Episode 812
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 spiritual invertebrate on this edition of FanGraphs Audio.

Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.

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Audio after the jump. (Approximately 55 min play time.)

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Fringe Five Scoreboards: 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013.

The Fringe Five is a weekly regular-season exercise, introduced a few years ago by the present author, wherein that same author utilizes regressed stats, scouting reports, and also his own fallible intuition 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 among the Five) is any rookie-eligible player at High-A or above who (a) was omitted from the preseason prospect lists produced by Baseball Prospectus, MLB.com, John Sickels, and (most importantly) FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel* and also who (b) is currently absent from a major-league roster. Players appearing on any updated, midseason-type list will also be excluded from eligibility.

*Note: I’ve excluded Baseball America’s list this year not due to any complaints with their coverage, but simply because said list is now behind a paywall.

For those interested in learning how Fringe Five players have fared at the major-league level, this somewhat recent post offers that kind of information. The short answer: better than a reasonable person would have have expected. In the final analysis, though, the basic idea here is to recognize those prospects who are perhaps receiving less notoriety than their talents or performance might otherwise warrant.

Austin Davidson, 2B, Washington (Profile)
For some time, Davidson has been among that class of players perpetually in contention for a place among the Five. He earned a couple of appearances here back in 2016 on the strength of some impressive batting indicators and, it seemed, sufficient defensive skill to remain on the infield. He was absent all last year, though — not because his profile changed (it didn’t) but because his own organization seemed reluctant to advance him through the system. Indeed, Davidson passed the entirety of his 2017 campaign as a 24-year-old in the Carolina League. That is not typically line item found on the resumes of major leaguers.

In an even less inspiring development, Davidson opened this year at High-A Potomac, as well. An impressive start to the season, however, earned him a promotion to Double-A, where he has recorded walk and strikeout rates of 13.9% and 16.7%, respectively, while producing a .290 isolated-power mark — or more than double the league average of .128.

Here’s what a home run by Davidson looks like on a dreary day in Trenton and also you got seats just to the third-base side of home plate:

https://gfycat.com/RingedVapidEasteuropeanshepherd

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Episode 811
Shakeia Taylor’s work has appeared both at Complex and The Hardball Times. Most relevant to this episode, she has also served as FanGraphs’ resident for the month of April. On this edition of the program, she discusses Cleveland baseball and Chicago baseball and youth baseball.

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 57 min play time.)

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Fringe Five Scoreboards: 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013.

The Fringe Five is a weekly regular-season exercise, introduced a few years ago by the present author, wherein that same author utilizes regressed stats, scouting reports, and also his own fallible intuition 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 among the Five) is any rookie-eligible player at High-A or above who (a) was omitted from the preseason prospect lists produced by Baseball Prospectus, MLB.com, John Sickels, and (most importantly) FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel* and also who (b) is currently absent from a major-league roster. Players appearing on any updated, midseason-type list will also be excluded from eligibility.

*Note: I’ve excluded Baseball America’s list this year not due to any complaints with their coverage, but simply because said list is now behind a paywall.

For those interested in learning how Fringe Five players have fared at the major-league level, this recent post offers that kind of information. The short answer: better than a reasonable person would have have expected. In the final analysis, though, the basic idea here is to recognize those prospects who are perhaps receiving less notoriety than their talents or performance might otherwise warrant.

David Fletcher, 2B/SS, Los Angeles AL (Profile)
As noted in last week’s edition of this same column, David Fletcher has only ever once produced an isolated-power figure above .080 in a professional season during which he’s also compiled more than 100 plate appearances. As things currently stand with Triple-A Salt Lake City, however, Fletcher could fail to record an extra-base hit in any of his next 106 at-bats and he’d still post something slightly better than an .080 ISO.*

*As of Thursday afternoon, at least. Fletcher actually added a stupid double and stupid homer last night, meaning his extra-base drought could extend even longer.

Incredibly, Fletcher has produced these unprecedented power numbers while also striking out at a much lower rate than usual. Which, actually, that’s not entirely accurate: Fletcher isn’t just striking out less often, he’s striking out almost never. In 86 plate appearances entering yesterday, he’d recorded just one strikeout, a figure in close proximity to — some would say the closest proximity to — zero strikeouts.

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Episode 810
Eric Longenhagen was told by a source before publishing his Astros list that right-hander Josh James, a former 34th-round pick and generally obscure prospect, had been recording higher fastball velocities in camp. Given James’ age and modest numbers as a professional, Longenhagen omitted him from the Astros list anyway. In the meantime, however, James has cobbled together one of the best starts in all the minors. Should it have been obvious? Would Longenhagen do anything differently? Those are questions the host of FanGraphs Audio fails to ask explicitly.

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 51 min play time.)

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Fringe Five Scoreboards: 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013.

The Fringe Five is a weekly regular-season exercise, introduced a few years ago by the present author, wherein that same author utilizes regressed stats, scouting reports, and also his own fallible intuition 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 among the Five) is any rookie-eligible player at High-A or above who (a) was omitted from the preseason prospect lists produced by Baseball Prospectus, MLB.com, John Sickels, and (most importantly) FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel* and also who (b) is currently absent from a major-league roster. Players appearing on any updated, midseason-type list will also be excluded from eligibility.

*Note: I’ve excluded Baseball America’s list this year not due to any complaints with their coverage, but simply because said list is now behind a paywall.

For those interested in learning how Fringe Five players have fared at the major-league level, this recent post offers that kind of information. The short answer: better than a reasonable person would have have expected. In the final analysis, though, the basic idea here is to recognize those prospects who are perhaps receiving less notoriety than their talents or performance might otherwise warrant.

JT Brubaker, RHP, Pittsburgh (Profile)
After twice appearing among the Next Five portion of this weekly exercise last year, Brubaker returned to that space in last week’s dispatch, as well. That was on the strength of his first two starts, during which he struck out 13 of 45 batters faced (or just under 30%). Brubaker was even better this past Wednesday, recording a strikeout-to-walk ratio of 8:1 against 23 batters while facing Cleveland’s Double-A affiliate (box).

Nor is Brubaker well acquitted merely by the numbers. The 24-year-old right-hander sat at 93-97 mph with his fastball during the Fall League, according to lead prospect analyst Eric Longenhagen, who also suggests that Brubaker possesses “late-blooming traits.”

Brubaker appeared to throw two different breaking pitches against Akron, first this shorter-breaking (and typically less effective) slider/cutter type pitch…

https://gfycat.com/SameMadDuckling

… and then a more vertically oriented pitch with which he got multiple whiffs below the zone (like the two featured here):

https://gfycat.com/HiddenWelloffGalago

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Episode 809
Jay Jaffe has served as a contributor both to Sports Illustrated and, before that, to Baseball Prospectus. He’s the progenitor of the very famous JAWS metric and also author of the reasonably famous The Cooperstown Casebook. This represents his inaugural appearance on the program.

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 46 min play time.)

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