Moments ago the following tweet crept down my screen:
The Royals officially announced that they signed Pedro Feliz to a minor league deal.@mlbtraderumors | Twitter
I'm not going to bother making any jokes, but would like to point out that our very own Matt Klassen should be blamed for this move. See, what many don't realize is that Dayton Moore is taking the Moneyball credo of acquiring undervalued talent, like the ability to take walks about ten years ago, and has applied it with a shocking bizarro-world logic. Think: if every team now values walks, the ability to NOT WALK is now undervalued! He's gamed the system!
So you can only imagine GMDM's howling laughter when he saw the following from Matt Klaassen over at Fangraphs, posted nearly two months ago:
First, the four worst hitters hitters (by wOBA) among qualified players from 2008-2010.
127. Pedro Feliz, .284 wOBA
126. Jason Kendall, .288 wOBA
125. Yuniesky Betancourt, .291 wOBA
124. Jeff Francoeur, .298 wOBA
That's no accident, folks. Dayton Moore deserves accolades for cornering the market on guys that can't get on base, sure. But the data tells us that DM knows what he's doing and at this point, it's obvious he's doing it on purpose because Moneyball told him to go after unwanted pieces from other organizations.
But Matt Klaassen deserves credit (blame) for this move.