Ken Griffey, Jr., traded to White Sox

[Invader3K]

Considering the team is playing massively over it's head atm

I guess they've been playing over their heads for the whole season then? They're 14 games over .500, you know.

 

[TooLiveBrew]

Not sure what Ennder thinks but teams playing over their heads the whole season (or mostly) isn't unheard of.

[BCZF]

FJM has a take on the Mike Downey reporting of Jr's trade:

 

http://www.firejoemorgan.com/

[trwi7]

FJM has a take on the Mike Downey reporting of Jr's trade:

 

http://www.firejoemorgan.com/

 

2:18 PM: Downey smurfs the Weird under close supervision from Greenhorn and two Chicago-based FBI agents whose domestic terror-alert system has mis-identified Downey's computer's IP address as the possible epicenter of an internet-based terror attack.

These guys need to write for the Tribune.http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/laugh.gif

 

 

[snyttri]

Not sure what Ennder thinks but teams playing over their heads the whole season (or mostly) isn't unheard of.

I don't think it's possible for a team to play over it's head for a whole season. A team, unlike a player, only exists for one season and is a product of team chemistry. If a team plays very well for the whole season then that was the level of that team. Not what the numbers might have predicted.

 

[TooLiveBrew]

I don't think it's possible for a team to play over it's head for a whole season.

 

I mean no disrespect, but it's not only possible... it happens nearly every season.

 

 

A team, unlike a player, only exists for one season and is a product of team chemistry.

 

A team is constituted of those players. So if multiple players play over their heads, that certainly leads to a team playing over its 'talent head'.

[Invader3K]

Or sometimes the projections are just wrong and a team performs better than was anticipated due to x, y, and z factors.

[TooLiveBrew]

Yes, factors, like players performing above their talent level. There's nothing wrong with saying that about a player -- I don't know why some people find that so offensive. Braun played way over his head in 2007 for a long stretch, and esp. against LHP. J.J. Hardy played over his head for a big stretch this season. It happens for every team.

[rluzinski]

Whole teams under and over perform every year and that can be completely independent of their players' overall numbers. A player can be known for having a knack for getting that big hit when his team needs him one year and be the goat the next. It should be obvious that at least some luck is involved.

 

Nothing wrong with that. Luck makes sports exciting.

[logan82]

MLB LF .273/.343/.445/.788

MLB RF .267/.342/.442/.784

AL DH .251/.337/.427/.764

Griffey .249/.358/.432/.790

 

Don't know what they traded, but I think they traded for an average player. I can see why Dusty would have wanted to get rid of him as his stats look like a base clogger to me.

[danzig6767]

Yes, factors, like players performing above their talent level. There's nothing wrong with saying that about a player -- I don't know why some people find that so offensive. Braun played way over his head in 2007 for a long stretch, and esp. against LHP. J.J. Hardy played over his head for a big stretch this season. It happens for every team.

 

 

I don't doubt that some players have years where they likely won't be sustained in future seasons, but when i look at the numbers for the White Sox, i see quite a few of their major contributors this year being guys with a history of performing well. They do have two young starters having great years and i'd assume better than Williams would have hoped for, but both guys were top 10 picks with great arms and stuff, they just hadn't put it together prior to this year. It certainly isn't very rare for young pitchers with great arms to need some time before their performance matches their stuff. We'll see in future years if Danks and Floyd are just having an aberration season or if they really are just young arms who needed experience and they will continue being good starters going forward. Plus, the White Sox have a few guys in Swisher and especially Konerko that have struggled.

I just fail to see where they are massively playing over their heads

[snyttri]

It makes sense to say a player has played over his head for a whole season because the season can be an anomaly, like Norm Cash's career year (Cash).

 

However a team is assembled differently every year to work well together. Unlike with a player who will be the same player next year the particular combination of veterans, rookies and acquisitions will never appear in another season. So its team performance can't be an anomaly. Even if baseball is the most individual of team sports there is more to it than a collection of individual stats. If a lot of the players have good years it could be attributed to the way the team was put together that year. If CC pitches over a season's worth of complete games in less than half a season here it might be attributable to the circumstances rather than being just a statistical anomaly.

 

Assuming that championships by someone other than the usual suspects are traceable to players playing over their heads rather than baseball people seizing on unique opportunities seems to me to elevate projections above reality. If a team wins 100 games and a World Series then it would seem that the season determined how good it was, not how the individual players careers rank against the players of other championship teams. If so many players have good years together that the team has a historic season it may not be just a coincidence. Every championship team contains some impressive statistical oddities. It could be exceptional team chemistry causing players to do surprising things. And not as much a collection of surprisingly good seasons with the happy coincidence of a championship.

 

Player's values are determined by their careers, so one outstanding year can be discounted. Because a team is assembled year by year to win a championship it doesn't seem to make sense to discount one team's season for what a different collection of players failed to accomplish.

[endaround]

Its funny you think that while talking about teh White Sox because when teh White Sox won teh series, their entire pitching staff over achieved and it had nothing to do with how they were assembled. Its luck that the entire bullpen pitched like Eckersley in his prime.

[snyttri]

It was quite a stroke of luck that Garcia and McCarthy turned into Danks and Floyd. Ken Williams should get out of the player evaluation business and move to Las Vegas.

 

Sure there's some luck involved, but give some credit for identifying which players have a good year in them, which have potential and which are washed up. The Brewers have not gone so long without seeing the layoffs by bad luck and turning youngsters and washed up players into players at their peaks capable of having big years who complement each other is a little more than luck.

[danzig6767]

I remember quite a few people making mocking comments about Williams early in his tenure and saying he'd be terrible, but he's done a great job since taking over the White Sox.