2010 MLB Season Discussion

[Penthesilea]

Halladay's a scrub; I only wish we got the chance to face him every day.

Spoiler: show

Sanchez's strikezone is gigantic compared to what Leroy is getting. He keeps getting the low strikes/outside corner.

[Akiyama]

Ah.. 6 in a row.

[pohibaba]

Sanchez's strikezone is gigantic compared to what Leroy is getting. He keeps getting the low strikes/outside corner.

This sure sounds like fanboy crying to me. The zone is huge for both of them.

[Bozo]

Ryan just missed a 3-run bomb to center off a lefty of all things in his 1st at bat following the contract. CF made a tough catch which makes it sting more. Probably a homer in any other park besides Minute Maid though. Strike zone is all over and small.

[Alderaan]

If i was a Braves pitcher, i'd boycott. In such a pissy mood.

[pohibaba]

It took the worst offense in all of baseball to give Doc his first loss of the year. Go Giants!

[Bozo]

Meh. Phillies should have won that. Sanchez has a ton of baserunners and only gives up 1 run. Phillies leave em' loaded 2-3 times. Doc gets unlucky with the homer off the foul pole and the one double down the line.

Come back soon J-roll, Phillies need some sort of offensive spark to get it going again.

[Kyo]

Meh. Phillies should have won that. Sanchez has a ton of baserunners and only gives up 1 run. Phillies leave em' loaded 2-3 times. Doc gets unlucky with the homer off the foul pole and the one double down the line.

Come back soon J-roll, Phillies need some sort of offensive spark to get it going again.

I'm not sure how you can say a team "should" have won a game when they clearly didnt drive those runners in, cant award a team a win with shoulda coulda woulda's.

[Bozo]

Well I meant that they shouldn't have stranded so many guys. They were in a ton of opportunities where all they needed was a single to get something going and got nothing. I'm not trying to take anything away from the Giants but they just looked really bad in the game. I'm sure they'll snap out of it soon.

[Havocxx]

Met's player Angel suspended for 50 games for doping.

The Ryan Howard contract is pretty bad, but not Vernon Wells bad. They're overpaying him for too many years in which he'd need to be 2009 value Ryan Howard or better in his ages 32-37 seasons. Hitters comparable to Howard's profile all declined horribly through those ages; Richie Sexson, Cecil Fielder, Mo Vaugn, David Ortiz, Tony Clark and others are among Ryan Howard’s most comparable hitters according to Baseball-Reference. All of them dropped off harshly in their early 30s. About the only success story in Howard’s top ten comparables in Willie McCovey.

[Bozo]

If Howard had signed with anyone but Philadelphia then 99% of the people would love it. All the "experts" just know two teams no matter how good or bad they are and I think we all know who those teams are. I'm glad all the experts pretending to be know-it-alls got a big "Fuck You" shoved in their face and I hope it happens again with Werth so everyone can moan that it's a bad contract because it wasn't with the Red Sox or Yankees.

Edit: http://www.thefightins.com/meechone/...n-howard-deal/ Pretty much sums up what I'm talking about. I don't know how you can be so disrespectful to a guy(and organization) after he's been a huge reason why the Phillies have even been to two World Series in a row.

[Havocxx]

I like Ryan Howard, he's been a big time player for your Phils, but contracts that long should be more about what Howard is going to do instead of what he has already done.

Just take a look at the most similar hitters to Ryan Howard on baseball-reference.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/pl...owarry01.shtml

Similar Batters through 29
View Player Links in Pop-up
Compare Stats to Similars

1. Richie Sexson ( 918 )
2. Cecil Fielder (893)
3. Mo Vaughn (891)
4. Willie McCovey (891) *
5. David Ortiz (890)
6. Tony Clark (890)
7. Mark McGwire (889)
8. Carlos Delgado (889)
9. Fred McGriff (885)
10. Norm Cash (876)

* - Signifies Hall of Famer

Most of the hitters that Ryan Howard is comparable drop off significantly in their early-mid 30s. Willie McCovey the only of the 10 most similar hitters to Howard to produce well into their mid 30s.

Just look at Ortiz, one of Howard's comps. Imagine Ortiz getting the same deal after his 54 homer season in 2006 at 30 years old. He produced the following year, but the past 3 years he's fallen off the proverbial cliff. OPS+ from 170 down to 101 in 2 years (An OPS+ of 100 is the atypical league minimum 395k salary replacement-level guy, basically 'average' in every sense of the word.) Ortiz is currently at an OPS+ 47 for 2010, which small sample size willing, is fucking horrible.


I hope Howard keeps mashing, destroying the Mets, and losing to the Yanks in the WS, but this contract just looks way too risky for the Phillies.

[CalaisDL]

If Howard had signed with anyone but Philadelphia then 99% of the people would love it. All the "experts" just know two teams no matter how good or bad they are and I think we all know who those teams are. I'm glad all the experts pretending to be know-it-alls got a big "Fuck You" shoved in their face and I hope it happens again with Werth so everyone can moan that it's a bad contract because it wasn't with the Red Sox or Yankees.

Edit: http://www.thefightins.com/meechone/...n-howard-deal/ Pretty much sums up what I'm talking about. I don't know how you can be so disrespectful to a guy(and organization) after he's been a huge reason why the Phillies have even been to two World Series in a row.

I stopped reading that article when it started ridiculing Rob Neyer for ridiculing the overvaluation of rbi's. I think most people in this thread would agree that rbi's are an outdated way of measuring offensive production. I have read a lot of articles and opinions on the Ryan Howard deal and I haven't seen anyone arguing that Howard is a shitty player or anything but a very nice guy, but he is not a good enough player to warrant this type of contract. They're paying him like he's going to reproduce his MVP season every year going into the downswing of his career. He is without a doubt a great homerun hitter and a pretty good defensive first basemen, but he's closer to a more defensively inclined Adam Dunn than he is to an elite talent like Pujols. I just can't see any way that this contract is going to be worthwhile for the Phllies 3-5 years down the road.

Here's an article that pretty much sums up what I'm talking about. The comments are worth reading too. http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index...lies-thinking/.

[Cephius]

I'm in the camp that the Phillies overpaid for Howard. Will it matter? If they don't keep Werth, yes it's a bad deal. If they keep Werth anyway, who cares.

http://hphotos-snc3.fbcdn.net/hs531....7_904440_n.jpg

Would be a cool pic if they weren't weirdly touching Mo.

[fren.]

Why is Pettitte doing a half-assed imitation of Captain Morgan?

[CalaisDL]

I thought he was just trying to mount Rivera.

[Alderaan]

Braves started 10-11 last April compared to 8-11 now with 4 games to play.

We've scored 12 less runs but also given up 10 less.

I'm not ready to panic yet. They have to break out of this slump at some point.

The problem is, as Chipper has said, they failed to make the playoff because of their horrible start last year.

[Cephius]

Thank you Curt Schilling for reminding Yankee fans there are people we hate more than Javier Vazquez.

[Melena]

Schilling is a fucking retard. Outside of people in Boston, I think everyone tunes him out when he opens his mouth.

[Pringles]

And the Yankees loss to the Orioles. Glad I didn't end up going to this game with a coworker like I planned to. Oh well, still tomorrow.