The False Dichotomy of Being Buyers or Sellers

A newt

You may have noticed that the Pirates look like a sinking ship. Andrew McCutchen has been turned into a newt. Jeff Locke misses more lunar eclipses than bats. Francisco Liriano, Juan Nicasio and Jon Neise have left a mess on the mound and there's no one to help closer Mark Melancon clean it up. After a 6-20 stretch from May to late June, they're under .500 and so far behind the Cubs they're about to be lapped.

So, the thinking seems to go, management either believes they can win a Wild Card or they're going to sell off parts at the trade deadline.

Talk about a false dichotomy.

Trading away valuable veterans makes sense if your team won't contend until those veterans leave or lose their value. If Pittsburgh brass believes 2016 is a lost cause they might want to unload a player who turns free agent in November. But jettisoning assets from a team that won 98 times last season for future value is the work of a paranoid schizophrenic.

Total Rebuild as Default
We have become so accustomed to the total rebuild that we've lost sight of what a dramatic and desperate act it is. It's tantamount to giving up in hopes of bouncing back twice as strong a few years hence. Which is why it shouldn't be the default position for any franchise, much less one that seems to be in nothing more than a slump.

That's even assuming the Pirates are a lost cause. In fact, they're a fine offensive and defensive team, except for a rotation that's lighting up scoreboards and dragging the team to a 37-40 record. If you're going to suffer the extended scuffling of good players, it might as well be in the element of the game that is most inconsistent under the best of circumstances.

Small Improvement = Wild Card Contender
Indeed, if Bucco hurling improves from fourth worst to middle of the pack in their remaining 85 games, the Pirates could easily make up the 4.5-game gap between them and the Wild Card. With a pitching coach, Ray Searage, considered something of a mound whisperer, and a rotation of hurlers who have achieved success in the past, that is eminently possible. It might even be predictable.

If GM Neal Huntington believes third basemen David Freese and Jung-ho Kang are sufficiently redundant to swap one for a set-up man or a third starter, that's defensible. If he wants to hedge his bets on sacrificing the long-term for a Wild Card charge that might fall short, that's understandable. 

If he announces he's flipping the roster for draft picks and Single-A All Stars, I want to see a picture ID, because that's some irrational fan talking, not the savvy team builder who turned the franchise around from the two dark decades that preceded him. 

The Pirates have more choices than just buyers or sellers. If the pundits don't know it, I guarantee that the people who run the club do.

Yes Way Jose: Mets Sell High and Buy Low on Reyes

Buy low and sell high, goes the cliche about investing in the stock market. If we could gaze confidently into the future, we all would have bought Apple stock in 2003 and sold it on Feb. 23, 2015. But we couldn't, so we didn't.

Baseball teams do have some future-gazing tools, which the NY Mets employed when superstar shortstop Jose Reyes qualified for free agency following a stupendous 2011 season. What they saw was a sufficiently high risk of injury and declining performance as he entered his 30s to dissuade them from making a nine figure commitment to him.

Big Contract; Middling Returns
So Reyes signed with a Miami outfit that was going for broke in 2012, and, in fact, broke. He was swapped to Toronto, which attempted a similar all-in policy with the same results, at least in the first two seasons. That strategy paid off in a division title for the Blue Jays last year, but not until after they tossed their oft-laid-up shortstop to Colorado for his doppelganger -- Troy Tulowitzki. 

It's fair to say both teams lost that deal. Reyes' skills have been knocked down twice by Father Time and the inevitable TKO may be imminent, but the $70 million remaining on his contract continues in fine fettle. Then, in the wake of a 51-game suspension for "alledgedly" knocking around his wife while on winter vacation, Reyes was jettisoned to his own devices by the Rockies.

Caveat

(I'm purposely avoiding any discussion of Reyes and his "alleged" wife-beating because we've been down this road before. For the record, I'm opposed to any kind of person-beating and endorse long suspensions for such actions, even when cases won't hold up to the exceptionally high standard of reasonable doubt necessary for prosecution that could lead to a conviction. That is exactly what Commissioner Rob Manfred imposed on Reyes at a cost to the ballplayer of $7 million. He has now served his time, expressed his contrition and agreed to further conditions. So I'll focus on the baseball end of things and hope that he has learned to treat his bride with the respect she deserves.)

The Price Has Come Down
So this week, two-thirds (or some similar fraction) of Jose Reyes was available for roughly 1/66th of the price. The New York Mets, desperate for any species of offense after being repeatedly white-washed by the International League Atlanta Braves, signed their old speedster for $300 grand -- the financial equivalent for an MLB club of a pizza party.

Assuming Reyes can stand upright without help, this is like dumping a stock immediately following its peak and then purchasing it again after it had crashed. Any positive performance will be a bargain.

Is There a Position for Him?

Of course it's not that simple. There is no mutual exclusivity in stock ownership: you can own Apple and Samsung and Google and Microsoft and Facebook all at once. Baseball players are different in that they can each only play one position. The Mets already have a better option at short -- Asdrubal Cabrera -- and a better option at second -- Neil Walker -- and there is scant evidence that Reyes can play third. (He has staffed the hot corner exactly never in 1,562 career games.) 

Beyond that, there is replacement value that is not present in stocks. Reyes is worthless to the Mets if he can't outperform Wilmer Flores at third.

Other alternatives, like moving Reyes to the keystone and swapping Walker to third, are fraught with danger and only pay off if Reyes can recapture some measure of his past glory.

It's the Way to Bet
Still, it's a no-downside bet for Citi's denizens, who have outsourced their manufacturing of runs to a shell corporation in Imagistan. Even with their historically-talented pitching staff, the Mets need a run or three to contend for a Wild Card, much less the division. So bring in Reyes and see what he's got. And management can smile about the $105,700,000 they didn't pay him.

Shelby Miller Doesn't Suck

Psst. Wanna buy a pitcher cheap? Have I got a deal for you.

Take this Shelby Miller. He's a bargain. 

What? Yeah, I know he's 2-6, 6.36. Yeah, he's lasted just 52 innings in 11 starts and allowed 61 hits and 30 walks. Right, right, that's dreadful. Heck, it isn't even replacement level.

That's why he's a bargain.

No, really. Look at this. In his first 10 starts he was beyond awful. That grotesque motion had him so flexed he was scraping the mound with his pitching hand on the follow-through. He was literally a knuckle-scraper.

The D-backs sent him to the Minors to tweak his motion. He made two starts. Walked one and fanned 19. Gave up one run in 12 innings.

Sure, sure, that's 19-year-olds. 

Then he faced the semi-Major League Phillies at Citizens Bank Ballpark. He didn't touch the mound once -- at least not with his hand. (You might want to check the bottom of his spikes.)

He went seven frames and allowed a run on five hits. Walked one and struck out five.

Okay, maybe he's still not Clayton Kershaw. Who is? But he's a decent pitcher. Lifetime 3.47 ERA in 107 starts gotta count for something, yeah?

Look out for this guy. He's gonna make another 15 starts and lower that ERA below 4 before the season's over, you wait.

Don't say I didn't warn ya.

The Real Reason the Warriors Aren't Champs

In baseball, it took 100 years to assert and demonstrate the imposing presence of luck. It has an over-sized impact on who wins the championship.

In basketball, it's something else, and it was the difference between Golden State celebrating the greatest season of all time and walking off their home court in shock.

Listen to the analysis during and after Game 7 of the NBA Finals and you will hear a lot of insightful commentary about match-ups, switches, spacing and the like. No doubt these are all important.

They don't determine games, though.

The Golden State Warriors lost Game 7, the finals series, the championship and their magical season because in the finals series they missed their shots.  

It's that simple.

All the strategy you can fit on the court is weak sauce if the opponent puts the ball in the basket. Certainly a good defensive strategy can make it more difficult. But the Warriors' genius was that they were immune to those kinds of efforts.

If you watched the series, you saw each team take ridiculous, ill-advised shots. And score. Then you saw players slip past their defenders for an easy layup. And clank it. There was no deduction for poor judgment on the first shot and no consolation for great floor play on the second.

The Warriors won 73 regular season games on the strength of making impossible shots. For four games in the finals, those shots went awry. 

In the last two games on their home court, they missed 63% of their attempts in Game 5 and 61% in Game 7. They were outshot by a wide margin in all four losses.

The MVP of the league, the rabbit-pulling hoops master, the player who thrilled us all season by tossing in bombs despite two hands in his face, missed 45 of 73 shots in the four Warriors losses. 

What more do you need to know? 

Imagine how completely different the narrative would be had Steph Curry hit just two more shots in Game 7 and reclaimed the crown.

No one sounds smart on TV asserting that the difference in the game is that one team is making baskets and the other isn't. But ultimately, that's all it is.

Can Braves Broadcast Do Better Announcing This Stinkbomb of a Team?

Braves' broadcasts offer an intriguing experience this season because of the challenge facing the broadcast crew when their team is hopeless. 

Braves lose....again.

A really good broadcast team recognizes the following and adjusts accordingly:

1. No individual game matters. If the Braves win tomorrow, they'll be 19-46. If they lose they'll be 18-47. Eight percentages points worth of suck one way or the other.
2. Almost none of their current players matter. Jeff Francoeur, AJ Pierzynski and Nick Markakis are just filler.  The cavalry is coming but it's not here now.
3. The corollary to #2 -- the players who will lead this team to success are mostly elsewhere. Like on the farm -- or in someone else's farm.
4. It's much more important that the young players learn their craft than perform well now. If Matt Wisler and Aaron Blair are the future, they will have to improve.
5. The Braves are in the market to trade veterans for prospects. The young players on other teams should be of more interest to Braves fans than the veteran flotsam and jetsam on their own roster.

One would expect to hear less about the contributions of Erick Aybar, a 32-year-old shortstop, than about the progress made by Mallex Smith, a 23-year-old center fielder. Indeed, listeners should be salivating for news about the progress made by Minor Leaguer Dansby Swanson, the Braves' shortstop of the future, than about anything Aybar does for the team today.

Broadcasters Haven't Given Up
Alas, the broadcasters, though acknowledging their team's futility, are still struggling to accept the full reality. Last night it reached comic proportions with 25-year-old ace Julio Teheran on the mound. Teheran's record tells you everything you need to know about the performance of him and his team: he's the ace of the staff with a 2.93 ERA, 85 K and just 24 BB. And his record is 2-7.

Aside from openly rooting for a timely Atlanta hit or Teheran strikeout, broadcasters Jim Powell and Don Sutton delved into the prospect of a trade of Teheran. The discussion is mostly nonsense.

Ain't Gonna Happen
The best player on the team isn't going anywhere. He's 25 and is signed through his age 29 season at a nice discount. What can Atlanta possibly get for the ace of their staff that would make them better in 2018, which is management's time horizon?

If they did decide to swap Teheran, it would have to be for an investment in the future. The announcers proposed that the Braves would only accept a "middle of the order bat, 25 or less and under team control" for their pitcher. Well sure, in the same way that I'm not selling my cat except for a winning Powerball jackpot ticket. That is, it ain't gonna happen. No trade partner is sufficiently stupid.

No, You're Not Getting Bryce Harper
Teheran has been worth 8-9 wins against replacement his first three full years -- about three a year. That's a good pitcher. But it's not what the announcers described -- Kris Bryant or Nolan Arenado, players worth 5-6 wins a season. No contender is going to trade one asset for another in order to acquire the lesser asset.

Any plausible Teheran deal would have to be present value for future value, the kind Atlanta pulled off in acquiring Swanson from Arizona for Shelby Miller. That can only mean Teheran for a boatload of prospects from the low Minors. 

Hopecasting
So why are Powell and Sutton entertaining such silliness? Because Teheran is their guy. they like him. They have to see him in the clubhouse after the game. So while they feel compelled to discuss the possibility that he's shipped off, they bloat his value beyond objectivity. They are prayercasting and it's not serving their listeners.

Bottom line, it's the right discussion for the third inning of a meaningless mid-June tilt against the woebegone Reds. It's just a pretty silly conclusion. I'll be listening to see if the Braves announcers improve over the course of the lost season too.

You Can't Believe This...

Matt Kemp has worked 4 walks this season and fanned 61 times. That's how a guy who pounds 15 home runs in 60 games still produces an OPS under .700.

The Cubs have won by far the most games in the Majors this year, but if you were to name an NL All-Star team right now they wouldn't have a single starter. In fact, the only player you could make a case for would be Dexter Fowler in center field.

The 40-man roster of the Atlanta Braves has hit 25 home runs this season. A washed up outfielder named Mark Trumbo has hit 20.

The world is upside down: Seattle is second in the Majors with 92 homers. The Cardinals are second in NL with 82.

The boom and bust Orioles have hit 3 triples. Twenty-four individual players have 3 or more, including speedsters Jay Bruce and Jonathan Lucroy with 5 each.

Red Sox base runners have been thrown out five times while stealing 43 bases. Astros right fielder George Springer has been thrown out six times while stealing four bases.

Clayton Kershaw has allowed six bases on balls while whiffing 122 batters. Mike Pelfrey, Yordano Ventura and Clay Bucholz have combined for three fewer strikeouts while walking 91.

Kershaw, Jake Arrieta, Noah Syndegaard and Johnny Cueto have allowed 16 HR combined, the same number as Max Scherzer.

Who's this year's best hitting rookie? You've been hearing about Trevor Story's home run binge, Aledmys Diaz's league-leading batting average and Nomar Mazzara's shiny future. But the rookie most tearing the cover off the ball is 33-year-old Korean Dae Ho Lee. The giant Mariners' first baseman is hitting .301/.339/.592 with 10 homers in 41 games.

You may have heard that Cincinnati Reds' relievers should be arrested for arson. They have closed out eight saves in 20 chances as a team.

Jeanmar Gomez & Mark Melnacon each have each also had 20 save chances. Each has converted 19 of them. Indeed, 19 individual pitchers have more saves than entire Reds bullpen.

On top of that, the Reds have the Majors' worst starter -- Alfredo Simon. His record: 2-6, 9.11. In 52 innings he's allowed 76 hits, 27 BB, and 14 HR. The league is hitting .338 against him. He's 2.2 losses worse than a Minor Leaguer the Reds could pick up at a quarter of the price.

The Revisionist History Around Muhammad Ali

A funny thing has been happening over the years as Muhammad Ali was sliding into decrepitude from Parkinson's disease, and now that he has slipped away from all of us. 

For decades, going back even before he ceremoniously lit the torch to the Atlanta Olympics 20 years ago, we have been revising the Muhammad Ali story.

Not so much with respect to Ali himself.
He deserved most of the accolades, though I don't recall anyone contemporaneously -- except Ali himself, of course -- crediting him as the greatest fighter of all time. There were the Sugar Rays -- Leonard and Robinson, the undefeated Marciano, Joe Louis, Jack Dempsey and now there's Floyd Mayweather, Jr. Many at the time thought Joe Frazier was the greater heavyweight, particularly after he knocked down and defeated Ali.

The real revisionism is about Ali the Beloved, America's sweetheart of the boxing world, who stood up against injustice to widespread applause.

In fact, Muhammad Ali was reviled by much of white America during his boxing career. Social conservatives, especially here in the South, hated everything about him. To them he was an "uppity nigger" who pointedly championed civil rights, eschewed Christianity, defied authority, opposed the Vietnam war and bragged about himself ceaselessly. 

Vulnerable and Nonthreatening
Only since Ali became vulnerable and nonthreatening has all of America embraced him. More importantly, the dawning recognition that he was right about everything has created a collective amnesia about all those who opposed him with every fiber of their being. 

It's easy to say now that Ali was the good guy: America was treating blacks unfairly, as his own life demonstrated. Authority was wrong about the Vietnam war, a waste of 58,000 American lives. Athletes can be flamboyant and still lovable. And Ali was the prettiest, and if not the greatest, certainly among the greats.

Injustice, Hypocrisy and Hatred
But in the 60s and 70s, these were highly inflammable issues. In style, tone and message Ali was the anti-Christ, challenging norms everywhere he went. Successful black Americans at the time acted like Booker T. Washington, not like Stokely Carmichael. Remember, Jackie Robinson had to absorb all the abuse without comment in order to break into the Majors successfully.

It's great to celebrate the life and career of Muhammad Ali, and it's heartening that ultimately the good guys won these cultural skirmishes. But let's not let America off the hook so easily. Ali is great because he ran counter to type and paid a heavy price for soldiering on against the injustice, hate and hypocrisy that dominated America not so long ago.

Why the Mets Are Thrilled That Cespedes Might Opt Out

Pity the poor Mets and Cubs. They signed Yoenis Cespedes and Dexter Fowler, respectively, to multi-year deals with first year opt outs. Each is tearing it up and likely to move on to heftier paydays after this season.

Cespedes is slashing .273/.347/.593, among the league leaders in
dingers and playing a lovely center field. Fowler has topped that, slashing .312/.434/.512 in addition to his usual bag of tricks like defense and baserunning.

So you can just imagine Mets GM Sandy Alderson and Cubs management guru Theo Epstein doing cartwheels.

Wait, what?

Yeah, cartwheels.

Both Cespedes and Fowler will be 31 next year. The odds that 2016 is their zenith are strikingly high. That's particularly true because they are currently center fielders, a position that demands youth like a boy band.  In addition, each is playing out of his mind. Cespedes has doubled his walk rate; Fowler has added 60 points of OBP to his career high.

So the Mets and Cubs got great value from the deals they struck with these players, essentially one-year contracts. One great year.

If they leave, someone else will overpay them based on their career-best season, and maybe into their baseball dotage. Sandy and Theo can spend their money on another big outfield bat with a one-year opt out. Cespedes and Fowler win the lottery and the ball clubs get a year each of great performance. Everybody's happy, even the agents, who pocket 10% of bigger numbers.

The player opt-out is now paradoxically the antidote to the late-contract overpay. And when it's inserted after one year, the team gets an extra-motivated player.

Random Observations From An Unhinged Mind

Stuff floating around my brain with nowhere to go...

This is the year of the flexfielder. Ben Zobrist has made a career of playing everything but the battery. This year Cubs slugger Kris Bryant has donned an outfield glove, an infield glove and a first baseman's mitt. The Cardinals are talking about moving Jhonny Peralta and Matt Carpenter about the infield in order to keep shortstop Aledmys Diaz on the field.

The Royals lost two stars for extended periods on this one play. Then they lost their star catcher for a month. Then they stormed back from a 7-1 ninth inning deficit to defeat the division leader. They're just different.

Ryan Howard has more strikeouts than total bases. This is very hard to do. You need to start with a .172 batting average. Don't try this at home: this man is a professional.

You know how you have to get to a great pitcher early or you miss your chance? New research shows that's poppycock. In fact, almost every pitcher in history was worse the third time through the order, than the first time through, even though he generally had to be having a good day in order to still be in the game the third time through. 

 Are dominant starters more dominant than ever or am I just now noticing it?  Look at this:
Clayton Kershaw -- 7-1, 1.56; 5BB/105K
Jake Arrieta -- 9-0, 1.72; 21BB/67K
Chris Sale -- 9-1, 2.26; 14BB/69K
Madison Bumgarner -- 6-2, 2.12; 22BB/83K
Noah Syndergaard -- 5-2, 1.87; 9BB/79K

A 21-1 K-BB ratio for Kershaw? These are video game numbers.

Big Papi is halfway to matching the WAR of the greatest final season ever before retiring. (Shoeless Joe Jackson earned 7.6 WAR in his final season but he was banned mid-career, not retired. Roberto Clemente earned 4.8 WAR before dying in a plane crash.) At 2.3 WAR, he's closing in on Jackie Robinson (4.5 WAR), Barry Bonds, 3.4 WAR), Hank Greenberg (3.4 WAR), and Ted Williams (3.0). As of Memorial Day. Big Papi was hitting .339/.420/.720, leading the league in OBP, SLG, doubles and RBI.

Mike Trout's 150th home run last week added his name to a list of 18 players who have stroked 150 home runs before age 25 season. Two things to note here:
1. Trout has two-thirds of that season to add to his total.
2. Home run hitting is not his signature skill.

Home field advantage has gone all woolly mammoth on us. Fourteen of the 30 teams have winning road records, including Arizona, which is 8-18 at home. It doesn't include Colorado, which is .500 on the road and a losing record at home; or Atlanta, which is a mortifying 4-20 at Turner but 10-14 away from it.

In the decade of the shift, recent research shows batters actually have higher batting averages when shifted against -- but slug for fewer bases. It sounds as if they are purposely hitting the ball the other way through the hole left for them, but in effect sacrificing opportunities to hit for power. On aggregate, shifts have not been effective. Which means calls for prohibiting them is even dumber than you thought.

Royals rookie Cheslor Cuthbert hails from Little Corn Island about 43 miles east of the Caribbean coast of Nicaragua. His home is a mile square. A tropical rain forest, it gets 170 inches of rain a year. Although residents of a Spanish-speaking country, Corn Islanders are English-speaking. A natural Royal, Cuthbert is a direct descendant of the last king of eastern Nicaragua. 

In a game on Saturday, Russell Martin, who had managed just four extra base hits all season, ripped a game-tying double to the wall against Craig Kimbrel, who had allowed just three extra base hits all season. It was Kimbrel's second blown lead of the game, about what he normally does in half-a-season.

Another Accidental Steroid Victim

I feel so sad for Marlon Byrd and his family.

He's yet another unwitting victim of mysterious steroidal substances inserting themselves into the clean-living ballplayer's vitamins. Byrd never knowingly took any illegal substances but is manning up and accepting responsibility, which probably amounts to the end of his career. At 38, he's banned for all of this year and the first two months of next.

Maturity and Accountability on Display
Byrd is particularly admirable because he maturely accepted responsibility a couple of years ago for his positive test for Tomoxifen, which he never knowingly took either but miraculously bored into some supplements he was taking.

So poor Marlon has been twice victimized, lost millions of dollars and the respect of many, and yet, in an unprecedented demonstration of restraint, he has declined to challenge a system that is obviously overzealous and unfair. Perhaps we should start a campaign for a statue of the outfielder outside Progressive Field.

A Chemist and a Writer
On top of that, Marlon is amazingly eloquent for a professional athlete.  Here is, in part, his statement, which you know he wrote himself and comes from his heart:

"I have accepted a one-year suspension by Major League Baseball," Byrd said. "Recently, I was notified that I had tested positive for Ipamorelin, a peptide prohibited by the JDA. In 2012, I tested positive for the medication Tamoxifen, which I was using on the advice of a physician for a medical condition resulting from surgery, and I accepted my suspension without challenge. Since that time, I have paid close attention to the substances that are banned by the Joint Drug Agreement, as I had no intention of taking any banned substances.

"I relied upon a medical professional for assistance and advice with respect to the supplements that I was taking. However, certain supplements I was taking were not on the NSF Certified for Sport list, and therefore, I assumed certain risks in taking them. When I learned that I had tested positive for Ipamorelin, I retained the services of private counsel and an independent chemist to determine the origin of the Ipamorelin test result, because I never knowingly ingested Ipamorelin.

Isn't it heartbreaking? Poor Marlon. At least he has a future career as a college English professor or a professional publicist.

And now for something completely different...
Here's what I don't understand: the guy's career is over. He has nothing to lose. Why can't he actually take responsibility and acknowledge what everyone knows. 

"Yeah, I took steroids. I'm only sorry I got caught. Steroids helped me enjoy a 16-year Major League career and make $38 million. Where else am I gonna sign a contact for $1 million plus incentives -- stocking shelves at the local food mart? You'd do it for a million bucks too. See ya, suckers."

I'd like him so much better if he did. Now I just think he's a fool and a liar. Good riddance, chump.