Reilly
02-22-2005, 11:57 PM
PHOENIX – Jason Kendall (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=5562) bears the relaxed, liberated look of a man who's just received his "Get out of Bradenton Free" card. After nine straight losing seasons in Pittsburgh, he looks dapper in Oakland green and gold, and ready to contribute to a winner in any way he can.
Kendall's mission in Oakland is two-fold: 1) The Athletics want him to play up to his career standard and get on base at a clip of .390 or thereabouts; and 2) they'd like him to spend the next eight months doing a mind-meld with their pitching staff.
Even though Kendall is known primarily as an offensive catcher, he takes pride in his defense. He is, after all, the son of a catcher, and aware of the cerebral shortcomings of the men who stand 60 feet, 6 inches away.
"Pitchers are really out there," Kendall said, "so you don't want them to think. You want to do the thinking for them, because they're not very bright. That's just my opinion."
In Oakland, the pitchers are bright enough to know they'll spend a big chunk of spring training fielding questions about whether this team can win without Tim Hudson (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6245) and Mark Mulder (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6393) at the top of the rotation. While that's preferable to inquiries about Jose Canseco's book, leaked grand jury testimony or the pluses and minuses of Alex Rodriguez (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=5275), the routine still has the potential to get old in a hurry.
Soon the focus will shift to holdover Barry Zito (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6394) and whether he's ready, at 26, to rediscover his 23-5, Cy Young Award form of 2002. The A's claim they're confident Zito is up to the challenge, even though his 11-11 record and 4.48 ERA a year ago weren't exactly inspiring.
The hard part is figuring out what to expect from the rest of Oakland's precocious staff. Judging from the youthful makeup of the rotation in the 2-5 spots, Zito might not be the only one carrying stuffed animals with him on the road this season:
Rich Harden (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7180), at 23, throws in the upper 90s and is the classic power pitcher. Harden was Oakland's best starter after the All-Star break last season, but went only 11-7 because of a bad bullpen and a lack of run support. His 13 no-decisions were two short of Ron Darling's club record.
Joe Blanton (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7461) grew up like all boys in Kentucky, with the whimsical notion that he might one day play basketball for the Wildcats. But reality quickly intervened. "I couldn't jump and I couldn't shoot," Blanton, 24, said. "That was my downfall in basketball." So he played baseball at Kentucky with Brandon Webb (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7121), went to Oakland in the first round of the "Moneyball" draft, and has spent the past three years refining the command of the four pitches in his repertoire. Blanton has 344 strikeouts and only 70 walks as a pro.
Dan Meyer (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7426), 23, comes from New Jersey and James Madison University, and has a fondness for golf when he's not playing baseball. His former team, Atlanta, is known for making the right calls on which prospects to keep and which ones to discard (with Jason Schmidt (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=5340) being the notable exception). Time will tell if John Schuerholz made the correct call by packaging Meyer for Hudson.
Danny Haren (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7172), 23, is a Southern California kid out of Pepperdine. He throws a sinking fastball and a splitter, and he showed he's not fazed by pressure by pitching 3 2/3 shutout innings for St. Louis in Game 1 of the World Series while the rest of his teammates were getting torched in an 11-9 loss to the Red Sox.
It took chutzpah for GM Billy Beane to trade Mulder and Hudson in the same winter, but he knew it was a long shot to sign either pitcher to a long-term contract, so the double-barreled deals seemed like a sensible way not to prolong the pain. The biggest factor linking Meyer and Haren – other than their lack of service time and reasonable price – is their propensity for throwing the ball over the plate.
Meyer has whiffed 382 batters and walked 88 in three professional seasons. Last year Haren went 11-4 with 150 strikeouts and 33 walks for Triple-A Memphis. As any sharp baseball executive knows, pitchers with high strikeout totals take luck, defense and other variables out of play, and pitchers with low walk totals make for happy, well-adjusted, gainfully-employed managers.
"When you're a young pitcher and you're not walking guys, you're going to make the other team beat you," Beane said. "It's not rocket science."
Beane plans to talk with all the young pitchers early in spring training, and the message will be the same: Keep pounding the strike zone, and don't be afraid of contact. Your stuff is good enough to win at this level. If you trust it and keep on doing what you've been doing, you'll be fine.
"Are they going to be Hudson and Mulder right off the bat?" Beane said. "No. But Mulder wasn't Mulder his first year, either. He had a five-plus ERA." Mulder was 9-10 with a 5.44 ERA, to be precise, before breaking through as a 20-game winner in his second year.
The inevitable growth pains at the front end of the staff prompted Beane to fortify his bullpen by adding Kiko Calero (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7115) from St. Louis in the Mulder deal and acquiring Juan Cruz (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6783) from Atlanta in the Hudson trade. Calero held opponents to a .176 average last year, and Cruz threw 72 innings and made significant progress, even though Atlanta manager Bobby Cox helped by limiting his exposure to high-pressure situations.
The new relievers will join Ricardo Rincon (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=5757), Chad Bradford (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6061) and Justin Duchscherer (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6767) as part of Oakland's middle-setup contingent. The depth of the pen will give Oakland manager Ken Macha the luxury of not having to push his starters, and put less of a strain on closer Octavio Dotel (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6111), who pitched more than an inning eight times after joining the A's from Houston by trade in June.
Although Beane doesn't pretend that Oakland's bullpen has the same anxiety-producing potential as Anaheim's killer Frankie Rodriguez-Brendan Donnelly (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6840)-Troy Percival (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=5315) contingent of a couple of years ago, he's trying to cultivate that same shutdown mentality in Oakland. "If you have guys who are good and can throw multiple innings, it's quite a weapon," Beane said. "It's intimidating."
The wild cards in the equation are Huston Street and Jairo Garcia (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7401), who have a chance to force their way into the picture with impressive springs, but could just as easily begin the season in Triple-A.
When pitching coach Curt Young talks about acquainting Oakland's young pitchers with the "A's way," he's talking primarily about an organizational throwing program that's been devised to keep pitchers healthy and productive. But this spring will be about more than long-toss and side sessions. Geezers like David Wells (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=4057), Tom Glavine (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=4122) and Al Leiter (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=4130) can tinker away in spring training and ignore the results, but the A's want their kids to build confidence with success against hitters they'll be facing during the regular season. In this respect, the Cactus League box scores out of Phoenix will be a little more relevant than in some places.
Once the season starts, the A's will pick their spots in letting Meyer, Haren and Blanton work out of jams. "It's hard to tell any pitcher, 'OK, you've pitched well for five innings and now you're done,'" Young said. "We'll get reads off personalities and body language, and we'll learn about guys when we feel it's time for them to come out of the game."
If the A's plan to contend in the American League West, the kids will have to assert themselves quickly. Get beyond the front five, and Macha's main options are journeyman Seth Etherton (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6479) and 36-year-old Japanese righty Keiichi Yabu. The lack of depth in the rotation is every bit as pronounced as the dearth of experience.
Still, Kendall is upbeat about his new team's prospects. After reading newspaper accounts, poring over statistical profiles and doing a little reconnaissance on the new guys, Kendall is convinced they're for real. "They're capable of a lot of special things," Kendall said. "They're capable of taking this team to another level."
Dotel, Oakland's energetic closer, seconds that emotion. He's gone from disappointed over the departure of Mulder and Hudson to intrigued by the adventure that lies ahead. "When the trades happened, I felt a little bit bad," Dotel said. "But now we have to move forward with what we've got. And what we've got is pretty good."
Kendall's mission in Oakland is two-fold: 1) The Athletics want him to play up to his career standard and get on base at a clip of .390 or thereabouts; and 2) they'd like him to spend the next eight months doing a mind-meld with their pitching staff.
Even though Kendall is known primarily as an offensive catcher, he takes pride in his defense. He is, after all, the son of a catcher, and aware of the cerebral shortcomings of the men who stand 60 feet, 6 inches away.
"Pitchers are really out there," Kendall said, "so you don't want them to think. You want to do the thinking for them, because they're not very bright. That's just my opinion."
In Oakland, the pitchers are bright enough to know they'll spend a big chunk of spring training fielding questions about whether this team can win without Tim Hudson (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6245) and Mark Mulder (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6393) at the top of the rotation. While that's preferable to inquiries about Jose Canseco's book, leaked grand jury testimony or the pluses and minuses of Alex Rodriguez (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=5275), the routine still has the potential to get old in a hurry.
Soon the focus will shift to holdover Barry Zito (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6394) and whether he's ready, at 26, to rediscover his 23-5, Cy Young Award form of 2002. The A's claim they're confident Zito is up to the challenge, even though his 11-11 record and 4.48 ERA a year ago weren't exactly inspiring.
The hard part is figuring out what to expect from the rest of Oakland's precocious staff. Judging from the youthful makeup of the rotation in the 2-5 spots, Zito might not be the only one carrying stuffed animals with him on the road this season:
Rich Harden (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7180), at 23, throws in the upper 90s and is the classic power pitcher. Harden was Oakland's best starter after the All-Star break last season, but went only 11-7 because of a bad bullpen and a lack of run support. His 13 no-decisions were two short of Ron Darling's club record.
Joe Blanton (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7461) grew up like all boys in Kentucky, with the whimsical notion that he might one day play basketball for the Wildcats. But reality quickly intervened. "I couldn't jump and I couldn't shoot," Blanton, 24, said. "That was my downfall in basketball." So he played baseball at Kentucky with Brandon Webb (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7121), went to Oakland in the first round of the "Moneyball" draft, and has spent the past three years refining the command of the four pitches in his repertoire. Blanton has 344 strikeouts and only 70 walks as a pro.
Dan Meyer (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7426), 23, comes from New Jersey and James Madison University, and has a fondness for golf when he's not playing baseball. His former team, Atlanta, is known for making the right calls on which prospects to keep and which ones to discard (with Jason Schmidt (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=5340) being the notable exception). Time will tell if John Schuerholz made the correct call by packaging Meyer for Hudson.
Danny Haren (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7172), 23, is a Southern California kid out of Pepperdine. He throws a sinking fastball and a splitter, and he showed he's not fazed by pressure by pitching 3 2/3 shutout innings for St. Louis in Game 1 of the World Series while the rest of his teammates were getting torched in an 11-9 loss to the Red Sox.
It took chutzpah for GM Billy Beane to trade Mulder and Hudson in the same winter, but he knew it was a long shot to sign either pitcher to a long-term contract, so the double-barreled deals seemed like a sensible way not to prolong the pain. The biggest factor linking Meyer and Haren – other than their lack of service time and reasonable price – is their propensity for throwing the ball over the plate.
Meyer has whiffed 382 batters and walked 88 in three professional seasons. Last year Haren went 11-4 with 150 strikeouts and 33 walks for Triple-A Memphis. As any sharp baseball executive knows, pitchers with high strikeout totals take luck, defense and other variables out of play, and pitchers with low walk totals make for happy, well-adjusted, gainfully-employed managers.
"When you're a young pitcher and you're not walking guys, you're going to make the other team beat you," Beane said. "It's not rocket science."
Beane plans to talk with all the young pitchers early in spring training, and the message will be the same: Keep pounding the strike zone, and don't be afraid of contact. Your stuff is good enough to win at this level. If you trust it and keep on doing what you've been doing, you'll be fine.
"Are they going to be Hudson and Mulder right off the bat?" Beane said. "No. But Mulder wasn't Mulder his first year, either. He had a five-plus ERA." Mulder was 9-10 with a 5.44 ERA, to be precise, before breaking through as a 20-game winner in his second year.
The inevitable growth pains at the front end of the staff prompted Beane to fortify his bullpen by adding Kiko Calero (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7115) from St. Louis in the Mulder deal and acquiring Juan Cruz (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6783) from Atlanta in the Hudson trade. Calero held opponents to a .176 average last year, and Cruz threw 72 innings and made significant progress, even though Atlanta manager Bobby Cox helped by limiting his exposure to high-pressure situations.
The new relievers will join Ricardo Rincon (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=5757), Chad Bradford (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6061) and Justin Duchscherer (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6767) as part of Oakland's middle-setup contingent. The depth of the pen will give Oakland manager Ken Macha the luxury of not having to push his starters, and put less of a strain on closer Octavio Dotel (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6111), who pitched more than an inning eight times after joining the A's from Houston by trade in June.
Although Beane doesn't pretend that Oakland's bullpen has the same anxiety-producing potential as Anaheim's killer Frankie Rodriguez-Brendan Donnelly (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6840)-Troy Percival (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=5315) contingent of a couple of years ago, he's trying to cultivate that same shutdown mentality in Oakland. "If you have guys who are good and can throw multiple innings, it's quite a weapon," Beane said. "It's intimidating."
The wild cards in the equation are Huston Street and Jairo Garcia (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=7401), who have a chance to force their way into the picture with impressive springs, but could just as easily begin the season in Triple-A.
When pitching coach Curt Young talks about acquainting Oakland's young pitchers with the "A's way," he's talking primarily about an organizational throwing program that's been devised to keep pitchers healthy and productive. But this spring will be about more than long-toss and side sessions. Geezers like David Wells (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=4057), Tom Glavine (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=4122) and Al Leiter (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=4130) can tinker away in spring training and ignore the results, but the A's want their kids to build confidence with success against hitters they'll be facing during the regular season. In this respect, the Cactus League box scores out of Phoenix will be a little more relevant than in some places.
Once the season starts, the A's will pick their spots in letting Meyer, Haren and Blanton work out of jams. "It's hard to tell any pitcher, 'OK, you've pitched well for five innings and now you're done,'" Young said. "We'll get reads off personalities and body language, and we'll learn about guys when we feel it's time for them to come out of the game."
If the A's plan to contend in the American League West, the kids will have to assert themselves quickly. Get beyond the front five, and Macha's main options are journeyman Seth Etherton (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=6479) and 36-year-old Japanese righty Keiichi Yabu. The lack of depth in the rotation is every bit as pronounced as the dearth of experience.
Still, Kendall is upbeat about his new team's prospects. After reading newspaper accounts, poring over statistical profiles and doing a little reconnaissance on the new guys, Kendall is convinced they're for real. "They're capable of a lot of special things," Kendall said. "They're capable of taking this team to another level."
Dotel, Oakland's energetic closer, seconds that emotion. He's gone from disappointed over the departure of Mulder and Hudson to intrigued by the adventure that lies ahead. "When the trades happened, I felt a little bit bad," Dotel said. "But now we have to move forward with what we've got. And what we've got is pretty good."