Phillies Nation

Abreu’s career OBP% of .405 makes him the best player in history according to the Oakland A’s approach..

Obviously i’m being as ass to help me prove my point.. but there are WAY more things that go into baseball than just looking at numbers, otherwise the Oakland A’s would play the RedSox for the AL crown every year, and it would end it a tie in game 7 of ALCS…

was it gillick or wade who signed rollins and utley to very reasonable contracts (well below market value) thus locking them up for years?

that lidge trade sure was awful as well.

dobbs. horrible signing. werth, useless. pedro feliz, just awful. durbin, a weak armed sissy. pulling romero off the heap last year, brainless. getting moyer, and then convincing him to stay in philly, idiotic.

there are some bad signings, some bad trades. but overall, gillick has done a very good job here.

put it this way, they didn’t make the playiffs last year, nor are they in first this year in spite of gillick. it’s more likely because of gillick.

Uh Don… Red Sox $ > A’s $. Give them equal amount of money to spend and would you still stick to that point?

why did ryan zimmerman finish so highly on that list? he had 11+ throwing errors ALONE last year.

“Abreu’s career OBP% of .405 makes him the best player in history according to the Oakland A’s approach…”

You seem to have trouble comprehending what sabermetrics is and what stats are used to determine a player’s value. Why don’t you go read Bill James Baseball Abstracts and then try having an argument after you actually inform yourself on the subject.

23 errors total

Cause you also need to look at the good players he signed… and the fact that he improved the team in both of the years he’s been here.. getting us over the hump and into the playoffs last year.

You’re right, you never said Feliz was a bad thirdbaseman..

you said, “Feliz is TERRIBLE. He is hitting .256 and has an OBP of .304. You honestly think that is good for a starting 3b? Dobbs should be starting at 3b.”

Abreu, another example of the Phillies getting dicked in return.

Gillick signed Eaton to a 3years/$24.51M deal.

All in all, Gillick did get us over the hump and into the playoffs. That is very true, but it just seems like he isn’t committed to improving this team this season. He says if we perform the way we’re capable of then we should be fine. I don’t know what fine means, but even if the Phillies play the way they are capable of… they still aren’t winning the world series. Might they get there? Doubt it. If you aren’t committed to winning the world series… then what are you?

If you could read you would realize I was talking about his defensive abilty.

Oh really, Gillick got us over the hump? Did he pay the Mets player to throw games becuase I’m pretty sure we luckboxed our way into the playoffs last year. ANY GM in baseball, well except for maybe Steve Phillips, could have done what Gillick has done with the core he was given.

if youre not committed to winning the world series then youre a lapdog for cheap ownership. THAT is why i get upset at gillick. he has a reputation and clout. if he wanted to, he could leverage the owners into chipping in at least a little bit more. if private discussion didnt work, where hes saying “hey ive won before and i know we need this this and this or else were not going anywhere,” then you go out IN PUBLIC and out the owners to the media and say a PC-but obvious version of “we tried to get this guy or that guy but THE OWNERSHIP did not want to spend the money.”

if he gets fired for saying that, then it will even further reinforce his statement that the ownership doesnt want to win, fan revolt, team sold, problem solved.

Did you even read the rest of what I wrote

“Harry, can you fill me in what I can’t comprehend about Sabermetrics…

I understand the runs-created and all that stuff..and you need baserunners to score…so you need guys on base… so you need players with high OBP%…. we were talking about GMs that use it.. Billy Beane was the first to start targeting players with high OBP% because he could sign them cheaply..and he would let other teams overpay for his overvalued players..”

What question are you asking?

So you’re giving all the credit to Ed Wade for this team’s success?

The Mets may have collapsed last year, but we still needed to go out an win our games, and we did… Luck, I guess.. no skill involved in winning down the stretch.

“If you could read you would realize I was talking about his defensive abilty.”

If I could read…. so you mean he’s TERRIBLE on defense… even though all those players and talent evaluators think he deserved the gold glove?

“Abreu is a good player.. he was my favorite player when he was on the Phillies…

Is he a great player? No… ”

You are out of your mind if you don’t think Abreu was a good player when playing for the Phillies… completely out your mind.

Wade managed to assemble a core consisting of Burrell, Utley, Howard, Victorino, Hamels and Rollins while ownership did not allow him to make any big signings. So umm yeah, that’s what I’m saying.

Seriously Don, are you just messing with me? You can’at be this dumb. What I said was I NEVER SAID FELIZ WASN’T GOOD DEFENSIVELY. My whole point is that it’s absurd to think Gillick signing Feliz was an unbelievable steal.

I just called Abreu a good player…. and then followed that up by saying that he’s not a GREAT player..

And you just told me that If I don’t think Abreu was a good player when playing for the Phillies… im out of my mind…

Obviously, you didn’t read what I said, you just copied it..

Seriously though..
My question is.. Since you keep telling me that I don’t understand sabermetrics, could you tell me what I don’t know? I’ve said what I understand about it, so what parts don’t I get? I

Geoff, I agree 100% with your thought process behind what Gillick could have said in public… but who the hell is going to lash out against ownership… He’d lose his job and never get hired again… granted he’s old… but he wants to keep working, and would enver be able to find another job again.

I don’t agree with everything at my job, but I’m not about to revolt and get fired over it… can’t really fault the man there.

The league average in the AL is .269, in the NL its .265…..

When a guy is hitting .256 with some Home Runs… from the 6th or 7th spot in your lineup… but he’s playing Gold Glove caliber defense (still disagree, Harry?) he’s an asset to your team.

From everything that has come out… including public comments from Gillick and Amaro that the ownership understands, and is on-board with the fact that they need to being in a top-of-the-rotation starting pitcher this offseason, in order to contend…

that leads me to believe that they have had those conversations with ownership..and have made their views known

Ryan, thanks…..Fellas, I hate to rain on this sunshine parade, but Getting back to the money…..According to published reports, the Phils are around 12th or 13th both in revenue and in payroll spending, so it appears that they do just like everyone else does. We can continue calling them cheap forever if we want, but we know it won’t change. Our payroll did jump noticeably when we moved into CBP.

My main concern about this money situation is that the Mets are moving into their new ballpark next year. Their payroll is significantly higher than ours now, and we have trouble beating them. Next year I would expect them to enter into the Yankees/Red Sox neighborhood of payroll expenditure which means if we stay as is, it’s going to be much more difficult to stay with them.

“The league average in the AL is .269, in the NL its .265…..

When a guy is hitting .256 with some Home Runs… from the 6th or 7th spot in your lineup… but he’s playing Gold Glove caliber defense (still disagree, Harry?) he’s an asset to your team.”

Sigh… Don, lets compare stats amount NL 3b.

Average – 8 out of 12
OBP – 11 out of 12
Slugging – 10 out of 12
Extra base hits – 12 out of 12

You know you’re argument is weak when you’re trying to say that Feliz is almost an average hitter.

I’m pretty sure your entire arguement was that FELIZ IS TERRIBLE… and i’ve proved that he’s not… if you would really rather have Greg Dobbs starting at 3b.. then you are smart because obviously Dobbs is a much better 3b than Feliz..

“I got the impression that you think/thought sabermetics was going after players with high on base percentages, when it isn’t. As I’ve said before, it’s signing players who provide the most value — and the stats determining how valuable a player is are not homeruns and RBI’s (and lol at the people who thought Howard deserved to be an all-star because he led the league in those two categories)”

What are the stats that teams use to see which players provide the most value? If its not OBP, Home Runs, or RBIs… is it Sac-Flys?

I was pretty sure that A’s were into “runs created” and targeted players with high OBP.. Of course the only book I’ve read directly related to that was MONEYBALL…which talks directly about how the A’s targeted players with high OBP.

If your arguement is the RedSox than you also need to ackonwledge the fact that they had one of the highest payrolls in baseball.. and obtained whatever players they needed (much better job of spending by Epstein than Cashman..) But not everyteam uses the same stats as to what is important..and some teams think the whole stats-explosion is overrated.