Cal Ripken Jr. started his streak of 2,632 consecutive games played on this date 30 years ago. He played third base and batted eighth for the Orioles back on May 30th, 1982 and continued playing until September, 1998. Here are today's links…
- Jamie Moyer told Troy Renck of The Denver Post that he hopes to continue pitching after being designated for assignment by the Rockies earlier today (Twitter link). When asked if Moyer will keep playing, MLBTR readers were split nearly 50-50.
- It’ll be an interesting summer for Blue Jays fans as they await the moves of GM Alex Anthopoulos, Jon Paul Morosi of FOX Sports writes.
- Kevin Goldstein explains how teams could clear space for top prospects like Wil Myers and Anthony Rizzo in a piece at ESPN.com.
- Will Middlebrooks and Yu Darvish join Matt Moore, Bryce Harper and Mike Trout on Jim Bowden's list of rookies with the best long-term futures at ESPN.com.
Mike Axisa contributed to this post.
With his record as a GM and such “insight” as far as his “list of rookies with the best long-term futures” could somebody remind me again WHY Jim bowden has a job at ESPN and how anybody takes him seriously?
I mean, I could watch the MLB cable channel and put together that list just as easily as him….
It’s kinda pathetic. Bowden names the top 3 rookie hitters, the top rookie starter, and the #2 prospect who’s actually having a better year than his record would indicate. People who understand almost nothing about baseball could have made the exact same list.
Tough year to win AL Rookie of the year this season, no “win by default” at all like a few won’t name as has happened before.
If Darvish does not win, it will be a blow to him and Texas, but Trout would really make me Happy. You baseball fans who have not caught this kid should watch him run.. This kid is lightning in a bottle with a huge baseball future IMO.
Middlebrooks also picked a bad year to break in, even if he gets FT starts.. He doesn’t have a chance paired up with Trout and Darvish.. forget Moore.. those 2 are going to run away with the AL balloting.
My bet is there’s still going to be some voters unwilling to vote first place for Darvish since he’s coming from the NPB, especially if there isn’t a clear cut winner. So if the voting were held today, I’d say Trout wins partly by the default of having more ABs than Middlebrooks and partly because of his speed, most other stats are comparable.
That said, there’s 4 months left to see who can do what. Also if Darvish gets 20 wins, 200+ innings, and 200+ Ks it’ll be hard for the voters not to put him in first place.
It’s possible a few avoid Darvish for that and some don’t take for granted the raw speed Trout has.. That kid..You have to keep an eye on him every second he is so explosive.. he takes 2 bases on everything if you don’t, like that kid Amarista for the Padres who is “listed” at 5’7, but no way he is that tall.
Or it could be because Trout has been much more valuable than Middlebrooks. 1.7 WAR for Trout, 0.5 WAR for Middlebrooks and a fair amount more valuable than Darvish 1.1 WAR.
Did you know out of the last 20 winners of the ROY award only 4 of them lead eligible rookies in WAR.
Just saying.
Montero leads all rookies in RBI, at least last time I checked was this weekend
Think you are correct there. To give you an example of how that would hold up however:
Middlebrooks has 5 less RBI in half the games played and half the PA. Middlebrooks (thus far) has the advantage in OPS, SLG, OBP. Most of the categories.
The RBI difference is partially because Middlebrooks hits in the (this switches some) between 2-4th best offense around, even with some injuries and Montero really does not have that many people to drive in very often.
It really isn’t going to matter for either as described.. Montero doesn’t get much type space playing in Seattle and Middlebrooks isn’t going to out shine that rising star Trout in Anaheim, nor Darvish in Arlington anyway. I doubt Montero would have had a chance even if he put up somewhat better numbers than he has and was still in NY those other 2 have been so good.
Us Tigers fans were all hoping Smyly would get some votes in mid may, before he got smacked around by the white sox, pirates, and twins. Needless to say those wild talks are now dead.
Is Dayan Viciedo a rookie still or no? Not sure how many PA’s he has had in his career. If so, I think hes a lock unless pitchers can figure him out.
Guessing you could find the answer on…The Internet.
Well, an answer at the very least. I’m sure there’s some site out there saying he’s from outer space, too.
He is indeed still a rookie
I’m just happy Middlebrooks is showing people how much higher on the list he should have been. He probably won’t win the ROY, which is fine but the people saying he wasn’t a blue chipper and that the Sox farm is dead can safely swallow those words. Average, power, D, and a little speed. I’ll take it.
The issue I personally have with Middlebrooks is that I don’t think he can sustain the .400 BABIP and the very poor K/BB rate will catch up to him over time.
The guy is still developing and could potentially get even better with his plate discipline. He has managed to hit for average at every level of minor league ball and has more than done that so far so I guess we will see. I’m sure the average will come back down to his career norm 270’s (Solid) but the glove and power are for real.
His K/BB rates have been pretty much the same throughout his MiL career though. (and the BB side of it has actually gotten WORSE over time). That just doesn’t portend major league success. He’s done well so far, but that’s with an unsustainably high BABIP. I have feeling that he’ll end up looking a lot like Kevin Kouzmanoff.
Homerism at it’s best. Call us when he has done it for more than a couple of weeks.
Should I call you now? What’s your number?
He did it all year last year, he did it for the first month of this year in AAA, and he’s done it for a month now in the majors.
First off, the response was to Leonard. Secondly, I didnt realize AAA meant anything as to a guys actual value.
Lastly, OH MY GOD! He’s hit well for a month in the majors, call the Hall of Fame! In case you couldnt tell, that was sarcasm.
My original post still stands. Call us when he’s done it for more than a couple of weeks. I wouldnt expect you to understand that AAA means nothing as all Red Sox prospects are the second coming.
Thanks for your input though. It was entertaining, if not a little pathetic.
I didn’t realize you and Leonard were having a private conversation, so I apologize for butting in.
Of course AAA means something to a players actual value (obviously not as much as MLB, but it certainly means something), if it didn’t mean anything then we would have no idea how good a player was until he was in the majors, and if that were the case how would teams know who to call up because AAA performance wouldn’t tell us anything, right? We’d also never see players traded for prospects because prospects don’t mean anything because they’ve never done it in the majors.
You’re comment was “call me when he’s done it for more than a couple weeks.” A ‘couple’ is two and even if we go by your rules and completely ignore everything other than the major leagues he’s done it for a month (which is just over four weeks by the way).
His BABIP wont stay around .400, but he hits a lot of line drives, and has very good bat speed (so the ball is moving quite fast off his bat), so he is the type of hitter who can maintain a higher than average BABIP despite only having average speed.
Like you said though, the real issue is with his plate discipline; with the low number of walks he can’t really afford to have his BABIP drop at all. Even if he can maintain a BABIP around .350 he would be a ~.270 hitter (not bad), but would have a OBP under .300 (really bad). The power and defense are for real, but he still needs to work on the plate discipline.
As kind of an aside: his strike out rates have actually been better every year (32.3% in ’08, 28.8% in ’09, 25.2% in ’10, 24.2% last year, and 18% in limited time in AAA this year), and he has only swung and missed 11% of the time so far this year and makes contact almost 80% of the time on pitches in the zone (and 65% on the ones he swings at out of the zone) so he’s swinging at the right pitches and making contact when he does, so it’s really more about working on his aggressiveness and willingness to take walks than actual plate discipline.
I want to see AA put his money where his mouth is. He talks about being willing to make moves and leaks information about proposed trades, well they’ve been rebuilding for a few years now and they got a good enough team where they should be buyers. Let’s see what he can do.
This will be either one of the most exciting or most boring trade deadline in years because so many new teams are in the hunt, but that can also mean there are far less teams selling.
I hear ya. For as good as AA has been with the moves he has actually made their is almost more praise for the ones he wants to make. Guy is like the wizard of Oz. He’s got everybody believing he is this amazing GM but really he is just a good GM who acts like he is on cocaine all the time. I want this yeah I want that wow wouldn’t that cool I’ll keep my option open we certainly have the pieces aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
Don’t forget in Arizona, a rookie named Wade Miley is having a stellar year with a 6-1 record and a sub 3 era
They play baseball west of the mississippi?