Post#4 » by TSE » Wed Oct 21, 2009 2:48 am
I will interject my comments regarding this Guillen rumor, but in a roundabout way that addresses a few other issues that interrelate. In general, I'm not terribly concerned with the vast majority of things that have to do with our outfield and pitching staff. As far as Guillen as a player is concerned though, yes he does have some fielding issues, but as a hitter he does have the potential to make up for his defensive deficiency. He did have a rough last year, but he still managed a .419 slugging avg despite his low batting average, so it's not completely worthless, but is down from his career avg of .446. The year before last year it was .436. The 2 years prior to that and 3 of the last 4 years he was over .500. This is what we MUST have from him. So the question becomes, can Guillen hit north of a .500 slugging average for 2010, or will he hit near his career average of .446 or below? I am somewhat suspicious that he can shoot back up to .500, but if he can do that then we will be fine there. My instincts tell me that it is a game of chance on which we will see, maybe a 50/50 coin flip, and I don't think that is a good enough chance in our favor to roll the die. Whether we win that gamble or not is anybody's guess.
Those decisions really shouldn't make us or break us. Whether or not we will have a strong 2010 as well as 2011-2015 really depends on what we do with the 4 key infield spots that are our glaring weakness: 3B / SS / 2B / C. If we lose Polanco and utilize Sizemore, that should be ok, so that knocks it down to 3. That means we have now 3B / SS / C that are going to cripple us if we don't make MASSIVE improvements. I doubt we will do much at 3B, so we will have to gamble that Inge can reduce his strikeouts and raise his batting average and power, we need him to do all 3 of those things.
Really, the top 2 offseason stories that I care most about are SS and C, we really need to enhance those positions otherwise it's going to be a long year. There isn't a TON of FAs that can help, and the Tigers likely won't want to spend money for a Miguel Tejada anyhow, so the only way we can really hit a home run in those 2 categories is to make some strategic trades, which ties in to this Guillen story.
If Guillen is the every day LF, then that means less at bats for guys like Raburn and Thames, which isn't convenient, because clearly those guys are superior hitters to the glut of guys that are penciled in as our projected infielders sans Cabrera.
Thus, what we NEED to do regarding LF, is we NEED to do a trade. We need to find a buyer for one or more of Guillen / Thames / Raburn / Ramirez and shift our OF equity into a chip to help us improve an infield position. If it was up to me, I would rather trade Guillen because I think that the odds of Thames or Raburn hitting at a high enough of an efficiency are a little more secure than Guillen's chances. With Guillen's much larger contract and age, he is the value play to dump off in a trade in the category of these 4 players. Ramirez is a wildcard, so we won't get much value in a trade and we are better off rolling the die with him a little before committing to him long term or dealing him away.
So trade Guillen and then try to trade either Thames or Raburn might be also a good idea if the price is right in other teams evaluating those players favorably. With Guillen's contract though, it might be tough to deal him at all, so we might have to take the 50/50 gamble on him and just pray for the best, which puts us in a conundrum and makes things even more interesting.
Thus, there is ANOTHER choice we could make that would solve this crowded OF equity as well as our SS problem. It's a VERY high risk choice that also would be somewhat controversial, but given the circumstances of having too many OFs, and too high of a salary for Guillen w/too much uncertainty with him and age to trade him and in conjunction with having a MAJOR hole at SS that we can't fix with spending more money, MAYBE, just MAYBE our best solution is to let Guillen play SS tandem with Santiago. (Santiago then can get more play time last year by spelling Sizemore at 2B and get a piece of both spots, which also allows us to DH or PH Guillen on days that Santiago is at SS)
Now I know what you are all thinking, is that crazy? Why yes it is, because Guillen is too old to play there, and the last year he played SS he had a .955 Fielding Pct which is not great, and who knows if that could dip even lower. BUT, the few years before his .955 of 2007, he was at .975 from 2004 and 2005. Granted he is getting older and less athletic, but it could be possible for him to hold down numbers that may get destroyed by other SSs, but the gap between how poor he is there could actually still help us in comparison to what we had with Everett, and here's how. Everett, had a FP of .970 last year, but his SLG pct was a terrible .350. There is ACTUALLY room for Guillen to suck defensively and use his last year SLG pct of .419, his career of .446, and his top end possibility of .500+ to more than make up for his fielding deficiency. If we can't trade him, or trade the other OFs that we don't have room for, then it might be the only solution to all of our problems. That way we are gambling on Guillen to beat out Everett's .325 SLG pct of last year instead of a Thames / Raburn / Ramirez SLG pct of .450-.500+. By the way, Thames and Raburn have career SLG pcts of .491 and .461 respectively, while Everett's is .351. (Ramirez doesn't count due to small sample size and his wildcard status)
In conclusion, if I had to pick today, I'd sooner stick Guillen at SS and pray to God that it wouldn't backfire in my face before I would anoint him as the everyday LF. And I know that sounds scary as heck, it's not that I WANT to do that, cause if it was up to me, I would be signing Miguel Tejada so damn fast to play SS, and there is no way that Illitch could stop me because I would never leave his office until he finally gave in and let me do it, I'd die of starvation or thirst before I would quit on filibustering my case that we need to sign Tejada, but all things considered, it is a possible solution, and it is the most $ economical solution if pinching pennies is important, which apparently it is extremely important due to our shockingly inept results last year.
(although this is assuming that Guillen is upset with his status because he can make a case for being able to play SS, which I suspect is possible, especially knowing that we can move the floor down on his FP as a result of our inability to spend money for a traditionally sound alternative which we don't have if we can't sign Tejada.)
Now, let me finally add this. I don't think for a second that we will actually see Guillen at SS under this theory, because the only way that could happen would be if Leyland and DD had analyzed that the SLG pct that Guillen can overtake Everett on can make up for his FP deficiency. They won't look at that comparison, because if they appreciated the relationship between FP and SLG pct, we wouldn't have EVER signed Everett in the first place. That numerical analysis would have made Everett stick out like such a sore thumb, and the Tigers would have realized WAY back before the season started that signing Everett is an impossible consideration because that would make him our clearcut weakest link. But that's not what happened, because Leyland and DD do not know how to properly compare FP #s to SLG pct #s, thus coming around to THIS particular theory/analysis has a very remote chance of happening. It would take an alteration of their baseball philosophy at the very core of it, which is not something most people like to do with their philosophies. I wish they would and see things with more of a logical interpretation and Saberesque nature, but they aren't numbers guys. They are old fashioned guys, and "defense wins championships" mentalities, and thus we won't see them reconstruct their general philosophy of baseball.
And that is why we are seeing this story today of Leyland telling Guillen he will play LF, cause he has no other place to put him, and he won't dissect these numbers or audit his baseball philosophy.
