#AskSpector: When can a player be called a bust?

Jesse Spector

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#AskSpector: When can a player be called a bust? image

Welcome to the Memorial Day edition of the #AskSpector Tweetbag, where, as always, you can get the answers to whatever you want to ask, just by sending questions on Twitter with the #AskSpector hashtag. Next week's Tweetbag is already open, because the Tweetbag is always open, so if these questions are different from whatever questions you have, you already know how to get the answers you seek. Let's see what's in this week's extravaganza.

 

 

Zack Wheeler, 27 starts into his major league career and owner of a 3.74 ERA with 137 strikeouts in 156.1 innings, is by no means a bust as he approaches his 24th birthday on Friday, so let's just get that out of the way right now. Wheeler had a 3.42 ERA and 4.17 FIP last year, and while his ERA this year is 4.31, his FIP is 3.63, with an increased strikeout ratio and lower rate of home runs allowed, although his walk rate has gone up a tick. Yes, he's 1-5, but the Mets have scored 40 runs in his 10 starts, with 19 of those runs coming in two games. He hasn't had a great May, it's true, but he also still has not made a full season's worth of starts at the major league level, and there are obvious signs of promise and potential still abounding.

So, while Wheeler is not someone to call a bust yet, the question of when a player can be called a bust still needs to be answered. It has to be on a case by case basis, given expectations. Let's put it in Mets terms. A first-round draft pick who never makes it to the major leagues (Steve Chilcott) is a bust, a player rated as a top 10 prospect who winds up playing only a handful of games at below replacement level (Fernando Martinez) is a bust, and a big-money free agent who is so bad that he winds up getting bought out with a year and a half left on his contract (Jason Bay) is a bust.

But when can you apply the tag? That's a subjective matter, one which I would say, in the case of a touted prospect, takes at least two years of major league action to apply. Even then, it's dicey. Nolan Ryan was pretty much a bust with the Mets — a pitcher worth 3.0 WAR over parts of five seasons at the major league level. We all know what happened after he left the Mets, and now we live in a world where the Mets give out Nolan Ryan bobbleheads.

That's a different kind of bust.

 

 

I still have a problem with the NHL issuing suspensions based on severity of injury related to a hit. If Brandon Prust had hit Derek Stepan, and Stepan had not broken his jaw, would Prust have gotten off without a suspension? That's wrong to me. While there is a difference in a court of law between what happens if you hit somebody with your car and if you seriously injure somebody you hit with your car, sports are not life. The penalty should have to do with the action itself, not the result, especially in hockey, where dirty hits can lead to concussion symptoms that do not present themselves until days or weeks after a suspension decision is handed down.

 

 

The second half of this question presupposes an affirmative answer to the first half, and let's just grant that, indeed, "the code" is all but dead now. I think that players being made to answer for their dirty play by fighting is something that had some legitimacy once, but not for a very long time. As specialization in the game grew, designated fighters became proxies for each team's antagonists, and now it's just a matter of those players beating on each other for what often amounts to no reason at all. I think that the rise of the goon, while increasing fighting over a short term, ultimately has led hockey to a place where it's reasonable not only to talk about the end of fighting in the sport, but to see the road to that place in the not too distant future, especially given the increased knowledge of the long-term consequences to human brains.

 

 

I don't think the Reds' rotation is underrated, because people know how good they are, as the reason that Cincinnati has not fallen completely out of contention. Reds starters lead the majors in WHIP. How underrated can they be? I'd say the Cubs' rotation actually is pretty underrated. All six starters used this year — Jeff Samardzija, Jason Hammel, Travis Wood, Edwin Jackson, and Carlos Villanueva — have an FIP under 4.00, and Chicago starters rank 11th in the majors in strikeout rate, 13th in ERA, ninth in WHIP, and 12th in strikeout-to-walk ratio, while being tied with Tigers starters for the fewest homers allowed -- in 12 more innings. All this while the Cubs have the worst record in the National League. That's how bad the Cubs' bullpen and offense are, but people just tend to assume the whole team stinks. They don't.

 

 

The last time the Padres had a playoff-caliber roster, Black got them pretty darn close, two games out of first place in a 90-win season in 2010 -- the Giants were just better that year. Since then, here are the Padres' top players by WAR each year: Cameron Maybin in 2011, Chase Headley in 2012, Chris Denorfia in 2013, and Seth Smith so far this year. Why fire Black if you believe he's a good mananger but you haven't had the talent for him to put the team in position to win?

 

 

I wish I had a full answer to this, but rationalizing each choice would take forever, and I'm pretty sure everyone would get bored reading it. Let's just say that the Astros are the G train — traveling through trendy areas but hardly ever working the way anyone wants it to, and leave it at that for now.

 

 

It can, but I'm not going to say that it will. Mark Buehrle and J.A. Happ are a combined 12-2 on the season, with ERAs of 2.16 and 3.34, respectively, to go with FIPs of 3.14 and 5.14. Consider me wary of a pitching staff with the second-highest walk rate in baseball — the rest of the "top five" is the White Sox, Indians, Mets, and Astros. I would not take that as a good sign.

 

 

No. Babe Ruth and Jackie Robinson have to be on a baseball Mount Rushmore, and that leaves two spots. You can argue for a lot of people for those two spots, but Jeter doesn't come close to Roberto Clemente, Stan Musial, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Cy Young, Hank Aaron, Sandy Koufax, Ted Williams...

 

 

Much as I would love to say "July 13 of this year," I don't really believe that it's going to happen for the USA this year. We got to the round of 16 last time, but the time before that, did not make it out of the group stage. Something like 2040 or 2044 feels right for a prediction — another couple of generations to catch up with the rest of the world, but there are a lot of assumptions there about both soccer culture here and the talent that can be produced. But at the same time, you look at England, and they think they can always win, but still have not done so since 1966, and that was at home.

 

 

In a way, it's my fault — me and people like me, anyway. After Dan Harmon left the show, Community went downhill in a hurry, and even though I caught a couple of episodes after his return in season five and enjoyed them, I never restored it to a place on my DVR. That said, I was part of the reason it stayed on in the first place, because I kept watching even though the first few episodes were terrible. There was potential, and it was realized, but I'm still much more upset about the cancelation of Happy Endings, which was brilliant from start to untimely finish.

 

 

They can, and do, but generally it's better left to players who are not running off of a hill, and whose regular job is to catch balls rather than to throw them.

 

 

It does still exist, and it is an effective rule for those rare times when umpires' interpretation of a rule is so egregiously wrong, that the only fair thing to do is to replay a game from the point of protest. The most famous example of this happening is the Pine Tar Game (you can argue whether the wrongness in that case lied with the umpires or the league office), but you could see something like that happening again, especially with the vagaries of replay, and what is and is not reviewable. It's rare, but it's a safety valve for the integrity of the game that is worth preserving.

 

 

Letting the All-Star Game be an exhibition with no consequences, and awarding home field in the playoffs based on regular-season record would be just fine with me. I don't think a "big idea" is necessary.

 

 

I really haven't been to that many, because by the time I got to an age where I started going to lots of ballparks and arenas, it was the era of corporate naming rights. I never got to Memorial Stadium in Baltimore or Buffalo Memorial Auditorium. I did go to plenty of games at Veterans Stadium throughout my college years in Philadelphia, and while it surely was a dump, it was a super fun place to go spend less than $10 to sit in the 700 level, watch the Phillies usually get their brains beaten in, and also watch some Philadelphians beat each other's brains in. The other place I've regularly been that fits the category is Nassau Coliseum, formally Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, which also is a dump and a fun place to go. When it comes to favorite, though, I'd have to go with Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, home of Wake Forest basketball, and the place where I covered Penn losing to Illinois in the 2000 NCAA Tournament, then watched what might be the best basketball game I've ever seen live, as Final Four-bound Florida survived Butler's upset bid in overtime.

 

 

I really don't know. Trotz has had a lot of success as a defensive-minded coach, but that's largely a product of the teams that he has had in Nashville. How would he handle having a talent like Alex Ovechkin? I think Trotz is smart enough not to be like Dale Hunter and completely shackle one of the greatest offensive players in the game, but would his system work? Like I said, I really don't know. I don't think anyone is going to look at Barry Trotz and say that he's a bad hire for anyone, it's just a question of whether Washington is the place where he would have the most success.

 

 

Every year, right up until they introduced ugly hats for American holidays. I understand that the proceeds of hat sales go to veterans charities. Know another good way for Major League Baseball to help those charities? Maybe the multibillion-dollar industry could cut a check without foisting a gimmick upon everyone.

 

 

Game 7 of the 2013 Eastern Conference quarterfinals between the Boston Bruins and Toronto Maple Leafs.

 

 

Yes it is. For similar reasons to the ones that make expansion for MLB a good idea, but even more so in the NHL, where one conference is 16 teams, the other is 14 teams, and eight from each make the playoffs. Get both conferences to 16 teams.

 

 

Not really, no.

 

 

I would like to spend so much time writing a detailed and very thoughtful response to this, because it seems like a really great question. There's only one problem, and that is that there is a patently obvious answer. It's golf. Not only do the athletes have weapons in their hands that they could use to possibly try to fight off the tiger, but in golf, the spectators are basically on the field of play, which would lead to mass chaos as everyone tries to run away from a tiger on the loose. Throw in the fact that the best golfer of the last 30 years is a guy who is NAMED TIGER, and it's not even close.

 

 

Standard answer for a request for a prediction.

 

 

I think Hollywood passes on the project, because the script is just too "Hollywood" to actually make it into a movie. Undersized player who became a star, then got cut from his nation's Olympic team by his own general manager, then wound up going to the Olympics and winning gold anyway, then forced his way out in a trade, struggled with his new team, then his mom dies, and then he leads that new team as an inspiring figure in both person and performance? They'd never buy it.

 

 

This really depends on your definition of "helped," but there is the one basebrawl I always remember when it comes to guys coming out of the bullpen and getting involved: Yankees vs. Orioles in 1998, with Graeme Lloyd and Jeff Nelson the main bullpen participants after Armando Benitez drilled Tino Martinez. (Ed. note: Orioles reliever Alan Mills also came in from the bullpen and played a major part in that brawl.)

Far more often, relievers run in and stand around the periphery of a brawl, because what else are they going to do? Lloyd and Nelson saw an opportunity to get at Benitez from around the scrum, and they took it.

Jesse Spector