Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 29: The Future of the Red Sox and Dodgers, and Roger Clemens’ Comeback

Episode Date: August 27, 2012

Ben and Sam discuss the futures of the two teams involved in the weekend’s blockbuster trade, then talk about whether the Astros would benefit from signing Roger Clemens.

8.5, 900, 800, 9, 9, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, Good morning. It is a new week and a new episode, episode 29 of Effectively Wild, the Daily Baseball Perspectives podcast. You are either on your work or at work and thrilled to be at work or on your way to work because you have a new episode of us to listen to.

I am Ben Lindberg in New York, New York, and as usual in Long Beach in his car with the door open, Sam Miller. How are you, Sam? How was your weekend? It was great. I'm energized by how chirpy you are. Yeah. Well, I was outside a lot this weekend. By the pool? Not by the pool, but I went bike riding in the sun for hours, and it was very nice, although I'm in considerable discomfort now. Were you bike riding in Manhattan? Yeah, I was over by the river, and I won't go into too much detail, but I'm recording this podcast standing up, and that is all I'll say about that subject.

All right. We are, I think, going to talk about probably the biggest news of this weekend. Joe Saunders. Right. What is your topic today? My topic is actually the Red Sox. Okay. And the Phillies. All right. And my topic is Roger Clemens. Oh, wow. Okay.

So my question is actually, it's about the Red Sox. It's also about the Phillies, who were both very good teams last year. The Phillies won 102 games. The Red Sox won 90. They are both teams that we have become accustomed to being very good and making the playoffs virtually every year. And both are lousy this year. And I just wanted to find out whether you think either one is going to be a contender in 2013.

one is going to be a contender in 2013? Off the top of my head, I would say probably not. Not that they will be awful, but I don't think I see that. I guess, I mean, I pick the Red Sox to be really, really good every year, and I've been wrong a lot about that lately. I guess if it didn't work out this season, now they just traded their whole team. Obviously, I mean, it's at least likely that they'll have better health in the future, but I don't know. I don't see them being as good as the Yankees or Rays, I guess. They have $45 million committed in salary next year, though, and presumably they're going to try to do smart things.

And, I mean, to some degree, doesn't this come down to whether you have faith in their front office to do smart things? Yeah, I guess so. And I do generally. They haven't had the greatest year, but I wouldn't write them off. I mean, yeah, maybe it's just too early to say. It is, I mean, I wondered why Gonzalez was the guy to go, and maybe it was just an opportunity to get rid of the other contracts that they got rid of, but in the sense that he was signed

to what seemed like a reasonable deal, if not a below-market deal. So it's kind of hard to see them doing more with that money than they had done with him. But obviously getting the Beckett money back. And I don't know that the Crawford money would have gone to waste. Maybe Crawford will be excellent next year. I don't know. But, I mean, do you think that they will go out and sign a Granke or a Hamilton or something?

Do you think that they will go out and sign a Granke or a Hamilton or something? Because if they don't make a huge move like that, it's sort of hard to see them making up what they lost. Well, you know, it's interesting. I think that in a way, part of it comes down to the question of whether – well, I guess they're in the same position that the Dodgers maybe feared they were going to be in, where they have the money, but there aren't really good ways to spend it. It's a, I mean, hardly anybody good gets a free agency anymore. And the free agents that are available this year are pretty uninspiring. You named basically the two that are going to get the most attention and beyond those it's um you know

pj upton and nick swisher and um edwin jackson i mean not really i don't know colby lewis not really um the sort of players that i don't know that i would want to be overpaying for this winner. So that's tricky. I mean, I think that there's a sense that you get from a lot of the moves that we've seen around baseball as far as extensions go, as far as the Dodgers have been spending, that there's a fear that there's going to be more money than players. fear that there's going to be more money than players and that at this point it's more important to get the good player and worry about how to pay him later, particularly with so much money coming into the game. And so I guess maybe it's possible that the Red Sox, I mean, I think the deal was great for the Red Sox. I can't believe they pulled it off, but maybe the Red Sox are sort of gambling that there will be, that there will always be players available and I was trying to think if I were to make a bold and unsubstantiated

rumor up out of nowhere I could definitely see the Red Sox adding something like Justin Upton this winter because I don't know I just winter. Because I don't know. I just don't get the feeling that they're looking at this free agent market and thinking, oh, thank goodness we have $130 million freed up for Sean Markham, if that all makes sense. They also have the 11th ranked organization before the season started, as far as their farm system by Kevin, and I asked him, and he says that it'll go up certainly with the guys that they've acquired and some guys who've broken out this year or who have improved this year. But it's not really a group that's going to have any impact in 2013 besides LaVarnway.

It's really more late 2013 and and much more in the years after that so maybe it's sort of a consolidation year stopgap year don't do anything crazy and make any other huge commitments when you just got out from under your old ones and and just kind of sign a few mid-market guys and not embarrass yourself and wait for other people to arrive? Could be. It's hard to sign mid-market guys to win your deals. Yeah. Well, that will be interesting to see, and so will what the Dodgers do.

If you're listening to this on Monday, Maury Brown has an article up on the site for us today about how many millions of dollars they're going to be above the luxury tax threshold. Even before talking about resigning some of their guys or giving arbitration raises. I mean, it wasn't really your topic, but do you think that there is there an element of recklessness to what they're doing? I mean, I I love it. It's kind of a I mean, just in contrast to the McCourt Dodgers, obviously, it's nice to see them able to spend something. almost the wrestling heel style approach of just throwing your money around and kind of all the quotes that they've had about really how there's no ceiling or there's no ceiling in sight.

I mean, I don't know. Do you think that they are going to spend their way into trouble if they keep going down this route or do they really just have unlimited funds? Or this TV deal is really going to give them enough money to outspend every team for every player, seemingly? Yeah, I mean, I guess if there's... I mean, we don't know, right? We don't know. I mean, we don't know, right?

We don't know. But the Yankees were certainly exponentially beyond everybody else for many years. And I think that we did see that even with the Yankees, there were limits. And they did have contracts that they regretted. But they were able to basically keep it going nonstop. I mean, I think they missed the playoffs one year. They never really did have to rebuild like we're talking about maybe the Red Sox having to do. So if you have enough money, I guess you can do it. I mean, I guess I'm a little bit down on all the guys they've added.

I mean, Adrian Gonzalez is a very good player. Don't get me wrong. Hanley Ramirez might be. But the way that they've done this has required them to take on a lot of guys who have question marks of one sort or another. And certainly I thought the Ethier contract was that way too. And really I think the Dodgers, they say you can never evaluate a trade until years later. I really don't think you can evaluate what the Dodgers are doing unless you know what the economy worldwide in 2014 and in baseball in 2014 actually look like.

Which they must be pretty confident about. They are either pretty confident. Well, they are pretty confident about it. It doesn't make them correct yet. Yeah. But they might be. I mean, I don't know. I think that probably it's got to be annoying for the Giants to see them do this. But on the other hand, I mean, this could,

I think probably based on the history of the sport, you have to think that this probably looks pretty ugly in a few years. Well, I'm enjoying it because even when the Yankees throw their money around, they're generally not that ostentatious about it. They don't try to attract attention, maybe because they know how rigged the system is in their favor. They don't want to rub it in anyone's face any more than they do usually. But you don't hear them saying that they have no limits, even though if they do have limits, they're probably higher than anyone else's.

It may just be that they don't want to attract attention and give the commissioner any more reason than he already has to try to level the playing field. But if anything, you kind of hear them cry poor once in a while. So I'm enjoying the Dodgers just spending a ton of money and kind of bragging about it almost. bragging about it almost. And maybe that's just kind of trying to heal the fan base from the McCourt period and establish how different the new regime is. Anyway, the other big news of the weekend, I guess, took place nowhere near the major leagues.

It was in the independent leagues that Roger Clemens made his comeback or the start of his comeback presumably it will continue uh he pitched uh three and a third innings and he gave up one hit and he struck out a couple guys and generally looked uh i guess about as as good as you could expect a 50 year old guy who hasn't pitched professionally in years to look. He looked miles and miles better than his teammate Scott Kazmaier has looked. And Kazmaier is, I think, 27 this year. Yeah. And so you've heard that the Astros expressed some interest in bringing him back,

expressed some interest in bringing him back and no other team has has said anything about that in fact there was uh there were a couple of royals people there and people assumed that they were interested also dayton moore went out of his way to to say that they are not interested and they were just watching the game because they're old friends of clemens um so it seems like if if a major league comeback is going to happen it's it's going to be the astros or nothing and it's probably going to be no more than a game or two at the end of the season and i mean jim crane who's the astros owner said that if it happens he the one thing they don't want to do is make it a publicity stunt, which is just a funny quote because, I mean, what else could it be really with a 50-year-old pitcher and with the Astros? So I just wonder, I mean, my question is, can the

Astros really embarrass themselves at this point any more than they already have by being the Astros? But there's a certain integrity or honor to how bad they've been to this point. They've been bad in a very honest way. So you don't think they should do it? You think that it's unethical or something? You think it demeans the game? I don't think it's unethical. I don't know about demeaning the game.

It's just – I mean, I think teams can do whatever they want to do to make some money, and it's fine with me. with me um but i just wonder if it kind of takes away a little bit from what they're doing because jeff luno is trying to sell this rebuilding um as just this this process that you get rid of all your veterans and you play the young guys and eventually those young guys become something. And I don't know. I mean, it's just, it's clearly a cash grab if they do it. And again, there's nothing wrong with a cash grab. It's probably not really even that much cash, right? I mean, they'd make, you assume it's some tens of thousands of dollars. It's one or two games he pitches.

Obviously the Astros aren't drawing particularly well now, but even say they sell out those one or two games, it's not a huge sum of money. And so I wonder. I mean, the Astros are already kind of a joke, so there's certainly the perspective that they can't become any more of a joke by pitching a 50-year-old guy. And yet there's, I don't know, they're kind of a joke in a different way. They're a legitimate joke.

And somehow it would feel sort of more like a sideshow to me, even than it does when they throw the ball around the infield over and over and over and miss it and do all those things that they do. I don't know. Do you think it has any effect on the Astros at all? Or is it just the Astros are so bad right now that it doesn't matter? It's not going to make them any worse and it will generate a little bit of interest and that in itself is reason enough to consider it. I just have no opposition to it at all. Nothing gives me any cause for concern. I think that one of the coolest things about old-timey baseball that I ever remember learning as a kid was all about S Satchel Pages game when he was I think 59 and of course it's a slightly different thing but I would certainly watch it I would completely forget you know by next year that it ever happened I don't think I would hold any grudges against the

Astros and who knows maybe Maybe Clemens sticks around. Maybe he pitches another year. It'd be interesting to see how good he is. I mean, I don't know. Why not? You'd learn a little something about baseball, right? I don't know. I think to me it would feel a little bit like when Matt Kemp goes on a rehab stint to Rancho

Cucamonga and plays a game against the Inland Empire 66ers. And it's obviously Matt Kemp is not an A-ball player and it takes away the authenticity of the competition. But every guy on both sides loves it. The's uh you know it's a game that doesn't actually matter and uh the houston astros games certainly don't actually matter and really none of these games actually matter so yeah sure go for it i'm all for it yeah i hope it happens just because i want to see it i don't know that i would feel that way if i worked in the astros front office but maybe i would because it's a distraction from how bad the rest of the esters are right now what would his era be if he pitched next year uh if he pitched a full 2013 in the al

west I guess it would be yeah yeah exactly um gee I wouldn't see it being under five certainly definitely I wouldn't see it under five I would be kind of impressed if it were under five, certainly. I wouldn't see it under five. I would be kind of impressed if it were near five, honestly, because he wasn't great the last time he pitched, which was five years ago. Who would you rather have as a reliever, him or Hisanoy Takahashi? I guess in a single outing I guess I might take Clemens at this point over a full season I don't

think he could hold up my topic tomorrow if you want to start preparing for it is just naming players and asking who you would rather have him or Clemens okay yeah because I mean he pitched in 2007 and of course it was the AL East but in in 100 innings or so, he struck out at about six and walked about three. You figure he's five years older now, or would be six years older next year, and coming off a long layoff, I can't say he's doing well at all. I can't say he's doing well at all. He did, but the year before that, he had a 2.30 ERA. And you know that we don't follow trend lines, Ben. We know about things like regression. And I mean, I don't know.

We could look it up, but I bet you his Pocota projection in 2008 was better than he was in 2007. Yeah, that could be. And I'm sure his Pocota projection now is just horrible. Well, why don't we have one? No, I remember Jamie Moyer gave Pocota fits at the beginning of last season since there were just no comparables. I think we need to run a million simulations of Roger Clemens against Barry Bonds right now. Okay. I will instant message Colin Myers and get it. Thank you. I'll see you later, Ben.

Okay. This has been episode 29. We will be back for more shows the rest of the week.