Episode 503
Dave Cameron is both (a) the managing editor of FanGraphs and (b) the guest on this particular edition of FanGraphs Audio — during which edition he discusses mostly the end-of-season awards, against the will of a certain host.
Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.
Last year around this time, the author published a study in consideration of those players who’d entered — at the end of the 2011, 2012, and/or 2013 seasons — who’d entered minor-league free agency and what sort of production those same players recorded at the major-league level the following season.
In most cases, the unsurprising result was “zero” production. A minor leaguer is granted free agency when he (a) has played for more than six years in the affiliated minor leagues and yet (b) remains absent from his (or any other) club’s 40-man roster. Of those players who meet both criteria, it’s generally the case that there’s something less than overwhelming demand for their talents.
Episode 502
Kiley McDaniel is both (a) the lead prospect writer for FanGraphs and also (b) the guest on this particular edition of FanGraphs Audio — during which edition he reflects, among other matters, upon certain prospects he saw during the Arizona Fall League.
Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.
Between last Friday and this most recent Wednesday, the author visited the greater Phoenix area with a view towards watching Arizona Fall League games and, with the help of lead prospect analyst Kiley McDaniel — as well as other FanGraphs contributor Eric Longenhagen — to better understand how to perform evaluations of baseball prospects. Between the tutelage of those two and a small collection of strangers who mistakenly talked to me of their own volition, I’ve left Phoenix with a deeper (if still mostly imperfect) understanding of prospect analysis and its various challenges.
What follows is a collection of eight lessons from that visit, of varying degrees of merit and arranged in senseless order.
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1. Batting practice is an ideal opportunity for grading raw power.
By the end of their respective batting-practice rounds, most players are swinging at maximum effort or close to it — and, in many cases, harder than they might otherwise swing during games. This serves as an opportune moment to get a sense of the raw power each player possesses. For certain players — particularly those for whom power is an integral component of their overall offensive value — raw power might be roughly equivalent to game power. For those who possess more of a contact-oriented approach, that raw power is unlikely to appear in game play.
Episode 501
Dave Cameron is both (a) the managing editor of FanGraphs and (b) the guest on this particular edition of FanGraphs Audio — during which edition he introduces the whole world to baseball’s offseason.
Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.
At the Winter Meetings a couple years ago in Nashville, I happened to be sitting next to Kiley McDaniel — now himself the lead prospect analyst for this site — while he was looking over some video he’d recently taken of then-amateur prospect Lance McCullers, a right-hander now in the Houston system.
As a person who is both an idiot and also curious, I began asking McDaniel a number of simple-minded questions about McCullers and for what, specifically, McDaniel was looking as he went frame-by-frame through McCullers’ windup. I learned a considerable amount during that five- or ten-minute exchange — and ultimately asked questions that would have never previously occurred to me.
This past Saturday, I sat next to McDaniel again — in this case, behind home plate at Salt River Fields in Scottsdale, AZ, for the Arizona Fall League All-Star Game. Once again, I asked a number of idiot’s questions and, once again, McDaniel answered them (mostly) patiently.
What follows is an attempt to reproduce certain moments of that exchange. For five different pitcher-batter encounters during the AFL All-Star Game I’ve reproduced animated GIFs of relevant pitches. I’ve also included several minutes of audio of McDaniel commenting on particular aspects of the footage in question. For each of the encounters, the reader can push play for the corresponding commentary.
Episode 500
Dayn Perry is a contributor to CBS Sports’ Eye on Baseball and the author of three books — one of them not very miserable. He’s also the guest on this dumb 500th edition of FanGraphs Audio.
Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.
The Arizona Fall League is a remarkable spectacle for those with even a passing interest in prospects, insofar as it provides an opportunity to see many of the best ones of those (i.e. the best prospects). This year’s edition of the AFL, for example, has featured Byron Buxton, Addison Russell, and Francisco Lindor — ranked first, fifth, and sixth, respectively, among Baseball America’s midseason top-50 list. Except for the Futures Game, there’s rarely an occasion upon which one is able to witness such a substantial collection of minor-league talent.
Free agency begins five days after the end of the World Series — which competition, barring some unforeseen circumstance, is likely to end today. As in otherrecentoffseasons, FanGraphs once again facilitated this offseason a contract-crowdsourcing project, the idea being to harness the wisdom of the crowds to the end of better understanding the 2014-15 free-agent market.
Below are the results of same. For each player, respondents provided estimates of the years and dollars he’s likely to receive. Also, in such cases as a player is a candidate to receive a qualifying offer from his club, readers predicted whether he would or not — and whether, having received a qualifying offer, that player would accept it. Answers to other questions — regarding options, for example — also appear below.
In terms of how the projected contract values below are likely to relate to reality, a comparison between last year’s crowdsourced estimates and the actual contracts received reveals that the crowd typically missed by 37% on overall contract value and is most likely to underestimate the overall contract figures of the most high-profile free agents. It’s not unreasonable, in other words, to expect that Hanley Ramirez will receive more than the 5 years and $90 million he’s projected to receive. Of note, however, is that most of last year’s top free agents were hitters, while Max Scherzer and Jon Lester are the most formidable names among this year’s free-agent class. Whether this same principle of underestimating the contracts received by top free agents applies to pitchers, as well — for whom length of contract is an issue, given the possibility of injury — is a question that remains.
Later this morning, FanGraphs will publish the results of this year’s contract crowdsourcing effort, a list of the top-55 free agents (more or less) in order of total contract value as estimated by the wisdom of the crowd that is FanGraphs’ readership.
The projected contract values in that post will likely not precisely match the actual contracts received by this offseason’s free agents. To understand what biases the crowd might exhibit (if any), I’ve published below the results from last year’s crowdsourcing effort, alongside the actual contracts received by the relevant free agents.
