Entering the season, Indians closer Chris Perez was probably pretty high up on the “closer most likely to get replaced” lists, but somehow he kept surviving. He kept the job through a sore shoulder, he kept it through drug charges, and he kept it through home run troubles that led to an awful 5.08 FIP. But finally, in the waning days of the season and in the midst of a miraculous run to the playoffs, manager Terry Francona could stand no more and finally removed Perez from the job on Friday.

Now, as the Indians welcome Tampa Bay to Cleveland for the one-game American League wild card game on Wednesday, Francona is suddenly without a defined closer. But that’s not the problem it might otherwise be, because what he does have available is an intriguingly unorthodox option — Opening Day starter Justin Masterson, who made his first All-Star team this year and has exactly zero career saves to his name. Masterson missed most of the final month with an oblique injury and is not considered to be stretched out enough to start until later in the playoffs, if at all. Read the rest of this entry »

Free agency begins five days after the end of the World Series. As in other recent offseasons, FanGraphs is once again facilitating this offseason a contract-crowdsourcing project, the idea being to harness the wisdom of the crowds to the end of better understanding the 2013-14 free-agent market.

Note that, this year, in addition to asking readers to estimate the years/dollars each free agent is likely to receive, FanGraphs is also requesting that readers make note of how much they’d pay each free agent were they, themselves, actual GMs.

In this edition: Robinson Cano.

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There is always a bit of a lull between the end of the minor league playoffs in September and the start of the annual top prospects lists in early November. Because of that gap, I’m breathing new life into an old feature that I wrote for the site in FanGraphs’ infancy back in 2008 and 2009.

The series ‘A Minor Review of 2013’ will look back on some of the major happenings in each MLB organization since the beginning of April as a primer for the upcoming FanGraphs Top 10+5 prospects lists. This series will run throughout September and October. I hope you enjoy the series and are eagerly anticipating the start of ‘Prospect List Season.’

The player listed in the sleeper section was featured in a pre-season series that looked at one fringe prospect in each organization that was expected to take a big step forward during 2013, chosen by myself, a scout or a front office talent evaluator.

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Free agency begins five days after the end of the World Series. As in other recent offseasons, FanGraphs is once again facilitating this offseason a contract-crowdsourcing project, the idea being to harness the wisdom of the crowds to the end of better understanding the 2013-14 free-agent market.

Note that, this year, in addition to asking readers to estimate the years/dollars each free agent is likely to receive, FanGraphs is also requesting that readers make note of how much they’d pay each free agent were they, themselves, actual GMs.

In this edition: Mike Napoli.

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Yesterday, the nation got to watch Francisco Liriano go up against Johnny Cueto. Come Thursday, Adam Wainwright and Clayton Kershaw are going to pitch, albeit not opposite each other. This is the playoffs, meaning the teams left are good, which means the players left are good, which means the pitchers left are good. There are going to be some incredible potential pitchers’ duels, and some of those are going to work out as actual pitchers’ duels. But Wednesday brings us a special one, even if the majority of baseball fans don’t know a thing about the guys taking the hill. As the Rays and Indians fight in the American League wild-card playoff, they’ll be throwing two of the league’s better and more unknown starters.

The Indians are turning to Danny Salazar, who’s far from a household name. Those who know him, at least, understand his sex appeal. The Rays, meanwhile, are turning to Alex Cobb, and there are people in Cobb’s own home who might not recognize him. Cobb certainly doesn’t have Salazar’s eye-popping stuff, but what the two do have in common are eye-popping numbers — numbers that put them in elite company. Numbers that make this a showdown to anticipate.

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Ben and Sam answer listener emails about unusual outfield alignments, high schoolers versus big leaguers, modern starters used like Cy Young, and more.

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One of the oldest cliches in baseball is that pitchers have to establish their fastball. The average Major League pitcher throws their fastball about 60% of the time, and any deviation from that can get you labeled a junkballer.

Francisco Liriano, with the Pirates season on the line, told that cliche to go pound sand.

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Maybe you can’t get enough baseball. Maybe you want to mourn the Giants’ season. Maybe you’re a West Coast yinzer! Maybe you just love Joey Votto. Or maybe you want to drink good beer and talk beer or baseball with the FanGraphs and BeerGraphs crew. We might even have an unlisted guest or two show up.

Public House, San Francisco, 4-9pm PT (Time subject to change due to schedule.)

Eno Sarris (FanGraphs/BeerGraphs)
Matt Hunter (FanGraphs/BeerGraphs)
Wendy Thurm (FanGraphs)
Carmen Kiew (Bay Area Sports Guy)
King Kaufman (Bleacher Report)
Erik Malinowski (Buzzfeed Sports)
Eric Freeman (The Classical)
Noah Jackson (First Base Foundation, former scout)
Daniel Zarchy (Giants Pod)
Patrick Newman (NPBTracker)
Jeff McClure (Drake’s Brewing)
Owen Poindexter (BeerGraphs)
Jen Rizzo (BeerGraphs)