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Monday, June 07, 2004

HEADING BACK EAST

Ugly wins still count. Hopefully, the Sox start playing better on Tuesday because the Padres and Dodgers are tough. The Rockies and Giants at home are not creampuffs either but those clubs will be addressed next week. (I didn’t setup any NL team Q&A’s for the first installment of inter-league play. El Guapo’s Ghost has been busy. The first part of the Red Sox assessment should be posted tomorrow.)

The Padres and Dodgers come to town this week to start inter-league play. The clubs share the top spot in the NL West. L.A. has a run differential of 23 runs and S.D.’s is 16. Both clubs are, basically, meeting their Pythagorean Projection.

Each team is averaging 4.5 runs per game ranking 11th and 12th in the NL. S.D. is ranked 4th with a 341 OBP and L.A. is 7th at 335. Despite playing in a pitcher’s park, L.A. ranks 5th with in SLG at 428 while S.D. is 15th at 387. The Padres home ballpark’s spacious outfield, most notably 385 to right-center, has a lot to do with their deflated SLG. The Padres road SLG is 427 versus 342 at home. Don’t let the numbers fool you; the Padres have a strong lineup top to bottom with no automatic outs. Brian Giles is the man for the Padres and one of the most underrated hitters in the game. (The Giles for Rincon deal should be compared to the Bagwell-Anderson deal as one of the most lopsided deals of all-time.)

On the other hand, the Dodgers are being carried by the reemergence of Paul LoDuca (363/405/487) and Adrian Beltre (307/335/561) both of whom will be free agents after this season. Milton Bradley is hitting as expected (hopefully, his suspension will kick in over the weekend), but Shawn Green is struggling (228/329/391) and Juan Encarnacion has performed even worse than SABR folks projected. The saving grace of the Dodgers is that Izturis, Alex Cora and Dave Roberts all have OBPs above 350. Unfortunately for Dodger fans, Roberts is the only one likely to end the season with an OBP of 350.

The Sox are scheduled to face David “Fat Ass” Wells tomorrow, Joey Lawerence, and former Sox property, Dennis Tankersley in the finally. Wells is just coming off the DL, which could explain his poor peripheral numbers over 50 innings – 16 strikeouts, seven walks, and six tall jacks. If Wells doesn’t have command of his curveball and Tito doesn’t write in the B-team, Wells might not make it pass the fifth inning. Lawerence is becoming the typical #2 on a contending club – 200+ innings with a low 4 ERA – not “must see T.V.” but a vital component to a winning team. The Tank will be making his third start of the season and only the 13 of his career so who knows. The Sox will need to put runs up early because the pen, unlike the NBA playoffs, has been fantastic. Hoffman is healthy and back to his old self. Otsuka has dominated as the primary setup guy by K-ing 34 while walking nine in 28.1 innings. Former MFYs Witasick and Osuna are averaging a strikeout per innings and Rob “I just know who to get outs” Beck is back from the DL.

As good as S.D.’s pen is L.A.’s maybe better because of Montreal native, Eric Gagne. He is just sick. Let’s hope he doesn’t get into a game this weekend. The pitchers leading to Gagne - Dreifort, Mota, etc. – all have their faults so Jim Tracy’s usage is important. As it stands now, the Sox should get Jeff Weaver, Odalis Perez and a starter to be named later. Perez requested to be pushed back to face the Sox. Perez is putting up peripheral numbers similar to his last two seasons. O.P. will be a tough assignment for the Sox LHB and RHB should try to take him to right. Weaver’s numbers compare to his good days in Detroit. Without watching Weaver, it is difficult to make any kind of assessment of his performance (Q&A is handy here).

These series should be interesting. I’ll be at Fenway on Saturday. Over the winter, I was planning on making it to San Fran next weekend, but tickets were impossible. Denver during the week is a tough. It is always fun to watch the Sox in a new/N.L. park. MLB schedulers take note – the Sox in Arizona and San Diego next year would be a great vacation.

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