On Tuesday night, Adrian Gonzalez, aka Far and Away the Best Player on the Padres, had to leave the game after the fourth inning after he strained his right knee on a slide into third.

On Wednesday night, Adrian Gonzalez, aka Far and Away the Best Player on the Padres, was back in the starting lineup.

Why?

Let’s take a step back. On May 22nd, in another base-running mishap, Jake Peavy hurt his ankle. Five days later, on May 27th, Peavy was back out there anyway, giving up four earned in six plus against the Diamondbacks while only striking out five. He would start two more games, the flu-ridden debacle against the Phillies and a strong start against those same Diamondbacks, before being shut down for months, maybe even the entire season, with a longitudinal tearing in the posterior tibialis tendon. The severity of the injury caught both Peavy and the team off guard, which explains how a star pitcher can be handled so nonchalantly. One would hope that if the Padres had to do it all over again, they’d give Peavy’s ankle more time to build back its strength.

Cue Adrian.

Following the recent days off for Ryan Howard and Justin Morneau, Adrian became the active consecutive games leader. As of the writing of this article, Adrian has played in 284 consecutive games, which leads him 21 games behind Steve Garvey’s Padre record. Garvey, one of the four San Diego Padres worthy of having his number retired. From where I’m sitting, which is in my mother’s basement, something doesn’t seem right. Is risking Adrian’s long-term health worth this streak, if that’s what this is about? And if it’s not, what is it about?

As we’ve been over, this is not the season to be calling out all the stops. I would imagine that Adrian doesn’t want to come out of the lineup, but he’s not supposed to want to come out. That’s when Bud Black is supposed to take a step back, realize that he has the team’s number one prospect who also so happens to be a first baseman just sitting around, and make the best big picture decision.

Of course, to be fair, my mother’s basement doesn’t have all the answers. There’s many nuances that go into running a baseball team that I don’t know. I just have a bad feeling about this.

A large portion of The Sac Bunt’s search engine traffic comes from searches for Padres, and strangely non-Padres various walkup musics. If you’re here for that reason, welcome. I also write about other useless and esoteric sports subjects, like the amount of time viewers spend looking at advertising watching a game. With promotion like that, who could not check it out!?

Getting to the meat of the situation, Adrian is still riding his classic Pitbull, then mariachi music. Brian Giles is keeping it current with Eminem’s “Lose Yourself”. Chris Burke, apparently missing something in his past as much as I miss college, hums along to Kenny Chesney’s “I Go Back” on his way to the plate.

Tony Gwynn Jr. rocks “Nothin But A G Thang” by Snoop and Dr Dre, taking a page out of ex-Padre Greg Vaughn’s book. Scott Hairston keeps it hip with the cool kids using TI and all those other people’s “Swagger Like Us”.

And as a special retro walkup music feature too fantastic not to include, is Gary Templeton’s “Smooth Operator” by Sage. Marvelous.

The Padres walkup music page is updated accordingly.

Also, I think I have the poll fixed. Please vote your heart out. If it doesn’t work, tell me the error you get so I can fix it my heart out. Thanks.

You might have noticed recently that the Padres’ league home run leader Adrian Gonzalez was not included in an online poll about the forthcoming home run derby.

Darren Smith apparently mentioned the oversight on air, which I have been unable to confirm since I refuse to subjugate myself to listening to XX 1090.

I didn’t see it mentioned in that Gaslamp Ball thread linked above, so I’m not sure if it was reported on air, but it is worth pointing out that the poll itself has no bearing on which players actually participate in the contest.

According to the statement printed directly below the online ballot:

Poll results will in no way determine the actual participants of the 2009 State Farm Home Run Derby, since player participation is solely at the discretion of the Office of the Commissioner of Baseball

Gonzalez’s inclusion in the home run derby was hotly contested last year. Milwaukee’s Ryan Braun was selected over Adrian as the final NL participant, despite sitting tied for 4th in home runs and seeing slightly more than half his opportunities for homers in a pitchers’ park.

Patrick Courtney, spokesman for the commissioner’s office, corroborated the selection rules:

Asked who decides which players are selected, Courtney said Tuesday, “We work together with ESPN, (Commissioner) Bud Selig, a committee of people.”

Gonzalez, as with any bid for a spot on the home run or all-star squad from a Padre, has an uphill battle. The Padres play in the most extreme pitcher friendly ballpark, and in one of the smallest media markets in the nation.

Hopefully, ballpark and league adjusted statistics will become the norm when measuring ballplayer contributions, but they aren’t right now. Instead we’re stuck with simplistic, misleading counting statistics like home runs and RBIs. There’s not much we can do much about the market size of San Diego.

Strangely, Padres.com currently displays a photo of Adrian Gonzalez with the caption “Enjoying a career year, Gonzalez needs your vote.” Just below is a link titled “Vote for derby participants,”  which leads to the famed ballot lacking any mention of our boy.

Not selected him last year was unfortunate. Not selecting the front-running league home run champ to for the damn home run derby this year is a joke. I have a hard time expecting such an oversight this year, but I also hope the team will step up its marketing efforts behind Adrian. Hopefully, since the actual selections are made internally, they already are.

It is also my hope Padres fans step up the pressure publicly. With the impending trade of Jake Peavy, Adrian Gonzalez is clearly the face of the franchise. His participation in such a well viewed event brings recognition for him, and our favorite team.

Let’s be those obnoxious big market fans. Lets make a stink about it. Ok, you don’t have to be too obnoxious if you don’t want to. But it’s highly encouraged!

To help, I put together a little something something for your blog sidebar for forum signature. Below it is the HTML code to copy and paste. The photo is licensed under Creative Commons by Dirk Hansen.

Large:
<a href=”http://thesacrificebunt.com/1245/adrian-gonzalez-for-home-run-derby-taking-matters-into-our-own-hands/”><img src=”http://thesacrificebunt.com/blog/wp-content/2009/06/gonzalez4derby_large.png” alt=”Adrian Gonzalez for Home Run Derby” width=”300″ height=”224″ /></a>

Small:
<a href=”http://thesacrificebunt.com/1245/adrian-gonzalez-for-home-run-derby-taking-matters-into-our-own-hands/”><img src=”http://thesacrificebunt.com/blog/wp-content/2009/06/gonzalez4derby_small.png” alt=”Adrian Gonzalez for Home Run Derby” width=”200″ height=”150″ /></a>

Literally every second, Ray and I get hundreds of emails from loyal SacBuntians clamoring for ways to advertise The Sacrifice Bunt for us, free of charge.

“I’m tired of wearing shirts with boring little green alligators, or apparel without hilarious sayings that show the world how witty and hip I am,” they say. And as is our usual policy when strangers on the Internet tell us to do things: we have wholeheartedly obliged.

The Sacrifice Bunt Shop is here, hipper and with more Padres related double entendres than previously thought possible.

Honest to goodness, we don’t make any money off this stuff, besides the good feeling in our hearts we get when people cover their bodies with the logo of our worthy to be on a t-shirt website.

Most shirts feature a design on the front with a Sac Bunt logo on the back. AA means it’s American Apparel. So they’re a little further up the pricing scale, but the shirts are soft and well fitted. You can choose any t-shirt color your heart desires, but if you want a different color ink, or a different style of shirt (long sleeve or moar women’s styles, for instance) let me know.

I know it’s usually Melvin’s thing to highlight the ridiculousness of the Union-Tribune’s sports reporting, but I’m the one with the degree in journalism, damnit! 

As you, a devoted reader of the Sacrifice Bunt, knows, Petco Park is the hardest stadium on hitters in the entire major leagues. And it’s not even close. But today, we’ve learned that Nick Canepa’s yet to bookmark us. 

The Padres have just begun their sixth season in Petco Park, and it appears they’ve finally called off the exorcists. Extensive and expensive studies by engineers have revealed the place is an expanse of grass and dirt, with fences along its outer edge. There is no cemetery beneath it. They don’t sell voodoo dolls in the gift shop.

It’s difficult to judge any baseball team after a few days, although it’s apparent to just about everyone who doesn’t believe in witchcraft that these particular Padres aren’t going to arrive in Cooperstown in the same bus. But there are enough new faces probably unaware of the Petco Curse, what with so many of the complainers having grabbed their Tarot cards and left the building.

This is not – not – the Petco Triangle.

No more singing the ballpark blues

Let us be very very clear: Petco hurts hitting. It’s very likely that it is in the hitters head, from Nevin and Klesko on up, but for good reason. From 2004 through 2007, Petco suffocated runs by almost 20%, and 2008 was worse. Any hitter that complains about the effect Petco has on their hitting is well within their right. Which is, presumably, why Canepa didn’t talk to any for his article.

Instead, to help show how the team has truly exorcised the hitting hurting demons, he interviewed Peavy and Black.

“I’m so tired of hearing that stuff,” Padres ace Jake Peavy was saying. “We can win here; we’ve won here. So it’s not a bandbox. Matt Kemp hit one off the batter’s eye against me the other day. Hit it hard. I’m tired of ballpark excuses.

For a little bit of context, here’s what Peavy had to say following Monday’s home opening loss:

“Today’s game was nothing new to me,” Peavy said. “It’s always been this way. I’m not knocking any hitters that we’ve had in the past or our hitters now. We’re just going to play low-scoring ballgames. That’s the makeup of our teams here.”

Exactly. For good measure, Peavy pointed out that the other guys don’t have a problem, and Black backed him up.

“There are ballparks that play bigger than this. Guys will tell you Pac Bell, or whatever it is (now AT&T in San Francisco), is harder to hit in. The guys who’ve been here are not going to let the new guys get in a negative frame of mind. This team has moved past that. It’s not like the Dodgers were batting in Arizona and we were batting here.”

——–

“We don’t need players who have the ballpark in their heads,” Black said. “I feel as though our players are strong mentally, so the ballpark shouldn’t come into their heads. You’re playing a baseball game. Play the game.

“Eighteen players play at the same time. It’s a baseball game. When the wind blows out in Chicago, the same guys are playing. I hear about Safeco outs and Citizens Bank home runs and Great American Ballpark home runs. So what?”

Peavy being Peavy. I want to give Black the benefit of the doubt and say that he’s not telling the hitters to man up, but Canepa didn’t intend for that interpretation. I’d be curious what Edgar Gonzalez, who recently told the North County Times that it’s already Petco 3 - Gonzalez Bros. 0 and counting, thinks about Peavy and Black’s comments. 

If only press passes weren’t so hard to come by.

RAY UPDATE:

Whine and ye shall receive.

The North County Times is reporting that Moorad and new president Tom Garfinkel are looking at bringing in the fences.

Asked on XX 1090’s morning show Thursday about the possibility of moving in the fences, Moorad said he’s scheduled to meet with former president Dick Freeman to get an insider’s perspective.

Everything in this article is pretty ambiguous; it says that Moorad and Garfinkle “want to learn all they can about the outfield dimensions at Petco Park,” though I imagine Alderson knew a good amount without doing anything about it. But the implication is there.

In the comments, I threw in a quote from Adrian showing that he knows what’s up, and the NCT throws in some more:

First baseman Adrian Gonzalez favors bringing in the fences, particularly in the gaps. Gonzalez said he’s fine with the depth in right field but would like the gaps in right- and left-center field to be shortened to 385 feet. The current distances are 400 feet in right-center and 401 in left-center.

Gonzalez said the change not only would result in more home runs, but also would affect the way outfielders chase long fly balls.

“If he catches it, he’ll run into a wall,” Gonzalez said. “He’ll have to deal with the wall. Instead he’s running, he’s running, he’s running, and he catches it and is still short of the wall.”

And, to top things off, here’s a very fun fact:

This winter, Padres researchers discovered that fly balls hit more than 325 feet at Petco result in a .278 average as opposed to a major league average of .405.

Remember how delusional Grady Fuson got when Baseball America announced the farm system as 29th in the league? I anticipate the team’s response following this:

Organizational Rankings: #25 - San Diego Padres

Our much revered Fangraphs has begun listing all 30 Major League clubs in descending order and, as you don’t even need to click to see, the Padres ended up at 25th. 

The grading was broken down into Ownership, Front Office, Major League Talent and Minor League Talent. Some highlights:

Ownership: N/A

This is an ownership group in transition, and we just don’t have enough information to give them any kind of grade.

This one seems kind of obvious. They go on to say that there is a sense of shadiness behind the sale to Moorad, as he still had a stake in the Diamondbacks. Personally, I think it’d only be appropriate if a conflict of interest blows up in our face. Nothing’s impossible.

Front Office: B-

Kevin Towers is a smart, likable guy, and currently the longest tenured GM in the game… However, there’s some serious question marks about how the team will be run going forward. With Alderson on the way out, does he take Asst. GM Paul DePodesta with him? Can Towers avoid being fired if the team struggles in 2009, especially with new ownership?

Really, not to be a bloodsucker, but it seems like they went a little soft on the front office. Towers’ legacy in San Diego speaks for itself, but he had a rough 2008. Go through our archives and you won’t see too many “Hey, we signed this guy!” articles, unless they were followed by a “Hey, we traded this guy for not a whole lot!” article. Then there’s our impossibly disappointing minor league system, the uncertainty going forward, and our general 2009 awfulness, and that B- grade seems a bit generous. 

Major League Talent: C-

Regression needs to be expected from both, and there just isn’t much in the way of run production for the Padres outside of (Gerut and Giles) and Adrian Gonzalez. Chase Headley is a solid enough young player, but when he represents the hopes of your future line-up, things aren’t great.

Fangraphs makes a potentially dubious statement in “the pitchers aren’t as good as advertised, and the hitters are a bit better than everyone thinks.” I’m not sure why the pitchers are flat-out not as good but the hitters are just kinda sorta better. Petco Park still eats statistics for breakfast. The Three-G’s all had a road OPS near .900, with Adrian topping out at .946. Only Giles made it over .800 at home. Maybe the scrub seatholders are only a bit better on the road, but I don’t like defining the team by them. 

Minor League Talent: C-

There aren’t any position prospects here that everyone loves, and the ranks of the pitching prospects are full of guys who throw 87 MPH and try to get by on smarts. It isn’t a horrible farm system, but it’s not a very good one either, and for a team in need of a talent injection, that’s a problem.

Hey, “isn’t a horrible farm system.” That’s pretty good! But seriously, this cuts to the core of this team’s problem. We can talk all day about the missing $30 million and how that’s hindering the team, but the fact remains that this team needs that $30 million because it has yet to start producing its own talent. While other teams in our league are filling out their lineups with homegrowns, the Padres have Chase Headley and Nick Hundley. And with the exception of Kyle Blanks, no one’s really close. I think this fact needs better representation in the Front Office grade.

I’ll leave you with Fangraph’s summation of this team’s fortunes going forward. Have a good weekend!

Overall: C

 If you’re a glass half full guy, you can hold onto the fact that the D’Backs were very well ran while Moorad was in Arizona, and that the front office is full of guys who could run a team well. If you’re a glass half empty guy, then you see an organization that lacks talent, has only a couple of really valuable players (two of whom have full no-trade clauses), and who plays in a division with two teams that are better, younger, and have greater revenue steams. I have a feeling that San Diego is in for some tough times ahead.

PECOTA’S Standings (Friar Forecast)

Mr. Logan over at Friar Forecast has a nice write-up on the 2009 predictions and they’re actually not that bad. At least, coming off a season during which the Padres won only 63 games, 74 doesn’t sound so bad. Although, PECOTA isn’t quite an exact science; for 2008, it had the Padres winning 83 games. Maybe we’ll win 94 this year? Probably not, although I feel like the Padres are a couple of fortuitous breaks from contention. One such break would be the return of this man.

Prior is ready to give it one more shot; ‘I don’t want to give up,’ he says (San Diego Union-Tribune)

“Cautiously optimistic.” Those are actually Mark Prior’s words, when discussing his 2009. “If he’s healthy, and all the reports thus far are encouraging, Prior is my ace in the hole.” Those are Kevin Towers’ words, and the optimist in me prefers what Towers has to say. If Prior can at least stay on the mound for 20-some starts and hold Baek back from the third spot in the rotation, the team’s chances of success jump up.

Jake Peavy breaks his silence (Gaslamp Ball)

jbox threw up Peavy’s comments on 1090 yesterday, and they’re rather refreshing after the war Peavy and the front office waged on each other this off-season. Especially refreshing is Peavy’s denial that he ever sang “Go Cubs Go.” Ah, much better. Here’s your knife back, Jake. Sorry for the confusion.

Padres by Position (San Diego Union-Tribune)

Starting with Adrian, Blanks, and first base, Bill Center has been documenting the Padres, position-by-position (hey!). While the articles are a bit sparse, Center does a good job of covering the Padres from top to bottom. He even manages to sneak in a couple juicy nuggets, like how the Padres are looking at moving third baseman Logan Forsythe to catcher.

Best outfield arms of 2008 (The Hardball Times)

Remember when I said Brian Giles was one of the best defensive outfielders in baseball, and that pushed him past Adrian as the MVPadre for 08? Well, about that- The Hardball Times has recently published numbers on outfield arms and Giles’ is unsurprisingly atrocious. He can still run them down, and he’s still worth 1.1 more wins than Adrian, so I stand by my MVPadre pick, but, uh, yeah.

Brian Giles. At least, he should be.

We’ve written before on the ridiculousness of this award, and I expect this year to be no different.

That sounds harsh, so let me explain.

If Adrian Gonzalez doesn’t win this year’s M.V.Padre award. I will be greatly surprised. He hit 36 home runs, drove in 119 runs, raised most all of his important numbers, and even won a Gold Glove. He’s a legit player and he hits in one of the most ridiculous stadiums in the league. But he wasn’t the best player on the team this year.

Offensively, it could go either way. Adrian leads the standard categories, jumping above Giles in home runs, RBI, doubles, slugging, and OPS. In the fancier categories, Giles catches back up, leading Adrian in wRAA, wOBA, and EqA, though he’s really not that far up on Adrian in most. Where Giles pulls away is on defense.

When it was announced, I wrote briefly on the ridiculousness of Adrian’s Gold Glove win. Adrian is not the best fielding baseball in the National League. Far from it. Lance Berkman, with a UZR of 11.2, was the best in the National League. Down the list at -7 was Adrian.

Giles, meanwhile, was one of the best defensive outfielders in baseball. And when this is taken into consideration with his offensive contributions, the choice becomes very clear.

Fangraphs has recently added a value section, which includes the following:

Batting - wRAA (Runs Above Average) with a park adjustment.

Fielding - The sum of a player’s UZR.

Replacement - The replacement level adjustment set at 20 Runs / 600 PA.

Positional - The positional adjustment set using Tangotiger’s values (see this link)

Value Runs - The sum of Batting, Fielding, Replacement, and Positional.

Value Wins - Value Runs converted to a wins scale.

Dollars - Value Wins converted to the following dollar scale: 2008 - $4.5m / win

This how is Giles and Adrian stack up:

I threw in Gerut for some perspective. When all things are considered, Giles was so much the best player on the team that Adrian is closer to Gerut. And this is to take nothing away from Gerut, who had a surprisingly fantastic season.
Adrian is absolutely the face of the franchise. He’s the Padres first transcendent hitter since Petco opened, and he took the Gold Glove away from such players as Berkman and Albert Pujols. That is exceptional company to keep, and I don’t mean to come off as iconoclastic. Giles was simply the Most Valuable Padre in 2008.

(With all due respect to Jake Peavy, the most potent part of the offense.)

Cheers to our boy.

My unofficial, probably not very accurate survey of defensive metrics puts Adrian as a good, but not best in the league first baseman. His offensive goodness and his success with the stupid fielding percentage stat probably helped attract attention as well.

Still though, cool news. No Yankees, you can’t have him for in exchange for a bag of baseballs. He’s ours, you spoiled clowns.

Maddux wins one too. No surprise there. How can he just keep being so good? The voters are screwed next with Maddux retired and no shoe in.

R. update: I hate to have to do this, but this was a bad call.

The Gold Gloves have long been a gag gift, highlighted by Palmeiro winning the award for first baseman in 1999 despite playing 28 games at the position.

Adrian was not the best defensive first baseman in the N.L. According to the Fielding Bible, he wasn’t in the top 10. Using their plus/minus system (which tracks the number of plays made more or less than the average fielder), the Fielding Bible ranked Mark Teixeira the best first baseman in baseball at +24. The best N.L. first baseman was Pujols at +20. Other National Leaguers in the top ten are Joey Votto (+19), Lance Berkman (+18), and Todd Helton (+6). Casey Kotchman’s in there too, so I guess he and Teixeira combine to make one National Leaguer. Either way, you’ll notice that a name’s missing from this list.

I love Adrian, but our principles are most important when they’re inconvenient, right?

I’m sorry.