Potpourri

by John Sickels on Apr 10, 2025 2:02 PM EDT Comment 3 comments

**The Nick Adenhart thing was like a punch in the gut. Although I didn't see the last game he pitched, I saw him pitch several times in the minors, and of course had been following his career since he was in high school. I seemed to be something of a curse for Adenhart: every time I saw him pitch in the minors, he got hit hard. His numbers last year in Triple-A were not impressive, and those two factors led me to give him a very cautious review in the book this year. But his natural talent was very evident this spring, and his great start against Oakland clearly showed what he was capable of when everything was working. The whole thing is so senseless, three lives snuffed out in such a pointless way. If anything good can come of this, perhaps it can make someone out there THINK before taking that extra drink, getting behind the wheel, and wiping out more innocent lives.

You can find excellent coverage about the Adenhart situation at Halos Heaven, particularly this heartfelt essay.

**With all attention focused on the Adenhart tragedy, Rick Porcello's major league debut has kind of gotten lost in the shuffle. He wasn't great, but he wasn't awful. Minor League Notebook has a terrific scouting report using Pitch F/X data. It pretty much matches the reports we had on him this spring and in the minors: low-90s sinker topping out at 94, erratic but promising secondary pitches, not a lot of swings and misses. This just confirms what we already knew about him.

**The minor league season gets going this weekend. On Monday I will start making daily updates at Rotowire about minor league players, and we'll certainly have more to talk about here. I'll have some Crystal Balls coming up shortly. Health issues have kept me from doing any traveling so far this spring, but I'm hopeful that will be changing too. I'm going to try and see some college baseball down in Oklahoma in addition to the minor league stuff.

**What does it say about human nature that the thread about Dumb Roster Moves generated over 100 comments, but the thread about Good Roster Moves has fewer than 20 so far? Do major league teams make more dumb moves than smart ones, or are we as fans just negative people who like to criticize?

**As you know I tend to be conservative about promoting prospects too quickly, but I'm intrigued with the Cubs assigning Jay Jackson, one of my sleepers for this year, to Double-A Tennessee. A year ago he was pitching for Furman, earning a ninth round spot in the draft, but he's been super-impressive as a pro and has rapidly emerged as one of Chicago's best prospects, on the strength of his 90-95 MPH fastball, slider, curveball, and changeup. I'm glad I shadow-drafted him. His assignment to Tennessee is aggressive and indicates how highly the Cubs think of him.

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There's only really 2 (or 8) winners?

The most black and white view of Roster moves is that you made good ones if you make the playoffs and/or World Series, and that anything less mean you could have done something more.

This makes sense - teams that don’t make the playoffs will have more players that didn’t perform as well as playoff teams. Could someone else have played better instead of them?

by unspider on Apr 10, 2025 5:41 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

What a start

to a year… so many things going so many different directions. I watched some of Adenhart’s last start and when I saw that breaking news banner on CBS the other morning, it was indeed a punch in the gut. I have also followed him since HS and he’s been one I’ve kept a close eye on ever since. I’ve defended him quite a bit over the years on this site and am sad that he will never get the chance to prove his meddle, let alone live long enough to get married, have kids and enjoy retirement as a former major leaguer. I can’t imagine what was going through his dad’s mind the next day as he sat on the pitcher mound.

I also took notice of the disparity between the 2 “GM moves” threads. I’ve always been outspoken here about thoroughly HATING arm chair GM’s / coaches and this just fans those flames for me. Everyone thinks they’re a Goddamn expert. I understand there is such a thing as criticism/analysis, but much of what gets posted about management goes well beyond that into mindless-hot-air-bullshit. If these many of these people were actually doing well-reasoned analysis in place of spewing to hear themselves talk, the balance between the two threads would be a lot more reasonable.

RIP Nick…

by slurve on Apr 10, 2025 5:42 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Dumb vs. Smart

John, you bring up something interesting about Dumb vs. Smart moves. I don’t think it’s that teams only make dumb moves. I think a better way to put it is Dumb Moves vs. Risky Moves That Worked. Why? Because all the obvious, no-brainer moves are smart moves, but we don’t acknowledge them. The Cardinals putting Albert Pujols on their roster and in the middle of the lineup is quite clearly the smart thing to do (whereas cutting him or trading him to the Cubs for a rookie ball 5th OF would be dumb). But it’s also what anybody with half a brain would do, so it’s not really worth mentioning. It’s kinda like how nobody points out all the times they got your order right at McDonald’s. It’s just not notable when people go, basically, by the book and do well. People aren’t being overly negative; it’s just that smart moves are far less notable most of the time (especially a week into the season).

by thejd44 on Apr 13, 2025 4:55 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs