Mo's Approval Rating -- Revised
by wizardofozzie on Jan 4, 2009 9:21 PM EST
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PrintThanks for the input from everyone else on the previous post! Instead of simply approving or disapproving of Mo's job thus far, I would like to see the rating from 1 to 5 that people here think he has done. I know people like a lot of the things he has done but yet dislike other things.
Please feel free to comment on why you gave him the grade, and some of the moves he has made that you approve or disapprove of.
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Mo
Best Moves — Glaus/Rolen trade, Lohse pickup, F-Lopez midseason pickup
Worst Moves — Reyes/Perdomo trade, and Lohse’s current contract
Lohse’s contract could prove to be good but I don’t feel like it was a wise way to spend that much money. I only see him going down from here, I feel like the Khalil Greene trade was a good one but I was scared to put it up there because of the PTBNL
Can't agree more
Thanks for revising it, this is much more interesting
The Godfather himself has decided to grace us with his presence. This is his damn house. He sleeps 20 feet away.
Appreciate the input..
Last one was just kind of impulse.
by wizardofozzie on Jan 4, 2009 9:30 PM EST up reply actions
I would include the Edmonds/Freese deal
on the best moves category as well.
Patiently awaiting the day Colby Rasmus does this: .275/.381/.551/.932, 29HR, in St. Louis...
by RunninRedbird on Jan 4, 2009 9:50 PM EST up reply actions
+1
I voted for 4 by the way. The 2nd Lohse deal is the only thing that I don’t like. I’m also a little worried the PTBNL in the Greene trade is Salas.
The Godfather himself has decided to grace us with his presence. This is his damn house. He sleeps 20 feet away.
by thegodfather on Jan 4, 2009 10:37 PM EST up reply actions
You can't say thats a best move
without Freese having played in the majors.
It can’t really go down as a bad deal because not having Edmonds didn’t hurt us.
But it can’t be considered great or even good until Freese does something positive for us.
Sure you can
Edmonds was worthless for the first half of 08 and not having him got Ludwick more playing time. Freese has also emerged as a top prospect (though an old one) in the Cards’ system and he has a good shot IMO of being a backup player in 2009. If nothing else, he’s an awesome trade chip for us right now. If we had kept Edmonds, we would currently be without Edmonds and Freese.
The Godfather himself has decided to grace us with his presence. This is his damn house. He sleeps 20 feet away.
by thegodfather on Jan 4, 2009 10:46 PM EST up reply actions
+1
Says everything I would have said
Patiently awaiting the day Colby Rasmus does this: .275/.381/.551/.932, 29HR, in St. Louis...
by RunninRedbird on Jan 5, 2009 11:07 AM EST up reply actions
Jimmy Ballgame...
… we payed him to play for the Cubs, put up roughly the same OPS+ as Ankiel and play much better defense. yeah we got Freese, but just about the last thing we need is another so-so 3B prospect.
i’m pretty pleased with Mo, but i’m really not sure how the JED deal can really be considered a major success.
Edmonds wOBA: .353
Ankiel wOBA: .360
Edmonds UZR: -10.9
Ankiel UZR: -10.2
Edmonds WAR: 1.2
Ankiel WAR: 1.9
Edmonds value: 5.6M
Ankiel value: 8.5M
All per Fangraphs.
I think it has to be viewed in the context of potential liability at the point of the decision as well as the value of giving other players more time on the field: Ankiel and Schumaker go to CF while Edmonds isn’t there, Ludwick goes to RF while Ankiel and Schumaker aren’t there, etc.
Even so, I'm surprised how close they were.
Although I’m still a defensive stat newbie and have little sense of scale with those metrics. Same goes for WAR, I don’t really know how similar 1.2 and 1.9 are.
UZR is measured in runs above AVERAGE for the same position. According to that, both Ankiel and Edmonds prevented about 10 less runs than their positional peers. If I were managing I think I’d put Ankiel in RF (strong arm) and Edmonds in either RF or LF.
WAR is wins above “replacement,” which is worse than average. This factors offense (wOBA), defense (UZR), and positional value. A “win” is factored to be a little over 10 runs in baseball, so you could see 1.2 as 12 runs and 1.9 as 19 runs. An easier way to look at that data might be to poke around that same zone of 1.2 and 1.9 with other players and see which ones you recognize. Adam Dunn was a 1.9 win player in 2008, for example, and Edgar Renteria was 1.2. It’s about seven runs worth of difference, or about 7/10 of an entire win in the standings.
If you’re not familiar with wOBA, it’s on an OBP scale. League average OBP = league average wOBA. It’s just that wOBA does more than OBP, it values walks, singles, HRs, etc according to their calculated run values as opposed to OBP (I got on base or I didn’t) and SLG (doesn’t consider walks and assigns linear value to each additional base).
Ah ha! That's very helpful.
(Side note: is there any stat that tries to derive “replacement” level empirically, or do they all just take an educated guess?)
And thanks astro, as well. For some reason I never looked into WAR too much and therefore never realized it is simply in terms of wins.
2.2 WAR, .394 wOBA, -10.4 UZR/150, worth $9.8M
They paid him 400K.
still cannot accept that Rachael was Chani.
but it's a good thing
since he’ll probably be playing for someone else next year. between replacing derosa with miles (-2.4 WAR), replacing edmonds with pie or whoever (at least a win), wood with gregg (about -1.2 wins, by FIP), etc, and after dempster + fontenot + soto regress, they’ll be starting with a baseline of about a 90 win team in ’09.
still cannot accept that Rachael was Chani.
I think it looks like the likely outcome is Soriano LF, Fukudome CF, Bradley RF. So you could say they’re replacing Edmonds with Bradley. I think it’ll be Fontenot and Marmol at 2B and closer respectively, but I don’t know how serious they are about Miles.
MLB Trade Rumors has had no updates on Edmonds since last November. I’m really surprised that the Cubs apparently didn’t even try to lowball him. I think it’s time for him to move to a corner position regardless, but even if he does that I think he’ll still be the consolation prize for the teams that didn’t get Ramirez, Bradley, Dunn, Burrell, etc. So many bat-heavy OFs out there this year.
It doesn't make sense to use Marmol as the closer
He is probably the biggest shutdown pitcher in the game when you consider BAA and K/9. He should be used in tight situations, whether it is the 6,7,8 or 9th, instead of just pigeonholing him to the ninth.
by vivaelpujols on Jan 7, 2009 12:00 AM EST up reply actions
But the Cubs want Marmol to start racking up the saves.
Marmol probably won’t be happy just continuing to be 8th inning/fireman.
I assume that Gregg will be the 8th inning guy and Samardjiza will be the fireman. Still, I bet losing Howry and Jose Ceda hurts that bullpen. The Cubs were idiots for trading Ceda for Gregg.
by Czechguardsman on Jan 7, 2009 2:17 AM EST up reply actions
-1
Stupid little bears
The Godfather himself has decided to grace us with his presence. This is his damn house. He sleeps 20 feet away.
actually
there’s a couple of things. 1.) When we got Freese we didn’t have a lot of 3B prospects. 2.) It removed an opportunity cost.
Noone has any true idea on the value returned until Freese is on the team or traded, but I’d say we did damn fine considering it was a salary dump.
If Rick or Luddy happen to get traded it’s fair to say that some of their value will correlate back to the Edmonds trade. Removing him gave them room.
One Century down, next on its way. Cardinals '09 : Preserving the Cubs tradition.
by AdjustedExpectations on Jan 6, 2009 5:06 AM EST up reply actions
No horrible mistakes
So far he has stayed away from a Mulder debacle. Only a few GMs make their living fleecing the rest of the league and it is good that Mo does not feel like he has to do that. At the end of the day, he appears to have been given a short leash so not much room to make an impression. His goal is clearly to keep the team competitive until the young players arrive. I wish he had done at deal at the deadline for some relief or MIF help to get us to the playoffs but I suspect his hands were tied on trading prospects.
he’ll look back and realized he overpaid Lohse but it’s not a horrible deal considering he was virtually free last year.
Just win
Matt Clement? Not a horrible Mulder like mistake, but in the same league at least, for signing a pitcher that got to spring training “ready to go” and never threw a pitch over 83 MPH*
Also, relying on Clement, Mulder and Carp last season is a problem in my book. The rest of his moves have been great, with the exceptions noted above (Reyes, Lohse contract).
(*a guess, I didn’t want to dig enough to look).
It's not like the Clement thing was a huge burn, though
that deal was a low risk, high reward thing any way you slice it.
They say that it's never too late, but you don't get any younger...
Personally, I wouldn’t mind him spending a million/year on a reclamation project if he wishes. Some won’t pan out, some will.
One Century down, next on its way. Cardinals '09 : Preserving the Cubs tradition.
by AdjustedExpectations on Jan 6, 2009 5:08 AM EST up reply actions
What is the verdict on Pineiro?
I think he was technically signed on Mo’s non-interim watch. I could easily see it as a situation where offers had long been extended, it was just a matter of dotting the Is and crossing the Ts and that sort of thing.
Note: I don’t mean the verdict on him as a pitcher, but whether it was Mo or Walt that really signed him
Damn
I think I’ll pretend I didn’t just see that.
Walt signed Pin-head.
It was Walt, I swear it.
Mo wouldn’t do this to us…
MO DIDN"T SIGN JOEL PINEIRO!!!
Mommy…
The Godfather himself has decided to grace us with his presence. This is his damn house. He sleeps 20 feet away.
by thegodfather on Jan 5, 2009 12:35 PM EST up reply actions
we still don't know that it was his decision
it seems likely that it was, but it very well could have been DeWitt’s.
still cannot accept that Rachael was Chani.
Possibly
But he very likely had his hand in the deal somewhere. He’s lucky he didn’t lose a finger. (Okay, I know that was a terrible joke)
The Godfather himself has decided to grace us with his presence. This is his damn house. He sleeps 20 feet away.
by thegodfather on Jan 5, 2009 10:56 PM EST up reply actions
I appreciate the link, although it only seems to confirm that the transaction completed on his watch. What I’m hoping to discover is who wrote the offer and when it was actually extended. If Walt drafted and faxed something to Joel’s agent and it was finalized after Mo became interim/official GM then Mo isn’t necessarily responsible.
It wasn't a terrible deal considering the circumstances
Remember there was almost no FA starters on the market and Piniero had the chance for some upside.
by vivaelpujols on Jan 7, 2009 12:01 AM EST up reply actions
I guess this is as good a thread as any to ask this question...
I seem to recall that Mozeliak’s area of expertise as an assistant GM was reported to be contracts and contract negotiations. I believe this was talked about a bit when they were either making the GM decision or had just announced it. Do I remember things right?
This discussion has made me wonder what effect MO actually has on the changes in the FO’s operations as a whole (heh… MO-FO… sorry). Is it unfair to call him a strictly “business” guy and chalk up things like talent evaluation achievements to Luhnow and his gang? It’s probably very difficult to make any claims like that, but I’m curious what others think.
The fact that he hasn't traded the farm for a rental or reliever
I take this to mean that he is more in line with the internal development frame of mind.
"I'm gonna throw the nastiest curveball I have ever thrown...if he hits it, I'll tip my cap, but if not we're going to the Series."
--Adam Wainwright on the final pitch of the 2006 NLCS
by bgh on Jan 5, 2009 3:47 PM EST up reply actions
i think it is also
fair to evaluate him on deals not made, like for putz. how many improvements could have been made is, unfortunately, hard to judge.
"No matter where you go, there you are" Buckeroo Bonzai Across the 8th Dimension
and/or whether they would actually have been "improvements".
still cannot accept that Rachael was Chani.
well maybe we were in on Putz
but the asking price was too high.
Let’s just hypothetically take the Met’s role in that trade. Possibly they would have wanted KMac and Schumaker/Mather as part of that deal. Hell, maybe they asked for Rasmus. I just don’t think we can put down a GM for not making a trade when we don’t even know that we weren’t in on it.
* sarcasm might be involved in this comment
And what deals will backfire can't be known yet, either
We may all bitch and moan about Sheets, but if he arms literally explodes on opening day—sending bits of shoulder muscles flying through the air—then we’ll all go “whew.”
That said, I still want to know what kind of money Sheets is going to command.
I’d say impossible instead of hard when looking to judge.
Putz as your example states was part of a three team trade. I don’t think you can assign a fail when trying to break that up. Not counting the fact that you have no real idea on what the costs for getting him.
I do like that when it comes to trades but more so free agents he has a price and sticks by it, even if it means they don’t get the player.
One Century down, next on its way. Cardinals '09 : Preserving the Cubs tradition.
by AdjustedExpectations on Jan 6, 2009 5:12 AM EST up reply actions
After 175 votes he has a 3.62
Not too shabby.It’s really hard to judge it in the middle of the hot stove season too since it seems like the Cards missed out on a signing almost every time another team signs a player.
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971
A 3, with the potential for 4
I still think we have a surplus of outfielders…in general, I like his moves so far. Still think that we have a glut of outfielders with which to deal. If he deals from that pool, I’ll give him a 4 – it will take stones and be a risk, but a good one.
Maybe I’m nuts…but if the Yanks sign another FA pitcher, I’m calling this deal right now:
Ank or Ludnuts for one of their pitchers and a prospect.
I have discovered in twenty years of moving around a ball park, that the knowledge of the game is usually in inverse proportion to the price of the seats. ~Bill Veeck
4our more TYPE As in addition to the three they have already singed.
They no longer have Abreu, Pettitte, Giambi, and Mussina, so in addition to the 3 Type As already signed per official quota, they can resign or replace these 4 above also.
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