“What we don’t have is experience and a veteran who is in the lineup every day that can be an anchor for us. We don’t have it…. He’s not there every game. It’s 162 games. It’s not a 100-game season.” (h/t to Aaron Gleeman)
That’s ridiculous. Hanley Ramirez has been incredibly durable until this year. From 2006-2009, he averaged 154 games a year. Last year, he played in 142 games, though he missed 9 of the last 11. Meanwhile, Morrison broke his thumb in 2009 and missed 57 games in the minors. In 2010, his season got off to a late start when a collision in the field left him with shoulder soreness for about 25 days. And this year, Morrison missed 21 games with a foot sprain. Since his (somewhat delayed) debut on July 27 last year, Morrison has played 155 out of a total of 180 possible games. Ramirez has played 138 of those games. While TCM is sure it’s frustrating when Ramirez is not out there, it’s hard to say that he’s been taking much more time off than LoMo.
LoMo would also be smart to remember what happened the last time Ramirez tried to play through an injury. With his back and knees ailing, Ramirez hit just .210/.306/.309 through the first two months of the season. He wasn’t driving the ball, and posted just a .236 BABIP thanks to his weak contact. Since coming off the DL, the much improved shortstop has hit .280/.365/.459. It’s still not quite what we’ve come to expect out of Hanley, but it’s much improved. And the hope is that with additional time to heal this offseason, he’ll come back and be his normal durable self in 2012.
Finally, and this is perhaps the most important part, the Marlins aren’t playing for anything right now. According to Baseball Prospectus, they have a 0.0% chance of making the postseason. They are last in the NL East, 22 games back of the Phillies and 13.5 games back of the Braves for the Wild Card. There is literally no chance they will be playing in October. To risk the long-term health of the team’s best player because Logan Morrison wants to have a veteran player be an “anchor,” would be the height of irresponsiblity. If Logan Morrison wants someone on the team to hit the damn baseball, perhaps he might consider contributing a little, given that he’s hit .233/.307/.430 since coming off the DL on May 13.
(David Gershman, of Marlins Daily, has a similar take on Morrison's knuckleheadedness.)
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One other thing The Common Man loves, and he knows you do too, is trade trees. TCM has been known to make a few of his own, but so has friend-of-the-blog David Kaleida, the excellent proprietor of 6-4-3 Putout. He has traced out a 37 year tree that runs through Pirate history, and intersects the careers of Ralph Kiner, Don Hoak, Preacher Roe, Harvey Haddix, and Al Lopez. It's kind of got to be seen to be believed.
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Continuing the Pirates' theme, the new ESPN SweetSpot blog PittPlank is rightfully angry at the concept of regression.
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Another friend of the blog, Chip Buck, is wondering if Josh Beckett should win the AL Cy Young. TCM thinks the line forms behind Jered Weaver. And barring any other changes between now and the end of the year, TCM would stump for Jose Bautista, Jeremy Hellickson, Roy Halladay, Matt Kemp, and Freddie Freeman.
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And frequent commenter and diligent reader William Tasker, aka The Flagrant Fan, points out we've seen a lot of players finding redemption in 2011, with Chien-Ming Wang, Dontrelle Willis, Micah Owings, Jason Isringhausen, and LaTroy Hawkins finding a lot of success after being left for dead.
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Finally, today is the one-year anniversary of the founding of The Platoon Advantage. We've had a lot of fun in the last year, and are grateful for everyone who has linked to or even just read our stuff. We appreicate your time more than you know, and we hope to keep you coming back for years into the future. We'll have a more formal celebration on Monday, but in the meantime, thanks for reading.
1 comment:
Thanks for linking to my article TCM! Also congrats to you, Bill, and Mark on the one year anniversary of TPA! It's one of my daily stops. Keep up the good work!
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