Episode 485
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 discusses, among other things, the effects of Tony LaRussa’s hiring on the D-backs’ scouting and player-development staffs.

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 52 min play time.)

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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
Detroit at Kansas City | 20:10 ET
Justin Verlander (190.2 IP, 112 xFIP-, 2.7 WAR) faces Jason Vargas (179.2 IP, 104 xFIP-, 2.7 WAR). In the event that one were interested in consuming a game between two clubs separated by almost nothing at the top of their respective division and with similar odds of winning that same division, then one would be — perhaps already is, without the aid of this brief paragraph — interested in consuming this particular game, so far as it fits the aforementioned criteria. Those with less interest in high-leverage baseball should consider directing their attention to almost every other game tonight.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Detroit Radio.

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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
Boston at Pittsburgh | 19:05 ET
Brandon Workman (82.0 IP, 112 xFIP-, 0.7 WAR) faces Gerrit Cole (117.0 IP, 96 xFIP-, 1.2 WAR). While French theologian John Calvin — and any other number of determinists, religious or otherwise — would likely argue that the outcomes of the various playoff races have been decided already, the editors of FanGraphs are capable only of speaking in probabilities. So far as Pittsburgh’s probability of qualifying for the divisional series is concerned, “almost exactly 50%” is the best answer available to us at the moment. Of greater certainty — one bordering on 100%, in this case — is that Cuban emigre Rusney Castillo will make his second start for Boston tonight in center field.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Boston Radio or Television.

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Last week, the author published the final results of this year’s weekly Fringe Five column, which column is designed to identify the most compelling of those rookie-eligible minor leaguers excluded from notable preseason top-100 prospect lists. To what degree it does that (i.e. identify compelling prospects) is a matter of some debate, probably. With a view to assessing the efficacy of the project, however — or, at least, to producing internet content — what follows is a review of the top finishers from the 2013 series of weekly Fringe Five posts. Players ordered alphabetically according to surname.

Wilmer Flores, 3B/SS, New York NL (Profile)

Much of what the author is compelled to say about Wilmer Flores, he’s already said within the last 24 hours via a combo package of two posts regarding the 23-year-old’s surprisingly adequate shortstop defense. What’s omitted from those posts, however, is any mention of Flores’s offensive acumen — which acumen the Venezuelan native exhibited considerably during Tuesday night’s Mets game, during which he hit two home runs and produced a single-game 836 wRC+ over four plate appearances. Over the last two weeks now, Flores has recorded the highest isolated-power mark (.429) among 156 qualified batters while simultaneously posting the fourth-lowest strikeout rate among that same group.

Maikel Franco, 1B/3B, Philadelphia (Profile)

That Franco appeared among the top-five finishers on the arbitrarily calculated end-of-season 2013 Fringe Five Scoreboard deserves some note — insofar, that is, as he (i.e. Franco) last appeared within that weekly column at some point in or around July, his inclusion on multiple mid-season prospect lists having disqualified him from consideration as a “fringe” prospect. Though he continued to exhibit an excellent combination of power and contact ability following a promotion to Double-A last year, that same package of skills didn’t translate entirely to Triple-A this season, where he homered at only about half the rate as in 2013. That he recorded a league-average line there as just a 21-year-old, however, bodes well for his future.

Mike O’Neill, OF, St. Louis (Profile)

Given the limits both of his power and also his defensive skills, O’Neill’s ceiling is necessarily rather low. In 2013, however, he produced such considerably anomalous walk and strikeout rates (16.0% and 6.5%, respectively) at Double- and Triple-A that he became a fixture among those prospects included weekly in the Fringe Five. While still better than average, O’Neill’s rates haven’t scaled the heights of incredulity like last year. In 477 plate appearances between Double- and Triple-A this season, O’Neill has produced marks of 10.3% and 8.8%, respectively. That he’s employed by an organization boasting a surplus of outfielders offers no great hope to his chances of earning any kind of playing time.

Danny Salazar, RHP, Cleveland (Profile)

Salazar began last season as a Tommy John survivor never to have appeared on a top-100 prospect list and ended it starting the Cleveland Clevelanders’ literally most important game of the year. What he did in the meantime was exhibit both a 96 mph fastball and also split-changeup, the latter of which offering provoked a non-zero number of religious experiences throughout Cuyahoga County. In terms of run prevention, Salazar’s 2014 season hasn’t been as excellent; indeed, he’s produced a league- and park-adjusted ERA 13% worse than average. In terms of his fielding-independent performance, however, Salazar has continued to pitch like an above-average major-league starter — if with perhaps slightly less electricity than during his 10-start run with the parent club last year.

Marcus Semien, 2B/3B (Profile)

As one notes from his stat lines here, Semien has produced very different offensive numbers this season at the minor- and major-league levels, exhibiting excellent plate discipline and contact skills in the former and much less of those things in the latter. That said, Semien’s walk and strikeout rates in 2014 represent a substantial improvement over his brief time with the White Sox last year, when he produced a 1:22 walk-to-strikeout ratio in 71 plate appearances. Both Steamer and ZiPS regard him as a nearly a league-average true-talent hitter.

The Next Five
Here are the players who finished sixth through tenth on last year’s Fringe Five scoreboard.

Boston infielder/outfielder/wunderkind Mookie Betts wasn’t even eligible for the Five until a mid-July promotion to High-A Salem, but still produced enough there to finish sixth overall on the mostly arbitrary Scoreboard. His 2014 season has been mostly a study is excellence … Miami left-hander Brian Flynn appeared within a number of early season editions of the Five, but was less effective following a promotion to Triple-A New Orleans. He made just two major-league appearances this season… Somewhat surprisingly, it’s been Mets right-hander Rafael Montero‘s command that has made his transition to the majors difficult. He’s produced a walk rate of 12.3% over 39.0 innings in the majors this season after walking only 5.8% of batters in over 400 minor-league innings… St. Louis’s Stephen Piscotty didn’t exhibit any more power this year than last — of some concern, that, if he’s to play a corner-outfield spot. Still, he continued to record excellent plate-discipline marks this season, posting walk and strikeout rates of 7.7% and 11.0%, respectively, with Triple-A Memphis… Following a promising record in the minor’s last season, Burch Smith’s 2014 was a nothing: he pitched only 5.1 innings for San Diego’s Triple-A affiliate while dealing with a forearm injury.

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 Games
Chicago AL at Kansas City | 20:10 ET
Texas at Oakland | 22:05 ET
In a development that’s probably unprecedented, but also maybe not unprecedented, this edition of FanGraphs’ NERD Game Scores features two contests. First, Chris Sale (163.0 IP, 74 xFIP-, 5.3 WAR) faces Yordano Ventura (165.0 IP, 100 xFIP-, 2.5 WAR) and then, two hours later, Derek Holland (21.0 IP, 82 xFIP-, 0.9 WAR) faces Jeff Samardzija (197.2 IP, 84 xFIP-, 3.5 WAR). All pitchers, one notes, offer the prospect of Considerable Pleasure, while two of the clubs involved (the Royals and A’s) feature playoff odds — which is to say, in this case, odds of qualifying for the divisional series — uncommonly close to 50%.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Kansas City and Texas Radios.

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The footage embedded above comes from an August 22nd game between the Mets and the Dodgers and depicts Wilmer Flores acting out what is essentially the baseball equivalent of a first-day-of-school anxiety dream. With two outs and runners at first and second, Yasiel Puig batted a mostly harmless ground ball to Flores. Instead of converting said grounder into a routine out, however, what Flores did was first to (a) misplay the ball and then, after picking it up, (b) stumble forward unprovoked and fall to the ground in front of everyone.

That no one scored on the play (or the inning) is perhaps some consolation so far as this particular instance is concerned. Still, to the degree that just any one play can, this particular one doesn’t recommend Flores’ hands and agility.

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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
San Francisco at Arizona | 21:40 ET
Jake Peavy (183.0 IP, 102 xFIP-, 1.9 WAR) faces Josh Collmenter (157.0 IP, 96 xFIP-, 1.6 WAR). This game serves as a reasonable pretense upon which to note that, despite having produced relatively average numbers over the course of the whole season, Giants right-hander Jake Peavy has actually recorded the 14th-best park-adjusted xFIP among qualified pitchers over the last month and also the 11th-best WAR among all pitchers over that same interval. It also serves as a pretense upon which to note that Ender Inciarte — of whom the author can only claim a passing knowledge — has batted leadoff in 42 consecutive games for Arizona, producing actually an above-average batting line and 10-for-11 stolen-base record over that same stretch.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: San Francisco Radio or Television.

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Episode 484
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 what is the FanGraphs’ Player of the Year Award, among other things.

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 38 min play time.)

Read the rest of this entry »

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

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
Seattle at Los Angeles AL | 22:05 ET
Hisashi Iwakuma (165.0 IP, 75 xFIP-, 3.3 WAR) faces Matt Shoemaker (128.1 IP, 87 xFIP-, 1.9 WAR). While this game actually scores lower than San Francisco-Arizona on decimal points according to NERD, that proprietary and flawed metric fails to account for two non-negligible points, both of which concern the person of Matt Shoemaker. First is this: Shoemaker has unexpectedly emerged as probably the best starter on what is almost certainly the best team in the majors, rendering him, by some manner of transitive property, one of the best pitchers in all the leagues. And second is this: in Hisashi Iwakuma, Shoemaker faces one of three pitchers to whom he’s most comparable in the majors, all of whom (one notes) hail from a certain island nation in East Asia.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Los Angeles AL Radio.

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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
Los Angeles NL at San Francisco | 16:05 ET
Clayton Kershaw (177.1 IP, 56 xFIP-, 6.3 WAR) faces Yusmeiro Petit (99.1 IP, 78 xFIP-, 1.4 WAR). It was either Socrates or one of Socrates’s Athenian friends who stated that one ought either “to ball hard, or not ball at all.” What the Giants did on Saturday against the visiting Dodgers was to apply that adage to losing — insofar, that is, as they lost really hard. San Francisco entered the game trailing their opponents by a single game and featuring about 24% odds of winning the division. As of this morning, that figure is closest to 15%. Still, not inconsequential, that.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Almost All of Them.

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