Here, I thought it virtually inevitable that Alex Cobb would settle for something similar to the Lance Lynn contract. The pitchers have similar ages, strengths, and profiles, and both Cobb and Lynn happen to have turned down qualifying offers. A week and a half ago, Lynn signed with the Twins for a year and $12 million, after spending the offseason aiming much higher. In my head, I figured that would be Cobb’s fate, too. There are worse things. Yet Cobb has emerged with something much stronger, something more lucrative. Seemingly despite the odds, Cobb now has more or less the contract he wanted all along, agreeing to terms with the Orioles for four years and $57 million.

In the bigger picture, it’s not surprising, since Cobb was expected to get something like this back in December. In the smaller picture, it is surprising, given how the market played out. And it’s additionally surprising, given the Orioles’ reluctance to sign pitchers to long-term deals. I don’t think this was ever the likelihood, which helps to explain why it took so long in the first place. But for Cobb, he’s got a home, in a familiar division. And for the Orioles, they’ve patched another rotation together, after appearing shorthanded. While they might be the East’s worst team, we’ve heard that before. They’re going to give this another shot.

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Out of all the polling projects I run, this one’s always my favorite. No sense in beating around the bush. Here are our current, schedule-adjusted projected 2018 standings. These are based on the Steamer projection system, the ZiPS projection system, and manually-adjusted team depth charts. Now that the Orioles have signed Alex Cobb, there are hardly more big changes to make between now and opening day. So, what do you actually think of the projections you’re seeing?

For convenience, here are the league landscapes, in case you didn’t feel like clicking the link.

The top looks like the top you’d expect. The bottom looks like the bottom you’d expect. We’ve been writing about the various tiers for months. But, even if you might not realize it, you’re experts. You know a lot about particular baseball teams, information the projection systems might not be aware of. So you might consider certain team projections too optimistic, or you might consider certain team projections too pessimistic. This is your collective opportunity to make yourselves heard. Last year, the community thought the projections were too low on the Rockies, Brewers, and Royals. All three teams won more games than was projected. Meanwhile, the community thought the projections were too high on the A’s, Angels, and Marlins. All three teams won fewer games than was projected. You all can provide valuable input, and so I love when this project gets to the analysis part.

The analysis part is coming, probably early next week. Following, you’ll find 30 polls for 30 teams. They should be simple to understand, especially if you’ve done this before. Vote based on research, or vote based on gut. I don’t care. Just vote. All I ask is that you vote based on the information we know today. Vote based on the rosters and depth teams have, and don’t vote based on the assumption that a team will make midseason additions or subtractions. That stuff is effectively un-projectable. Everything now being said, I leave it to you. Thank you all in advance for your participation.

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It’s that time again! The time when I get to write the same post I write every March. Oh, every time, the numbers are always different. But the words? The words seldom change. In one sense, that makes this post very easy. In another sense, it makes it hard to change things up. Hopefully you won’t notice if I plagiarize myself.

Strength of schedule. You know what I mean when I say that, right? It’s pretty much self-explanatory — we’re talking about how strong or weak a team’s overall schedule is. I think this gets talked about most often in football. Especially college football, I assume. You don’t hear this much in conversations about baseball, because baseball is widely perceived to have a great deal of parity. And the schedules are so very long that it’s easy to assume everything just averages out in the end. But that’s not what happens! If anything, the schedules are so very long that minor differences have a chance to pile up. What’s the cost of a win on the free-agent market? $8 million? $7 million? $9 million? Schedule strengths can matter by multiple wins. This can be a real and significant variable.

And FanGraphs makes this very simple to calculate. So, come along. I can show you who’ll have it relatively easy, and who’ll find things relatively challenging. I always love a post I can write in an hour.

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Season-preview time is always a little weird. Spring training is the signal that the regular season is coming right up. We’re past the point where we’ve heard about who’s in great shape. By this point we’ve already had players getting injured. And, of course, we’ve had players getting reassigned or released. The Opening Day rosters are clearer than ever, because Opening Day’s in a week and a half. We should do something to prepare for the season, right? Something to lay out how every team looks.

On the one hand, maybe it’s unnecessary, because we’ve been writing about baseball every day, and there have been constantly updating 2018 team projections. If you’re on FanGraphs, you’re more likely to already know what’s going on. On the other hand, some sort of season preview just feels obligatory. You can’t not preview the upcoming season. There seems to be a demand for it. The trick is to do it well, and to be thorough while still being engaging.

I don’t think anyone has figured out the perfect way to do a season preview. What I can say is that FanGraphs, at least, runs a series unlike any other. It might not be perfect, but I like what we have. Consider this the kickoff post. Welcome to the 2018 positional power rankings!

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Eugenio Suarez is young, and, last year, he was very good. He wasn’t about to leave the Reds any time soon, but now a separation could be even further away. See, Suarez was looking at three more years of team control, but now he and the club have agreed to a seven-year contract with an eighth-year club option. The breakdown is as follows, and what isn’t shown is Suarez’s $2-million signing bonus.

• 2018: $2.25 million
• 2019: $7 million
• 2020: $9.25 million
• 2021: $10.5 million
• 2022: $11 million
• 2023: $11 million
• 2024: $11 million
• 2025: $15-million club option ($2-million buyout)

Suarez’s first free-agent year would’ve been 2021. He’s signed away four of them, and maybe a fifth, and the total guarantee works out to $66 million. There are no other bonuses or escalators included, and Suarez also hasn’t received a no-trade clause. We’ve seen a lot of increasingly complicated contracts. This one’s simple. The Reds are locking up a good player for a while, and that player is now guaranteed life-changing money that will afford his family great comfort.

Everyone right now is saying the right things. The mood is typically pleasant when a contract is announced. The Reds say they’re thrilled to keep a building block. They see Suarez as someone who can lead them out of the rebuild and into contention. And Suarez says he’s ecstatic to commit to Cincinnati, where he’s come to excel. I can’t imagine being upset about sixty-six million dollars. It’s very, very easy to see how this is a triumphant moment for Suarez as a player. It’s also easy to see how Suarez might’ve been undervalued. The timing here probably isn’t a coincidence.

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It’s not actually all that clear how many pitchers have had Tommy John surgery three or more times. According to some sources, Jose Rijo counts. According to some sources, Jason Isringhausen counts. Baseball Reference includes Scott Williamson, Jarrod Parker, Josh Johnson, and Chad Fox. On the other hand, we have the list provided by Jon Roegele. Among the repeats, there’s only one three-time survivor. Anthony Castrovince provides a partial explanation.

How many pitchers have made it back to the big leagues after their third Tommy John? Technically, none. Though Jose Rijo and Jason Isringhausen are often cited to have had at least three Tommy Johns apiece, Jon Roegele’s oft-cited Tommy John database does not recognize either pitcher as a three-time recipient of the surgery, because, for each guy, at least one of the surgeries addressed a flexor tendon tear, not a UCL tear.

I can’t speak to the exact history of the procedure. I can’t tell you exactly how many pitchers have had it three times. I can tell you that, whatever the answer is, it’s an absurdly low number. It’s a number that includes Jonny Venters. Not only has Venters been through Tommy John three times; more recently, he’s been through another elbow operation. Right now, he’s in camp with the Rays. Just yesterday, he pitched. And when he pitched on February 25 against the Twins, it was his first spring action since 2013.

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The last thing you probably want to read right now is another summary of the slow-moving pace of free agency. And it wasn’t just that the market moved slowly — for so many players, the contracts they’ve signed have fallen well short of expectations. It’s still too soon to know whether this will be an aberration, but it does feel as if something has shifted. One explanation would be that the free-agent market, from the team perspective, worked rationally. The player perspective would be less charitable. Teams are certainly behaving as if they’re not thrilled to pay players much money as they get deeper into their 30s.

If we take it to be true that free agency is changing, well, there would be several contributors to that. And if we take it to be true that free agency is changing, that should raise the level of urgency to shift more money to players earlier in their careers. That’s the real issue for baseball to deal with. But let’s go back for a second. I want to talk about one single contributor to a depressed market. I don’t think it’s something that’s been happening intentionally, for teams to try to save money. I think the impact on the market is one arguably unfortunate side effect. This is an exciting time for baseball — the age of information. What that can mean has probably been under-discussed.

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To the overwhelming majority of baseball fans, the name Willians Astudillo means nothing. The 26-year-old has never been called up to the majors, and for three years in a row now, he’s elected free agency and signed a minor-league contract. Astudillo is there in spring training right now, but so are countless professional players you’d never recognize at the next table in a restaurant. Most people don’t know Willians Astudillo. Most people will never know Willians Astudillo. But there are those out there who know exactly who he is. Astudillo has a claim to being the single most interesting player in the minors.

Astudillo has yet to strike out this spring. Over the winter he batted 223 times in Venezuela, and he struck out on just four occasions. He struck out less often than a teammate who came to the plate just eight times. This is the Astudillo story. Out of the thousands of players in the minors in 2017, Astudillo had the third-lowest strikeout rate, and the lowest strikeout rate in Triple-A. He had the lowest strikeout rate in the minors in 2016. He had the lowest strikeout rate in the minors in 2015. He had the second-lowest strikeout rate in the minors in 2014. He apparently didn’t play in 2013, but in 2012, and in 2011, and in 2010, he had the lowest strikeout rate in the minors. Astudillo doesn’t strike out. Astudillo also doesn’t walk, and he has a limited track record of hitting for power, but he doesn’t strike out. As a professional, Astudillo has 67 strikeouts in 2,154 plate appearances. Joey Gallo recorded his 67th major-league strikeout in his 140th plate appearance.

For his ability to make contact alone, Astudillo has won himself some fans. But now, he also has another claim to fame. Although Astudillo has moved around, he is still considered a catcher. And, the other day, in a spring game, he picked off Shane Robinson without looking.

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I’ll get to Lucas Giolito in a moment. But first, James Paxton. Paxton has always had pretty good stuff, but for a while, he didn’t know quite where it was going. Here are two screenshots from before Paxton broke out.

Paxton would reach back, and, with his glove arm, he’d reach up. Like, way up. And that sort of set the tone, because Paxton’s throwing arm would then come over the top. There are good over-the-top pitchers — there are great over-the-top pitchers — but Paxton didn’t become one. Not quite. Early in 2016, Paxton changed his angles. Almost instantly, he gained some gas, and he gained some control. Paxton turned into an ace-level starter, when he’s been healthy enough to start, at least. Two more screenshots, now.

Paxton’s glove arm has calmed down. And while he’s still not a side-armer or anything, Paxton has lowered his arm slot. His release point is down several inches, from where it had been. The way Paxton describes it, this is his natural slot, and it certainly looks more comfortable to the eye. Paxton has settled on better mechanics, and it’s among the reasons why he’s gotten so good.

To Giolito, now. There’s something I was just never able to shake.

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