Edgy MD

Tell me Domonic Brown is wearing a Mets helmet. Please.

Sorry. That's what I meant. Keeping too many balls in air at home.

ESPN radio guy calling Shea a "pitcher-firendly park."

Two out, tying run on, and the AL about to meet Mr. Wright.

Any chance there'll be payback against Wright?

Surely he likes the scoreboard.

Good stuff and good typing. I like this part. Tejada: We have to be open minded about SS. nbever had power so value was OBP and that's declined 3 years. Defensively, range not what it was. We have to look at what he have. He has to work back to ML team. Here he is admitting what really he didn't have to (range has declined) and what Mike never would've asked him about (OBP), so good on him for owning up on Tejada's troubles. If we have 5 solid 3s we like 6-8 guys who can be No. 3s Not sure what to make of that. Interesting how confident he is that Gee and Hef have turned a corner and are not merely getting good results for the time being.

I get past a lot of those walls by eyeing the article's title an then searching for it by name. Sometimes you're allowed to read if you don't got through the front page. Usually works with the Washington Post, anywhizz.

soupcan wrote: That's all well and good but who exactly are they going to spend money on? They aiming to overspend for Ellsbury? Okay I guess, but what else is going to be out there that they can simply buy? Well, it's both foolish and against the rules to announce their targets before they are available. Besides, spending can mean spending in the free-agent market, but it can also mean trading for good players that already have large contracts, or trading and signing. It can also mean being more aggressive with the next Cuban defector or Japanese gyroman. People who will be available include I dunno, Robinson Cano, Jarrod Saltalamacchia, A.J. Pierzynski, Carlos Voltran, Shin-Soo Choo, Nate McLouth, Luke Scott, probably what's left of Roy Halladay, Josh Johnson, I dunno. I hear that Lincecum guy is good. We can even get Olvier Perez back. And there's the always-desirable Delmon Young.

It's a rarity in sports: an event that seemingly made for a great live spectacle but turgid and drudging TV fare.

But if they can't, which is the topic of this thread, and must be traded to improve the team, why can't they be replaced with a new pair for whom I have high hopes? I didn't say they couldn't be replaced. They can be replaced by any number of players. But the topic of the thread isn't "if they can't." The topic is which you'd rather see dealt if your choice was trading one and keeping the other. (OE: or what FK sez.)

Standings news: Philadelphia slips within a half a game of Washington, even as Met announcers interpret every Washington win as the beginning of a run they just know the Nats have in them, and every loss as perhaps the last bump in the road before said run comes. Embarrassing, guys. They're just a team. Mets sit 11 off the division lead after the Harveyless squad lost their first series in weeks, despite playing the triumphant Pirates largely even, being in every game to the end. Pittsburgh's series win puts them back over .500. If they're going to come crashing back down to earth, it ain't the Mets that are going to do it. They looked good, and they're pitching looks as deep as the Braves. In the Wild Card race, the last series put the Giants back a half game up on the Mets an dCubbies. The Dodgers pulled in front of the Rockies in the West to get even at the break, saving Mattingly's head so that he might fight another day. San Diego continues to sink. First 14 games following the break for the Mets are intradivisional matchups. TeamWLPCTGBNGBAtlanta5441.568��Washington4847.5056.06.0Philadelphia4848.5006.57.0New York4150.45111.020.5Miami3558.37618.048.5 TeamWLPCTGBNGBPittsburgh5637.602-4.0-4.0Cincinnati5342.558��Washington4847.5055.05.0Philadelphia4848.5005.56.0Los Angeles4747.5005.56.0Colorado4650.4797.514.0San Francisco4351.4579.524.0Chicago4251.45210.027.0New York4150.45110.027.0San Diego4254.43811.539.0Milwaukee3856.40414.566.0Miami3558.37617.091.0

bmfc1 wrote: The guy came up with Lucas Duda as his favorite player. Really? That guy moved my heart.

Except not in Davis or Duda, apparently.

How can you not tell that that guy's a jock?

Look it me. I get to play Bud Abbott to your Blue Costello.

Looking back on the Valdespin timeline, I noticed that divisive controversy with the guy and his manager seems to pop-up once a month, on the same day each month. May 15, 2013: "Mets� Collins On Valdespin Flap: �I Don�t Answer To Fans�" June 15, 2013: "Collins wants to give Valdespin a chance to succeed" July 15, 2013: "Spin's Big Mistake: GM Witnessed Tantrum"

Vic Sage wrote: "clutch" is a perfectly good adjective when looking at a player's past production in certain games or situations ("wow, that was a clutch hit Steve Sax just got!"), but it just sucks for projecting his future production (eg. "that guy has the mental toughness of a clutch hitter, so we should sign him to a big long-term contract"). I would tend to agree. If such a trait exists, I'm not sure it's presence is isolatable enough to put a dollar sign on it. If I'm choosing between Steve Sax and a similar player at 28 (I don't know, let's say Johnny Ray) and all other things are equal, sure I'd go for a guy with a clutch track record. But the things I'd sooner look at are whether I like the guy's lifestyle or is he fun to be around or other peripheral ephemera. I just don't think the arguments have shown the matter of clutch theory to be as dead as all that. But certainly it has been necessarily and convincingly marginalized.

I agree that you're unlikely to see a consistent display of late-and-close numbers for a player each year of his career. But then we're necessarily cutting the data to sets of about 90 plate appearances for a full-time player, at the same time we're deeming the much larger data set of a career to be to too small to be meaningful. I mean, in most years, Nolan Ryan was no better than anybody else in the no-hitter department..

Keep in mind, I'm in no way jonesing for Loney here.

Ceetar wrote: Lucas Duda has WAY too small a sample to draw something conclusive from splits. What's enough though? We've got more than a season's worth of data with Perez and Saxie. Ceetar wrote: And as you mentioned, it does matter on how you define it. Yes, that's why I menitoned it. Ceetar wrote: And using the pre-defined statistical splits to define them probably doesn't quite jive with how real pressure is felt by the player. Well, we have to agree on some objective definition, or else why bother? That's science. Ceetar wrote: What's "late and close" if it's a September game and you're 20 out? or already clinched? Same for 9th inning stats. or whatever you choose. An objective measure that accounts for the same type of at-bats regardless of the time of year or standings and hopefully finds a meaningful bottom line that speaks neither of May nor September but something in between. Ceetar wrote: It doesn't take much either. I'm not sure what that means. Ceetar wrote: Take those guys you just mentioned, is the late and close difference starker in one of their career years? I would imagine, as all other statistical measurements vary. Ceetar wrote: Is it perhaps simply good luck that when they were at the top of their game the hits happened to fall more often with runners on late in the game? Those are guys with a long careers and a lot of plate appearances. So maybe it's random but maybe it's still worth noting.

Ceetar wrote: Those shakier players aren't going to stick around long , and are probably a long shot to make the majors anyway. What if they're otherwise really good? I'm not sure what 50,000 coin flips producing 80+ heads means? If it's even close to a mere 80 out of 50,000, that's pretty pectacular. What if that coin flips 1,000 times? Or 10,000? At what point is the nature of the coin worth considering? Lucas Duda, all situations: .235 / .353 / .438 // .791. Lucas Duda, late and close: .242 / .327 / .382 // .709. Again, it may WELL be random statistical fallout, but I reject the notion that players who are otherwise capable but less so in the clutch --- wiltingly, randomly, or otherwise --- don't stick around for meaningful lengths of time.

[list:3pkftmc1]Tony P�rez, all situations: .279 / .341 / .463 // .804. Tony P�rez, late and close: .300 / .370 / .490 // .860.[/list:u:3pkftmc1] Now, that may not make eyes jump, and I'm perfectly willing to call it statistical noise, but it's a guy with a 10,000 PA career (and 1,886 L&C) plate appearances. But it seems a .021 / .029 / .027 // .056 bump is worth noting and further study. But again, that difference can disappear, depending on how you slice the data. [list:3pkftmc1]Steve Sax, all situations: .281 / .335 / .358 // .692. Steve Sax, late and close: .299 / .355 / .380 // .735.[/list:u:3pkftmc1] Those differences for both guys would obviously be larger if comparing L&C situations to no-L&C situations, rather than L&C to the full record, but I don't have the time, and you get the idea. None of this is to necessarily argue for the primacy of clutch theory (far from it), only to say the question is still partly open in my mind.

batmagadanleadoff wrote: Edgy MD wrote: There are guys whose numbers have stood out in clutch situations on something like a regular basis Really? Who? Two that come to mind are Tony P�rez and Steve Sax. It's worth noting that the former is exactly what we think of when we think of a clutch hitter (if we think of one at all), and the latter is exactly not. But again, it depends on how you frame the definition of a clutchity clutch situation.