SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — At 19, Javier Baez is the second-youngest player in the Arizona Fall League, and he is making a huge jump, competing against players who have been in Double-A or Triple-A. "He's a guy who, mentally, we felt was ready for the Fall League, ready to be pushed like that, ready to be challenged like that," said Jason …
WAR conversion
Bryan Crosnick calculated the exact way in which we'd put each version of WAR (fWAR, rWAR and WARP) on the same scale. These all use different replacement levels so thanks to his work we can now compare these players using the same replacement level. 2012 fWAR to rWAR Conversion: -0.00094 fWAR/PA 2012 WARP to rWAR Conversion: 0.00046 WARP/PA
Another new forum
When the site switched to a responsive theme one of the unintended consequences was that the forum we'd been using most of 2012 was not going to work without significant modifications. While moving to an all new forum was not ideal, it was by far the easiest and it made the most sense. However, this site relies on ad revenue …
DBacks Looking for SS, Veteran SP, 3B
Awhile back we were kicking around trade ideas for Justin Upton from the Diamondbacks. GM Kevin Towers' postseason press conference confirms much of our speculation: Towers identified shortstop (no surprise), a veteran starter (mild surprise), third baseman (mild surprise) and bullpen help (no surprise) as his off-season wish list. I’m not sure if that’s in order of priority, but shortstop …
Cubs tickets are not selling for peanuts
The Slanch Report suggests that Cubs tickets are selling for peanuts. Julie posted the other day you can get tickets for 9 cents. I wondered how accurate it would be to say they were selling for peanuts so I went over to Google Shopping to find out. Turns out the cheapest Planters Peanuts you can buy cost a dollar. If …
Wrigley Talk Friday: We Barely Mention the Cubs and It’s Glorious – 9-28-12
Today on Wrigley Talk Friday, AC and I discuss a lot of stuff that really only tangentially had anything to do with the Cubs. And then my call got dropped as I made a really insightful comment about Kevin Youkilis. We run a tight ship at WTF. Listen to internet radio with Wrigley Talk Friday on Blog Talk Radio
Road to 100 losses
The Cubs currently have 95 losses with 8 games to play. PECOTA projects them to go 3-5 over the final week of the season giving them a final record of 62-100. Only the 1962 and 1966 Cubs have lost more than 98 games (each team lost 103). The Cubs would have to go 5-3 just to match 98 wins and …
Vitters’ -12 wRC+
List of players with 90 or more PA since 2000 worse than Vitters -12 wRC+: Halladay twice, Arroyo, Carpenter, Johnson twice, Schilling
— dmick89 (@dmick89) September 22, 2012