March 6 Game - F&F

 Sometimes you have games like this.  6-0. F&F -Flush it and Forget it

• We had 5 hits.  No one had more than one. Arias had our only extra base hit, a double but also had an error that opened the gates in the 5th..
• Xzavion Curry got lit up for 4 runs in the 5th
• Herrin was touched for two triples and a run in the 7th

These are the big negatives.  On the plus side:

• Civale did better, giving up only dinger with 2 Ks in 2
• Clase had a clean inning
• Cade Smith with 2 Ks and a walk.  Best game so far at missing bats
• Curry was good in the 4th, just not the 5th and then pitched into the 6th.  

Tomorrow is an off day, boys.  Let's get them next time.

As far as the lineup Francona used, nothing to see here, folks.  Straw leading off to get some ABs.  Brennan #2 (I like it, but he didn't do anything). Naylor #3, Gonzalez #4, Arias #5, Freeman #6.  Quinn #7, Gallagher #8 and Rocchio #9.  Just guys getting ABs, mostly in positions they won't hit in during the regular season.

Wednesday against Team Mexico.  Hoping to get Pleaac on tract. 

Our best lineup - what do the stats say?

Lots to talk about in terms of how I think our lineup should be constructed so let's get started:

DOUBLE PLAYS

Last year Josh Bell finished 3rd in the majors in grounding into double plays.  Amed Rosario finished 6th.  

If you have read this site in 2023 you likely know that I think double plays are really a problem for a team that manufactures runs like the Guardians.  

In today's game Jose Ramirez got on base and Josh Bell followed by hitting into a double play while hitting righthanded.

Neither of those events was surprising.  Jose is, well, Jose and Josh Bell hit into 22 double plays last year, 10 while hitting righthanded.  In fact, he hit into a DP every 18 AB righthanded last year and, not surprisingly, every 33 ABs when he was hitting left-handed, being two steps closer to first base.

As Bell claimed the shift hurt his stats last year I wanted to see if the removal of the shift this year could actually make his double plays go down.  It likely will not.

An analysis done at the beginning of the 2022 season showed that one of the things the shift DOESN'T do is get more double plays.  This isn't surprising as the shift is designed to stop hits, not increase double plays as alignments that have three fielders on the right or left side of the infield don't really put players in ideal positions to throw to second or turn the double play after receiving the throw.  In fact, comparing 2021 to 2020 the shift decreased the percent of ABs that end up in double plays from 3.9% to 2.3%.  The study looked further and over the previous 6-year period the shift dcreased double plays from 3.4% of at bats to 2.5%.  

Using these statistics, we will likely see an increase in double plays this year, maybe by as much as 50%.  Thus it would not be surprising to see Bell among the league leaders in DPs, and killing some rallies, if we don't try to avoid it.

CHASE RATE

According to Baseball Savant, Amed Rosario was in the 4th percentile in chase rate in 2022 but in the 96th percentile in speed.  Both these things we implicitly know if we have watched him hit. He also hit into 19 DPs and had a large rate at which he topped balls (leading to infield hits, I am sure) and hit ground balls, leading to forceouts and double plays.  Here is a guy who needs to bat with no one in front of him for a lot of reasons.  BTW, I don't see Rosario's double plays going up this year as I don't think he was shifted on at all last year.

PREMISE FOR SCORING BY TEAMS WITHOUT A LOT OF POWER

In order to score, teams without power have to bunch hits, steal bases, go from first to third and second to home at every opportunity.  Basically, you have to get more than one guy on in an inning.  You have to extend rallies, you have to avoid giving away outs.  

My position is that in order to do this effectively you have to avoid giving up outs.  This can be from getting thrown out on the bases but it can also come from avoiding giving up two outs in one AB.  That is, by avoiding double plays.

LINEUPS

So my lineup, actually platoon lineups, are designed to keep the good elements from last year while avoiding double plays AND protecting hitters.   So here it goes:

vs Left-handed starting pitchers

Kwan

Freeman (DH)

Ramirez

Gonzalez

Bell

Gimenez

Zunino

Rosario

Straw

Comments: If Freeman can't cut it you move Rosaro back to #2 and have one of Freeman, Arias or Fry hit #8, being the DH, replaceable by Naylor if the team switches to a right handed pitcher.  This lineup limits double plays as Gonzalez and Zunino are not huge OBP guys, good since they are hitting in front of our two high DP guys, Bell and Rosario, respectively.   Plus Rosario tops enough balls that you want first base open when he hits.   Plus, this lineup protects Gonzalez by having him hitting in front of Bell and gives us a lot of L/R alternating down through spot #7 although our last three spots in this lineup are right-handed hitters if Rosario bats 8th.  If Rosario bats 2nd then Naylor pinchhitting for the #8, DH spot, brings that balance back.  This doesn't really hurt our DP situation as Straw is generally not a DP candidate.

vs Right-Handed Pitchers

Kwan

Brennan

Ramirez

Naylor (DH)

Bell

Gimenez

Zunino

Rosario

Straw

Comments: This lineup has weaknesses with two left-handed hitters hitting in the first two spots and three right handed hitters hitting in the last 3 spots.  If a team switches to a LH pitcher you just substitute Gonzalez for Brennan.  While this is not ideal Gonzalez is not a rally killer in terms of double plays.   The same strengths apply here as in the other lineup.  Naylor is protected by Bell and is not a high OBP guy so he doesn't give Bell as many opportunities for hitting into double plays.  The comments about Gimenz and Zunino and Zunino and Rosario still apply.

Rosario got a lot of cheap hits from his speed and all his topped balls last year.  If that doesn't work out this year having him hit 8th most if not all the time doesn't hurt the team if we can get Brennan and Freeman or Arias to be effective at #2.

Again, Francona is not likely to do this as he is a creature of habit and Rosario at #2 last year was a key to going 92-70.  I don't see him change but he should.  I predict that double plays will REALLY hurt this team this year and we need to find ways to avoid it right out of the gate.

March 5 - Insights From Today's Lineup and Game Results

 LINEUP

Interesting lineup today.  Let's dive in.

Francona has shown himself to be an innovator (think Andrew Miller in 2016) and an if-it-ain't-broke-don't-fix-it guy.  His lineup today seems like the latter. Yet there are still intersting components to it.

• Kwan leading off against the left-hander Baumgartner.  Although we all knew it already, Francona again is saying that Kwan is his leadoff hitter against all comers this season.
• Rosario hitting 2nd.  Again, using the latter approach, Rosario hit second last year and is in that spot again.
• Ramirez hitting 3rd.  Not only is this carved in stone, it gives Francona a chance to see the dynamic of Bell hitting after Ramirez.  Does it offer Ramirez protection, is it a productive pairing leading to runs?
• Bell hitting 4th.  See Ramirez above.  More on this in another post about the lineup and DP balls.
• Gimenez hitting 5th.  This seems a natural spot for him to keep us able to alternate L-R hitters
• Zunino hitting 6th.  If he gets going he could offer protection for Gimenez at 5 and be a good separator between Gimenez and Naylor to keep the L-R thing alternating.
• David Fry hitting 7th.  With a lefty starting, the first inkling of what they might do to keep Naylor off the field.  The fact that they want to look at Fry there and not go with what they did last year (Arias) is also interesting.  Maybe reading too much into this but I am thinking that it will be 2 of Arias, Freeman and Fry on the opening day roster.  Fry at 1B for Naylor against lefties plays, IMHO.  The only reason to keep Arias and Freeeman is if Arias plays 1B against lefties.  
• Pries hitting 8th.  An odd choice against the lefty Baumgartner but you could just as easily imagine Gonzalez there during the regular season.
• Straw hitting 9th - Where he will be a lot during the regular season.

Analysis - OK, we have our first potential platoon lineup, this one against lefties.  Remember that Gonzalez played yesterday so maybe was held out because of that.  If this was the regular season my lineup would have been

Kwan

Rosario

Ramirez

Gonzalez

Bell

Gimenez

Zunino

Fry

Straw

If a righty was starting my lineup would be

Kwan

Gimenez

Ramirez

Naylor

Bell

Brennan

Zunino

Rosario

Straw

More on this later.

MARCH 5th GAME

Back up the salt truck!   You have got to take spring training results with a grain of salt and we have lots of results that take lots of grains.  So let's get started:

Josh Bell - He is 2-13 this year.  His hit today was a groundball down the left field line.  He also grounded out, grounded into a double play and struck out swinging.  Grain of salt time: He has 4 groundballs (one a hit), 2 flyballs, 1 BB, 1 lineout and 5 Ks, all swinging, so far.  If I wasn't inundated with salt I would say his performance is reminiscent of Bobby Bradley.  

McKenzie - An outing to forget with 3 walks without getting destroyed.  Dustin Knight, Diehl and Barager pitched as we sorted through our low level minor league free agents signings...agan.

Again, no one with more than one hit.  Fry with 2 Ks and 1 BB when given a chance to start. 

Well, on to tomorrow when I hope we can leave the salt truck parked in the driveway.

Games on March 3 and 4, 2023

MARCH 3rd GAME

• Zach Plesac stunk it up again in the first inning.  Maybe we need to do an opener for him because he had much better results in innings 2 and 3 after the Guardians exploited the brought-back-from-the-dead rule to give him extra work.
• Myles Straw played...much better than the alternative
• Petey Halpin replaced Straw and got the game winning hit.  A minor league pundit predicted that Halpin would have a better career than Pete Crow-Armstrong of the Cubs.
• Out of the bullpen Tim Herrin did a Tim Herrin impersonation and gave up a walk and had a K in his one inning.   Right now he is our only true lefty option in the bullpen if you don't count Konnor Pilkington who is really a soft-tossing starting pitcher and is so not ideal for a bullpen guy.
• Luis Oviedo is still a little intriguing to me.  We have a lot of RH relievers in the majors and in our system but, still, I think Oviedo has a little helium with me, at least.
• Speaking of RH reliever prospects, Nick Mikoajchak righted the ship and K'd 2 in the 9th for the save.  Still like him better than any of our AAAA minor league signees as a guy to bring up later this year, if needed.
• Hunter Gaddis was shaky.  He needs to be better than this and I think if they told him and groomed him as a reliever he would be.  This bouncing back and forth only worked for Josh Tomlin.  In my opinion, Gaddis' stuff and demeanor screams reliever.
• Bilous showed why he was DFAd, giving up a HR and a walk with 2 Ks in his one inning.  Still like the Church guy from KC's minor league system (I think).  Could we trade him even up for Bilous?  I really think Bilous' 40-man roster spot goes to the backup catcher (Cam Gallagher?).
• Brito with 2 more walks.  I think he will have a monster offensive year this year but I think his defense will be exposed.  Maybe it is time to switch him over to being a catcher.  I also think, for the trade for Nolan Jones to even have a chance of bearing fruit, Brito will have to spend a successful half-season at Akron.   He is 2-7 with 6 walks and his two hits were slap hits (one a double) the other way from the left-hand side of the plate.
• Freeman and Martinez with identical lines while splitting third base.  Don't think we have seen Freeman in the outfield, yet.  Arias has been out there, including yesterday.  Zunino with another 0-2.  Brennan, Rosario and Rocchio with doubles.

Summary - Solid game for the Guards with Plesac's struggles being frustrating.  All he needs is to be a quality #4 or 5 pitcher.  Clearly with the bar set that low he should be thriving.  Yet, not so much right now.  I hope he gets his act together as, assuming everyone else does their job, Plesac having a good year could be a difference maker.  If he had just pitched .500 ball last year we would have gone 97-65.  If he pitched a little over .500 we could have won 100 games.  Think about that!  A good Plesac is a huge difference maker.   He just needs to thrive in his role.   Everyone else today just held serve with no one causing movement on the 26-player roster needle. 

MARCH 4th GAME

• Bieber with another strong start today. This is what I am used to seeing from veterans as they ramp up in spring training.  Obviously anyone can get hurt at any time but he is looking like he is going to have a good season.  I do see the bullpen maybe undoing his season if we don't have enough quality arms to get him out of games after 6 innings.  And, right now, our bullpen is questionable.
• Speaking of the bullpen, Trevor Stephan had his first outing today and it did not go well.  Not to go all Chicken Little but this (starting late and having an outing like this) is starting to smell like Stephan has an injury and that is the reason he was brought along slowly.
• Speaking of the bullpen, part deux, Karinchak did not look sharp as he walked two guys.  Pilkington gave up some hard contact but got out of it with only one run in 2 innings with 2 Ks.  Then, of course, we had our minor league invitees Simpson, Toussaint and Kelly.   These guys were brought in, I think, to fill bullpen roles at AAA to save our prospects' arms.   If any of them are on the opening day roster then something is wrong as the FO should have brought in enough talent this winter for situations like this.  I don't believe they did.
• Looking at the hitters, it was Micah Pries again who stood out with a homer and a walk.  I think he is 5-14 on the season with two doubles, one triple and two homeruns.  He should start the season with Columbus but it is hard to ignore his performance this spring.  Oh, BTW, don't trade him now as no one trusts spring training perfomrances and we will never, with this front office, get equal value for him.
• Gimenez hitting second is a hopeful sign for me.  He is penciled into my opening day lineup hitting there.  Him play SS is a nod to him playing in the WBC.  Again, as I said, the ideal thing would be for him to hit after a leading-off Altuve on their WBC team.   That would hopefully put it squarely in Francona's mind that moving Rosario way down in the order and hitting Gimenez second, in front of Ramirez, is the right thing to do.
• Once again, no one got more than one hit today, meaning no one is taking the bull by the horns to take over spots on the roster.  Contrast this to Jordan Walker who, in the absence of Arenado and Goldschmidt to the WBC US team, is hitting in the middle of their order and went 4-4 today with a double and 2 HRs.  It would be nice to see some of our young hitters break out.  People are just getting by with 1 hit or a hit and a walk.  No one is breaking out yet.
• Juan Brito got another walk today but struck out later in the game with the lead runs in scoring position and one out. Again, breakout season predicted by me for Brito this year but his hits so far this spring are two slap hits from the left side of the plate.  Freeman did get another hit and stole another bag.  If Rosario is hitting 8th Freeman would just slide into that position in the field and the order seamlessly if they wanted to give Roasrio a day off.   Something to think about.

Weekly lineup post and the March 2, 2023 Game Thoughts

 Weekly Lineup Thoughts

• In the first few games we have seen Zunino hitting 5th a couple of times.  While we may get to that sometme this year we are not there yet.
• Today's lineup had a number of things I didn't like:
• Gonzalez hitting 7th and out on an island by being followed by two guys who won't be big offensive threats.  This will exacerbate any tendency for him to go after pitches out of the zone, making hm a weaker hitter.
• Three right handed batters in a row
• Rosaro hitting second, as he is not a true #2 hitter - too many DPs and chases too many pitches.

Again, nothing I have seen so far sways me away from a lineup that looks something like this:

Gimenez (or Kwan)

Kwan (or Gimenez)

Ramirez

Gonzalez

Bell

Zunino

Naylor 

Rosario

Straw

Again, the goal is to not give up two outs with one swing of the bat and also balance the lineup.  I know this hurts Rosario's number of plate appearances but I think it balances the lineup with no more than two same-handed guys in a row.  

Today's Game

Now, here are my thoughts on the box score and looking through the Summary for inning by inning stuff on the MLB website:

1. Feel a little better about Quantrill today.  Don't know how hard they were hit but his hits were on ground balls which is a good sign with our IF defense.

2. Jose with a couple of hits today.  I don't think he generally muscles up in spring training but I would like to see him driving the ball for extrabase hits before the season starts.

3. Lampe filling in, hit a triple.  Don't know how he looked defensively.  With his skillset he has to be able play CF and hit.  As a corner outfielder I can't see how his skillset fits this team in the near future with Brennan, Straw and Kwan with Lampe, like Brennan and Kwan, being LH hitters who would only be passable in CF.  Still, if he can hit and take a walk he might start at AA this year, which is better than what I thought.  Still think he starts at Lake County but could quickly move up to AA.

4. Josh Naylor with a couple of hits.  The further he gets away from his gruesome injury the more we see who he really is.  Still, no RF for him, please.  He wasn't good in the OF before the injury.  Now I think his defensive range would really be unacceptable and his arm is not that good for RF.

5. Morgan must have looked better.  Barager and Diehl helping to cement their position as AAAA guys who, even if Hentges goes to the DL, shouldn't EVER be added to the 40- or 26-man roster.  Davis Sharpe looked that way :-).  Mason Hickman, as a reliever, is clearly a work in progress but I still have LOTS of hope he adapts to that role and balls out for years in the majors.  We forget about Kyle Marman but I could see him closing at Columbus this year.

6. Oscar Gonzalez - He is not striking out but it doesn't sound like he is making hard contact, either.  Watching the game would have been helpful to see that.

7. Joe Naranjo continues to get hits.  People forget he hit .235 each of the last two years at the same level of the minors although his HR total went up from 6 to 18.    Still, to see the guy get basehits in these games, no matter what inning he gets into the game, is a good sign that he may still be on the steep part of that learning curve.

Going Thin On The Pitching

 OK,  so here we are in the first couple week of spring training games and here is what we have:

• Cody Morris out with a lat injury (apparently improving)
• Enyel De Los Santos out with a hamstring (apparently improving)
• Sam Hentges out with a shoulder problem (could put him out for months)
• Aaron Civale limited to one inning in his first start
• Emmanuel Clase has yet to make his first appearance this spring (seems ominous to me).  No one has really said anything.
• I don't know that Stephan has pitched yet, either.  
• Sandlin still may not be right physically.
• Quantrill and Plesac were not sharp in their starts
• Kelly, Barager, Simpson, Diehl and Knight are getting an ominous amount of work (may be nothing but I will not believe, with all the free agent relievers out there, if any of these guys see any appreciable time on the ML roster this year.  Bryan Shaw is a minor league signee.  These guys are AAA and AA depth guys to save our prospects from burning out in the minors and, maybe, to showcase their abilities to international leagues, staying with us only if they can't latch on to a better opportunity

Right now I am real concerned that the Guardians decided to go real cheap in the bullpen this year as far as depth, not even taking guys who are true first line depth guys and, instead, taking second and third line depth guys.

Also not really sure the Guardians will be willing to do what is necessary and use Gaddis, Curry and Battenfield in the bullpen which is where they all belong.  

 I am also not sure that they have a good handle on who would be the best guys to call up if they need a starter and, instead, just run Pilkington, Gaddis and/or Curry out there just because they did it and, frankly, failed at it last year.  

We have a lot of pitching depth but that depth will be tested this year because of the lack of quality free agent signings or doable trades (Puk and Soto) that would have given us some depth.

There are lots of things going on here and the longer it takes for us to see our better relievers from last year the more I fear that we are having more issues than the serious ones we KNOW already that we are having.  

I also don't trust that this front office can pull off a reasonable trade for relief help if we need it and I think we could possibly get robbed because we will be so desperate.

And all because I don't think the FO planned well this off-season and went cheap, possibly because of the uncertainty created by the DSG failure.  

Even last year we were thin, having to get unexpected performances from guys like De Los Santo to keep our bullpen afloat.

Let's hope this all gets under control because the last thing we need this season, especially early, is for Francona to leave his starters in too long...and he WILL leave his starters in too long if he doesn't have confidence in his bullpen.  And speaking of the bullpen, he will overuse the guys he has confidence in, creating a problem later in the season.

Don't want to be a Chicken Little here but even a couple of significant injuries could create a cascade effect that could really hurt our pitching pretty significantly.

Let's hope Francona and the FO has all this under control.  From where I am sitting, however, I think this could start spiraling out of control unless we start getting some really good news on our pitchers soon.

Thoughts on Tuesday's split squad games and Sam Hentges

ROLLING MY EYES AND GNASHING MY TEETH

First, this is what you get when you only have one lefty in your pen.  Hentges has shoulder inflammation which makes the start to his 2023 season uncertain.  AJ Puk or Gregory Soto.  We could have EASILY matched what it cost in players to get these guys and it wouldn't have, in my opinion, created even a ripple in our prospect depth.

Andrew Chafin, Matt Moore and others were signed.

We stuck with Tim Herrin, a surprise addition to our roster in November.

We did not plan well, at all.

So what is left in free agency:  Will Smith, Zach Britton, Brad Hand, Sean Dolittle, Mike Montgomery, Jose Alvarez, Jake Brentz, Seth Romero and a bunch of AAAA relievers.

Plus there is always the panic trade in which we give up more than what we would have had to give up for Puk or Soto.

Just frustrating to me that there was a weakness and we did nothing to address it all winter and now we are at this point.  You cannot run a team so thin that an injury just makes you really weak.  Obviously an injury to Ramirez hurts a lot and to Bieber or McKenzie.  But, as much as I like all the rest of the guys on this team, clearly, to me, Hentges is the most difficult to replace besides those 3, including, and just in my opinion, replacing Clase.  I know we have the 3 batter rule so situational lefties are not very important any more but counting on Hentges being your only viable lefty in the bullpen was really not a smart move.  

You have a window of opportunity, guys.  You needed to do a better job making sure we didn't run into a very easily rectified (cash for a free agent or a very reasonable trade for a lefty reliever).  Arrrgh.

GAMES ON TUESDAY

• Speaking of Tim Herrin, a couple of bad pitches and hard hit balls ruined his day.  But this is exactly what you would expect for a rookie who likely needs more seasoning.
• Logan T. Allen is apparently channeling our previous Logan Allen looking at his performance yesterday.  Worried that he has reached his ceiling in AA and is not able to get people out...or he has an injury that he had last season and it just isn't going away.
• Battenfield's line looked good...for a reliever.  Guardians: get the message.
• Carver for Vargas seemed a bit odd to me.  Carver showed yesterday what happens if you are a one trick pony and that trick isn't working.  When you have a 100 mph fastball like Vargas, you MAYBE can get away with some inconsistency.
• Brito is 2-5 with 3 walks.  However his two hits were of the slap variety.  Think Richie Palacious with more plate discipline.  Gotta love the production but for this trade to work in the Guardians' favor, or to be an even trade, Brito needs to show power.  
• David Fry with another hit, a bases-loaded double.  while playing 3B.  
• Josh Bell with his first HR.  Not to be a worry wart but it appeared it was an off-speed pitch that he just waited on.  You gotta be able to hit the fastball out in the majors so we will see.Yet, a HR is a HR and I doubt Owen Miller hits that ball out.
• Shame about Valera.  Hope it is only a short-term thing.  Lampe got a couple of knocks in emergency duty.  Wish I had seen the game to see if he just slapped at the ball or if he was really driving the ball.  By Gameday the description just looked like he was slapping at it.
• Triston McKenzie did well.  Mikolajchak with a bounce back outing.  Cade Smith looked like he will need a lot more work to reduce the hard contact rate.
• They continue to play Juan Escobedo.  I wonder what their plans are for him? ML player or a coach within their system.
• Toussaint - AAAA reliever.  Again, you shop in the bargain basement department and you likely will get crappy clothes that don't fit right.
• Hard to tell about anyone else because, after 4 innings, you are likely playing in/pitching in garbage time.

On to Wednesday!