Meg Rowley and guest co-host Eric Longenhagen banter about Walker Buehler’s unusual approach to opening beers and their own past dental emergencies before recapping the AL Wild Card game. They consider what went wrong for the Yankees, and assess the Red Sox’s good starters, potent lineup, and shaky defense, as well as Nick Pivetta and Garrett Richards. Next they shift to the Red Sox/Rays ALDS matchup and consider the state of Tampa Bay’s pitching, the Rays’ talented hitters, and whether playoff experience (or a lack thereof) will matter for Tampa’s young starters. After that it’s on to the Astros and White Sox, featuring an embarrassment of good hitters including Kyle Tucker and Luis Robert, plus Houston’s talented pitching and Chicago’s dominant bullpen. Then they wrap up with thoughts on the NL Wild Card and play a game of stumpo with Arizona Fall League rosters. Read the rest of this entry »

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4:01	Jay Jaffe: Good afternoon, folks, and welcome to our AL Division Series Game 1 chat! We’ll be starting things off shortly

4:06	David Laurila: Greetings, all.

4:08	David Laurila: Not worth a poll, but today’s Lance matchup begs a question: Who is the best-ever baseball Lance? Berkman and Parrish are presumably the top candidates?

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8:01	Dan Szymborski: G’evening!

8:01	Dan Szymborski: Hopefully chatting with me won’t be too traumatic!

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We may have been robbed of tiebreaker madness, but this season’s playoffs still promise to deliver great matchups, with division rivalries, electric starters, potent bats, and a bit of devil magic thrown in for good measure. And though the field boasts a number of dominant teams that seem poised for deep runs, a lot can happen in a short series. That makes it difficult to predict how October will unfold, but 28 of our writers from FanGraphs and RotoGraphs answered the call.

Below are our predictions by league and round, as well as each writer’s complete forecast. Happy playoffs! Read the rest of this entry »

Meg Rowley and guest co-host Craig Goldstein of Baseball Prospectus recap the final weekend of regular season baseball before previewing this week’s Wild Card games. They discuss the Mariners’ decision not to promote Julio Rodríguez, their disappointment at the lack of tiebreaker games, franchise player farewells, the current playoff format, what comes next for Seattle and Toronto, and what they’re most excited to watch in October. Then they turn their attention to the Yankees, Red Sox, Dodgers, and Cardinals, offering their thoughts on what each squad should feel confident and nervous about going into the play-in games. Finally, they try to solve the mystery of Hunter Renfroe’s defense. Read the rest of this entry »

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With the postseason around the corner, Meg Rowley and guest co-host Ben Clemens discuss the playoff picture, how the Seattle Mariners got where they are, which team Ben would prefer to see his Cardinals match up against in the NL Wild Card, and the biggest surprises of the season. Then they discuss Ben’s recent work assessing FanGraphs’ playoff odds, what the odds do well and less-well, what kinds of teams they tend to be too low on or overestimate, and how the model could improve. They also offer some theories about why we seem to struggle with probabilistic thinking, look back on what they’ll miss most about the 2021 regular season, and share some brief Cy Young thoughts. Read the rest of this entry »

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Over the past two weeks, the FanGraphs staff has written over 50 pieces dedicated to analyzing the 2021 trade deadline, from Jay Jaffe’s Replacement-Level Killers series, which previewed teams’ positions of need, to Eric Longenhagen’s breakdown of the teams with impending 40-man roster crunch, to our analysis of every deadline move, to Ben Clemens and Dan Szymborski’s recaps of the deadline’s winners and losers. It’s a lot to sort through, so to assist you in finding anything you may have missed during the flurry, I’ve rounded up all of our deadline pieces in one place. You’ll find the broader preview and summary pieces (of which we’ll have a few more today, so stay tuned) listed first, followed by a team-by-team listing of the transaction analyses that involved your favorite squad, either as buyers or sellers. In instances where we dissected a transaction across multiple pieces — hello, Max Scherzer/Trea Turner trade! — you’ll see them grouped together.

As always, all of the pieces linked below are free to read, but they took time and resources to produce. If you enjoyed our coverage of the trade deadline and are in a position to do so, we hope you’ll sign up for a FanGraphs Ad-free Membership. It’s the best way to support our work and experience the site. Now, on to the roundup! Read the rest of this entry »

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