LIES!

by AdamOnFirst on Jul 20, 2008 12:50 AM EDT

It should be pretty well known by now that I'm not often a big fan of Ron Gardenhire's decision when it comes to a lot of things. COnsidering Carlos Gomez has been one of the worst hitters in the American League so far this year, a lot of people have been wondering why he's still leading off.

Gardenhire recently said he thinks Gomez needs to have better at bats, but he's not going to move him down in the order. That prompted a funny line from this article.

Gomez hasn't visibly shown much frustration during his recent slump, but the prolonged struggles have started to affect the center fielder's demeanor off the field slightly. And that's part of the reason why Gardenhire said there have been no plans to alter Gomez's role in the order, despite his recent troubles in the leadoff spot. The skipper has always been cautious to change things drastically for young players who are in the midst of a slump.

Ummm...

via www.gardenal.org

That's all I really have to say about that level of fallacy.

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Feeding the monster

Another nothing story produced to fill what is perceived to be space on the Web.

by Johnny Safron on Jul 20, 2008 8:15 PM EDT 0 recs

Confused.

I’m not exactly sure what point you are trying to make here…

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by joeiscool12 on Jul 20, 2008 10:37 PM EDT 0 recs

Point I Am Making Here

When someone thinks there’s a need, even if there is not a need, they tend to want to fill that need.

Someone at MLB.com thought there was a big space in the Internet. “Yup, looks like it might be right over there next to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Web site. So let’s put up a story.”

And they did. Christ, just because it’s in the paper or on the Web doesn’t mean it warrants attention.

How many more GoGo must be demoted to No. 9 stories will we see in the next few days? Plenty. Well, then there must be a need for them, right?

Wrong.

But there’s a space to fill, so let’s fill it.

Reality: Managers get so many bullets in a season, and Gardenhire would be a fool to use this one now. Why demote Gomez to No. 9 now? Are the Twins playing .300 ball for the past month or so? No. They are playing .700 ball. And they’re not firing on all cylinders because no team ever is. But why do you, as a manager, make a high-profile move like this when your team is playing .700 ball for more than a month?

You wait for a four-game losing streak, and if Gomez still has a .280 or so OBP you announce you’re going to make a move. You don’t do it for the fans, for the writers or for MLB.com. You do it for the other players. It keeps them from getting complacent, but it also keeps them from looking over their shoulders and wondering every time they have a oh-fer.

They know you’re not about to panic, but they also know you’re not going to sit around forever while someone is under-performing.

You don’t need to shake up much of anything – fire that bullet – when your team is winning series after series,just because someone thinks there’s a hole in the Internet to fill.

by Johnny Safron on Jul 20, 2008 11:51 PM EDT 0 recs

Because

Gardenhire shouldn’t move Gomez because fans think so, he should do it because he’s giving one of, if not the WORST hitter (starter) in the American League more at bats than anyone else on the team. he’s leading off a guy who is over .40 OBP points below the leadoff man with the SECOND worst OBP in the AL.

And the idea that moving Gomez would discourage him more? Unlikely. I was at today’s game, and Gomez was a wreck. After failing to put down his sacrifice bunt, popping it up, Gomez walked into the hallway, hit his bat against the wall twice, then tried to break it over his knee. All in view of most of the fans. Then he walked into the dugout and almost kicked over one of the gatorades.

When he walked out to tke the field that inning, he had hi head down and was clearly talking to himself.

When he got back to the dugout for the next TWO innings after uneventful innings in the field, he kicked the wall in anger before entering the dugout.

I’ve been to a lot of Major League games. I’ve seen a lot of players kick things or heard them punch something in anger in the halls behind the dugouts. I can’t remember a player looking that visibly distured on the field.

The fact is he’s a very very poor hitter right now, and he shouldn’t be leading off, hitting in front of our best hitters, and getting more plate appearances than anyone else on the team.

But that wasn’t the point of the article. THe point I was making was how funny I find the idea that Gardenhire doesn’t like to mess with young players when they struggle a bit. Tell that to Michael Cuddyer, Jason Bartlett, Jason Kubel or Justin Morneau.

"You can't sit on a lead and run a few plays into the line and just kill the clock. You've got to throw the ball over the damn plate and give the other man his chance. That's why baseball is the greatest game of them all."
~ Earl Weaver
"In God we trust. All others must provide evidence."
~ Billy Beane

by AdamOnFirst on Jul 21, 2008 3:31 AM EDT 0 recs

That was exactly how I understood your post

And I totally agree with your arguments. Gomez is a wreck right now. It can be very dangerous to always live by the adage that “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Yes, the Twins are winning ball games at a tremendous rate at the moment, but moving Gomez down to the 9th spot might be worth around a quarter of a run per game (maybe a little less). It needs to be done as quickly as possible.

by PhoenixV on Jul 21, 2008 5:44 AM EDT up 0 recs

I agree

The conventional wisdom is to develop players in low pressure situations until they demonstrate an ability to handle higher pressure situations. I’m thinking of the way the Yankees brought Roberto Kelly along slowly. He hit .302 in his first full season, but they kept him in the nine hole all on a team full of .270 hitters because they wanted to make sure his confidence didn’t suffer. I think he led the team in hitting, but developing him was more important than giving him the tough opportunities.

Gardy is taking the opposite approach to Gomez, claiming that he’s afraid to harm the kid’s confidence by moving him down. Well, it seems to me he’s doing more long-term harm to Gomez’s confidence by keeping him in the lead-off hole. It would be a shame if Gardy ruined the most valuable piece of the Santana trade because he doesn’t want to fix something that isn’t broken.

To say nothing of how much harm Gomez is doing to our scoring chances, especially early in games, when it seems like our best hitters are always coming up with outs on the board rather than runners on base.

"You're thinking too much. Just have fun." -- Bennie "The Jet" Rodriguez in Sandlot

by cmathewson on Jul 21, 2008 10:14 AM EDT up 0 recs

Conventional wisdom

The conventional wisdom is to develop players in low pressure situations until they demonstrate an ability to handle higher pressure situations. I’m thinking of the way the Yankees brought Roberto Kelly along slowly.

I don’t see any evidence through recent baseball history that this is conventional wisdom, and you can’t make a case by singling out what you allege Peter Gammons said to support it. Mr. Kelly was a rookie more than 15 years ago and he was not a rookie with the Twins, as was Chuck Knoblauch, for instance.

Mr. Knoblauch is one of many exceptions to this alleged convention.

He was installed at the number two spot from the get-go. If the Twins lacked Dan Gladden, they undoubtedly would have put Mr. Knoblauch leadoff, but as has been pointed out, team personnel dictates most of these decisions. Even if Mr. Gladden wasn’t the perfect lead-off man, very few managers will displace a veteran with a rookie.

Earl Weaver left Lee Maye at first base and placed Eddie Murray into the dh role when Mr. Murray was a rookie, and that was another example of personnel shaping a decision. Mr. Maye was a veteran first baseman and the manager could not make a case to place the veteran in the dh role. If Mr. Maye had been a poor fielder, that might have been an argument for making such a move, but he was a fine fielder.

Evan Langoria is another example of someone who defies “conventional wisdom.” He was promoted and then “protected” in the sixth spot for all of two games before the Rays moved him into the fifth spot.

We can go on singling out examples all day. Personnel dictates managerial moves, and it’s not common that the majority of teams have the luxury of “coddling” exceptional young players. The 1984 Minnesota Twins are plenty of additional evidence. Few of those player were developed in “low pressure situations” because the Twins’ situation at the time did not allow it.

It bears noting that the Twins have their youngest team this season during Ron Gardenhire,’s managerial career, so his approach to handling 22-year-old rookies is uncharted territory. The only previous player who parallels Carlos Gomez is Luis Rivas, and Mr. Gardenhire batted him all over the place as a rookie, an approach that could be argued to be more disruptive that leaving him in the same slot, whether that be first, second or ninth, or anywhere in between.

by Sev on Jul 24, 2008 12:06 AM EDT up 0 recs

I half-assumed that...

but with all of the Gomez-batting-9th talk lately, I thought it was possible you were talking about that as well.

Oh, and I agree fully with that point, haha.

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by joeiscool12 on Jul 21, 2008 12:24 PM EDT up 0 recs

I would not be surprised

if Gardy is getting some pressure from above to keep playing Gomez. They want to show that we are getting something for Santana.

The owls are not what they seem.

richman

by anderson800 on Jul 21, 2008 10:56 AM EDT 0 recs

I'm in this camp as well

but at this point I think most fans have moved on from the ‘did we get anything for Santana’ state of mind and are more interested in seeing this team continue to fight for the division.

If there is pressure from the front office, they need to turn the page and help the team win this division.

by caluofmn on Jul 21, 2008 12:46 PM EDT up 0 recs

The real reason the Yankees batted Robert Kelly No. 9

He hit .302 in his first full season, but they kept him in the nine hole all on a team full of .270 hitters because they wanted to make sure his confidence didn’t suffer.

That never happened.

In Kelly’s first full season in 1989, the Yankees envisioned that Roberto Kelly would eventually grow into a No. 4 or 5 hitter. He was slotted 9th in that rookie season because the team had two established leadoff hitters in Rickey Henderson and Steve Sax. No manager – let alone Dallas Green – would have dreamed of replacing either of these men with Kelly, who whiffed way more than he walked (and for some reason in his first two seasons, whiffed way, way more on the road than at home).

When Henderson was traded in 1989, Sax was moved into his logical spot atop the order, a spot he was accustomed to during his Dodger career. Luis Polonia, a natural No. 2 hitter who usually put the ball in play, rarely walking or striking out, was the No. 2 guy after the Henderson trade.

Don Mattingly, Jesse Barfield and Steve Balboni were the heart of the order, so Kelly was not going to break into that group, and Kelly had the wheels, so the obvious spot for him was No. 9.

Green never had to think about coddling Kelly. His personnel dictated Kelly’s spot in the order.

In 1990, Kelly took the vast majority of his swings at lead-off after replacing Sax there. Sax moved down to No. 2. around late May or early June. Kelly had nearly 700 PAs that season and a little more than 100 were anywhere else but the Nos. 1 and 2 spots.

by Johnny Safron on Jul 22, 2008 12:23 AM EDT 0 recs

That's your story and you're sticking to it

I got mine from Peter Gammons. Perhaps Gammons was wrong. But if it’s between you and Gammons, I’ll take Gammons. No offense.

"You're thinking too much. Just have fun." -- Bennie "The Jet" Rodriguez in Sandlot

by cmathewson on Jul 22, 2008 9:48 AM EDT up 0 recs

Looks like I should be talking with Peter, then

Odd, you didn’t attribute the remark to Peter initially, but portrayed it as your own. The problem with adopting someone else’s remark as your own is that when the remark is challenged it’s a little difficult to defend.

For a blogger who takes the conventional media to task all the time, you sure seem to like them when it’s convenient.

Well, you’ll have to come up with better support for a statement you initially claimed as your own than to abruptly hide behind something you claim that Peter Gammons said.

Any knowledgeable baseball person knows that Rickey Henderson came to the plate as a leadoff hitter about 13,000 times. No one would consider batting anyone else leadoff with him on the team. It’s clear that Kelly batted exactly where he should have given the personnel on that team.

by Johnny Safron on Jul 22, 2008 8:51 PM EDT up 0 recs

My bad

I didn’t make attribution. I considered it conventional wisdom. But, whatever. You attack the illustration rather than the point. The illustration is just there to help readers understand my position, not to defend it. The defense is in the numbers.

As long as Gomez’s OBP is 100 points lower than Span’s flip flopping them in the order seems like a no-brainer to me.

"You're thinking too much. Just have fun." -- Bennie "The Jet" Rodriguez in Sandlot

by cmathewson on Jul 22, 2008 11:04 PM EDT up 0 recs

Why would they care?

if Gardy is getting some pressure from above to keep playing Gomez. They want to show that we are getting something for Santana.

Everyone has either forgotten Santana or knows that he hasn’t won for New York. Casual fans - and that’s most fans - aren’t going to drill down beyond Santana’s W-L mark or ERA, which is relatively high for him in a non-DH league.

Fans move on. Organizations move on. This org is done with Santana. Certainly, they wish him well, but no team that is fighting for a playoff will let what happened in the off-season dictate what they are doing as August approaches.

by Johnny Safron on Jul 22, 2008 12:29 AM EDT 0 recs

I agree on at least one point

This org is done with Santana. Certainly, they wish him well, but no team that is fighting for a playoff will let what happened in the off-season dictate what they are doing as August approaches.

I can’t imagine that the Twins’ front office would be so selfishly short-sighted as to try and insist on pushing Gomez to the detriment of the team’s chances of winning. If the team is winning, fans won’t care what Santana is doing (except as fans of Johan Santana), and the trade pieces, post-trade criticism, will fade into the background. However keeping Gomez in the lead off spot for everyone to continually witness 0-5 nights will keep that trade in the foreground.

by montanatwinsfan on Jul 22, 2008 11:04 AM EDT up 0 recs