There are reportedly fifteen different teams talking with the San Diego Padres about acquiring Heath Bells late inning services. What this does for Heath Bells fantasy value remains to be seen, as he could easily end up being an 8th inning guy or a closer, depending upon where he lands. Thems the breaks. If I had to gamble on Heath Bell being moved in the next 24 hours, I would say the chances are greater than 75%. The Padres would be foolish to not sell high on the guy, as Bell is going to be 32 next season, and will be facing arbitration this winter, (bad words for the Padres front office). Heath Bells value will never be higher.

So who will be closing games in San Diego for that one win a week, once Bell moves on?

An absolutely great read on Everth Cabrera. Dare I say, a must read ..

“He reminds me so much of Omar (Vizquel),” says Padres coach Jim Lefebvre. “He has more range, more of an arm, more speed and he's more advanced physically than Omar was at his age. With that said, Omar became probably the greatest shortstop who ever played. This kid's a great find who could be around a long, long time.”

Cabrera's batting average (.259) and on-base percentage (.342) leave some room for improvement, and he's clearly a work in progress after just 42 big league games. In the opener of the Padres' current series at Cincinnati, Cabrera smoked a line drive left-handed for his first major league home run, then hit a triple right-handed with a bit of bravura on the basepaths. He added three hits Tuesday night, including a pair of doubles.

The triple was Cabrera's fourth of the season, equaling the most by any Padres hitter all last year. His speed and fearlessness made Cabrera professional baseball's stolen-base leader in 2008. He's tops on the Padres with 13 thefts in 14 tries – and that's after missing no fewer than 60 games with a fractured hamate bone in his left hand suffered April 19.

SDUT

Adrian Gonzalez, 1B, San Diego: Anytime a hitter has a BABIP as low as Gonzalez', I am prone to think it must be fluky. Then again, given the depleted state of the Padres' lineup, I thought maybe there was another source behind his .245 rate. I assumed that Gonzalez was not getting many good pitches to hit, a theory that his 19 percent walk rate supports. Better yet, according to the Fangraphs website, Gonzalez is among the bottom 20 batters in terms of the percentage of pitches seen in the strike zone. As it turns out, seven of these 20 hitters, including Gonzo, have BABIP rates of .280 or lower.

It looks like Gonzalez' owners should just start resigning themselves to a second half replete with homers, walks and easy outs, but repeat after me: correlation is not causation. Just because Gonzalez and his compatriots aren't getting many pitches in the zone doesn't mean that they are doomed to low batting averages. Five of these seven low-BABIP batters possess flyball trends that would likely lead to subpar BABIP rates in any event, pitch-arounds notwithstanding. Only Gonzalez and Aubrey Huff have profiles that suggest they are due to produce higher batting averages going forward. Even without protection, Gonzalez should revert back to being a .280 hitter as soon as better luck starts to kick in.

FantasyNews.CBSSports.com

There are not a bunch of great match-ups today, but I am going with this one here for a few reasons. First off, if we are looking for great match-ups the Padres will rarely get their name in the lights, so I might as well show them a little love on a half day. Secondly, today is July 23rd, almost two thirds of the baseball season is behind us, and Kevin Correia, a pitcher for one of the worst teams in the game, has more wins and a better ERA, than Cole Hamels. Thirdly, yours truly spent the whole off season, telling you to avoid Cole Hamels this season.

I hope you listened.

Padres (37-58) @ Phillies (53-39), 7:05pm
  SDP: Kevin Correia (28, RHP, 6-7, 4.34)
  PHI: Cole Hamels (25, LHP, 5-5, 4.72)

Reference.com

An excellent, in depth look, at the Padres (mis)handling of Mat Latos

The stuff is there to keep Major League hitters at bay -- especially if he can get some decent use out of his changeup. But in all likelihood, inexperience will keep him from maximizing his offerings. With just over 180 innings of pro experience heading into his MLB debut, Latos is still "learning how to pitch," according to the same area scout.

The lack of experience leads us to workload issues. After his Sunday start, the 21-year-old Latos has accumulated 76 1/3 innings between Class A Fort Wayne, Double-A San Antonio and now San Diego, or 20 innings more than his previous high as a professional. Health issues have kept his innings down throughout his pro career, but injuries to his ankle and intercostals aren’t nearly as troubling as the shoulder soreness that has sidelined him from time to time, most recently at the start of this season.

An argument could be made to shut him down at this point, or at the very least put him in a minor league bullpen where his workload can be closely monitored, rather than exposing him to a major jump in innings at a higher adrenaline level versus the top competition. This isn’t to say that the Padres won't be monitoring his workload. He was on a strict 75 pitch limit in his big league debut. GM Kevin Towers has been quoted that he doesn’t like his young pitchers to double the amount of innings they throw from year to year, and he's hinted that Latos could be shut down before the end of the season.

Prospect Insider

I wonder if any of our other viewers here are members of the "Pogo the Ostrich" fan club. Personally, I am card carrying member. Have been for years. Heck I think my card says fan number three, right behind Mrs. Pogo the Ostrich, and any family pets he might own.

This week the Osterich is pimping Garrett Jones (even if said Osterich is late getting to the Jones bandwagon) and Everth Cabrera. Two guys I own in a couple of leagues, and have pimped here recently, which probably explains why I am in the fan club in the first place. :)

Called up on June 30, Garrett Jones has been destroying the baseball. In fact, he just hit his eighth HR of the season while I was typing this and it is only his fifteenth game of the season. Jones has settled into the third spot in the order for the Pirates and is playing 1B, LF, and RF making him a very versatile fantasy player. His run and RBI totals might suffer some from Pittsburgh’s anemic offense, but McCutchen and Sanchez have been doing a good job of getting on base, plus LaRoche is a notorious second half hitter, so perhaps the concern is overstated. Garrett Jones should be a good source of power while putting up decent numbers in Rs, RBIs, and SBs.

Let’s not beat around the bush. There is one reason you want to own Cabrera, and that is for his SB totals. Cabrera is only 22, so there will be some inevitable growing pains, but he is now hitting lead-off and has seven SBs while only being caught once. The number that really caught my eye was 73. That is how many SBs Cabrera had while playing in the minors last year. He has wheels and he has opportunity. If you need SBs, make the move for Cabrera

Fantasy Baseball Cafe 2009

Why not make the padres totally unwatchable.

As a local native and lifelong fan of the Padres, he can see it. He can see how it could help in the long run for the Padres to trade Adrian Gonzalez, getting everything they can for their best player, one of the pre-eminent sluggers in the major leagues. Indeed, if he also were the club's general manager, Adrian Gonzalez might trade himself.

“To a certain extent, I don't disagree with people who say the best thing for the Padres is to go out and get a bunch of people for me,” said Gonzalez. “If you're looking at it from an ownership standpoint, I think there's a lot to it, just because of where the team is and everything.

“Would I want to be traded? No. Is it to a team that has a chance to win the World Series? I'd have to be intrigued by it. Know what I mean?”

sdut

Adrian Gonzalez’s trade value :: Friar Forecast

Hear Hear!

The NL Worst. The NL Weak Division. We've heard it all. After a 2007 NLCS matchup pitting two West teams, we hoped that would change, but a brutal 2008 revitalized that reputation. With San Diego set to field an epicly bad team coming into the 2009, the division's reputation didn't get better in the eyes of many. Times have changed. Don't believe what your TV says. The Mets and Phillies can eat my shorts. Outside of the AL East and their monstrous payrolls, the best baseball is being played in the West. Here's some fun factoids for you:

* 9 teams have 50 wins. 3 are in the AL East, 3 in in the NL West, and one each in the AL West, NL East, and NL Central.
* 7 teams have a run differential of +40 or more. 3 are in the AL East, 3 in in the NL West, and one in the NL East.
* 4 teams have 30 home wins. 2 are in the AL East, 2 in the NL West.
* 3 teams have at least 27 road victories. 2 are in the NL West, one in the NL East, and NONE in the AL East.
* 6 NL teams were .500 or better in interleague. 3 of those are in the NL West.
* T3 of the top 4 teams in the NL by win percentage are in the West.
* The best team in MLB is in the NL West.

Purple Row

Stauffer is still not on my radar. Okay, maybe in a NL only. He won't get you any wins, and I believe the k's are a fluke. I do. The minute I pick him up, he'll morph back into the Stauffer I loathed seasons ago. I just know it. Nope, not going to do it.

It's probably time to dust off the name Tim Stauffer and get him on the post-hype sleeper list. The No. 4 overall pick from 2003 missed all of last season after getting a torn labrum repaired and wasn't on anyone's radar entering 2009, but he's worked his way up from Double-A to the majors and thrown a couple of solid games for the Padres. The latest effort was a tidy no-decision against Florida Monday (6 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 2 BB, 4 K), with 8-of-12 outs coming on the ground.

Stauffer wasn't a big strikeout guy in his revolution with the Padres and his average fastball barely cracks 90 mph, but a fixed shoulder can't hurt the cause and he struck out seven Giants in his first start. Petco Park isn't getting any smaller, you know. A start at Washington calls on the weekend, and that's a cushy draw in our make-believe game

Roto Arcade

Is Mat Latos, relying more on his arms and torso, versus his legs, to generate power, worrisome? I would think so, but time will tell I guess.

On the mound, Latos is a bit unconventional because he has a fairly short stride for a tall guy. "Gives him more downward plane on the ball," said manager Bud Black. The shorter stride, Black said, probably means the 6-foot-5 right-hander relies less on his legs and more on his torso and arm to generate power. No worries, Black said. Success comes in a wide variety of sizes and stride lengths.

Latos, he added, somewhat reminds him of Chuck Finley, another tall guy with a short stride who "threw downhill" and "got on top of the ball."

Finley, too, was a free spirit. And he had very nice career. Here's hoping the same for Latos. He had a nice showing today. Gave up one cheap run, one hard run in his four innings. The 96-mph fastball that Ian Stewart hit 430 feet made the debut more memorable. "(Latos) has a chance," a Rockies evaluator told me afterward. "He has enough fastball, way, way enough. If he comes along with the changeup and breaking ball, he can be really good. I like him."

insidethepadres

great read.

Henderson's career is far livelier and more entertaining when told through the voices of his colleagues - the former teammates, opponents and managers who had front-row seats for the Rickey Show. It was an incomparable production, moving from coast to coast and including ample doses of talent, flamboyance, contractual discontent, nagging injuries, loud poker games and creative aliases. Henderson's path from his childhood in Oakland to his impending induction in Cooperstown left a long trail of memories:

Dennis Eckersley, former A's pitcher: "In day games when he first came up, he'd get a walk and look at his shadow, kind of admiring it, on his way to first base. I didn't know what he was doing at first, but then I figured it out - and I screamed at him. A lot of guys hooted on Rickey, but he didn't care. He had thick skin. It wasn't a hot-dog thing, that was just Rickey's style. After I was teammates with him for a while, I understood."

sf chron

Mat Latos, an 11th round pick in 2006, is 5-1 with a 1.91 ERA in 9 starts for San Antonio this season. He has 46 k's and 9 bb's in 47 ip. Opponents are hitting .192 against him.

As with Kyle Drabek, there have been some disagreements over the mechanics of Padres pitching prospect Mat Latos, who the Padres are soon to call up. We start with John Sickels’ take of Latos after watching his appearance in this year’s Futures Game:

I didn’t like Mat Latos’ delivery at all. It just screamed “arm problems” to me…

We then contrast view with this quote by Kevin Goldstein of Baseball Prospectus:

His straight up-and-down delivery is easy, repeatable, and has a bit of deception.

You also have Jason Grey of ESPN.com giving his take on Latos:

A 6-foot-5 righty with the prototypical pitcher’s frame, Latos can get a good downhill plane with his clean “tall-and-fall” delivery that allows him to have good command potential.

Do I think Latos’ mechanics raise his risk of injury? Not really…the only red flag I have is that he uses more of his arm to generate his velocity and not enough of his body. Plus, the fact that he throws for a high velocity is a risk in itself.

baseball intellect

I did an update in the other thread, but here is a union tribune piece on it ..

The Padres took another step in the rebuilding movement Friday night, calling up 21-year-old right-hander Mat Latos from Double-A San Antonio. Latos will make his major league debut Sunday afternoon at Petco Park in the finale of the four-game series with the Colorado Rockies

“Mat is throwing the ball as well as anyone in our organization,” Padres manager Bud Black said after the Padres lost for a 12th time in their past 14 games. “His performance in the minors has been outstanding. Our minor league people and (general manager) Kevin Towers agree it's his time.”

sdut

The prospects of ace Jake Peavy pitching for the Padres again this season improved considerably Thursday with the sight of him walking around without a restrictive boot, then even more when he was able to play catch from 60 feet on flat ground. Contrary to thoughts that the Padres might simply shut down Peavy for the rest of the season and preserve him for 2010, the pitcher sounded eager to get back to rehabbing the troublesome right ankle after yesterday's examination by medical personnel proved positive.

“Getting out of the boot's a big sigh of relief after five weeks,” Peavy said. “I was super-excited just to be able to play catch for the first time, and all went well. I haven't thrown in five weeks, haven't been able to walk (without the boot) for five weeks. Now I'm walking around pain-free and looking to start getting stronger.” While saying he and the team would “let my body guide us as we go,” he anticipated a rehabilitation stretch of approximately five weeks.

“I can't imagine, the way I feel today, not being able to play (before the end of the season),” he said. “I can't imagine it taking 10 weeks to get my arm ready to play.”

sdut.com

Still no word if this is set in stone yet, but rest assured, I'll keep ya posted.

Baseball America questioned the kid's maturity and health, but praised his raw stuff as "ridiculously good." Excellent fastball and slider, decent changeup. BA really worries about his attitude, and had him pegged for just Double A this year.

Another factor to consider is that Padres GM Kevin Towers suggested in the above-linked article that Latos will be shut down after about 55 more innings. So you're probably getting 10-11 starts. I see the kid is not yet listed in Yahoo leagues. Based on his numbers, scouting report, and home park, I'd pounce when he does appear. We often see young players struggle with control, but that might not be an issue with Latos.

RotoAuthority.com

Well that blows. Even if it is the right thing to-do, it still blows.

What you see now with the Padres is pretty much what you are going to see for the rest of the season. Which, among other things, means you might not see Jake Peavy again.

“I think it's 50-50 if Jake will pitch again this season,” Padres General Manager Kevin Towers said this week as he projected the second half of the Padres season. “We'll know more when he comes out of the cast. I can't speak for Jake, but I'd much rather have him ready for 2010 than risking more serious injury by coming back too early this year.”

sdut.com

Gotta give some love to the soulsurfer once in a while. Even when he is wrong.

I just lost a bar bet. Cost me an Arrogant Bastard and a shot of Makers Mark. I was arguing that there was no way that Kevin Kouzmanoff has more hits than Adrian Gonzalez. After all Gonzalez is an All Star. The best Padres player by far.

And Kouzmanoff? Well, he has been so bad that the Padres can't even trade him. Guess what? Kouzmanoff has 80 hits and Gonzalez has 77. Yes, I know that Adrian has 24 home runs and Kouzmanoff only has 12. But with 12 more home runs, Adrian only has 5 more RBI and he has had 16 more people on base in front of him than Kouzmanoff.

In other words, Kouzmanoff has done a better job of driving in runs. Kouzmanoff is hitting 40 points better with runners in scoring position.

Websoulsurfer

Ya Think?

Las Vegas doesn't have much confidence in Brandon Inge winning Monday night's Home Run Derby in St. Louis. Inge has 21 home runs, tied for fourth in the American League with Minnesota's Justin Morneau and the Yankees' Mark Teixeira. But Las Vegas odds-makers pit Inge as Monday's underdog. Lasvegassports-odds.com lists Inge as its biggest underdog of the Derby's eight participants, with odds to win at +950, which means a bet of $100 could earn the bettor $950 if Inge were to win. The favorite ..

• St. Louis first baseman Albert Pujols, is a +200.
• Philadelphia's Ryan Howard is second at +240,
• Milwaukee's Prince Fielder at +325,
• San Diego's Adrian Gonzalez at +465,
• Tampa Bay's Carlos Pena at +550,
• Texas' Nelson Cruz at +750,
• Minnesota's Joe Mauer at +800 and Inge.

detnews.com

Did Towers just rip off the Beane?

The player to be named in the Scott Hairston deal with the Padres will be right-hander Sean Gallagher, two sources confirmed to The Chronicle. Gallagher (knee) is on the disabled list at Triple-A Sacramento and is not eligible to be sent to San Diego until he comes off the DL.

Gallagher, obtained last July in the Rich Harden trade with the Cubs, is 3-5 with a 6.34 ERA in 17 games, 13 starts, with Oakland. He had a 1.74 ERA in five starts (202/3innings) with the River Cats this year.

SF Chron