Matt DiFilippo at Seamheads.com re-examines some statements (h/t Baseball Think Factory) made by the writers of Baseball Prospectus over the years that ended up a little wide of the mark. Here are a few of my favorites:
On Hanley Ramirez, before his monster rookie campaign (.292/.353/.480 at age 22) with the Florida Marlins:
There’s no indication that he is ready for the major leagues, but the Marlins are apparently going to let him try.
On Jimmy Rollins, in 2004 (three years before he won the NL MVP):
In any event, his power and speed both appear to be dissipating, and without those he won’t …read more

Small Sample Hero? Control Freak? Flamethower? Sounds like a comic book convention gone horribly wrong…

Phillies at Reds, 9:35 a.m. PT — Fire up a pot of coffee and sidle on up to the Internet (really, I’d like to see that). Cole Hamels and Bronson Arroyo square off in Monday’s first game. Plus you get a chance to watch Jeff “Offensive Beast” Keppinger in action. Honestly, I always thought that guy could be useful if given the chance, but .435/.480/.826 through the first week? Man, I love small samples. They’ll show you just about anything you want to see.
Mariners …read more

Ah, Opening Day. I hope you had as much fun as we did (full report at Ducksnorts). Beyond the thrill of a packed house at Petco Park watching Jake Peavy spin a shutout, here are a few items from Monday that caught my eye:

The Mets beat the Marlins, 7-2. The planet’s best pitcher against a Triple-A squad — who could’ve have anticipated such a result? Uh, everyone.
The Pittsburgh/Atlanta game was insane. The Pirates took a 9-4 lead into the bottom of the ninth, but the Braves tied. Then the Bucs jumped ahead in the 12th, 12-9, before allowing two runs …read more

Once again I’m a little late delivering the goods because I wanted to make sure there were actual goods to deliver. In this case, it turns out there are.
The St. Louis Cardinals have traded third baseman Scott Rolen to the Toronto Blue Jays for third baseman Troy Glaus. Fun trade. Rolen is 33 and has battled shoulder problems, while Glaus is 31 and has battled foot problems.
Career lines:
Rolen: 6380 PA, .283/.372/.507, 126 OPS+
Glaus: 5203 PA, .254/.358/.500, 121 OPS+
2007 lines:
Rolen: 441 PA, .265/.331/.398, 89 OPS+
Glaus: 456 PA, .262/.366/.473, 120 OPS+
Yikes, Rolen’s power has disappeared.
Peak lines:
Rolen: 593 PA, .314/.409/.598, 157 OPS+ (2004, …read more

Right-hander Don Cardwell, who pitched for the Phillies, Cubs, Pirates, Mets, and Braves from 1957 to 1970, died Monday at age 72. Cardwell owned a 102-138 career record and is perhaps best known for his role on the 1969 “Miracle” Mets. Another member of that team, Hall of Famer Tom Seaver, had kind words for Cardwell:
He was a tremendous mentor to the young guys on our staff. When he said something, you listened. He was the ultimate professional on and off the field. Just a tremendous, tremendous guy — and a big part of everything we accomplished that year.
Cardwell also …read more

The San Francisco Giants have signed outfielder Aaron Rowand, previously with the Phillies, to a 5-year, $60 million deal. He’ll take over in center field for Dave Roberts, whom the Giants inked to a long-term contract last winter to play the position despite the fact that he wasn’t really a center fielder.
Rowand isn’t a bad ballplayer, but it seems to me that San Francisco is buying high. Rowand hit .309/.374/.515 in ‘07 while playing half his games in a bandbox. (His line was a brilliant .319/.380/.557 at home, and a merely respectable .299/.368/.475 on the road.)
The main problem I have …read more

Pardon me as I catch up from my time in Vegas. This deal happened a while back, but it’s still worth mentioning: The Philadelphia Phillies traded outfielder Michael Bourn, right-hander Geoff Geary, and third baseman Mike Costanzo to the Houston Astros for right-hander Brad Lidge and infielder Eric Bruntlett.
What This Means for the Astros
Lidge lost his job as closer at one point during the 2007 season, and although he finished with respectable numbers, the Astros didn’t seem to have a lot of confidence in him. Among other things, this means that Houston’s closer situation is unsettled, but for a team …read more

Curt Schilling himself says, “it’s looking good” (have I mentioned lately that I love the fact that Schilling has a blog?), where “it” is the prospect of nailing down a 1-year deal that will keep him in Boston. I don’t have much to add in the way of analysis, so I thought I’d look back a little. This is from Bill Mazeroski’s Baseball ‘92:
In April [Astros manager Art] Howe handed the ball to Curt Schilling, who responded by converting five of his first six save opportunities. Hitters, though, eventually caught up to Schilling. His fastball has movement, but he overthrows …read more

Congrats to the Cleveland Indians for beating the Yankees in their house Monday night to take their ALDS, three games to one. In three of four series so far, the team with the much smaller payroll has won (salaries in millions; source, Cot’s Baseball Contracts):
Red Sox: $143.0
Angels: $109.3
Indians: $61.7
Yankees: $189.6
Diamondbacks: $52.1
Cubs: $99.7
Rockies: $54.4
Phillies: $89.4
If you’d seeded the playoff teams by money spent on salary, here’s what it would have looked like:

Yankees
Red Sox
Angels
Cubs
Phillies
Indians
Rockies
Diamondbacks

Three of the four teams from the bottom half have advanced the LCS. One of the two smallest salaried teams in the dance is guaranteed to reach the World …read more

It’s the pitching, silly. I take a more extensive look at why Colorado beat the Phillies in three games over at Hardball Times.