Go-Time?

By Matt "The Stat" Himelfarb
Posted Monday, August 6, 2007

In the face of political ramifications and possible treason resulting in jail time, a wise young man once wrote arguably one of the most famous and carefully crafted pieces of writing in American history. That’s right, under such circumstances, Thomas Paine managed to write his “Common Sense” pamphlet, rallying thousands of supporters on the brink of war.

But do Mets fans really find something as simple as finding a proper second baseman anywhere close to common sense? Apparently not.

Make no mistake, hardly any Twins fan will disagree that trading Luis Castillo was a grievous blunder that showed little foresight in their organization, prompting skeptics to wonder whether the Twins' success all these years was reliant upon their scouting department, and not too much their front office. For those that’ve been sleeping under a rock, the Mets dealt a 24-year-old AA catcher who can barely hit his weight. (Drew Butera) along with a 23-year-old whose ceiling at this point is a fourth outfielder (Dustin Martin). In return, the Mets not only received a replacement-level hitting second baseman in Luis Castillo, but also, should Castillo leave via free agency at the end of this year, the Mets will likely receive a sandwich pick between the second and third round of next year’s draft; a better value than the both Butera and Martin combined. Simply put, on the surface, Terry Ryan got fleeced by Omar Minaya.

Only the trade comes with a bit of a warning: “should Minaya resort to politics as the main reason behind who should play regularly at second base, he’ll effectively make his team weaker down the stretch.”

Before I get to the excuses that’ll follow as Luis Castillo continues to transcend into a liability in the Mets lineup, there are several ingenious ways that I’ll quickly run down as to how you can justify playing Castillo over Gotay.

Castillo never strikes out. Unless your name is Albert Pujols, this would be considered a negative in today’s game. The hitters that have stuck out the least in 2007 are as follows: Placido Polanco, Paul Lo Duca, Luis Castillo, Kenny Lofton, and Juan Pierre. The players that have stuck out the most in 2007 are: Ryan Howard, Adam Dunn, Dan Uggla, Grady Sizemore, and Mike Cameron. If you had to choose from either groups of players, I'm sure most people would go with the latter.

Castillo is a gold glove second baseman. Nearly everyone will tell you this isn’t true anymore, but aside from the fact that nearly every gold glove award is undeserved, saying he has “diminished range” is a bit of an understatement to say the least. It’s no surprise Castillo won all of these gold glove awards, since he traditionally never makes an error, but Gotay has the edge in zone rating (.827 to .801), as well as FRAA (-3 to -8). Castillo represents a minor defensive upgrade, at best.

The major lingering question, however, is whether Gotay can keep up with his offensive performance so far this year. His BABIP is a ridiculous .423, but as I mentioned in my Carlos Beltran article a week ago, LD rates are something that a hitter has control over, as opposed to pitchers. (Derek Jeter almost always manages to compile a high BABIP as the result of his LD rates.)

Not one player has been able to amass a BABIP of over .400 since Ichiro Suzuki in 2004, which was mostly due to his foot speed. You have to take into consideration that if Gotay had enough at-bats, he’d be leading all of baseball in LD rate right now (27.7%). Here are other players that have put up similar LD rates over the last several years.

2006:

LD% BABIP

Freddy Sanchez 27.5% .377

Mark Loretta 27.1% .313

Adam Kennedy 27.0% .322

2005:

Brian Roberts 27.4% .347

It’s almost a given that Gotay will experience some considerable regression if he played everyday. I’m sure we could find someone that could do an exact estimation as to what Gotay’s numbers should look like (something that’s completely over my head) but let's just say Gotay would have to expierence a tremendous downfall should his offensive production fall below that of Luis Castillo's.

I’ve come to learn that in a town where people still believe Alex Rodriguez isn’t clutch, when a player becomes non-productive, fans will usually find a way to defend him. In the case of Luis Castillo, he does “the little things,” such as moving the runners over, laying down a bunt, taking pitches for Jose Reyes, regardless of the fact that not only has Ruben Gotay has taken more pitches per plate appearance, (4.2) in 2007 than Luis Castillo (4.0), but part of the reason Castillo does the little things so often is that 70% of his batted balls are grounders. He’s also known as a “winner,” as the result of his 2003 World Championship Ring, even though the playoffs are a complete crapshoot and there were 24 other players that also received that same exact ring. Those were the same exact things we heard at the time of the acquisition of Shawn Green.

Yes, there are lots of stats, plenty of love for a young ballplayer, and a myriad of zealots looking for some weakness in the Omar and Co. regime.

But hey, in the end, it’s just common sense.

 

you can contact Matt at: matthimelfarb@gmail.com and check out www.cyclonesnation.wordpress.com