Aubrey Huff In Baltimore: He Just Wanted to Take It Home

San Francisco first baseman Aubrey Huff sat down with Baseball Prospectus' David Laurilla to talk about his season and his career. The Baltimore-related excerpts:

DL: You’re happier here in San Francisco?


AH: Oh yeah, man. I’m in a pennant race, the staff is good, the organization—everything here is first class...


I found out as soon as I got to spring training. We have a facility [in Scottsdale, Arizona] that is top notch. All the staff was awesome, the whole nine yards. We have a great weight room. In Baltimore we had this Fort Lauderdale Stadium with a weight tent outside, with just some rental equipment, and that’s not cool. To me, this organization does everything right.


DL: How much do things like that matter to a player?


AH: They matter a ton. When you’re in spring training with a facility like the one we had in Fort Lauderdale, with rental weight equipment, it just goes to show how much farther ahead every other team is than you are.


DL: Does being on a winning team impact a player’s performance?


AH: Without question. It makes you happier, and when you’re happy you play better. And I’m extremely happy this year. I was in the American League East for nine years—pretty much my whole career. I was with Tampa the first six years, when they were the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, and they weren’t good. Then I spent the last three with Baltimore, when they were pretty much dead last while Tampa was good. It was always a grind for me coming to the field against teams like the Yankees and Red Sox, knowing that you’re probably going to lose. I come to this place and know we have a great chance to win every single day, so it‘s just a completely different feel for me.


DL: Do you think your 2010 performance is directly related to that feeling?


AH: Absolutely. I mean, I don’t know where I’d be right now, performance-wise, if I was still in Baltimore. I might be at the point where I just want to take it home. It got to that point, seriously, the last couple of years there.

First things first...he's absolutely right about the Spring Training facilities. The setup in Fort Lauderdale was embarrassing and he's not the only player to say so. It was a poor reflection on the organization that the Orioles had to use those sub-standard facilities for so many years.

It's the on the field stuff that I was more intrigued by. What does losing do to a player? After nine years of last place (or near), what does that do to a player's psyche? You're seeing a little of it here. Huff is honest enough to reveal that, yes, it wears on you as a player and, for him, it was harder to play well when you were getting your head handed to you.

But Carl Crawford has been in Tampa Bay for a long time with only recent success and it hasn't affected his performance. But Huff has been in a pennant race before. The Rays traded him to the Astros in 2006 and he didn't hit any better once he got there. He really hit a little worse. When the Orioles traded him to the Tigers last season, he stunk even worse than he had in Baltimore for a team that had to play 163 games to decide their season.

While I'm sure a winning environment helps a player a bit, I think his comments say more about Huff as a player than the situation he's in. Listen to this again:

I mean, I don’t know where I’d be right now, performance-wise, if I was still in Baltimore. I might be at the point where I just want to take it home. It got to that point, seriously, the last couple of years there.


He just said that he probably wouldn't be hitting this well in Baltimore because he would just be packing it in. Go through the motions at the park and go home. Sound like a guy you want on your team?  Think the Orioles should have resigned him for 2010?

I would imagine that Huff doesn't think he was one of the reasons so many of those teams he was on were losers in the first place.

Top 5 Oriole Interleague Stars - The Hitters

As the Orioles are in the midst of interleague play yet again, I thought I'd take a look at the Oriole hitters who had taken advantage of the National League. God knows we could use some of these guys now.

Here's the top 5:


5. Aubrey Huff

         AVG   OBP   SLG   HR   OPS
Huff    .326  .394  .526    7  .920
 

Perhaps this was the indicator that Aubrey Huff would bounce back a bit once he went to the NL this offseason.

4. Albert Belle

         AVG   OBP   SLG   HR   OPS
Belle   .326  .396  .525    7  .921
 

It's crazy how close Huff and Belle's interleague numbers are. But they were both raking.



3. Cal Ripken, Jr.

         AVG   OBP   SLG   HR   OPS
Ripken  .330  .380  .558   14  .938

Of course, Cal is here. Even more amazing than those numbers is the fact he did it at a time when the NL was probably the better league.

2. Larry Bigbie

         AVG   OBP   SLG   HR   OPS
Bigbie  .360  .446  .523    3  .969
 
 

There always has to be a surprise on a list like this and Bigbie qualifies. This is over 101 plate appearances where he walked 14 times. It's still a drag this guy didn't make it.



1. Harold Baines

         AVG   OBP   SLG   HR   OPS
Baines  .355  .424  .553    3  .976
 

Just another reason to love Harold Baines. No Oriole was more effective against the Senior Circuit.

Huff Era Over, Now Aubrey's a Tiger

Aubrey Huff has been traded to Detroit for minor league reliever Brett Jacobson.

Once Huff cleared waivers early last week, you had to figure that Baltimore would try to move him but I was surprised they found any takers. But the Tigers, who appear headed for the postseason, were looking for more left handed hitting and parted with a young reliever to get him.

You had two options when it came to Huff. You could trade him now or offer him arbitration in the offseason and see if another team signs him giving the O's an extra draft pick. But the risk was that Huff would accept arbitration and remain an Oriole. That wouldn't have been good. Huff was not having a good year and there is little sign that he will ever get better.

Before the Orioles signed him, I wondered if Kevin Millar might just outperform him at a fraction of the price...

WAR     Huff   Millar
2007    0.8     0.7           
2008    4.2     0.0
2009   -0.4    -0.4

Huff made $20 million, Millar made $7.4 mil. Was that one great year worth $12.6 million to the Orioles? Probably...

But Huff's gone. Who is Brett Jacobson?

Jacobson is a right handed reliever drafted out of Vanderbilt in the 4th round of the 2008 draft. The 22-year-old is listed at 6'6" and 205 pounds. The stats:

        ERA   IP   SO   BB   HR   WHIP
2008 A  1.52  29.2  31    5    0   1.04
2009 A+ 3.74  55.1  44   17    6   1.23

Decent stats, nothing earth-shattering. According to MinorLeagueSplits.com, Lakeland has a pretty fair stadium in terms of pitching so what we see here is what we get.

What kind of prospect is he? John Sickels had him listed as the #3 prospect in the Tiger system (although in fairness, he didn't like the system a ton anyway). Baseball America did not have him listed in their top ten. Nor is he on the TopProspectAlert.com list. But most reports I can find describe him as a power arm. For 6 weeks of Aubrey Huff, that seems to be a fair return.

Base Hits: 7/20/2009

I posted this rant over at Camden Crazies in response to some tweets by frostking. I figured I'd repost some of that here...

OK, so this trade in a vacuum is 31-year old Salazar for 26-year old middle reliever. But in this case I don’t care how old Salazar is because he is a) cheap and under control (not even a full season of MLB experience yet) and b) the Orioles have a need for a bat at both corner spots in the infield, certainly this year and even more so in 2010.

The Warehouse will not pick up the option on Mora and will probably not resign Huff unless Aubrey is ready to take a big paycut. That leaves Ty Wigginton to play third base and…who’d on first? Salazar could have filled that need and given Brandon Snyder (who is not exactly tearing up AAA) more time to develop. It’s cheap offense and buys time for one of our few position player prospects. That’s value.

People act like the only choice was to trade either Salazar or Pie. There was another. Cut Melvin Mora. MacPhail seems to understand the concept of a sunk cost and with only $3 million still owed to Mora, it would have been fairly easy to do. Even with Salazar’s poor defense at third, he would still more valuable than Mora. Shift Wiggy to third and let Salazar get ABs at first, the defense is even less of an issue.

Cla Meredith is bad away from PETCO and against AL competition:

http://dempseysarmy.blogspot.com/2009/07/oscar-salazar-gone-to-san-diego.html

The splits are ugly and he may contribute absolutely nothing to the team.

A team like Baltimore needs to be creative in filling holes. They can’t attract top free agents quite yet. Who’s going to play third base next year? Or first? Retreads, has-beens or “good field, no-hit” types. Seems to me Salazar would have been at least a shot at filling the spot cheaply and maybe even produce on a regular basis. His major league OPS is .880 . His last two years in Norfolk he’s had an OPS well over .900 . Worth a shot, I think.

Now maybe MacPhail has irons in the fire that will garner Baltimore a 1B or 3B for next year. But I gave him the benefit of the doubt with the rotation this year and they really didn’t have a great plan in place for that deficiency. On the face of it, I’m calling this trade shortsighted.

I'd say this is my last word on the subject but I know if Salazar starts tearing up the NL West I'll be back here stamping my feet like a petulant child...

*****

A few loosely related things...

I finally got around to reading the Sports Illustrated Earl Weaver "Where are they now?" article.

I've toyed with the idea of writing an article about how easy it is for an Oriole fan to get on board with basic Sabermetric principals because Earl was employing them years before they had a name. But I'm not that talented a writer and Tom Verducci basically did it here.

Semi-related, former Oriole farmhhand Steve Dalkowski is being inducted into The Shrine of the Eternals. Read all about the amazing career (or lack thereof) at The Baseball Analysts and via links at Roar From 34.

So, regarding the Earl Weaver/Sabermetrics link, there was this about former Oriole manager Paul Richards:

As a manager, Richards was thrown out of games more frequently than anyone else....

He was the first manager known to enforce pitch counts to protect young arms from injury. Previously undiscovered documents reveal that Richards tracked his hitters' on-base percentages before that statistic even had a name and decades before it became a cornerstone of baseball analysis. He computed catchers' earned run averages years before the sabermetric community thought of it.

So the roots of statistical analysis (and evidently hot-headedness) run deep in Oriole managerial history.

Also, this nugget about Dalkowski:

However, to the extent that this card has any value whatsoever, it is solely due to the legend that is Dalkowski, the inspiration for Nick LaLoosh, the character portrayed by Tim Robbins in "Bull Durham."

Ron Shelton, who wrote and directed the 1988 movie classic, will introduce Dalkowski at tomorrow's induction ceremony. Shelton was a minor league second baseman for the Orioles during the '60s, yet, according to George Vecsey in an article in today's The New York Times, he and Dalkowski have surprisingly never met.

I had forgotten all about the Dalkowski's Nuke La Loosh connection and that Ron Shelton had been an Oriole farmhand. Makes me love that movie even more...

*****

Some new developments of note for Oriole Spring Training...Sarasota has cleared a major hurdle in luring the Orioles to Sarasota for Spring Training. The City of Sarasota has approved a measure to turn the stadium complex over to the city for $1 allowing the county to make a $31 million bid for the team. County officials and the Orioles report they are close to an agreement.

*****

So I switched from Sirius to XM so I could listen to baseball on the radio. It's nice.

Anyway, I was listening to MLB Home Plate and Aubrey Huff was scheduled to join the network for an interview during the 11 o'clock hour but he never showed up.

If I was a conspiracy theorist, I would imagine that it is because he is on the verge of being traded and the club doesn't want him talking to the media. If I was...

*****

Screech is tearing up the International League. Jeff Fiorentino in Norfolk:

               AVG   OBP   SLG   2B   3B   HR   K   BB
Fiorentino    .317  .388  .527   18    4    7  44   28
 
 

Not too shabby. That gives him a MLE OPS of .793. Maybe he could be trade bait? Maybe he's finally breaking through? A long shot but worth thinking about. And good for Jeff.

Oscar Salazar Needs a Place to Play

Oscar Salazar is rotting on the bench. I imagine he and Felix Pie are getting to be quite chummy.

Rumors are swirling about trades involving Aubrey Huff and I can't begin to decide if they're true...but they should be. The Orioles have an adequate replacement for Huff sitting on the bench. Sure, he'll soon be 31. He's certainly no prospect. But Salazar is ready to play and can serve as a nice bridge to Brandon Snyder in a year or two.

Aubrey Huff 2009:

       G  AVG   OBP   SLG   OPS   2B   HR
Huff  63 .266  .330  .444  .774   14    9
  

These numbers are a far cry from Huff's career 2008 where he OPSed .912 but they are far closer to what kind of player he really is at this point in his career.

Conversely, Salazar in 2008:

              G   AVG   OBP   SLG   OPS   2B   HR
Salazar '08  34  .284  .372  .506  .879    3    5

 

Salazar in Norfolk this year:

              G   AVG   OBP   SLG   OPS   2B   HR
Salazar AAA  50  .372  .408  .618 1.027   17   10
 

 

According to MinorLeagueSplits.com his Major League Equivalent (MLE) stats for his 2009 Norfolk stats:

                   G   AVG   OBP   SLG   OPS   2B   HR
Salazar 2009 MLE  50  .337  .366  .545  .911   15    9
 

These are pretty good indicators that Salazar is ready to take a real shot at holding down a regular position in the majors. He certainly will be able to hold his own and may be able to put up better overall numbers than Huff would anyway.

ZIPS projection for the rest of the season for Salazar:

               AB   AVG   OBP   SLG   OPS   2B   HR
Salazar ZIPS  243  .284  .326  .457  .782   15    9
 

Then you can trade Huff away for some useful players who will be around when the rebuilding effort begins to bear fruit.

I keep hearing that the Orioles don't have any candidates to take over at first base if Huff is moved. I respectfully disagree. Not only do they have a replacement, they may have an upgrade.

So I don't know what will happen at the trading deadline with Aubrey Huff but I do know what should.

Oriole Power 2008 - A Retrospective

Just finishing up a few fillers while waiting for Opening Day...

I never followed up on this mid-year post that examined Baltimore sluggers using data from HitTrackerOnline.com....so here it is.

Home run leaders for 2008:

            HR
Huff        32
Mora        23
Scott       23
Markakis    20
Millar      20
 

Now, who hit the longest shots of 2008?

Top home runs by Standard Distance:

             Distance    Date
Scott          450      5/20/08
Scott          437      9/8/08
Jones          435      9/1/08
Markakis       434      8/30/08
Huff           429      8/24/08
 

Look at Adam Jones in there with the big boys. He's got a lot of potential to hit 20+ very soon.

Who hit the longest home runs on average? Give them the Golden Sledgehammer!

Golden Sledgerhammer

            Avg. Distance
Scott          401.6
Huff           394.6
Mora           390.5
Markakis       388.9
Millar         372.5
 

Now for three classifications of home runs: No Doubts, Just Enoughs and Lucky. The names are pretty self-explanatory but if you want to see how Hit Tracker determines this, look here.

No Doubts

         HR
Scott    11
Huff      7
Markakis  3
Mora      2
Millar    2
 

Raw power. Look at Luke Scott! Nearly 50% of his homers were never in question. See Nick Markakis? Make a note of that while we look at the next category.

Just Enoughs

             HR
Huff         11
Mora         10
Millar        9
Markakis      9
R. Hernandez  8
 

Nearly half of Markakis' homers were just making it over the fence. Why? He's a line drive hitter, not a classic power hitter. That's why I don't think Nick will ever hit 30 homers regularly; he's just not that type of hitter even though he might have the power to do so. I don't think that's a bad thing either.

Lucky Homers

              HR
Markakis       5
Millar         4
R. Hernandez   4
Huff           4
Mora           2
 

And just for kicks, let's take a look at the Isolated Power leaders.

ISO

            ISO
Huff       .247
Scott      .215
Mora       .199
Markakis   .185
Millar     .160
 

Mora's ISO is startling, we haven't seen power out of Mora like this in years. From FanGraphs.com, Melmo's ISO compared to league average from the past few years.

Mora's power was up in the 2004-2005 range again. Can he maintain it for one last season?

The Crystal Ball '09: Aubrey Huff

Last year at this time, I was bashing Aubrey Huff for being a slugger who was modestly successful in his prime but well into his decline phase and probably wouldn't hit better than league average in 2008.

Of course, he went out and had a career year, was the best bat on the team and was named Oriole MVP. Shows what I know.

Now, there are two possible causes for Huff's results last year:

1) He simply had a career year and his decline will continue in earnest in 2009

2) He received a cosmic kick in the butt, refocused himself and will enjoy a late career renaissance.

After Aubrey's so-so 2007 and the whole controversy he created with his comments on the Bubba the Love Sponge Show, it is indeed possible that Huff saw the end of his career staring him in the face. Let's face it, if the Orioles are willing to kick you to the curb, are there really that many teams that are looking for your services? Hell, if you signed with the O's to begin with, there probably weren't many teams looking for you in first place. Maybe this spurred Huff into a more diligent offseason and more focus on the diamond instead of the nightlife he loves so well.

As much as I'd like to believe it, I don't. I imagine Huff's performance will slip back to something just above his 2007 output and he will be a much more ordinary player.

But the real question, now that Felix Pie has pushed Luke Scott to a role that wil primarily be as a DH, is how well Huff will hold down a job in the field for the first time in 3 years.

It's nice to have a slick-fielder manning first base but the truth is that a first baseman's defense hurts you far less than any other position in the field. If you're going to have a bad defender on your team, a bad firstbaseman hurts you the least. When touting Adam Dunn over Mark Teixeira , there were arguments that not only was Dunn not Teix's equal at the plate but he wasn't his equal with the glove. (BTW, the difference in batting wasn't the point. Teix is a better hitter, just not "double the money" better than Dunn. But I digress...) But the glove matters little at first.

From FanGraphs.com, the difference in UZR/150 from the best centerfielder (Carlos Gomez) and the worst (Nate McClouth) was 32.1 runs. the difference between the best shortstop (Orlando Cabrera) and the worst (Yuniesky Betancourt) was 28.1 runs. The difference between the top fielding firstbaseman (Teixeira) and the worst (Prince Fielder) was 17.6 runs.

And I don't think he will be among the worst fielders in 2009. Over the course of the last few seasons, Huff has logged nearly 1800 innings at first posting a -2.6 UZR/150. That's just below average if you go by 2008 standards. I figure that Huff can approach average with his glove if he's handed the full-time job and allowed to play there exclusively all year. I think Huff will be further motivated to be perceived as a firstbaseman vs. a DH as he heads for free agency in 2010.

I'll be posting a full WAR spreadsheet at some point but I have Huff penciled in for a WAR of 1.7 in 2009. Look for a capable, if not great, glove, and something close to his Marcel projection of .280/.342/.475.

Photo by Phil Romans and used under the Creative Commons License 2.0

Base Hits: 11/14/2008

Aubrey Huff has won the 2008 Silver Slugger award for DH and deservedly so. Before the season, I described Huff as a "hitter in decline" but I was wrong, at least for last year.

*****

The West Oahu Canefires will play in the Hawaiian League Championship game on Sunday. Oriole prospects haven't had a lot to do with their success (Tim Bascom, for instance, has been horrible) with the bright spot being 3B Tyler Henson hitting .261 with 16 RBI and a team high 25 walks. Adam Loewen plays for the Canefires too. He is hitting .143 with no extra base hits. And he's been hit by a pitch three times in just 8 games. Good!

*****

Sarasota has hammered out a proposal worth more than $30 million to become the Spring Training home for the Baltimore Orioles after two days of meetings with Oriole officials. The offer has yet to be voted on by the Lee County Commission before the offer is official.

*****

Former Oriole manager and universal sad-sack Sam Perlozzo has joined the Charlie Manuel's staff with the Philadelphia Phillies. God help them.

*****

A clip from Dave Sheinin's Nationals Journal blog as the free agent season begins. (The Nationals seem to think they have a legitimate shot at signing Mark Teixeira...oookay...)

*The Nationals' chief competitors might be just up the road in Baltimore. Someone who speaks to Peter Angelos regularly told me that he has never seen him so fixated on a player as he is on Teixeira. Others have told me that Angelos has been asking everyone in baseball what they think of Teixeira.

My educated guess is that the Orioles will end up making the highest bid for Teixeira.

*****

Song of the Week: Bringing a little country feel into the mix with the excellent alt country band out of Athens, GA, Drive-By Truckers with "Gravity's Gone" Have a nice weekend.

Five Pleasant Surprises from 2008

1. The Melvin Mora Renaissance - .284/.344/.488, 23 HR, 101 RBI, 117 OPS+

It's almost as if Melvin Mora invented the time machine during the offseason, went back to 2005 and sent that version of himself back to play for the Orioles of 2008. Mora had been given up for dead as far as being a productive major league bat. Outside of A-Rod, he's the most productive third baseman in the American League. The only thing negative to be said about Mora this year is that his play in the field has regressed after two straight seasons of above average glove work.

2. Luke Scott as a Regular - .270/.351/.499, 23 HR, 122 OPS+

The Orioles have been desperate for a respectable leftfielder for years and when they traded Miguel Tejada to the Astros one of the players they got back was a 30 year old platoon player and promptly handed him the starting job. Scott still doesn't hit lefties well but turned in the most productive year of his career and the best season from an Oriole leftfielder since the prime of B. J. Surhoff. A diamond in the rough turned up by Andy Macphail.

3. The Oriole Offense - 5th in Runs, 4th in OPS, 4th in HR

The Oriole offense, as a whole, put on a good show this season. When you consider how impotent the O's bats were in 2007, they put up some surprisingly good numbers in 2008.

4. Aubrey Huff Breaks Out - .314/.371/.576, 32 HR, 106 RBI, 146 OPS+

After three very average years and some offseason controversy, Huff exploded out of the gate in April and has had the best season of his career. Huff provided the offensive spark that fans were hoping for in 2007 and he would make attractive trade bait in the offseason.

5. Jim Johnson Emerges - 68.7 IP, 38 K, 2.23 ERA, 198 ERA+

A starter in the minors, Johnson was called up from Norfolk and placed in the bullpen. He became one of the better setup men in the league and a symbol of the rejuvenated Oriole relief corp.

Honorable Mentions -

George Sherrill - an afterthought in the Erik Bedard trade, George had an up and down year but he made the All-Star team and showed that he can close in this league even if he's not among the elite closers in baseball.

Luis Montanez - the late-bloomer made his major league debut and has hit .310 during his stint with the big club. Perhaps a fourth outfielder/platoon partner for Luke Scott in 2009?

Adam Jones - The Truth was up and down during the season but on the whole played a great centerfield and showed a solid bat for a player that green. Good signs for the future.

Later, Five Big Disappointments from 2008. Those will be much easier to find unfortunately...

Terry Crowley and Oriole DH's Over The Years

Enchanting Sunshine made a comment on one of my previous posts about Aubrey Huff and how he's having one of the better seasons ever for an Oriole DH. "Where was Terry Crowley?", she wondered.

I only included players that qualified for the batting title. Crowley never did. So I changed the criteria to include Crowley in the assessment. Here it is:

             Year  OPS+
T. Crowley   1979  154
H. Baines    1999  150
H. Baines    1995  142
H. Baines    1993  137
A. Huff      2008  136
K. Singleton 1981  135
J. Dwyer     1987  131
K. Singleton 1983  131
S. Horn      1991  130
T. Crowley   1980  130
 

Crowley only played in 61 games in 1979 but he made the most of his at bats. He was perhaps more impressive in 1980 when he playe din 92 games, still hitting at a high level.

Look, it's Sam Horn! You think Weaver would've loved having Horn on his bench? Horn could've been the Terry Crowley of the 90's.

Huff has fallen off the pace a bit since last week but still finishes in the top 5 of all-time.

E.S. also wondered about Huff coming through for the team this year. Luke Scott has a lot of big hits but who's had the biggest hits for the club this year?

Total WPA leaders for the 2008 Baltimore Orioles:

           WPA
Huff       1.87
Roberts    1.40
Mora       1.35
Markakis   1.00
Scott      0.56
 

Surprised to see Luke Scott so low? I sure was.

Huff has loomed large overall (he has been uncharacteristically consistent all year) but Melvin Mora at number 3? Has the Melmosity been peaking and I haven't noticed?

(BTW, from 1979-1981, Crowley had 78, 266 and 166 plate appearances respectively. He posted WPAs of 1.19, 2.00 and 1.50 respectively. Crazy numbers for a guy who played so little. Per at bat, he may be the clutchiest player in Oriole history.)

The biggest hits of the year by measure of WPA:

10 - Adam Jones - 6/29 - .351 WPA

Down by a run in the top of the 12th, The Truth singles home Markakis to tie up the Nats.

9 - Ramon Hernandez - 6/14 - .388 WPA

Two outs in the bottom of the 9th, Hernandez singles home Freddie Bynum to tie up the Pirates.

8 - Ramon Hernandez - 4/12 - .405 WPA

Down to their last out, Hernandez gives the Orioles life by hitting a solo shot to tie the game against Houston.

7 - Luke Scott - 7/19 - .414 WPA

With one out in the bottom of the 10th, Scott homers to tie the game.

6 - Melvin Mora - 4/17 - .418

Two outs in the ninth and the score ties, Mora singles Roberts home off Bobby Jenks to win the game.

5 - Ramon Hernandez - 7/19 - .431

Walk-off homer against Joe Zumaya to defeat the Tigers.

4 - Brian Roberts - 6/15 - .489

Walk-off homer against Matt Capps to defeat the Pirates.

3 - Melvin Mora - 6/17 - .556

Down 5-6 in the bottom of the 8th with 2 out, Mora doubles to center scoring Adam Jones and Brian Roberts.

2 - Aubrey Huff - 5/27 - .611

Down 7-6 in the bottom of the 8th to the Rays, Huff doubles in Kevin Millar and Mora to give the O's the lead.

1 - Aubrey Huff - 4/2 - .617

In the bottom of the 11th, Huff doubles to the wall off of Yankee reliever (and Oriole badmouther) LaTroy Hawkins. Mora comes all the way from 1st to score the winning run.

Who would have thought that Huff had the two biggest hits all season? Not I. Luke Scott only shows up once. Ramon Hernandez shows up three time lending creedence to my belief that he is having a better season than the boxscore shows. (Not that it matters much. Matt Wieters approaches.) Mora on both lists may indicate that he is having a better year than I thought as well. More to dwell on later...

E.S. also said, "I guess that's why it's better to not rely on perceptions." Well, not necessarily!

Earlier in the year, George Sherrill was being compared by many to Don Stanhouse (especially by E.S.) so I took a look at where Sherrill ranked among other "nailbiter" closers in Oriole history. At the time, he did not make the Top Ten based on my criteria. Now he is in a statistical dead heat with Stanhouse's 1978 season in terms of WHIP. That puts him as the #5 nailbitingest closer in Oriole history.

Sometimes perception is correct regardless of what the numbers say!

But eventually, the numbers tend to catch up.

Base Hits: 7/31/2008

Shortly after I posted yesterday, I received a press release from MASN stating that Roch Kubatko will be joining MASN and that the Roch Around the Clock blog will continue of there starting on Friday. Here's the link to the news on MASN.com. Update your bookmarks accordingly.

*****

It's going to be a tough August for the Birds. They only play two series against teams with losing records (Seattle and Cleveland) and they play those series on the road. Speaking of playing on the road, the O's play 16 of 28 on the road in August. The O's are only playing at a .400 winning percentage on the road this season.

It's looking like it'll be a rough August for the Baltimore Orioles.

*****

Not a whisper about Aubrey Huff moving at the deadline. Huff has put together one of the best seasons ever (so far) by a Oriole DH:

          OPS+  Year
H. Baines 150   1999
H. Baines 142   1995
A. Huff   140   2008
H. Baines 137   1993
Singleton 131   1983
 

Baines and Singleton...that's rarefied air in Orioles history.

He has also matched his RBI total from 2007 already and surpassed his home run numbers.

I have to grudgingly give Huff some respect for his performance this year. And I thought he was done as an impact bat. I was wrong.

A Little Homer Analysis

Just for fun, a little home run analysis of the Orioles for the season thus far using some data from HitTrackerOnline.com

First, just the raw home run leaders for the O's in 2008:

           HR

Huff       19

Scott      17

Markakis   15

Mora       15

Millar     12


 

Going into September of last season, it didn't look like any Oriole batter was going to hit 20 homers (and without a power surge by Markakis in September, no one would have...). Now, we have 4 players already at 15. Low standards to be sure but it's an improvement.

So, the longest home runs (so far) by Standard Distance:

           Distance

Markakis    447 ft

Quiroz      443 ft

Scott       442 ft

Huff        433 ft

Huff        430 ft

 

Now the leaders in True Distance. I won't go into great detail on all of the definitions here so here's the Hit Tracker glossary. Basically, it's the distance a home run would have travelled if it had continued, uninterrrupted, to field level.

          Distance

Scott      444 ft

Scott      421 ft

Markakis   421 ft

Mora       421 ft

Scott      421 ft


 

Look at Luke Scott! A lot of raw power coming out of leftfield. But wait, there's more. The most No Doubt homers by an Oriole:

          No Doubts

Scott        6

Huff         3

Markakis     1

Mora         1

Millar       1

 

Scott has a ton of monster shots. More than double the next guy and no one else has more than 1! Scott is a flawed player but I am a big fan of having at least one guy who can just crush the ball way over the outfield wall. The Orioles haven't had a guy with such raw power since Albert Belle.

Now the Just Enoughs:

          Just Enoughs
Markakis       8
Hernandez      6
Huff           6
Mora           5
Millar         4
 

It's not really a surprise that Markakis leads this list. He does not have a classic home run swing; he's a line drive hitter with power. Since one of the qualifiactions for "Just Enoughs" is "the ball must clear the wall by less than 10 vertical feet", I am almost surprised he doesn't have more!

As hard as Ramon Hernandez is hitting the ball, he ssem sto be getting a little lucky with his homerun totals.

Speaking of luck, the leaders in Lucky Homers (affected by wind, temp, etc)

           Lucky Homers
Hernandez       6
Markakis        4
Huff            4
Scott           2
Payton          2
 

More than half of Hernandez's homers have been classified as "lucky". Not a good trend. Markakis is here again due to his line drive swing. Sometimes his homers are just inches away from being doubles...and vice versa.

Finally, the leaders in Average Standars Distance or as Hit Tracker calls it, The Golden Sledgehammer:

             Avg. Std. Distance
Huff              397.2 ft
Scott             395.4 ft
Mora              391.6 ft
Markakis          388.1 ft
Millar            371.3 ft
 

Aubrey Huff in an upset! Huff just edges out Luke Scott by less than 2 ft on average. I was kind of surprised to see Melvin Mora come in third though.

Just a footnote: Adam Jones has only hit 6 homers but only 1 of them was classified as "Just Enough". Our centerfielder also has some nice raw power if he can harness it. He is The Truth!

The Crystal Ball '08: Aubrey Huff

Aubrey Huff. I'm going to dust off an old nickname and call him Spanky from here on out. I'm sure Mike LaValliere won't mind.

What to expect from Spanky this year? Expect him to be worse than last year. Why?

Aubrey Huff
             AVG  HR  OBP  SLG  OPS
2000-2004   .295  98 .348 .491 .839
2005-2007   .269  85 .333 .445 .778

 

He's gone from a fairly useful, sometimes dangerous, slugger to a marginal 1b/DH type.

He has gotten progressively less patient at the plate and his slugging is down almost 50 points over the last three years.

He posted a .779 OPS last year. It isn't as if he brings a lot of speed or defense to the table to offset that number. That puts him right above Jose Vidro and behind Kevin Millar among MLB first basemen for the 2007 season.

(I'll cover this later but Millar has been such a bargain over the last two seasons. He outperformed Spanky and cost the team less than half Huff's salary...I don't find Millar to be a bad player at all, at least for the talent level available on the Baltimore roster. He's the best option for 1B on the 40-man roster. That's right, I said it.)

Is there any hope? Some take solace in that strong August and September Spanky had to finish the season. I don't. He's always finished strong. That's his modus operandi. It's also to start so slow that he is one of the worst offensive firstbasemen in the major leagues before Memorial Day.

All we can pray for is that he posts a first half worthy of notice and some contender offers to take him off our hands. And good riddance.

Base Hits: 11/28/2007

After engaging in a little double speak about changing positions earlier this offseason, Melvin Mora will reportedly play winter ball in Venezuela and split time between third base and the outfield. Less than a month ago Mora stated the following about moving off of third base:

"I don't want to play those games," he said. "I'm one of the best third basemen in the American League and in baseball. If you are going to move me, you have to make the team more competitive."

I guess someone forgot to tell him at the time that moving to left would make the O's more competitive. You know, filling a gaping hole in left and allowing better production at third (Tejada) as well as improving defense and perhaps a steady bat at short (Hernandez). Nice to see that he finally got the message...

***

I never weighed in on the Aubrey Huff nonsense but since Andy McPhail is still pondering punishment, I'll beat this dead horse a little more.

I have Sirius radio and although I don't listen to Bubba the Love Sponge, I do listen to Howard Stern and have an idea of what goes down on Bubba's show. Imagine the uncensored Howard Stern program...only rawer and more profane. That pretty much sums it up.

I don't think anything Aubrey talked about on Bubba's show was in bad taste. OK, it was in really bad taste but I don't think I was surprised at the activities Aubrey described. I was in the Navy and when hanging out with a bunch of single guys of the ages of 18-30, I'd say about 75% of us were involved in at least one of the activities Huff spoke about. Chasing women? Watching porn? Drinking? Hanging out with strippers and porn stars? Is anyone really shocked that single professional ballplayers engage in such activities? I'm not. I would imagine the 75% rule applies to them too.

His comments about Baltimore seemed to stem from questions about the nightlife and on that point, Aubrey's absolutely correct. Fell's Point is great but it's not Ybor City by a long shot.

That being said, maybe Aubrey needs to familiarize himself more with the batting cages and less with the watering holes and meat markets next season...

***

Former Oriole player and manager Davey Johnson will be up for election to the Baseball Hall of Fame as a manager, not a player.

***

Talks between the Dodgers and Orioles have stalled as Baltimore would rather sign Erik Bedard long term than trade him. I don't spend much time speculating on trades but Matt Kemp would be a wonderful addition if Bedard cannot be signed.

Pinstripe Destruction

O's win. 12-0. Over the hated New York Yankees.

Take that one to your grave Phil Rizzuto.

Phil Rizzuto is the perfect example of why I hate the Yankees. If he had played in St. Louis, you never would've heard of him. Because he played on some great teams for the Yankees, it got him into the Hall of Fame. It's a joke. A .273 career hitter. Career OPS+ of 93. He somehow managed to win an MVP in 1950 even though he was only the third best player on his team that year (behind Yogi Berra and Joe Dimaggio). All because he was an average hitter who was little and played for the Yankees. He never led the league in anything but sacrifices. Feh.

Anyway, the enigma that we call Daniel Cabrera shut down the Yanks last night for 6+ innings and allowed the mop up guys to mop up.

Hopefully, Erik Bedard shuts them down this afternoon and drops the Yankees further back in the playoff hunt.

Paul Bako Can Really Handle A Pitching Staff...

You heard that a lot about Bako when the O's signed him. Great glove man. Handles pitchers well. Intanglibles baby!

Well, when Paul Bako is behind the plate the league hits .267 against O's pitchers, a full 20 point above the .247 the league hits against Baltimore when Ramon Hernandez calls the game. They also slug 33 points better with Bako donning the mask (.409 to .376) instead of Hernandez.

While we're at it, opposing baserunners have stolen bases at a 72% success rate against Ramon this year. Not great. But our great glove man Bako has allowed them to steal at an 81% success rate.

Why do we still pay this guy?

Quick Notes

Aubrey Huff is (finally) having a truly great month in August, hitting .395 with 3 homers and 4 doubles thus far, good for an OPS of 1.191...Corey Patterson continues to (oddly) wear out lefty pitchers hitting them at a .322 clip for the season, 80 points better than his career average...If Erik Bedard strikes out 6 batters today he will pass Dave McNally (1968) and Mike Mussina (1996) to place third in Baltimore history in single season strikeouts (behind only Mussina's 2000 and 1997 seasons). He will also be 4th in franchise history which includes the St. Louis Browns.

Odds and Ends...

The Strange Case of Corey Patterson

Corey has really turned it around in July. He has been red hot (.368 batting average this month) after being just as cold as can be for the first half of the season. It's only been seven games but since Trembly has tried Patterson as the #2 hitter he is hitting .357 and OPSing .821. Much like the Millar as cleanup hitter experiment, I hope Trembley leaves him there until he plays his way out of the role.

But the strangest thing about Patterson's performance is his turnaround against left handed pitching. He has hit .242 for his career against lefties but has worn them out this year at a .344 clip! That would be great if he suddenly hadn't forgotten to hit righties (.262 for his career, .218 this season, even after his recent hot streak). I have never seen this kind of turnaround in an established player.

Leave Huff At Home

Aubrey is hitting .294 and slugging .447 at Camden Yards and hitting .220 and slugging .327 on the road. The solution? Sit him on the road. Nothing else seems to be working.

If Paul Bako wasn't so horrible with a bat, I'd suggest the same thing for Ramon Hernandez (.806 OPS at home, .638 OPS on the road)...

Send Up A Mannequin Instead

Paul Bako would be a much more fearsome hitter if he never swung his bat. He only sees 3.4 pitches per plate appearance, the lowest on the team outside of Corey Patterson and Jay Payton but at least those guys have some offensive skills to offer by swinging the bat. Sitting there like a pitcher and letting three balls go by is hardly worse. Better yet Paul, anything that looks like it's going to be in the strike zone, foul it off. Just don't swing or swing to foul it off. At least you'll be there to piss off the opposing pitcher and in some small way help wear him down.

And I want to hear no more about his defensive prowess. Opponents have stolen 17 bases off of him and he has caught only 4 good for only a 19% kill rate. Only 6 catchers in the majors have more passed balls than him...and they're all regulars! He's terrible. Would it really be so bad for J.R. House or even Eli Whiteside to sit back there once a week? Alberto Castillo would be a better choice. One of the worst signings this team has ever made.

Speaking of J.R. House...

Hey, O's! The season is lost outside of playing for pride. Let's see what some of the kids can do. Is Paul Bako really in your plans for next season? Let's get House up her and see how he does. House's line in Norfolk: .307/.366/.461. He's can't be worse than what we have as a backup catcher. Jon Knott's up but maybe we could throw him out in left everyday and see what happens. Maybe we could see if Adam Stern can hit with Patterson probably out the door after the season? And let's play Brandon Fahey out there everyday to see if he can really play. (I don't think he can but at least we'd know for sure.)

Dave Trembley's playing for his job so I doubt this will happen...