In my book, The Fielding Bible, we came up with a way to evaluate outfielder arms. We look at two elements: Runner Advance Percentage — how often do runners succeed at taken an extra base on a single or double, and Baserunner Kills — how often does an outfielder directly throw out a runner at a base (no relays). Based on these two statistics, here’s how we evaluate players in the first half this year.

Starting in left field, the player with the most kills so far this year is Raul Ibanez with five. Also with five kills out of left field are Delmon Young and Ben Francisco. Ibanez has allowed only 35.8 percent of baserunners to take an extra base, which is above average for left field. However, Pat Burrell, while he has only four kills, has only allowed 29.9 percent of baserunners to advance. Based on his better advance percentage, we select Pat Burrell as the left fielder with the best throwing arm in baseball so far this year.

In center field we have former second baseman B.J. Upton with eight kills thus far. That ties him with right fielder Nick Markakis for the most baserunner kills in baseball. However, Upton’s 71.4 percent advance percentage is one of the worst among all center fielders. The best throwing center fielder for 2008 might come as no surprise. It’s former pitcher Rick Ankiel, who along with four kills, has only allowed 47.1 percent of baserunners to advance, the best figure among center fielders with 40 or more opportunities.

In right field, we already mentioned Nick Markakis with eight kills, but somewhat similar to B.J. Upton, his advance percentage of 54.7 percent is below average. The best throwing right fielders in baseball this year are Hunter Pence and Michael Cuddyer, each with five kills and each with a 46.3 advance percentage. They’re tied for second in best advance percentage among all right fielders. Kosuke Fukudome leads the way with a 45.2 percent advance percentage but only two kills.

In summary, here are the best so far this year (click for readable size):

Source: BillJamesOnline.com (through the All-Star break)

Used with permission from John Dewan’s Stat of the Week™, www.statoftheweek.com.

Crain’s Chicago Business Reports:

Inland bids for Wrigley Field: report
(Crain’s) — Inland Real Estate Group of Cos., an Oak Brook-based real estate investment firm, has submitted an offer to buy Wrigley Field, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

Inland, one of the nation’s largest shopping-center owners, is believed to have offered close to $300 million for the North Side baseball stadium, the Sun-Times reported Thursday on its Web site.

Inland Vice-chairman Joseph Cosenza would not confirm the offer, but said, “I think anyone would want to own Wrigley Field,” according to the report.

http://www.chicagorealestatedaily.com/cgi-bin/news.pl?id=30238

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Cubs players represented very will on the mound, but not so much at the plate:

• Cubs pitchers: 4 shutout innings, 1 hit, 1 pick-off and 6 strikeouts. 
• Cubs batters went 0 for 4 with 2 strikeouts plus a walk.

I think Clint Hurdle did a pretty decent job managing the game and the roster for the Nationals.  However, I don’t know how you let the cleanup hitter (Aramis Ramirez) on the National League’s most prolific offense (based on RBI, slugging, batting average, on-base pct, and runs scored) come to bat just one time in a game where runs are hard to come by. I guess you had to pinch run for him given the tie score in the 9th, but working him into the game an inning or two earlier, perhaps with runners on base, might have been a good plan.

So it seems the Cubs could not help themselves in bringing home field advantage to the National League for the World Series. Maybe this will prove to be a moot point, but for now it stings just a bit.

Some really interesting charts on Rich Hardin and Chad Gaudin as well as Big Z’s last outing. The detail on this blog is staggering and analysis is insightful.  Check it out here.

• Aramis Ramirez has a sleek white Maserati
• Carlos Zambrano has a black Mercedes S-Class sedan
• Kosuke Fukudome has a giant white Escalade
• Pat Hughes has a small Mercedes SUV
• Ron Santo takes a chauffeur-driven Lincoln Town Car

In talking with the parking lot attendant, it seems Kosuke had been driving a Pontiac as of last week.  But this homestand he has the largest Cadillac Escalade.  Peer pressure must have got the best of him?

July 10, 2008

There’s an old saying in Chicago: Vote early, vote often. Well, that certainly seemed to be the case for Cubs fans this season, as seven representatives of the Cubs were selected to play in the All-Star Game. You get the feeling there may have been some ballot-stuffing going on…Which of course is within every fan’s right. (Boston fans, by the way, voted in five of their own, which is no small feat in the American League, competing against Yankee fans.) But how close did fans and players actually come to selecting the most-deserving all-stars based on Win Shares and OPS? Here are the starters selected for the All-Star Game, broken down by league, compared to leaders in Win Shares and OPS at their respective positions:

Used with permission from John Dewan’s Stat of the Week™, www.statoftheweek.com.

Photo of Rich Harden and Chad Gaudin arriving at Wrigley Field 7/9/08:

With Harden and Gaudin come high expectations and cautious hope.  Still, many Cub fans seem reluctant to express outwardly their secret, perhaps even desperate hopes for the club’s first successful post-season in 100 years.  By “successful” of course I mean to define success as bringing a World Championship to the North side of Chicago.

I was saying to a friend the other day that I want ‘the Cubs to go all the way this year, baby!’  He chided me - seriously - for saying such a thing out loud. He said that really isn’t a good idea, even not cool. Now he is a die hard fan like I am, but he feared somehow upsetting the baseball Gods, or squandering whatever karmic collateral the Cubs have built up could have an effect on the season.  Sometimes its just hard to hope - out loud.

I think it would be a mistake to assign too much responsibility to Rich Harden.  There has been talk the Cubs will go easy on him, letting him go an extra day this week so his Cubs debut will be Saturday.  Then he will reportedly get the fourth start after the All Star Break which would put him at eight days rest.  This is the right thing to do, go easy on him, keep the pressure down, cut him tons of slack… because we will need him in the playoffs, baby!

Photo of his first ever throw as a Cub, playing long toss with Larry Rothschild prior to Tuesday’s game: