Hi there. I'm still sort of on hiatus because I'm sick, but I couldn't let yesterday go by without saying something...
DOUG FREAKING GLANVILLE!!! WHAT THE HELL WAS HE THINKING!? AND WHY DID THEY EVEN BRING HIM IN THE GAME!? ARGH!!!
OK, just had to get that out of my system.
The good news: Bobby Abreu made the All-Star team.
The bad news: The Phillies are sucking tonight.
The worse news: I'm sick, so updates will be light for the next few days.
Surprise surprise, Bobby Abreu was left off the NL All-Star team. Let's look at the numbers for the players who were selected:
AVG OBP SLG (OPS) VORP Barry Bonds .354 .620 .794 (1.414) 68.3 Ken Griffey, Jr. .244 .344 .511 (0.855) 21.0 Sammy Sosa .276 .362 .562 (0.924) 18.5 Lance Berkman .305 .461 .578 (1.039) 38.0 Moises Alou .287 .339 .531 (0.870) 21.7 Miguel Cabrera .288 .356 .534 (0.841) 28.7 --------------------------------------------- Bobby Abreu .301 .444 .563 (1.006) 44.3
Kinda funny that the two least deserving players (as far as VORP is concerned), Griffey and Sosa, were both elected as starters, huh? Anyway, statistically speaking, the starting outfield should be Bonds, Berkman and Abreu, and yet Abreu isn't even on the team. An argument could be made that J.D. Drew (1.039 OPS, 41.4) belongs in the outfield too, but considering Drew's past in Philly, I'm not going to make that argument, lest I be pelted with batteries.
Edit: Looks like Abreu is one of the "Final Vote" candidates for the last spot on the team, so get of your ass and go vote for him over at mlb.com.
Is anyone else surprised that the Phils (specifically, Bobby Abreu and Jim Thome) aren't getting any respect in the All-Star balloting? I know, it's not the most important thing in the world, but you'd think that with the seasons Thome and Abreu are having and with the Phils being 5th in the majors and 3rd in the National League in home attendance (the team's got a shiny new ballpark, in case you haven't heard), they'd have more votes. As of the last voting update, Thome is 4th among NL first basemen (866,684 behind leader Albert Pujols) and Abreu is 14th among NL outfielders (1,135,668 behind 3rd place OF Sammy Sosa) -- in other words, they ain't gonna make it. Ah well, perhaps I should have ranted about this before voting ended last night. Hopefully we'll see both players picked as backups when the final selections are made this Friday.
Check it out, though -- here's how the two players are doing in some of the more sabermetrically-oriented stat categories:
VORP (R) EQA (R) EQR (R) RAP (R) OPS (R) IsoP (R) WS (R) Thome 45.8 (2) .355 (2) 65.9 (2) 28.9 (2) 1.128 (2) .400 (2) 14 (10) Abreu 42.7 (6) .349 (3) 65.9 (2) 28.7 (3) 1.010 (8) .268 (10) 18 (4)
(R = NL rank)
So, yeah, these guys are doing pretty well. I'm guessing that one of them will start getting mentioned at the end of the year when the MVP talk starts up, but teh question is who? Thome's stats are prettier with all the home runs, but as you can see above, Abreu's been just as valuable, if not moreso, once defense is taken into account (Win Shares is the only stat up there that includes a player's defensive contribution).
Anyway, it looks like Pat Burrell is back in the lineup for tonight's game, which is a good thing. As fun as it is to watch Doug Glanville battle the Mendoza line (current standings: Glanville .203, Mendoza .200), I'm sure we'd all much rather see real major league ballplayers out there. Randy Wolf comes back tonight too with his second start since his DL stint -- assuming the rain doesn't spoil things...