Greg 2003
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Draft Capsule:
Went with the H Halladay after the elite pitchers were taken in the 1st, then followed with a good Maddux and a ZZ in Schilling, but the three did not provide the 1-2-3 results one would expect. Took a pretty powerful team, with the keystone combo of Soriano and Jose Hernandez, and did well to turn a potential negative 1B situation into a great opportunity cost with the Durazo/Fullmer/Phelps/Millar platoon. Weaker bench than usual with Cameron and Fox, and no one able to improve the 1B-2 defense that had to start. With Burrell, Posada, Hernandez, Soriano and the 1B group, Greg drafted a ton of whiffs.
Season Highlight:
I thought Steve was handing Greg a playoff spot with his round 10 swap. Greg had to be pretty high at that point. After the trade, he took Burnett, Crudale, Cordero, Posada, Durocher and Jose at SS, all guys who offered alot of positives to what Greg probably thought was an already strong team. Followed all that up with Millar late, who was as good as any late round pick in the whole draft. Not sure where the wheels fell off for him, but it had to happen pretty early on in the season, so without diving into the minutiae of Greg's season, the trade might've been the highlight.
Season Lowlight:
In reading Greg's emails and listening to him talk, the whole season was pretty low. The mistaken pick of Boehinger was low. Nen blowing save after save early on was pretty low. Getting next to nothing from Schilling, Burnett and Dessens had to be pretty demoralizing. The high grade guys like Durocher and Cordero, even Nen, repeatedly giving up runs was probably pretty hard to swallow. Add it all up and that's probably the collective lowlight. Shrug.
If I analyzed the scripts or boxes, I'd check how:
I'd analyze Schilling's starts, pitch by pitch. Seems to me that the ZZ is a great weapon, but it can also backfire in instances. In a case like Schilling, I'd check to see how many potential bases empty walks were turned into balls, then the at bat yielded bigger hits. On the whole, it's hard to argue against the effectiveness of preventing baserunners, but it's also plain to see that Schilling gave up an absurd amount of hits.
2003 Surprises:
We've had a lot of crappy teams in our history. Greg was not expecting to be anywhere near them in 2003. I think he probably surprised himself when he stepped back from his draft and saw that after going for the bash bunch that he did, he ended up with such an un-Greg-like roster. I was surprised that Cameron and Fox were who he thought would be his pinch-runner extraordinaires, carrying on the tradition of Womack and Goodwin et al, and they both did well in their roles, I think with Fox leading the league in steals.
Best Strategy:
I thought it curious to take a 2B-6 like Soriano and expect to give him the bulk of 2B playing time, but that's what Greg did, and it seemed to work out fine for him. Greg was low in the double plays turned stat, but having a 2 at 1B and an 8 at SS affect that number in addition to Soriano. No one understands that speed is an asset in this league to the extent that Greg does, so maybe Soriano was a bargain considering his speed and power (which most of us seem to covet).
Worst Strategy:
Can't really point to a single thing, but Burrell hit in the meat of the order too often, when everyone else seemed to understand that him being there was an Achilles heel. And Burrell was a plodder with high whiffs, and as I pointed out earlier, that type of player was too prevalent on this roster. Loading up on the low games pitched relievers while sacrificing offensive, defensive, and pinch-running flexibility might not have been a terrible strategy, just was so un-Greg-like. Nitpicking like this is just a way to explain the team's poor performance, and when I'm nitpicking about this kind of stuff, it's all a compliment to what Greg has done in the past, honestly.
GM Summary:
I thought his team was as good as any other coming out of the draft. Probably lacked the same Greg moxie of other seasons, but do you really draft moxie? Maybe this a comment for Greg, maybe for Graham, maybe for everyone who is ever way under .500 ... at what point do you pull a GM Ken of 2003 and go nuts trying to revamp your roster? Doug Basler made a great GM decision back in '99. He was out of it, so he made an eight-player blockbuster that allowed him to wrestle home run king and #1 pick Mark McGwire from playoff-bound Joe. It cost a lot, but it gave Doug some optimism for the rest of the season. Maybe Matt did a similar thing this year in making the Floyd-Green for Ichiro-Sheff deal, though he was by no means out of it at the 40 game mark. Maybe it would have worked the same way for Greg as it did for Doug, or as it did for Matt. It's a tough call ... I would guess Greg had a measure of confidence in his underperforming players but didn't think he could he convince other GMs of their value and potential. I don't know. And it's not like he wasn't involved in trades, as he was able to pick up Mariano for Millar, and he entered the FA draft to pick up Bautista. But those didn't do much to overhaul things. Maybe at a certain point, you keep playing the way you set out to play, and focus as much on learning about yourself and the style of play you are employing as much as you focus on winning each game. I don't know. By no means am I comdemning Greg or others who were not more aggressive with trades, but I'm just wondering when an overhaul becomes the best play to make as a GM.
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