Post by MGrage on Aug 28, 2006 16:20:29 GMT -5
Hi Everybody!
Inspired by the Emmy Awards last night hosted by my favorite late night talk show host, Conan O'Brien and completely bored sitting here in my hotel room in AZ, I decided to take a look at a couple of CFCL Awards that are near and dear to my heart, Rookie of the Year and Most Productive Farm System. How's that for a thesis statement? In your face Ms. Byrnes!!
In case y'all are wondering what I'm doing in the middle of the desert, I'd tell you but I'd have to hunt you down and kill you. Nah, just kidding. Or am I???
I'm going to watch the D'Backs play tonight. I got a couple of tickets 3 rows behind the visitors dugout tonight so I'm hoping for a foul ball or at least a shard of ash to come my way. I should get a great view of several Bulls and Ruffins tonight too.
Unless I read the award rules wrong, only players who were activated during the season are eligible to be considered for the Farm System award so I'll start there. I think this leaves guys like Prince Fielder, Connor Jackson, Adam Wainwright, Jeremy Hermida, Josh Barfield and Matt Cain ineligible for consideration. Sorry Nick, I didn't make the rules. But by God, I'm going to enforce them and crush you, crush you, crush your award hopes here. Rich's aspirations for this award takes a huge hit as well since Prince was his #1, #2, #3 and #4 arguments for Best Farm System. Another class of prospects excluded are those who were drafted in the auction this year. This leaves out guys like Josh Johnson, Sean Marshall,Dan Uggla, Rich Hill and Hanley Ramirez. We can quickly eliminate about half the league due to a lack of prospects promoted during the season. The Coppers' cupboard was entirely bare, the only team this year without even a Freddy Bynum to crow about like the DoorMatts. Mike Pelfry, Zach Jackson and John Maine are not nearly enough to keep the Meisters, Stones and Red Hots in the discussion so they're out. To get to the Final Four, I had to make a couple of tough calls and vote the Rebs and Splinters off the island. While a Luke Scott hot streak was enough to exile Preston Wilson to the arctic wastes of St. Louis, Teddy needs a little more to make the finals. James Loney could also be an excellent player but to this point, he hasn't put up enough production to boost his erstwhile owner into the Quintessential Quartet. As I said before, losing Fielder put the kibosh on Rich's chances. Though Corey Hart should be a very nice player next year if he gets a chance to accumulate 300-400 ABs. Thorman and Bray are also good players with lots of upside that he can try to build his 2007 team around.
This leaves the Ruffins, Dozers, Lambchops and me in the Terrific Tetrode. While Anthony Reyes by himself was enough to boost the Chops over Rich and Teddy, it's not enough to get him into the final mano y mano match up. Had he not traded Cole Hamels to the Stones way back in May, the Ruffins would have been a shoo-in for the Delightful Duo. But alas, he did so I have to waive good-bye the the mighty Ruffin juggernaut on his way to winning the Championship this year. I must now apologize in advance if I call down the wrath of the Baseball Gods and strike you down in my arrogance Dave.
And now the moment you've all been waiting for. I'm hungry and going to go get something to eat. j/k I'll delay my culinary cravings for a bit longer to settle the eternal question of who will win the Most Productive Farm System of the YEAR!!!!
Let's get ready to rumble! Unfortunately like most of Mike Tyson's fights back when he was hungry for wins and championships instead of Hollifield's ear, this wasn't much of a fight between Kenny and me. I had to eat his children to extend the disturbing Tyson references even further. 
Matt Kemp and Russell Martin are two excellent prospects who put up very good numbers, especially the latter. Martin ran the two guys ahead of him on the depth chart out of town, exiling my own Dionner Navarro to Tampa Bay in the process. He's also done a fair amount of running himself as he has double the number of SBs as the second place catcher, Yorvit Torrealba. I'm sure Kenny is hoping that he'll develop into being more than the next Jason Kendall though. Russell needs to find his power stroke to avoid that. Kemp was white hot when he first came up to the bigs but ML pitchers soon figured out that he has a nose to toes strike zone and his numbers soon plummeted.
Well, enough of going all Simon Cowell on my competition and now I'm should start tooting my own horn here. I believe that I have both quantity and quality to support my campaign for world domination, er the Farm System award. Chad Billingsley and Anibal Sanchez have been uniformly excellent since I was forced to activate them earlier this month. I'm hoping that they'll be my 2003 version of Beckett and Prior and propel me into the 2007 Championship picture next year. Their walk rates are a little high which depresses their WHIP and K:BB rates but hopefully they'll keep improving next year. Steven Drew is 6 ABs and Lastings Milledge is 16 away from the dreaded 150 AB barrier so I feel safe in including them in this discussion. Drew has been terrific since his callup in July. The only chink in his armor has been a severe lack of walks thus far. He had shown much better patience in the minors though so I'm not too worried yet. It's a big surprise that Lastings has a been walk rate in the bigs to this point though. He has more power/speed potential than just about any other prospect anywhere. Once he gets his batting average back up to a more respectable level, he'll take off.
Erg, now I'm really hungry so I'm going to stop here and find a Carl's Jr or Jack in the Box to get something to eat so I don't pig out totally at the game tonight. Before I go though I have to do the usual CYA thing and say that there is a month left and one of the aforementioned players could get hot and and change things. I'll include the stats from the major players too. Mahalo
Matt
Name AB OBA SLG
Milledge 134 .309 .396
Drew 144 .353 .514
Quentin 80 .333 .500
Martin 316 .356 .437
Scott 124 .458 .605
IP ERA WHIP QS
Billingsley 80.1 3.01 1.55 6
Sanchez 71.1 3.41 1.31 8
Reyes 64.2 4.73 1.32 3
PS. Hmm, I just looked at the Opening Day rosters and there was a D next to Josh Johnson. I guess I should get a clarification from Dave before I exclude him from consideration for this award. Dave? Should Josh have gotten a D or an M because it looks like Eric drafted him in the reserve draft and he only had 12 IP last season. I have no idea if he was on anybody's active roster last year though. Thanks
Inspired by the Emmy Awards last night hosted by my favorite late night talk show host, Conan O'Brien and completely bored sitting here in my hotel room in AZ, I decided to take a look at a couple of CFCL Awards that are near and dear to my heart, Rookie of the Year and Most Productive Farm System. How's that for a thesis statement? In your face Ms. Byrnes!!
In case y'all are wondering what I'm doing in the middle of the desert, I'd tell you but I'd have to hunt you down and kill you. Nah, just kidding. Or am I???
I'm going to watch the D'Backs play tonight. I got a couple of tickets 3 rows behind the visitors dugout tonight so I'm hoping for a foul ball or at least a shard of ash to come my way. I should get a great view of several Bulls and Ruffins tonight too.Unless I read the award rules wrong, only players who were activated during the season are eligible to be considered for the Farm System award so I'll start there. I think this leaves guys like Prince Fielder, Connor Jackson, Adam Wainwright, Jeremy Hermida, Josh Barfield and Matt Cain ineligible for consideration. Sorry Nick, I didn't make the rules. But by God, I'm going to enforce them and crush you, crush you, crush your award hopes here. Rich's aspirations for this award takes a huge hit as well since Prince was his #1, #2, #3 and #4 arguments for Best Farm System. Another class of prospects excluded are those who were drafted in the auction this year. This leaves out guys like Josh Johnson, Sean Marshall,Dan Uggla, Rich Hill and Hanley Ramirez. We can quickly eliminate about half the league due to a lack of prospects promoted during the season. The Coppers' cupboard was entirely bare, the only team this year without even a Freddy Bynum to crow about like the DoorMatts. Mike Pelfry, Zach Jackson and John Maine are not nearly enough to keep the Meisters, Stones and Red Hots in the discussion so they're out. To get to the Final Four, I had to make a couple of tough calls and vote the Rebs and Splinters off the island. While a Luke Scott hot streak was enough to exile Preston Wilson to the arctic wastes of St. Louis, Teddy needs a little more to make the finals. James Loney could also be an excellent player but to this point, he hasn't put up enough production to boost his erstwhile owner into the Quintessential Quartet. As I said before, losing Fielder put the kibosh on Rich's chances. Though Corey Hart should be a very nice player next year if he gets a chance to accumulate 300-400 ABs. Thorman and Bray are also good players with lots of upside that he can try to build his 2007 team around.
This leaves the Ruffins, Dozers, Lambchops and me in the Terrific Tetrode. While Anthony Reyes by himself was enough to boost the Chops over Rich and Teddy, it's not enough to get him into the final mano y mano match up. Had he not traded Cole Hamels to the Stones way back in May, the Ruffins would have been a shoo-in for the Delightful Duo. But alas, he did so I have to waive good-bye the the mighty Ruffin juggernaut on his way to winning the Championship this year. I must now apologize in advance if I call down the wrath of the Baseball Gods and strike you down in my arrogance Dave.
And now the moment you've all been waiting for. I'm hungry and going to go get something to eat. j/k I'll delay my culinary cravings for a bit longer to settle the eternal question of who will win the Most Productive Farm System of the YEAR!!!!
Let's get ready to rumble! Unfortunately like most of Mike Tyson's fights back when he was hungry for wins and championships instead of Hollifield's ear, this wasn't much of a fight between Kenny and me. I had to eat his children to extend the disturbing Tyson references even further. 
Matt Kemp and Russell Martin are two excellent prospects who put up very good numbers, especially the latter. Martin ran the two guys ahead of him on the depth chart out of town, exiling my own Dionner Navarro to Tampa Bay in the process. He's also done a fair amount of running himself as he has double the number of SBs as the second place catcher, Yorvit Torrealba. I'm sure Kenny is hoping that he'll develop into being more than the next Jason Kendall though. Russell needs to find his power stroke to avoid that. Kemp was white hot when he first came up to the bigs but ML pitchers soon figured out that he has a nose to toes strike zone and his numbers soon plummeted.Well, enough of going all Simon Cowell on my competition and now I'm should start tooting my own horn here. I believe that I have both quantity and quality to support my campaign for world domination, er the Farm System award. Chad Billingsley and Anibal Sanchez have been uniformly excellent since I was forced to activate them earlier this month. I'm hoping that they'll be my 2003 version of Beckett and Prior and propel me into the 2007 Championship picture next year. Their walk rates are a little high which depresses their WHIP and K:BB rates but hopefully they'll keep improving next year. Steven Drew is 6 ABs and Lastings Milledge is 16 away from the dreaded 150 AB barrier so I feel safe in including them in this discussion. Drew has been terrific since his callup in July. The only chink in his armor has been a severe lack of walks thus far. He had shown much better patience in the minors though so I'm not too worried yet. It's a big surprise that Lastings has a been walk rate in the bigs to this point though. He has more power/speed potential than just about any other prospect anywhere. Once he gets his batting average back up to a more respectable level, he'll take off.
Erg, now I'm really hungry so I'm going to stop here and find a Carl's Jr or Jack in the Box to get something to eat so I don't pig out totally at the game tonight. Before I go though I have to do the usual CYA thing and say that there is a month left and one of the aforementioned players could get hot and and change things. I'll include the stats from the major players too. Mahalo
Matt
Name AB OBA SLG
Milledge 134 .309 .396
Drew 144 .353 .514
Quentin 80 .333 .500
Martin 316 .356 .437
Scott 124 .458 .605
IP ERA WHIP QS
Billingsley 80.1 3.01 1.55 6
Sanchez 71.1 3.41 1.31 8
Reyes 64.2 4.73 1.32 3
PS. Hmm, I just looked at the Opening Day rosters and there was a D next to Josh Johnson. I guess I should get a clarification from Dave before I exclude him from consideration for this award. Dave? Should Josh have gotten a D or an M because it looks like Eric drafted him in the reserve draft and he only had 12 IP last season. I have no idea if he was on anybody's active roster last year though. Thanks
Mahalo
Which is exactly what I'll be doing tomorrow night, weather permitting. BTW, I'm not 100% sure that Adrian Gonzalez is still a rookie though. He may have too much service time to still be part of this discussion. *ack* We're closing in on midnight here in the desert so I need to get to the hurlers ...