Email a copy of 'Padres' Chairman Ron Fowler On Weaver, Preller, Szczur' to a friend
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By Steve Adams and Jeff Todd | at
Email a copy of 'Padres' Chairman Ron Fowler On Weaver, Preller, Szczur' to a friend
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davidcoonce74
Yangervis Solarte and his 92 OPS plus is a “strong performance.” ? Huh. Okay. Myers is hitting fairly well but that 5/38 scares me. And while Weaver probably won’t make it through the season, the morbid part of me wants to see him stick it out and set the record for most homers allowed in a season. He’s almost a third of the way there and it’s May 10th.
Philliesfan4life
It’s hard not seeing Weaver in Angels Red but he has had a great carrer , its time for him to hang it up.
davidcoonce74
It’s interesting how much his career arc is mirroring that of his brother, who was also washed up in his early 30s.
Philliesfan4life
He would be a perfect pitching coach for the angels.
SixFlagsMagicPadres
The Quest for the First Pick lives on…
Sign all the Cubans
LOL Padres.
Jered Weaver has been circling the drain for a couple of years now, and all of sudden the Padres expected him to be replacement-level?
This is some funny stuff, and is just one more reason why Preller and Co. won’t be around to see all that young talent in Class A/Class A – Advanced pan out.
jdgoat
I don’t know a guy moving from the AL to the NL is always worth a chance
Sign all the Cubans
Dude is having trouble hitting the mid-80’s with his FB. That won’t play in either league.
jdgoat
Ya I guess that’s a bad example because he’s clearly declining
darkstar61
The Matt Szczur comments are very curious to me. I mean, they make sense enough on their own, but then when you look at the actual situation the Padres are in it falls apart.
First though, Szczur has never hit all that well anywhere in his career outside a short 18 game stretch in Boise way back in 2010, so saying he hasn’t hit as well as hoped is a tad laughable. And I get the Defense stuff, ut you are talking about a temporary fill-in on a horrific team here, not a long-term player on a competing club.
Then you look at the internal options the Padres had available to them at El Paso and you see names like Nick Buss (currently hitting .397/.448/.586/1.034), Rafael Ortega (currently hitting .319/.381/.489/.870) and even the recently-sold-to-Korea Jamie Romak (who was hitting .347/.392/.800/1.192) plus even super-utility guy Jose Pirela (hitting .306/.372/.435/.808) and prospect Franchy Cordero who is still young and needs more learning, but he too seems a better option than Szcuzr (Franchy is hitting .246/.305/.483/.788 in AAA, which isn’t great but it’s still nearly 100 OPS points higher than the .273/.331/.363/693 Matt has hit over his AAA career)
With 5 internal options available to the club that are hitting well to fantastic, 3 of which naturally play CF… well as I said, it’s just odd
scogan
I’m just guessing here, but maybe they are saving time clocks with them all.
darkstar61
Understandable guess, but Cordero is the only prospect in the bunch. The other 4 were all minor league FA signings that have been around for a while (Ortega is the youngest of those 4 at 26yo; or in other words, they are all around the same age as Szczur)
bbatardo
Probably safe to say the Padres are shooting for the #1 pick this year.. I suppose they don’t want to intentionally tank, but a lot of their moves show they are fine losing a few more than winning a few more.
As a result they might wait until later in the year to go full youth.
anoff
First, Triple A El Paso is basically the minors-version of Coors Field, and it’s not just El Paso, but almost every stadium in the PCL. Those numbers put up there, in large part, are meaningless. Doubly so when you’re looking at the production for late-20s/early-30s veterans vs 21 year old competition – of course they’re crushing it in Triple A, they graduated from that level 5 years ago. Second, Szczur was out of options but already on the 40 man – none of those players in El Paso are, so it would’ve either required burning an option or adding a veteran that you then would have to DFA to move back to El Paso. Third, most of those players you mentioned don’t play much CF. I don’t know where you get that a 1B, a middle infielder, 2 journeyman OF that haven’t played much CF of late and a fringy prospect that converted to OF from SS “naturally play CF” but that is flat out wrong. Finally, Szczur has done something none of those other guys has: be productive in the majors – better to bet on someone that has done it before than on someone that hasn’t
darkstar61
First, El Paso is not even close to the Coors of AAA (those 5 guys are all in the mere 7 El Paso hitters to have an OPS over .720 or SLG over league average, btw) …similarly, your “late-20s/early-30s veterans vs 21 year old competition” theory apparently works just like your stadium theory, as it sure hasn’t done anything for Collin Cowgill, Dusty Coleman, Rocky Gale or Tony Cruz either
Second, you are worried about burning options on MiLB FA signings? Huh? Regardless, the guys mentioned were almost all MiLB FAs they had specifically signed for such depth needs anyway. It’s the only reason they are there! Giving up another player in trade for yet another out-of-options depth piece that is no better than the ones already on staff…
Third, yes they are not all playing CF at the same time for El Paso right now (great observation there) but 2 are career CFers while one has been covered to a full-time CFer – and all the Padres need is an occasional game or two because “Margot is playing literally every game”
Forth, Szcuzr has not been “productive in the majors”, that’s beyond laughable. The only thing Matt has on them is MLB playing time (he is a worse to dramatically worse MiLB hitter than them though, so…)
So yeah, whatever man
ZB39
El Paso numbers are always inflated. In general, PCL is a hitters league.. Lots of parks in deserts (like El Paso, Albuquerque,or Las Vegas) or high altitude cities (like Colorado Springs, Salt Lake City).
Look at number 10 on this list:
baseballamerica.com/minors/baseballist-extreme-bal…
Note this sentence: “Among big league ballparks, only Coors Field comes close to featuring as many hits on balls in play.”
darkstar61
Yes, the PCL is a hitters league – and that is where most of the players in question, including Szczur, have spent most of their time (Matt spent all of his AAA time in the PCL)
But as far as the nonsense claim El Paso is somehow like Coors, well that is absolute pure gibberish, and actual reality shows this:
Pacific Coast League – 2015
Team R HR H
El Paso 1.003 / 0.937 / 1.036
Pacific Coast League – 2014-15
El Paso / 1.041 /0.946 / 1.053
milb.com/international/news/toolshed-final-triple-…
…yes, El Paso is semi-neutral and pretty middle of the pact for the PCL
Anoff is just making some crud up with that claim, not unlike all the others he made in his post
ZB39
From what I can tell, those numbers measure how the park plays relative to other parks *in the league*. So slightly higher than neutral ballpark in the PCL does not mean that it plays neutral, all things considered, if the PCL is, as a whole, a hitters’ league. But perhaps I’m wrong; the article is thin on details.
Here’s some more data from Baseball America that compares ballparks from different leagues against each other. Check out the the BABIP percentile for El Paso: 94%,
Salt Lake is 99%, Reno 98%, Las Vegas 95, ABQ 96%, Colorado Springs 98%.
baseballamerica.com/minors/minor-league-ballpark-e…
I follow the Padres closely. There is *always* some El Paso player that has ridiculous numbers, like he’s playing on the moon or something. I’ve learned to take those numbers with a grain of salt. For example, Ryan Shimpf’s average in El Paso last year was .355; in San Diego he’s hit .167 this year and .217 last year.
WubbaLubbaDubDub
Digging this Pads debate.
davidcoonce74
Those are all – except Cordero – minor league veterans playing in the minor league equivalent of Coors field. Don’t scout the stat line. None of those guys are prospects.
darkstar61
It is nothing like Coors and Szczur is the same type of minor league vet (I also specifically said only one is a prospect, btw – the rest were all signed just for the issue the Padres currently have and are needlessly and oddly trading for the similarly skilled Szczur to fill)
davidcoonce74
El Paso has ridiculous ballpark effects. Szczr has one advantage over all those other guys, in that he’s played in the majors already. That’s a huge difference.
darkstar61
That is just flat out comically nonsense completely made up out of thin air by anoff
Again, reality is:
Pacific Coast League – 2015
Team R HR H
El Paso 1.003 / 0.937 / 1.036
Pacific Coast League – 2014-15
El Paso / 1.041 /0.946 / 1.053
milb.com/international/news/toolshed-final-triple-…
It’s middle of the pact for PCL parks
ZB39
The idea that El Paso is like Coors is not made up out of thin air by anoff. It’s how El Paso is talked about by the reporters that cover the Padres. Ted Leitner, the radio play by play announcer for the Padres, compares El Paso to Coors all the time.
Perhaps everyone in the Padres orbit is wrong about El Paso, but it definitely has a reputation for being Coors like.
outinleftfield
PCL stats are not a good indication of what a hitter can do, especially El Paso. Makes Coors Field look like a pitcher’s park. Buss is pretty old and a career minor leaguer. Not really an option. Pirela, Ortega and Romak were throwaways. Never really more than guys to give a team depth. That is why no one else wanted them. Not even my Orioles who they could have filled needs for if they were any good.
The Padres had 2 rookies and Jankowski as their starters to start the season. Makes sense for any team in that situation to want to pick up a veteran OF that can give all 3 of those guys a day off and some leadership in the clubhouse.
darkstar61
And one more time because one more person decided to believe absolute pure nonsense being spouted by anoff:
Pacific Coast League – 2015
Team R HR H
El Paso 1.003 / 0.937 / 1.036
Pacific Coast League – 2014-15
El Paso / 1.041 /0.946 / 1.053
xpensivewinos
An imbecilic, clueless and profoundly pathetic organization from top to bottom.
lesterdnightfly
True, but this is a baseball site, so leave the current White House out of this.
bleacherbum
Jared Cosart has one more rehab start at El Paso scheduled so that can be the corresponding move when Weaver gets bombed again in 4 days and is DFA’d or released. That was a quick way to waste 3 million bucks, 0-4 with a 6 ERA and the team has lost all 7 of the games he has started.
SixFlagsMagicPadres
It’s all for the benefit of getting that first pick next year. When looking at it from that perspective, Weaver has made a great contribution.
GarryHarris
Both Jeff and Jared Weaver were pretty good pitchers. Their respective organizations built up their fragile psychics and the Weavers expected to be treated as immortal superheroes. It seems that when Carlos Guillen hit a HR and uncharacteristically intentionally watched it fly outa the park, it marked the point when Jared’s career took an immediate downward spiral.
lesterdnightfly
“Their respective organizations built up their fragile psychics…”
If the Angels and Pads were consulting “fragile psychics”, they should have found some more stable ones. There must be lots of psychics to hire in SoCal.
SixFlagsMagicPadres
Of course Fowler is going to make it seem like taking a chance on a guy like weaver was a good idea at the time. We all know the real reason behind this year though: Preller wants that first overall pick.
BravesBoi
El Paso is like Coors Field
ZB39
Shhh… don’t awake darkstar61
angels in Anaheim
I hope Weaver pitches one final game at Petco then call it a career the next day.