A's Have Not Been As Ravaged by Injuries as You'd Think
by Tyler Bleszinski on Jun 4, 2009 2:58 PM PDT
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PrintSB Nation sister site Beyond the Boxscore ran an outstanding piece exploring DL trips from 2002-2008. The A's landed 20th on the list. You'd suspect that they would've been higher considering the team has set records for injury time the last two consecutive seasons. I suspect that if it was broken down by year, the A's would have to be in the top three over the past three seasons in terms of injury issues.
I'd love to get them to do a breakdown on the A's, so if you have a free moment, jump on over there and pester them for a breakdown of our A's. I'd just love to see how it truly shakes out. Not that it will make me feel any better about all those injuries, but at least it will be good to see it in black and white.
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The information is indeed interesting to say the least;
I just hope we keep this three game win streak on a roll!
Go Giambi and go A’s…
"Where's the beef?"
I was wondering when someone would get around to crunching the numbers
on this. Here on AN we always whine about how bad we’ve been hurt by injuries as if we’re the only ones who suffer from it, but fans of almost every other team do the same thing. I remember a year not too long ago when the Angels got smacked by injuries much worse than we did, but we blithely kept complaining about our own anyway.
"Go ahead and overachieve, you scrappy Brett-Favre-colored walk-takers." —Rev Halofan
It's a good point, iglew.
Of course if we see it in black and white, we might not have anything else to whine about. And that would be awful. Well, I supposed we could find something else.
I'm here to talk about the past.
Aw, man, we don't have anything to whine about any more! No fair!!
"And Julio Franco is batting right-handed!" -- Wayne Hagin, A's radio play-by-play, mid-80s
Yeah but we whine better than everybody else.
Nico: Okay. We have twelve hours to make a really big pickle.
We also wine pretty well, too.
"And Julio Franco is batting right-handed!" -- Wayne Hagin, A's radio play-by-play, mid-80s
I whiskey pretty well.
"I’m Joey Devine, I’m what Joba Chamberlain would be if he was good and nobody had ever heard of him."
Actually, no...
…Cubs and Giants fans are the best whiners.
I could prove God statistically. Take the human body alone - the chances that all the functions of an individual would just happen is a statistical monstrosity.
~George Gallup
When your front line is thin you notice the injuries more.
The Angels had a much better farm system so they were less affected. Take right now for instance. Our pitching has been coming around lately but if we have injuries to Giambi and Holliday then we’re done. The Angels have a better manager (ughhh…I hate saying it) and a better offensive philosophy so our margin of error is small in payroll and execution.
These ain't your father's A's.
by ohtobe21likehuston on Jun 4, 2009 5:39 PM PDT up reply actions
I'm pretty sure that along with setting team records for DL use, the A's have also been at or near the top of the league in DL usage the last two years.
And I’m willing to bet that concurrently, much of the “whining” has occurred during this period of time. If so, then I really don’t see why A’s fans don’t have a legitimate reason to “whine.”
Damn you.
Please stop making sense.
These ain't your father's A's.
by ohtobe21likehuston on Jun 4, 2009 6:22 PM PDT up reply actions
What would be REALLY cool
would be to see correlations between DL trips, winning %, and postseason records. Just eyeballing the list, it appears that the better teams are clustered near the middle.
Do you know the way to San Jose?
or how about just how well win% correlates to amount of time on the DL.
When the A’s started losing, they also started getting hurt more. It would be nice to see just how much an affect injuries can have on a team.
"It's like déjà vu all over again." -yogi berra
I would like to see that
but instead of going back to 2002, when we were famous for being a very healthy team (ironically enough), they just looked at 2006-2009
Don't believe in yourself.
Believe in Me who believes in You.
Yeah
I think that the A’s were really healthy during the earlier part of the decade (exceptions given to Harden and Mulder), but have been DL-riddled in recent years.
"You end up with a name like ‘Outman,’" he said last week. "What else are you going to do? You’re going to get people out, man." ~ Dallas Braden
If that's true
It means it’s remarkably scary just how healthy we’d have to have been in order to be 20th stretched out between ’02 & ’08.
CuttheMullet, from "The Thread":
"Whenever I’m about to do something, I think "would an idiot do that?" and if they would, I do not do that thing."
The more I look at the numbers, the A's were scary healthy back in '02 and '03
2002:
Tejada, T-Long, Chavy all played 150+ games
Hatteberg, Dye, and Ramon Hernandez all played 130+ games
Justice played 118 and Ellis played 98
Lidle, Huddy, Mulder, and Zito all pitched 190+ innings
The A’s only used 17 different pitchers to get through the 2002 season and 18 in ‘03. Considering that there are 12 men on a pitching staff at any given time, that’s impressive. (we used 24 in ’07 and ’08)
"You end up with a name like ‘Outman,’" he said last week. "What else are you going to do? You’re going to get people out, man." ~ Dallas Braden
In 2002, we had great bench players
A good bench is hard to find. Typically bench players either (a) just aren’t very good, which is why they aren’t starting, or (b) they are good but they need regular starts and can’t get them because they’re blocked by someone else who is even better.
Most hitters, whether they’re good or not-so-good, need to bat regularly in order to stay sharp. A few guys have that rare talent where they can sit idle for several days, then be called in on short notice and deliver a few good at-bats, then go back to the bench again. If the guy is also a second-tier veteran who is reasonably content with his bench role, so much the better.
Ideally, you want to have guys like that on your bench. In terms of value to the team, I’d say it’s better to populate your bench with guys like that than with hot prospects or starter-quality guys, either of whom need to be getting more regular work. The problem is that a natural bench guy is rare and hard to find.
On the 2002 team, the A’s had three guys like that (John Mabry, Greg Myers, and Olmedo Saenz). The 2002 team was great in a lot of ways, but I think the least appreciated of them is that it’s the best bench we’ve ever had — not because any of them were stars, but because they were such perfect bench guys.
Having those guys made it easier to give the starters lots of games, because they weren’t so good that the manager had to juggle the lineup to find more work for them, but at the same time they were good enough that the manager was happy to use them for a pinch-hit or when a starter did need a break.
"Go ahead and overachieve, you scrappy Brett-Favre-colored walk-takers." —Rev Halofan
hudson went to the DL multiple times
it was only zito who was durable
The Not-So-Casual Fan
Huddy still was really, really healthy over that time period
His # of starts made, ‘02-’04, were 34, 34, and 27.
That’s still crazy impressive in terms of health.
"You end up with a name like ‘Outman,’" he said last week. "What else are you going to do? You’re going to get people out, man." ~ Dallas Braden
it wouldn't show all of the games and innings
where teams played shorthanded because of injured players who remained “day to day”
The number of injurues this didn;t seem way out of proportion to me.
Where I felt we fell off the boat is injuries from players that we were counting on… that we really had no business placing that much faith in… i.e. Duke, Chavez.
I could prove God statistically. Take the human body alone - the chances that all the functions of an individual would just happen is a statistical monstrosity.
~George Gallup
Good point. Interview the average A's fan BEFORE
the season and they would have told you that Duke, Chavy & Ellis were doubtful to stay injury free. They would also say that if we had to count on Nomar than we would be in trouble. Who knew Holliday would start off this slow? I didn’t see that one coming at all, ever, no way in hell, etc.
The main bitch with those who complain is that our backup plan was non-existent and 3B should have been a point of emphasis. It’s easy to not complain about injuries when you have a sufficient (or even average) backup at a few positions. We simply don’t have that and players were signing pretty cheap due to the economy.
These ain't your father's A's.
by ohtobe21likehuston on Jun 4, 2009 6:48 PM PDT up reply actions
No, the backup plan wasn't non-existent
it was Nomar, who is just as injury prone as Chavez.
As much as I hated the thought during the offseason, Russ Branyan would look a hell of a lot better than Jack Hannahan in the lineup every day.
Now I’m hoping that we pick up Wilson Betemit from Chicago
"I’m Joey Devine, I’m what Joba Chamberlain would be if he was good and nobody had ever heard of him."
That's why I see it as non-existent.
I totally agree on Branyan and it couldn’t hurt to pick up Betemit either. He is at least a 3B in the ML sense and Hannahan has to go.
My point is that the A’s had a very low payroll and could have picked up some bargains if they were looking hard enough. Most teams with inflated salaries were being very cautious.
These ain't your father's A's.
by ohtobe21likehuston on Jun 4, 2009 8:45 PM PDT up reply actions
The difference is
that we lose our best players and key players to injuries at positions where we lack the depth the most (3B, SS)
and our closer is now out for the season and our ace has been on the shelf all season.
Best Starter, Best Closer, and at positions lacking depth = make it seem much worse than it is.
Fuck you Bob Geren
The A's have not been ravaged by injuries, but rather by shitty players.
I’m looking at you Jack Hannahan.
"True fact: In a global thermonuclear war, the only human who would survive would be David Eckstein" -PT
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