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Rob Neyer
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Jason Brannon
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Jim Baker
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Marc Normandin
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Following a terrible 2011 season, Seattle's Ichiro Suzuki has lost his job as leadoff man. But his replacement might surprise anybody who was paying attention last year.
Feb 20, 2012 - Yes, it's actually happening. Supposedly. For essentially the first time in his brilliant-until-2011 career, Ichiro will not be slated for leadoff duties this season. Not that anyone should be all that surprised at this point. Geoff Baker:
The Mariners would have needed to take out front page ads in both the Seattle and New York Times not to have dropped any broader hints that Ichiro would be moved out of the leadoff role this season.
--snip--
But again: the writing has been on the wall for some time. I'm a little surprised at some of the uproar I keep seeing on the blog and my Twitter feed. I know that some of you are upset that Chone Figgins is almost certainly going to get first crack at the job.
But really, if not Figgins, who else?
Remember, Figgins was not batting leadoff the last two years when his numbers plummeted. Prior to that, he was the leadoff hitter with the Angels and one of the best in baseball at that role.
Two Truths:
1. Someone does have to lead off. It's in the rules.
2. The Mariners are going to finish third or fourth. Distantly. So it really doesn't matter who leads off.
Here are two things I think are True:
a. If Chone Figgins could not hit in the No. 2 slot -- where he spent all of 2010 and most of '11 -- there's little reason to think he will hit in the No. 1 slot. I mean, I would absolutely love to see the study suggesting that a top-of-the-order hitter's performance really hinges on whether he's batting first or second. Seriously.
b. The Mariners don't have trouble scoring runs because the right guys are in the wrong spots in the lineup. They have trouble scoring runs because they have the wrong guys.
Or have had, anyway. The Mariners averaged 3.3 runs per game over the last two seasons, which is hilarious unless you care about the Mariners, in which case it's some sort of cosmic tragedy inflicted by this guy.
Moving Ichiro is unlikely to make him hit better, and moving Figgins is unlikely to make him hit better, and frankly everyone would be a lot better off if Eric Wedge spent less time worrying about trivial bullshit and read more books about baseball and psychology and baseball psychology.
I think.
Meanwhile, the real issue a lot of people have is with Desmond DeChone Figgins being in the lineup at all. Or on the roster. Baker:
When the decision was made last summer not to release Figgins, the Mariners owed it to themselves to at least try to revive his career. To at least try to get some value out of a four-year deal now halfway done.
We've talked about this since last summer. Most teams don't eat $20 million worth of salary. That's the type of deal that gets GMs fired, even if they make five good moves in the interim.
No, the M's were always going to try to salvage this. And until they put Figgins in the leadoff role for an extended time, they'll never be able to say they fully tried to save something from this deal.
Geoff Baker's a good reporter, and so I tend to believe him. And here's something else I think ... If management is keeping Figgins around just so they can say they tried -- you know, as opposed to thinking it will actually work -- then something's wrong at the top. I mean, there's also the obvious inability to understand that Figgins is simply a sunk cost, unless they really do think that he's got something left. Which he probably doesn't. Oddly enough.
On the plus side, keeping Figgins means the Mariners might actually get something out of him, to the point where they might actually be able to trade him for, at the very least, a bit of payroll relief.
On the minus side, keeping Figgins means the Mariners might get nothing out of him -- as they did last season -- in which case the front office will look even dumber, and the fans will become even more disgusted. And Alex Liddi will be stuck in Tacoma for no particularly good reason.
But Alex Liddi could probably use more Tacoma time, considering how often he struck out last season. And I'm not sure the fans could get any more disgusted than they already are.
The only thing that bothers me about all this is how much time everybody's spent thinking about it. Including me.
22 comments
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Comments
Burnett
If the Yankees can find a taker for part of A.J. Burnett’s salary, the M’s should be able to find some chump willing to pay a couple million bucks a year for Figgins.
by GBSimons on Feb 20, 2012 12:48 PM EST reply actions
So, Is It Galactus....
… because this team is the Sub-Mariners??
"We praise or blame as one or the other affords more opportunity for exhibiting our power of judgment." Friedrich Nietzsche, "Human,All Too Human" (1878)
by wgarrett on Feb 20, 2012 12:48 PM EST reply actions
Yeah, I didn't get the reference either.
Maybe Neyer got his wires crossed between Sub-Mariner and Silver Surfer? They are both Marvel heroes with aquatic names.
11 01 10
Veni Vidi Vixi
by WhereThere'sAWillieThere'sAMays on Feb 20, 2012 12:56 PM EST up reply actions
He should have just posted a picture of Bill Bavasi.
"Perhaps the worst comment I've ever seen on LL." - sanford_and_son.
by Ride the Apocalypse on Feb 20, 2012 6:07 PM EST up reply actions
I thought the link would take me to an image of Jack Z.
by JulioBernazard on Feb 20, 2012 1:54 PM EST up reply actions
Milwaukee will take him back.
The Brewers drafts haven’t been much to speak of since he left. On the other hand, with the exception of the historically terrible Arnett/Heckathorn picks, they’ve been doing a better job finding pitching than they had with Jack.
It’s also really easy to look smart when you’re drafting blue-chip hitters like Prince Fielder, Ryan Braun, Rickie Weeks, and Brett Lawrie (I think Lawrie was a Jack Z. pick… could be wrong).
by mpbMKE on Feb 20, 2012 2:17 PM EST up reply actions
Geoff Baker periodically goes off on anti-sabermetric rants.
The last one condemned the idea of being efficient with payroll, which was really rather strange.
That said, I think I agree with him on this one.
by ThirteenOfTwo on Feb 20, 2012 1:39 PM EST reply actions
Geoff Baker is a professional troll
by Poochie on Feb 20, 2012 1:57 PM EST up reply actions 7 recs
He's a decent reporter
As in, tracking down and reporting what actually happened or was said.
He’s a terrible analyst, as in providing any insight or creative (or even sensible) thinking of his own.
He also seems to have a penchant for self-promotion (as evidenced by his embarrassing attempts at video blogging) so I always find myself looking for ulterior motives whenever he brings up anything even slightly controversial.
by J0SER on Feb 20, 2012 2:38 PM EST up reply actions 1 recs
When you have one of the worst full-time batters in the league..
…you want to make sure he gets the maximum amount of AB’s.
by Dale Sams on Feb 20, 2012 1:56 PM EST reply actions 4 recs
Matthew had a good point about sunk cost
In this post last year.
As per definition (using Wikipedia):
However,
There-in lies the problem. Chone Figgins has one more year in his contract. Mariners are not paying for that year yet so there exists the possibility that they do not have to pay all of it. Also, as much as I don’t like Figgins, we cannot definitively say he’s finished. We only have enough data to conclude that last year was a really, really bad year for him. Plus he was also dealing with injuries. As strange as it sounds, there is some upside there.
Figgins doesn’t have 3B locked down and no one else has commanding control of the position. Certainly, not Alex Liddi who is currently behind Kyle Seager in the depth chart. And really, if Chone Figgins is still bad the arrangement won’t last long. This really isn’t a big deal. The M’s aren’t going to run Figgins out there for +600 PA if he can’t hit and they’re not expecting to “fix” both Ichiro and Figgins just by swapping them.
by ThundaPC on Feb 20, 2012 2:00 PM EST reply actions 2 recs
They only don't pay him
if someone else is willing to eat his salary. I can’t think of many teams that want Figgins at any cost, so the list of teams willing to eat that payroll is probably not a long one. The Brewers ended up eating almost 2 (3?) full seasons of Bill Hall’s contract, and a very large portion of Jeff Suppan’s contract, as well. It sucks, but sometimes it’s necessary.
by mpbMKE on Feb 20, 2012 2:12 PM EST up reply actions
I agree with Joe Posnanski
When he wrote
by J0SER on Feb 20, 2012 2:32 PM EST reply actions 2 recs
I agree with everything in this article, but...
Last year, Figgins was the worst major leaguer I have ever seen play. Not trying to be hyperbolic, but he was awful. He swung at pitches that were thrown right at him and swung at pitches that bounced two feet in front of the plate. He (although having a pretty solid defensive reputation from his days in LA) booted balls hit right to him. He threw to the wrong base. He got picked off first multiple times in clearly non-running situations.
If there was ever a player that let his poor play get in his head, it was Chone Figgins in 2011.
I guess I’m thinking that if anyone could benefit from a vote of confidence like this, it would be Figgins. Not that I think it will work out.
by ICBT on Feb 20, 2012 3:21 PM EST reply actions
While he's certainly not getting any younger, and he shouldn't be leading off,
Figgins should see some rebound in 2012. His 2011 BAbip was .215, but Chris Dutton’s xBAbip calculator says that it should have been around .315. If Figgins had hit his xBAbip in 2011, he would have added about 25 hits. That swing in hits would change his 2011 OBP from .241 to .320.
I don’t have enough data or analytic skills to see if, historically, players have been able to rebound from such a low BAbip, but I’m willing to believe that Figgins will bounce back a bit. Afterall, we are talking about a player with a career BAbip of .329 and a .314 mark as recently as 2010. He’s getting older, and the drop in walk rate a bit scary, but I’m not ready to write the guy off completely because of 300 PAs.
BAbip does have a lot to do with making good contact, but it is also heavily influenced by luck. We shouldn’t necessarily expect Figgins to hit that .315 BAbip, let alone his career rate. Nobody is expecting him to return to form as a first-division starter, but a .320 OBP and some good defense at 3rd might be enough to make Figgins (and his salary) movable. As ThundaPC said above, the Mariners could open some future opportunities by giving Figgins some playing time, getting a small rebound, then dropping some of his salary on another team.
by SeanP on Feb 20, 2012 4:09 PM EST reply actions
This won't last long
Figgins had a terrible BAbip because every time he hit the ball it was a weak grounder or a soft fly ball. BAbip it isn’t all luck, it has a lot to do with how well and how hard the ball is hit. I would expect Ackley or Kyle Seager to be leading off by May and Figgins enjoying his retirement.
by Dustin G on Feb 20, 2012 4:13 PM EST reply actions
Lost in all this Geoff Baker nonsense
is the fact that Dustin Ackley should be the M’s leadoff hitter for the foreseeable future. It amazes me how overlooked this angle is.
But if they want to give Figgins a try for a couple months by all means, go for it. The only way to build up trade value is by giving him a chance to succeed and hoping he can make himself attractive to some team, any team. Ackley/Seager have years and years to make themselves valuable to the Mariners, whereas Figgins really only has a couple months.
by Bullpen Bully on Feb 20, 2012 5:19 PM EST reply actions 1 recs
Rob
The least you can do is add “most likely” as a qualifier. Have you already forgotten about the Rays and Diamondbacks of 2011?
Wear your own fur.
by Marc Fournier on Feb 20, 2012 6:02 PM EST reply actions 1 recs
"Everyone would be a lot better off if Eric Wedge spent less time worrying about trivial bullshit and read more books about baseball and psychology and baseball psychology."
THANK YOU! The Mariners need a competent Manager. Wedge doesn’t cut it.
"Perhaps the worst comment I've ever seen on LL." - sanford_and_son.
by Ride the Apocalypse on Feb 20, 2012 6:06 PM EST reply actions
Rob, I would take whatever Geoff Baker writes with a huge grain of salt.
Especially anything to do with Ichiro. Among Mariner fans Baker is well known as a muckraker and someone with a huge Anti-Ichiro bias.
Baker is also an attention whore and a reporter with low standards who is not above what amounts to virtually fabricating and peddling garbage to stir up trouble (and get himself hits and attention).
Although his skills finally deteriorated as a player, one great off-the-field thing that Junior did when he came back in the offseason of 2008 was to try to keep Baker’s undermining garbage out of the clubhouse. The 2009 Mariners were a well knit team and exceeded expectations by a lot.
The wheels finally came off in 2010 and Junior’s career as a player didn’t end in the best way, but hey, 2009 was a lot of fun.
Anyway, Baker is a self-promoting peddler of garbage and a muckraker (and an attention whore). I would not take things that he writes at face value.
by daveinny on Feb 20, 2012 6:42 PM EST reply actions 3 recs
Also, MuckRaker Baker will dredge up anything if he can eventually bring it around to a slam on Ichiro
by Chris_FB on Feb 20, 2012 6:50 PM EST up reply actions
Isn't it obvious? Figgins is the scapegoat for 2012, to protect the kids
There’s multiple youngsters who haven’t had full, productive, healthy seasons at all yet (or in a while). What better way to take the pressure off of them by setting up Figlet to fail?
Feed into his natural pouting – excuse me, “battling” – and drama, take away his last possible excuse for having his career suddenly tank, and by the time they DFA him, the M’s will be a couple weeks from being mathematically eliminated anyway. The kids won’t need to feel like they let the team down or anything, and can just learn to play the right way.
Well, as long as they don’t feel the right way includes letting a Mendoza-line hitter supplant a likely first-ballot-HOFer at the top of the lineup.
by Chris_FB on Feb 20, 2012 6:54 PM EST reply actions
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