Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Oakland at Seattle | 22:10 ET
Jeff Samardzija (115.0 IP, 86 xFIP-, 2.4 WAR) faces Felix Hernandez (136.1 IP, 62 xFIP-, 5.1 WAR). One notes, with regard to the latter, that his most recent start — over which he produced an 8:1 strikeout-to-walk ratio and 55% ground-ball rate — actually served to slightly increase (i.e. make worse) his park-adjusted xFIP. That’s likely the most economical way of indicating that Hernandez is in the midst of an excellent season. A less economical way would be to paint a large portrait of Hernandez astride a pile of corpses, each corpse representing a batter Hernandez had retired this season.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Seattle Radio.

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Each weekday during the minor-league season, FanGraphs is providing a status update on multiple rookie-eligible players. Note that Age denotes the relevant prospect’s baseball age (i.e. as of July 1st of the current year); Top-15, the prospect’s place on Marc Hulet’s preseason organizational list; and Top-100, that same prospect’s rank on Hulet’s overall top-100 list.

In this installment, I’ll discuss three pitchers I’ve come across in A-ball who boast more polish than most at their level.

Summary
Plutko gained plenty of prospect helium with a dominant run at Low-A early in the season, but he’s found the going tougher after a promotion to the Carolina League.

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Entering play on Thursday night, Kyle Seager owned a .274 batting average. Chris Johnson’s average was a nearly identical .273. The two third basemen have played in a similar number of games and have come to the plate close to the same number of times. If you use batting average to evaluate these players’ seasons, you’d come to the conclusion that Seager and Johnson are essentially equivalent players this year.

They’re not. In fact, it’s very clear Seager is substantially better than Johnson. Let me rephrase that: It’s very clear Seager is better than Johnson — but only if you’re well-versed in the language of baseball statistics. If you know how to properly value walks, extra base power, baserunning and defense, the difference between Seager and Johnson is impossible to miss.

At FanGraphs, our writers use statistics and metrics like wOBA, wRC+, FIP and WAR to evaluate baseball players and teams. We provide those tools, and more, so others might conduct evaluations on their own. Want to know Miguel Cabrera’s wOBA against lefties? You can find that on FanGraphs. But what if you don’t know what wOBA means, how it’s calculated or why you should care about it more than batting average?

You can find some of that information on FanGraphs. A well-motivated, self-starter could show up at the site, notice something called wOBA on the leaderboards, go to the glossary and figure out what it means and why it’s important. But it can be intimidating and challenging for people who are just starting out to make sense of everything we offer.

In an effort to make advanced statistics easier, and to understand and to better use the data and features available at FanGraphs, we’re relaunching and promoting the FanGraphs Library. There’s a lot of great information there already, but this revamped library is even better. There’s a steep learning curve, though, so I’ve been tasked with making things a bit simpler.

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Ben and Sam discuss their new jobs and the future of the podcast, then talk about how ace starters are defined.

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LeBron James is a basketball player. Let’s imagine a LeBron James equivalent as a baseball player.

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Brandon Belt was once thought of primarily a pitcher, so the Giants’ first baseman knows a little bit about change. He’s been accused of walking too much, striking out too much, and now perhaps swinging too much. But he’s still found his way to just outside the top ten at a position with a high offensive bar.

The process hasn’t been easy, but past changes to his game, combined with his current mindset, can both give us hope that he’s got what it takes to continue improving, while also dishing us a dollop of despair — hitting seems hopelessly hard, a continual game of adjustments, even on the game level.

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The Rockies 2014 season is essentially over. They stand 39-53, and our Playoff Odds model gives them a 0.1% chance of reaching the postseason. And that’s just a one-tenth-of-one-percent chance of getting to the Wild Card game, where they would be heavy underdogs and likely eliminated after Game 163. As Mike Petriello wrote earlier this week, the Rockies need to seriously think about changing course.

There are good arguments against trading Troy Tulowitzki, however. He’s a superstar signed to one of the most team-friendly contracts in baseball. They can rebuild around Tulo and build a winner while he’s still a productive player. He needs better teammates, but it’s generally easier to find new good role players than it is to develop another MVP-caliber shortstop and sign him to a long term extension for half of his market value.

But the key to building a winner around Troy Tulowitzki is to properly determine which players should be kept, and which players should be replaced. Given the recent rumors, it appears that the Rockies may not have figure that part out yet.

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The Fringe Five is a weekly regular-season exercise, introduced last April by the present author, wherein that same ridiculous author utilizes regressed stats, scouting reports, and also his own heart to identify and/or continue monitoring the most compelling fringe prospects in all of baseball.

Central to the exercise, of course, is a definition of the word fringe, a term which possesses different connotations for different sorts of readers. For the purposes of the column this year, a fringe prospect (and therefore one eligible for inclusion in the Five) is any rookie-eligible player at High-A or above both (a) absent from all of three notable preseason top-100 prospect lists* and also (b) not currently playing in the majors. Players appearing on the midseason prospect lists produced by those same notable sources or, otherwise, selected in the first round of the current season’s amateur draft will also be excluded from eligibility.

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There is something to be said for getting the jump on the trading deadline. You get an opportunity to set the market, rather than react to it. Making a big move for pitching in advance of the trading deadline has other, salient benefits, such as the ability to get an extra start or two from your newly acquired arm(s) as you restructure your rotation going into, and out of the All Star break. This rings especially true to me personally, having been with the Brewers the year of the C.C. Sabathia trade, when we wound up needing almost every exceptional start and inning he gave us.

The A’s jumped the gun on this year’s deadline, getting not one, but two of the premier available arms, Jeff Samardzija and Jason Hammel, albeit for a hefty price. The A’s are obviously playing for now – so how much better does this deal make the A’s in the short term, and does it materially increase their chances of finally bringing home some hardware this fall? Read the rest of this entry »