We know Cesar Izturis can't hit, but did you know there's a major leaguer who he puts to shame with the bat? That would be the Angels' Jeff Mathis, who gets significant playing time with LA despite being the worst hitter in baseball in recent years. Is there justification for that? His defense, perhaps? I looked into it at Beyond the Box Score today. Check it out.

I did an interview with Al Skorupa of Bullpen Banter recently, discussing the blog, the Orioles' off-season, the direction of the team, Matt Wieters, and the O's farmsystem. Check it out.

Congratulations to Bert Blyleven and Roberto Alomar on being inducted to the Hall of Fame today. Both well deserved. I didn't formally write up a ballot like I did last year, but that vote pretty much stands. In addition to Alomar, Blyleven, Barry Larkin, Edgar Martinez, Mark McGwire, Tim Raines, and Alan Trammell as returning players, I would have voted for Jeff Bagwell, Larry Walker, Rafael Palmeiro, and Kevin Brown as well. That's 11 guys, but seeing as how I don't have an official ballot anyway, it doesn't much matter. Heck, Lou Whitaker, Bobby Grich, and Ron Santo would be on there too.

Kevin Brown only getting 2.1% of the vote and dropping off the ballot is a travesty (he got less than half as many votes as Juan Gonzalez!). He actually had a pretty similar career to Curt Schilling (with fewer K's, but also many fewer home runs allowed - check out the graphs). From 1996 to 200, Brown had a streak of seasons with 230+ IP, an ERA of 3 or less (including a 1.89), and over 6 fWAR (including a 9.3). I get that the contract and attitude stuff might knock him down a peg or two, but that only gets him into borderline territory.

Bagwell came on with a decent showing, so I think he'll get in. All the stupid steroids whispers are terrible though (and not just because of the results - "I heard he may possibly be guilty of doing something I don't like at the moment, so I'm going to punish him" is an awful process). If I had a vote and didn't vote for Jack Morris because I thought he used PEDs I would be torn apart by the people voting for Morris (who also happen to be many of the same people voting against Bagwell because of something they have no evidence of). Was he a great player? Most definitely. Then he belongs in the Hall of Fame.

Speaking of Morris, it was great to see that his support didn't jump much. If he doesn't get voted in next year with a weak incoming class then I don't think it'll happen. He just wasn't an all-time great pitcher. He was a good pitcher who pitched a lot and had one great and meaningful game. You know who was at least as good as Jack Morris? Orel Hershiser. Bret Saberhagen. Dave Steib. Kevin Appier.

Quick, which one of these guys should go to the Hall?

245-193, 3.70 ERA, 106 ERA+, 3999 IP, 4.8 K/9, 2.6 BB/9, 0.8 HR/9, 47 fWAR, 39 brWAR
254-186, 3.90 ERA, 105 ERA+, 3824 IP, 5.8 K/9, 3.3 BB/9, 0.9 HR/9, 52 fWAR, 39 brWAR
239-157, 4.13 ERA, 108 ERA+, 3439 IP, 5.8 K/9, 1.9 BB/9, 1.1 HR/9, 61 fWAR, 51 brWAR

The new blog is only a few weeks, but I can already refer back to a previous statement:

"Giving Kevin Gregg $10 M is really not a particularly smart idea."

Andy MacPhail has gotten around doing other dumb things (LaRoche, Bartlett), but he finally was able to enact his plan A at a postion, locking up reliever Kein Gregg for two years and $10 M (with incentives and a vesting option for a third, which could take the deal up to $20 M - that's just crazy). At the going rate of $5 M per win, that means the team is looking for Gregg to produce about one win a year over the course of the contract. Number of times in his career that Gregg has posted an fWAR over 1? One. What about brWAR? Two. Over his eight years in the big leagues, Gregg has averaged right around 0.6 WAR (either version) per season (65 IP). The chances of the O's even breaking even on the deal are pretty slim (and I don't think it's worth considering any potential free agent compensation after Gregg leaves, since (1) the CBA might be changed to address that issue and (2) it probably won't be worth offering him arbitration).

That's not to say Gregg is terrible; he's a perfectly serviceable bullpen arm. His stuff isn't all that impressive, but he'll miss some bats (8.3 K/9 career). His control is spotty though (3.8 BB/9 career, but 4.3 BB/9 or above in three of the past four seasons), and he's a flyball pitcher who might have some home run issues at Camden Yards. Even if you want to give him full credit for longball suppression (xFIP of 4.30), his career ERA (4.03) lines up with his FIP (3.95) - and I think both tell the story of the kind of pitcher he is. Solid, but not a relief ace by any stretch of the imagination (though, to be fair, his ERA was around 3.50 three of the past four years). He's the kind of guy that you're happy to throw in the pen as a scarp-heap pick-up (or even a little more) or someone from your minor league system - not someone to hold on to once he starts getting really expensive. The signing improves the bullpen's ERA - even assuming Gregg pitches better than his career rates - by something like a tenth of a run. That will obviously propel the club from 5th to 3rd place! I think Gregg is likely to be the "closer", since he was signed for more money than Koji and he likely signed with the understanding that he'd be first in line for saves. That's actually not a bad thing, since it allows Buck to use the better pitcher (Uehara) in earlier high leverage situations while leaving the ninth for Gregg.

I don't know how long it'll be before the O's stop handing multi-year, big money (for a guy throwing 60 innings) contracts to mediocre pitchers, but that point can't come too soon. When the team is looking at a 90 win season and have an obvious hole in the bullpen, then you can make an exception. Maybe.

The O's went after Jason Bartlett and then ended up trading for JJ Hardy (in a much better deal). They were looking at Kevin Gregg and then signed Jeremy Accardo (to a much cheaper deal - though they sadly still might have interest in Gregg). They may have offered Adam LaRoche a three-year contract and were looking at him as their first choice to play first-base in 2011. Luckily they had to go to plan B again, as LaRoche was holding out for something better. The Orioles finally wised up and moved on to Derrek Lee, who they signed to a one-year, $8 M contract (probably - the exact terms haven't been released yet, but that's the figure that was going around*).

* Apparenlty Lee turned down $8.5 M from the Padres to come to Baltimore. Huge diffference in park factors there, but still.

Lee had a down season last year, hitting .260/.347/.428 and accumulating just 2.0 fWAR. His strike-out rate of 24.5% was the highest it had been in eight years (though there wasn't a big drop in his contact rate), and his .168 ISO the lowest it had been in eleven. Still, he walked at an above average clip (11.7%) which kept his bat above average. Lee's also just one year removed from a .306/.393/.579 season (5.2 fWAR), and though he's not likely to reach those heights again, there is some upside potential there.

If Lee hits, say, .275/.355/.450 next year, that would make him +10 runs offensively over 600 plate appearances. The weighted average of his last three seasons is .288/.368/.493, which would be more like +20 runs. I'd say that's the ceiling of what one could reasonably expect, though perhaps with a few extra points of OBP at the expense of some SLG. In any case, it'll be nice to have another player on the team with some real plate discipline - Lee consistently swings at fewer pitches out of the strike-zone than average (according to FanGraphs) and has walked at least 70 times in four straight seasons (Nick Markakis was the only Oriole to walk 70 times last year, and he had only 73 free passes).

Defensively, the fielding stats have Lee between average and pretty good. Career UZR/150 is +1; DRS/150 is +1; Total Zone is 0; and the Fan Scouting Report (just for the past two seasons) is +5 per 150 games. I'd take an even zero for 2011 as a fair expectation; he'll be older, but his recent years are also the ones with the better numbers.

Putting that together, Lee would be about a 2 wins player next year. At $5 M per win, that would make the deal favorable for the Orioles by around $2 M. If his bat bounces back a little more and his fielding is a little better, than a 3-3.5 win season would make the signing look really good. Plus, if Lee is actually playing that well then there might be some demand for him at the trade deadline.

I think this was a good, low-downside (the team should get a minimum of 1 win if Lee is reasonably healthy*), decent-upside signing. The Orioles' infield is set with guys who should each be around average to somewhat above, which hasn't happened in quite a while. The team isn't locked into mediocrity for multiple years, and they buy themselves another year to find a longer-term answer at first. Andy MacPhail once again backed into the move he should have made to begin with.

* He's recovering from thumb surgery, though I think he'll be mostly OK. The injury might partially explains the down season in 2010 though.

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Stats: BB% & K%, ISO, wRAA, Plate Discipline Stats, UZR, DRS, Total Zone, Fan Scouting Report, WAR

One of the more disappointing trends in recent years has been the progression (or lack thereof) of Nick Markakis' career. After his phenomenal 2008 season (.306/.406/.491, +12 UZR), Nick has seemingly settled in as just a decent player - which is a far cry from the All-Star the Orioles need him to be to make the AL East more interesting.

Coming into the 2010 season, there was some hope that Markakis could rediscover the plate discipline that allowed him to walk 99 times in '08, which was almost cut in half in '09 (56 BB). An uptick there, a slight bump in power, and an improvement in his defensive numbers (to a small plus; between his very good 2008 and his -6 UZR in '09) would have left Nick short of the 6.1 fWAR he posted in what now looks like his career year, but still solidly above average at 4+ WAR.

Markakis started the year out walking left and right, with 10 free passes in his first 7 games. At the All-Star break his walk rate stood at 12.9% - a good deal closer to his previous high (14.2%) then last year's low (7.9%). He was hitting for average and knocking out doubles - a "Nick Markakis day" was a 1-3 with a two-base knock and a walk - but his slugging percentage was hovering in the lower .400s. On May 23rd he had just 2 home runs. He finished the year at .297/.370/.436 with only 12 homers. The OBP was nice (or, at least, nicer than it was the previous season), but where was the power?

I know this is coming a little late, but I liked the move so I wanted to touch on it even if it was no longer "news".

There was exactly one player I really wanted the Orioles to pick up this off-season. It wasn't Cliff Lee or Carl Crawford or Adrian Beltre (though singing Beltre would be pretty awesome too). My number one wish was for the Minnesota Twins to non-tender shortstop JJ Hardy and for the O's to sign him. When the team signed Cesar Izturis a couple years ago, the idea was for the all-glove no-hit Izzy to hold the fort and give the front office some time to acquire a younger replacement. That never happened though - and drafting the 17 year old Manny Machado in 2010 doesn't count - and with there being a dearth of options at the position on the free agent market this off-season, there was a distinct possibility that re-signing Izzy for another year might really have been the best option. JJ Hardy - while perhaps no longer a star - sure seemed like it by comparison. I usually don't set my sights on a specific player quite so intently*, but Andy MacPhail really came through even when the Twins (wisely) decided not to release Hardy.

* I was pretty adamant that the team sign Gregg Zaun a couple years ago. They did, and it worked out pretty well. Usually I prefer a wait-and-see approach, since I don't have enough information on demands and preferences and whatnot.

When there were rumors floating around that the Rays were trying to unload Jason Bartlett, it made sense for the O's to inquire on the price. That turned out to supposedly be Nolan Reimold, which seemed like a pretty bad deal to me given that the outfielder still has some potential... and five more years of team control. Then there was supposed to be another player involved - a prospect from the Rays to balance things out, I expected. When the second player was revealed to be Alfredo Simon, I went from against the trade to very against the trade*. Luckily that fell through, and the O's moved on to JJ Hardy, who the Twins made available for some reason.

* I admit that, for personal reasons, I like Simon more than I should.

When the terms were released (some time after midnight as evening last week) - Hardy and infielder Brendan Harris for minor league pitchers Brett Jacobson and Jim Hoey - I almost didn't believe it. Bartlett required a cheap position player with power and patience and a major league reliever, while Hardy - a not dissimilarly valuable player - required only a couple arms that might never even see time in the majors. When the trade went down as presented - with the Twins even tossing in $500K - I was really excited (stayed up for 2+ hours to do some analysis).

Let's take a look at a more in-depth breakdown: