Analyzing the All-Free Agent Teams

Buster Olney, Peter Abraham and the folks at River Ave Blues have all had some fun putting together an All-Free Agent team, composed of the Free Agents that have yet to sign contracts.

Some of the players are quite good, so I figured I'd have my own fun and do a little analysis of the teams that have been proposed.

First of all though, there's something every team has in common: A good defensive infield, horrible defensive outfield and very shorthanded bullpen!

Buster Olney's Team

Some future Hall of Famers signed this week, but Bobby Abreu is still out of work, and so are Manny Ramirez, Pedro Martinez and Orlando Hudson. With a little more than a month to go until spring training begins, you could start a 31st team with the available free agents and might have a shot at a respectable record:

Lineup
SS Orlando Cabrera
2B Orlando Hudson
RF Bobby Abreu
DH Manny Ramirez
LF Adam Dunn
3B Joe Crede
CF Jim Edmonds
1B Sean Casey
C Jason Varitek

Rotation: Ben Sheets, Derek Lowe, Oliver Perez, Jon Garland, Paul Byrd, Randy Wolf, Mark Mulder

Bullpen: Brandon Lyon, Juan Cruz, Dennys Reyes, Will Ohman

Bench: Garret Anderson, OF; Brad Ausmus, C; Eric Hinske, 1B/3B; Kevin Millar, 1B

The biggest here is Olney's proposed infield. While it won't score you much fantasy points, going Crede-Cabrera-Hudson-Casey, aside from being a tongue twister, would be the defensive infield par excellence.

Olney has, however, done a good job putting a theoretical line-up together (if we ignore how all those guys would mesh in a clubhouse). He has a legitimate 1-2 punch in Cabrera and Hudson; Abreu is an effective three hitter if he remembers how to walk and Manny is theoretically the perfect clean up man. Dunn is a little shaky as a five hitter given his all-or-nothing approach, but he's a better option there than the others in the line up. Varitek is a veritable hole in the nine spot, which would be a tremendous weakness in an AL lineup, but between him and Brad Ausmus, there's not much choice.

With a seven man rotation, Olney is playing with fire, but given that Sheets is not likely to make it past April without a DL stint, a six man rotation seems more do-able, especially when you consider that there's no other really #1 type-starter listed. Lowe and Perez are hit-or-miss, and the others are best used as back-end guys.

I don't know much about the guys in the bullpen, except that Olney will probably need to trade for another reliever--four-deep bullpens don't generally get very far.

Anderson and Ausmus are weak on the bench, but Millar is a weapon to use against the Yankees (since this is an AL line up) and Hinske had a bit of a renaissance in Tampa.




Pete Abraham's Team

First base: Kevin Millar
Second base: Orlando Hudson
Shortstop: Orlando Cabrera
Third base: Ty Wigginton
Left field: Adam Dunn
Center field: Ken Griffey Jr.
Right field: Bobby Abreu
Catcher: Jason Varitek
DH: Manny Ramirez
No. 1 starter: Ben Sheets
No. 2 starter: Derek Lowe
No. 3 starter: Andy Pettitte
No. 4 starter: Jon Garland
No. 5 starter: Oliver Perez
Closer: Brandon Lyon
Set-up man: Will Ohman
Set-up man: Juan Cruz

Unlike Olney, PeteAbe didn't order his line up, so let's do some basic managing here:

Like Olney, the top four should be Hudson, Cabrera, Abreu and Ramirez. With the rest of the options, I'd personally go Dunn-Griffey-Millar-Wigginton-Varitek. Griffey has, unfortunately become injury prone and given that this team seems to have no bench at all, hitting him fifth would create an issue when there's an empty hole in the line-up! Anyway, the only hard decision here is the Millar-Wigginton order since Varitek is certainly the nine hitter.

I tend to like PeteAbe's rotation better than Olney's because of the inclusion of Andy Pettitte over Paul Byrd, but, again, there's likely only so long Sheets can go without getting hurt. Can Lowe still be a #1-type? I don't know, and Pettitte, as we all know, is not a power pitcher.

As with Olney, PeteAbe's bullpen is massively shorthanded--how long can a team effectively run on three in the bullpen?


River Ave Blue's Team:

C: Gregg Zaun - the best of a bad lot, Zaun’s the only legit starting catcher option that posted an OBP north of .321 last year (he was at .340)
1B: Doug Mientkiewicz - I’ll take Minky’s avg offense and Gold Glove defense over Kevin Millar’s & Sean Casey’s mediocre bat/no glove offerings
2B: Orlando Hudson - no brainer, my specialty
SS: Orlando Cabrera - another avg bat/GG defense guy, he’s easily the best of a terrifying SS crop
3B: Joe Crede - not going to offer much OBP, but he might run into 25 homers … another stud glove guy
LF: Adam Dunn - it’s okay Adam, I love your perennial .900+ OPS
CF: Jacque Jones - might have a little offensive rebound in him, but more importantly I need a guy with a ton of range between these two corner OFers
RF: Bobby Abreu - what, were you expecting Brad Wilkerson?
DH: Manny Ramirez - no explanation needed

Rotation: Derek Lowe, Andy Pettitte, Ben Sheets, Braden Looper, John Garland - with above average defense all-around the infield, give me the ground ball guys … and Ben Sheets

Bullpen: Juan Cruz, Aquilino Lopez, Brandon Lyon, Will Ohman, Brian Shouse, Russ Springer, Matt Wise - it’s a collection of above avg K guys who throw strikes for the most part

Bench: Pudge Rodriguez (C), Gape Kapler (OF), Damien Easley (IF/OF), Ty Wigginton (IF) - outside of Pudge, everyone on the bench can play multiple positions adequately and hit the ball out of the park … only problem is no lefty hitter

RAB does a very nice job analyzing their own team here, so I'll keep my analysis fairly simple.

The top of the line-up, through the five hitter, is no different than the other two above, but the bottom half is a bit different.

Jacque Jones in Center means that defensively, RAB's team has the best outfield (though, that doesn't necessarily make it a good defensive infield), but that also means that there's a weaker bat there as well. However, RAB sort of makes up for that by including Gregg Zaun as a catcher; unlike Varitek he is not necessarily an automatic out.

Anyway, to order it into a lineup: Hudson, Cabrera, Abreu, Ramirez, Dunn, Jones, Mienty, Zaun, Crede.

RAB's is the only rotation to use Looper, and I like him over Wolf, Byrd or Perez.

RAB's bullpen is also the closest to what an actual ML bullpen would need, although Olney's bench is, IMO, better constructed--RAB's is heavily aged and can't, outside of Wigginton (actually I have no idea if Wigginton can run or not) steal.



Conclusion

If I were to rank these teams as to how I predict they'd due, I would have to say that Olney's team is best constructed to weather an injury to Sheets, while RAB's team is better poised to make up for that loss with offense and mostly solid defense.

I would have to say that RAB's would be most likely to end up in not-in-last-place, and, if everything goes right, possibly contend for a Wild Card. Olney's is second, and PeteAbe's, I'm sorry to say, needs a bit of help.

Viva La Bronx

By popular demand, the extended version of my guest post here.


*****

How do I write about this place??

I’ve been here for five months, and still I haven’t tried it — it seems a task too daunting for a graduate student, much less a baseball blogger. I'm a rich white girl from Jersey. What the hell do I know about the Bronx?

When I walk to the grocery store on Arthur Ave, and I pass the cathedral, bells ringing and all, I imagine I am somewhere in sixteenth century Spain or eighteenth century Mexico. When I can smell the freshly baked bread and I see the fresh seafood lying on display in front of the fish market, I may as well be in Florence.

The language of this place slowly filters in — a Puerto Rican/Dominican blend of Spanish spoken so fast that despite my years of study, I have to strain to understand it. I begin to spot the bodegas that are on every street corner, which sell the essentials: Agua, cerveza, galletas, dulces and the Daily News. More often than not, the News is flipped over so that the back page — the sports page — is what greets you. Every bodega I’ve been in sells the News; I’ve only found one that has the New York Times.

After all, things like the mortgage crisis and the credit default swap don’t mean much to a lot of the people here, not when they’re too busy making sure they have enough money to pay for a gallon of milk and a carton of eggs.

Most of the people I meet could never afford to go to a Yankee game even in the old Stadium. I almost have to wonder if the Yankees even belong here. How could the Yankees be a part of a neighborhood that seems so far off from the baseball team?

The Yankees are a symbol of rich America, right? A symbol of corporate-types and their excess, while the Bronx is a grind of poverty, right?

And then …

Then I remember that night in The Jolly Tinker, a dirty, dark, dank place that calls itself an Irish pub. I am sitting at a table with three classmates. We're discussing plans to submit to a conference--at this point in time I have no idea that I'll have to withdraw, after tripping over my computer cord and shattering the laptop's hard drive, thus losing my paper. There are two pitchers of beer, and J. is busy telling us his life story, something that involves parents in a rock band, Katrina, bartending in Ireland while speaking fluent Gaelic, and living homeless in Manhattan for three months. One of the pub regulars walks over to our table and points out his hat, one commemorating the 2008 All Star Game at Yankee Stadium. The same one I am wearing.

“You go to the game?” he asks. His manner betrays a lifetime in this borough, hard work while the world passes him by. In his FDNY fleece with his slurred speech, he is every bit the stereotype. A baseball fan from a generation that no longer matters, his opportunity spent.

“Nah,” I say. “Couldn’t afford the tickets.”

J., sighing because I am again talking about baseball and not medieval England, slams his beer on the table, and then, in his thick southern drawl, says, “All right, that’s it, I have to say it. I hate the Yankees.”

“You’re from the South,” I say. “You don’t get it.”

The man in the hat looks at me and smiles.

I've never seen this man before and I probably won't see him again, but for that brief second, we are as united as close kin.

And then I realize something.

The Yankees do belong here.

This is a neighborhood that teems with life. People stop into the bodegas to chat with the owners, restaurants are (still) packed with university students and even tourists, and old women sit and talk outside their doorman-less apartments on a warm summer day, with Italian accents so thick I can't even guess at their conversation.

This is a place where I can get freshly baked bread from Madonna Brothers, fish from the fish market next door and produce from the covered market in between, and then purchase my toothpaste and shampoo from the dollar store. I haven't been to the Modern grocery store in months. I don't need to go.

Other neighborhoods have their teams, other teams have their neighborhoods. The Red Sox have the University capital of the world in Boston, the Giants have the Bay, the Cubs have the North Shore...but only the Yankees have the Bronx.


And, as I look at the man in the hat and my other compatriots in the Tinker, only the Bronx deserves the Yankees.

Hello, World!

So if you're reading this, there's a chance you may have just hopped over from Pete Abraham's site, so if you're new I'd like to say 'welcome' and 'Let's Go Yankees!'

Feel free to click around; there hasn't been a ton of Yankee stuff of late, so if you're looking for Yankees-specific entries, use the sidebar to navigate.


If you've got your own blog and want a link, or if you just want to say hello, feel free to drop me a line at rebecca@puristbleedspinstripes.com



Only seventeen days, not counting the 28th (today) to go 'till Spring Training.



A bonus nugget for the regular readers: In March, I'm going to attempt a preview-a-day season preview, starting on 1 March with the Angels, and going in alphabetical order, so that the last one, on 30 March, the day before the season starts is the New York Yankees.

I promise, I'll try not to let school get in the way too much...