Please Explain: Kemp Benched Again
April 13, 2008 at 11:09 am | In Matt Kemp | 2 CommentsDespite my pleas of the previous two posts, Matt Kemp still didn’t get to start last night. When he finally did get into the game, it’s not like he contributed too much - just a home run and a fantastic catch in RF. That’s probably enough to earn him a spot in today’s lineup, right? There’s no earthly reason to keep him out yet again, is there?
Well, Tony Jackson’s got today’s lineup (hat tip to Tony, who’s been beating the official blog to the punch lately with the lineups), and you’re not going to like it:
Dodgers:
Furcal. SS
Pierre. LF
Ethier. RF
Kent. 2B
Loney. 1B
Martin. C
Jones. CF
DeWitt. 3B
Billingsley. P
Why is Kemp sitting again? At this point I’m not even so upset that Pierre is in, because there’s every reason to be down on Andruw Jones at the moment. But I really don’t care which of Jones and Pierre is sitting right now, as long as Kemp is playing. Sure, he had a rough few games to start the year - he’s now 6 for his last 12, with a homer and a triple, and a great play in RF.
What really worries me is this: he’s been sitting in favor of Pierre against right-handed pitchers. As soon as Chris Young left the game last night in favor of lefty Glendon Rusch, that’s when Kemp hit for Pierre. Is Torre really going to make this a strict left/right platoon? In my previous post, I showed stats which pointed out that Kemp doesn’t really have much of a split in his career thus far, but more frightening is the fact that there are obviously a much greater amount of right-handed pitchers in the league than lefties. Is Kemp really only going to get to play against lefties? The man who just may be our most talented hitter is only going to start less than half the time? This is not good.
Also: maybe we should just let Derek Lowe play CF on his days off? 2-3 last night with 3 RBI, while Jones put up another 0-fer. Oh, and the 8 innings of 1-run, 4-hit ball: that’s not bad either.
Edited to add: I can’t actually fault the inclusion of Juan Pierre here, as he’s had pretty decent success against Greg Maddux (.364/.400/.455) in 28 at-bats. Again, my point was that Kemp should be playing no matter what right now, and if this is a good game for JP to be in (especially with 3 LHP lined up in the next 4 games), then today’s a day to bench Andruw Jones. Kemp and Jones each have under 10 at-bats against Maddux lifetime, which isn’t much of a sample size.
Edited again to add: it’s time to retire the “Trade Juan Pierre” banner in favor of “Play Matt Kemp!” Pierre’s not going anywhere anyway, especially until Jones shows us anything in CF, and letting Kemp play is more important. Also, to complete the Stephen Colbert jokes after giving Tony Jackson a tip of the hat, a stern wag of the finger to Sons of Steve Garvey for forcing me to see that Photoshopped “Matt Kemp in a bikini” abomination every time I Google Image Search him. Thanks, guys!
- Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness 
Not Exactly the Start We Were Hoping For
April 12, 2008 at 10:29 am | In Andruw Jones, Esteban Loaiza, Hong-Chih Kuo, Matt Kemp, Rafael Furcal | 1 CommentHere’s the good news: by one metric, Rafael Furcal is the best player in baseball so far.
2008 MLB leaders in MLV (Runs contributed by a batter beyond what an average player at the same position would produce in a team of otherwise league-average hitters.) [From Baseball Prospectus]
1. Rafael Furcal SS LAD 9.6 
2. Pat Burrell OF PHI 9.5
3. Hanley Ramirez SS FLO 9.3
4. Albert Pujols 1B STL 8.5
Here’s the bad news: just about everything else. To start with, Andruw Jones. MLV, as described above, has 503 qualified players in 2008. Where’s Jonesy rank? At a robust 498th. Basically, while Furcal has gained us 9.6 runs already over what an average SS would do (remember, the Dodgers have only played 10 games. Furcal is gaining us 1 run every game so far), Jones has cost the Dodgers 5.8 runs to this point. That said, two of the only five players who are worse off than Jones so far? David Ortiz and Robinson Cano. And this is why small sample sizes are fun!
Also, for the fourth time in six games, Matt Kemp was on the bench last night - and one of the two he started can almost be seen as a fluke, because he replaced Jones in center while Juan Pierre still got to play. Now, Pierre has hardly been the biggest problem of this young season, but how exactly is a young talent like Kemp supposed to get into a groove when he barely gets to play? In the two games he did get to play, he was 4 for 9 with a triple.
Kemp said,
“I believe I hit righties pretty good,” Kemp said. “I don’t have an answer to the question (of why I don’t play), I really don’t, but I wish I could get in there against those guys.
Let’s put that to the test. It’s hardly a rarity that a young player has some big left/right splits - one needs look no further than Detroit’s otherwise exemplary Curtis Granderson to see that. What about Kemp? Well, his career numbers vs. righties are a pretty respectable .299/.328/.497. His OPS vs lefties is a little better (.868 vs .825), but still - he’s hardly a liability vs. the right-handed pitcher. Plus, as we very recently pointed out, considering his age? That’s a pretty good track record. Can we just let the kid play? Please? I mean, it’s not like the Dodgers are having widespread offensive apathy right now.
In other news, Hong-Chih Kuo gets moved up to be the 5th starter while Esteban Loaiza gets pushed to the pen, and Rotoworld is pissed:
That’s a pretty disgusting way to treat a veteran, and it’s especially surprising coming from Joe Torre. Loaiza had a solid enough spring, and the day after he allowed four runs over four innings in his first start of the year, Torre said he’d stick with him as a fifth starter. Now he’s reversing course. It’s a long shot that this will work out, as Kuo has never been able to stay healthy as a starter. Odds are that Loaiza will be right back in the rotation in two weeks, except he’ll be a worse bet than ever because his arm strength will have deteriorated that much more.
“A pretty disgusting way to treat a veteran”? Really? I’m not exactly sure what him being a veteran has to do with anything - besides, while Kuo has obviously not been able to stick in the bigs, he’s hardly a rookie; it’s now his fourth season in which he’s appeared in the bigs, including starting Game 2 of the 2006 NLDS. And are we really that attached to Loaiza? He’s given up 5 earned runs in 6.2 innings so far. Sure, he probably deserved another start or two. But we all know the 3 headed, 2 hyphened 5th starter beast of Estehong-Ho Parkuoaiza (ugh. best I could do) is just keeping the seat warm for Clayton Kershaw anyway, so I really can’t get all that worked up about this. Kuo has consistently said that he’s more comfortable as a starter anyway, and having also pitched 6.2 innings this year, he’s given up 0 runs and struck out 8. Sorry, Esteban. I’m not sure why Rotoworld has your back so much, but you’re out of luck on this one.
Anyway, Chris Young and the Padres are back for another game tonight. Maybe, just maybe Matt Kemp will get a start? Ken Gurnick and dodgers.com, please give me some hope? Please?
Juan Pierre, who was batting .067 two games ago, is up to .273 after going 3-for-4 and could return to the lineup for a third consecutive game Saturday night against Chris Young.
One outfielder who figures to be in the lineup is Andre Ethier, who drove in two runs Friday night and is 6-for-16 with three homers lifetime against Young.
Oh. Fantastic.
- Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness
Free Matt Kemp!
April 6, 2008 at 9:55 pm | In Juan Pierre sucks, Matt Kemp | 8 CommentsI’m not here to complain about Juan Pierre starting over Matt Kemp on Saturday night vs. Jake Peavy.
I’m not here to complain about Juan Pierre starting over Matt Kemp on Sunday afternoon vs. Chris Young, though it’s perplexing.
I’d really really like to complain about the fact that Juan Pierre’s going to also start on Monday night vs. Dan Haren, even though Pierre went 0-4 today and didn’t hit the ball on the ground once, but I’m not going to do that either.
Why? Because we’ve been over the mediocrity of Juan Pierre many, many, many times, and as he’s currently batting .091, I’m pretty sure everyone on the planet knows he’s just not all that good, so there’s no point in beating it into the ground. And also, Weisman beat me to it and did it much more eloquently than I could have anyway.
No, I’d rather look at the other side: it’s common knowledge that Pierre should not be playing, but you might not know just how much Kemp should be playing.
Here’s some names for you: Alex Rodriguez, Al Kaline, Albert Pujols, Hank Aaron, Vladimir Guerrero, Miguel Cabrera, Paul Molitor, and Frank Robinson. I feel like I know all those names from somewhere. But where? And what do those names have to do with Matt Kemp? Rany Jazayerli of Baseball Prospectus points out something extremely interesting…
Here at Baseball Prospectus we have long warned of the dangers of overrating the importance of batting average. But still, .342 says something. That’s an impressive average for any hitter. For a 22-year-old hitter? More impressive still. For a 22-year-old right-handed hitter? It’s historic.
[snip]
So for Kemp to hit as well as he did from the right side is most unusual. He became just the tenth right-handed hitter since World War II to hit .320 or better (min: 250 PA) at the age of 22 or less. It’s what you might call a pretty impressive list:
Year Player Age AVG 1996 Alex Rodriguez 20 .358 2007 Matt Kemp 22 .342 1955 Al Kaline 20 .340 2001 Albert Pujols 21 .329 1956 Hank Aaron 22 .328 1998 Vladimir Guerrero 22 .324 2005 Miguel Cabrera 22 .323 1979 Paul Molitor 22 .322 1957 Frank Robinson 21 .322 1973 Cesar Cedeno 22 .320 1972 Cesar Cedeno 21 .320That’s four Hall of Famers, three guys who probably would get voted into the Hall of Fame if they retired today, and a guy (Miguel Cabrera) who’s absolutely on a Hall of Fame trajectory. At the bottom of the list is Cesar Cedeno, who had one of the great “what if” careers in baseball history. And then there’s Kemp.
Hey, no one’s calling Matt Kemp a Hall of Famer. But we’re not talking about a list of 4 legends and 6 flashes in the pan. Every single one of those guys had excellent careers - even at the low end of this scale, Cesar Cedeno made four All Star teams. Pierre or not, unless our outfield suddenly consists of Carl Crawford, Grady Sizemore, and Ichiro Suzuki (note: it does not) isn’t that list of gods a pretty worthwhile reason to just let the kid play every day? I don’t want to completely rip off our compadres at Sons of Steve Garvey, but perhaps it’s time to update the “Don’t Be Stupid” box up there in the corner from “Trade Juan Pierre” to “FREE MATT KEMP!”
Despite some dreadful offensive performances this week, the Dodgers are still 4-2 and tied for first after taking 2 out of 3 in Petco, thanks to some great pitching performances. If we’d like to see the offense perk up, maybe we could, I don’t know, play the kid who’s shown some possibly historic talent? Maybe?
But I’ll keep my word, and this team is in first place at the moment, so this post is for talking up Kemp and not beating down Pierre.
Juan Pierre qualifies for his own list, though not one he’s eager to be seen on. Here’s the list of batters who have made the most outs in a season (outs being defined as at-bats minus hits, plus caught stealing and GIDP) over the last 25 years:
Year Player Outs R RBI 1984 Juan Samuel 531 105 69 2005 Jose Reyes 528 99 58 2006 Juan Pierre 521 87 40 2007 Jimmy Rollins 521 139 94 2007 Jose Reyes 517 119 57We include the runs scored and batted in totals to make the point that the other guys on this list at least have the excuse that all the outs they generated did lead to a significant offensive contribution. Pierre? Just to pick a name at random, Edgar Renteria scored as many runs last season as Pierre did in 2006, and drove in 17 more runners, while using up only 346 outs.
Hey - I said I wouldn’t dump on him today. That was all Rany!
- Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness
Jake Peavy’s Got Our Goat
April 5, 2008 at 8:10 pm | In Dodgers, Jake Peavy loves goats | 3 CommentsO.K., so making photos of Jake Peavy as a southern, practitioner of bestiality makes me feel better when the Dodgers are getting completely dominated. I’m only kidding, of course.
They weren’t doctored. 
While one can chalk this loss up to just a dominating performance by one of the best pitchers in baseball, which would be accurate, this does signal an issue that has been going on for awhile now. That is, the Dodgers’ inability to beat elite pitchers. Tony Jackson of “Inside The Dodgers” provides an interesting statistic:
Since the start of last season, the No. 1 starters for the Rockies, Padres and Diamondbacks — Jeff Francis, Jake Peavy and Brandon Webb, respectively — are now a combined 11-0 with a 1.71 ERA in 14 starts against the Dodgers, who are 1-13 in those 14 games. If this team is to contend, it HAS to find a way to beat good pitching, at least once in a while.
Jackson would be right. However, after reading this, it made me want to check to see how far back some of these elite pitchers have dominated the Dodgers, as this seems to be a problem that’s lasted beyond the start of last year. Here’s a quick and dirty check:
Jake Peavy has not lost one start against L.A. since 2003 and since the start of 2005, he has gone 6-0 with a 2.04 ERA, which is his best against any team.
It gets worse. Brandon Webb, since the start of 2005, has gone 7-0 with an ERA of 1.21, also his best when taking into account the amount of innings pitched against the Dodgers in that span, 52. He has not lost a decision against the Dodgers since 2004.
Jeff Francis since 2005 is 4-1 with a 2.96 ERA, that one loss coming in 2005.
While I’m not one to pay much attention to wins, the ERA’s do speak for themselves. It’s one thing to just get beat by the best sometimes, but the Dodgers are going to have to do a hell of a lot better than this, especially within their own division, if they want to seriously compete. This won’t cut it.
Oh well. At least we still have Barry Zito to beat up on.
- Vin 
My Kuroda - Game 1
April 5, 2008 at 12:05 am | In Hiroki Kuroda, Holy crap we beat the Padres! | 3 CommentsAfter somewhat of an inconsistent spring, Hiroki Kuroda finally made his official MLB debut tonight.
And he rocked. 
No, really… big time.
Kuroda, in his debut, put up the following stat line: 7 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 4 K, along with 9 groundouts and 8 flyouts. The most awesome part of the start? It only took him 77 pitches to put up those numbers. 77! I haven’t seen a Dodger pitch that efficiently since the Maddux game against the Giants in August of 2006 when he threw 68 over 8 IP. Actually, throughout the start tonight, that’s who Kuroda kept reminding me of, with his efficiency; the difference being, of course, that Hiroki has velocity. He kept pounding the zone with strike after strike and the efficiency is probably what surprised me the most. As I said when the Dodgers signed him, generally speaking, one of the issues that tend to plague Japanese pitchers making the transition to the U.S. is control, and thus they tend to give up a lot of walks (i.e. Matsuzaka, Igawa, Ishii, Nomo, etc.).
Outside of the fastball down the pipe that Giles hit for a HR, he was just dominating the Padres’ “offense.” While I try to avoid spewing hyperbole after one start, especially against SD’s offense, his stuff was electric and if he can pitch a semblance of how he did tonight more times than not this year, the Dodgers will have a lot more than just a typical 4th starter.
Great debut, Hiroki, and God Bless Logan White.
Oh yeah… we won!
- Vin
Observations Thus Far
April 4, 2008 at 1:25 am | In Dodgers, Random Observations | 2 CommentsSo, as the first series of the year concludes, here are some random observations, thus far, as I try to think positively and completely forget about last night’s terrible loss:
On the offensive side of things (FUCKING HELL, THAT SUCKED!!), Blake DeWitt has capitalized on his opportunity at third base and has filled in more than adequately (What kind of swing was that, Kemp?!). DeWitt has started his 2008 season 5-9, while looking solid on defense and his at-bats have been efficient (THAT BALL WAS YOURS, ANDRUW!!). He seems to show some good plate discipline and works the count, as shown by his 3 BB so far. As of now, there are no reasons to keep him away from 3B if he keeps performing 
at this level, regardless of the Giles signing… or, excuse me, non-signing… or signing…. non-signing. Unless DeWitt completely Wally Pipp’s both Nomar and LaRoche, my guess is that he’ll probably be sent back down, eventually (DIE, PIERRE!!), but he’s earned a longer look.
It’s also been really cool to see that Furcal guy reappear after going MIA at the end of 2006. I think when going back to the failures of 2007, sometimes people forget his injuries and just how much it killed the Dodgers, last year. Thankfully, he’s finally looking healthy, or to put it another way: finally staying the hell away from Jason Repko, and, when he’s on his game, he can be an absolute monster, both offensively and defensively. Hell, you could even make an argument that, when healthy, he’s the team’s MVP. So far, he’s been off to a great start and if he can stay healthy, he’ll provide the Dodgers with one of the better leadoff men in the game. Healthy Furcal = very good.
Jeff Kent is back into form and says: “Spring Training, my ass,” while James Loney continues to do his thing, but some of the downsides have been Russell Martin, Matt Kemp, as well as Andruw Jones. Martin has been pressing big time lately and I expect him to get out of it, so I am not really concerned with him. Matt Kemp, on the other hand, has been getting schooled since his RBI single to open up the season, and looks more like the Kemp of 2006 than 2007. The plate discipline has seemed to erode slightly and he’s getting suckered into chasing some of those fastballs on the outside corner and just missing fastballs, in general. Granted, some of the former might be due to the absolute piss poor umpiring this series, but, like Martin, I expect Kemp to rebound… again, we’ve only completed three games.
Having said that, the one who concerns me the most right now is Andruw Jones. After watching him throughout the Spring, he has not really looked good at all, at least offensively. While he’s been as advertised defensively, he’s been taking some God-awful swings and what I’ve noticed from him during all of Spring Training, and now, is that he seems to be hellbent on pulling the ball. If he can get away from this habit, I expect him to improve, but if not… I fear 2007 Andruw again. I’m still on the optimistic side about the signing, and feel, ultimately, he will be a good addition, but my optimism has somewhat tapered…
On the pitching side of things, I’m relieved to see Takashi Saito round into form, after his injuries this Spring, but what’s been really fun to watch is the continuing maturity of Brad Penny as a pitcher the past year or so, and Opening Day was a good example of that. One of the problems that has historically bitten Brad Penny in the ass has been his inefficiency with his pitches, thus leading to higher pitch counts and shorter outings. He improved in this area somewhat last year and it was nice to see him be able to go into the 7th inning in an outing that was really far from his best. Granted, it was against the Giants, so feeling some sense of accomplishment in beating them is like boasting you beat your 5 year old nephew in a game of chess, or saying that you outhit Juan Pierre, but, nonetheless, it is a step in a positive direction. Penny has gradually moved away from trying to strike out every hitter and, instead pitch to contact, and he’s become a better pitcher for it. As usual, the only challenge is whether he’ll be able to carry his usual stellar beginning of the season into the second half…
So now it’s on to SD this weekend. Can we please finally, say, I don’t know, win a game against them?!
- Vin
Might Nomar Actually Be Flammable?
April 3, 2008 at 4:00 pm | In The Dugout | 1 CommentThis is about a week old, but it just came to my attention so I’m posting it anyway. If you’ve never read “The Dugout” on AOL’s Fanhouse, you are sorely missing out. Basically, they run (highly fictional, obviously) chat room conversation between famous athletes. This time, they send up the Dodgers - here’s the link to the full article, but check out this quick taste:
- Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness
Fun With Rain Delays and Young Pitching
April 2, 2008 at 10:20 pm | In Chad Billingsley | 4 CommentsThree games into the season, and our first questionable managerial decision!
Explain this: tonight’s game called for a matchup of two of the brightest young pitching prospects in baseball, Chad Billingsley for the Blue and Tim Lincecum for the Giants. Great! Something to look forward to. Except that the forecast called for imminent rain, and both 
pitchers were scratched to avoid having them throw an inning or two and then get washed away, causing them to waste a start. Which, by the way, is something I’ve never seen before. But, okay, fine. Hong-Chih Kuo starts, followed by Ramon Troncoso, and they put together four of the ugliest scoreless innings you’ll ever see, helped in no small part by the Giants offensive incompetence.
So in the 4th inning, the rain starts to come. The Dodgers go up 1-0 in the bottom of the frame on a James Loney RBI single (helped immensely by the previous batter, Andruw Jones, hustling down the line to beat out what would have been an inning-ending double play). As the 4th inning ends on a Matt Kemp flyout to center field, the rain comes down harder. With the Dodgers now having a lead, the umpires suddenly have motivation to get through the top of the 5th inning.
Who comes out to pitch the top of the 5th for the Dodgers? Chad Billingsley. That’s right - he couldn’t start the game because it might rain; but then when it does rain, he can come in. Of course, he gave up the tying run before the rains came.
After a 72 minute delay, Esteban Loaiza is currently on the hill. So the entire reason that Billingsley didn’t start the game - to avoid having him get warmed up but not get to pitch a full start - ended up happening anyway. Meanwhile, if he had been allowed to start, we’d have been able to get a full five innings out of him before the rains came.
Ah, hell, I guess it could be worse - Bruce Bochy did the exact same thing with supposed starter Tim Lincecum, except he’s allowing his prized young righty to stay in the game after such a long delay. Brilliant.
- Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness
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