As an Oakland A’s and Cincinnati Reds fan, I often wonder what the Reds would be like if they had Billy Beane running the team.  If BB had taken over after last season, I can see him realizing that the team was more than 1-2 players away from contending and that the minor league system needed some additional strength.  Here’s what I can picture happening:

• Harang to Arizona for a similar haul as he got for Haren (includes Greg Smith, Dana Eveland, Carlos Gonzalez, who are on the MLB team, and Brett Anderson, Chris Carter, and Aaron Cunningham).
• Arroyo to another team for prospects similar to those obtained by Blanton (includes Adrian Cardenas, Josh Outman, and  Matthew Spencer)
• Griffey to another team for a minor prospect
• Never invited Corey Patterson within 100 miles of Cincinnati
• Trade Dunn near the trading deadline and called up Jay Bruce
• Kept Josh Hamilton – I just don’t think he would have traded away such an enormous talent.   The only way Volquez would be a Red would be if the Rangers would have taken Joey Votto for him.
• A Josh Fogg-ish pitcher would be in the rotation, but so would Smith, Eveland, Cueto, and Thompson/Bailey.
• Not signing Francisco Cordero.
• All in all, reducing the club’s payroll significantly, leaving more room for large bonuses for draft picks and Latin ballplayers, and giving flexibility going into next offseason.

The thing I love about BB is that he makes pre-emptive moves.  The A’s weren’t going to win this year without a couple big-name free-agent signings, which just weren’t available last offseason.  So, BB, knowing the weakness of A’s farm system, acted to shore it up with short and long-term solutions.  Yes, Aaron Harang is a stud, 2008 injury notwithstanding, but so are the 6 players Oakland got for Dan Haren, including the 2 whose MLB pitching performances are not that far behind Haren’s.

The thing that frustrates me about Reds’ management is that they seem to be stuck between wanting to win now (“Going for it”) and building for the future.  As Billy Beane shows us, there is a way to succeed at doing both.

Has Aaron Harang ever had higher value than he has right now?  What about Brandon Phillips?  Harang has pitched over 230 innings each of the past two years and is averaging 7 innings per start this year.  Phillips provides gold-glover caliber defense, power, and speed while playing at a traditionally weak offensive position.  Both are signed to reasonable long-term deals.  They are the perfect players to build a team around.  So why even consider trading them?

Let's look at the team as a whole.  The Reds have 4 solid young pitchers including Harang and  if Bailey is included in the group.  They have a core of young position players including Phillips, Votto, Bruce, EdE, and Kepp who could be the start to a good team.  But there are major issues with this team.

The way the Reds are going, you have to assume we'll see the mid-summer fire sale of Dunn, Griffey, Weathers, Hatteburg, Bako, and maybe others.  I'd guess those players as a whole will net 2-3 servicable players and a couple low-level, low-rated prospects.  So we're left with holes in the outfield, at catcher, and at a starter.  Could Phillips be turned into a decent outfielder and a starter?  Could Harang be turned into a ML-ready starter, a young prospect, and a couple decent position prospects? 

I don't think the Reds have the guts to make that type of move, but it's time to at least explore the possibilities.  This is a team that needs to chart a course and stick to it, or we'll just keep going in circles.

I don't know if I fully believe this, but I can see some merit.  A few years ago, Ryan Howard was one of the hottest minor league prospects.  The Phillies kept him in the minors an extra year and a half - he was 26 in his first full major league season.  I think their philosophy with him (other than having Jim Thome blocking him) was that they would have more years of Howard's prime by keeping him in the minors.

Fast forward to our situation.  With the number of highly-regarded minor-league prospects we have, keeping them down 1/2 a season longer will control costs and allow the Reds to control them during more of their 'peak' years.  With the arbitration salaries spinning out of control (see Howard = $10M!!!), it becomes even more important to have guys for as much of their peak years as possible.

Howard was the one I thought of with a team keeping a top minor leaguer down - are there any other examples anyone can think of?  Is it worth keeping a guy down a half or full season to be able to have him for more of his prime?

My ideas coming into the offseason for what the Reds should do were a lot different than what has actually been done.  I hold out hope of a Blanton for Cueto+3 other non-Bailey/Bruce/Votto minor leaguers deal, but I'm at the point where I think we're basically set for the season.  While I'm comfortable with what's been done, here's what my ideal (and, to me, realistic) offseason would've brought us:

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I'm currently getting by on the hypothesis that the A's are only 2 'happenings' away from a WS title: (1) signing Barry Bonds, and (2) a healthy team.  I'm going to tackle the first issue in this diary by looking at what the A's numbers 'with Bonds' and 'without Bonds' would've been in 2007.  I've taken out Mike Piazza's 2007 numbers as well as the fill-in outfielders, including Langerhans, Bocachica, Thompson, Kielty, Putnum, and Davanon.  I'm obviously replacing some of our weaker links with Bonds, so the results will be overstated, but take a look just for fun.

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I know we're all fully into 'Play the young guys' mode and 'let's look ahead to 2008' mode, so I decided to give a little preview of one player who we hope will have a big role in our future, Jay Bruce.  Looking solely at the numbers, he compares to a certain player on the current Reds' roster, see below:

            AB       R       H       2B     3B    HR    RBI    SB    CS    BB    SO    AVG    OBP    SLG
Bruce    1045    187    312    90    15    45    194    31    24    106    262    0.299    0.364    0.543
Dunn    1208    263    367    70    4    63    220    60    21    230    270    0.304    0.425    0.525

I will use these numbers to compare Dunn and Bruce in 4 'tools' I look for in a hitter: Average, Power, Baserunning, Eye.  Note that the comparison below comes only from an analysis of the numbers, no scouting reports are used.

- AVERAGE: By the numbers, it appears that Bruce hits more line drives than Dunn, as shown by the higher doubles and triples.  To me, this says that he has the potential to be a better all around hitter and that he'll use more of the ballpark.  ADVANTAGE: Bruce

- POWER: In the minors, Dunn HR'd every 19 official at-bats.  Bruce HR'd every 23.  Not a big difference, in my book.    Their ISO power stats (SLG - AVG) are also similar.  I would expect this trend to continue in the majors as well.  ADVANTAGE: Push

- BASERUNNING: A popular complaint about Dunn is that he is big and slow.  Check out the SB numbers and you'll see that Dunn was successful 74%, and Bruce was successful 56% - not a good average for Bruce.  Again, however, we go back to 2B and especially 3B and we see that Bruce has far more than Dunn, which, in my book, evens it out.  ADVANTAGE: Push

- EYE: Bruce strikes out more than Dunn (gasp!) - 22% of his plate appearances vs. Dunn's 18%.  Bruce also walks nearly half as much as Dunn (9% vs. 19%).  Bruce's swing is obviously not without holes.  Obviously I'll take a .364 OBP in the majors from Bruce, but on this key stat, ADVANTAGE: Dunn

So, what does this mean?  Will we get the player we hope Bruce will be, or will we get the player Dunn is?  We may get to see sooner than we think...

Ever get a really cool A's-related gift?

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I know the Hamilton posts are like a broken record, but it is a pretty good broken record!  Hamilon was on the Jim Rome show Monday.  I caught the last part of the interview.  When I started listening, Rome was asking the usual questions about Hamilton's past, and as usual, Hamilton was very open with his answers.  Rome was impressed.  

My favorite part of the interview was Hamilton putting a bad day at the park into perspective.  He mentioned losing one in the sun in Wrigley and going 0-4.  He talked about how, on the way home, his wife was on the phone with one of her friends saying how it was a bad day for Hamilton, and he corrected her saying how great of a day it was.  He mentioned the bleacher creatures riding him the whole game.  They would follow his every footstep, "Left... Right... Left" so he would jump occasionally to throw them off.  I bet they loved that!

If there happens to be a link or recording of the interview, would someone post it?  It really was great.

no, not the baseball team, but what my wife and I found out we're expecting in May!  This will be our first and second kids and we're totally excited.  I love the idea of having twins, it'll be an adventure for sure.  The ultrasound technician says, "Well, there are definately two in there, let's see if there are any more."  The world stopped for a good 1 minute as I regained my breath to hear, "well, it's twins!"

So, mark down 2 more A's fans to come!  I'm going to have to train them from Cincinnati, but they'll be growing up in green and gold!

So, I was wondering, are there any twins out there or anyone who has twins that would like to weigh in with advice for a young couple?  Also, should I become a little more of a Twins fan (a suggestion by someone in class)?  Or, have there ever been twins to make it to the major leagues?  Or, what's a good twins joke you've heard?  Let's talk twins, but not the baseball team!

Anyone unconvinced that having young, cheap starting pitching isn't a huge luxury?  Well, here's a bit of proof:  I give you, the 2004 free agent starting pitcher signings:

The BAD or INJURED:
ARI: Russ Ortiz (115IP 6.89ERA 5-11)
CHW: Orlando Hernandez (128.1IP 5.12ERA 9-9)
FLA: Al Leiter (80IP 6.64ERA 3-7 [in Florida])
KC: Jose Lima (168.2IP 6.99ERA 5-16)
SEA: Aaron Sele (116IP 5.66ERA 6-12)
BOS: Wade Miller (91IP 4.95ERA 4-4)
CIN: Eric Milton (186.1IP 6.47ERA 8-15)
TB: Hideo Nomo (100.2IP 7.24ERA 5-8)
NYY: Carl Pavano (100IP 4.77ERA 4-6)
NYY: Jaret Wright (63.2IP 6.08ERA 5-5)

The OKAY:
BOS: Matt Clement (191IP 4.57ERA 13-6)
BOS: David Wells (184IP 4.45ERA 15-7)
ARI: Shawn Estes (123.2IP 4.80ERA 7-8)
PHI: Jon Lieber (217.1IP 4.20ERA 17-13)
SD: Woody Williams (159.2IP 4.85ERA 9-12)

The GOOD:
LAA: Paul Byrd (204.1IP 3.74ERA 12-11)
WSH: Esteban Loaiza (217IP 3.77ERA 12-10)
LAD: Derek Lowe (222IP 3.61ERA 12-15)
NYM: Pedro Martinez (217IP 2.82ERA 15-8)
CLE: Kevin Millwood (192IP 2.86ERA 9-11)

So, out of the 20 biggest signings, 10 were terrible or injured, 5 were okay, and 5 were good.  Compare that to our starting 5... only 25% of them had ERA's lower than our HIGHEST ERA.  

OAKLAND:
Zito (228.1IP 3.86ERA 14-13)
Harden (128IP 2.53ERA 10-5)
Haren (217IP 3.73ERA 14-12)
Blanton (201.1IP 3.53ERA 12-12)
Saarloos (159.2IP 4.17ERA 10-9)

We can sit back and appreciate the luxury we have of having a brilliant GM who understands where bargains are to be had and where other GM's overpay.  Let's hope he continues exploiting this!

So, I say we avoid the AJ Burnetts and Jarrod Washburns of the world and stick to the organizational philosophy of getting young, inexpensive pitchers.