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The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider

Moderator: JaysRule15

Who's your opening day left fielder?

Eric Thames
23
42%
Travis Snider
32
58%
 
Total votes: 55

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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#81 » by Lateral Quicks » Wed Mar 21, 2012 6:58 pm

Michael Bradley wrote:Thames and Snider both need to play everyday, and for whatever reason the Jays are against platooning Lind and EE at 1B (which would open up LF and DH for Snider and Thames respectively), so it has to be an either/or situation with them. Ideally, the Jays should have dumped Lind and gave EE the everyday 1B job. Would have opened up a spot for both outfielders to play everyday and at this point (unless Lind starts to hit lefties again) EE is the better player overall. Unfortunately, AA is the asset man, so he won't trade Lind unless Lind increases his value and becomes tradable for value.


You could easily devise a rotation where Snider and Thames get 400-450 AB's each, and that's assuming no one gets injured in the OF, DH, or 1B spots the entire season. That's plenty for both.
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#82 » by LBJSeizedMyID » Wed Mar 21, 2012 7:21 pm

Lateral Quicks wrote:
illy wrote:you dont understand baseball do you? you can't have snider or thames riding a bench job or a rotating/platoon position. its either they are starting in the big leagues, triple-A on route to being traded.

francisco is soley a bench player and nothing more. his job is to pinch hit and play on off-days for the starters. thats why


... And if you read the responses to the post at BB - where the average poster is much more knowledgeable about baseball than here - you will find the vast majority agree that they should both make the team.

Are you Ben Francisco?


I visit BB on occasion. Please post these knowledgeable responses and educate us. The reason why you have Francisco is in the event a right handed pinch hitter is needed. Both Snider and to a lesser extent, Thames have both shown ineffective against southpaw pitching.

Francisco won't be starting too many games but has proven to be a fairly clutch hitter when runners are on base or in scoring position. That's why you have him on the bench.
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#83 » by Avenger » Wed Mar 21, 2012 7:30 pm

Rajai Davis has shown some ability in handling left handed pitching, he can do everything Francisco can do except with more speed. There's really no reason to have Francisco on the team at all, i wish people would stop trying to be a contrarian on this issue.

I've bought up the idea of keeping both Thames and Snider in the lineup before but its not gonna happen because AA like so many idiots in this fan base doesn't seem to understand how awful Lind is. This is a season where we could miss the playoffs by a couple of games and the difference could be Lind vs a non awful hitter at 1B(like EE), this is not the time to try to extract value out of **** assets.
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#84 » by LBJSeizedMyID » Wed Mar 21, 2012 7:37 pm

Please tell us how awful Lind is again. I'm an idiot.
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#85 » by illy » Wed Mar 21, 2012 8:08 pm

so rajai davis would be on the bench for hitting and speed. what about power? ben can provide that.

you guys are caught up on prospects and having them play together. in the end they ALL can't stay. and to the poster talking about BB, i could care less about their opinion. you acting like their opinion means something. both snider and thames are starters but both can't make this team. plain and simple.

it is isnt fair for them to be playing platoon positions, when they are fully capable of being full-time startsers.
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#86 » by Lateral Quicks » Wed Mar 21, 2012 8:37 pm

What's clear "illy" is that the only opinion you give any weight to is your own, and that anyone who has a different opinion to yours "knows nothing about baseball". Fair enough. Posters with that attitude are a dime a dozen.

And yes, BB posters know a heck of a lot more about baseball than the average poster here (exceptions being folks like Schad and Randall). Many who post here are basketball fans first, and relatively new to baseball. BB is loaded with folks who've loved the game for decades and know it inside out. This isn't meant to degrade the posters here; the more fans the better. And it isn't meant to put myself on a pedestal, either. I don't post on BB, but do read it regularly.

On the actual topic, you're right, they all can't stay as long as we have an unnecessary player like Ben Francisco taking up a roster spot. The fact of the matter is you could easily give Thames and Snider 400-450 AB each, which is pretty close to full-time work - and again, that assumes no one gets injured and/or falls flat on their face the entire year.
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#87 » by Lateral Quicks » Wed Mar 21, 2012 8:43 pm

LBJSeizedMyID wrote:Please tell us how awful Lind is again. I'm an idiot.


For starters, the last two years Lind has put up an OPS equal to or less than Snider's career average OPS to date, which as we all know hasn't been good (but not far from Francisco's, either, a 30-year old bench player). I actually believe Lind deserves another chance due to his torrid first few months of last year, and the off chance he did in fact suck the remainder due to injury. But you could still do that and start Encarnacion say two games a week at first, and give those freed up DH AB's to Thames.
Nick Nurse recounting his first meeting with Kawhi:
“We could have gone forever. (Raptors management) kept knocking on the door and I was like, ‘A couple more minutes.’ Because we were really into it."
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#88 » by illy » Wed Mar 21, 2012 9:07 pm

Lateral Quicks wrote:What's clear "illy" is that the only opinion you give any weight to is your own, and that anyone who has a different opinion to yours "knows nothing about baseball". Fair enough. Posters with that attitude are a dime a dozen.

And yes, BB posters know a heck of a lot more about baseball than the average poster here (exceptions being folks like Schad and Randall). Many who post here are basketball fans first, and relatively new to baseball. BB is loaded with folks who've loved the game for decades and know it inside out. This isn't meant to degrade the posters here; the more fans the better. And it isn't meant to put myself on a pedestal, either. I don't post on BB, but do read it regularly.

On the actual topic, you're right, they all can't stay as long as we have an unnecessary player like Ben Francisco taking up a roster spot. The fact of the matter is you could easily give Thames and Snider 400-450 AB each, which is pretty close to full-time work - and again, that assumes no one gets injured and/or falls flat on their face the entire year.


you just don't get it. its all about respect. both snider and thames are capable starters, you can just **** on them and make them platoon regardless if they get that many at bats. your taking away at bats from lind and e3 and potentially others. so how does that make sense. dont get me started on how bad both snider and thames are against lefties

thats why AA is giving lind another chance. its all about RESPECT. you sign a guy to a contract and give them their chances and in linds case, he needs to redeem himself into 2009 form. i agree its business in the end, but you need to respect your players. i guarentee that one of thames or snider gets shipped before the season. you won't see them both coming up.

AA had already thought this through bringing in francisco for the pinch-hitter role. im not saying i know more about baseball than other, or my opinion is better than everyone. im just saying this makes more sense than what you said.
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#89 » by Michael Bradley » Wed Mar 21, 2012 11:12 pm

Lateral Quicks wrote:On the actual topic, you're right, they all can't stay as long as we have an unnecessary player like Ben Francisco taking up a roster spot. The fact of the matter is you could easily give Thames and Snider 400-450 AB each, which is pretty close to full-time work - and again, that assumes no one gets injured and/or falls flat on their face the entire year.


If the club feels both players are full-time starters, then it would be pointless to carry both on the team while having one sit sporadically. I get the impression Thames will get platooned with Francisco at some point, but initially he will probably get full-time AB's.

A good example of someone the club previously used in the 400-450 AB scenario you mentioned above is Reed Johnson. The club knew he had issues against RHP so they used him as a LHP crusher who also spelled the outfielders at times. They knew he had limited upside and used him to his strengths. It is harder to do that with Thames/Snider, especially if the club feels both of them will benefit from full-time AB's and are better than fourth OF calibre.

Carrying Francisco and Davis seems redundant, but I definitely see the benefit in keeping one of Snider/Thames rather than both IF they intend on playing Lind and EE everyday (which they obviously do). Like I said, platoon Lind/EE at 1B and use EE as the "400-450 AB utility player", and the team is probably better off, but they don't want to do that, so you are left with the other scenario.

But this goes beyond "who is the better player" or "carrying both". There is a reason why the Jays ran out a bunch of garbage last season rather than using Lawrie and Thames earlier than they did. AA uses options very aggressively and options are the only reason this is even a debate. If Snider were out of options, he'd be starting in LF and Thames would be in Vegas.
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#90 » by Lateral Quicks » Thu Mar 22, 2012 4:38 pm

illy wrote:you just don't get it. its all about respect. both snider and thames are capable starters, you can just **** on them and make them platoon regardless if they get that many at bats. your taking away at bats from lind and e3 and potentially others. so how does that make sense. dont get me started on how bad both snider and thames are against lefties

thats why AA is giving lind another chance. its all about RESPECT. you sign a guy to a contract and give them their chances and in linds case, he needs to redeem himself into 2009 form. i agree its business in the end, but you need to respect your players. i guarentee that one of thames or snider gets shipped before the season. you won't see them both coming up.


I guarantee that if you asked Thames or Snider whether they'd prefer getting 400-450 AB's in the bigs versus 550-600 in AAA, they'd jump at the chance to play with the big club. If they were 10-year big league veteran regulars, or one of them was coming off a rookie of the year calibre campaign, respect would be an issue. Spreading the AB's around a bit among two comparable (at least for now) young players is not a sign of disrespect at all.

Re: Lind and respect, the issue is one of performance, not respect. The Jays have already given Lind plenty of leash/respect, and if he were on just about any other team, he would have lost his starter's spot by now. By your rationale, any highly paid player on a multi-year contract should never lose his job regardless of how bad he plays. I'm not sure many would agree with your argument there.
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#91 » by BossManJr » Thu Mar 22, 2012 7:18 pm

I want Snider. Snider is a more of a complete player. He is faster, he plays better defense,and he could be a better hitter. Thing with Snider is that he is very streaky and when he's not hitting well, he makes some head scratching defense.
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Re: The Battle for Left Field: Thames vs. Snider 

Post#92 » by baulderdash77 » Sat Mar 24, 2012 8:18 pm

Thames is starting to get some separation as Snider is cooling off the last few games as Thames maintains that pace. I think it's probably over for Snider to win the job at this point. Thames was 2-3 today and Snider was 0-3 with 2 more strike outs. The strike out rate is alarming as the sample size gets bigger his BABIP is normalizing and he's not getting contact.

Thames batting .349/.404/.534 BB% 8.5 SO% 17.9
Snider batting .283/.352/.652 BB% 9.8 SO% 31.3
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