Stone cold sober as a matter of fact.

Not back, back.  But back for long enough to show us what they’re capable of, scoring 7 runs on 14 hits against the Marlins Saturday night.  And demonstrate the crazy unpredictable nature of baseball coming from the team that seemed so far out of sync at the plate thus far in the year.

On the ongoing slow players needlessly giving themselves up on the bases watch, Paul McAnulty tried tagging from second on a pop fly to Jorge Cantu.  You may be concerned to learn that Cantu was playing third base at the time, yes, that third base.  He caught a foul ball near the infield wall and flipped to Hanley Ramirez covering.  The tag was closer than you’d think, but with two outs you have to know value of going from second to third is minimal.  Someone should be told that running just isn’t McAnulty’s game, though I never imagined it would need to be said.

How to Score a Souvenir Baseball at Petco (The Baseball Collector)

This dude’s hobby is going to ballparks and taking as many souvenir baseballs from kids as he can.  At least something like that.  He carries more than 3,000 balls in his collection, employs a glove rigged with a string and pen to snag otherwise unattainable balls out of reach, brings a hat from each team to games and switches between them, and prepares a cheat sheet with names of players so he can call them by name, pictures, and other notes.

The story linked above (the guy’s name is Zack Hample) details his 2006 visit to Petco Park, plus his catch off a home run by none other than Barrold Rutherford Bonds (I made up the middle name).  There’s a Bruce Bochy autographed lineup card and a solid group of Petco Park photographias.  One note from the lineup card: Boch needs to work on his calligraphy.

Padres Playoff Odds (Baseball Prospectus)

Not pretty.  The worst of the worst, in fact:

2.1%: San Diego
2.9%: Pittsburgh
4.7%: Kansas City
5.4%: Washington
5.5%: San Francisco

I refuse to believe ours is that bad of a team.  The problem is, like what Myron at Friar Forecast has been saying: Even if they get back to their expected performance, at this point they’re starting behind the curve.  We’ll need an equally big run above what we expected, just to catch up.  If I’m Kevin Towers, I’d keep an ear out from here until the deadline for interest in Wolf or Giles in exchange for a building block.  It’s about that time.

PECOTA on Padres (and other) Prospects (Baseball Prospectus)

Back to more fun topics of discussion, Nate Silver applies his PECOTA projection system to determine the “upside” score of minor league prospects.  Upside is defined by Silver as “the degree and probability of above-average performance while the player is under the control of his parent club“.  In other words, the score rewards good expectations without considering the bad ones, and only during a player’s cheap years (usually until age 28).

Silver’s most recent article on second basemen prospects highlights Padre property Matt Antonelli.  He scores an upside of 70.1.  This beats the next closest on the list of of Damon Sublett from the Yanks at 69.4.  The highest prospect, for comparison, is the White Sox’ Alexei Ramirez with a score of 111.2, three rankings above our boy Matt.

Silver brings up what he calls “empty walks” when mentioning Antonelli.  He suggests Antonelli’s walks may not be sustainable by his bat when pitchers decimate the zone with strikes.  Craig Stansberry also gets a mention as a “very good prospect” with a score of 60.  Craig’s age of 26 limits his potential as a prospect.

In an older writeup of the PECOTA upside for first basemen, Padre prospect Kyle Blanks gets his due as the third best in the majors at 53.9.  Silver warns of PECOTA’s propensity to penalize weight in its calculation, a fault the system no doubt shares with its real life scouting counterparts.

That’s it for now.  Ask yourself if you’re either depressed or glad to read a Padres blog with Elton John references.  It has to be one or the other.

Kevin Goldstein’s Padres prospect list is out and holy shitballs, Chase Headley and Matt Antonelli are five star prospects! There have been rumblings that these two are solid yet not top caliber guys. Goldstein disagrees, and ranks our top boys with the likes of Andy LaRoche, Cabrera trade centerpiece Cameron Maybin, and Dan Haren bounty Carlos Gonzalez.

Headley and Antonelli will find their place around the young core of Jake Peavy, Chris Young, Kevin Kouzmanoff, Adrian Gonzalez, and Khalil Greene.

The “perfect world projection” is the most fun part of Goldstein’s analysis, as our imaginations go wild with expectations of what might be. Goldstein expects middle of the order offensive production from Headley, while his position on the diamond is still to be determined.

He sees Antonelli as:

An offense-oriented second baseman who can hit leadoff, smack 15-20 home runs a year, and steal 25-30 bases.

If I were a cartoon my eyes would be wide open with dollar signs flashing at these projections. The dollar signs of course refer to the untold advertising riches reaped by the proprietor of a blog dedicated to the newest MLB dynasty, the San Diego Padres.

Here’s the final list:

Five-Star Prospects
1. Chase Headley, 3B/OF
2. Matt Antonelli, 2B
Four-Star Prospects
3. Matt Latos, RHP
Three-Star Prospects
4. Drew Miller, RHP
5. Cesar Carrillo, RHP
6. Drew Cumberland, SS
7. Wade LeBlanc, LHP
8. Will Inman, RHP
9. Kyle Blanks, 1B
Two-Star Prospects
10. Kellen Kulbacki, OF
11. Mitch Canham, C

The next surprise is Kyle Blanks as a two star at number 9. Though the star system is designed to eliminate the near pointless debates on minor list order discrepancies, I have to say I expected a high ceiling guy like Blanks a bit further up the list. Goldstein identifies Blanks’ larger, limiting physique as his biggest hindrance. Goldstein also clarifies the ranking by mentioning scouts’ general disagreement on Blanks’ projection.

The current minor league system is a testament to the abilities Sandy Alderson and Grady Fuson have to improve our team’s future. The turnaround these two (among others) engineered in three short years is more than commendable.

As a small market organization, we are lucky to have smart business men in charge who keep us competitive with our more abundant neighboring markets. I’ve said it before, but what an encouraging time it is to be a fan.

PS, If any Baseball Prospectus bigwigs are reading this, let me make up for my blatant ripoff of your content with a no kickback endorsement of Baseball Prospectus’ subscription offerings. Now holla at us in our new poll! Who should be after Latos?

No, not really. But that’s a hard headline to pass up.

The Union-Tribune is reporting that the Padres have lost out on Fukudome.

The Padres found out Tuesday night that they lost out in their bid for Japanese outfielder Kosuke Fukudome. The star outfielder is headed to the Cubs.

The Padres, rating Fukudome as the prime piece to their offseason plans, bid more than $10 million per season as part of a guarantee of at least three years. It was the most the club had offered a non-Padre since tendering a $55 million to $60 million proposal nine years ago to pitcher Kevin Brown, who chose to accept more than $100 million from the Dodgers.

While it would have been nice to have Fukudome, I’m almost relieved we didn’t get him. His centerfielding ability got a less than stellar review from Trey Hillman and his offensive ability does not project to be a player that would warrant the money the team was offering him. And considering we don’t know if he’ll be Hideki or Kaz, we may have just dodged a bullet.

Of course, we still have a hole in center and the options left on the market are dwindling. With that in mind, I propose three options the team could look into:

Mike Cameron

Yes, he’ll be suspended for the first month. And he usually takes a month to get his swing going, so he’ll be worthless until June. But he knows this team and he knows this ballpark and we know what we’ll be getting from him. Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t type of deal. Not to suggest that Cameron is the/a devil, but you get the idea.

That, and he’s got style.

Jim Edmonds

Hollywood Jim could be a classic turnaround story. He’s already on the team’s radar and if he’s as healthy as he says he is, why not? If he bounces back to an average player by his standards, he’ll still be a middle of the lineup guy.

Matt Antonelli

Whaaaaaaaat?

I really can’t back this up (because I can’t find the link) but I recall reading Fuson or one of those guys say that Antonelli is such a gifted athlete that he might be able to handle center. Since second is such an easy position to fill, why don’t we at least find out?

Melvin Nieves to the Rescue: Tom Krasovic special from June, 2006:

The Padres are intrigued about his potential in center field. Antonelli’s foot speed, Fuson said, warrants a 70 on a scouting scale that tops out at 80, and center field is a thin position within the system.

I have a feeling this is a reference to a scouting report published elsewhere. I also haven’t heard anything about Antonelli in center more recently. I think it could make sense, but it’s quite the impossible call to make without much working knowledge of the guy.

We tend to hang our hats on these throwaway sentences without any background a bit too much, in my opinion.

Melvin’s unhelpfully vague suggestion:

Corner Power Guy / All D No Bat Guy

Grab a Willy Taveras type in center, then make up the power and obp loss in left. This might mean Chase Headley or Kevin Kouzmanoff, or it could involve dealing Headley for someone like Jason Bay.

You hate to trade the young, homegrown Headley, so signing Geoff Jenkins might make sense as a backup plan. Headley could spell Jenkins, Giles, and Kouzmanoff if he is even deemed ready for the bigs.