This slump is really stretching our headline writing skills

Why must we suffer the horrors of Juan Pierre and Jeff Kent night after night after night? Can't Pierre ever get a day offf? How come when there's a lefty on the mound, Andre Ethier always has to sit, when Pierre and his candy ass arm and nancy bat haven't missed a game since Furcal got hurt? Another consecutive game streak? Heaven help us. The guy slugs .323. .323!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ethier has a higher on base percentage and slugs 100 points higher, but he can't get arrested. Meanwhile, Kent has the lowest OBP on the team, and the third lowest SLG, behind Pierre and DeWitt.

Sit the old farts, play the kids. They're the ones who are actually producing, yet Joe feels the need to rest them. WHy, Please god tell me why you sit your best players and play your lousy ones. The Dodgers now have three options better than Jeff Kent at 2b: LaRoche, Young, and even Maza, who makes up with his glove what he lacks with his bat.

Word to TJ Simers: you're right about Ned Colletti, but don't go second-guessing the Milton Bradley for Andre Ethier deal. Bradley was an albatross, and the Dodgers were lucky to get anything for him. He's on his third team since leaving the Dodgers, and is still a career .278 hitter. Sure he's hitting .330 in Texas, but everybody hits well there. Just wait until August when it's too broiling to run, and his numbers will come back down.

But on a more important note, can you imagine the influence Bradley would have had on young players like Matt Kemp? If he were still a Dodger, Kemp would probably have turned into another first class jerk.

On the other hand, maybe if we still had Bradley, Collitis wouldn't have signed those horrendous deals for Pierre or Fatso Andruw Jones. Still, if we're looking with hindsight, there's no way I don't pull the trigger on the Bradley deal. I just wouldn't sign Pierre or Jones, that's all.

Torre picked an odd day to ask the hitters to be more patient. Buehrle is a guy who throws strikes early and often. His strikeout to walk ratio is better than 2-1, and that's only because he doesn't striek out that many battters. He's walked all of 27 batters this year. You're not going to beat Buehrle by going deep in the count against him. You beat him by identifying a pitch early in the count that you can hit. You may have to hit an 0-2 pitch, but don't imagine you're going to work a lot of walks out of him.

This sad sad sad team is still only 4 games out. Life support is an amazing technology.

Good post, SaMo. i completely concur.
And I still put it ALL on Torre. He is, after all, there to MANAGE a team. Oh, and the hitting coaches....
(I actually groan when I see Scioscia and Mickey Hatcher still putting it all together.)

AK/BK:

I heard you talking on the live blog about Torre. he gets the benefit of the doubt because he has four rings, but his skill was never in on-field managing. He was actually rather lame at that. Where he excelled was in media managemement, keeping reporters from killing the team every time they stumbled. Luckily, he had a whole lot of talent and a ton of money on the roster to work with.

He has less talent here, and media more concerned with who should be tasting Shaq's behind than the Dodgers. As soon as USC football starts, nobody will even pay attention unless the team is in the playoffs, and maybe not even then.

But I can't give Torre much of a pass because this team has performed no differently for him than they did under Grady Little. And that's because the manager, whoever that may be, refuses to sit overpriced old losers and let the kids play. Baseball has become a young man's game again in the post-steroids era, and the Dodgers have too many grizzled veterans on their roster. It's ok to have one or two for chemistry, but Jeff Kent is not a feel good kind of guy.

As for Adrian Beltre, where would you put him? The Dodgers have three third basemen already.

I agree with Adrian Garcia that Delwyn Young should play every day,if only to boost his trade value. Certainly nobody is interested in taking Juan Pierre off our hands. The problem with acquiring a big stick for the middle of the lineup is again, where would he play? We already have good hitters sitting behind Pierre. Who is it that plays second, third, or short that's going to hit 40 homers? The only guy of this caliber was A-Rod, and the Dodgers didn't want to spend that kind of money on a guy who has never won anything.

SaMo..Great posts!

Yes, it's easier to manage in the AL because of the DH especially if you have an owner that will buy you anything you want, price no problem.

I can't believe the comment Torre reputedly made that Perre and Kent know how to put up a good at bat but he doesn't mention Loney who is hitting 311 and has hit in 20 staright starts. Huh?!

All this talk about good at bats is just a cover for the fact that Joe didn't really want to manage anymore but he couldn't turn down a ridiculous amount of money offered to him where he would just have to just sit on the bench and collect his pay check. Can't blame him.

As if it couldn't get worse, I just heard that Scott Proctor went on the 15-day DL and Gary Bennett was transferred to the 60-day DL. Good times.

I also happen to have Gavin Floyd in my fantasy league, so am more curious than normal to see how tonight's game turns out, but I think we all know we're destined for a 4-2 loss. Sigh.

Chris
http://www.dodgerfan.net

Va Blueblood
It isn't that I won't acknowledge minor league stats. I will but I do not give them near the merit that I give Major League stats. Let's look at LaRoches stats. He has 6 pieces of or full seasons in the minor leagues. His overall BA is .294 which is not extremely high for the minor leagues. I would say about average for a possible major league player. His OBP is .382 which is pretty good, but there are 27 people in the Major Leagues with a higher OBP and Martin is better than that on the Dodgers. DeWitt is .335 in the major leagues. LaRoches best stat is slg .516 which is very good. I think what I have been trying to say is not that LaRoches minor league stats are not good but that DeWitt has performed at the highest level possible and been successful, only to be kiched to the curb. Although that only represents a mere 220 ABs. While LaRoche has had only 111 abs but has not performed well. He has struck out right at 25% of the time and I feel that he is getting another opportunity at DeWitts expense. I don't understand why you think that you can compare Minor and Major leagues performance. It is not nearly the same. It is kinda like we discussed on the PurpleGold and Blue show today. LaRoche is getting an opportunity because of his bloodline as much as other things. Also, I am safe in saying that the excuse is that LaRoche has not had enough ABs in the major leagues to just give the 3rd base job to DeWitt even though he has had some success in the Majors, also because he has slumped for all of 60ABs. We will see what LaRoche has done after 220 ABs but as I told AK/BK, I feel that if all things were considered and LaRoche was anywhere close to being acceptable(Even if DeWitts were slightly better) LaRoche would be given the job. Hey, like BK said All things are not fair, nor should the be. I don't accept that saying but many do. Thanks for at least asking why as opposed to just accepting one side.

Package

Steve M:

You skip right past the most important part of your argument with regard to Pierre: IF he gets to first base. My problem with Pierre is that he doesn't get to first base all that often. His OBP is second-lowest on the team (to Kent).

Russell Martin gets on 4 out of 10 times, gets to second base by himself (on doubles) 14 times (Compared to 9 for Pierre) and gets himself home (on a dinger) 7 more times than Pierre. On those seven occasions, he doesn't need anybody to drive him home.

Pierre gets to second 30 more times than he gets to first, by stealing, but also turns his hits (or paltry 17 walks) into outs by getting caught.

Here's another way to look at slugging percentage for a speed guy:

Add Pierre's steals to his total bases, but subtract the times he makes an out, since those negate hits. That gives him 106 total bases in 385 appearances, or a slugging percentage of .385.

That's STILL lowest on the team. So much for speed.

As for Kent, every time I look at the numbers, it's just ridiculous. He has all of 10 walks this year. Even Matt Kemp has more walks, and he's never seen a pitch he doesn't like. If Joe wants to talk about approach, the guy he should be talking to is Kent, not Kemp.