Three Days of Thomson: On Day 3, he bashed New York Players
Goodbye Shea Hillenbrand and Ted Lilly...hello John Thomson. Apparently, Thomson isn't quite enamored with the New York Mets, who were the other team bidding for his services.
About Paul LoDuca:
"As far as just looking at Paul Lo Duca across the field, I'm not really into how he acts behind the plate,"But before we judge Thomson's comments, let's take a look at the new Rosenthal column:
"Blue Jays right-hander John Thomson is not alone in his criticism of Mets catcher Paul LoDuca. Many rival players believe LoDuca is overrated defensively, and some Mets officials are still miffed that LoDuca allowed right-hander Guillermo Mota to abandon his changeup in a pivotal at-bat against the Cardinals' Scott Spiezio in Game 2 of the National League Championship Series. Mota got ahead 0-2 on changeups, but Spiezio hit a two-out, two-run double off a fastball to tie the score. ..."Good to know that Thomson only calls them as he sees them...
The outfield defense?
"And then with Vernon Wells in center field, I'm not really concerned about the outfield with him out there. ... Just watching the Mets' outfield, if Cliff Floyd is still there it's not a real good fit for him out there. He can hit the ball, but as far as defense, he's a little shaky."Someone forgot to tell Thomson that he's suppose to hate the Yankees, not the Mets...and also that Floyd is no longer a Met...I like his competitive fire and his comments were probably just explanatory but I hope that for Jays management he's not as confrontational as he seems since John Gibbons is not winning any sensitivity awards lately. Is it too early to get him copies of this?
I personally don't think so...But hey, Jays fans if nothing else, he should make for another entertaining season of when is" Gibby going punch him"? Let's just hope he doesn't write on the whiteboard or almost blow huge leads and get pissed off for being pulled before throwing the mandatory innings for a win. Maybe the new Jays slogan should be "Even when we're losing, things are ALWAYS exciting" since there seems to be this confrontational nature from the top of the organization down. Maybe J.P. can sign Floyd...However, Thomson did have some good things to say about the Jays, as mentioned he praised Vernon's defense and:
"I know a bit about [Toronto catcher] Gregg Zaun and I know he wants to win and he's not going to let anything get in his way to do that, and I like that."Also mentioned in this article is that A) Thomson makes $1.5 million if he makes the Opening Day roster and B) he's been told that a rotation spot is his to lose. Finally, he talked about his late season appearence I mentioned yesterday... "I threw nine pitches. I threw eight strikes and I got three outs so I was pretty happy," Thomson said.
- LOOGY Scott Schoenweis has found a home in New York...3 year deal, over $10 million. They already have one LOOGY and I'm sort of wondering if they will bring him in as a possible starter? I hope for them that they won't, he's a valuable over-paid LOOGY(Lefty one out guy) in the NL...
- And...Bonds apparently failed a drug test last season...when will the witch hunt stop?
7 comments:
More Comments from J.P. Courtesy of Buster Olney
"We had our [staff] look at it, and what we found is that No. 5 starters have an ERA of about 6.25, and No. 4 starters are at about 4.60," said Ricciardi. "We just need guys who can hold the fort down."
"I was telling [the front-office staff], 'You're going to think I'm nuts, but there will be a day soon when a 5 ERA is considered to be average in the big leagues, considering how lineups are being built these days."
Jules, how likely do you think it is that FO’s look at the same stuff as we do (meaning fans), like THT or BP? I’m not name dropping or anything so don’t get the wrong impression but I was asking the same types of questions a while back to Keith Law via email and he basically said that most teams already know most of the information like Sackmann’s articles at THT. I didn’t call him on it but stuff like JP’s quote makes me think otherwise. I mean the Jays hired Law from BP basically so I’m sure teams know about the main sites like BP. I don’t think they have much choice but the take some of the stuff being posted seriously, right? I mean in BP’s golden age the articles and analyses were just ridiculous. What’s your thoughts?
Duh...any GM should read everything he can about baseball...even if he hates sabrmetrics
Yeah good answer Miker. Way to get the discussion going. It's not at all what I said though. Of course any GM SHOULD use information available to them, the question is do they? Do they trust third party information such as BP enough to factor into their discussions/decisions or do they take it with a grain of salt and dismiss it in favor of internal studies etc?
I'm sure you're both right in a way that like any executive you try to get your hands on the most literature you can but I'm sure they take it with a grain of salt because it's independent research. It may be used to double check or cross-reference but obviously will never be the basis for decisions. If it were these people wouldn't be writing, they'd have in MLB team offices.
It's probably just coincidence because the stats that JP mentioned aren't terribly hard to calculate but it's just exactly what Sackmann's shit was about recently. That's what originally caught my attention. Word
yeh, I'm sure they have their own stats guys figuring this out...with much more sophisticated software that any of us have.
Post a Comment