The biggest problem with baseball operations management is a reliance on conventional wisdom and the tried-and-true methods. Moneyball and the Billy Beane/Paul DePodesta revolution of 2001-2002 helped to shed some light on how creative thinking could help improve teams with limited payrolls. The recent trend towards hiring younger general managers who aren’t bound by traditional methods has helped as well.
I bring this all up because Angels GM Bill Stoneman, a veritable dinosaur at the age of 62, optioned rookie pitcher Jered Weaver back to Triple-A Salt Lake City today in order to activate 2005 Cy Young Award winner Bartolo Colon. There’s certainly nothing wrong with making a roster move to bring back the reigning ace of a team’s pitching staff. But why should the rookie be the fall guy? Jered was 4-0/ 1.37 ERA/ 0.76 WHIP in his brief stay with the major league club. While I grant that three of his wins were against sub-par talent (Baltimore, Tampa, Kansas City), it doesn’t change the fact that was still winning in the big leagues.
When combined with his 2006 Triple-A stats, Weaver was 8-1/ 2.13 ERA/ 0.95 WHIP with 90 K in 88.1 IP (9.16 K/9). It’s pretty clear that Jered Weaver is ready for the show. So why is he being moved to clear room for Colon? Stoneman could’ve moved someone else (Hector Carrasco, Esteban Yan, or Jeff Weaver were all better candidates to pick on) instead of the younger Weaver. This highlights the problem with baseball operations management – namely that the old farts running most ballclubs no longer think critically about the game. They’d rather spare the veteran than go with the rookie. It happens all the time on the Yankees and it’s obvious that the Angels have the same misguided loyalty to older players when younger players can clearly do the job better.
The worst part of all this is that the Angels, a last place team in the AL West, are only 7 games behind the first place Oakland A’s. One would think that it would be more important to continue winning with a young phenom while they’re still technically in the race for their division…
I bring this all up because Angels GM Bill Stoneman, a veritable dinosaur at the age of 62, optioned rookie pitcher Jered Weaver back to Triple-A Salt Lake City today in order to activate 2005 Cy Young Award winner Bartolo Colon. There’s certainly nothing wrong with making a roster move to bring back the reigning ace of a team’s pitching staff. But why should the rookie be the fall guy? Jered was 4-0/ 1.37 ERA/ 0.76 WHIP in his brief stay with the major league club. While I grant that three of his wins were against sub-par talent (Baltimore, Tampa, Kansas City), it doesn’t change the fact that was still winning in the big leagues.
When combined with his 2006 Triple-A stats, Weaver was 8-1/ 2.13 ERA/ 0.95 WHIP with 90 K in 88.1 IP (9.16 K/9). It’s pretty clear that Jered Weaver is ready for the show. So why is he being moved to clear room for Colon? Stoneman could’ve moved someone else (Hector Carrasco, Esteban Yan, or Jeff Weaver were all better candidates to pick on) instead of the younger Weaver. This highlights the problem with baseball operations management – namely that the old farts running most ballclubs no longer think critically about the game. They’d rather spare the veteran than go with the rookie. It happens all the time on the Yankees and it’s obvious that the Angels have the same misguided loyalty to older players when younger players can clearly do the job better.
The worst part of all this is that the Angels, a last place team in the AL West, are only 7 games behind the first place Oakland A’s. One would think that it would be more important to continue winning with a young phenom while they’re still technically in the race for their division…
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