Contemporary Minor League Aces

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a two-part series on contemporary minor league stars, who I defined as players with at least 4,000 career plate appearances in the high minors (the AAA and AA levels).  The two parts are here and here.

I thought it would also be fun to identify any recent pitchers who have had long and successful minor league careers.  Deciding on 1,200 career innings pitched in the high minors as a cut-off (which limits the list to starters and seems to be about the equivalent of my 4,000 plate appearances cut-off for position players), I was able to find only six contemporary pitchers who have accomplished this feat.  However, I was able to find an additional half a dozen or so pitchers who have come awfully close.

One final note before getting on with the list — for purchases of AA and AAA performance, pitching in the Mexican League counts, but pitching in other foreign leagues (Japan’s NPB, South Korea’s KBO, Taiwan, Italy, etc.) does not.  While this is somewhat arbitrary, it makes it easier to use baseball reference to find the qualifying pitchers, and what I am interested in doing is identifying American minor league stars, rather than Americans who have starred in Asia.  Without further ado:

1.  Nelson Figueroa (1,470 AAA innings pitched, 266.2 AA, 499 MLB).  Leading the list of contemporary minor league aces, Figueroa is a smallish right-hander (listed as 6’1″ and 185 lbs), who has a career minor league of 141-95, by far the most wins and best winning percentage of any recent minor leaguer I could find.  He has a career 3.70 minor league ERA with nearly three strikeouts for every walk allowed.

Nelson was originally drafted by the Mets in the 30th round of the 1995 Draft, and he was only just released in late April of this year by the Diamondbacks after getting off to a brutally bad start for the AAA Reno Aces a month shy of his 39th birthday.

Figueroa pitched in parts of nine major league seasons for six different teams mostly as a spot starter/long reliever.  While his career major league record of 20-35 is pretty bad, his career 4.55 ERA is hardly terrible.

2.  Andrew Lorraine (1,613 AAA, 7.1 AA, 175 MLB).  Once a 4th round draft pick out of Stanford, Lorraine has thrown more innings at the AAA level than any other recent pitcher.  His minor league career record was 110-89 with a 4.15 ERA.

A left-hander, Andrew pitched in parts of seven major league seasons for seven different teams and invariably got hit hard (career MLB ERA of 6.53).  He just didn’t have the stuff to have a successful major league career, but he clearly knew enough about pitching to excel at the AAA level.  His career ended in 2009 at age 36 playing in the now-defunct independent-A Golden Baseball League.

3.  Jared Fernandez (1,293.1 AAA, 504.1 AA, 108.2 MLB).  A big right-hander, Fernandez pitched more innings in the high minors than anyone else on my list.  He finished his minor league career in 2007 at age 35 with a 105-100 record and a 4.34 ERA.

Jared didn’t break through to the majors until age 29, and even though he pitched effectively for the Reds in 2002 and the Astros in 2003, he was already past age 30 both of those seasons.  Fernandez’s career ended with the Hiroshima Carp of Japan’s NPB.

4.  Chris George (1,244.1 AAA, 97.1 AA, 237.1 MLB).  The 31st overall pick in the 1998 Draft out of high school, George got numerous opportunities while in his early 20′s between 2001 and 2004 to establish himself as a starter for the Royals.  However, he didn’t have major league command, and he was also hit hard, posting a career major league 6.48 ERA with awful numbers at every pitching category.

Chris then settled in as a journeyman AAA starter.  He finished his minor league career in 2012 with an 85-87 record and a 4.70 ERA.

5.  Shane Loux (1,143.1 and counting AAA, 157.2 AA, 144 MLB).  Still pitching effectively, but unspectacularly, for the AAA Fresno Grizzlies this season at age 33, Loux is now 106-109 with a 4.46 ERA for his minor league career. He was once a second round draft pick.

Shane pitched in the majors in 2002-2003 for the Tigers, 2008-2009 for the Angels and last season for the Giants.  Last year’s performance, in which he posted a 4.97 ERA in 19 relief appearances, was probably his best at the major league level.

6.  Andy Van Hekken (740.1 AAA, 460.2 AA, 30 MLB).  A former 3rd round draft pick, Van Hekken’s only major league experience came in 2002 at the age of 22 when he went 1-3 in five starts for the Tigers.  His 3.00 ERA looked pretty good, but his other numbers suggested he wasn’t major league ready.

Andy returned to AAA and never made it back to the Show.  His career minor league record of 122-86 and 3.94 ERA look pretty good, but he never had any big years at AAA and had to use the independent-A Atlantic League several times to keep himself in professional baseball.

Andy went to South Korea to pitch in 2012, where he has established himself as one of the KBO’s top starters.  He currently has one of the five best ERAs in the young 2013 KBO season.

7.  R. A. Dickey (1,079 AAA, 108.2 AA, 1,113.1 MLB).  Undoubtedly the best pitcher on this list, Dickey’s career story is well known.  He makes this list with more than 1,000 AAA innings pitched because he has had essentially two professional pitching careers, the first as a regular pitcher and the second as a knuckleballer.

8.  Chris Michalak (1,048.2 AAA, 78 AA, 191.1 MLB).  A lefty, Michalak finished his professional career with the AAA Las Vegas 51′s in 2009 at age 38.  He finished with a minor league career record of 93-90 and a 4.14 ERA.

Michalak pitched fairly well for the Blue Jays and Rangers in 2001 and 2002, but he was already over 30 years old in 2001.

9.  Randy Keisler (1,027.1 AAA, 116 AA, 150.2 MLB).  Another lefty, Keisler has gone 99-77 with a 3.95 ERA in his minor league career.  He pitched last year in the Atlantic League at age 36.  Keisler pitched parts of six major league seasons for five different teams and almost always got hit hard, posting a career MLB ERA of 6.63 with lots of hits, home runs and walks allowed.

10.  Brandon Duckworth (1,014 AAA, 167 AA, 511 MLB).  Other than Nelson Figueroa and R. A. Dickey, the only pitcher on this list with a substantial major league career, Duckworth pitched eight seasons in the Show, going 23-34 with a 5.28 ERA mostly as a fifth and spot starter/long reliever.  As a minor leaguer, Brandon has a career 110-74 record with a 3.80 ERA.

Duckworth went to Japan late last season and pitched well enough in six starts to return to the Rakuten Golden Eagles this year at age 37.  After seven starts this year, he is 2-3 with a 4.30 ERA, not good enough for a highly paid foreigner in pitching-dominated NPB.

11.  Brian Cooper (877 AAA, 319.2 AA, 167.2 MLB).  A small right-hander whose professional career ended in 2006 at age 31, Cooper appeared in a total of 13 games for the 2004 and 2005 Giants.  Given that the Giants are the team I follow, I’m a bit embarrassed to admit that I don’t really remember Cooper.

Cooper finished his minor league career with an 87-80 record and a 4.61 ERA.  He went 15-9 for the 2003 AAA Charlotte Knights, which is a lot for AAA — none of the players higher on this list managed to win 15 games in a single year at AAA.

12.  Adam Pettyjohn (788.1 AAA, 367.1 AA, 69 MLB).  Once a second round draft pick, Pettyjohn had a career minor league record of 85-74 with a 4.23 ERA.  He went 15-6 for the 2008 AAA Louisville Bats.

Pettyjohn pitched briefly for the 2001 Detroit Tigers and the 2008 Cincinnati Reds.  His last season was 2010 for the AAA Buffalo Bisons.

13.  Derek Lee (450.2 AAA, 732.2 AA, 0 MLB).  Last and certainly least on this list, Derek Lee is the only player on this list to pitch more innings at AA than AAA.  He never pitched in the majors, which likely also prevented him from making some real money playing in Asia.  He finished his minor league career in the Mexican League in 2008 at age 33 with a final record of 81-84 and 3.61 ERA.

Lee played twelve years of professional baseball and probably never made more than $50,000 a year, if that.  He’s also unlikely to get a pension in any amount, unlike almost all the other players on this list, who had major league careers just long enough to get some kind of a pension.  Somehow, it doesn’t seem fair.

If I’ve missed any pitchers who should be included in my list, please let me know.

A Young NPB Up-and-Comer

Want to impress your friends with your in-depth knowledge of Japanese professional baseball?  Probably not, but if you did, you would want to drop the name Kensuke Kondo on them.

Kondo is a 19 year old catcher playing for the Nippon Ham Fighters’ minor league team (NPB teams have only one minor league team each).  Despite being only a 4th round draft pick out of high school in 2011, Kondo played briefly for the Ham Fighters’ ichi-gun (major league) team last season (20 games, 30 plate appearances)  and was even included on the team’s post-season roster, getting a single pinch hit appearance in the final game of the Japan Series against the Yomiuri Giants.  For what it’s worth, Kondo hit .279/.367/.355 last year in the NPB minors.

This year back on the Ham Fighters’ minor league squad, Kondo is leading all Japanese minor league hitters by very wide margins with a .460 batting average and a 1.289 OPS.  Granted, Kondo has only played 20 games so far this year, but for a player this young his numbers are eye-popping.

Because NPB teams have only one minor league club each, the level of play is high, probably the equivalent of an MLB team’s AA team, at least in terms of the difference between the ichi-gun team and the minor league team.  The upshot is that the top hitters in the Japanese minors are usually much older.

In Japan, colleges and industrial leagues serve as the equivalent of the MLB low minors.  NPB teams only draft about seven to 12 players each year, and team rosters are huge, so each minor league team has a mix of older and younger players.

Meanwhile, the Ham Fighters have a couple of what appear to be good-field-no-hit catchers in Shinya Tsuruoka and Shota Ono this year, so you’d have to think the parent club would be eager to bring up a catcher who can really hit.  I have no idea what Kondo’s defense is like — at his age his defense could be terrible — but professional teams everywhere usually find a roster spot for young catchers who hit like Kondo.

The fact that Kondo was only a fourth round draft pick suggests that the NPB draft is as hit-and-miss as the MLB draft.  I couldn’t help but notice that Cincinnati Reds’ rookie hurler Tony Cingrani struck out eleven Nationals in six innings of work yesterday.

Cingrani, a tall left-hander, was a 3rd round draft pick (114th overall) out of Rice University in 2011.  He shot like a rocket through the minor leagues, reaching the majors in a year and a half, posting a career minor league ERA of 1.62 with a pitching line of 211.2 IP, 136 hits, ten HRs, 60 walks and 278 Ks.  How could more than a hundred players have been selected before him in the 2011 Draft?

Cingrani started his college career at a JC, and didn’t pitch well at Rice until his final college season when he was an old 21.  He was incredibly effective that year with a 1.74 ERA and more strike outs than innings pitched or hits and walks combined, but he pitched mostly in relief.  The upshot is that you don’t really know how a player will play in the pros until he actually plays in the pros, and there were guys with more impressive college records at the time MLB teams had to do the choosing.

At any rate, keep an eye on Kondo.  If he stays healthy, which is always tough for a catcher, he’s on a pace to become a true free agent at a young enough age to make MLB teams highly interested in his services.  If Kensuke Kondo makes it to MLB one day, you heard it here first.

Wladimir Balentien Slugging ‘Em Deep in Japan

A player who didn’t get mentioned in yesterday’s run-down of hot Nippon Professional Baseball (“NPB”) hitters because he’s missed about a dozen games this year, former Cincinnati Red and Seattle Mariner Wladimir Balentien reportedly hit three home runs today for the Yakult Swallows in a game against the Yokohama Bay Stars.  The first two blasts left the stadium, and security guards warned passersby to watch out for low-flying objects when Wladimir came up to bat in the 8th inning.

This is the fourth time in his two-plus year NPB career that Balentien has hit three HRs in a game, which puts him in a seven-way tie for third most three-homer games in NPB history.  Only Ralph Bryant (8 times) and Sadaharu Oh (5 times) have done it more. [You'll have to scroll down the link to find Bryant's NPB stats.]  Balentien also joins Cecil Fielder on August 13, 1989 and Leo Gomez on May 17, 2000 as the only players to have hit two balls entirely out of the stadium in one NPB game.

Balentien has now hit eight HRs in 15 games this season, but still trails Tony Blanco, who hit his 14th HR of the young season in the same game (Blanco’s 27th game of the season), for the Central League lead.  This is the reason why NPB teams pay the big bucks to bring in foreign hitters — to slug the long ball.

Never Say Die

In Spring Time hope springs eternal.  Even the most aged or down-and-out ballplayers believe they have at least one last hurrah left in them.

The Reds have just signed perennial comeback kid Mark Prior to a minor league deal.  Since blowing his arm out in 2006, Prior has thrown a total of 49 professional innings over the last three seasons, after not pitching at all from 2007 through 2009.

Although Prior remains a real long-shot, his numbers at AAA Pawtucket last season at least create some room for hope.  In 25 innings pitched, Prior had a 3.96 ERA with a pitching line of only 15 hits, but four HRs and 23 walks, allowed and 38 Ks.  He’s still hard to hit, but his command is still long departed.

Vladimir Guerrero is looking for  a minor league deal this Spring.  He last played in the majors in 2011, but he’s still only 38 years old this year, assuming that 1975 is his real birth year (Guerrero admitted a couple of years back that he was older than he claimed when he originally signed with the Montreal Expos).

Guerrero played 12 minor league games for the Blue Jays last year, but asked for and received his release when the Jays did not immediately promote him to the majors.  His unwillingness to stick it out longer in the minors might impact teams’ willingness to sign him this Spring, since the odds of him getting a major league job out of Spring Training seem slim.

Guerrero could still hit when he last played in the majors (between .290 and .300 each of his last three seasons), but his on-base percentages declined precipitously, and his power numbers were also on the wain.  Even so, he could help a team in need of a right-handed hitter with pop, particularly if some one on the major league roster gets hurt.

Meanwhile, the Royals are still hoping to squeeze another year out of the soon to be 39 year old Miguel Tejada.  They signed him in late December to a minor league deal that promises him $1.1 million if he makes the major league club.

Tejada hasn’t played in the majors since 2011 and had a terrible .596 OPS in 343 plate appearances for the Giants that year.  Losing Buster Posey for most of the season was the biggest reason the Giants didn’t make the post-season in 2011, but giving Tejada so many plate appearances certainly didn’t help.

Tejada is hitting .267 with a .600 OPS in seven games so far this Spring Training.

Finally, Dontrelle Willis‘s most recent comeback, this time with the Cubs, hit a snag in his very first Spring Training game earlier this week.  Only seven pitches in, Willis came out of the game with “shoulder tightness” — apparently meaning that his shoulder hurt.

Willis has said the injury is minor, and he is reportedly resumed his throwing schedule in the Cubs’ minor league camp.  Willis wasn’t expected to make the Cubs’ major league roster this Spring, but it’s still disappointing that he couldn’t make it through one outing without hurting himself.

The Best Hitting Pitchers in MLB Baseball 2013

The most popular posts I’ve written for this blog identify the best hitting pitchers currently active in major league baseball.  Given the level of interest, I have decided to update this piece annually, starting with this 2013 update.

As I’m sure you know, modern pitchers as a group can’t hit a lick.  The rise of the designated hitter, not only in the American League, but also it’s wide-spread use in the minors and in the college game is perhaps the biggest factor for the demise of pitchers who can hit, but it’s hardly the only one.

Pitchers simply don’t get as many opportunities to hit today because of the steady trend of using more and more relievers throwing more and more innings, which means starting pitchers get fewer opportunities to hit, and there are more opportunities for professional hitters to be used as pinch hitters.

Also, no matter what the old-timers tend to say, the level of major league play has gradually and steadily improved since the professional game started in the 1870′s, which means that pitchers, who make the major leagues solely based on their ability to pitch (which has been the norm since at least the early 1880′s and probably much earlier) have undergone a slow but steady decline as hitters by virtue of the relative improvement of pitchers (as pitchers), fielders and professional hitters, even though most major league pitchers were great hitters in high school.

Nevertheless, there are always a few pitchers in any era who can hit.  This post ranks current pitchers with at least 100 career major league at-bats in order to weed out the pitchers who just haven’t had enough at-bats for their career hitting stats to mean anything one way or another.  I may have missed a couple of qualifiers, but not more than a couple.

By today’s standards, a good-hitting pitcher is any pitcher with a career batting average above .167 or a career OPS over .400.  That’s really pretty terrible as hitters go, and it shows just how hard it is even for professional athletes who have played baseball all their lives to hit major league pitching if the players have not been selected for the major leagues based their ability to hit.

A few pitchers can swing the stick a little bit, though.  Here is my non-scientific list of the best hitting pitchers currently playing as we approach the start of the 2013 season:

1.  Micah Owings.  Micah Owings remains far and away the best hitting pitcher in baseball (at least if you exclude Rick Ankiel, who hasn’t pitched in the majors since 2004).  Micah’s career numbers have slipped a bit the last two season, likely due both to the law of averages and the facts that he isn’t a starter any more and didn’t pitch much last year due to an elbow injury.  His career batting average is currently .283 with an .813 OPS in 205 career ABs.

As I’ve written previously, it’s clear the Arizona Diamondbacks made a terrible mistake when, after drafting Owings in the 3rd Round of the 2005 Draft, they decided to develop him solely as a pitcher.

Owings is now 30 years old, and it’s doubtful he’ll ever develop into a good major league pitcher.  In fact, Owings just signed a minor league contract with the Washington Nationals with an invitation to 2013 Spring Training — the Nats signed Owings as a 1Bman, which strongly suggests they will try to develop him as a hitter.

Owings is getting old to switch positions, and it isn’t clear if he could still pitch if he and the Nats wanted him to.  He had arthroscopic elbow surgery last July and hasn’t pitched since last April.  Nonetheless, I still have a hope he’ll become the next Brooks Kieschnick, pitching, pinch-hitting and occasionally playing the field, depending on his team’s needs at the moment.

2.  Dontrelle Willis.  One of the things I always loved about Dontrelle was his ability to hit.  While he hasn’t played in the majors since 2011, he recently signed a minor league deal with the Cubs with an invitation to 2013 Spring Training.  In 2011 his last year of play, Willis batted .387 (12 for 31) with a 1.032 OPS to bring his career numbers up to .244 with a .665 OPS, respectively.

Dontrelle is now 31 years old, so it’s probably too late for him to make the switch to a position.  Too bad — as a 6’4″ lefty, he probably could have been major league 1Bman or corner outfielder if he’d been developed as a hitter.

3.  Mike Leake.  Leake remains the top young hitting pitcher in MLB.  He hit .295 with a .749 OPS last year, and despite his 2011 sophomore slump year, he still has a career batting average of .274 with a .656 OPS in 164 major league at-bats.  Leake walked only once last season, dropping his career on-base percentage to .308, but he hit for power for the first time in his career with two taters and five extra base hits.

I wonder what is more discouraging to a pitcher: walking the opposing pitcher or giving up an extra base hit.  Even though the latter would seem to have more value, the pitcher on the hill can better rationalize it: the batter got lucky, he’s a good-hitting pitcher, etc.  Everyone on defense slumps their shoulders when the pitcher walks his doppelganger.

4.  Carlos Zambrano.  In 2012 Big Z had his worst season swinging the ash since his 2002 rookie season, hitting only .176 with a .441 OPS.  Even so, he still has a career .238 batting average with a .636 OPS.

Carlos is an all-or-nothing hitter.  He has only ten walks to go with 240 strikeouts in 693 major league at-bats, but he has hit an impressive 24 HRs and 53 extra base hits.  He’s scored 75 runs and driven in another 71 in his career.  That’s better than a lot of middle infielders given the same number of at-bats.

5.  C. C. Sabathia.  He’s one of the most interesting players on this list.  Unlike all the other pitchers on this list, he’s only played one-half of one season in the National League.  As an American League hurler, he only gets to hit about two games a year, yet hit he does.  Despite going 0 for 5 at the plate in 2012, he’s still hitting .238 with a .598 OPS in 105 career at-bats.

Sabathia is tall and heavy set, which doesn’t sound like a recipe for a good-hitting pitcher, but obviously he’s just a baseball player pure and simple.  One wonders what kind of numbers he would put up playing three or four full seasons in a row in the NL.

6.  Yovani Gallardo.  The still young Brewers ace is another pitcher with pop at the plate.  Despite his worst season with the bat as a regular starting pitcher, Yovani still has a career batting average of .2o7 with a .599 OPS, thanks to ten HRs and 27 extra base hits in 305 career at-bats.

7.  Daniel Hudson.  After a break-out season in 2011 at age 24, Hudson blew out his elbow tendon after ten starts (nine for Arizona, one for AAA Reno) before having Tommy John surgery in early July.  Presumably, he won’t be back in action until after the 2013 All-Star Break.  At any rate, Hudson has a .229 batting average and a .573 OPS in 105 major league at-bats to date.

8.  Dan Haren.   Haren has a .223 lifetime batting average and .572 OPS.  In 2010, his last season in the NL, he hit .364 (20 for 55) with a .902 OPS. He signed with the Washington Nationals this off-season, so he’ll get the opportunity to hit regularly again in 2013.

Haren and Sabathia are the best arguments against the designated hitter.

9.  Adam Wainwright.  Wainwright’s hitting has dropped off his last two seasons (2010 and 2012), but he still has a career .204 batting average and .545 OPS in 367 major league at-bats.

Honorable Mention.  Livan Hernandez (career .221 batting average, .526 OPS, but his career might be over — he’d still like to pitch, but hasn’t been offered even a minor league contract as of early February 2013); Darren Oliver (.221, .545 — the latest word is he’ll be back with the Blue Jays in 2013, but he hasn’t had a plate appearance since 2006); Chris Narveson (.227, .522 — he missed most of 2012 to rotator cuff surgery, but the Brewers have signed him to a major league contract for 2013); Jason Marquis (.202, .508 — he hit well last year and he’s returning to the Padres for 2013); Manny Parra (.183, .500 — he signed with the Reds for 2013); Javier Vasquez (.204, .478 — rumor has it he’s interested in resuming his major league pitching career after a strong season in the Puerto Rican Winter League); Jordan Zimmerman (.190, .463); and Edwin Jackson (.200, .462).  As you can see, the best hitting pitchers get bad pretty fast.

Young Hitting Pitcher to Watch.  Stephen Strasburg.  He hit .277 (13 for 47) in 2012 with a .759 OPS, highest of any pitcher with at least 50 plate appearances, just beating out Mike Leake.  Strasburg’s career numbers are only .192 and .521, so it has yet to be determined whether he’s closer to 2012′s best hitting pitcher or the guy who started his career a pathetic-even-for-a-pitcher 1 for 26.

Carlos Zambrano started his career 1 for 32, before developing into a good-hitting pitcher, so I tend to think Strasburg will continue to hit well for a pitcher in future years.  One thing is for certain, however: with Strasburg, Haren, Zimmerman and possibly Micah Owings, the Nationals should have the best hitting pitching in MLB in 2013.

The Best and Worst Hitters’ Parks in MLB 2013

Last summer I discovered that espn.com provides stats for what it calls “park factor”, which for purposes of this post means the ratio between the number of runs scored at a ballpark in any given season divided by the number of runs scored by said ballpark’s occupant (and its opponents) in away games that same season.  I wrote a post last June which evaluates each park’s park factor for the five years ending with the 2011 season.

As we approach the 2013 season (and the 2012 stats have long been in), it seems like a good time to update my earlier post incorporating the 2012 season.  Without further ado, here are the average park factors for all major league ballparks over the last six season (or less for the five ball parks that have opened more recently).

1.  Coors Field (Rockies) 1.301

2.  The Ballpark at Arlington (Rangers) 1.148

3.  Chase Field (Diamondbacks) 1.134

4.  Fenway Park (Red Sox) 1.131

5.  U.S. Cellular Field (White Sox) 1.111

6.  Wrigley Field (Cubs) 1.086

7.  Camden Yards (Orioles) 1.080

8.  New Yankee Stadium (2009-2012) 1.066 [Old Yankee Stadium, 2004-2008, 1.002]

9.  Great American Ball Park (Reds) 1.057.

10.  Comerica Park (Tigers) 1.044.

11.  Kauffman Stadium (Royals) 1.018

12.  Rogers Center (Blue Jays) 1.010

12.  Miller Park (Brewers) 1.010

14.  Citizens Bank Ballpark (Phillies) 1.008

15.  Marlins Park (2012) 1.005  [Sun Life Stadium, 2007-2011, 1.038]

16.  Nationals Park (2008-2012) 0.998 [RFK Stadium, 2005-2007, 0.892]

17.  Minute Maid Park (Astros) 0.986

18.  Target Field (Twins, 2010-2012) 0.983 [Mall of America Field (the Metrodome), 2005-2009, 0.966]

19.  Turner Field (Braves) 0.978

20.  Progressive Field (Indians) 0.960

21.  Angels Stadium 0.939

22.  PNC Park (Pirates) 0.936

22.  Busch Stadium (Cardinals) 0.936

24.  Oakland Coliseum (A’s) 0.919

25.  AT&T Park (Giants) 0.917

26.  Dodger Stadium 0.915

27.  Citi Field (Mets, 2009-2012) 0.904 [Shea Stadium, 2004-2008, 0.886]

28.  Tropicana Field (Rays) 0.889

29.  Safeco Field (Mariners) 0.864

30.  Petco Park (Padres) 0.808

The rankings didn’t change much from last year.  Among last year’s ten best hitters’ parks, U.S. Cellular Park, where the White Sox play, was apparently a great place to hit in 2012, moving it up two slots.  New Yankee Stadium was apparently not a great place to hit, moving it down two slots. Coors Field improved on its status as far and away the best hitters’ park in MLB.

The Marlins’ new park, which looked like a great place to hit in late June of last year, turned out to be only a little better than average for the full season — we’ll have to see how it plays over the next few seasons.

The Royals’ Kauffman Stadium moved up two slots, and the Phillies’ Citizens’ Bank Park fell two slots.  The Astros’ Minute Maid Park also fell two slots.  The Twins’ Target Field was a hitters’ park for the first time in its three year history, jumping it up four slots.  The Pirates and Giants and their respective opponents scored a lot more runs on the road in 2012, causing both PNC Park and AT&T Park to drop three slots.

With another year in the books, the Mets’ Citi Field is developing into as much of a pitchers’ park as the old Shea Stadium.  San Diego’s Petco Park remains the worst place to ply one’s trade as a major league hitter, but Seattle’s Safeco Field narrowed the gap considerably.

Ryan Freel Passes

Former major leaguer Ryan Freel passed away yesterday at age 36, apparently as a result of a self-inflicted shotgun wound.  He reportedly leaves behind a wife and three daughters.

Freel played mainly for the Reds and was one of those relatively rare players who had a successful major league career although he did not establish himself as a major league player until age 27.  Freel was a jack-of-all-trades who played every position except pitcher, catcher and shortstop at the major league level.  He was also a good top-of-the-order hitter, retiring with a career .354 on-base percentage and stealing 143 bases with a nearly 75% success rate.  He retired in 2010.

At present, the reasons for Freel’s apparent decision to take his own life are unknown.  Reports state that he had been named as coach of the baseball team for St. Joseph Academy, a Catholic High School in St. Augustine, Florida, near Freel’s home town of Jacksonville, in late June this year.  However, Freel later turned down the position.

Freel was a free spirit who played hard to the point of recklessness, sometimes crashing into fences and other players.  After a particularly brutal collision with Reds teammate Norris Hopper in 2007, Freel told reporters he had had “nine or ten” concussions in his life, but couldn’t remember the exact number.

Freel additionally once jokingly told reporters that he had an imaginary friend named “Farney” with whom he was conversing when he appeared to be talking to himself.  Freel was also twice arrested for alcohol related offenses during his career.

No information has been published yet concerning whether Freel was having marital or financial problems, whether his history of concussions contributed to depression which might understandably have arisen at the end of his professional career, or whether he was still drinking.  Regardless of the reasons for it, his death at his own hands is really a shame.

What Were the Arizona Diamondbacks Thinking?

The one thing I don’t understand about the nine player trade between the Diamondbacks, Cleveland Indians and Cincinnati Reds is how the Diamondbacks could possibly think that SS Didi Gregorius is worth giving up RHP Trevor Bauer.

The rest of it, I understand.  Cleveland wanted to get rid of Shin Soo Choo, and the Reds need a lead-off man until Billy Hamilton is ready.  Most of the rest of the players in the trade are role players or guys who have regressed the last couple of seasons and need a fresh start with a new organization.

The rest of the players the Diamondbacks received (Tony Sipp, Lars Anderson) and gave up (Matt Albers, Bryan Shaw) seem like an even swap, assuming the D-Backs had a surplus of right-handed middle relievers and need a left-handed short man.  In other words, the trade really does come down to Gregorius for Bauer as far as the D-Backs are concerned.

Bauer looks like a sure thing, at least in the short term and at least as much as any pitching prospect can be a sure thing.  Aside from being the 3rd pick of the 2011 Draft, Bauer has struck out 200 batters in 156 minor league innings pitched, a majority of those innings at the AAA level and all but nine of those innings at the AA level or higher.

The knocks on Bauer are essentially the same as those on Tim Lincecum. Bauer has a long motion that makes it hard at times for him to throw strikes (Bauer walked 74 batters in 146.2 IP in 2012, which is another way of saying he doesn’t have major league command yet, but he was only 21 years old and in his first full year of professional baseball last season).  Also, Bauer doesn’t have the body major league teams want from their RHPs (espn.com lists Bauer at 6’1″ and 185 lbs).

However, Bauer actually pitched better in college that Lincecum did, and what team wouldn’t take what Lincecum has done to date from a pitcher they’ve drafted in the first round?  Lincecum got off to a faster professional start, but Lincecum was two years older than Bauer when he hit professional baseball.

I’m not saying that Bauer will, in fact, be the next Tim Lincecum.  However, given what we’ve seen to date, the comparisons between the two pitchers are apt.

Meanwhile, Didi Gregorius is a slick-fielding shortstop who may or may not develop into a major league hitter.  Entering the 2013 season, Gregorius has a career minor league OPB of .323 and OPS of .699 in 1,909 plate appearances.  In 2012, in a season split between AA and AAA ball (64% at AA), Gregorius at age 22 had a .324 OBP and a .717 OPS.

Gregorius is still young enough to develop into a major league hitter, but if the Diamondbacks think he’s going to help them at the major league level in 2013, I think they’re sorely mistaken no matter how good his glove is.

Stories about Tony Freitas

Tony Freitas was one of the greatest minor league pitchers ever.  His 342 minor league victories, most of them for the old Sacramento Senators/Solons of the Pacific Coast League, is the most by any left-hander in baseball history.

Freitas was only 5’8″ and 160 lbs and didn’t have what would normally be considered “big league stuff.”  Instead, he relied on pin-point control, a good curve and change-up, and later in his career developed a screwball.  Like a lot of minor league stars, he needed better than average defense behind him to succeed at the major league level, but generally didn’t get it during his major league opportunities.

I am in the process of reading Baseball’s Forgotten Heroes by Tony Salin (Masters Press 1999).  The book has a Chapter on Tony Freitas largely based on interviews with Freitas.  Here are a few stories from his career.

Tony was born and raised in Mill Valley, Marin County, California, part of the San Francisco Bay Area.  However, the team to scout and sign him was the Sacramento Senators of the Pacific Coast League (“PCL”), and they initially assigned him to the Arizona State League.  After a year and half of seasoning, he was promoted to Sacramento, where he was an immediate success, winning 19 games in back-to-back seasons in 1930 and 1931.

At this point, the Senators began to look for a major league team to whom they could sell Freitas.  Most likely in 1931, Freitas was sent to jail for five days for speeding.  He had a 1929 Model A roadster and was busted several times for speeding through Novato, presumably driving between Sacramento and his family home in Mill Valley.

The judge apparently decided that fines weren’t having the desired effect, so he sentenced Freitas to five days in the County jail.  However, claiming a shortage of pitchers, Sacramento’s manager convinced the judge to let Freitas out of jail long enough to pitch a game against the San Francisco Mission Reds.  Freitas won the game 5-3 and then returned to jail to complete his sentence.

Another version of the story has it that a major league scout was in town, and the Senators were determined to have Freitas pitch in the series so they might be able to sell him.

On May 5, 1932, his 24th birthday, Freitas pitched a no-hitter against the Oakland Oaks.  Before the end of that month, his contract had been sold to the Philadelphia A’s.

After getting hit hard in his first half dozen major league appearances, Freitas won nine starts in a row and finished the 1932 season 12-5 for the A’s. During that streak, Freitas was involved in a play that got him a notice in Ripley’s Believe It Or Not.

With runners on second and third with one out in the fifth inning in a game versus the Tigers, Freitas fielded a come-backer and saw that the man on third was caught too far off the base.  Freitas ran straight at the base runner, faking throws and eventually tagging the runner out himself.  Freitas then looked at the runner at second and saw that he too was caught too far off the base.  Again, Freitas ran directly at the base runner and ended up tagging that runner out as well.  Unassisted double plays by the pitcher on ground balls don’t happen very often.

Freitas had been written up in Ripley’s Believe It Or Not once before.  A year or two earlier in a PCL game, Freitas struck out Henry “Prince” Oana, a famed Hawaian ballplayer and another great minor league star.  However, the pitch got away from the catcher.  Freitas raced in, picked up the ball and managed to throw Oana out at first, even though Oana was not regarded as a slow baserunner.  (If I had to guess, I’d say the ball ricocheted off the backstop back towards Freitas, and Oana got a late jump out of the box not immediately realizing the catcher had not caught the ball.)

Freitas got off to a poor start with the A’s in 1933 and quickly found himself back in the minors.However, the Cincinnati Reds purchased his contract in late May 1934.

While Freitas had little success with the Reds over the next three seasons, recording an 11-24 overall record, he pitched in an exceptional game against Dizzy Dean on July 1, 1934, the year Diz won 30.

Neither Freitas nor Dean was particularly effective through nine innings, both pitchers allowing five earned runs.  Both hurlers then settled down and threw seven consecutive shut out innings.

In the top of the 17th, Freitas weakened and allowed the Cardinals a run.  However, in the bottom half of the inning the Reds struck back, scoring a run off Dizzy to even the score again.  Both Freitas and Dean came out after 17 innings pitched, and Reds reliever Paul Derringer allowed two runs in the top of the 18th to lose it.  Dean received credit for the win, and Freitas got a no-decision.

Freitas was also on hand for the first night game in major league history played at the Reds’ Crosley Field on May 23, 1935.  Freitas had similarly been in attendance for the PCL’s first night game five years earlier in Sacramento.

After starting the 1936 season 0-2, the Reds sold Freitas to the Columbus Redbirds of the American Association.  Columbus was a franchise in the St. Louis Cardinals’ huge minor league system, as were the Sacramento Senators.  Freitas, at his wife’s suggestion, asked Cardinals’ general manager Branch Rickey, to assign him to the Senators, since both franchises were the same classification (AAA today, AA back then).

After the 1936 season, Columbus sold Freitas to Sacramento (now called the Solons).  Back where he considered home, Tony won 20 or more games with ERAs under 3.00 the next six seasons in a row.

Freitas says that, after the first two 20-win seasons, Branch Rickey offered to trade him to another major league team, but that Freitas requested to remain in Sacramento and Rickey agreed not to trade him.

This story is likely true.  Even though Sacramento was a small-market team, PCL teams played 30 to 50 more games each year than major league teams, and Freitas, as a marginal major league pitcher but a great PCL star, could probably make the same money playing in the PCL as he would have made pitching in the major leagues.  Freitas was much comfortable pitching near home in California, where he felt less pressure compared to pitching in the major leagues.

Freitas was not above the horse-play that many ballplayers love.  He would occasionally buy leftover army store dynamite (it was truly a different era), which he would roll into homemade firecrackers that he’d later toss onto the playing field to liven things up.

Another highlight of Freitas’ career was late 1942, when the Solons finished in 1st place their one and only time after staging an incredible comeback against the Los Angeles Angels in the season’s final week.  With a two game lead, the Angels traveled to Sacramento for the season’s final seven games.

The Angels won the first two games of the series to pull ahead by four games, but the Solons then astoundingly won the last five games in a row to take the title.  The last two games were a double-header.  In the first game, the Solons came back from a 5-0 deficit to win 7-5 with Freitas pitching a one-two-three ninth inning.  In the second game, Freitas started and won 5-1.  [Unfortunately, the Solons then lost to the Seattle Rainiers in the first round of the Governor's Cup in which the top four finishing PCL teams played two best-of-seven series to determine the league champion.]

After the 1942 season, Freitas joined the military and did not return to professional baseball until 1946, when he was nearly 38 years old.  He continued to pitch in the PCL until 1950, when he was cut by the Solons after a poor start.

However, Freitas was not ready to retire, instead signing first with the Modesto Reds and later the Stockton Ports of the California League.  Against younger, less experienced (and in many cases, less talented) players, Freitas was again dominating, winning 20 or more games with ERAs under 3.00 four years in row.

Late in the 1953 season, Freitas, now age 45, declared his intent to finally retire.  Before his final start, the Stockton Ports presented him with a new 1953 Ford automobile, and Freitas finished his long pitching career by striking out the final three batters he faced.

Cubs Sign Scott Baker

The Cubs just signed Scott Baker, the Out Maker (at least that’s what my Twins fan friend Chris called him when he was pitching good), to a one-year deal for $5.5 million with a potential $1.5 million in performance bonuses.  $5.5 million guaranteed is a lot of money for a 31 year old pitcher coming off Tommy John surgery, but that seems to be the current market.

Actually, I think Baker is a fairly good sign for the Cubs.  Baker knows how to pitch, he throws strikes, and pitchers now come back from TJ surgery, particularly if they aren’t too old.

The biggest knock on Baker pitching half is games at Wrigley is that he’s always given up his share of gopher balls — 1.16 per nine innings over the course of his career.  That comes out to about 26 home runs for every 200 innings pitched, which is lot, and is likely to be even more pitching half his games at Wrigley.  Good thing Baker doesn’t hand out a lot of free passes — which should be a requirement for every Cubs starter.

The second biggest knock on Baker is his inability to stay healthy.  Even before the elbow surgery, he managed to pitch 200 innings in a season only once (exactly 200 in  2009).

mlbtraderumors.com also relays ESPN’s Buster Olney’s opinion that essentially every free agent is trending upward “as the market begins to take shape.”  In other words, teams have paid through the nose for every free agent signed so far, which is pretty terrific for almost every free agent who has yet to sign (there may be a few at the end who lose out on the game of musical chairs).

One player I agree with trending upwards is reliever Jonathan Broxton.  After his 2011 elbow and shoulder problems, he was back in 2012 with the lowest ERA (2.48) of his career.

Broxton’s strike out rate was way down compared his career norms (7.0 per nine IP, compared to his career through 2011 rate of 11.5 per nine IP).  However, his walks rate also improved substantially.

One would think, based on his 2012 season, that Broxton’s 2011 arm problems permanently took something out of his arm, but that it forced him to finally learn how to pitch, instead of just trying to blow it by every hitter he faced.  This is particularly the case when you consider that his 2012 teams (Royals and Reds) play in much better hitters’ parks than his old team the Dodgers (although he pitched much better at home in 2012 than did on the road, as was the case when he was a Dodger).

Broxton’s 2012 could just be an aberration, although his reduced strike out rate suggests something has changed.  Even so, Broxton has clearly re-established himself as at least a top-level set-up man of the Brandon League/Jeremy Affeldt class, and he’s still only 29 in 2013.  As such, and based on League’s and Affeldt’s recent signings, a three-year, $18 million contract seems entirely likely.