Braves To Sign Jack Wilson

Uh . . . pardon me, AllStarJackWilson. One year, $1 million plus $500,000 in incentives to be a utility infielder.

Comments

Good luck to Jack

Good player for the us who had to deal with 2,353,253,465,345 seasons of Pirates losing. Hope he finally makes the playoffs.

by bishopmp1 on Jan 13, 2012 4:03 PM EST reply actions

Hope he finally makes the playoffs.

Agreed. Seems like a decent situation for him – hope things go well.

by Vlad on Jan 13, 2012 5:11 PM EST up reply actions

to be fair

Unlike GoldgloverNateMcLouth, Jack deserved his All-Star appearance.

Not actually affiliated with whygavs.

by WHYG Zane Smith on Jan 13, 2012 4:16 PM EST reply actions

agreed

2004 was a great season for Jack.

by insane_sanity on Jan 13, 2012 5:50 PM EST up reply actions

I never could understand why he could never come close to repeating it.

Occupy MLB! Down with Seligula!

by WTM on Jan 13, 2012 5:57 PM EST up reply actions

pitchers adjusted?

by white angus on Jan 13, 2012 6:11 PM EST up reply actions

2007 was good

by white angus on Jan 13, 2012 6:12 PM EST up reply actions

Don’t feel like looking it up now, but iirc it was mainly one huge month, right after it became clear that Tracy wanted to get rid of him so Izturis could be the SS.

Seemed like Jack did just fine when he just tried to hit pitches away to RF. When he tried to pull everything, he was an easy out. That always struck me as the difference during the few stretches when he was hitting well.

Occupy MLB! Down with Seligula!

by WTM on Jan 13, 2012 6:52 PM EST up reply actions

I looked it up

He got off to a crazy hot start — I remember that as the year he and Craig were at the top of the batting average leaderboards for a while — but though he tailed off, it’s really more two cold months than one hot one — he was an above-average hitter every month except July and August, when he put up his usual wRC+ in the 70s. His walk rate was even lower than usual that year, and only began to creep up in August.

By fangraphs WAR, Izturis was actually the third-best NL shortstop that year. If you want to use that as a reason to discredit fangraphs WAR, I can’t say I blame you. Jimmy Rollins was the WAR leader ahead of Jack, but he started terribly and did most of his damage after the All-Start break. The other NL SS All-stars were Edgar Renteria, for no reason I can see, and a courtesy appearance from a 40-year-old Barry Larkin.

Not actually affiliated with whygavs.

by WHYG Zane Smith on Jan 13, 2012 7:58 PM EST up reply actions

I was talking about 2007, which was Jack’s other good year. I checked it out and he was having his usual crappy season at bat until he put up a 1.024 OPS in Aug. and 1.318 (with .825 SLG!!) in Sept. He actually had his best career OPS+ in 2007.

Iztumanyouts has always had a good glove, but his 88 OPS+ in 2004 was by far the best of his career. Ugh.

Occupy MLB! Down with Seligula!

by WTM on Jan 13, 2012 9:12 PM EST up reply actions

duh

Should’ve figured that out from the reference to Jim Tracy if not from the fact that you were replying to a comment about 2007. In my defense, I try to repress Tracy and his attempt to turn the Pirates into the Dodgers, like Scottie Ferguson making Judy dress up as Madeleine.

Izturis was a fine defender but I don’t believe his UZR spike from 2004, which is what takes him from a guy having a decent year with the bat for a shortstop to third-best SS in the NL.

Not actually affiliated with whygavs.

by WHYG Zane Smith on Jan 13, 2012 11:21 PM EST up reply actions

i hate doing this but...

his BABIP in 2004 was .330, easily the highest of his career

by white angus on Jan 13, 2012 6:14 PM EST up reply actions

i feel dirty

by white angus on Jan 13, 2012 6:14 PM EST up reply actions

go take a shower & two aspirin

you’ll feel better in the morning

by Garrett122 on Jan 13, 2012 6:46 PM EST up reply actions

join us

Not actually affiliated with whygavs.

by WHYG Zane Smith on Jan 13, 2012 7:42 PM EST up reply actions

Nooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!! Thats Impossibullllllllllll!!!!!!!!!!!

by white angus on Jan 13, 2012 11:01 PM EST up reply actions

He might play a fair amount, too. Tyler Pastornicky looks okay, but he’s not a top prospect and he’s never played in the majors before.

by Charlie Wilmoth on Jan 13, 2012 6:25 PM EST reply actions

That's what I was thinking.

They’re handing shortstop to an untested 22-year-old, with Jack as the backup plan?

Ugh.

by bucdaddy on Jan 14, 2012 12:49 AM EST up reply actions

but the Braves have established players at other positions. theoretically, isnt this what teams SHOULD be doing?

by white angus on Jan 14, 2012 10:00 AM EST up reply actions

The Pirates obviously don’t need a utility infielder as badly as the Braves do. ;-)

by Thunder on Jan 13, 2012 7:25 PM EST reply actions

Kind of like Captain Jack Sparrow...

by NastyNate82 on Jan 13, 2012 7:59 PM EST reply actions

Is one of those incentives to not end up on the DL?

"When I put on my uniform, I feel I am the proudest man on earth."
-Roberto

by blackjackfishtaco on Jan 13, 2012 8:10 PM EST reply actions

Hope this story

has a happy ending for Jack. In my mind he will always be a Pirate. No matter how bad things were I always got the sense that he took pride in being a Pirate. In Bill James’ Historical Baseball abstract when he was doing a synposis of the game by decade, for each decade he named a player that was a better human being than a ballplayer. I think that is a pretty good description of Jack. Freddy S. was as well – not to demean Freddy’s talents – more of a compliment to his character.

"Don Mossi was the complete five-tool ugly player. He could run ugly, hit ugly, throw ugly, field ugly and ugly for power.

by Pagliaroni on Jan 13, 2012 10:51 PM EST reply actions