No idea what happened to Emaus at the end of the AFL, none of the game notes on the league's official site said anything about him being injured. His name just dropped off the active roster with no explanation...So hopefully he isn't hurt but if it was serious I'm assuming it would've been noted somewhere.

Another thing that slipped by me for a couple weeks is that Gary Cathcart the Fisher Cats manager was not brought back for the 2010 season and as of today has joined the Washington Nationals organization although I don't know in what capacity.

There could be a lot of reasons for Emaus's absence.  Because the AFL is during the off-season, players often have personal issues such as their own weddings, family weddings, pre-booked trips etc.   Clubs are generally reasonable about letting players leave for those reasons.

I asked him, and needless to say it wasn't injury,  a family related issue to be more specific.

Anyone else here see Mills' prospect star fading? I didn't really want to judge him on his MLB season, because he was up here way too early. But if he's getting hit this much in AFL, it does dent my assessment.

10 months!

Any guy in the AFL, who played during the 2009 season, is now in his 10th consecutive month of play! Hundreds of games! AFL stats mean diddlysquat and (to quote a  3 year old acquaintance) poopoocaca.

Ken Rosenthal covers the jays new approach to scouting here.

Here is an interesting nugget of information:

Anthopolous, 32, is no old-school throwback, longing for the days when teams relied solely on scouts' opinions and not computers. Quite the contrary. He grew up reading Bill James, believes in blending subjective and objective analysis, and uses Tom Tango, a leading sabermetrician, as a consultant.

And on scouting:

"With an expanded scouting staff, we should get more looks than any other team," Anthopoulos says. "With the right evaluators, the probability of getting the player right should increase."

Ah, but that's the trick — finding the right evaluators.

"You can have 100 scouts," Anthopoulos says. "But if they're not the right evaluators, you're going to get the players wrong."

 

That is interesting, Gerry. I thought that Tango was consulting for the Mariners.  But, maybe it does take two to tango...

I wouldn't be running my ideas past Billy Beane.  He's a competitor, in the same way that Theo Epstein is.

Good article.  It makes sense that AA would talk with other GM's about how they go about their business, especially ones who've had some success in 'smaller' markets (as Toronto pretends to be).

Something that caught my eye was...

"Scouts get paid $30,000-$35,000," Anthopoulos says. "They've got no job security. The reason some scouts are with eight to 10 teams is because there's no loyalty. They have to jump ship for a $2,000-$3,000 raise.

I forget where I posted it, but years ago I said that a high level scout is worth well over $100k a year if they can just identify one major leaguer no one else would've every 5 or even 10 years (factoring in you get 3 years of that ML player at the minimum which can amount to millions of dollars saved vs free agency or arbitration eligible players).  The trick is in finding and identifying those scouts.  To do so you'd need to have information on who they recommended to be drafted at each slot of the draft and how well they judged the signability of those players.  So, if you could find a scout who was screaming at his team to draft Piazza back in the early 90's for the first 60 rounds, or one who was pushing hard to take Pujols a few years ago in the first 10 rounds then you have a scout that should be listened to more often.  On the other hand if you have a scout who keeps pushing for guys who don't work out year in year out then you gotta get rid of him.  Without being in those meetings though it is hard to know who is who and which scout really did do those things (I figure there had to be at least one who did push for Pujols out there, seeing the massive potential).  If it only would cost the Jays $50k a year to grab that guy then they should run,not walk, out to him and hand it to him along with free internet and whatever else is needed to keep family contact going during the season.

Heck, a good scout could potentially save his salary just in one negotiation with a kid in the first 2 rounds by getting in good with the family and convincing them that signing now for, say, $1 mil vs signing next year for $1.1 is a good idea ($100k saved, player in system for certain).  If Boras gets in there you're screwed, but I figure there is still a lot of room out there for negotiation and if a kid and their family feel safe via this one scout then they might sign for $100k less than they otherwise would've (proper pressure to make them feel that is all they'll get regardless of the agent).

An unbalanced schedule and different divisions makes Billy less of a competitor. It may be in Billy's interest for the Blue Jays to become really, really good.   If the Yanks, Sox, Rays and Jays were all good they will cluster closer to .500 and make it easier for Billy's A's to win a wild card with 90 wins.

 

2014 (rose colored dream) standings.

Jays 90-72

Yanks 89-73

Sox 89-73

Rays 86-76

 

Mariners 96-66

As 90-72

 

 

What AA is doing is "Moneyball."

Moneyball was not about OBP - it was about looking for value that is not assessed properly in whatever the current "conventional wisdom" is. In the last draft we lost several of those we signed - HAD we more scouts who had the time to learn more about those players and their families AS HUMANS we might have been better able to sign them OR be smart enough NOT to draft them but to draft others.

He's also RIGHT about scouting other teams organizations. Most GM's do not have good scouting reports for guys in the lower levels of other organizations.

I'm a fan of AA's "long term" moves so far. Just hope I don't have to get to 70 before we get any results! (I'm 63 now).

Speaking of AA and moneyball, Murray Chass has interesting story here:

http://www.murraychass.com/?p=1177&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+MurrayChass+%28Murray+Chass+On+Baseball%29

The lede:

LEARN TO SPELL ANTHOPOULOS By Murray Chass November 22, 2009

When the Toronto Blue Jays named Alex Anthopoulos their new general manager last month, the inclination was to think that they couldn’t get out of the statistically-oriented rut their departing general manager, J.P. Ricciardi had put them in. Anthopoulos, after all, had been Ricciardi’s assistant and was 32 years old. All those young new general managers practiced statistically-oriented baseball, didn’t they?

But then came word from Omar Minaya, the New York Mets’ general manager, who gave Anthopoulos his first job in baseball with the Montreal Expos in 2002.

“He’s not from a statistics background,” Minaya said. “He’s from an evaluation background.”

BTF had fun with the Chass piece. Of course, Chass just serves 'em up on a silver platter.

and uses Tom Tango, a leading sabermetrician, as a consultant

Okay, then.

I feel better.

I think the article also said that the Jays would have a scout for every two major league teams and their affiliates, and one more scout that would cover just one major league team and its affiliates.  (15 scouts)

I wonder which team gets double the attention?