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Jason Giambi Scouting Report
There is a cool site called Diamond Mines run by the National Baseball Hall of Fame where they have (an awful search engine, but) really cool old scouting reports on players. Poking around it you can find some interesting things and while this seems best suited for offseason posts its a cool new discovery so I will post something from it now. This is a scouting report from Dave Littlefield (who would go on to be the GM of the Pittsburgh Pirates during the period where they were criticized for getting signable players as opposed to the best players with the first overall selection of Bryan Bullington whom Littlefield labeled a future #3 starter in the “Moneyball draft”) of one Jason Giambi who would of course be the offensive staple of the A’s lineup at the end of the previous millenium and beginning of this one. But what did Littlefield think of Giambi on Valentine’s Day 1992?
“Big body w/pretty good bat, future 1B-LF, disappointed w/def play @3B, plays hard but tools (except for bat) are short, future 3A journeyman, maybe bat off bench”
Littlefield, who at the time was working for the Montreal Expos, also rated Giambi’s future hitting ability as “average”, power as “below average” and dedication as “fair”. Of course Giambi exceeded Littlefield’s 3A joyrneyman, maybe bat off bench expectations making his MLB debut a little over three years after this scouting report on May 8, 1995. In 2000 he would make his first All Star team and also win the MVP hitting .333/.476/.647 with a 7.7 WAR season in spite of his poor defense which Littlefield correctly pegged at “below average”. Giambi of course is still playing with Cleveland now and in his career has thus far amassed 50.1 WAR and 431 home runs while hitting .280/.403/.522 with a .398 wOBA and 143 wRC+. Maybe he could’ve been used as a bat off the bench?
Salary Comparison A’s vs. AL West
It is well known that the A’s are one of the more frugal teams in the American League and in baseball as a whole. Only the two Floridian teams and Houston have lower payrolls than the Athletics of Oakland who currently sit at a “mere” $61,964,500. The Los Angeles Times has an interesting graphic where you can compare teams salaries position by position against one another. It is interesting stuff and worth messing around with if you have some spare time. What was interesting is just seeing how many places the A’s actually have a more expensive position than other teams which at times is surprising but owing to the rules in baseball that suppress young players’ salaries it often happens when one wouldn’t expect it.
For example, the A’s versus the Angels where comparing the ten positions (pitchers aren’t differentiated according to role, plus the designated hitter), the A’s have more expensive players at three of the ten positions: left field, center field and designated hitter. That is largely because the A’s have Yoenis Cespedes, Coco Crisp and Seth Smith there while the Angels feature pre-arbitration Mike Trout, Peter Bourjos and Mark Trumbo at those positions, wheras the Angels’ pitchers earn more than the entire A’s team at $63,831,250.
With Texas the A’s again outspend their rivals at three positions: left field (Cespedes beating out David Murphy), center field (Coco trumping the duo of Leonys Martin and Craig Gentry) and first base where Brandon Moss and Nate Freiman trump the salary earned by Mitch Moreland.
Seattle is an interesting foe as the A’s beat them at four positions salary wise. Right field where the combo of Josh Reddick and Chris Young outearn Michael Saunders, shortstop where Jed Lowrie and Hiroyuki Nakajima beat out Brendan Ryan (though the Times has Robert Andino at second base, if you move him to shortstop the A’s still have more payroll there and it would also leave things at second base unchanged too). First base sees the A’s spending more on Moss and Freiman than the M’s spend on Justin Smoak and then the A’s also edge out Seattle at the backstop where John Jaso and Derek Norris earn $289,200 more than Jesus Montero and Kelly Shoppach collectively.
Houston with the lowest payroll in baseball, just north of $26M, make the A’s look like huge spenders with Oakland having a higher payroll at every position except one: first base where Carlos Pena and Brett Wallace, both former A’s themselves, earning more than Moss and Freiman. As it stands right now money clearly doesn’t mean much as the A’s find themselves second in the standings despite being fourth in funding.
Recap: A’s @ Yankees Game 32
Wrap: Oakland 5, New York 4. A’s 18-14 (2nd Place, 2 1/2 games back)
The A’s take the series against New York, first time they’ve taken two out of three from the Yankees in the Bronx since August of 2011 (the one loss in that series being that awful 22 run debacle) . Turns out when Yoenis Cespedes, who homered, is in the A’s lineup the A’s this season are 13-4, with a 95-50 record since he joined the club and he has been in the lineup as per MLB.com. Regardless it wasn’t all Cespedes today as the club put together a solid showing to win.
The Bats
Lineup vs. Andy Pettitte: Adam Rosales SS, Derek Norris C, Jed Lowrie 2B, Cespedes CF, Josh Donaldson 3B, Nate Freiman 1B, Luke Montz DH, Seth Smith LF, Michael Taylor RF.
The A’s were powered by the home run in this game: Montz had a solo shot in the fourth, Cespedes a two-run dinger in the sixth, and Donaldson the go-ahead in the top of the eighth. Montz had a nice day for himself going 2-for-4 his other hit being a double that also came off of Pettitte. Freiman struck out against Pettite with the bases juiced in the first inning as a part of a 1-for-4 day. Freiman is sticking around as a Rule V pick with a .243/.326/.378 slash line and has been worth -0.2 WAR today. Tough situation today for Freiman but I still have to say I like the little I’ve seen. Remember this is a kid who has previously not played above Double-A. The other hit of note is Josh Reddick coming in and getting a double off of Boone Logan having come in as a defensive replacement for Taylor who went 0-for-3 (still hitless in 2013) upping his season slash line to .148/.267/.250. The home runs were important (as they always are, but particularly so in this game) as the A’s couldn’t put together runs on their own going a pathetic 0-for-9 with runners in scoring position.
The Pitching
Appearances: Dan Straily, Jerry Blevins, Sean Doolittle, Ryan Cook, Grant Balfour.
Straily looked alright until the sixth inning when running out of gas it seems after 85 pitches (60 of them strikes) he allowed a single to Robinson Cano and later walked Travis Hafner. (Overall on the day, he had five and a third innings pitched tagged for three runs on four hits with three walks and four stirkeouts) Blevins came in but was awful allowing both inherited runners to score, first Cano on an Ichiro Suzuki double, and later Hafner on a Lyle Overbay single that also would score Ichiro. On the year Blevins had previously been good with inherited runners with only two of the ten scoring. Doolittle pitched a perfect seventh earning the win care of Donaldson’s blast in the next half inning. Cook meanwhile got himself into trouble with singles to Hafner and Ichiro before pitching himself out of a mess. Balfour did the same thing allowing a single to Brett Gardner and intentionally walking Cano after a wild pitch moved Gardner to second, before finally getting Vernon Wells out on strikes to end the game. Not the prettiest of games from the pitching staff but overall not terrible as the A’s pitchers combined for nine innings of four earned run, nine hit, four walk and eight strikeout baseball, a recipe I imagine would work more often than not.
Hero/Zero
Gonna go with Montz. Cespedes had the biggest home run in terms of runs, with his being a two-run shot, but Montz was the only hitter with more than one hit. Donaldson’s home run while the go-ahead was worth just as many runs as Montz’ and Montz having a day with a double and home run narrowly wins to be the hero.
Chris Young who has not played since April 29th, when he went 2-for-4 in the A’s 19 inning win over the Angels, has been placed on the 15-day disabled list with a left quad strain. Young who has in many ways been supplanted by Seth Smith as the fourth outfielder in the A’s outfield mix, is off to a very slow start with his new club hitting just .172/.277/.391 in his 101 plate appearances this year. His .172 BABIP is largely responsible for the lowered numbers as he has featured a strong .218 ISO with four home runs and five stolen bases for a total of 0.1 WAR. In his stead the A’s recalled Michael Taylor who is hitting .329/.380/.616 with five home runs in 79 plate appearances at Sacramento. Granted hitting at Sacramento or Triple-A Lehigh Valley when he was a member of the Phillies organization hasn’t ever been Taylor’s problem, hitting at the MLB level has. This year is no different thus far as he went 0-for-6 in his brief stint up with the big league club. Taylor “sort of” can play all three outfield spots giving the A’s the same versatility as Young but is primarily a corner outfielder.
Hiroyuki Nakajima, who I felt was a bad signing and who during the spring did nothing to dissuade me of that fact hitting .167/.286/.190 this spring in 49 plate appearances, is headed to Sacramento for a “rehab assignment” where he will be staying for an apparent indefinite amount of time. The A’s have received a .306/.383/.469 slash line with a .372 wOBA and 138 wRC+ out of shortstop this year which is Nakajima’s natural position. Out of second base where conceivably Jed Lowrie could be moved to make room for Nakajima, he has played there the past few nights, the A’s have just got a .236/.302/.323 line with a .278 wOBA and 75 wRC+ still a number better than what Nakajima has put up thus far in his short audition. The fact he is signed to a two-year $6.5M deal means we will see him, but I am glad to see that the A’s aren’t just letting the money or the intrigue dictate where he is playing but instead are allowing the results on the field dictate when he will be in Oakland. I had the same concerns last season with Manny Ramirez and the A’s were prudent and waited to see if he’d be ready instead of just knee-jerk inserting him in the lineup so it is great to see the same patience and reticence being utilized again.
