Entering play yesterday, there were four catchers among the top 30 position players in WAR. Three of them should come as no surprise: Buster Posey, Joe Mauer and Yadier Molina. The fourth might be a bit of a surprise, though. Well, at least it might be if you hadn’t read the title of this article. Which, I’m guessing you did. That’s right, it’s Russell Martin.
And the trade season is officially here. We have our first significant trade of the year on July 2nd, and the timing of this move is not a coincidence.
First, the details, per Keith Law.
Orioles acquire Scott Feldman and Tony Clevenger from the Cubs for Jake Arrietta, Pedro Strop, and int'l bonus slots.
— keithlaw (@keithlaw) July 2, 2013
For the record, he meant Steve Clevenger, but he’s a throw-in in this deal, and it’s not like Baltimore is acquiring him to unseat Matt Wieters or anything. This deal is basically Feldman for two pitchers and, in a first for MLB, pool allocation money that will allow the Cubs to be more aggressive in international free agency. We’ll get to that part of the trade in a second. First, let’s start with what the Orioles are getting in Scott Feldman.
Episode 356
Outfielder and recent Vanderbilt alumnus Connor Harrell was the Detroit Tigers’ seventh-round pick in the most recent amateur draft. He’s also the guest on this edition of FanGraphs Audio.
Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.
You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.
Audio after the jump. (Approximately 12 min play time.)
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: RSS
New York City hosts this year’s All-Star festivities, just five years after hosting the 2008 summer classic. The Mets are in charge this year, with the All-Star Game, Home Run Derby, Futures Game and All-
Everything, it seems, is more expensive in New York City — and tickets for the All-Star Game and Home Run Derby are no exception. Tickets for this year’s game range from $195 to $715, according to Major League Baseball. In 2008, the range was $150 to $725. That’s a nearly 33% increase for the least expensive ticket, with a slight decrease at the upper end. By comparison, ticket prices for last year’s All-Star Game in Kansas City ranged from $125 to $400.
The economy’s certainly picked up since 2008, which may have contributed to the ticket price increase. There’s also the issue of supply and demand. Yankee Stadium could fit more than 56,000 fans. CitiField’s capacity, including standing room only, is only 45,000. Not every seat in the ballpark is for sale, either. MLB uses quite a few seats for TV and corporate sponsors and players get seats for their friends and family. Read the rest of this entry »
| 9:03 |
: Hello, you all!
|
| 9:03 |
: I just had a lovely time-consuming error regarding coveritlive console something something!
|
| 9:04 |
: I don’t have a very good memory of errors! Let’s chat about baseball now for a while.
|
| 9:04 |
Would you rather have Doug Fister or Matt Moore ROS? Is it close? |
| 9:04 |
: Fister and it isn’t close because I don’t and can’t trust Matt Moore
|
| 9:05 |
: Maybe Moore is making some strides, I haven’t checked lately, but his control problems freak me out
|
Imagine, for a second, that Major League Baseball had an automated strike zone, and there weren’t any bugs in the system. Imagine that the zone were specifically defined, changing consistently for each hitter, such that there couldn’t ever be any dispute. The zone would be perfect, and any given pitch would be either a definite strike or a definite ball. What you have imagined doesn’t exist. Instead, we have human brains doing everything, and sometimes human brains fall for magic tricks and infomercials. Umpires make mistakes, and because of that, any pitch could conceivably be called either way. There’s always some probability, however small, that a bad pitch might be called a strike, or that a good pitch might be called a ball. This is the way it is, and for now the rate of mistakes is low enough that we haven’t had a bloody revolt.
Because there are mistakes, there is a spectrum of mistakes, with some being the most understandable and some being the most wrong. The most wrong strike-zone call would be a call with the greatest difference between the actual call and what the call should’ve been. Imagine a fastball down the middle. If it’s taken, and called a ball, that would be a big mistake on the umpire’s part. With all this in mind, the month of June is over, so I thought we’d take a look at the month’s most wrong ball call. In part out of curiosity; in part to see what we can learn. Get ready for a little Edwin Jackson.
Ben and Sam discuss whether hardcore quantitative analysts make good GM material, then estimate the likelihood that under-30 players will make the Hall of Fame.
Podcast (effectively-wild): Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: RSS
Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of the Daily Notes.
1. The Corey Kluber Society Remains Undaunted
2. Today’s MLB.TV Free Game
3. Today’s Complete Schedule
The Corey Kluber Society Remains Undaunted
The Purpose of This Post
The purpose of this post is to announce both (a) a meeting tonight (Tuesday) of the Corey Kluber Society, at 8:10pm ET, and also (b) that the members of the aforementioned Society remain undaunted by Kluber’s last two starts, despite how he’s allowed 10 runs in 10.1 innings.
In less than two weeks the best prospects from the United States will square off against the top young players from around the world at the MLB Futures Game on the all-star weekend. We’ve already taken a look at the offensive side of each exhibition team and you can read that here.
As mentioned in the previous piece, the biggest name missing from the Futures Game rotations is Jameson Taillon of the Pirates. Other absentee names that I would pay to see include Robert Stephenson of the Reds, and Aaron Sanchez of the Blue Jays. The two most surprising additions were Taylor Jordan of the Nationals (who was recently promoted to the Majors) and Chen-Chang Lee of the Indians.
Without further ado, let’s have a look at the arms that earned roster spots for this year’s Futures Game.
The author attended on Sunday a Class-A Midwest League game between Rays affiliate Bowling Green and Tigers affiliate West Michigan, at the latter’s home park just outside of Grand Rapids, Michigan.
What follows are some brief comments on notable players from same.
Regarding Jeff Ames
Entering the season, writes Marc Hulet, right-handed Tampa Bay prospect Jeff Ames was known for possessing a mid-90s fastball with excellent life, but less in the way of command or secondary offerings. On Sunday, in fact, Ames’ fastball never exceeded 92 mph — or, at least, not so’s the author noticed. Ames worked at 88-92 mph for the duration of his start and demonstrated an inability to find his release point, sometimes jerking the ball towards the left-handed batter’s box, sometimes opening up his left shoulder too early and pushing the ball to the right-handed batter’s box.
While he ultimately conceded no runs over 4.0 innings, there was considerable labor involved. So far as the slider is concerned, Ames had much the same sort of trouble with it as with the fastball. On those occasions when Ames found his release point, the pitch was effective, at 83-87 mph with nice shape (as demonstrated in the animated GIF, a slider to Lance Durham, below). The changeup — which sat at about 81-83 mph — had little of the depth or fade that one associates with the best versions of that pitch.
Regarding Andrew Toles
Speed merchant Andrew Toles had the most impressive batting practice of any of the rather talented Bowling Green club — not insofar as it was full of home runs (it wasn’t), but for the quality of the contact Toles made and backspin he produced. It surprised the author to find that Toles’ bat has been one of the concerns regarding that player, the core of whose game is based on speed and defense.
In fact, it would be more accurate to say that concerns (from analysts such as Mark Andersen, for example) regarding Toles’ offensive ability haven’t centered on the quality of Toles’ contact, but rather his approach. Indeed, the center fielder has recorded walk and strikeout rates of 3.8% and 19.9%, respectively, this season through 300-plus plate appearances.
Ideally, a player of Toles’ age relative to the level would be demonstrating more control of the strike zone. If he’s to succeed offensively, it will likely require the sustainment of high BABIPs — which is possible, of course, given his speed and line-drive approach.
Brief Notes
• Tigers second-base prospect Harold Castro, recently demoted to West Michigan from High-A Lakeland following the promotion of Devon Travis to same, demonstrated impressively fluid movements and quick hands defensively — both in-game and during infield practice. While no demotion is regarded as a particularly great sign, Castro is still just 19 years old.
• In an interview with the author before the game, recently drafted Vanderbilt star Connor Harrell noted that he’d like to make the base-on-balls a more significant part of his game. He walked twice against Bowling Green, and struck out looking in a third plate appearance. Coincidence? Very likely, yes.
• Patrick Leonard, acquired from Kansas City along with Mike Montgomery, Wil Myers, and Jake Odorizzi, started at first base for Bowling Green. The 20-year-old has had some difficulty in the Midwest League — having recorded a 26:62 walk-to-strikeout ratio and just four home runs in 278 plate appearances — after having posted one of the top regressed offensive lines in all of Rookie-level baseball last season. He had probably the hardest-hit ball of the game, a long fly ball to the left-field wall in the second inning.
• Brandon Martin is compelling as a prospect insofar as he’s (a) a supplemental-round pick by the Rays from 2011, (b) a shortstop, and also (c) a 19-year-old in the Midwest League. He produced what the author is prepared to describe as two “competitive at-bats” against Whitecaps starter Charlie Gillies — two at-bats which saw him face a total of 11 pitches and resulted in a walk and then strikeout.
• The author can personally vouch for the quality of the macaroni-and-cheese with barbecue pulled chicken available from a cart behind the home-plate area.
