Mop Up Duty Mop Up Duty A Baseball Blog dedicated to answering the questions rarely asked. Main topics include fantasy baseball, sabermatics, forgotten leagues & players, expansion, bios, etc. Updated almost everyday! 
Articles
Travis Snider Not MLB Ready
2009-01-18 04:40:00 Travis Snider Not MLB Ready Travis Snider is not MLB ready at this point. The only reason that he was able to hit .301 in 2008 (and post his 800+ OPS) was due to his extremely lucky .417 BABIP. To put how lucky that BABIP was into perspective, Pujols career high BABIP is .340, Joe Mauer’s ... More About: Travis
International Baseball Links
2009-01-16 13:50:00 International Baseball Links We at Mop Up Duty have written fairly extensively on International Baseball and with the World Baseball Classic on the not-too-distant horizon, links pertaining to this subject are beginning to pop up around teh interwebz. The other day I was talking to my immigrant friend from the former Yugoslavia who was telling me they actually ... More About: International , Calman , Keith Law
Second Hypothetical 2009 HOF Ballot
2009-01-09 13:58:00 Second Hypothetical 2009 HOF Ballot Callum’s HOF ballot went yesterday. Now it’s time for my 2009 hypothetical HOF ballot. Leaving Off A few players could be on the button this year and in the future. One of these players is none other than Harold Baines. His overall career stats look pretty good (close to 3000 hits, 400 HR, ... More About: Commentary , Hall of Fame , Tim Raines
My Hypothetical Hall of Fame Ballot
2009-01-08 17:44:00 My Hypothetical Hall of Fame Ballot Since we are 4 days away from the Hall of Fame ballotting results, we at MUD.com thought we would throw up our ballots and maybe spark up a little controversy, if not at least some discussion. I’ll start it off. Bert ?Be Home? Blyleven: BB won 287 games - only one ... More About: Commentary , Calman
Henderson Hall Update
2009-01-07 21:37:00 Henderson Hall Update Not long ago I wrote a post on Rickey Henderson becoming possibly the first unanimous hall of fame entrant. Well, now we know this is not going to be the case. With a tip of the hat to ESPN’s Rob Neyer, BBWAA member Corky Simpson left Rickey off this year’s ballot. He does, ... More About: Commentary , Hall of Fame , Calman
Random Observations Jan 6th, 2009
2009-01-06 16:41:00 Random Observations Jan 6th, 2009 The Rays were able to sign Pat Burrell to a two-year, $16 million deal. The Phillies spring home is in clearwater and this supposedly had an effect in the negotiations. What a great signing from a valuation standpoint. Burrell has close to a .900 OPS over the past three seasons. He’s ... More About: Commentary , Random , Transactions , Toronto Blue Jays
Pre-Christmas Random Observations
2008-12-24 01:16:00 Pre-Christmas Random Observations Happy holidays! With the holidays upon us I’ve decided to take use this week as a trial of sorts. I’ll mix in some of my traditional stats based/research style posts with some more informal rant and train of thought posts. Random Observations This week one of baseball’s more controversial players passed away, all-star pitcher Dock ...
Ricky Romero in MLB in 2009? Give me a break!
2008-12-17 18:03:00 Ricky Romero in MLB in 2009? Give me a break! Opinion It seems like a few kind words from scouts and a few professional internet journalists have swayed public opinion on Romero. J.P. has also been turning on his usual spin cycle. Now across traditional and internet media Romero is considered a reformed prospect and a realistic ... More About: Break , Ricky
Best Free Agent Signings of 2009: Russell Branyan
2008-12-15 15:12:00 Best Free Agent Signings of 2009: Russell Branyan The Seattle Mariners December 3rd signing of Russell Branyan (one year contract at $1.4 million) kicks off this years edition of best free agent signings. Branyan is a left-handed power bat with less than desirable defense. While his D is below average, he is flexible enough to play at ... More About: Transactions
AJ?s Obituary
2008-12-13 15:14:00 AJ’s Obituary In today’s Star, Cathal Kelly absolutely nails it as he writes an obituary of sorts. In the article he reminisces on AJ’s time in Toronto and airs some dirty laundry that some of us may or may not know. Here is a telling quote: The Halladay/Burnett relationship existed, but was never as close as advertised. Burnett ... More About: Calman , Toronto Blue Jays
I Think We?re Alone Now
2008-12-13 03:37:00 I Think We’re Alone Now Ok. AJ has officially left us. What are we to do? JP’s used car lot is in full swing, buying an arm in Clement with 600,000+ km’s on it and trying to sell it back to Jays fans as good as new. Well he hasn’t done it yet, but he will. ...
Jays Sign Matt Clement - WTF?
2008-12-12 03:18:00 Jays Sign Matt Clement - WTF? J.P. has saved the day. In the vein of Thompson’s, Ohka’s and Zambrano’s, the Jays have signed a washed up pitcher to a contract. This time it’s a minor league deal for Matt Clement. Clement had a couple of decent seasons, namely 2002 - 2005. Since then he’s been hurt ... More About: Transactions , Toronto Blue Jays
HOF Recap & Jays Notes
2008-12-10 16:07:00 HOF Recap & Jays Notes Sherry Magee only received 25% of the Veteran’s committee votes (3 of 12) and thus fell short of the required 75% needed for inclusion. The only player selected for the HOF from the pre and post-1943 ballots was former Yankee and Indians second baseman Joe Gordon. Gordon was solid if not ... More About: Hall of Fame , Toronto Blue Jays
Sherry Magee Anecdotes
2008-12-07 03:48:00 Sherry Magee Anecdotes After writing Thursday’s article on voting Sherry Magee into the baseball hall of fame I came across a great biography piece by the SABR Bio Project. The entire article, written by Tom Simon, can be read here: Sherry Magee SABR Bio. I’ve borrowed some of the key points from the article, which are ... More About: Hall of Fame
Sherry Magee for 2008 HOF
2008-12-04 13:30:00 Sherry Magee for 2008 HOF Who he is Sherry Magee spent sixteen seasons in the major leagues, beginning his career in 1904 and ending it in 1919. He spent his prime seasons playing for the Philadelphia Phillies. During the first ten years of his career he was considered the second greatest offensive star in the National League, ... More About: Hall of Fame , Sabermetrics , Cooperstown
Unanimous Hall of Fame Entrant?
2008-12-02 13:23:00 Unanimous Hall of Fame Entrant? Not long ago Kman and I had a discussion about Greg Maddux’s career. I argued that Maddux was a candidate to be the first ever player inducted to the Hall of Fame with a unanimous vote. Surprisingly, this has never happened before - not even Cal Ripken received votes from 100% ... More About: Calman , Toronto Blue Jays
Vernon Wells Version ??? in 2009
2008-12-01 15:22:00 Vernon Wells Version ??? in 2009 Recently selected as the Neil MacCarl Toronto Blue Jays Player of the Year (Jays only award), the question that many Jays fans will ask is which Vernon Wells will show up in 2009? While doing a little background research I was surprised to see that consistent production has been a problem ... More About: Sabermetrics , Vernon Wells
Toronto Blue Jays Random Stats
2008-11-27 13:41:00 Toronto Blue Jays Random Stats Last season’s average positional player age of 31.0 years was the highest in franchise history. The DH games played leader for the Jays has been different for five years in a row. Counting down from 2008 to 2004, DH starters for the Jays have been Stairs, Thomas, Hillenbrand, Aaron Hill (34 ... More About: Toronto
GPA & the 2008 Toronto Blue Jays
2008-11-26 14:33:00 GPA & the 2008 Toronto Blue Jays After writing about the value of a largely OBP% prospect that can’t slug (Scott Campbell) yesterday, I decided to go back and take a look at the 2008 Toronto Blue Jays and the AL from an OBP perspective. In the classic baseball work Moneyball, there is a small section outlining ... More About: Season
Arizona Fall League Seventh and Final Week (2008 Season)
2008-11-25 15:49:00 AFL Seventh and Final Week (2008 Season ) This is the seventh (whew) installment of our AFL weekly reports. The Phoenix Desert Dogs won their fifth Arizona Fall League Championship in a row on Saturday. This was a pretty impressive win, as the Desert Dogs came from three down in the fifth to win the game 10 - ...
Baseball Week in Review Nov 23rd 2008
2008-11-23 17:38:00 Baseball Week in Review Nov 23rd 2008 Links of the Week ESPN outlines this years group of Japanese players that are MLB bound, which is a small list. The interview portion of the article is conducted with Marty Brown, a former International League manager of the year that made his way over to Japan after being blocked ... More About: Baseball
Elect Scott Rolen for the 2009 Leadoff Role
2008-11-21 14:52:00 Elect Scott Role n for the 2009 Leadoff Role Now and in the Recent Past Looking back at a variety of 2007/2008 off-season news and blog articles, it appeared that the Jays finally got what they needed, a “prototypical” leadoff man with speed in David Eckstein. We’ve seen how that worked out. Ok, so now what are the ... More About: Season , Toronto Blue Jays
Arizona Fall League Prospect Bios (Sixth Week 2008 Season)
2008-11-18 15:37:00 AFL Prospect Bios (Sixth Week 2008 Season ) Cleveland Indians prospect Josh Tomlin was one of the pitchers knocked around in the 28 - 1 “AFL supersized beatdown” on October 20th. Outside of this start he’s been decent and in 28 IP he’s struck out 28 against only 3 walks. This is the norm for Tomlin, super ... More About: Arizona , League , Fall
SS: Johnny Mac vs Marco Scutaro
2008-11-17 20:06:00 Jays 2009 SS: Johnny Mac vs Marco Scutaro VS It all comes down to winning. Throw out your OPS, VORP, +/-, etc and let’s just focus on wins from the shortstop position. I ran a very simple test. In games started as the SS position, what ended up being the Toronto Blue Jays win-loss record when ... More About: Donald
Toronto Blue Jays 1st Base Platoon Spinners
2008-11-14 15:25:00 Toronto Blue Jays 1st Base Platoon Spinners Yesterday we looked at the “spinners” of Lyle Overbay vs LHP & RHP. Today I performed some analysis amongst low cost free agents vs rhp. Of this group the best fit for the Jays turned out to be Emil Brown. He’s a low cost solution that hits LHP. I ... More About: Toronto , Toronto Blue Jays , Sabermetrics
Lyle Overbay Split Spinners
2008-11-13 15:23:00 Lyle Overbay Split Spinners Bear with me here, I’ll be going over one of the bigger off season issues for the Jays, which is what’s going on at 1st and DH. The Jays need more extra base power (preferably HR) from these two positions. It could be argued that they also need more HR power from ... More About: Toronto Blue Jays , Sabermetrics , Lyle Overbay
Jesse Litsch to Tampa Bay Rays?
2008-11-12 15:18:00 Jesse Litsch to Tampa Bay Rays? Check out this photo: Awesome, huh? I gave the baseballboss game a try (the one that’s in all of the ads over at MLB Trade Rumors) and this is the card for Jesse Litsch. Check out the cut and paste on the neck. Speaking of the Jays and Rays…. Article segway. The ... More About: Transactions , Jesse , Toronto Blue Jays , Sabermetrics
Arizona Fall League Prospect Bios (Fifth Week 2008 Season)
2008-11-11 14:32:00 AFL Prospect Bios (Fifth Week 2008 Season ) Eric Young… where have I heard that name before? Yep, he’s the son of former major league second baseman Eric Young. If you’re a make-up guy, check out this quote from Baseball America; Seeing no value in sitting at home after the 2007 season, he invited himself to instructional league ... More About: Arizona , League , Fall
Blogger Vs. Legitimate Reporter Rant
2008-11-10 13:57:00 Blogger Vs. Legitimate Reporter Rant A while back I read a post on our friends Drunk Jays Fans’ blog in regards to bloggers being fans and nothing more. Basically the gist of it is bloggers are hacks because we do not have the same access to the team that writers have. At first I used to ... More About: Blogger , Calman
Baseball Week in Review Nov 9th 2008
More articles from this author:2008-11-09 07:31:00 Baseball Week in Review Nov 9th 2008 Links of the Week The Padres picked up a one year Brian Giles option for $9 million. If the Padres choose to opt out it would have cost them $3 mill, so in net sum this was a $6 million signing. I’ve always been a huge Giles fan and I ... More About: Baseball 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 |
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