What causes teams to succeed in the playoffs? This is one of the debates in baseball most ridden with conventional wisdom, folksy tales, and grand assertions. Some claim that teams need to have playoff experience. Others focus on clutch performance, which usually coincides with whatever the person wishes to argue. A common argument, more cloaked in the language of reasonableness, is that teams that are more reliant on home runs than other ways of scoring underperform in the postseason. There are myriad reasons given for why some teams end up winning October, and most of them can tested for accuracy based on baseball history. I did a piece last year that looked at dozens of different team variables, and most of the explanations meant bupkis.
That doesn’t necessarily mean we throw our hands in the air and just assume teams are equally as good as they are in the regular season and go with that. There are significant structural differences between postseason and regular-season play simply due to the number of games and the increased number of off-days. Regular-season winning percentage is one of the few good predictors of postseason success; projections do even better. When I change the methodology in the ZiPS projections to focus more on a team’s frontline talent and the exact matchups and less on important regular-season things like depth, team strength becomes significantly more predictive of postseason success.
One of the best recent examples of this is the Nationals in 2019. Despite the 13-win regular-season advantage of the Dodgers, ZiPS projected their NLDS as a coin flip on the strength of the Nats being able to stuff so much of their team’s value into players who would be on the field. That was a projection that got a lot of pushback, but in the end, Washington won the World Series, basically riding the top of the rotation, a few really good hitters, and the two or three relievers that Dave Martinez could actually trust. Read the rest of this entry »
To say 2023 has not exactly been the Year of the Padres should win some kind of solid gold trophy awarded for understatement. After 2021’s epic collapse, they returned to the playoffs last year, and though the NLCS ended in disappointment, they at least got the satisfaction of ending Los Angeles’ season early. With a full year of Juan Soto and the return of Fernando Tatis Jr., surely things would be looking up for the mustard-and-brown! Not so much. Though the Padres haven’t eclipsed 2021 in terms of dramatic failure, they’ve been mired in mediocrity the whole year; the last time they woke up in the morning with at least a .500 record was back in May. A 10–18 record in August suggested they’d go out once again with a whimper. Instead, they’ve gone 13–5 in September, easily their best month, and with a seven-game win streak, they’ve kept the ember of their playoff hopes just hot enough to make a fire potentially. And I mean that literally, since I’m currently thinking of a similar scene at the end of The Fifth Element as I write this.
Many of the elements to make an improbable run are there. For one, there are good reasons to think the Padres are a better team than their record. With a run differential that suggests an 85–68 record — and run differential is still more predictive than actual record — they’d be on the verge of clinching a playoff berth. That kind of thing may not save jobs, but it does give them a better chance at reeling off an impressive run of wins over the final week. Also helping out is that two of the competition have spent the last week in a state of collapse. The Cubs have lost 10 of their last 13 games, including six to direct competitor Arizona and series losses to the last-place Rockies and the last-place Pirates. The Giants, at 6–12 for the month, haven’t been much better and just lost Alex Cobb for at least the rest of the regular season. San Diego, meanwhile, gets six games against the White Sox and Cardinals, two teams that haven’t shown a pulse all season, and three games against those stumbling Giants.
Over at MLB.com, our friend Mike Petriello wrote about San Diego’s lackluster campaign and ran down some of the scenarios that need to happen for postseason baseball in San Diego. But let’s go one step farther and crunch some numbers for the Padres. Read the rest of this entry »
Guest: Has this season increased or decreased Justin Verlander’s odds of reaching 300 wins? This season feels like a median outcome to me, but curious if Zips sees something different.
12:04
Dan Szymborski: I don’t have ZiPS open, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s dropped a little bit
12:04
Dan Szymborski: Verlander matched his projections, but remember, he wasn’t at 50% to win 300 games
12:04
Dan Szymborski: He kinda needs to beat his win projections by a bit
12:05
Guest: Enjoyed the milestone article looking 3,000 hits. Any other milestones that you’re planning to look at soon?
Two years ago, I wrote about the imminent demise of the 3,000 Hit Club after Miguel Cabrera became a member. Simply put, it was a question of math. The worse the environment is for hitting for batting average, the fewer players there will be who will put up lofty career hit totals. While it would be easy to think there are simply more lousy hitters these days, as league batting average has dropped in recent decades, the spread in individual batting averages has not increased; great players see lower batting averages when league batting averages decline. But while 2023’s new rules didn’t herald a reversal of the trend, one late entrant in the race for 3,000 hits has continued to excel: Freddie Freeman.
What makes the nadir of the 3,000 Hit Club so jarring to a baseball fan is the newness of this phenomenon. The explosion of offense in the 1990s wasn’t just homers, but batting average as well. Even going back 10 years, there were always a lot of players with career hit totals somewhere north of 2,000.
In 2023, that number is seven, and that’s only because there were four new members this year: Freeman, Jose Altuve, Elvis Andrus, and Andrew McCutchen. (I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that Evan Longoria won’t get 72 hits over the next two weeks.) Contrast that with 2004, which featured 27 active players with 2,000 career hits. Read the rest of this entry »
Just in case Max Scherzer’s season-ending injury wasn’t enough pitcher-specific tragedy for the week, baseball’s deities have handed down a tale of woe to another of the game’s top pitchers. Sandy Alcantara, last year’s NL Cy Young award winner, may miss the remainder of the season as well. While you could argue that teammate Jesús Luzardo has surpassed Alcantara as a top-of-the-rotation weapon, Alcantara’s history as one of the NL’s top workhorses makes his absence extremely ill-timed for the Marlins, who are currently fighting for their playoff lives against the Diamondbacks, Reds, and Giants.
Alcantara first landed on the IL about a week ago after experiencing discomfort in his forearm. Baseball people take forearm pain as seriously as the denizens of Middle-earth regard inscribed poems on mysterious rings, so Alcantara was shut down for further diagnosis. While he felt healthy enough to play catch on Wednesday, an MRI revealed that his forearm strain stems from a sprained UCL. While the worst-case scenario — namely, a Tommy John surgery that would cost him the rest of this season and likely all of 2024 — does not appear to be the immediate course of action, his 2023 status remains uncertain. When asked specifically about Alcantara’s return, Marlins manager Skip Schumaker avoided being too bullish on the prospects of getting him back this year, saying, “I don’t know. I can’t say yes. I can’t say no. I’ve just gotta be positive. I just gotta keep telling myself day by day and try to take advantage of the opportunity.”
I wouldn’t necessarily characterize Alcantara as having a rough season — I think something like Alek Manoah’s disastrous 2023 better fits that bill — but I can’t deny that it’s been a bit disappointing compared to his 2022. This year, Alcantara has posted his highest ERA as a Marlin, as well as his highest home run allowed rate and lowest strikeout rate. He’s been hit harder than usual, so none of these numbers are pure flukes. But while Statcast’s xERA isn’t happy about his season, ZiPS sees him as have a 3.60 zFIP, reflecting that the declines in his strikeout rate don’t quite match the smaller declines seen in his plate discipline data. It would be hard to say he’s been an ace this year, but the fact that Alcantara is able to eat so many innings has kept his value strong, and he was likely headed for his third-straight season of 200 innings and at least 3 WAR. The Marlins have a young rotation and many of their pitchers have significant injury histories. That makes it extra nice to have one of baseball’s dwindling number of pitchers who can casually go seven innings most nights.
In losing Scherzer, ZiPS estimated that the Rangers lost two percentage points in the playoff race and 0.4 percentage points in World Series probability. ZiPS likes Alcantara slightly better as a pitcher and feels more confident about the replacement options in Texas, so the impact on Miami’s fate is a skosh larger. First, I ran ZiPS assuming that Alcantara would miss the rest of the season:
ZiPS Projected Standings – NL Wild Card (9/14)
Team
W
L
GB
Pct
Div%
WC%
Playoff%
WS Win%
Philadelphia Phillies
87
75
—
.537
0.0%
92.5%
92.5%
3.0%
Chicago Cubs
85
77
2
.525
8.4%
62.1%
70.5%
2.9%
Arizona Diamondbacks
84
78
3
.519
0.0%
36.1%
36.1%
1.2%
Cincinnati Reds
84
78
3
.519
2.0%
35.7%
37.7%
0.5%
San Francisco Giants
83
79
4
.512
0.0%
34.1%
34.1%
1.8%
Miami Marlins
83
79
4
.512
0.0%
30.1%
30.1%
0.2%
San Diego Padres
78
84
9
.481
0.0%
0.1%
0.1%
0.0%
If we ignore the Padres, who are on the verge of rounding to zero, the Marlins have the toughest road of any of the Wild Card contenders without Alcantara. Now, let’s assume the Marlins get one of those aforementioned Tolkienian rings, use its little-known power to heal elbow and forearm problems, and get Alcantara back into the rotation when he’s eligible on Tuesday:
In a very tight race, getting Alcantara back for a couple starts is still enough to snag the Marlins nearly four percentage points of playoff probability, about twice what a healthy Scherzer would have done for the Rangers. And as importantly, having him for the playoffs would change the top of the rotation enough to give Miami a much better chance of making a deep postseason run.
Naturally, the worst-case scenario would have a significant effect on Alcantara’s long-term outlook:
ZiPS Projection – Sandy Alcantara (Tommy John Surgery)
Year
W
L
S
ERA
G
GS
IP
H
ER
HR
BB
SO
ERA+
WAR
2024
0
0
0
0.00
0
0
0.0
0
0
0
0
0
—
0.0
2025
7
9
0
3.74
23
23
158.7
147
66
17
40
128
109
2.7
2026
7
8
0
3.85
22
22
152.0
143
65
17
38
120
106
2.4
2027
6
8
0
3.94
21
21
144.0
138
63
16
36
112
104
2.2
While the odds still favor Alcantara returning, if worst came to worst, there would be a lot of concerns. Would Alcantara’s changeup still be as devastating if he came back with a 95 mph fastball instead of a 98 mph one? Would the loss of an entire year reduce the chances of him finally finding the strikeout upside of his solid stuff, as Nathan Eovaldi eventually did? What are the chances he could return and still be one of the few pitchers who’s a good bet to throw 200 innings?
Thankfully, we’re not yet at the point where we have to answer those questions. Mason Miller suffered an UCL sprain in May, but has been able to come back with conservative treatment thanks to the A’s showing an abundance of caution in terms of hurrying him back. But if Alcantara’s 2023 is indeed over, the Marlins face a tougher path to the playoffs, certainly a tougher one than when both ZiPS and the FanGraphs playoff odds had them with an over 70% chance of making the playoffs back in July.
Dan Szymborski: Greetings, fair FanGraphs reader, it is a time for chats and chidings.
12:01
Dan Szymborski: Also, since it was being stubborn about getting on the front page, my queue is almost nothing, so this is YOUR best time for random nonsense.
12:01
Ryan Z: Hey Dan, we are starting to see talk of the next CBA negotiations taking place and what each side wants. Do you expect we’ll have another lockout? Missed games in 2027?
12:01
Dan Szymborski: While it’s too early to say exactly *what* will happen, I’m not particularly optimistic.
12:02
Dan Szymborski: The players complaints heading into the last CBA are going to be basically unchanged except for minimums salaries.
12:02
Dan Szymborski: The luxury tax threshold still grows slower than inflation and WAY slower than MLB revenue growth
On Friday, the Rockies and starting pitcher Germán Márquez agreed on terms to a two-year contract extension worth a guaranteed $20 million. This was a lost season for Márquez, as an elbow injury and eventual Tommy John surgery resulted in him only making four starts. Unsurprisingly for a pitcher suffering a major injury, the second year of his new deal is heavily incentivized, with two roster bonuses and three inning bonuses. Márquez is expected to miss the first half of the 2024 season, but if he throws 160 innings in 2025, he’ll net a cool $22 million for the season. The contract also includes a $1 million assignment bonus, paid by his new team if the Rockies should trade him.
An elbow injury that requires a scalpel is never a welcome sign for anyone, but for Márquez, originally a free agent this fall, it was a particularly hard blow. The hope had been that he would bounce back from a pedestrian 2022 season that saw his FIP balloon to nearly five and his strikeout rate fall about 10% from 2021. While my thoughts on how the Rockies have been run since, well, 1993 are well-known, he was one of their biggest coups in franchise history. It’s hard to prove the Rays wrong on a young pitcher, but that the Rockies did, picking up Márquez and Jake McGee from Tampa Bay for Corey Dickerson and Kevin Padlo in 2016. Despite being only 28, he already looms large in Rockies history.
Jiménez’s three-year peak as an elite pitcher makes him the king of the mountain, but Márquez is only a couple good months behind him. When you consider offense as well (Márquez was once a Silver Slugger), the latter is already the leader. And while I can’t expect anyone in Denver to appreciate this, it certainly matters to me that my most recent memory of Márquez isn’t Buck Showalter throwing him into a playoff game for no particular reason.
Lest you think Márquez’s lofty standing is me damning the Rockies with faint praise, he’s long been one of the best-projected young pitchers in ZiPS WAR:
ZiPS Rest of Career Pitching, WAR Germán Márquez
Year (Preseason)
Rest-of-Career WAR
Rank
2016
13.4
99
2017
27.6
25
2018
38.1
10
2019
44.8
2
2020
39.5
6
2021
32.6
9
2022
28.3
17
2023
22.8
31
Naturally, his position in the rankings dropped as he failed to maintain his 2018 strikeout rate, but some of the decline is natural due to having fewer tomorrows remaining. With the kind of bounceback that ZiPS expected, he would have been looking at a pretty good payday in free agency. Here’s what his long-term projections for 2024 and beyond looked like before the start of 2023. I’m using a neutral park for this one since Coors Field is… complicated.
ZiPS Projection – Germán Márquez (Preseason 2023)
Year
W
L
ERA
G
GS
IP
H
ER
HR
BB
SO
ERA+
WAR
2024
10
9
3.83
26
26
160.0
144
68
18
49
144
109
3.0
2025
9
9
3.88
24
24
153.0
139
66
17
47
135
107
2.7
2026
9
8
3.97
22
22
142.7
133
63
17
43
123
105
2.5
2027
9
8
4.04
22
22
140.3
133
63
17
43
118
103
2.3
2028
8
7
4.15
20
20
125.7
123
58
16
39
103
100
1.9
2029
6
7
4.28
18
18
111.3
110
53
14
36
90
97
1.6
2030
6
6
4.38
16
16
98.7
100
48
13
33
78
95
1.3
Based on that projection, ZiPS recommended a seven-year, $126 million extension or $116 million over six years. That’s not Gerrit Cole money and reflects the increased risk stemming from his 2022, but nine figures can buy an impressive haul of goods and/or services. It certainly would have been a better use of money than, say, signing an aging third baseman from the Cubs to play left field for $182 million.
I went ahead and told ZiPS that Márquez has missed time due to Tommy John surgery (I normally do this after the season) and re-ran the numbers.
ZiPS Projection – Germán Márquez
Year
W
L
ERA
G
GS
IP
H
ER
HR
BB
SO
ERA+
WAR
2024
5
6
4.53
16
16
93.3
95
47
12
31
77
107
1.3
2025
6
6
4.65
17
17
98.7
101
51
12
34
80
104
1.3
ZiPS would have suggested two years at $18.2 million, but the difference between that and $20 million, in the context of MLB, is basically nothing. In any case, the fact that he is a pitcher who has survived Coors Field is almost certainly worth a bit more cash, even if ZiPS isn’t specifically valuing that here. In other words, the Rockies made a move that I cannot complain about.
Where does Márquez fit into the future of the Rockies? That’s a much trickier question. While the best result for him is that he makes a grand return next July and returns to his 2017–21 peak form, resulting in him getting that $100 million contract in a couple of years, I’m not sure the Rockies will take fullest advantage of this sunny scenario. If the organization is going to become competitive again, it has a lot of work to do, and Márquez rocking the NL inside out in 2025 likely makes him more valuable to the Rockies in terms of who they can acquire for him rather than his actual performance.
Trading veterans, especially veterans who had an important past in the story of the franchise, always appears to be psychologically difficult for Colorado’s ownership. But that’s a problem for the future Rockies. The team made a good move in extending Márquez to a low-risk, high-upside contract, and that’s good enough for me to pause my grumbling.
When the Phillies signed Trea Turner to an 11-year, $300 million contract over the winter, the second-largest contract in franchise history, they were probably prepared for Year 11 to be a bit underwhelming, not so much Year One. Turner got off to an excellent start in Philadelphia, beginning the season with 12 hits in the first seven games with two triples. Once his seven-game hitting streak was snapped, the next four months turned into an unbelievable slog: .225/.282/.354 with 10 homers. On the morning of August 5, his OPS hit a season-low .656. But over the last month, Turner has been one of the hottest hitters in baseball.
During the hottest months of the summer, one of the most common questions I got was some variant of “is Trea Turner broken?” My usual answer was that he’d probably be fine, even if expectations had to be lowered a bit, but it felt a little less convincing. The zStats I ran for hitters in early August as part of the “full-fat” ZiPS saw Turner as having a better season than was reflected in his overall numbers, with a .728 zOPS compared to that .656 mark. That wasn’t enough to make the leaderboard, headed by Spencer Torkelson (with a .975 OPS since then), but it was still a significant gap. And I doubt the Phillies or the fans would have felt much relief even with the .264/.309/.419 line that zStats gave him.
Back then, I re-ran Turner’s long-term projections to see what kind of bounceback ZiPS was expecting. While the computer saw a pretty good recovery in 2024, it was well off his preseason numbers. There was also a lot more risk in the mix, significantly pushing his numbers in future years down. Read the rest of this entry »
The Angels surprised everyone on Tuesday when they placed six veterans from their big league roster on waivers. Four of the players — Lucas Giolito, Reynaldo López, Randal Grichuk, and Dominic Leone — were recently acquired by the Angels at the trade deadline, while the final two — Hunter Renfroe and Matt Moore — had been picked up last offseason. The Yankees followed suit by placing center fielder Harrison Bader on waivers. With waiver claim priority going from the team with the worst record to the best, the teams at the back end of the playoff races got first dibs. The Cleveland Guardians and Cincinnati Reds, two teams that would miss the playoffs if the season ended today, scooped up five of these seven players, with the Mariners grabbing a sixth in Leone. Only Grichuk went unclaimed. Carlos Carrasco, José Cisnero, and Mike Clevinger also joined the waiver wire without attracting any interest.
The Guardians were the most active team, adding Giolito, López, and Moore. Giolito was one of the bigger names traded at the deadline, and the Angels thought enough of him at the time to give up Edgar Quero, our 51st-ranked prospect, and former second-rounder Ky Bush in order to bring him and López to LA for one last-gasp attempt to grab a playoff spot. Giolito was a disaster for the Angels. His ERA and FIP were both near seven, and he only managed quality starts in two of his six attempts. López fared somewhat better, but was rather adventure-prone, only throwing a clean 1-2-3 inning once in 13 games for the Halos. Moore had a solid year in Los Angeles, but he can be fairly tricky to use, as he doesn’t have the typical profile of a lefty reliever, with his changeup and his knuckle-curve significantly tougher for righties to hit than lefties these days. Read the rest of this entry »
Dan Szymborski: Sorry, was busy talking about the Springfield Bear Patrol
