Read the rest of this entry »

In the first 2014 regular-season baseball game played in the Northern Hemisphere, the Padres hosted the Dodgers. A 1-0 game became a 1-1 game late, and then Yasmani Grandal got on and stole third base. Moments later he scored the go-ahead run, and the Padres held on to win 3-1. That steal happened to be the first of Grandal’s major-league career. It also happened to be the first of Grandal’s professional career. Grandal is a slow-moving catcher and he’s coming off knee surgery. You’re right to identify this as an unlikely turn of events. It was also, in part, the consequence of an unlikely turn of events.

Not long ago I wrote a few posts about the challenge of bunting. Bunting, see, has the reputation of being something absurdly easy to do, but it’s really quite hard, even if certain position players don’t do it enough. Sunday night’s attempted bunting was a mixed bag. There were seven attempts overall. There were two successful sacrifices. There was one blown sacrifice, where the lead runner was thrown out. Two bunts went foul. Another bunt went foul into a glove on the fly. One attempted bunt was missed completely. That missed bunt, by the Padres, was instrumental in the Padres earning the win.

Read the rest of this entry »

Right around the eve of the meaningful beginning of the 2014 regular season, baseball has announced an enhanced Joint Drug Prevention and Treatment Program. You can read the details right here, but the primary takeaway is that now a first-time PED violation will result in an 80-game suspension, and a second-time PED violation will result in a 162-game suspension. A third violation still earns a lifetime ban, since it’s not very easy to make that penalty tougher without breaking actual laws. Also, a player suspended for a violation will no longer be eligible for that year’s postseason.

Of course, there are other enhancements, too. And it should be noted that the majority of the players have been supportive of tougher penalties for users. Many of the players want to play within a clean game, and they’re not fans of what users do for the perception of themselves and everyone else. In that way, perhaps this shouldn’t be viewed as a concession, but one bullet point in there shows that the players got something extra for themselves in return.

Read the rest of this entry »

According to IMDB, Gone with the Wind pulled in nearly $200 million at the American box office. The Sound of Music pulled in just over $163 million. This makes them two of the highest-grossing films in US movie history. Those numbers are also utterly trounced by Fast & Furious 6’s $239 million. It can be said, technically accurately, that Fast & Furious 6 has been a higher-grossing film than the other two mentioned. But that sort of technical accuracy is deceptive accuracy, and, of course, we need to make adjustments. The raw numbers don’t tell us anything of value.

Listen to Twitter and you’ll find out in a hurry that the baseball industry was shocked by news of the new Miguel Cabrera contract. Cabrera’s now guaranteed $292 million through 2023, and beyond that there are another two options. It’s a massive deal for the Tigers, and a massive commitment, and seemingly a massive risk, that the Tigers didn’t need to take right away. Everyone’s floored by the magnitude of the thing. But then, we’ve seen this thing before. Cabrera’s contract isn’t the biggest contract ever, and in fact it’s hardly even in the conversation.

Read the rest of this entry »

So, look, I feel like I need to explain why I’m looking at something you’ve probably never even thought about before. Obviously, I write a lot about pitch-framing, and about the different strike zones that different players get. Some time back, I was writing about Zack Greinke‘s favorable zone with Milwaukee. As such, I wrote about Jonathan Lucroy‘s receiving, and I wrote about Martin Maldonado’s receiving. Afterward, I received an interesting idea from a player:

I’m convinced the background in Milwaukee affects the home plate umpires’ depth perception and expands the zone down and away. Is there a home road split for both of the catchers? Maybe that will make some sense for my possibly distorted perception of balls and strikes in Milwaukee.

Not something I’d considered. Made sense, in theory. Perhaps a hidden park factor was inflating the framing numbers. Maybe Milwaukee is like the Colorado of expanding the strike zone. For whatever reason I never got around to researching this, until this afternoon, when I compiled the relevant data.

Read the rest of this entry »

The White Sox aren’t close, but they’re building a long-term core. Earlier in the week they signed starting pitcher Jose Quintana to a five-year contract with two more years of club options. Appropriately, given the player, the news didn’t capture the nation’s interest. In fact, the biggest immediate effect was Quintana could stop being such a nervous, uncomfortable wreck. It’s a smaller deal than Starling Marte’s new contract with Pittsburgh, in both guaranteed money and in relevance to the average fan’s interests.

There’s something here, though. Something one wouldn’t expect. Quintana’s 25 years old. Last year, by WAR, he was tied for 24th among major-league starters — neck and neck with the likes of Homer Bailey, Madison Bumgarner and Patrick Corbin. By RA9-WAR, he was tied for 23rd, equal to Jordan Zimmermann and Chris Tillman. He made all of his starts, and he threw 200 innings. A season ago, ever so quietly, Quintana was one of the better starters in the majors. Which leads  to this: What the heck is a Jose Quintana?

Read the rest of this entry »

What do we have here? For an explanation of this series, please read this introductory post. As noted in that introduction, the data is a hybrid projection of the ZIPS and Steamer systems with playing time determined through depth charts created by our team of authors. The rankings are based on aggregate projected WAR for each team at a given position. The author writing this post did not move your team down ten spots in order to make you angry. We don’t hate your team. I promise.

Because of the length of these write-ups, we’ve broken the starting pitchers and relief pitchers down into two posts apiece. The top half of the rotations are listed below, with the second half coming later this afternoon.

In this post, we deal with the left. You might notice that #15 is exactly even with #16. That’s an example of why the WAR is more important than the rank. Except for rank #1, where the leader is head and shoulders above the runner-up. The gap between first and second is bigger than the gap between second and tenth. So the #1 team probably has the best rotation in baseball, unless the projections end up wrong, which is possible if not probable. I’ll say this much: last year’s projected #1 rotation ended up as the actual #1 rotation. And this year it’s the same rotation!

One other note: our system admittedly doesn’t deal well with starter/reliever role shifts. In that it doesn’t deal with them at all, just plugging in the same projected numbers regardless. I’ll take care to note instances where that’s relevant and where the numbers might be misleading. An important instance is coming soon!

That all being said, let’s have some more be said, below. I’m comfortable with most of what’s to follow.

Read the rest of this entry »

There’s a good chance you might’ve missed it, but over the weekend, baseball began, by which I mean the kind of baseball that counts in the standings. The Dodgers played two games against the Diamondbacks, and the Dodgers won two games against the Diamondbacks, incrementally improving the playoff odds of the former, and incrementally hurting the playoff odds of the latter. The most likely outcome over two games is a split. As much as it’s early — it’s not even April! — the games were significant. Oh, and another reason they were significant is that they were played in Australia.

Specifically, they were played in the Sydney Cricket Ground, which was turned into a regulation baseball field in a matter of weeks. Someone asked recently how FanGraphs would deal with the park factors of two games played at such an unfamiliar location. The correct answer is, “it doesn’t matter, who cares?” Another answer is, “good question, let’s investigate and speculate on the Sydney Cricket Ground!” What if — hypothetically — what if the Sydney Cricket Ground played as a team’s home for a full regular season? For several full regular seasons?

Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

You remember what Scott Baker used to be. He used to be the model of what the Twins were going for. Lots of strikes, easy outs, strikeouts not so much as a result of stuff but as a result of throwing in the zone enough and throwing fastballs high enough. Baker was a dependable guy right up until his elbow surgery. He came back and took a while to get right with the Cubs. In three starts to close last year, he struck out six of 57 batters before becoming a low-profile free agent. He wound up with the Mariners, seemingly with an inside track for a rotation job. All he needed to be was Scott Baker.

According to Chris Cotillo, Baker is leaving the Mariners and becoming a free agent again. Didn’t like his chances, despite rotation injuries. About that: let’s go back to March 1. In the second inning of a start against the Angels, Baker struck out Chad Tracy. The strikeout was called. The pitch was in, and out of the zone. That’s been Baker’s only strikeout in the Cactus League, even though he’s faced 64 batters. He’s walked seven, and he’s hit three, and all three in a row, incidentally. The point is this: we’re conditioned to dismiss spring-training statistics. Sometimes, though, it sure feels like they’re telling us something. In this case, it sure feels like they’re telling us that Scott Baker isn’t right, and he’s always had a pretty slim margin of error.

Not that this is a post about Scott Baker! I promise.

Read the rest of this entry »