SKA SATURDAY: THE RETURN

I missed out last week on Ska Saturday and I am sorry about that, but here is a bit of redemption and in an effort to remember all that is going on now in Japan, I present to you one of the greatest Japanese Ska bands around Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra.

Weird Thought In Traffic

Just a general thought that came to head as I was sitting in my car at a stop light. It’s been a few years since I’ve seen it but here you go.

Kyle: [about stealing the answers to the SAT] It’s a victimless crime.
Anna: Okay, hypothetical situation: You’re driving, it’s late, you get to a red light in the middle of nowhere. Do you run the light?
[pause]
Anna: You see? You don’t. You wait. Because a victimless crime is still a crime. It isn’t worth it.
Kyle: Maybe it is. Maybe I run it. It depends.
Anna: On what?
Kyle: Am I trying to get somewhere important?
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My next thought was also strange. Has no one in this movie seen the opening scene from the Mexican?? I mean seriously Jerry had somewhere important to go. But, nooooo.

In a serious note, why would you sit there in the middle of no where at a stop light. Intent of the law. This is all I have to say before I self incriminate.

Guilty Pleasures

So, my wife came clean to me this past weekend about her newest guilty pleasure. Well… let me explain. Being in the military I work from 0700-1600(or 4pm for your civilians). So, my wonderful wife stays at home with our son (1-year old on Saturday).  She uses Netflix to keep up with her guilty pleasures (along with Farmville Frontierville on facebook) and to give her some “mommy” time while Noah sleeps.

Occasionally, I approve of this guilty pleasure. Such as when she went through Weeds last year. Just a few months ago she worked her way through “The Hills”. It provided a few laughs and was only mildly annoying. Not to mention, while I was home I could some what keep up with what was going on.

This weekend she started the “Secret Life Of The American Teenager”… I extremely disapprove.

Not because of the content or anything so self-righteous as that. But, rather it has perhaps the worst acting and story line ever written.  This can be a bright side normally. I mean I can think of a handful of other shows that I enjoy simply because it’s so lame (Buffy, Roswell, Alias and Dog Bites Man).

But, really this is too much. I even tried to take an interest in it. But really it amounted to Veronica Mars. If Veronica Mars wasn’t a part time PI, her dad wasn’t a PI and Veronica Mars got pregnant by Logan. Also the show has no Wallace. So besides all of that it’s … well it’s absolutely nothing like Veronica Mars but it’s high in drama and completely lacking in any entertainment quality.

So there is my little complaint for the day. BTW, my all-time favorite guilty pleasure is “The OC” … love it. Marissa, Ryan, Summer and my all time favorite Josh Schwartz character Seth Cohen (I know everyone loves Chuck Bartowski but I’ve never stay with the pop opinion).
Whats your guilty pleasure?

SKA Saturday: OC Supertones

SUPERTONES STRIKE BACK!

Random TV Shows and Thoughts

I am behind in the my last class needed for my Associates degree. So of course you would just expect that after I just finished writing my blog post for tomorrow and my subsequent draft for Tuesday that I would write something here.

It would seem most logical that at mid-night I would either, be working on one of my four papers for class or getting ready to head to bed. But, I’m not a robot or a Vulcan… so there you go.

In Harrison Crow reality I’m more likely to be watching an old TV show or playing Xbox (MLB2k10 or NCAA10 … don’t judge me I’m not paying $60 dollars every year to upgrade my rosters…)

Speaking about old TV shows. I just started watching “Reaper” via Netflix this past week. It’s been in my que for well over a year now (a long with 343 other items) and four episodes in I enjoy. Sure, a tad bit cliché and at times over the top in acting. But hey, it’s FOX and what else do you expect from a recycled idea that didn’t pan out the first time (see: Brimstone.)

Poor Peter Horton, I feel like I should apologies. But the guy did get 7 episodes with Teri Polo.

This brings me to the thought and question. What are some of the best canceled shows. Every one talks up “Firefly” and “Freaks and Geeks” (both great shows) but after awhile it just gets to be really cliché. Who says that after 11 amazing episodes that Firefly doesn’t go the way of “Heroes” and crashes trying to harness it’s wildly successful first season.

A few personal favorite of mine was “Sports Night”, “The Tick”(Patrick Warburton is a dead pan genius!) and the lesser appreciated “Andy Richter Controls the Universe”.

Speaking of Warburton, has anyone seen “Rules of Engagement”? It has good decent actors and been around for a while. But, I generally avoid the old persons television network, also known as CBS (with the exception of How I met Your Mother and Big Bang Theory).

SKA SATURDAY: FIF

I actually have a real blog post on life, and things…

but for now enjoy the song that has been stuck in my head for the last four days!

SKA SATURDAY: SL Third Wave Style

I haven’t completely forgotten about this place! I love writing and I may just randomly rant about things, such as how the writers are ripping through the “don’t-scratch-Sam’s-memory-wall storyline on Supernatural.

I also love the thought of just doing a blog of weird thoughts. So there’s that.

Anyways… It’s Saturday I spent mine fiddling with an Oracle 11g, searching for on call peoples and fighting weekend help desk degenerates. Here’s hoping yours was better. SKA!

Again, Seriously?

So much like those many great writers before me such as Sky Kalkman, Rob Neyer, and RJ Anderson. I too, find myself saying goodbye to go write somewhere else. I know what you are thinking? Harrison too?! I can’t believe he’s a sellouts just like the rest!

Well in reply I would just like to say, first off, thank you for automatically placing me in the same tier as all those amazing writers that I hold in high esteem. Second of all… well I guess there isn’t a second. I’m really selling out and it’s totally awesome!

John Parent and Wally Fish have hired me to write at Fansided.com for their Mariner’s page SodoMojo.

Basically what that means for me is I have to write a post a day over there and help deliver prime time content. So for you guys that means unpolished crappy written posts every day! Why wouldn’t you get excited about that?

I still will be putting together my watch list. The content won’t change. Just the location of where I post it.

What it also means is I won’t be writing here at my site any more… well… not about baseball anyways. I mean, I may write in general. But, I haven’t decided to do that or not. So if you like ill rehearsed quips about how I’m the living embodiment of John Dorian and awesome ska videos please stick around. Otherwise please diverted your attention to sodomojo.com.

Thanks for the comments and to the people that have made writing here the last 13 months so much fun!

Random Thoughts: Greg Halman

You know we all speculate on whether Greg Halman could be a big leaguer. Can he grow anymore as a professional hitter?

My question is does he have to grow anymore? Sure, he still isn’t polished and he won’t have anything on Mark Reynolds. But, is it possible that all he has to do is sit on fastballs?

Despite all the known scouting reports on Halman he still saw fastballs at a 48% rate according to fangraphs. That is nearly half the pitches he saw were fastballs. Sure he is going to get beat on some off speed pitches. But why not just play completely off his strengths.

According to fangraphs, Josh Hamilton received the lowest percentage of fastballs (46%) thrown during a plate appearance among qualified hitters (and remains the leader amongst hitters with at least 200 PA’s) in 2010. Who’s to say that Halman would receive anything less than 45%?

Halman has epic power and sticking him in the middle of the line-up with a regressed Figgins and Ichiro still doing his thing screams fastballs.

Sure, the guy doesn’t do well with bendy stuff and will have a perpetual problem during the most inopportune times. Sure, he is still going to strike out upwards of 35-40% of the time, if not more. But, is it possible that with that despite 40% of his at bats ending in strike outs he could still end up being valuable at the plate?

While hitting in Tacoma 22.4% of his fly balls went for home runs. Not to mention 58 of his 101 hits went for extra bases.

If we go back his minor league track record where he has a propensity to hit fly balls. He averages about 31.70% of all his hit balls are fly balls. If we assume that he still manages to put the ball in play at a 55-60% rate that would mean he would in the ball in the air roughly 19% of the time while at bat.

Taking his HR/FB ratio over his minor league career (16% by my calculation), he would hit a home run 3.04% of all plate appearances.  Roughly 21 home runs over 700 at bats. Now obviously, home runs aren’t everything. But the point is simple. He could still maintain his power production at the big league level despite the strike outs.

I believe Halman can produce a meager wOBA of .330. Looking over his minor league career according to statcorner you see that even in his horrendous 2009 he still posted a wOBA of .311 in AA West Tennessee. Even if he only hits .240/.310/.450 his wOBA should be around .340 -.350 because of what else he is able to do on the field.

All this while we haven’t talked at all about his defensive tools. He is still a defensive plus in the corner and is average or better in center. Over the course of 350 at bats, or basically being a platoon player, that is worth roughly 1.5 WAR.

Consider Ryan Langerhans for a second. He’s a perfect comparison. Over 2 years as a Mariner he’s amounted 254 PA’s and a wOBA of roughly .309 while posting +10 UZR in the “outfield”. That’s good for 1.3 WAR. Everyone still loves Langerhans. Yet he’s struck out 79 times in 254 attempts. Still posting an ISO of .145. I think that’s a fair comparison. Halman may have more power, but the his problems with pitch recognition are going to keep his power from “grading” out nearly as high as it could.

Don’t miss understand me. I like Ryan Langerhans, but he is going to 31 years old by the time the season starts. That’s the wrong side of 30 in baseball. Greg Halman is only 23, not to mention a higher ceiling.

He is going to have some rough patches and adjusting to MLB pitching is not going to be pretty. But give him 1200 PA’s and I think he is a major leaguer now. That’s my opinion.

Now all that and I’m going to admit, I’m not sure there is room for him on the 25-man roster to start the season. But, based on the NRI’s we have coming into camp there really isn’t anyone that can consistently play a “good” center full-time outside of Gutirrez. Halman is a major league right fielder but I believe he could pass as a center fielder just as well as Ryan Langerhans could.

I’m not saying Ryan Langerhans should be cast a side or that he is no longer useful because he is 31. It might be better to start Halman off in Tacoma and use Ryan Langerhans at the big league level for a while. But, lets remember what this season is really about. Giving the young guys the opportunity to show us what they have.

What good is it really going to be for Halman to spend another 400+ PAs in Tacoma crushing fastballs, striking out another 150+ times and making us wonder if he could be of any use. Just give him some time this year. That’s all I’m saying.

Minors To Majors: Adam Moore

Looking at what Adam Moore accomplished in 2010 was of course a disappointment. Even more so when you consider his overall talent level and his minor league achievements.

	PA	BA	OBP	SLG
Minor Leagues	1860	303	368	482

Going into 2011 it’s pretty much an enigma as to how Moore fits into the line-up. Miguel Olivo pretty much will have the starting job. But, as Dave Cameron pointed out a few months ago, just because Olivo will recieve the majority of at bats doesn’t mean that Adam Moore won’t be of value or he won’t progress as a player.

You can look to Bill James, Marcel, or the fans over at fangraphs to see some possible projections. But, I just don’t generally agree with them.

	PA	BA	OBP	SLG
Marcel	435	231	284	353
Bill James	311	254	300	389
Fans	315	246	294	360

It maybe just me but I think that we see more from him this year at the big league level.