Scheduling Highlights

With opening day less than one month (wooo!) away, I wanted to highlight some points in the season to pay a little more attention to. Every season has easy stretches, tough road trips, and high leverage situations. Monday April 12th @ Minnesota The Red Sox play guests of honor at the home opener of Target Field, the new home of the Minnesota Twins. With no contract yet in sight, story-lines will surround the possibility of Joe Mauer's final year with the Twins, and the coincidence that a potential suitor rolls into town on the heels of stalled or cancelled negotiations. Also, speculations of Target Field's park factors will be begin to arise. While rumor has it that Target Field is not going to repeat an opening month full of laughable power as Yankee Stadium did last year, the park's dimensions should be favorable for Minnesota's right handed power bats. Keep an eye on Cuddyer in fantasy drafts.

Evan Brunell’s 2010 MLB Predictions: Does Boston win it?

As the advent of spring training games are upon us, I thought I'd kick off everyone's favorite little exercise by providing my own personal predictions as to how I think the season will shake out. Now, before I do so, a word of caution: predictions can change daily based on events. Heck, my predictions change multiple times a week. But I've gotta make predictions at some point, right? Point being, I might disagree with my own predictions a week from now. Most of the time, these kind of predictions are an exercise in fallacy, but it's not going to stop me from trying. I don't know why I made things harder on myself, but I set out to present an exact record. This means I had to go into a spreadsheet and make sure all the wins and losses totaled the correct amount of games while also balancing out to a .500 record. Took me a while, but dadgum it, I did it. One thing I did not control for was the unbalanced schedule (in a total record sense), but I already strained my tenuous math skills, so I wasn't about to complicate it further. Click "read more" or the headline to find my predictions.

Casey Fien addition worth another look

Monday saw the Red Sox claim Casey Fien from the Detroit Tigers. Of little note is the dropping of Gaby Hernandez to clear a spot. I am a bit shocked to see a pitcher with such solid peripherals in the minors given up on by the Tigers. Perhaps there is something they know, but let's see what Fien adds to the Red Sox. He's a two pitch reliever with a 91 mph fastball and a 80 mph slider thrown 25% of the time. His slider did not show well in his small sampling with a run value of -5.47 per hundred thrown, but a much bigger sample is needed to decide if it needs work. This isn't very exciting as his speed isn't great and with only two pitches hitters can just wait out the fastball. His minor league numbers though show he has something to contribute. His ERA in the minors stands at 3.04 and 3.21 in Triple-A. Obviously as a reliever his sample sizes are small, but a minor league FIP of 2.86 and 3.20 in Triple-A. Then why would the Tigers give up on Fien as a reliever?

Baseball Analysis 101

On the heels of today's discussion, I ended up finding this link via Tom Tango's blog. If this interests you, let us know how it worked for you. Online Sabermetric Course for Beginners

UZR Making Me Crazy

This tactic is starting to get really old. Dear Members of the Baseball Media, before you attempt to reference a statistic you're intentionally bashing, it would be prudent to actually learn what it is. Our newest culprit is Chris Gasper of the Boston Globe who decided to try and tackle the subject with a completely unbiased and objective analysis. For our viewers at home, my apologies if my last sentence overloaded your sarcasm meters. I'll replace them if they weren't very expensive. While using combative and derisive language, Gasper drew comparisons of newer baseball statistics to the masses being slaves to technological advances; these very same advances that fuel his blog. Right. I thought I'd go through Gasper's post piece by piece and see what we could find. Come enjoy the ride!

Michael Bowden looks to make an impact in 2010

Is there any article about Michael Bowden that doesn't make reference to the Aug. 21 debacle against the Yankees. It's bad enough that we have to deal with relievers small sample sizes, but if we're going to boil a pitchers skill down to 2 IP then you'll never see what a pitcher really is. Obviously Bowden is not going to push Josh Beckett, Jon Lester or John Lackey from the rotation for sure. It's a long shot he passes Tim Wakefield, Daisuke Matsuzaka or Clay Buchholz without a few injuries. This leaves him one shot to make the major league roster out of camp. Lately there has been talk he could see time again this year in the bullpen. His stuff has not fully transitioned to the major league level as his strikeout rate is down to 6.43, but his walk rate was way up in 2009 at Triple-A and the majors. Unless he can return the walk rate to the elite levels he showed previously he will struggle as a starter with his K/BB around 2.00.

AL East Sleepers: Boston Red Sox

As the hometown team boasts one of the strongest starting nine in the American League, it can be difficult to detect sleepers among the pack. Don’t be fooled, however. They are there and prepped to support an elite cast looking to avenge last season’s early playoff exit. Though few of the positional starters offer much potential as true "sleepers", considering the number of All-Stars and MVP candidates among them, the pitching staff contributes much of the excitement on this front. With youngsters and rebound contenders among the lot, an already superb rotation and bullpen could receive a few significant boosts from numerous sources. SP Clay Buchholz After the light came on last season, it never seemed to go out. Finally hitting his stride at the Major League level, he was able to lay fears about his potential to rest. Though not a groundbreaking season by any means, Buchholz’ performance went a long way toward stabilizing the ailing rotation during August and September. Looking forward to 2010, Buchholz should comfortably take the place of the 5th starter – possibly 4th, depending upon the performance of Daisuke Matsuzaka – expectations he should have no problem fulfilling...