Cubs Interested In Bedard?

And Marmol..ARE YOU JOKING? He WAS the games best reliever last year..period. You are talking about him being a failed starter? Really? Aren't pretty much ALL relievers failed starters??? Wasn't Gagne? I can't believe you really used that argument. Its seriously pathetic.
Look at his BB/IP rate? Look at his SO, WHIP, ERA, ERA+!!! He was the games best reliever last year...period. Yes, it was one year. One year of sheer dominance! By the way, it was his FIRST full year in the bigs...so what are you even talking about?
By the way...the word you were looking for is giddy, not gitty. gitty isn't even a word.
Stop coming on Cubs threads and trying to bash every one of their players...its old. Pretty much all the experts think these guys are going to be very good. You can say they aren't all you want...but you do a pathetic job of backing up a point. Maybe its because your point just sucks.

Ok, so back the the point of this thread...

I love Bedard. Love him. But the Cubs would have to give up two to three or even four starting players next year...and that makes no sense. These other teams don't have to do that, which is why it makes more sense for them.

Marmol… No, Relief pitchers are not failed starters ~ they are usually starters who cant go 6-7 IP. Marmol was just a failed starter though who they threw in the pen as a last ditch effort and called him up when they were forced to. He had a very nice ERA and K rate in his first year in the pen, like I said, who cares? Lots of relievers post great K/IP and ERAs in their first or second years ~ it doesn’t mean much. Besides, the best relievers in the game list (non-closers that is) changes every 2-3 years, where not more than 2-3 names stay in the top 15 in the game over those 2-3 years. But yeah, you have 1 year of positive numbers here so I guess you feel righteous in your argument…

I guess I’m not very good at showing these players are not great longterm investments or very attractive prospects because I can only provide actual numbers and stats and trends over their entire careers. Which the numbers and stats I provide which tell us that these players are not very good prospects are obviously not really important in the face of one years worth of abnormal numbers, the Bill James projections or your personal feelings. I really don’t care either way; but if you think Marmol Soto Pie Hill Marshall Cedeno Patterson etcetera will be much more than fillers in the big picture well, then you have some huge disappointment headed your way in the near future.

Alright, I was really bored at work so I figured I would back up my claims and figure out the odds of Marmol following up 2007 with anything special. Oh and its by WHIP.

(ok, Type-pad is not allowing me to post this so I’m going to try it without the actual name lists ~ anyone can look it up themselves on the ESPN site though. Sort Relievers yearly by WHIP)

We see only nine show up twice (Takashi Saito, Brad Lidge, Scott Linebrink, Chad Cordero, Dan Wheeler, Russ Springer, Jason Isringhausen, Brain Fuentes, Matt Capps)
And three players 3-4 times (Aaron Heilman, Billy Wagner, Trevor, Hoffman)

80 names and I believe 12 repeats ~ about 3 a year… (that’s exactly what I said up above, hehehe…) You can also do the same thing for ERA, but the two go hand and hand so its basically the same list. Looking it over ~ man there are some horrible pitchers who were great for one year…

I guess Bill James and Baseball Prospectus are just idiots...you know better than all of them, huh? Thats why Rolen was so much better than Ramirez last year, huh? Dude, get a clue. You need to know when to quit. And in this case, you should have quit before you started.

BTW, Tim, you really, really need to do something about this system, I imagine most people are just going to stop even trying to post anymore. It doesn’t seem to want to allow lists of names or strings of stats, or maybe it’s the standard abbreviations or whatever. Who knows, but its really beyond annoying…

"Sean Gallagher ~ 2.75 ERA, 1.25 WHIP. His BB to SO rate in the minors is impressive, but if you look you’ll notice most of it came in the low minors. We are looking at a 3-4 starter max here guys…"

Ok then say the same thing about Adam Miller, because him and Sean Gallagher are too close to consider one better than the other. The Rays would have taken Adam Miller for Delmon Young straight up and Miller has been discussed in trades for Dan Haren and Miguel Cabrera. Let's stop underevaluating Sean Gallagher, yes?

The Catcher position sees these peaks in the second to forth year of TripleA all the time, it seems to be one of the more common things you will ever find. I didnt really search for guys that much at all, I just pulled up this years catcher roster and typed their names into minor league Baseball Reference finding out that almost every single name I tried experienced the same exact thing. Does it make him some great prospect? Nope, it makes him just like 90% of the catchers in baseball.

By the way, I had a statfilled post with all these guys, but of course TypeKey doesnt allow it to be posted. Im also not going to sit there for a halfhour trying to tweak it enough to sneak it thru. Instead you will just have to look up their careers yourself I guess. Im just about done with this TypeKey game though, its beyond insane to not be able to post stats on a baseball message board because its considered spam!

I am just about done with this site and postings. Trying to get through and the hoops it takes is second rate. I like the concept, but the quality is not the best. My postings, as if it matters, will be limited if at all.

You didn't give me the list I asked for...yet again. Give me a list of pitchers who threw AS MANY INNINGS as Marmol, with a 1.43 ERA or LOWER (that means not higher), had as many strikeouts. Your list wasn't even close to that, you didn't even list IP. I guess the best reliever in the game last year just isn't any good.

Regarding Soto, I'm not saying he is going to be Pujols as a catcher, no one is. But he could definitely be one of the top 5 hitting catchers in baseball. Oh, of all those catchers seasons you listed NOT ONE of them was as good as Soto's last year. Not one.

Hey Dark...kind of funny. I went back through your lists...lets review.

As far as your pitchers list goes...I looked them up. NOT ONE of them had a 1.4 ERA or lower while pitching anywhere CLOSE to as many innings as Marmol. NOT ONE. Not to mention in their first full years in the bigs. Again, that list you gave me is absolute crap, it proves my point even further.

trober,

Nah, just can't stand the same guy coming on every Cubs thread knocking every player for over a year now. Its old, and ignorant of the facts for that matter. If you read my post BEFORE Dark started in, you will see that I don't over value them, but guys like Hill, Soto, Pie, and Marmol will be big, big parts of the team next year. We can't make 3 or 4 holes for one pitcher, which is why it makes more sense for someone else.

turnbow, chad cordero, and neal cotts come to mind as examples in 2005, they dominated but then came back to earth the next year. cotts was a failed starter also, and i know turnbow once was a starter in the angels organization.

Also...check out what Soto did when he did come up, earned a job during a division title chase last year...he was pretty much A-Rod for those 50 some abs...not saying thats a good enough sample size, but you can't say its not impressive.

Also, look at Darks lists. None of those guys dominated like Marmol did for the amount of innings he did. None of them. Same with Soto...he was better than all of those guys on that list. All of them.

agreed...which is why I don't think he will keep up a .1000 OPS and hit .352 for his career. However, a line like .285\.360 is not unreasonable, and would actually probably make him a top 5 hitting catcher in baseball. Keep in mind, the guy has had OBP of around .350 for years now and then had a break out season where it was over .400. .360 in the majors is completely reasonable.

Adun, you really are such a fool…

First, of those pitchers I listed, all of them had atleast 50IP in their rookie year ~ otherwise it wouldn’t have been their rookie year... Each of them had a lower WHIP than Marmol except Madson. All of them finished the following year with an ERA more than double their rookie mark and a WHIP ballooning by atleast 0.130… Nice try, but your ignoring the obvious to try to prove the fantasy in your head here man…

BTW, even if he is considered a top-reliever, what does that even mean? Looking over the list I gave you will notice that not a single one of them is with the organization they came up with… I mean, we don’t see Braves fans jumping into each and every thread to proclaim Peter Moylan the second coming and one of the best prospects in baseball which every team would be drooling to get their hand on and everything ~ but Moylan posted the same WHIP, a similar ERA and pitching 20 more innings in his rookie campaign…

Third, I’m not even saying they are horrible players! I’m just giving the other side of the fense; telling the truth and saying that we don’t really have anything to say that they are going to be anything special. All we have on almost all of these guys is like ½ to 1 year worth of positive stats. Well, there are countless players who experienced the same ½ to 1 year run with abnormal stats only to go right back to their normals afterward. You will of course argue till your blue in the face that Soto will be one of the top 5 catchers in baseball or Marmol is the best reliever in the game (well, your obsessive nature means you will post that stuff in all caps, but…) but the fact remains that the only thing you have to try and back this up is 1 year of abnormal stats and Bill James. But hey, maybe Soto really is the best hitter on the Cubs, Bill James says he is afterall…

Yeah Trober, the actual list of the top-relievers over the last 4 years is a “who’s who” of “who the F” really. Every couples names we get a flash in the pan who we sit back and go “I wonder what happened to that guy” in our mind. Of course when a Cub makes the list it means he’s gold and everyone should be drooling, but whatever…

And yes, dont you dare say anything questioning one of the Cubs players because you will be in for rants and raves as some Cub fan (usually ADun) comes proclaiming their God-like abilities and the fact that every team has wet-dreams over them or whatever...

"(BTW, F* Type-key! Makes me post paragraph by paragraph!!! This system is out of control!)"

thats why he posted 5 in a row.

And yeah, like Trober said I only have multiple posts because of TypeKey (it allows them if you break them by paragraph). But the difference is my posts actually have stats, facts and tons of information in them instead of repeating what I feel and little more than a CubsBias. I guess all the Cubs fans would much rather have a world of everyone sitting around holding hands fondling the willie of all the Cubs players, but here in the real world there is a rational thought process. I realize “rational thought process” in the mind of a Cubs fan is “Hes great because he wears blue pinstripes”, but that still doesnt make it true.

But whatever, its the type of post you would expect from a Cubs fan…

Also, the list of cathers...NONE of them had the season Soto did. Find me one that did. One...match OPS...find one cather that had that OPS, I don't how many times they were in AAA.

So if you want to prove your point, get those lists and post them. Please. Can you handle that, or are you going to come back with some rant because they don't exist?

I'm not saying the Cubs prospects are the best in the game. But please, please, do us all a favor and stop coming in on every Cubs thread and knocking every player that is talked about. You are an Indians fan!!! Sorry your team doesn't get as much press, but thats not our fault. Its really pathetic that you have to come on here and do this on every thread. The conversation was great before you got here, now wasn't it?

Just like I thought...you couldn't do it. 49 IP isn't 70 buddy, try again. Pathetic...

Want a hitter with an OPS like Soto in his second to forth year in AAA? Uhhh, Can you atleast act like you can read past a first grade level for a second here, because you obviously couldnt grasp the list. But on the list you will see Todd Greene who went 1.127 (.051 points higher than Soto) and posted a 124 OPS+ in the majors that same year in 1997. He followed it up with a .254/.274/.352 line and didn’t hit worth a damn until a fluke 2002 season. But whatever, we know the drill ~ Greene actually doesn’t count because his sisters boyfriends cousins roommate went to Yale instead of Harvard so its obviously not a good comparison of a catcher who broke out for a 1.0+ OPS jump in their third year of TripleA only to see their normal numbers afterward.

Nice...still couldn't find that list, could you? Nice work buddy...

Too bad Green had played in a whopping 64 games that year, being his 4th in a row in AAA. You took his 64 games and put it up against Soto's 110 and acted like that counted? Nice...way to skew it. I guess we should just look at Soto's ML at bats last year and say he is Pujols.

By the way, how is that list coming? Ha ha ha...

You have Todd Greene? Ok, I'll throw out Jorge Posada, who in his 3rd full season at AAA finally figured it out. Am I saying Geovany Soto will be as good as Jorge Posada? Yes, yes I am. Geo Soto is Jorge Posada without the ridiculous ears.

Uhh, Teetz ~ Posada didn’t really increase his numbers from his second to third year at AAA. Well he did a little bit, but not by that much ~ really it was only his OBP that got higher. But whatever…

Infact Posada only saw his numbers go back to what they had been before ~ he is a horrible example and doesnt fit the "hit like M.Izturis for 6 years then like A.Pujols overnight" change at all...

"hit like M.Izturis for 6 years then like A.Pujols overnight"

That's correct, Soto didn't hit like Pujols overnight...it was over many nights...as in a whole baseball season wire-wire stretching into October. If you don't think there's a good chance he'll be an above average hitting catcher, which is what most people on here are projecting on Soto, then you have to admit you are blowing 2007 off as too small a sample size to include in Soto's overall product. Is this your view?

And as far as Soto ~ what I’m saying is that I only spent 5 minutes looking at 6-7 catchers names and managed to find that each improved their OPS by more than a full point in their third season of AAA. Now, Soto showed no, and I mean nothing in the way of hitting like this before 2007. The highest BA was .273 where he hit .353 in 07, His highest OBP was .357 where he posted a .424 in 07 and his highest SLG was .416 where he managed to pound out a .652 in 2007. Hmmm, yeah that just seems a little strange here… I mean, its not completely unprecedented, Brady Anderson had a similar change back in the early 90s. And we know that a whole slew of bad hitting Catchers ended up seeing huge upward turns in their third-forth year of AAA ~ but whatever…

Darkstar,

Your omissions are glaring. K-Rod came on very strong when he got moved to full-time relief, identical to Carlos Marmol. Likewise, their K-rates get similar once they both became full-time relievers.

"And I’m also not so sure a under-20 guy with a 11.9K/9 rate is that similar to a 20-24YO with a 9.22K/9 rate ~ but whatever…"

Did you ignore the part of my post detailing Carlos Marmol's youth? Francisco Rodriguez started pitching at age 17....Marmol started at age 20 and dominated his first year as a reliever at the pro level. So yes...you can obviously compare the two, regardless of the meaningless age argument. Age doesn't really matter when one pitcher has 230 innings of pitching experience entering his age 20 season and the other has zero.

Simply put, both had very similar numbers and dominated in their first year of pro baseball. Additionally, they have similar style of pitching/stuff. Much better comparison of the two than Jayson Durocher and Mike Crudale...you just embarass yourself with this anti-Cubs thing you got going on.

Teetz, Are you trying to prove to us that you too cant read? I have been on here telling the truth, not bashing anything (well, bashing ADun because he acts like a little bitch on the rag, but that’s it…) If you want to tell me that light-hitting catchers don’t break out in their third year of AAA all the time or that rookie relievers don’t dominate in their first year only to see much more modest numbers follow then please do, I’d love to hear it. Or how about you explain to me why the top-20-relievers list sees about 17 names change over each year and why so many of the names showing up are one hit wonders.

Secondly, I’m not comparing the stuff of Marmol to Durocher and Crudale ~ what I’m saying is that there are rookies who dominate in their rookie year only to see their numbers double or worse the year after. And its interesting that you took those names off the list but not guys like Valverde, Gonzalez, Otsuka, Hensley and Meredith ~ ie guys with as much hype as Mamrol is getting now. So whats the problem, gonna tell me that none of those guys had good stuff too? And its not like I struggled to find those guys, ESPN tells us who the rookies are each year and all you have to do is take each and every name with ungodly stats and check the following year ~ they all see the exact same situation (well, not Saito ~ but a 34YO “rookie” who played years in Japan is hardly a rookie…)

Have you seen Marmol pitch? Seriously, ever?? You only need to see his slider once to know why we and many others are comparing him to K-Rod. Its obvious, but I guess you just haven't even watched the guy you continue to say isn't that good. Nice.

As for your "little bitch on the rag comments"...what a loser dude. Grow up. Seriously, what are you, 5? Sorry, but while we have both made you look like your stupid self...you are the one that does yourself the most damage, not us. Get off your own period. Actually, you said its been what, like a month? THAT EXPLAINS IT! Finally, at least I know its that time of month now...I was having trouble figuring out why you were so moody all the sudden. Thanks for explaining that to me.