They say the Marlins are loaded with quality young pitching. Our own numbers disagree, at least as far as this coming season is concerned, but that’s what they say, and there are clearly some promising hard throwers slated to wear the uniform. Based on the pitching staff, you’d think the Marlins might have some kind of shot at the playoffs. The problem is almost literally everything else. You might’ve noticed a theme while scrolling through the positional power rankings so far. A lot of the Marlins’ positions look terrible. Marlins position players are projected for the lowest combined WAR in baseball, a hair behind the Twins and a wig factory behind the Dodgers. As such, the Marlins are also projected for one of the worst records in baseball, and though there’s talent in place for the future, the future ain’t 2014.

The Marlins project last at first base, third base, and shortstop. They’re tied for last at catcher, and they’re third-to-last at second base. They’re tied for first in right field — look at that! — but they’re average in left and below-average in center. With every individual projection, you can quibble. There’s less quibbling to be done when a unit looks this bad as a group.

But remember: projections are averages. Or medians. I don’t really know. So projections come with downsides, and projections come with upsides. What if we talked about the Marlins’ upside? What if we stretched the definition of “possible” to examine perhaps the greatest realistic Marlins possibility?

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Apparently what I’m really interested in these days is bunting. Which is a little odd, but which is also a welcome break from thinking about pitch-framing all the time. And though bunting is ordinarily associated with the dreaded and unproductive sacrifice, a well-placed bunt in fair territory can make for a hell of a weapon, in particular when it’s put down by a left-handed hitter against a defensive overshift. Everybody’s talking about shifting these days, and while it’s hard for a hitter to make dramatic changes to his swing, oftentimes there’s a single there for the taking, and it would require no swing at all. So bunting and the shift are worth analyzing in more detail.

Yesterday, I was excited to generate some bunting statistics I’d never seen anywhere before. Obviously, I’d seen bunt batting averages and whatnot, but I’d never seen attempts, including foul bunts and missed bunts. I was pleased to have that data, but the data also didn’t say enough. You can’t just characterize a fair bunt as a successful bunt. And within all bunt attempts are attempts at different sorts of bunts. A sacrifice bunt is different from a bunt for a hit, and a bunt for a hit against the shift is different from a bunt for a hit against a regular alignment. I made it a goal to dig a little deeper, because, what is it to bunt against the shift, really?

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Something you’ll notice in the positional power rankings is that the Marlins project to be terrible. That’s bad, because they’re supposed to be worthwhile fun, but it’s also okay, because no one’s entertaining playoff hopes in Miami. Things only really matter when you’re playing for something. The situation is a little more worrisome elsewhere. The Blue Jays still don’t have a real second baseman, and they’d sure like to play in October. (This October!) Meanwhile, the Tigers had a shortstop they liked, but then he fractured both his legs, and they’ll have to resume liking him in 2015. For the time being, the Tigers don’t have a real shortstop, and they’d sure like to play in October. They’re also a lot more likely to get there than Toronto is, but, anyway.

My expectation remains that the Jays will go and get themselves some help, instead of sticking with Ryan Goins. I also wouldn’t be surprised if the Tigers made at least a minor move, to improve on whatever they think they’re going to do right now. Thinking about Toronto and Detroit, though, got me thinking about successful teams who’ve played a lot of particularly bad position players. Now, Goins projects to be replacement-level, and the same could be said of the Tigers’ shortstop stopgaps, so this isn’t directly pertinent, but then, the worst regulars are the most likely to be the terrible regulars. Have past teams succeeded with terrible regulars?

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Baseball has dived headfirst into its own information era, and one of the consequences of all the information is the rise of defensive infield shifts. Certain batters have demonstrated certain tendencies, so certain teams have started combating this by moving infielders around to areas most likely to get balls in play. The most familiar version of the shift is against a left-handed hitter, and it involves three infielders around first and second and one infielder basically playing shortstop. That alignment allows for screenshots like this one:

The end result of that at-bat was a double. More specifically: the end result of that at-bat was a bunt double, down the third-base line, against the shift. The Red Sox handed Robinson Cano a free base. He took two of them. So the question everyone arrives at: why doesn’t this happen more? Why don’t people bunt against the shift all the damned time?

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Last weekend, I had the pleasure of hanging out with most of the rest of the FanGraphs crew in Arizona. As part of our annual festivities, we make sure to check out a couple spring training games, in part for fun and in part out of sensed obligation. This year we hauled ourselves to the new Cubs Park and also to Salt River Fields. During an inning break at the former, the scoreboard showed a video segment with Len Kasper who explained the concept of replacement level. But I want to talk a bit about the latter: At Salt River Fields, on Saturday, we watched some of the Angels take on some of the Rockies.

Mike Trout hit a super-long home run to dead-center. That’s the thing that stood out the most. The thing that stood out the second-most, though, was an at bat that featured Matt Long. I’d never heard of Matt Long before, and at the time of the at bat, I didn’t know his first name. He wasn’t even supposed to be playing — he was inserted in place of Brennan Boesch, who had earlier been ejected for what looked like nothing. Long would hit three times, but it was his first plate appearance that was by far the most intriguing. And not simply because it wasn’t supposed to happen.

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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.

Dave’s hit you with the introduction, so it’s time to begin this series in earnest. And we’ll begin, as we always do, with the catchers, even though catching might be baseball’s most mysterious position. For an idea of the spread of what you’re going to see — which is more important than the rankings themselves — here’s a graph with green in it:

You’ll notice there’s a big gap between first and second. It’s a gap of 1.2 WAR. That’s as big as the gap between fifth and 24th. Let there be no question: by our system, there’s a clear first place, looking down upon the rest of the landscape.

But of course, our system isn’t all-encompassing or perfect, and not just because the projections are arguable and the playing time is arguable too. There are just things about catching that aren’t included, one invisible one being game-calling, and one visible one being pitch-receiving or pitch-framing. You’ve seen the pitch-framing research, and you’ve seen some of the numbers it suggests. Including those numbers would shake up these rankings. The market doesn’t seem to believe too heavily in the numbers, and conversations I’ve had suggest people in the game think the numbers are too extreme, but there’s little question there’s some kind of skill there, and so catchers should receive at least partial credit. I’ll take care to talk about pitch-framing below, for catchers where it makes sense. You can mentally shuffle that information into the rankings. Now it’s probably beyond time to proceed, from the top.

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I don’t have much insight into the mind of the average baseball fan, but thanks to the chats that we host on this website, I’ve gotten some glimpses into the mind of the average FanGraphs reader. And, it seems to me, the average FanGraphs reader at present is wondering about two questions:

(1) Why is literally every single pitcher in baseball literally dying?
(2) Who the heck is finally going to trade for Nick Franklin?

Franklin has taken over the chat section, and for every Franklin question or comment we accept, I’d say we reject another five. Franklin’s is an unusual and compelling situation: he’s a young player, fairly highly rated, who’s all but certain to be moved because there’s nowhere for him to play. Young players aren’t often such obvious trade bait, and everyone wants to know if their team can get a new young player in a deal.

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Livan Hernandez is retiring, officially. Two things: Hernandez didn’t pitch in 2013. And Matt Klaassen is already writing something up about his career. Which means this is two posts about Livan Hernandez in the middle of spring training preceding a season following a season in which Hernandez was inactive. You can’t say FanGraphs doesn’t give the people what they want. The people want more content about Livan Hernandez, even if they don’t actually realize it.

This isn’t intended as a grand retrospective. I’m here to talk about one thing and one thing only, the way in which Livan Hernandez was unusual and the way in which Livan Hernandez survived. Watching him, you would’ve been justified in finding Hernandez profoundly uninteresting, and you might’ve wondered how he hung around so long. A little analysis reveals that Hernandez managed to pitch on his own terms. Everyone remembers Hernandez for the Eric Gregg strike zone. Fewer people remember that, for Hernandez, that strike zone wasn’t too far out of the ordinary.

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Before Matt Harvey was hurt, he was virtually perfect. Before Matt Harvey was perfect, he was imperfect, just another talented young pitcher a bit rough around the edges. The emergence of Harvey took a few of the spotlights away from Zack Wheeler, but Harvey going down bumped Wheeler front and center. Wheeler, now, is the great hope for 2014, and should he be able to reach his lofty potential, then come 2015 one might observe one of the rarest of breeds, that being the optimistic Mets fan. Harvey’s an ace if he can come back healthy. Wheeler’s an ace if he can just polish his game. It’s exciting to root for a team with two aces.

But to be sure, Wheeler has more in common with the imperfect Harvey than with the perfect Harvey. The numbers suggest he’s still an adjustment or two away from becoming the pitcher prospect types have dreamed about. Wheeler always walked hitters in the minors, but the strikeouts were there to pick him up. He continued walking hitters upon reaching the majors, but the strikeouts were present in lesser numbers. What we can tell is that Wheeler needs to throw some more strikes. Another thing we can tell is that that statement deserves an asterisk.

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