Angelfaninidaho

With only Shoe, Skaggs and possibly Trop having any value. But then again those are the players that don't cost much and so because of that have value for the Angels.

 So Cowart Kubitza don't even have trade value? 

Those guys, plus AYBAR. And now we have nothing valuable to trade, unless we gut the team.

Cowart, Kubitza, Shoemaker, Tropeano, Skaggs, Bandy, Featherstone, Navarro, Gentry, Nava, Ortega..  all tradeable.  One or two won't gut the team.

33, new position. This isn't like shifting from center to a corner outfield position. Up the middle is the hardest to play. He has shown he can play the left side, has experience on the left side. Unless there is really compelling evidence that one of Cowart or Kubitza is a bonifide 3rd baseman you are ****ing up the infield to marginally improve defense at 2nd base while vastly changing the stability at 3rd.

Bingo

Claude you love the Simmons trade (I love Simmons), but it's exactly what you shouldn't like. If you want us to be the Astros or Royals you want to keep young arms like Newcomb who can be dominant and cheap. 

Isn't Simmons dominant and cheap?  The best shortstop in baseball for a long reasonable contract?

I don't that is it, Tdawg. I think the camp that doesn't like Giavotella because his one full year of playing showed some warts on defense has them almost rabid in every thread about replacing the guy. But the replacements are kind of ridiculous.

 

Escobar has never really played the right side of the infield so is expected is that a 33 year old "rookie" learns that position in one spring training and exceeds the combined production of other infield options. If you drop Escobar at 2nd you've committed to one of two rookies at third. So now you've chosen to put a player out of position up the middle and put a complete unknown to sink or swim on 3rd.

 

It is irresponsible fanboy/fangraph thinking that just take all the candidates and scramble their order and expect a better result. It is taking a bridge too far saying you can have trainees at two infield positions while you still have a possible hole at 1st base while Pujols recovers.

 

For me it is not about being a fanboy of Giavotella, although I do believe he has a higher upside than last season, but more of less of a fan of having Escobar replacing him while learning another way to move towards a play at 33 and blowing up because of age and muscle memory. Not when he has already logged and full season at 3rd.

 

Old dawgs, new tricks? No thanks. Let's just apprentice one of Cowart/Kubitza later in the season to take the position from Escobar in 2017. It's going to be difficult enough to create wins without throwing too many new positions at new players.

Exactly this..  And Escobar has an option for 2017, right?  Furthermore, using all of Tdong87's defensive fangraph stats, the following players are as bad or worse than Gia..  Zobrist, Kendrick, Owens, Lawrie, Walker, Shoop, Cano.  Pretty good company.

Uhhh what exactly are you reading? He was tied for dead last among second basemen in DRS with -12. His UZR was 2nd to last. His DEF was also 2nd to last.

 

Yes, he was godawful.

 Yeah, of course there were 15 or 16 other 2B players that don't qualify so where was he compared to all the teams you aren't paying attention to? 

Yeah I mean sure, if you didn't actually watch him play or look at any stats, then yeah he wasn't that bad.

 

You have a boner for Gia and it's kinda cute. Him and his little bat and his clutch hits.

I just don't hate him with the white hot passion you do.  I think he had an illness that directly affected his f*cking eyesight, which is important for a major league baseball player.  He won the position out of nowhere in Spring Training and was pretty clutch after being terrified that he may never play again.  I watched almost every game, I've seen his stats, and if Cowart OR Kubitza really stood out at all and, frankly didn't f*cking suck just as much as Featherston, I wouldn't care that much.  But you keep being you jackoff..

If you are going to stick to that frame of mind after its been explained to you multiple times why people say that, could you at least come back with an argument that takes what has been said into account?

This isn't like picking which free agent to sign. Neither player has been given enough of a shot to know what they are capable of at the mlb level. Both have potential. If we could pick one then there would be no question as to who our starting 3B would be and that is a reality we don't live in. Saying it's lazy to not pick one is like saying it's lazy to not know exactly what numbers Trout will pay next year. Nobody knows. That scenario still needs to play itself out.

Now, considering what I just said, why do you feel like people should pick one or the other?

First off, I don't think we should pick one or the other at all.  I think we have a legit 3rd baseman in Escobar and a semi-legit back up in Pennington.  So I don't even think 3rd is a priority.  But I understand that some people on this board will do anything to move Gia off 2nd base so this leaves room for Cowart and Kubitza to compete for a spot if Escobar moves.  Now last year when Freese went down Kubitza started 9 games at 3rd, had 2 errors in 20 total chances and batted .194 with a .256 OBP.  Cowart started 13 games and had 2 errors in 52 total chances and batted .174 with a .255 OBP.  Small sample, yes, but Gia is simply not bad enough at defense and is good enough on offense that "hoping" one of those two becomes vastly better just to replace Gia seems unnecessary.  Especially since Gia will be playing alongside Simmons and Escobar and has his "rookie" season under his belt.  

If they traded one of them for a high level 2nd base prospect and let that guy battle with Gia I would be fine, but improving average talent at 2nd for questionable (to date) talent at 3rd makes no sense to me.

"Cowart/Kubitza" is just this years "Rutledge/Green/Giovatella".

Just meaning that the job would be hp for grabs if Escobar moves to 2B. At least thats how i read it

So we are so done with Gia at 2nd that trying that again at 3rd, even with a legit major league 3rd baseman on the roster, is preferable?  Serious question.

"Cowart/Kubitza" is not an actual player under contract for the Angels. For all those that want to slide Escobar to 2B and replace Freese at 3B, you should at least be willing to propose one or the other. 

 

For a semi-anonymous internet board filled with random opinions, it seems lazy not to have one here. Make up your minds. Do you want to go with Kaleb Cowart or Kyle Kubitza at 3B?

THIS^^^^^^^

Trading Newcomb and Ellis for Simmons does not increase the talent level of the organization - it simply rearranges the talent we already have. In the long run maybe it does, maybe it doesn't, but we sold upside and future value for a sure thing today. Thus the organization is not improved. 

And the coaching?

It's January first and they have literally done nothing to increase the overall talent level of the organization. Sure we have an arguably better team right now, and there is still time for some bargain free agent shopping, but they have spent future talent to get no where thus far.

Despite the contradictory statements, SS, 3rd base and C are all better, SS defensively and the other two offensively.  Simmons increases the "talent level" of the org for a few years.  As far as the rest of organization, the coaching staff seems vastly improved.  Hopefully Disarcina is better at 1st then 3rd.  Hanson must be salivating for a legit LF'r but has been successful throughout his coaching career.  The team and organization is just plain better so far.

Felix is still young so he won't decline for a couple more years assuming he's healthy. Also Iannetta can't be as bad as last year. They are improved but they still have to play the games, so who knows what will happen.

I had no idea he was not yet 30!  Seems like he's been on the M's forever.  He has started over 30 games every year for 9 years in a row.  Total workhorse, but that's a hell of a lot of pitching.

The Mariners are vastly improved.

  You think so? Aoki was a very nice pick up.  Lind is really good, but Trumbo was right there last year.  And Iannetta is the most micro of micro upgrades at C.  Not sure they are vastly improved.  Felix has to start aging soon as well.

We are a better team now by a pretty far margin, a LF big name star would be a complete game changer and make us a contender.  An additional starter like Chen would put us over the top and make us a favorite.  Just ****ing do it!!!

You know, it's not a bad thing they have 2 guys that look promising as future 3B. Just because neither is a top 100 prospect and sure thing doesn't make it bad. It just means we have a better chance of someone working out. Kubitza has a higher floor, but lower ceiling. Cowart is the opposite. But nobody knows who it will be so for now it's just "kubitza and Cowart"

It's not a bad thing.  But it has been stated ad nauseum that we should throw "Kubitza and Cowart" at 3rd and move Escobar to 2nd.  Or not worry about replacing Freese so we can fix other positions by letting "Cowart and Kubitza" play 3rd.  It's just strange to me to be so concerned with some positions but be completely willing to relinquish 3rd base to two prospects.  Especially prospects that are apparently completely interchangeable and not inspiring enough to stand alone.   

We changed the 3B coach so we're good. More runs scored and less outs. We should see a +5 in wins this season.

Glad you agree, he really ****ing sucked.

"Kubitza and Cowart"

The changes in coaching, especially at 3rd base, is good for one or two wins as well.  And Escobar will be the second best offensive player on the team and improve their record by 3 wins.  There's 5 right there.  Simmons will give them 2 more with his defense. Perez and Soto, and the subtraction of Iannetta, will give them 3.  They'll win more games against the Royals, the Dodgers, the Giants and the Blue Jays than last year and we crushed our division other than the Astros last year, which will be more difficult this year, so maybe a wash there.  Heaney will be good and Santiago will settle down.  I'll split the difference and say we are 5 games better and a 90 win team without a major injury.  A top 3 LF gives us 93-95 wins and the West.

What does Cano have to do with any of this? I don't want Cano. Most people here don't.

 

What I want is at least an average second basemen. Giavotella is not that.

Using your metrics I found that Cano is a similar defensive player at 50x the money.  It was just an observation.  

Not really, no. They never have been. His DRS was -12 which was oddly enough tied with Howie Kendrick for dead last in the majors among second basemen. His UZR was 2nd worst in the majors among qualified second basemen.

 

Even if we use errors, he had the third most in baseball among 2B.

 

There is literally no statistic that makes Gia out to be anything more than a terrible defensive player.

OK.  Thanks for forcing me to figure out UZR and DRS.  Seriously, it was kind of interesting..  So essentially we have Gia who is 28 and makes $516,000 vs. a similar defensive 2nd baseman in Robinson Cano who is 34 and makes $24M.  Sounds good to me.

Well no. In fact, he was one of the worst defensive players in all of baseball.

Are errors still a defensive statistic?

They have treated it as such but they were entirely wrong to do so. 2B was and is away more pressing need than anything other than LF.

More than replacing Iannetta and our FA 3rd baseman?  That's just wrong.  Gia was Ted Williams compared to Iannetta last year and Freese is a FA.  They had to be replaced 2nd and 3rd.  At least we agree on the LF disaster being top priority.

It's firstly hard to believe this is a serious post and secondly that I'm using my time to debunk its nonsense, but here we go anyway.

Giavotella is not very good and 2B should be upgraded as our second largest priority.

 

It's our second largest priority now...  after we cleaned up the catcher position, replaced our FA 3rd basement, randomly added a better SS, and replaced an inept coaching staff.  And LF is still a total disaster, which I assume you are alluding to.  So really 2B was about 6th in order of importance.  Which seems about right.  

So our rookie 2B wasn't the best defensive player on the team and was one of the better offensively.  Great.  Our veteran catcher was the worst catcher in the MLB behind Seattle's and our veteran LF was a coke head a-hole who couldn't stay on the field.  

This guy doesn't deserve the BS he gets here..

"That's one of the more frustrating parts," Giavotella said. "I can't do anything to speed up the process. There's no toughening it out. I can't see. I'd like to think that I'm a fairly tough person and play through a lot of pain, but there's no going out there and toughing it through this kind of injury."

Giavotella woke up two weeks ago seeing double and "went into full panic mode." He laid back down hoping it would go away, then rushed to the hospital when it didn't. The Angels placed Giavotella on the disabled list on Aug. 24 but didn't reveal specifics of his illness, largely because of health-information privacy laws but also because doctors were still trying to figure out what was wrong.