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10.08.2008
Moneybill
New Giants honcho Bill Neukom spoke to the media yesterday and gave us a glimpse of how the new era might take shape. Ray Ratto poked fun at Neukom for talking up the need for a “Giants Way,” a new organizational philosophy, but I found Neukom’s use of a dusty baseball axiom refreshing. Though short on details, it’s clear Neukom believes the organization needs focus and discipline.
We’ll see how he fills in the gaps, but it’s generally a good thing to set one’s sights on a few clear goals and have everyone work towards them. It’s like sending a kid to a certain school with a good reputation: Everyone who graduates knows how to write a convincing letter or job resume, read and understand a ballot measure, and do enough math to avoid getting bamboozled by car dealers and mortgage brokers.
The Braves for years have preached that pitchers need to throw fastballs to the corners. The A’s preach strike zone awareness for their hitters. Maybe the Giants will be known for teaching superior defensive fundamentals or flawless baserunning. Maybe they do these things already. But for too long this team’s organizational reputation has revolved around what it couldn’t do — develop hitters, evaluate free-agent talent, respect statistical analysis — instead of what it could do competently. (Develop pitching. That’s it, though that’s important.)
Read the full transcript here. Much of what he said could be read as boilerplate. But there are little things here and there I find interesting. Such as: “We all believe in team play and deflecting credit to your teammates.” He also says that the Giants Way encompasses “medium– and long-term strategic planning,” something that in recent years has seemed lacking from on high.
I liked this, too:
There’s a recent memo from Brian to instructional league folks saying, `Here are the kinds of things I want you to emphasize with our Giants players this year.’ What does a 2-1 count mean to you? How do you stretch your lead? Those kinds of fundamentals. That’s all part of the manual. The Giants Way itself will have broader themes to it, but certainly the way the game is played between the lines is an essential part of the Giants Way. The Giants Way also has to be, `What is the kind of talent we want to find and how do we find it?’
Neukom was asked about Sabermetrics and Moneyball. Before we read parts of his answer, remember that Brian Sabean famously derided Moneyball when it was all the craze a few years ago. No one’s asked Brian recently if he’s now better acquainted with The Googlenets, but one might take Neukom’s answer as having a certain pointedness. Let’s listen:
Baseball is a science and an art. When it comes to picking the talent, we need the sharpest baseball eyes: people who can pick the 16-year-old arm out of the cornfield. We also need to be very well informed with all that is at our fingertips. We need to be smart about that. It’ll be a blend…...
It’s important we have better scouts and better statistical analysis. We just have to outwork people, whether it’s in the conditioning room, down the dirt roads in middle America or in front of the screen.
Comments
I think him being the new sheriff in town and "agreeing" to not discuss an extension with either until after the season puts the onus on Sabean and Bochy to implement Neukom's vision during the next year, or risk not measuring up in the new meritocracy that is the Giants Way. I don't think either has survived this long in baseball management without executing their bosses' vision successfully.
Homegrown has marked Atlanta's way since Bobby Cox came into town and appeared to design 6 gruelling losing years, 85-90, which allowed him to select Chipper Jones and Steve Avery, with #1 and #3 overall picks, respectively.
In fact, his time as GM (that is why I think he designed it because he took over as manager right afterward; usually 6 grueling losing years would get someone fired) is illustrative of what I've been saying about the difficulties of the draft, even when you are selecting at the very top of the draft:
1986 Kent Mercker #5 overall
1987 Derek Lilliquist #6
1988 Steve Avery #3
1989 Tyler Houston #2
1990 Chipper Jones #1
1991 Mike Kelly #2
Six years of high draft picks, one true All-Star superstar in Chipper, another good player in Avery, but then two OK relievers and two positional busts. Not really the batting average most people would think would happen when drafting atop the draft. But that is about the success you can expect when drafting that high in the draft.
We can only hope that MadBum has as much success as Steve Avery. That's not sarcasm, even though Avery only had four above-average years in the bigs. (His career stats are here.
What I mean is that the odds are still against MadBum making the bigs, spectacular debut notwithstanding. For him to make the majors and succeed, even for a relatively short time, would beat the odds.
I agree for the most part, though I must note that Bumgarner is striking out as much and walking much less than Avery did initially plus at a higher level, when 18.
In addition, Bumgarner's stats are skewed by the fact that he was totally clueless his first three starts when the Giants tried to change his mechanics, but after returning to the way he threw before, he just totally dominated. So his "real" stats for this season is even better than it seems looking at his seasonal stats because he's not going back to his modified mechanics again.
And while good stats like that is no guarantee, it is still a very good sign that he has something that gets a lot of batters fooled, both into striking out and in not walking as much. And it was stats similar to this by Sanchez in Augusta that led the Giants to boost him quickly up the system to the majors.
For comparison, I checked the Sally League since 2000, for pitchers with walks around 1 BB/9 and K over 9 K/9, and leading ERA, under 20, and no pitcher really did that well, but under 2.0 BB/9 and all 19, just a handful showed up:
2006 Will Inman
2005 Troy Patton
2005 Phil Hughes
2005 Gaby Hernandez
2004 Yusmeiro Petit
2003 Cole Hamels
Nice set of comps, though Hernandez is the cautionary tale, he had some sort of injury (presumably) in 2006/7, as he hasn't pitched much the past two seasons. Don't know how good his mechanics were, but Bumgarner is suppose to be pretty good.
The good news there is that in 2006, both Patton and Hughes were rated atop their respective teams Top 30 by Baseball America (#2 and #1, respectively) while Hernandez didn't even rate a mention in either the Mets Top 30 NOR their depth chart, which includes unrated prospects as well. Bumgarner was highly rated last season by BA and I would assume should be up there again for 2009's edition (in 2008, it was Villalona, Alderson, Bumgarner up top)
I expect him to start in AA in 2009, paired off with Alderson. While caution is always the most prudent course in assessing the future of a prospect, Bumgarner looks pretty good so far and looks capable of doing good stuff in the majors, barring any injury. And while the odds are still low, it is much better than for most 18-19 year olds and tangible, I think, whereas for most it is just a far-off dream.
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I like what I've seen so far. I hope he can pull it off.