Monthly Archives: April 2010

This Is Going Downhill, Quickly

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After an MSTI-record 85 comments on the post about Ned Colletti’s comments on Matt Kemp, Kemp went out and misplayed a ball in the very first inning last night, directly leading to the only runs the Pirates would need. It’s hard to understate the poetry of that kind of timing, isn’t it?

I think what got lost in Colletti’s comments is that he’s not exactly wrong. Kemp has looked horrendous in the outfield this season, and I can’t put my finger on exactly why that is. I do think part of it is that after years of his defense being underrated, coming into this year he was now overrated, since he never really deserved last year’s Gold Glove in the first place. The Gold Glove voting is such a fantastically flawed process (it often just goes to the best hitter at a position) that it’s barely even worth recognizing, yet most fans still take it to mean something.

Still, that doesn’t absolve Kemp. His play on defense has been lousy, and it needs to change. But being right doesn’t absolve Colletti either; the whole point of yesterday’s post was not that Kemp’s play isn’t a problem, but just that the general manager of a team – one who’s made more than his share of mistakes – shouldn’t be publicly calling out the best player on his team without mentioning the horrible pitching that Colletti himself assembled, or the dozens of other far more pressing issues.

As for last night… what can you say? We all liked to think that getting back to Los Angeles would help, but when you manage just 4 hits off a 29-year-old with a 6.81 career ERA, what do you expect is going to happen? You can complain all you want that Clayton Kershaw had first-inning issues, but I’m not going to get all up in arms over allowing just 3 hits and striking out 7 while working into the 7th, and having his only runs scored in large part due to Kemp’s defense. This team has just stopped hitting, and it can’t only be because of Manny’s absence.

Speaking of Manny’s absence… Garret Anderson needs to be cut. Now. Not when Manny comes back. Today. After another 0-4 last night, in which he didn’t even get a ball out of the infield, he’s hitting an almost unbelievable .122. This experiment was a terrible idea from the beginning, and it’s a terrible idea now. The pinch-homer he hit on April 22 is the only hit he’s had in nearly three weeks. How much more do we need to see here? He’s had a nice career, but he’s cooked, and it’s time to acknowledge that. And for the love of GOD, Torre, if you must play him, can you please stop batting him second? The thought process here is almost unfathomable. Then again, this is the same guy who brought in Ramon Troncoso again last night.

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I’m off to South Carolina for the weekend, so you’ll have to have your fun here without me. It’s too bad – I’d have liked to have seen Carlos Monasterios get a start on Saturday – but the way things are going, I think I’ll be happier not watching this team right now.

Why the Dodgers Are In Last Place

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I was going to react to the lunacy of Ned Colletti calling out Matt Kemp, and then Chad had to go make a flow chart about it and render anything I had to say irrelevant. So instead, I thought I’d see how far down the list of reasons why the Dodgers are in last place ”Matt Kemp is a mediocre baserunner and outfielder” is. Hint: it’s not very high.

  1. Frank McCourt.
  2. Jamie McCourt.
  3. The club broke camp with not one but two Ortizes.
  4. Ramon Ortiz is still with the team despite a 6.39 ERA.
  5. Ramon Ortiz has been allowed to throw more innings than any reliever.
  6. Ten Dodgers have as many or more innings pitched than Jonathan Broxton, supposedly your relief ace.
  7. Broxton has thrown 38 pitches in the last 13 days, proving that Torre truly does not understand how to run a bullpen.
  8. Joe Torre is intent on sending Ramon Troncoso to his death.
  9. Eric Stults was sold to Japan for absolutely no good reason at all.
  10. The team has played just six home games so far.
  11. Randy Wolf and Orlando Hudson were allowed to walk in the offseason without so much as an arbitration offer.
  12. Vicente Padilla was the only signing for the pitching staff.
  13. Jamey Carroll was the biggest free agent acquisition of the winter.
  14. Jamey Carroll is your backup shortstop.
  15. Jamey Carroll has a .603 OPS with underwhelming defense.
  16. When just one starter (Padilla) went down, John Ely was the best you could do to replace him.
  17. Padilla, Manny, & Jeff Weaver all hit the DL on three consecutive days.
  18. Hong-Chih Kuo missed most of April with an arm injury and has pitched just 0.2 innings.
  19. Ronald Belisario couldn’t get himself to camp on time.
  20. George Sherrill was a disaster for nearly the entire month.
  21. Chad Billingsley has been consistently inconsistent.
  22. The pitching staff has the 5th-worst ERA in baseball.
  23. When the hitters hit, the pitchers fail – and vice versa.
  24. Charlie Haeger hasn’t lived up to expectations.
  25. Rick Honeycutt has nothing of value to offer a struggling staff.
  26. James Loney still has zero homers, and a .312 OBP.
  27. Rafael Furcal has missed time with a strained hamstring.
  28. Blake DeWitt has shown a good eye, but has just one extra base hit through the first month.
  29. DeWitt’s been a “work in progress”, to put it mildly, on defense.
  30. The entire defense has been atrocious, with the most errors and worst fielding percentage in baseball.
  31. Garret Anderson – hitting .135 – is supposedly your big bat off the bench, and no steps have been taken to replace him.
  32. Ronnie Belliard is your backup first baseman.
  33. Though he’s performed well, Casey Blake no longer has the power of the beard.
  34. Joe Torre is seemingly more interested in his horses than his baseball team.
  35. Half the team was forced to go to Asia for a money-making venture.
  36. The lack of home games means no Vin magic.
  37. Ned Colletti calls out his best player as being the biggest problem.
  38. Matt Kemp has shown indifferent defense and subpar baserunning.

And so on. But, Ned’s right. Your All-Star center fielder who’s leading the league in homers really is the biggest problem here.

Well, That Was a Bust

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Want to know how my trip to Queens to see the Dodgers was yesterday? You can get a simple recap from these Tweets, after arriving during the 7th inning of Game 1:

First pitch I saw was a 2 run Mets single, Dodgers are getting shut out, and its freeeezing. Hooray?

Then, early in Game 2:

Its like ice station zebra out here. Literally too cold to tweet. Had to retreat to team store.

And after Jamey Carroll’s botched throw to home:

I’ve never left a game in the 6th inning before, but its painfully cold and the Dodgers look pathetic. Time to go.

Remember, you’re talking to a guy who braved Boston in January to watch an outdoor hockey game at Fenway Park, and this was nearly as bad (in no small part because in January, I was far more prepared with gloves, hand warmers, and whiskey.)

With that in mind, I can’t even pretend to be horribly upset about getting swept. I couldn’t even feel my hands while holding a hot chocolate, so I can’t imagine what it must have been like to pitch. That’s not to pretend that this team isn’t in trouble; it is, and it starts at the top, because Joe Torre has completely gone off the deep end.

In each game, 4 relievers entered after the starting pitcher. In Game 1, following Hiroki Kuroda were Jon Link, Ramon Troncoso, George Sherrill, and Ramon Ortiz. After Charlie Haeger left in Game 2, you saw… Troncoso, Link, Sherrill, and Carlos Monasterios. I’ll forgive the usage of Link, who we all knew was getting sent back down to make room for John Ely today anyway, but Torre’s abuse of Troncoso is bordering on the ridiculous. He’s on pace to get into about 115 games this year, and Dylan Hernandez’ constant usage of the ‘paging Dr. El Attrache’ hashtag on Twitter has gone from “humorous” to “terrifying”.

Even beyond Troncoso, Sherrill was brought into both games. Yet Ronald Belisario never appeared. Hong-Chih Kuo never appeared. Perhaps worst of all is his infatuation with Jonathan Broxton never entering unless it’s a save situation, because you’re constantly putting in lesser pitchers while your best reliever watches. Broxton’s pitched just 7 innings, which is exactly as many as Russ Ortiz, who was cut over a week ago. He’s entered one-half as many games as Troncoso. He hasn’t pitched since Saturday, and before that hadn’t pitched since the previous Sunday. What that means is in the last 12 days (since April 16) your best reliever has thrown all of 38 pitches. It’s just unfathomable.

Finally – and we’ll touch more on this soon – Jamey Carroll cannot be your shortstop if Rafael Furcal’s hamstring is serious. Not only did he show zero range on a grounder up the middle early in Game 2, his terrible throw home not only cost the team a possible 6-2-3 double play in a big spot, it blew the game wide open and basically ended the sweep right there. But hey, at least he’s hitting .214 and is signed through next year!

John Ely gets the start today, as we all knew he would. Let’s hope that someone – bats, gloves, or bullpen – shows up to support him.

Game Offfff

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“Car! Car! Game Off!”

Due to the lousy weather here in New York, tonight’s game has been called, making what was already a messy situation for the Dodgers even messier. There’s now a doubleheader tomorrow, starting at 4:10p EST/1:10p PST. Which means the game I’m going to tomorrow night probably doesn’t start until like 8. Great!

Tonight’s starter, Hiroki Kuroda, will start one of tomorrow’s games (probably the first, but we’ll see.) With no replacement announced yet for Vicente Padilla’s Tuesday start, I’d been terrified that I’d have to go to the park and see Josh Towers. Now, the good news is that TBLA did a little sleuthing and they think it’d be John Ely, which is great. My question is, though, how do we not know this yet? Albuquerque is hardly close to New York City, so if someone’s beeing imported to start tomorrow, you’d think they’d already be on the way.

If it’s not Ely, then your options are slim. You could bring Charlie Haeger back on three days rest to pair with Kuroda, though that leaves you short for Wednesday’s game, as that’s his turn. Actually, what might make the most sense is to start Haeger tomorrow, and then start Ely on Wednesday instead. That way you can keep Jon Link (or Ramon Ortiz, or whomever is getting sent down for Ely) active for two of the next three games, rather than just one. There’s been some talk of starting Carlos Monasterios instead of making a roster move, but I just can’t see that happening. Not only do I not think Joe Torre would start a Rule 5 pick under any circumstances, it also puts you in a terrible situation should any of the thre starters (Kuroda/Haeger/Monasterios) not go deep into the game, because who are you going to bring in? At least if you go with Ely, you can have Monasterios ready to go a few innings.

Speaking of Padilla, the news isn’t good. Molly Knight has the scary update:

Vincente Padilla on his arm: “In the past I’ve been able to throw through this, but I can’t even do that. Never had pain this bad before.”

This jives exactly with what Chad said at Memories of Kevin Malone just yesterday:

-Am I the only one who doesn’t think Padilla’s injury is just a forearm strain?  Seems to me that “forearm strain” is always medical spin for “elbow sprain” which is spin for “slight elbow tear”.  I hope not, as he was starting to pitch much better and the Dodgers need arms.

Let’s be clear here: this is just speculation. There’s no solid word on Padilla’s injury just yet, so let’s not overreact. It’s just worth nothing that Chad’s totally right – that injuries that mention “forearm” often do end up being code for something far, worse, and when Padilla’s saying he’s “never had pain this bad before” – and remember, this is a guy who was shot just a few months ago - that almost certainly can’t be a good sign.

Stay tuned, friends. The next 36 hours could see 3 games and some big news.

Update: Dylan Hernandez reports that Kuroda will start Game 1 and Haeger will indeed go on 3 days rest for Game 2. No word yet on Wednesday, but this seems like the right move. It gives Ely (if it is him) another day to get to NYC, and allows the club to keep that extra reliever as long as possible.

And That’s Why You Stick With Chad Billingsley

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Chad Billingsley may have terrified us all with two disastrous starts in a row on the heel’s of last year’s second-half collapse, but its days like today that remind us why you keep sending him out there as long as you possibly can. Billingsley was nearly perfect in allowing just 1 run over 6 innings, walking only 2 while striking out 5. Even better, he was pretty economical in doing it, using just 86 pitches. Even better than that, when faced with a tough jam in the 6th inning (the frame which is always his own personal hell) after a double and an intentional walk, he got Josh Willingham to ground out and end the threat.

Since he was pitching so well and was still at a reasonable pitch count, you could have made the argument that he should have started the 7th to help out the tired Dodger bullpen, but I’m actually okay with the choice that was made. At this point, the most important thing is Billingsley’s confidence, and if you can take him out while feeling great about his performance rather than trying to push your luck and risk him coming out on a bad note, I’m fine with that. Besides, he came up with a man on in the top of the 7th, and at that point it’s more important to try to get that tying run in, though Andre Ethier merely managed to hit into an inning-ending double play.

With Vicente Padilla on the disabled list, it’s largely irrelevant since the team is having a hard enough time just replacing him in the rotation, but it’s important to remember why it’s worth it to stick with Billingsley through his troubles. When he’s right, he can be one of the best in the game, and no one who could theoretically replace him can compare to his potential. With starting pitching largely being what’s holding back the club this year, the entire season may depend on Billingsley getting his head back together, and cutting bait with him just means giving up on his massive potential in favor of guys who just aren’t as good. That doesn’t excuse him if he can’t string a few good starts together, of course, but today was a great step in that direction.

Of course, since the Dodgers couldn’t get anything going against Scott Olsen, even after three straight singles in the first, Billingsley left the game on the hook to be the losing pitcher. So in the game in which he gave up 1 run, he’s the loser. Yet in the previous two games, when he allowed 13 runs (10 earned) in 8.2 IP, he didn’t get the loss in either. Say it with me again, friends: “Wins and losses are completely irrelevant for pitchers.”

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Why is Garret Anderson getting starts again? After striking out three times today while going 0-4, he’s now hitting .143 with a .184 OBP, and it’s not like he’s helping you out in the field either. It’s nice that he ran into that pinch-hit homer the other day, but this experiment clearly isn’t working, just as we predicted it wouldn’t before the season. It’s time to cut the cord and let Xavier Paul play every day until Manny comes back, and then be Manny’s defensive caddy/lefty bench bat afterwards. If not Paul in left field, I’d even give some thought to putting Casey Blake out there (240 games of OF experience) and letting Ronnie Belliard play at 3B, just to keep Belliard’s bat in the lineup. Anything but Anderson.