Fish Bites: Weekend Edition

Since I haven’t been good about keeping up with my daily output, I’ll put up a special Weekend Edition of Fish Bites. Also, there’s something I just had to get to.

– First off, tonight’s game between the Marlins and Diamondbacks. Sean West takes the bump against Jon Garland for the D-backs. The Fish are looking to bounce back from a miserable team outing last night, so we’ll see if the bats can wake up and West can recover from his string of poor outings.

– In the thriller of a game Thursday night (you know, the one with The Inning), Burke Badenhop got hit in the knee with a line drive. The injury was classified as a knee contusion and X-rays were negative. We hope the Hopper and his long relief help can return soon, he’s been very good so far with his control this season (3.80 FIP, 49.7 GB%).

– Joe Capozzi of the Fish Tank (the Palm Beach Post blog) reports that Larry Beinfest is not going to trade Mike Stanton. Here are some of Beinfest’s choice words on the stud prospect:

"“The power is there already and usually power is one of the last things to come with a player and the power is already there. It’s just progressing through the system and getting experience at the higher levels and then from there hopefully he’ll be ready to go.’’"

Stanton hasn’t looked great in Double-A so far, but he’s so young it doesn’t even matter yet. He’s got a chance to be special.

– Greg Cote of the Miami Herald thinks the Marlins biggest acquisition should be a closer. You know how much I despise the concept of the closer. Rob Neyer mentioned that the Committee for Closing Games CAN work, and I tend to agree if the pitchers are good enough. Furthermore, Cote’s argument about who to trade is even worse:

"Second baseman Dan Uggla — though a fan favorite with a home run bat — also is eminently tradable. Uggla’s low average, too many strikeouts and mediocre glove are liabilities offsetting his power, yet his RBI production gives him market value.…The lineup, though nobody’s murderer’s row other than Hanley, is good enough."

Well, not everyone reads my stuff, but in case you didn’t notice, the Marlins are 20th in the majors in wOBA. Sure, the talent is there for them to play well, but giving up our third/fourth best hitter this season for a player who will only pitch the ninth most of the time. Uggla, with all his defensive struggles and poor BA, has managed approximately one win above replacement this season. The best relief pitcher in baseball by WAR has been Jonathon Broxton, who has managed approximately two wins above replacement. Other players mentioned:

Heath Bell (1.3 WAR)
David Aardsma (1.3 WAR)
George Sherrill (0.7 WAR)

One for one this would be a tough pill to swallow. In addition, the volatility of relief statistics can be a huge downside to acquiring a reliever over simply finding enough quality arms. Which isn’t to say that trading for an Aardsma or Sherrill would be bad, but rather that the team should not be giving up talent on the field for that return. Why not toss Ryan Tucker and some low-level prospects for a George Sherrill instead of risking Uggla for a one inning/outing pitcher? It’s ridiculous to think otherwise.

– Finally, two major trades to scoff at. First, the Royals give up live bodies for Yuniesky Betancourt. In case anyone doesn’t remember, Betancourt doesn’t know what a walk is. That can’t be good. And of course, Jeff Francoeur lands with the Mets for Ryan Church. Do you remember what Francoeur can’t do? Walk, eeeeexactly! It’s amazing what general managers what will do with “tools.”