Surprise Surprise Surprise - Krasovic misses the facts again

Wednesday August 19, 2009

At least he is consistent. Getting fired by the Union Tribune has not spurred Tom Krasovic into checking the facts before putting his opinion out there on his blog.

In his most recent blog post, Krasovic says "Breaking from their culture under Sandy Alderson ... the Padres are no longer predisposed to drafting a college player in the first round."

Unfortunately, once again he didn't check the facts. The Padres have taken a high school player in the first round each of 2006 to 2008. Decker, Cumberland and Burke.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/draft/?query_type=franch_round&team_ID=SDP&draft_round=1&draft_type=junreg


Krasovic also says that in 1994 Moores "inherited a major league roster loaded with power arms".

Here is the roster.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/SDP/1995-pitching.shtml

Led by Joey Hamilton, the staff included Andy Ashby, Andy Benes, Glen Dishman and Fernando Valenzuela. Scott Sanders also had 15 starts.

Hamilton's fastball sat 90-92.
Ashby's fastball sat at 88 mph. Well actually 87.6 for his career, but I was giving him the benefit of the doubt.
Benes could bring it. A true power pitcher.
Fernando was a screw ball pitcher.
Dishman sat in the mid to high 80's
Sanders sat 90-92, Occasionally hitting 94. He jsut wasn't an effective pitcher.

You make up your own mind how loaded with power arms the 1995 team that went 70-74 was. I would guess one power pitcher of 5 makes it loaded in Krasovic's mind.

Krasovic also says that "the Padres are deep into talks with a switch-hitting, 16-year-old outfielder who'll likely join other newcomers at their Dominican complex by month's end. A $450,000 agreement is in place."

Jairo Kelly and Humberto Valor both signed contracts of about $135k. They were considered the 24th and 25th best International players to be available this season for free agent signings.

So who exactly is this mystery OUTFIELDER?
Here is the list of the top 25 players from Baseball America.
http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prospects/international-affairs/2009/268478.html

Do you see an outfielder on there?

Yup. Only one, Luis Jolly. He turned down a reported $850k to sign with the Phillies. Maybe he is the one who is going to sign with the Padres for $450k, but he is certainly not a mystery player. He did work out at the Padres facility on Thursday.

Perhaps its actually Edgar Ferreira, a LHP the Padres had work out for them on August 11th at their Dominican facility that they are about to sign?

Either way its not a secret that Krasovic is suddenly breaking the story on.

Krasovic quotes an unnamed "AL Talent evaluator" who says he likes Everett Williams because he is a "5-foot-10ish kid, but he's strong, he can hit, he's a good athlete".

Hey Kras, is this the same "Al Talent Evaluator" you quoted when you were still at the UT that said he didn't like Jaff Decker, because his body type would predispose him to getting chunky as he got older?

Decker, like Williams, is a 5'10" 190-200 lb kid that can hit, throw and steal bases.

Guess that fact escaped you when you wrote those articles about Williams.

Later in his blog post, Krasovic says that you have to credit Alderson with the Tate signing because he budgeted $6 million for the Padres first pick in the draft ("Credit Alderson for helping to lay the groundwork to the Tate deal") and then in the very next paragraph says, " Whether Alderson would've approved $6 million for a high school player, though, is questionable. The Padres took a college player first in all four of his years as CEO, and I'm told that wasn't coincidental."

You can't have it both ways Kras. Either Alderson is to be given credit for budgeting $6 million to sign Tate, or he isn't.

As to Alderson not signing High School players in the first round, see the first section of this article.

Krasovic says, "As a Diamondbacks executive, Moorad endorsed the first-round selection of "high upside" prep players such as Justin Upton and Jarrod Parker."

I guess he is trying to imply is that Moores and the Padres didn't take "high upside" prep players. We have already debunked that myth.

What Krasovic also conveniently leaves out is that the Diamondbacks picked 1st and 9th overall respectively to get those two players. The Padres have not picked in the top 16 since they took Matt Bush, a top 10 prep talent, in 2004.


I can't really find much Krasovic got correct in his blog post as usual.Don't they teach you to do FACT CHECKING in journalism classes in college? Or does Krasovic just intentionally choosing to avoid making sure his posts are factual in order to be more sensationalistic?

Whiney Krasovic resurfaces as a blogger.

Monday July 13, 2009

The guy who so often complained from his bully pulpit about the bloggers of the world is now one.

Tom Krasovic, recently canned by the new owners of the San Diego Union Tribune, has resurfaced with a blog on Voice of San Diego. (BTW Guys, respectable companies do not take .org domains if they are not a non profit organization)

Krasovic, who has long dissed the San Diego Padres organization even while they were winning 4 straight, has posted a blog blasting the team saying, "There may not be a less-talented team in the major leagues today".

Hey Tom, wake up.

1. There are two teams with worse records and the Padres are 10 games in front of the Nationals. Obviously they are not the least talented team in the league.
   
   
2. The Padres are injured, not talent less. There is a difference and if you did not allow your unbridled hatred for everything San Diego to cloud your judgement, you would see that and would have written about it.
   
   
3. The farm team has provided enough players in Moores run with the team to allow for trades that brought the fans of San Diego the most wins and playoff appearances of any stretch in franchise history. While they may not have played for the Padres, the players developed in the Padres farm system were the reason the Padres could trade for the players that won all those games.
   
   
4. The Padres have drafted in the top 10 just 3 times in the 15 years while you were "on the beat" in San Diego. VERY few high upside amateur pitchers are picked outside of the top 10. In fact I can count those in the last 15 years that were drafted in the 1st round outside of the top 10 that made a big impact at the major league level as a front of the rotation type starter on one hand. Roy Halladay in 1995, CC Sabathia in 1998, Matt Cain in 2002. There were actually more taken after the 10th ROUND that made an impact than outside the top 10 in the 1st round.
   
   What I am saying is that the players you are talking about simply were not available when the Padres drafted. So your lack of research makes you look bad once again.
   
   
5. Loading your swing is pulling your hands back and UP. Burroughs DID load his swing. He did it naturally by KEEPING his hands up and back. And his problem wasn't hitting for average, it was hitting for power. Once again your hatred of all things Padres shines through as does your lack of knowledge of the game of baseball.
   
   
6. What successful team concentrates just on local kids when it comes to filling their roster? What a crock of garbage. And the Padres PASSED on Zito? Zito went with the 9th pick in 1999, a year when the Padres first pick was # 20. Don't you even bother to CHECK what really happened?
   
   And you are complaining that the Padres didn't take local kids like Zumaya and Giles that went in rounds 11 to 17 and even later. WTF are you talking about? NO ONE took those kids until the late rounds for a reason. They were not EXPECTED to be any good.
   
   
   • The Athletics passed on Adam Jones FIVE TIMES in 2002. The Cubs 3 times. 36 picks passed on Jones before he was taken 37th for a reason. He was not expected to be as good as the other players taken higher. And you wanted the Padres to take him 13th? Wouldn't that have worse than taking Bush with the #1 when he was expected to go around the 10th pick in 2004?
   
   
   • Carlos Quentin went 29th and you wanted the Padres to take him with the #4 pick?
   • Jacque Jones went #2 in the 2nd round and you wanted the Padres to take him with the 15th pick in the FIRST round?
   • Masterson was taken 27th in the 2nd round and still is only projected as a 4-5 starter. So the Padres were supposed to take him instead of Huffman in the 2nd round? Or in your mind because he was a SDSU product he should have been taken instead of Matt Anonelli with the 15th pick in the 1st round, a kid that was the top 2B prospect in all of baseball going into the 2008 season?
   
   
7. The hatred you display for the San Diego Padres maybe why you were fired from a San Diego newspaper. Or maybe it was just that you did such poor research and were wrong so often. After all you were not supposed to be writing an op-ed piece, you were supposedly REPORTING on the San Diego Padres.

I also have a bone to pick with you saying that it was under the orders of John Moores that the payroll was slashed. It was under the orders of a divorce proceeding that the payroll was cut. Ask around and you will find that Moores no more wanted to cut payroll than cut off his own nose. He did it because he had to. During a divorce proceeding of this type you cannot purposely lose money.

In 2008 the Padres lost about $15 million on a $73 million payroll. With expected drops in MLB wide revenue (and the revenue sharing check that keeps the Padres close to solvent) and the expected 25% drop in Padres ticket sales, the most the Padres could spend and stay profitable with a ticket sales (and concessions, parking, etc...) of 1.8 million is about $43 million.

And what was the Padres payroll cut to in 2009? About $43 million.

So set aside the BS about the Padres continuing to have teh lowest payroll in baseball. They have middle of road for MLB in Payroll in all but two seasons while Moores has been in charge, and Moorad has said they will grow the payroll back to the $70 million range. That is middle of the pack money and you know it.

So please. Stuff a sock in it.

You were a bad writer who didn't do your home work when you were paid to do it and now you sound like a bitter ex-writer who is lashing out at the very people who made your paycheck possible.