Monthly Archives: April 2007

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Tigers on Protrade

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Some of you may have already heard of Protrade. John Beamer took a comprehensive look at it for the Hardball Times earlier this week. Essentially it is where fantasy sports meet a stock market. Using fictional dollars you can look for undervalued players to buy or overvalued players to short.

Just recently, Protrade started doing this for teams as well. Taking a look at the Tigers, the market rates them as the 13th best team in MLB at 103.48. So how is that value achieved?

Using the pricing widget you input the number of wins you expect for the season, as well as post season performance. It is one dollar for each win, and $10 for making the postseason, plus additional monies for how far the team goes.

Speculating that the Tigers win 90 games, and take care of business in the ALDS before going down in 5 games in the ALCS would value the team at $126. This seems to be a reasonable, (and a little hopeful) expectation. The fact that the market prices them North of $100 means that there is a reasonable expectation that the Tigers at least make the playoffs.

This certainly seems fun, and and interesting thing to watch as the season progresses and we learn more about each team. It doesn’t cost anything to play with the pricing widget, so give it a try and let me know how you’d value the team.

And if you were wondering AL Central foes the Twins and Indians rank 5th and 6th respectively.

2007 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap – 4/26/07

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Akron 2 Erie 4
Clete Thomas singled, doubled, and walked. Andres Torres and Brent Dlugach each had 2 hits as well. Dallas Trahern went 6 innings allowing 2 runs on 6 hits, 1 walk, a homer, and 2 strike outs.

Akron 7 Erie 3
Jair Jurrjens had a no hitter for the first 5 innings, but then allowed 5 runs in the 6th inning. Jeff Larish singled and walked. Matt Joyce added a double for the Wolves only extra base hit.

Clearwater 11 Lakeland 3
Sendy Vasquez was knocked around for 9 hits and 8 runs – 5 earned – in 4 2/3 innings. In relief Matt Righter pitched 3 innings allowing 2 runs on 4 hits while fanning 5. Justin Justice tripled and singled to lead the offense.

West Michigan 11 Peoria 3
Gorkys Hernandez had a big game with 3 hits and a walk. Audy Ciriaco added 3 hits as well. Scott Sizemore had 2 hits and a walk while Ryan Strieby added 2 hits as well. Brennan Boesch hit his first homer of the year. Duane Below started and lasted 5 innings allowing 3 runs on 2 hits, 2 walks, and 6 strikeouts.

Links

links for 2007-04-27

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2007 Season, Pitching

Comparing Zumaya

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A couple weeks ago we took a look at Joel Zumaya’s 2 inning save against Toronto through the eyes of MLB.com’s Enhanced Gameday. Last night against the White Sox Zumaya had an outing on the opposite end of the effectiveness spectrum.

Zumaya basically couldn’t find the strike zone to save his life last night. He through 32 pitches in one inning, and only 11 went for strikes. It resulted in 4 walks and a hit batter. Zumaya thought he was being squeezed.

zumayasz.jpg

Enhanced Gameday only captured 26 of Zumaya’s 32 pitches. Plotting them it does appear that Zumaya had a couple of pitches in the strike zone that were called balls. But there are also a ton of balls no where near the strike zone, and in general Joel was leaving the ball up.

Against Toronto, Joel was consistently on the edges of the strike zone. Against the White Sox he was erratic. Enhanced Game Day does allow us to take a look at one aspect of mechanics and that is release point.
Joel Zumaya release point comparison
While there is overlap in the clusters, it appears that Joel Zumaya was releasing the ball closer to the center of the mound. Now it is hard to say what, if anything this data means. The difference could be in the calibration of the cameras. Or perhaps Zumaya was working from a different part of the rubber Or it could be that his mechanics were altered and he was releasing the ball closer to his head against the White Sox.

In terms of velocity, of the 26 pitches that gameday captured, 23 were fastballs. Of those 23 fastballs only 10 topped 100mph so Zumaya was working a little under the velocity we saw in Toronto. Against the Jays he averaged 100.5 on the gun. Again, this could be a calibration issue, or it could be that Zumaya was never comfortable last night for one reason or another.

This data is still quite new, and I’m still learning to work with it. As we learn more about the data, and it’s limitations and strengths, hopefully we’ll be able to discern more.

2007 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap – 4/25/07

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Toledo 4 Charlotte 6 10 innings
Zach Miner’s control numbers look better than they have. He walked none over 7 innings. He did allow 4 runs on 7 hits and 2 homers while striking out 4. Preston Larrison, who has been effective in relief, took the loss when he surrendered 2 unearned runs on a homer in the 10th. Chris Shelton, Mike Hessman and Ryan Raburn all homered for the Hens.

Erie – rained out

Lakeland 4 Sarasota 1
Eleazar Aponte pitched 6 shut out innings allowing only 3 hits and 2 walks while fanning 5. Justin Justice doubled twice in 4 at-bats

West Michigan – DNP

2007 Season, Game Post

Game 21: Tigers at White Sox

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PREGAME: I’ll be home from traveling later tonight, so these game posts should have more robust information soon. In the meantime you guys have been awesome with the comments in the game threads.

Tonight it is Chad Durbin and John Danks.

Game Time 8:11pm

POSTGAME:
So I actually got to see all of this game. I got back from Chicago (and yes the weather was freakin’ miserable) just in time for the first inning. With nearly 200 comments I think everyone has covered everything, but just a few comments:

  • Chad Durbin was quite awesome tonight. Some will point to a lineup and say he benefited from not facing Jim Thome and Jermaine Dye, to which I say “Duh.” Next I say “so what?”
  • Durbin has now made 4 starts, and I’d contend he’s done his job in 2 of them. Of course last night we got way more than we hoped for. But in his prior start against the White Sox he only allowed 2 runs in 5 innings. That is more than serviceable from a 5th starter. Now the 6th inning in that last start was of course dicey, but he’d already done his job keeping the team in the game.
  • As for leaving in Durbin to finish the job, he was really right in that gray area of pitch count. I certainly understand both camps here. On one hand, how often do you even have a chance at a complete game shutout? And at 106 pitches, he probably could have gone another one. On the other hand, it was a crappy night, it’s early in the season, he’s done his job.
  • As for why Joel Zumaya in a blowout? I’d guess it’s because Zumaya had been warming up in the 7th inning when it was a 4 run game. If Leyland gets a pitcher up, he tends to use them. It wasn’t Leyland’s fault that Zumaya couldn’t find the plate to save his life and is now unavailable for tomorrow.
  • With 13 hits, the offense is definitely coming around. Sure there are still 4 regulars struggling, but that number was at 6 a week and a half ago.
  • And just because it came up in the comments, clutch hitting. There are definitely things such as clutch hits, but I’m still not sure there are clutch hitters. The basic contention being that if you can will yourself to a hit with runners on, why can’t you do it the rest of the time. That said, I’d be inclined to believe that there are “unclutch” hitters who to suffer under pressure but that the perception is overblown. For one thing defining clutch situations is difficult. For another, sample size becomes an issue. Third, athletes playing in the major leagues have faced pressure situations all through out their careers to get to that point in the first place. I think that would be a significant weeding out process for those who were “unclutch.”

    • Tigers 6, White Sox 2

2007 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap – 4/24/2007

Toledo 2 Charlotte 4
Yorman Bazardo only allowed 3 hits, a walk, and an unearned run over 6 innings of work. Chris Shelton was 2 for 4 with a a walk.

Akron 9 Erie 2
Jon Connolly allowed 3 runs on 7 hits spanning 5 innings. Kyle Sleeth came on in relief and allowed 6 runs, 2 of which were earned in 1 2/3 innings. Jeff Larish homered and doubled to lead the offense.

Lakeland 7 Sarasota 5
Mike Hernandez went 4 for 4 with 2 doubles and Wilkin Ramirez added 2 hits. Lucas French allowed 5 hits, a walk, and 2 runs while fanning 5 in 7 innings.

Wisconsin 3 West Michigan 6
Lauren Gagnier went 5 innings allowing 3 runs on 2 hits and 2 walks. Brennan Boesch, Jeremy Laster, and Audy Ciriaco all had 2 hit games.

2007 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap 4/23/07

Toledo 8 Charlotte 1
Timo Perez hit his 4th homer and added 2 other hits. Brent Clevlen went 2 for 4 with a walk. Chris Maples and Dane Sardinha each had 2 hit games. Dennis Tankersley pitched 7 innings allowing only 4 hits and 1 run while walking one and fanning 5.

Akron 4 Erie 9
Jeff Larish doubled and walked raising his season line to an impressive 268/344/554. Mike Hollimon hit his first homer of the season and added a walk. Kody Kirkland and Brent Dlugach had 2 hit games and Jackson Melian had 3 hits. Eddie Bonine started and went 5 2/3 innings fanning 7 and allowing 3 runs on 7 hits. Anthony Tomey who was just promoted from Lakeland retired all 4 batters he faced, striking out 2.

Lakeland 2 Sarasota 7
Cameron Maybin tripled and singled and is n ow hitting 321/465/661. Burke Badenhop allowed 4 runs, but only one was earned, over 5 innings.

Wisconsin 6 West Michigan 3
Not much offense for the Caps with only 4 hits posted. Ryan Strieby picked up 2 of them. Jonah Nickerson pitched shutout baseball for 5 innings before being touched for 5 runs in his last 1 1/3.

Minors News

Virgil Vasquez was named International League pitcher of the week.

2007 Season, Game Post

Game 19: Tigers at Angels

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PREGAME: The Tigers kick off an asinine 4 game road trip that takes them to California for 2 games and Chicago for 2 games. The team flight arrived in LA about midnight eastern time last night.

It will be Mike Maroth taking on Jered Weaver. Let’s hope they can avoid extra innings tonight.

Game time 10:05pm