2010 Long Beach Surfers

[agrudez]

Offseason
After a 99 win season and playoff berth, coupled with a team salary over 100M before FA even began, few thought the Surfers would be an active participant this offseason – and that majority would have been right.

Subtractions:
Richard Wilcox – released
Carlos Daniel – released
Carl Workman – released
Rye Kelly – retired
Dave Santry – lost to FA
Sam Jones – lost to FA
Louis-Emile Boucher – lost to Rule 5 draft
Ethan Morgan – lost to Rule 5 draft
Ryan Morris – lost to Rule 5 draft

Additions:
Raulo Mora – 1 year, 1.9M FA
Arthur Bennett – 1 year, 900K FA
Ramon Cabral – claimed off waivers
Asdrubal Fernandez – claimed off waivers

Overall:
With the exception of Mora (whom could, surprisingly, find himself [as a ‘4’ at SS] in a late game defensive replacement role next season (help!])), LBC did not add to their upcoming roster in a tangible way this offseason; however, the impact of losing Wilcox is still as of yet unknown. While the Surfers’ long time OFer had a very down year last season (nearly 200 OPS points under his career average), his defense will be very hard to replace – particularly on a roster as devoid of quality gloves as Long Beach finds themselves (though he still couldn’t have taught their infield how to block a ball).

2010 Outlook
Pitching:
The LB rotation is 4 deep yet again this year as long time veterans Schmidt (4.1 ERA last season), Buckley (5.42 ERA), Vazquez (4.37 ERA) and Bhatia (4.29 ERA) attempt to hold it together despite, possibly, the most porous infield defense in the entire league since whomever LB trots out each 5th day [with the early lead going to Justin Mishap (er… Freudian slip, his last name is actually Milsap) despite harsh ratings lumps this offseason] will be the definition of AAAA quality. Meanwhile, at least their ‘pen will be on lock down as Chris Malone and Neil Huggins reprise their roles in the 9th and 8th innings respectively.

Batting:
Despite the question marks surrounding their infield gloves and exclamation point following around the ‘battle’ for their 5th starter spot heading into the season, the Surfers still have a scary good team because of the lumber that their lineup wields. In fact, their lineup is so good that a potential all-star batmay begin the 2010 season riding the pine! Veritable locks for the opening day lineup include: Guzman at 1B, Morales at 3B, Heredia at CF, Bowers at C, O’Herlihy in RF/LF, Tippett at 2B and Everitt at SS (help!). This will leave a battle royale between Alvarez and Newton for the last corner OF spot – with the losing then being forced to face off against Barfoot for the DH spot. Either way, one of those 3 big bats are not making the opening day lineup for this team… certainly a good problem to have! Of course, perhaps having a loaded bench will help once the extreme bouts of whiplash start to overload their DL…

Overall:
All joking aside, there are many teams in this league with terrible defenses and AAAA 5th starters, but not a single one comes ANYWHERE near the Surfers’ offense. This team will live and die by the production of their big bats – and my money is on them having a very long lifespan this upcoming season.

Long Beach prediction: 90 wins, -5 behind LV for the division crown, but winning the WC

[bschr682]

Personally I would start both Alvarez and Newton and have O’Herlihy as the 4th OF.

[agrudez]

Personally I would start both Alvarez and Newton and have O’Herlihy as the 4th OF.

I suppose a case could be made, but then Heredia would be the only competent fielder (a '5' 1B, '5' 2B, '2' SS, '5' 3B and then you would downgrade a '10' to a '6' in RF) in his entire lineup... I wonder how long it would take before all of his starters with .38 BABIPs start asking for trades? Of course... if they all are 20 game winners despite 5+ ERAs I suppose the Jack Morris effect would take hold.

[bschr682]

I'd sit O’Herlihy because, while I agree he is the better defender, if you are playing with that bad of a defense then just go all the way. If you are gonna punt defense, then punt defense. 1 better corner outfielder isn't gonna make a significant difference in my opinion.

[Al-Hoot]

Mishap.... lol

[recte44]

-5 behind Las Vegas? You must know something that OOTP doesn't.

[jcrmoon42]

Thanks for the writeup. There will be some platooning in the OF with O'Herlihy starting against lefties and coming in as a defensive replacement. Alvarez is likely to play versus righties, and Newton will probably come off the bench regularly. Barfoot will play first with Guzman at DH. As for the infield defense, you've got it right. I'm not too worried about it with this lineup. I've got a couple of guys such as Dicus who do good glovework who will come in to replace whoever is playing short.

The issue really is the starting rotation. Not excited about any of the options and am open to trading an outfielder for a starting pitcher. Nobody seems to be willing to get rid of anybody worth anything, however.

[agrudez]

The issue really is the starting rotation.

Your rotation was actually pretty good last year, they were just heavily let down by the gloves behind them.

-Schmidt had a 3.36 FIP and 4.1 ERA (.74 delta)
-Buckley had a 3.98 FIP and 5.42 ERA (1.44 delta!)
-Vazquez had a 4 FIP and 4.19 ERA (.19 delta)
-Bhatia had a 3.91 FIP and 4.29 ERA (.37 delta)
-Milsap had a 4.22 FIP and 4.87 ERA (.65 delta)

That is a theoretical loss of 0.678 ERA (without respect to weighting) from your rotation last season because of defense - staggering.

[Manny]

LB will have a field day hitting agaisnt Seattle so expect some big numbers.

[jcrmoon42]

That difference in ERA is truly stunning when you consider that I had the best defensive center fielder in the game and pretty consistently had a strong defensive outfield. Just goes to show what a defensively weak middle infield can do. That said, I had a very strong defense up the middle for several seasons, sacrificing some offense to do so, and had pretty much the same records as I did last year. Take one. Lose the other. Still results in a similar run differential. Now, if I can manage to have both offense AND defense, we will be in business.