Hacktastic

Many baseball fans play fantasy baseball with the goal of weeding out the overlooked talent on Major League rosters. Important websites dedicate entire sections and specialists to the subject, while other groups publish popular magazines and books. All of the hype shares the common theme of trying to identify the best players. Conversely, Baseball Prospectus runs an annual reverse fantasy game where players compose a team of entirely terrible players. The scoring comes from deriving negative counting stats, so players have to remain in the lineup or in the rotation in order to continue accumulating points. Christian Guzman, for example, made the All-Star team for last year’s HACKING MASS league (a forced acronym for I forget what). Today I will construct a preseason HACKING MASS team of players who look to be regulars or semi-regulars (min 350 projected PAs) lopping runs off of their own teams’ box scores and snagging defeat from the jaws of victory. Keep in mind, HACKING MASS does not count defensive stats, making a Juan Castro all the more hacktastic.

C- Yadier Molina: I recently mentioned that another big offensive season may not be in the Cards for 2006, and Molina spending even more time behind and at the plate can only contribute to the misery. Mike Matheny may be a HACKING MASS Hall of Famer, and would probably make the team this year if he projected to make it to the plate enough, but the man who filled his tools of ignorance in Budville stands to slug .363 and accumulate a total of 1.6 runs of VORP.

1B- Darin Erstad: First base is a position usually reserved for offensive players. It is not a coincidence that eight of the fourteen projected starting DH’s in the AL have spent most of their gloved careers at the cold corner (the rest are OF, except for Javy Lopez in Baltimore). And although Darin Erstad stands to move back to CF this year, paving the way for a more horrendous offense and more injuries, PECOTA does not try to guess at position changes, instead making him a 1B. Lucky for Eric Hinske, whose 7.4 VORP is bad, but not nearly as bad as the -3.2 Erstad looks to manage. Comparing him to Yadier Molina, Erstad intuitively seems like the better hitter, but they actually project to nearly similar lines this season.

2B- Aaron Miles: It’s sad to say, but with Adam Kennedy making a run at 2B and Funky Ben Molina’s other brother Jose close in the running at C, the Cardinals and Angels have had five out of a possible six horses in the race so far (with the admirable exception of Albert Pujols). Walt Jocketty got credit for landing Miles and Larry Bigbie-Sellers for fragile lefty specialist Ray King, but this Miles is more All Blues and less Miles Ahead. It is hard to avoid picking a negative VORPist, and Miles’ fits that description even at second base. No wonder, since his equivalent stat line comes out to .263/.303/.356, an off year for Luis Rivas.

3B- David Bell: On my fantasy draft card, the word “NO” is written next to Bell’s name in capital letters. He is thought of as a wiley veteran, but he doesn’t (and hasn’t) done anything particularly well. His career OBP is an anemic .318 and he has slugged only .396 at a corner position. He’s been playing off of a decent 2002 (.261/.333/.429) for San Francisco for the last three years, and looks to continue benefiting from Philadelphia’s notorious cronyism.

SS- tie: Neifi Perez/Christian Guzman: In selecting a HACKING MASS team, how could one choose between the two players who have come to epitomize squandered playing time? The answer is, one can’t. So I’ll do the next dumbest thing to playing one of these two slugs and keep a no-hit backup shortstop on my roster. Seriously, though, is there a legitimate way to choose between Neifi’s .264/.296/.365 and Guzy’s .257/.299/.350. Both actually project to playing above replacement level, albeit by less than two runs. But they are projected to make it to the plate 899 times combined this season and manage exactly seven HRs and 43 BBs. Not good.

OF- Nook Logan: It is unclear whether Logan or Curtis Granderson will get most of the time in CF for Detroit this season. It is also possible that, at age 26, he will improve over the next few years. Those are the mitigating factors; Logan is still horrid. Center-field gets something of an offensive pass for being a defense first position, but a .321 park adjusted SLG still isn’t good enough. Actually, a .321 SLG isn’t even good enough for the last man off the bench, or even some pitchers. That would be roughly equivalent to having a league average hitter in the lineup, but having him bat against the 2004 version of Johan Santana every time up.

OF- Jacque Jones: Jacque’s 6.0 VORP stands out among those selected so far on the HACKING MASS team, but most of the extremely low VORP OFs provide some value by stealing bases or otherwise mounting some sort of contribution. Jones is now 31, his projected steals are down to 8 (net steals down to 4), and he stands almost no chance of ever improving again. He has a little bit of pop, but his lack of discipline and struggles against lefties will give Cubs fans the Corey Patterson headache all over again. With Guzman and Jones on the list and Doug Mientkiewicz making a run at Erstad, it is a wonder the Twins offenses were as passable as they were.

OF- Bernie Williams: Sure, most of his PAs will come as a DH. Sure, he’s due an excuse for being a 37 year old in the swan song of a borderline HOF career. Gussy it up however you want; that does not make Bernie any better of a player. He qualifies by projecting to 383 PAs as a CF, and by projecting to a lower Marginal Lineup Value Rate than Adam Stern (-.050 to -.038)

P- Aaron Sele: I have no idea which of the scrubs at the bottom of the ptichers’ list will play and which will not (Lima? Brazelton? Reuter? Can’t go wrong with any of ‘em). Sele is a solid pick, though, with a 6.30 eqERA projection buoyed by about 4 Ks and 3.5 BBs every nine IP. I, for one, would actually like to see him get a full season’s worth of work just to see how bad he can really be. That’s basically what KC did with Jose Lima last year, and didn’t we all enjoy that?

There you have it- the worst MLB team money can buy. Comically, several of the players, including Jones, Guzman, Bell and Erstad are actually signed to pretty fat contracts. But when you really think about it, aside from first base, this lineup isn’t all that different from the one the Cubs will trot out on opening day.