The Rise Of Center Field
I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but there are a lot of really good center fielders in baseball right now. There is so much talent in center field that we could be seeing the dawning of the greatest group of talent to ever play the position at the same time. Seriously, just take a look at the current crop of players manning the position.
Established All-Stars: Grady Sizemore, Carlos Beltran, Torii Hunter, Curtis Granderson, Mike Cameron
Breakout Stars: Matt Kemp, Franklin Gutierrez, Denard Span, Shane Victorino
Potential Stars: Adam Jones, Colby Rasmus, BJ Upton, Josh Hamilton, Andrew McCutchen, Dexter Fowler
Flycatchers: Nyjer Morgan, Rajai Davis, Ryan Sweeney, Michael Bourn, Coco Crisp, Brett Gardner
Solid Players: Nate McLouth, Marlon Byrd, Jacoby Ellsbury, Kosuke Fukudome, Melky Cabrera
That’s 26 players with some real value to their teams. Twenty-Six, and I didn’t even include guys like Chris Dickerson or Chris Young. Usually, you expect to find 10-15 pretty good players at any given position, some others guys who fill a need for a while, and then a bunch of old guys at the end of their careers. But this crop of center field talent is just unbelievable in its depth and youth.
Sizemore, Beltran, and Granderson aren’t exactly old men, but they’re the elder statesmen of this group that is overflowing with young stars in the making. There’s so many good players roaming CF right now that you could state that a guy like Adam Jones is a below average player for the position this year. And Jones went to the all-star game, and his place as one of the game’s best young talents is not in question.
I’m not sure I have ever witnessed this kind of influx in talent at a single position before. This is the golden age of center field.
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This makes me more depressed to be a Jays fan
Exactly what I thought.
At least you dumped Alex Rios on my White Sox.
Sad…
Yeah, since Wells is paid like the Beltrans but is (significantly) worse than the Melky Cabreras
This article needs more Carlos Gonzalez, despite the fact that the Rockies are gonna play him in at the corners and CF when Dex needs a break.
I don’t know why UZR hates Ellsbury this much, but combined with his offense he’s arguably not worse than some players listed in front of him.
it hates Fowler as well, and he seems to be a pretty good CF, just has mental-judgment errors…from being 23, you now.
It hates Ellsbury because it doesn’t like players who take outfield routes like a little leaguer only to bail themselves out sometimes with their speed.
He’s been dreadful out there all season, even from an observational standpoint.
Nyjer Morgan is the obvious counter to your first statement. Have you ever seen the routes he takes sometimes? You would be amazed at how often he breaks the wrong direction and still tracks down a tough ball.
It always baffles me when I hear some one say something like “He’s been dreadful out there all season, even from an observational standpoint.” I watch every Red Sox game and what I know about Ellsbury’s defense I’ve learned from reading Fangraphs, BP, and other sites on the web. There is just no way to tell by watching on TV whether or not a player has good range or takes bad routes in the outfield.
Or, I should say, I haven’t figured one out. By the time the camera cuts away from home plate after a pitch, the outfielder is already on his way. I mean, sometimes, in extreme examples you can make a determination, but the vast majority of time, enough to form a solid opinion like the one stated above, you just can’t see enough.
I don’t mean this to knock the article or even Joel’s point, I just question how he could figure it out from watching on TV. I’m assuming it’s TV, if Joel attends 82 Red Sox games a year, forgive me.
@ Bill
No defensive fielding metric will punish you if you end up making the play.
@ Mattymatty
I actually brought it up on the Peter Gammons chat on espn yesterday. Usually you’ll get a replay of the action, you can see that Ellsbury is sometimes late on picking the ball up aesthetically speaking. This is probably something he’ll eventually improve.
Even though one idea I pitched around is the Red Sox let Bay walk, sign Crawford, stick him in CF, move Ellsbury to LF, suddenly our OF is Ellsbury in LF (which is the yay version of him), Crawford in CF, Drew in RF.
Im relativly new to sabr stats and all. And if I understand correctly, UZR and UZR/150 compares the players to other players? If so could this be the reason for Ellsburys poor UZR numbers. Because of all the great CF’ers there are right now, his numbers look below average? Or is he really that bad?
Correct. He is being compared to other CFs, so that could affect his numbers. So could random variation. Ellsbury put up a very impressive UZR last year. Did he get that much worse? Somewhere in the middle seems like the safe bet until we get another season or two of data on him.
Even the ballpark has a factor.
That’s true and something I didn’t consider. Defensive outfielders are getting trendy again (assuming they’re passable hitters and not offensive killers), teams are tending to play their best overall OF in CF. Ellsbury could very much just be a victim of awesomeness. It’s tough to look good in a position where so many players are fielding at a high level at it. This could be why CF’s like Langerhans went at way below value in free agency.
A new golden age, perhaps, but let’s not forget Duke Snider, Bobby Thompson, Mickey Mantle, Wille Mays, Dom DiMaggio, Gus Bell, and more frm the 50’s.
Who?
Don’t forget Richie Ashburn too! It’s funny to go back and look at positional offense from that period, where the centerfielders were actually BETTER hitters than the corner outfielders and, some seasons, the first basemen.
In 1959 there were 16 teams in MLB, and five of them had future HOF players in CF.
I was going to say New York City teams alone had better centerfielders in the 1950s than all of baseball today. And while I like him, is Cameron an established all-star or just once in a while named to the team?
Where is Vernon Wells? He’s a former gold glove winning, all-star player who makes over $20 million a year.
He deserves to be up there over no namers like Rajai Davis.
Uh oh.
Sarcasm?
Zito for Cy Young!
OK, I’ll bite.
1. The key word in your assessment of Vernon Wells is “former,” meaning he’s no longer, meaning he doesn’t fit in this topic.
2. It’s not Dave’s fault that you’ve never heard of Rajai Davis.
Come on guys, this was pretty obvious sarcasm.
You’re better than this.
Omar…I heard McNutty is looking for you…you feel me?
wakka wakka wakka
How is Mike Cameron an established all-star but Nate McLouth is not?
because mclouth is overrated and isn’t good enough to be considered an all-star
McLouth 2007 3.6 WAR 2008 3.1 WAR
Granderson 2007 3.8 WAR 2008 3.2 WAR
Hunter 2007 2.3 WAR 2008 3.9
Granderson and Hunter really are “Solid Players”, not really established All-Stars. Hunter really is much more ‘overrated’ based off his past 10 years than McLouth. None of those three are nearly as great as Sizemore and Beltran, and its not fair to put them together. Cameron isn’t close either, but he is a consistant 4 WAR guy, so he probably is an “All Star”.
Where is FG getting exposure from?
Granderson’s WAR in 2007 was 7.4 !!!!!
Was wondering the same about Victorino. He’s at least a more recent All-Star than Cameron.
Why no Carlos Gomez? He was the best CF by Fielding Bible standards last year and is fourth this year…
+1
+1. That Carlos hasn’t played much CF this year is only partially his fault. Even if he hasn’t hit well, Gardy still ought to send him to CF with Span in LF. …and Delmon as the backup bullpen catcher.
I would still consider Span a corner OF – not that great in center, but he’s there more because Go-Go isn’t much of a hitter.
Willy Taveras. Willy. Taveras.
A .258 wOBA will get you kicked off the list pretty quick.
Well, somebody has to finish last in the rankings.
Yes, of course. With more good centerfielders than at any time in history, the Reds brainstrust came up with Willy Taveras!
Exactly my first impression as a Reds fan reading the post. My second was to question the odd groupings; Kemp does not belong on the same list as Span, Gutierrez and Victorino.
They wanted to equip Dusty with the most base-unclogging roster possible.
With a team 2nd half OBP of .305, SUCCESS!
Julio Borbon could be included, he seems likely to be in CF next year, and then you might remove Hamilton who will probably slide to RF.
Drew Stubbs, if he can hold his own with the bat, will be a very good center fielder as well.
Neither Hamilton nor McLouth has any business playing CF. They should each be playing a corner. Hamilton’s arm is overrated, but it is good enough to play RF. McLouth’s is more of a LF arm.
Putting Kemp in the same tier as Span is a JOKE.
Is your beef with Kemp being in the second tier, or Span being there alongside him? Kemp is better, but I’d need another year or two before declaring him an “established all-star.” And he is the first guy listed in the second tier.
Who’s to say he’s not the best CF in the game right now? I’m not saying he definitely IS, but you’d be hard-pressed to tell me he’s definitely NOT.
Believe it or not Fish, “right now” doesnt mean “established”.
Then the hierarchy of the post is irrelevant. When a guy in your second-tier is the best in the entire post, you’ve got a fatal flaw. Kemp is leading all CF in WAR this year, and he won’t be 25 for another week or two. He is the best CF in the game right now, and to structure a post so that he is placed below Mike Cameron, the Ghost of Carlos Beltran, and the Shell of Grady Sizemore is a joke. To put him alongside such guys as Span, Gutierrez, and Victorino is to obscure the truth:
Matt Kemp is as good of a player as there is in the NL outside of Pujols, H. Ramirez, and Utley.
To equate his career trajectory to those of the other “breakout stars” is to vastly understate where Kemp stands now and figures to be over the next few years.
The Ghost of Carlos Beltran? What?
Forgive me for not being too terribly optimistic about a CF who will turn 33 next April and missed half the season.
There’s a difference between having the best 2009 and being the best center fielder in baseball. You’re more than welcome to make your decisions based on only one year, but forgive those of us who will not.
Sizemore and Beltran are established star players. Kemp isn’t quite there yet. I think he’ll be a stud, but I’m cool with holding off and waiting a year or two to see what happens.
I guess I’ll forgive you for ignoring his .411 wOBA. Definitely in a decline phase.
Not that I’m arguing Aaron Rowand is an amazing player or anything, and he’s certainly older than most of these guys, but he’s been good enough to at least get a mention with some of the lower tier guys in this list, right?
Dave’s got a soft spot for Mike Cameron. Shane Victorino UZR is not normalizing, which is worrying me. A nice addendum to this list would be corner outfielders who have CF range. Jayson Werth and Carl Crawford come to mind.
Actually Victorino’s UZR seems to be normalizing. I think I remember it being a -12 at one point, now it is at -4.0.
I was referring to his UZR/150 to be clear.
actually, Fish, this year Span and Kemp are almost identical players in regards to ops+. Kemp outslugs Span but Span has a higher obp which leaves Kemp w/ a little better ops (861 vs 814). defensively, i still like range factor where they are both about league average. not sure which player you would prefer. If you look at just 5 by 5 fantasy stats, i like kemp who steels fifty percent more bases and likes to hit homeruns. i really don’t get the appeal of span. Maybe bc i’m a ChiSox fan and have an anti twins bias. Span hits decidedly better at home than away (907 to 723 ops) leading me to believe his value will be greatly diminished next year when he is out of the bubble dome. Kemp actually hits worse at home (791 to 924) than away. the more i look at Kemp, the more i’ll be targeting him in fantasy next season (have him in one of three leagues this year) realizing sarcasm is lost online, maybe you were suggesting span isn’t really anything that special outside of a good obp? in short, love me some kemp
kemp steals at a higher clip, has nearly points on span in ISO, is head and shoulders better defensively using UZR and UZR/150. kemp has a 5.3 WAR to span’s 3.6 and a 2.53 WPA to span’s -0.9. kemp’s BB% his increased, his K% decreased, and he has shown an ability to succeed with an abnormally high BABIP.
span is a nice player…but in no way is he the player matt kemp is.
Succeeding DESPITE an abnormally high BABIP?! Impossible!
really should have proofread. noticed glaring punctuation and spelling errors. most notably wrong spelling of steal. typing outside on a netbook. forgiveness please.
You forgot Jim Edmonds’ imminent comeback.
Is it really that ridiculous to question Adam Jones as one of the top talents in baseball? I can see why you’d buy the ridiculous month-and-a-half hot streak if you loved him as a prospect, but his plate discipline always turned me off.
Gawd, is there a more overrated player in baseball than Matt Kemp?
Seriously?? I watch Dodger baseball on a regular basis since I’m stuck in LA because of business obligations, but I can’t stand the whole Kemp-man-crushness.
He used to swing at everything from his eyes to his heels. Now he just swings from his mouth to his shins. Yeah, real awesomely improved plate discipline there, buddy.
Not to mention he takes horrible routes out on the field. Because of this, he makes routine plays look spectacular. Maybe he takes fielding lessons from Juan Pierre.
Oh, and all his bloated stats have been padded by his spot in the no-pressure 8th spot of the lineup. Move him up anywhere higher than 8th, and he’ll hook it up with a ‘golden sombrero’ performance.
Dude really has some sick physical tools, but he is NOT a breakout star. Can’t even steal properly! Let’s reserve judgement until he actually LEARNS how to play the game of baseball before we christen this kid as the 2nd coming.
He’s just a decent starter till then, which is nothing to be ashamed of.
please go post on the ESPN baseball forums.
Why, because I speak the truth?
I can spew out baseball nerdy-geeky-stat talk too.
Matt Kemp cannot and will not maintain his absurdly high BABIP so his offensive stats are inflated as well.
I think Matt Kemp has a decent future. He’s just not a star right now.
Basketball player playing baseball.
He might make an All-Star squad in the near future, he certainly has the tools.
If you can’t back up your lame, blanket statements with sound evidence, then why don’t you go crawl around the ESPN dumpster forums yourself. You’ll see more of your kind there.
His BABIP this year is actually below his career number. Probably not sustainable, but he does have a history of running high BABIP numbers thanks to his speed and high number of line drives.
He’s workin’ purely off his physical talents.
When his speed starts to decline (what is he 230 pounds!?!) as he gets older, that BABIP will be his downfall and everything will catch up to him.
What does that have to do with whether he’s a star right now?
and i like how the “nerdy stats” are BABIP….which is probably one of the easiest “nerd” stats to explain to anyone that understands the definition of “luck.”
You may know what BABIP is, NYMDaWright, but you obviously do not know how to interpret it. A .363 BABIP for a player with the skill set of Kemp’s is not unheard of. He is fast, hits a lot of line drives and ground balls, and has a high IFH%.
And as far as the ‘low pressure’ argument goes: Kemp is second on the Dodgers in WPA.
And as far as “stealing properly,” he’s stolen 32 bags at an 82% clip, which is pretty damn good.
He was a three-win player last year, and he’s gotten better at pretty much everything.
It’s hard to argue with the results. He’s been the center fielder in baseball this year. He’s much better than a “decent starter.” He’s a far-above-average player. You can get away with poor discipline if you can hit the hell out of the ball. (And for the record, Kemp’s OBP –this year and for his career — is above league average.)
Oops. He’s been the best . . .
CF Value, both leagues
That’s a link, btw
You make me ashamed to say that I’m a mets fan.
wow…..really, dude?
I agree, this guy is a choker.
Yes, a 25 in a week year old CF on pace for 25 HR, an 82% steal rate, a .362 OBP, and good defense is a “decent starter”
BTW He’s hit 3rd 227 times in his career and has a .904 OPS doing it.
Denard Span is a corner outfielder, and really no better than McLouth. Why no Tony Gwynn?
If Beltran, Sizemore and Granderson are elder statesmen of this group… what does that make Torii Hunter?
a fellow elder statesman?
“A nice addendum to this list would be corner outfielders who have CF range. Jayson Werth and Carl Crawford come to mind.”
This mention by Phil is huge in my mind. There are valuable CFers playing corner solely because of the depth of the position, pointing to an even deeper talent pool then the one mentioned for the list. Isnt Choo a CFer? Bradley would probably be one on most teams if the position didnt have so much depth, wouldn’t he? Rios, despite the down year, would be on the list if not for Wells having blocked his path.
CF talent is much deeper then the 26 listed in the article.
And how could I forget Ichiro?
All I have to say after reading this piece is that the author is obviously infatuated with batters w/o any semblance of plate discipline.
actually, he’s just infatuated with players who are pretty good or have the potential to be pretty good CFers.
you make it sound like he forgot the CF version of Jason Giambi. who did he miss?
The 26 players listed here have an average OBP of .351 this year. They’re doing all right.
Don’t let that stop you from complaining, though.
I feel that this is going to be the huge negative of FG getting more mainstream attention. The spillover that will bring people like NYMDaWrightCHOICE to these article comment sections is going to land somewhere between annoying and nauseating on the roulette wheel.
lol, i knew as soon as i saw ellsbury listed last that whiny-bitch redsox fans would come out in force to complain.
Sorry, the value in a piece like this has to lie in the accurate classification of players into various buckets. Jacoby Ellsbury is 10th or 11th among starting CFers in EqA and appears to have made a real adjustment, learning how to work the count and drive the ball more, beginning in May when he was moved down in the order temporarily (.299 / .335 / .369 before, .299 / .358 / .436 since). He’s been absolutely brutal on balls hit in front of him, terrible early in the year on balls near any wall (a problem since fixed), inconsistent on balls hit over his head, excellent on balls in the gaps, and no, there’s nothing wrong with his routes, he’s just struggling to lean to read the ball off of MLB bats and get decent jumps. He clearly has the tools to be a +10 or more defender, and he just turned 26. On what planet is he not a “Potential Star”?
Note that I’m not specifically bitching about Jacoby, just using him as an example because he’s the one I’ve got the most expertise with. I’m also wondering, e.g. why Rajai Davis and Michael Bourn are mere “Flycatchers” when they’re both having excellent offensive years, and why you wouldn’t put Span and Bourn in the same bucket as guys who’ve hit better than their ml numbers suggested they would. Etc.
If you eliminate all of his negatives, he’s the best CFer in baseball!
No, it doesn’t. They could all be in one “bucket” and the concluding paragraph would be exactly the same.
Matt Kemp should be under Flycatchers, not Breakout Stars. His athleticism really helps him track down a ton of fly balls (albeit poor routes).
I’m willing to accept him being above a “Solid Player” category.
Although I’ll take the hard-nosed, heady McClouth over the dunce Kemp any day of the week and twice on Sunday.
]Oh and Ellsbury does not belong anywhere NEAR this list. Just another product of the Boston Hype Machine.
He’d be Juan Pierre if he played in Pittsburgh.
“Although I’ll take the hard-nosed, heady McClouth over the dunce Kemp”
wtf does this mean?
“His athleticism really helps him track down a ton of fly balls (albeit poor routes).”
So he…. uses his talent…. to be an above-average centre fielder and…. that’s….. bad (?)…. fair enough….
NYMDaWrightCHOICE:
You are clearly a fool. Matt Kemp is the best hitting CF in baseball by a vastly wide margin in 2009. His fielding has also been far above average and he has been spectacular, minus a handful of times this year where he has looked like a young kid, because he is. That makes it all the more remarkable that he has done what he has this season.
Kemp’s game has improved in every way possible from last season to this. The only thing down from 2008 will be Kemp’s doubles, which are down from 38 to 24 currently, yet Kemp has 6 triples to the 5 last season, and 23 homeruns to the 18 last season. He’s got 33 stolen bases and 7 CS to the 35 stolen bases and 11 CS last season. Kemp was a league average defensive CF last season, and this season he one one of the better fielding CF’s in all of the MLB.
All I see spouting from your mouth is bitterness because you are stuck in LA watching a team play great with emerging studs, who have the chance to be superstars, while your team is stuck wallowing in mediocrity this season. Join the rest of the non-ESPN community and realize that the Dodgers don’t have just one good player with the name Ramirez on the back of their jersey, they have a bunch of good players (this team could be amazing if Loney, Martin, and Furcal could produce at least close to their career averages…oh well).
Oh yes, not to mention Kemp’s got 3 more walks and 24 less strike outs in 13 less games than last season. While his BB/K ratio isn’t quite the 1.42 career like Pujols, it’s gone up from .17 (06) to .24 (07) to .30 (08) to .39 (09). That would be call improvement.
Just because Kemp has improved, proves nothing. I already conceded that he’s “improved” in my very first post of this article.
But it doesn’t mean he’s a star.
I’ve never seen a player who looks more lost on an 0-2 count than this clown. And he has struggled ever since Joe Torre moved him up higher in the lineup.
Btw, the Dodger young players are OVERRATED. Russ Martin is utter garbage. Loney has good D, but an embarrassment offensively in a loaded position. Billingsley sports a near 4 ERA and can’t get out of the 5th or 6th inning every single outing (ace?!? lol, please…)
The only players I envy the Dodgers having is Kershaw, who’s talent is obviously very apparent, and Ethier, who never gives up an at-bat.
Emerging studs??? Please…those LA chumps have nothing on Reyes and Wright who are ESTABLISHED SUPERSTARS.
And don’t even think about comparing BELTRAN with Kemp, they don’t even belong in the same breath.
Dodgers will be a 1-and-done team, mark my words. It’s just unfortunate that I won’t be in LA long enough to see them collapse in person.
I’ve never seen a player who looks more lost on an 0-2 count than this clown.
You’ve probably seen a few this year.
Kemp on 0-2: .151/.148/.321
MLB average on 0-2: .156/.164/.221
There’s not any one thing a player has to be good at in order to be a star. You can hand-pick any one thing that a player doesn’t do well, but that doesn’t change the fact that his overall value is what it is. Hitting well on an 0-2 count is not a prerequisite to being a great player. And even if it were, Kemp has been about average at that this year anyway. Everyone sucks on 0-2 counts.
Mets fan:
Russell Martin was one of the top catchers in baseball for over 2 years until this year, don’t expect 2010 to be the same as 2009 (though I’m not expecting him to be the same player he was last year or 2 years ago).
James Loney is having a tough year, but Loney is nearly a career .300 hitter, and power normally comes later in a players career, so having him become a .300 hitter with 20 homeruns is not out of the question at all.
You really want to talk crap about Billingsley? He started off the year as one of the top pitchers in baseball until he got into a funk, and I would bet that he’s been hiding an injury for the last few months, because he isn’t pitching like he has the past few years. You’re a complete idiot if you believe Billingsley is nothing special.
I’m not sitting here trying to tell anyone that Martin and Loney are great right now, because they suck pretty badly overall in 09. But writing them off for the future is stupid.
I hope no one is taking you seriously, because you are just proving how wrong you are with every new post you make. And btw, how many hitters do you think are good with an 0-2 count? Even the best hitters in the league struggle badly with an 0-2 count.
If you disqualify Kemp’s talent due to high BABIP numbers, how do you believe Wright is a superstar? If he had the same BABIP as Kemp, he would probably be hitting near .280, which coupled with his lack of power and below average defense would not be very impressive.
man, kevin hart just made matt kemp look SILLY giving up a 2r HR on a 0-2 pitch. left the ball right over the heart of the plate and kemp couldn’t do anything with it besides hit it weakly 12 rows up into the right-center field bleachers. not to mention, with the dodgers down 1-0, this home run was in garbage time.
Don’t forget his 2 Ks, 3 LOBs, and .250 BA from the cleanup spot.
Thanks for the MVP bro
Teej:
So yea, he’s below average.
The 100 points of slugging more than make up for the 16 points of OBP. But whatever, that wasn’t really the point. Think what you will.
OBP being lower than the AVG suggests sacrifices (I’d assume flys being in an 0-2 count). I personally would rather have a guarenteed run scored rather than working the count for a walk. Although there is something to be said for increasing pitch count.
The dawning of the greatest group of talent to ever play the position at the same time???? Talk about hype. You must be too young to recognize that the greatest group was Mays, Mantle, Dimaggio, Snider, etc. And that was only the New York teams. Get real.
Why is everyone focusing so much on what category the writer put a certain player into. That is not really the point. He is showing how deep the position is right now in the game. The categories are just an arbitrary assignment just trying to show the different tpyes of cf. Just because Matt Kemp is grouped with Denard Span doesn’t necessarily mean the writer thinks they are equals. The categories are too broad. They could both be considered breakout stars. What do you want a seperate category called breakout Superstars for Matt Kemp only? This list should not be taken as a strict ranking of players.
Honest question, haven’t had much time and hard to follow him from the east coast, but has Franklin Gutierrez been (a) consistant and a worthy breakout mention or (b) the product of several hot streaks (which could lead to a true breakout)?
He’s had his streaks just like most players. He heated up at the plate in the summer before cooling down in the past month or so. He’s had a solid approach at the plate throughout, though, shocking Mariners fans by showing them what it looks like when a hitter waits for his pitch. That said, his defense is the reason he’s on the breakout list.
It’s unlikely he’ll ever be an elite hitter, but when one of the best defensive center fielders in baseball puts up a league-average hitting line, that’s a damn good player. He’s pushing 5 wins, behind only Kemp and Morgan in the CF category. It’s getting trite at this point, but it’s hard not to compare him to Mike Cameron, but with a little less power.
How is Cody Ross not on this list? He has 2x as many games at CF than RF, so he definitely plays there enough. He has one of the top OF arms in the game and deceptively quick in the outfield.
With a .800+ OPS in 2009 and in his career along with a .200+ IsoP in 2009 and career he belongs at least on the “solid player” category if Fukodome is on there.
Of course if Ross played for the Mariners instead of the Marlins I’m sure his name would be on this list somewhere.
seems like just an honest mistake.
RE: MATT KEMP
uhh didn’t want to say I told you so, but….I told you so….
dude is mired in something like 2 for 20 slump….
Look for a HUGE dropoff in performance next year when the pitchers wise up and law of averages catch up to him…
Kemp is 2 for his last 17 (extending back to his last 20 at bats necessitates including a game when he was a double short of a cycle, which I don’t think you want to do). Meanwhile, the hard-nosed, heady McLouth is mired in a 2 for 26 slump right now. Are you still taking him ahead of Kemp 8 times a week, or would you maybe agree that it would be dumb to change your assessment based on how many hits someone has in his last 20 or so at bats?