Baseball: Australian for Brawling

Just because it is December January, doesn't mean that there isn't baseball happening. And not just any baseball, but rough and tumble, rock-em sock-em robots baseball. 

Yankees Sign Carlos Beltran Capping a Big Week of Spending

We have been hearing it all winter long; "The Yankees are doing everything that they can to get under the $189M luxury tax threshold for the 2014 season." It was the reason they stopped talking when Robinson Cano asked for $300M over 10 years. But after a week of being loose with their debit card, it seems that that was simply posturing on their part.

2013 Team Awards: Cincinnati Reds

In order to review the 2013 season, the crackpot staff of Off Base is handing out awards to each Major League team. Please send us $19.95 for the shipping and handling of your team's Hello Kitty stickers awards. Here are the Most Valuable Player, Least Valuable Player, Cy Young, Cy Yuck, Rookie of the Year and Reliever of the Year for the Cincinnati Reds. 

*Guidelines, prices and participation may vary by author*

MVP: Joey Votto

This wasn't an easy one. From someone who watched 95% of the team's games (only missing because I work during the week and couldn't skip out of work early for every mid-week businessman's special game), I think one of the damning qualities of the 2013 Reds may have been the lack of a true MVP. The numbers are there to please the sabermetrics crowd for Joey Votto (.305/.435/.491), but he honestly wasn't anything terrific in 2013. Let me rephrase; he wasn't 2010 Joey Votto, because that guy was an absolute menace for opposing pitching staffs. 

Votto had the nice 6.2 fWAR, but something seemed off. If I had to guess, he's still not completely back from knee surgery after the 2012 season. His lower half seemed to fail him - compare his ISO from the 2010 miraculous season (.276) and in 2013 (.186) and you see that it's a guy whose dip in power could completely be coming from a lack of torque in the lower half. Votto is still an amazing hitter without being at full strength; but for the Reds to take the next step and actually win a playoff series he's going to have to be more than just real good. That could happen, or the Reds could have someone else step up and carry the team, allowing Joey Votto to just be real good. As it stands the Reds have a bunch of 'pretty good' players but no one who was actually ELITE-ELITE. It felt that living and dying with them each night last summer. 

When the lights went out on their season, I drank a bottle of Sailor Jerry rum as I watched the outs melt away like sands through an hourglass. I didn't go into work the next day. I turned off my phone and didn't return text messages or calls. I needed that time for me. It was as if someone died and I needed the mourning period after the funeral. I am beginning to realize my allegiance to this franchise might not be a healthy habit in my life. To be a Reds fan with this current core, my one piece of advice would be to have a physical performed by your doctor to make sure you have a healthy functioning liver and kidneys. If he gets back to you with good news it's safe to proceed. 

LVP: Brandon Phillips 

I've always been a big Brandon Phillips supporter. I like the guy. He drove in a career-high 103 runs this past season. He made some jaw-dropping plays in the field. He played in 151 games. These are all things I appreciate as a fan. But we also saw the bad side of Phillips - like bitching about Joey Votto's contract in July. Or cussing out Reds beat writer C. Trent Rosecrans (and calling him the Pillsbury Doughboy). 

These things left a rotten taste in my mouth. When Phillips was complaining about his contract in comparison to Votto's, my question is why is this player doing this in such an important season? Why would someone who supposedly bleeds his team's colors in his veins creating a remarkable distraction in a season that the Reds needed to go deep in the postseason? The window is getting ready to close, and this guy is being a prick over money. I can live with a lot of things - but I'm starting to consider the notion of living without Brandon Phillips being a part of my favorite sports franchise. Let him go be a diva in a big market town. Let him go tell Mike Lupica to eat a bag of dicks out in New York. 

The Brandon Phillips who used to be a power/speed threat is no more. He stole five bases last season. He's slowly contributing to the Reds becoming a station-to-station National League club who sits around and waits for the three-run homer. Dusty Baker gets some blame in all of this, but in a division with the Cardinals and upstart Pirates, being a team in that mold is a huge problem. I think the Reds front office shares this same feeling with me, which is why you'll hear whispers of Phillips getting dealt in the off-season. Best guess is that Phillips talks his way into another chance with the Reds and they don't find the right price from a taker, but DatDude better change dem ways.

Cy Young: Aroldis Chapman 

I really can't overstate what it's like to have a lead and to send Aroldis Chapman into a game in the ninth inning. It's not that he converts every lead into a win - he's blown five saves in each of the last two seasons and when he's going to blow one you know it almost from his warm-up tosses. When bad Aroldis shows up, you're fucked. And it's painfully obvious. But I'm not sure I've ever seen a more dominating arm in my lifetime. I feel like getting to watch him his 105 MPH when I'm live at the stadium must have been what it was like to watch Michael Jordan in the old Slam Dunk contests. It's something you'll never see again no matter how long you live. 

Chapman posted a career high 15.83 K/9 in 2013. He was only worth 1.6 fWAR, but it's not his fault that his idiot manager petitioned the organization in Spring Training to leave Aroldis as a reliever. Even pitching coach Bryan Price (now Reds manager) was ready to make Chapman a starter where he could truly be a Cy Young candidate. But nooooooooo..... Dusty Baker and his status quo act had to step in and shit in everyone's birthday cake. 

I could have given this award to Mat Latos. But that just felt 'blah' to me. Aroldis Chapman is the best pitcher on the Reds roster. He has two 80-grade pitches. He just needs to be in the right role, and I think you'll see Aroldis as a starter in 2014.

Cy Yuck: Johnny Cueto

Now this will raise some eyebrows, but hear me out. Johnny Cueto was really good when he was part of the Reds rotation in 2013 (5-2, 2.82 ERA, 51 K, 18 BB) but the guy only appeared in 11 games. The injury bug that bit him in the 2012 playoffs continued to bite in 2013, leaving the Reds rotation in a constant state of flux due to the fact their 'ace' was rehabbing through the entire season. 

And then in true Dusty fashion, they throw Cueto out there for the one-game Wildcard Playoff in Pittsburgh because he looked good in a couple tune-up starts against a teams who were ready to start their golf game (the Astros). 

Cueto's wind-up might be causing the durability issues. And he looked completely rattled in Pittsburgh in one of the biggest games in modern franchise history. Everyone has an off night where their stuff just isn't there, but it was obvious from the opening moments of that game that Cueto's focus was off and the ferocious Pittsburgh crowd ruined him. I don't want that from my ace. And the Reds continue the trend of starting the wrong guy in the postseason (remember when they led with Edison Volquez)? What the hell are they trying to do to me. If you're keeping score at home, Cueto was worth a sparkling 0.6 fWAR in 2013. It's amazing that the Reds were able to win as many games as they did getting this minimal amount of output out of their number one (thank you Tony Cingrani).

Reliever of the Year: Aroldis Chapman

(Imagine Bart Simpson writing this on the chalkboard at the beginning of a Simpsons episode):
Screw you Dusty Baker.
Screw you Dusty Baker. 
Screw you Dusty Baker. 
Screw you Dusty Baker. 
Screw you Dusty Baker. 

Rudy Stein?!

So, first day of practice for the Bears and Rudi Stein volunteers to pitch. Though he seemed quite eager to pitch, jumping off the bleachers to inform Buttermaker of his desire to be the team's ace, he was just that: a volunteer. No one else in the yellow and brown wanted to be the hurler that would inevitably give up 27 runs and take seven comebackers off the shins per game. No one wanted to be the face of that team, and my goodness did that team have some faces.

 

There just weren't many options on day one of spring training:

* Engleberg is eating candy through the bars in his catcher's mask

* Lupus is getting hay fever out in RF

* Tanner Boyle falls down every time he does anything

* Ogilvie is in a windbreaker and jeans, didn't even bother to bring a glove

* Buttermaker is already nine beers in

* Kelly Leak is still weeks away from joining the team

* They've got a left-handed third baseman in a velvet jogging suit who is afraid of the ball

It's a mess of a first day of practice, and there's no one else to get on the mound and take the daily shellacking, so Stein volunteered, and that's fine for a non-serious little league where the kids and coaches are getting some fresh air and having fun.

But this isn't just any little league. The players have a genuine hatred for each other. The coaches are either drunks or psychotic (I seriously was hoping they'd release a new Bad News Bears DVD with extras where in one of the deleted scenes the Bears come back and beat the Yankees and Ron Turner is shown having hung himself in the dugout while Cleveland sobs in front of the body).

Anyway, Stein of course gets lit up. He's historically bad - bouncing pitches, can't field his position, throwing to the wrong bases, accidentally swallowing whole the rosin bag while attempting to field a bunt.

The Bears struggle. But Buttermaker finds Amanda Whurlitzer in a lawn chair handing out maps and remembers "this kid's got a curveball and I used to have sex with her mother. Maybe I can somehow get her t......." (passes out on the side of the road).

Soon the Bears have an ace: tons of innings, putting wear on her right arm, sure, but she's dominant and the best pitcher in the league. The Bears pass everyone into second and get a shot at the Yankees. Unfortunately Whurlitzer gets hurt in the championship game.

Buttermaker has to go to the pen.

Who does he turn to?

Rudi Stein.

RUDI STEIN?!

He goes right back to Rudi Stein?! There's no one else?!

At no time during the season, during practice, did he see if ANYONE ELSE could pitch? Ogilvie is the team statistician, refuses to play, he just wants to count foul balls and chart pitches. He couldn't at one point say "hey, Buttermaker, I know Amanda is pitching great, but let's say she gets hurt....you know, STEIN is the only other pitcher we have. Want to try to see if anyone else can pitch?

Maybe Ogilvie tried and Buttermaker was sunbathing nude in right field, who knows. But I still put this on Ogilvie - he should've done something.

 

And now we're in a tie championship game in the late innings, and Stein gets the ball again.

Ahmad Abdul Rahim?

Either of the Agular brothers?

The lefty they moved from 3rd to 1st? He can't give it a shot? Sure that might've meant bringing Jose Agular back to first, and we saw how poorly that went in the first practice.....but they're not going to even see if the lefty can get some people out?

Hell, give Boyle a shot. He may have been 3'4 and a horrible racist and bully, but he MUST'VE BEEN BETTER THAN RUDI STEIN.

If the fans are yelling out for anyone, EVEN THE RACIST, to pitch instead of the kid you currently have on the mound, you might have the wrong kid on the mound.

Kelly Leak can't pitch? He's the best athlete in the area and he can't pitch?! Why the hell not?! This kid is all-area and he's stuck in the outfield for the entire season?!

The Bears deserved that runner-up trophy.

Yankees Still Not Interested in a $300MM Robinson Cano

It looks like the Yankees are still not willing to give-in to Robinson Cano's and Jay-Z's demands that Cano get a 10-year $310MM contract. And I can't say that I blame them.

Bill Ballou Doesn't Value Mike Trout

After Miguel Cabrera crushed Mike Trout in 2012 AL MVP voting, it was clear that Trout wouldn't stand a chance at winning an MVP unless his Angels were playoff bound. And while Trout got better in 2013, the Angels got worse. Trout led all of baseball in Wins Above Replacement by a healthy margin again, general awesomeness and questions about whether his neck is a neck or just more shoulder. But he was doomed to finish second in AL MVP voting behind Cabrera for a second straight year. And finish second he did.

Trout trailed Cabrera by over 100 points (385-282) in 2013, which was a bigger margin than 2012 (362-281) when Cabrera won the frigging Triple Crown. So what changed this year? Well, Trout cut his 21.8 K% to 19.0% while raising his 10.5 BB% to 15.4% and raked an impressive .323/.432/.557 slash. Cabrera hit .348/.442/.636 in 64 fewer plate appearances while playing a very different version of third base than Manny Machado played. I could further detail how Trout was the much more valuable player than Cabrera but the Tigers made the playoffs and the Angels did not. And isn't that the definition of value? How well the rest of your teammates play or how your team's roster was constructed by people independent of you? That's how the BBWAA slides the numbers on their abacuses.

Trout not winning the MVP was a foregone conclusion. By how much, now that's where it was going to get interesting. And, holy shit, Bill Ballou hates Mike Trout. Mr. Ballou was lucky enough to be given an AL MVP vote by the BBWAA for his work at the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, which I've been told is not a publication about Morse code and baby antelopes. Ballou, a member of the Boston chapter, had an interesting MVP ballot. Trout was listed on all 30 AL MVP ballots but managed to only reach seventh (7th!) on Ballou's punch card. Ballou (quick google search says he is not, indeed, Salvador Dali's pet ocelot) had Chris Davis, Cabrera, Josh Donaldson, Robinson Cano, Adrian Beltre and Dustin Pedroia ahead of Trout. Trout's 10.4 fWAR (Fangraphs Wins Above Replacement) was two full wins more valuable than NL MVP Andrew McCutchen's 8.2 fWAR and some bigger math number than Donaldson's second best AL mark of 7.7 fWAR.

Ballou wasn't the only offender. Trout also received three third place votes and one fourth and one fifth place vote. Ballou was just the most egregious relunctator to the Trout MVP party this year. His reasoning echos that of others of his ilk. From a Sep 22 article...

If the award were Player of the Year, Mike Trout probably would be the winner. As an all-around player, Trout's abilities are
unsurpassed. He is both sides of the offense-defense equation. However, how valuable could he have been for a team
that is going to finish well out of contention? The Angels could have missed the playoffs without him

How valuable could he be for a team that didn't make the playoffs? Oh, 10 full wins valuable. His value counts regardless of whether the rest of his team is any good. Gas is going to cost the same whether you put it into a Cadillac or a lawn mower. There is a value for it. Unfortunately for Trout, the Angels have been less Escalade than John Deere for the past two seasons. If you wanted to get seriously literal about the term Most Valuable Player, Trout would win in a landslide considering he made less than half a million compared to the $21 million Cabrera made. But that would be giving voters way too much to consider.

Ultimately, it's all going to be on Trout to make the players around him better. He'll never win those individual awards unless his teammates step it up. Jerks.

Scheduled Alex Rodriguez Hearing May or May Not Happen

The countdown is ticking toward zero-hour for the Alex Rodriguez Biogenesis/PED/General Douchebaggery hearing that is scheduled for next week. Except now, it appears that the meeting could be canceled. That, of course, is terrible. Simpy because it means that this whole daytime soap opera is going to dragged out even longer than it needs to be.

I admit that I have gone out of my way to avoid this whole mess. I hate it. Hate hate hate hate it. Largely because it involves two people in baseball who annoy me more than a human being should be allowed to annoy another human being without physically doing anything to that person. Those people are Alex Rodriguez, and Bud Selig.

But I did get a laugh at what, apparently, is the wording used for the penalty against A-Rod. Cue the blockquote:

MLB said the penalty was for "use and possession of numerous forms of prohibited performance-enhancing substances, including testosterone and human growth hormone over the course of multiple years" and for "engaging in a course of conduct intended to obstruct and frustrate the office of the commissioner's investigation."

Engaging in a course of conduct intended to obstruct and frustrate the office of the commissioner's investigation. Did Rodriguez egg your house, Bud? Make prank calls? Loiter at your local liquor store? Threw a rock through your window? I am upset that the phrase "Git offa mah lawn" was not used once in that statement. Not. One. Time.....Damnit.

I, obviously, am 100% OK with Rodriguez getting a 211 game suspension. I am also OK with anything that adds a few inches to the waistline - and costs a few inches at the hairline - of Bud Selig.

What I am trying to say is: In the span of the of 30 minutes that I spent writing this post, I have become a fan of the shenanigans that is this investigation. The whole thing is regressing into nonsense and will likely provide plenty of things for me to write about. So, thank you, Alex Rodriguez and Bud Selig *vomits* for giving me news that isn't actually news but is incredibly easy to make fun of. I kind of appreciate it. *vomits again*

Kershaw, Scherzer Dominate Cy Young Voters Too

After the dust settled, the only thing left to do was tally the first place votes not given to Clayton Kershaw and Max Scherzer. Three. There were three voters who didn't participate in the Kershaw and Scherzer landsliding by the rest of the BBWAA. Anibal Sanchez, Chris Sale and Adam Wainwright supporters ruined the unanimanoty for the 2013 Cy Young winners.

I'm fine with the voting since I had Kershaw and Scherzer in my BBA ballot. And they also led baseball in Fangraphs Wins Above Replacement with a 6.5 fWAR for Kershaw and a 6.4 fWAR for Scherzer. So even most of the protractor wielding baseball fans can't complain too much. Plus, Scherzer led baseball with 21 wins and Kershaw led the same baseball with a 1.83 ERA. My grandfather nods approvingly of those stats while feeding a murder of crows that I'm sure will do his bidding soon. That's why I let him believe pitcher wins do matter.

Kershaw has been the best pitcher in baseball over the past few years and he was close to sweeping the first place votes. Over the past three seasons, only Justin Verlander has accumulated more fWAR than Kershaw (19.1-18.5) but Kershaw has led the Majors with a 2.21 ERA by a good margin during that span. The lone Wainwright first place voter was a Cincinnati beat writer. Which is fine but, at least, a little puzzling considering Wainwright gave up 29 hits and 19 earned runs in 22.0 innings against the Reds. His 7.77 ERA was, by far, the worst ERA Wainwright had against any team.

Scherzer crushed second place Yu Darvish by 110 points in voting. Darvish and his 432 pitch arsenal didn't garner a single first place vote but his baseball leading 11.89 K/9 landed him 19 second place votes. Scherzer was second with a 10.08 K/9, if your GM was wondering and considering trading for him since he's apparently available.

Hisashi Iwakuma finished third in the AL while his teammate, and better pitcher, Felix Hernandez finished eighth. ROY Jose Fernandez finished third in the NL, Matt Harvey finished fifth and the ghost of Christmas 2010, Francisco Liriano, finished tenth.