Hard to believe that squad was put together by the jackass who signed “Dusty” Pierre and the Ghost of Andruw Jones. (It helps that ownership was willing to eat both contracts and move onward and upward.)

But then again….The LAD were the perfect club for Hudson…I can see why he took the deal…Pair him up w/ Frucal…And you’ve got yourself one heck of a DP combo…And a legit 1-2 punch at the top of the line-up. (Hudson put up very respectable #’s in AZ from the LO…I would expect the same from the 2 hole, in LA.)

The LAD will be a much improved offensive & defensive club w/ those 2 in the fold(if both stay healthy)….and should be seen as the NL West favorites (assuming Manny ends-up back in LA), if they get even league average pitching out of that rebuilt staff.

SS Frucal
2B Hudson
RF Either
LF Ramirez
CF Kemp
3B Blake
1B Looney
C Martin

W/ C Ausmus, 3B DeWitt, OF Pierre, UTL Loretta and OF Delwyn Young coming off the bench…IMO, That’s a pretty damn descent line-up… W/ plenty of depth & versatility on the bench….I could easily see that line-up out producing the 700 runs the LAD put-up in 2008…And they should probably do so, by a wide margin.

(Oh, Joy!!! Those “left-coast”swings will continue to be a total suck-fest for the REDS!)

Dunn’s not going to “learn” to do what Dusty, a non-power hitter, wanted him to do…and it wasn’t necessary.

It was Dusty’s job, as manager, to use his players to the best of their abilities to help the team.

he didn’t do that and criticized his team publicly for not being him….

Yes, as manager, he’s responsible for training his players; however, part of training is understanding the skill set and improving that production….not trying to get someone to set a “goal” that is not achievable or realistic.

It’s not exactly the kind of methodology that I teach in my management training classes….

Even with pick, I would have used the Weathers and Taveras money to make that move.

Not sure I’d agree with #3. Putting the ball in play more often wouldn’t result in a few more hits?

This is true in little league, where the defenses are bad enough that any ball in play is likely to result in a good result. The thing in the major leagues is that taking big swings usually leads to two things: Strikeouts and HRs. One is much, much, much, much better than a single; the other is only a very, very, very, very tiny bit better than another kind of out.

It’s simply not possible to just “trade 100 strikeouts for 20 singles and 80 groundouts,” as much as we’d like it to be true.

this is just like the algorithm flow charts I used to study in computer science.

Yes.

avg/obp/slg.

A walk is .000/1.000/.000 (or 1.000OPS)
A hit is 1.000/1.000/1.000 (or 2.000OPS)

Exactly. Which is why every time I heard someone claim that Dunn has a good eye (based on his walks), I’d laugh. If he had a good eye, he wouldn’t strike out looking so often.

“How many times did we hear people defend Adam Dunn’s 200 strikeouts by saying “Yeah, but he walked 100 times.” What the hell does one have to do with the other? Do they somehow cancel each other out?”

“I’ve never heard that argument.”

I’m surprised – I’ve heard that one a million times.

“The strikeout defense is
1) strikeouts are basically the same as any other out
2) strikeouts are better than double plays
3) fewer strikeouts does not equal more hits”

Not sure I’d agree with #3. Putting the ball in play more often wouldn’t result in a few more hits?

“Too many people equate walks and OBP. The reality is that AVG is a huge portion of an individual’s OBP. Also, hits are much more heavily weighted than walks in the OPS calculation.

1 walk in 1 plate appearance = 1.000 OPS
1 hit in 1 plate appearance = 2.000 OPS”

I never thought of it this way. You’re basically saying that a hit counts for on-base AND slugging, right? Wheras a walk counts only for obp… That does give me a slightly different view, I admit.

And yes, that graphic is very well done (especially the part about keeping the defense on their toes and forcing them to make the play).

I may have spent too much time with these things…