cordero, and is slightly better than Jonathan Papelbon and Ryan Madson.

Wood has a 1.5 WAR in 208.2 innings, which is about a full season. Fangraphs actually gives him a 3.3 WAR, as his PE is .99, but his adjusted PE is .56, virtually all as a starter. This is pretty solid. His FIP - is 94 with a SIERA of 4.22. He is a flyball pitcher, but he hasn't been bitten by the longball. He has given up a lot of line drives, but seems to be a pretty average starting pitcher that doesn't cost anything and is under club control for quite a while.

Ronald Torreyes is 19, and has never played above A ball. However, he has been pretty good, earning a .419 OBP and .935 OPS. He doesn't walk much, at just 5.3%, and he isn't a home run hitter.

Dave Sappelt has played in 38 games in MLB, so it is more helpful to look at his minor league statistics. He has 451 PA in AAA, so we should look there. There he had a .374 OBP, .838 OPS, and 3.16 Simple WAR. This translates to a .328 OBP and 1.67 Simple WAR. He is below average at Center Field however.

It appears to me that the Cubs won this trade. Even though the Reds got an under the radar elite relief pitcher, they gave up a cheap average starter, and a center fielder that is a good hitter and major league ready.

Is Boxberger ready to be a big league closer?

With the Free Agency of Francisco Cordero, there are rumors that the Reds may promote a closer from within. I like this strategy a whole lot better than overpaying a big name like the Rangers did with Joe Nathan and the Phillies with Papelbon. This strategy has worked for teams like the Rangers with Neftali Feliz, and even the Red Sox with Papelbon several years ago. The prevalent name in circles that follow the Reds is Brad Boxberger. So with only minor league statistics to guide us, can we see tell if he will be a good Major League reliever? He has spent 2 seasons in the minor leagues and in 153.2 innings, and has a -4.71 PE (with BABIPs of .233, .241, .392, and .329). More importantly, he threw 27.2 innings for the AAA affiliate of the Reds, an International League team. This means we can use the metric previously formulated here. Boxberger had a -6.03 PE and -5.8 Adjusted PE, predicting that he would have somewhere between a -3.5 PE to -3.27 PE in the Majors. Of course, negative is good, but for comparison, Madson had a -3.44 (adjusted) PE in 2011, Marmol a -4.65, and Papelbon has a career -5.3 PE. So Boxberger projects to be among some of the elite closers/relief pitchers in the game. There are a couple of questions though, the above is a very small sample size, and his BABIP was extremely low at .233. FIP still has him at a 3.16 (that is why there is much of a change in adjusted PE), but he walked nearly 5 batters every 5 inning. This makes you question the validity of many of the AAA statistics. However, his overall minor league statistics (a decent sized sample), and his success in the very hitter friendly Arizona Fall League (-5.68 in 13.1 innings, obviously another small sample size) lead me to believe that it would be much smarter to use Boxberger as a closer than spending a bunch of money on a free agent closer (frankly, the market seems to set up to overpay closers). If Boxberger doesn't work out during the season, you can always try to trade for one (if the Reds are in contention). But even if Boxberger is only half as effective as Papelbon in 2012 (he projects to be better than that), he will still be making 3.8% of Papelbon's salary.

Will the Cubs trade Marmol?

Rumors are now swirling that the Cubs may consider trading closer Carlos Marmol. Marmol had a .9 WAR in 2011, with a WAR average over the past 3 years of 1.8. This is worth 5.4 million, but he is scheduled to make 7 million dollars in 2012. So certainly according to WAR, it is definitely time for the Cubs to move on. As one would expect for the type of pitcher he is, he registered a very good -4.65 PE, and an adjusted PE of -5.12 in 2011. In his career, his PE is -5.33, with an adjusted PE of -4.95. In 2011, his TR was 9.54, while it is 9.48 for his career. According to his career statistics, 2011 was a pretty good window, that is what you are going to get. The Bill James Projections don't give him quite the credit, but still have him at a -4.74 PE.

It is always nice to have a pitcher who misses bats, but Marmol has gotten too costly. Frequent readers of the blog know where I stand on this, bullpens should be built with relatively little money, with former starters and prospects. It simply doesn't make sense to give someone 7 million dollars to pitch 60 innings.

Correction: I want Jonathan Papelbon's job

The Phillies GM went on the MLB Network's Clubhouse Confidential the other day and told the baseball world that the Phillies are more interested in scouting than analytics in baseball. Perhaps they have shunned some analytics so much that they don't understand simple mathematics. I prematurely posted on the Ryan Madson contract with the Phillies (that deal end up falling through, I will keep the post up because it still has relevancy for teams considering Madson), and mocked the Phillies for that deal, but this Papelbon deal is even worse. They are giving a 4 year $50 million deal to a pitcher who throws about 60 innings a season. He will make 12.5 million a year (although probably not that exact number every year, but that will be the average), or about 1 million dollars every 5 innings. In 2011, Papelbon's WAR was all of 2. Teammate and fellow reliever Alfredo Aceves had a 2.9 WAR in 2011, while the set-up man Daniel Bard and 4th outfielder Josh Reddick both had 1.6 WARs. Over the past 3 years, Papelbon has a WAR average of just 2.1, worth 6.3 million dollars according to the Halladay Standard. So according to the most important and encompassing metric, Papelbon is being paid twice as much as he is worth. His -5.3 PE and 14.03 TR show that Papelbon is an incredible pitcher, and I am certainly not arguing that he is not, but with the small number of innings he actually pitches, he certainly isn't wort even close the the amount of money he is getting paid.

I want Ryan Madson's job

So it appears the Phillies have offered closer Ryan Madson a 4 year 44 million dollar deal. Madson had a 2.2 WAR in 2011, with a 1.7 WAR average over the past 3 years. The latter is worth 5.1 million, while the former is worth 6.6 million. You could probably end the article right here, but just for fun, I want to include this quote from Keith Law's twitter account: "The Phillies are now set up to pay $11MM to a guy who threw just over 4% of their innings in 2011, which is great on a $500MM payroll." So it is quite obvious that Ryan Madson is being way overpaid by the Phillies. All the reports I am hearing is that they are going to keep him as a closer. The only real way to redeem this contract is to make him a starter. He had a 2.2 WAR in 60.2 innings, and if he pitched 200 innings at the same success, he would have a 7.3 WAR which would be worth about 22 million a year, which would actually be a deal for Philly. However, that would be assuming the same success that he has as a reliever to a starter. This is no slam dunk, and in fact reliever's PEs are much lower than starters on average. For Madson to meet the WAR neccessary to earn 11 million dollars, he would need to throw 100 innings at the same effectiveness he threw 60 innings in 2011. This most certainly won't happen. Madson is a very good reliever, he had an adjusted PE of -3.44 in 2011, but he certainly isn't worth 11 million unless he is a top of the rotation starter, and the Phillies have a few of those.

Free Agent Watch: Phillips and Cordero

The Cincinnati Reds have 2 big free agents that they could possibly lose this offseason. Both starting 2nd basemen Brandon Phillips, and closer Francisco Cordero can test the free agent waters. The Reds have all the intent on keeping these two, as they were discussing contracts even before the season is over. First, Brandon Phillips: how much value does he have, and how much is he worth? He has already said that he will not give the Reds a "hometown discount". In 2011, he had his career high in both batting average and on base percentage. He also posted his career high WAR (4.1) and 30 years old. This is usually bad news, because this almost always adds up to a player being overpaid in the next contract. According to last year's numbers and the Halladay Standard, he deserves 12.3 million dollars. However, even though teams do it all the time, it is incredibly stupid to pay a player because of one year's performance. Instead, lets look at the 09-11. In that time, he averaged a 2.9 WAR, this would mean he is worth $8.7 million. If I were the Reds, I wouldn't go over this number (and may even go lower). I don't have a real pulse on how this situation will play out, but it seems that the Reds are really going to make sure he stays a Red. This may mean overpaying him, and could be a disaster. Now, on to Francisco Cordero. Closers are usually way overpaid (and now 7th and 8th inning guys are getting this way as well). Let me use a couple of examples, Mariano Rivera is making $15 million dollars to put up a 3.5 WAR and -3.843 PE (for those who counter that his postseason experience/success makes him invaluable, 27 of the 30 teams cannot afford to massively overpay a player just for the postseason). His own bullpen teammate David Robertson has posted a 3.9 WAR and -9.595 PE, while only making $460,000. Angels' closer Jordan Walden posted a 1.2 WAR while only making $416,000, Rangers' closer Neftali Feliz posted a 1.6 WAR while making just $457,000, and Rays' closer Kyle Farnsworth has a 1.8 WAR while making $3.25 million. This doesn't mention that a closer is not near as valuable as a starting pitcher, Alexi Ogando put up the same exact WAR as Rivera this season. With Cordero, the story isn't any different, as he made 12 million this year, while posting a WAR of 2.4, giving him a WASP way over the Halladay Standard at 5217. His WASP as a Red is 5302. This doesn't even mention that his PE was very unimpressive this year at .049. Unless Cordero is willing to take a huge pay cut, there is no way I would bring him back. However, I would not be surprised at all to see the Reds bring him back anyway.

So you have saved 600 have you? Mariano Rivera

Last night, Yankee's closer Mariano Rivera saved his 600th game. He did this around midnight Central time in Seattle, on a, bizarrely, failed Ichiro (I am really starting to question whether this season is just an aberration for Ichiro, he may be done) stolen base attempt, with little fanfare and no celebration. Rivera, who is now just 1 save behind all-time leader Trevor Hoffman, is still pitching great, with a 2.05 ERA, .930 WHIP, nearly a strikeout per inning pitched, only 1 walk per 9 innings, 21 RAR (Runs Above Replacement), and 3.1 WAR (Wins Above Replacement). For his career, Rivera has a 55.9 WAR (basically meaning he has single handedly won 60 games for the Yankees, when you add up all his accomplishments), and this doesn't even mention the post-season success. Saber-metrically, his career compares to Dennis Eckersley who compiled a 59 WAR in his career. However, it is quite silly to call (as I have been hearing lately) Rivera "the most valuable Yankee" or "greatest pitcher ever, as Greg Maddux had a WAR of nearly 100 for his career, and C.C. Sabathia more than doubles Rivera's WAR on the season with a 6.5. Relief pitchers, no matter how great, cannot be as valuable as good starting pitchers (this explains how Brandon League's, clearly having the better year, WAR is lower than Brandon Morrow's, who has struggled for the most part). As far as Rivera salary to performance (measured by WASP, which is discussed in previous postings here) he is well above (above is bad, below is good) the "Halladay Standard", posting a WASP of nearly 5000. But one could correctly make the point that the Yankees do not need to worry about efficiency because they are able to spend so much money. During his career, Rivera has made an eye popping $144 million and change. However, his career WASP is under the "Halladay Standard" of 3000 at 2585.51, so even for moneyball teams, Rivera would have been worth it. An obvious hall of famer, Rivera will become the all-time leader in saves with in the next few days, and its always fun seeing old guys do great