I have to agree with you on Youkilis.

He is uglier than sin, but he is a solid 1B with a sweet stick.

It pains me to say this, but I’d take him over Giambi any day of the week.

With Brett Gardner flashing speed and defense in Scranton and Austin Jackson not too far behind, why not shop “He That Must Slide In To First Base” while his value is higher than it otherwise is?

Thoughts?

Sorry Charlie, neither number equates to the most important thing in offensive baseball… SCORING RUNS!

Sure, those numbers are iluminative of individual performance, but not of RELEVANT individual performance. It’s not how many times you get on base, but what happens. It’s not what your slug… it’s WHEN you slug.

If you can’t run effectively, if you don’t score a lot than your high obp is useless. Yes, that’s a function of the team, but boys, it is a team game.

A guy with two doubles and a walk in four official at bats, no runs, no RBI has a better OBP and SLG than a guy who goes 1-for-5 with a grand slam. But one helped his team win and the other helped his stats.

Runs and RBI will be king as long as the win goes to the team with the most runs. If/when baseball games are decided by the number of baserunners the two teams had then OBP will move to the top of the stat sheet.

We talk on this and other sites about Jeter’s value transcending his stats. One of the reasons for that is howmany runs he scores. He goes first-to-third (there’s no stats for that). He steals bases, he advances on deep fly outs… all those things contribute to scoring runs and that contributes to winning games.

Runs scored or RBI’s shouldn’t make any difference for an individual player’s performance. Those stats hold water only when discussing the team’s performance as a whole. Like I said if you want to talk about a player’s ability to drive runs in quote his batting average with RISP. In that case you would be right because Giambi’s BA w/ RISP is god-awful.

yeah, i guess

“Fans usually only hate really good players on the opposing team….not mediocre ones. Just my take on things.”

his ugliness does help though

Which team wins? The one with higher OPB/SLG or the one with more runs???? OPB and slugging are very important stats, but it’s smoked filled coffee house BS if it doesn’t translate to production. Giambi’s on pace to drive in 85-90 runs and score about 80. That’s not great production. What are they getting out of that OBP??? Aside from the opportunity for Cano to make more outs. If he’s not homering, he’s scoring less than 1/4 of the times he gets on base. His numbers with RISP are disastarous.