Let’s start with four Tampa Bay Rays-related facts we know to be either true or at least have been recently publicly stated as such:

1. The team’s 85 losses in 2014 were more than the franchise has had since 2007, when they were still the Devil Rays, had Brendan Harris, Akinori Iwamura and Delmon Young in the regular lineup, and were finishing off a run off 10 consecutive 90-plus-loss seasons.
2. The two men most publicly associated with turning the franchise around, general manager Andrew Friedman and manager Joe Maddon, both departed in the past month in search of higher salaries and greater visibility.
3. The 2015 payroll, as disclosed by owner Stu Sternberg in September, is “clearly going to be lower” than the $76 million Opening Day figure it was this year, a franchise record that nonetheless ranked as one of the lowest numbers in baseball and was referred to by Sternberg as “an enormous aberration.” While there are plenty of very valid reasons not to shift blame to the fan base, this is no doubt impacted by a third consecutive season at the bottom of the average attendance standings.
4. The battle to find the team a new stadium, clearly the main impediment towards long-term success and stability in the Tampa Bay area, continues to go nowhere, with a recent Tampa Bay Times editorial clearly showing the exhaustion and frustration with the issue, and forcing franchise officials to deal with rumors of a move to Montreal.

This isn’t all going to be doom-and-gloom, I promise, but it’s going to start out that way, because those four items are all irrefutably bad news. While new baseball boss Matt Silverman is well-respected and a replacement for Maddon hasn’t yet been named, it’s probably time to investigate the Rays as the offseason gets moving and ask the question: Have we seen the best this franchise has to offer? Has the miraculous run of success that lasted longer than anyone thought would finally come to an end? Read the rest of this entry »

Nearly a year ago on these very electronic pages, I wrote a post entitled “The Dodgers And Too Many Outfielders,” investigating the fact that the Dodgers had four starting outfielders — Yasiel Puig, Matt Kemp, Carl Crawford and Andre Ethier — for three spots, a situation that would only get more complicated when top prospect Joc Pederson arrived. A move, it seemed, was a necessity, and I counted down six ways it could happen.

A year later, a lot has changed, both in terms of how some of those players are viewed and in what outfield positions they play. But what never did change is that Ned Colletti wasn’t able to move any of his veterans, and now Andrew Friedman, Farhan Zaidi and company are left with an even more constricting situation. Puig, Kemp, Crawford, and Ethier are still Dodgers. Pederson put up the first 30/30 season in the PCL in decades on his way to winning the league MVP and Rookie of the Year awards before making his major league debut in September. Most unexpectedly, lightly-regarded backup Scott Van Slyke became one of the league’s most valuable bench players and clearly deserves more time.

Four outfielders? If only. These Dodgers have six, and if we thought a move last year was a probability, now it seems like more of an imperative. But how is this going to resolve itself? Here we go again.

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I think my most recent seven posts here at FanGraphs were about the Giants or the Royals or both, a necessary side effect of being a regular baseball writer during the World Series. Sometimes it feels like there’s only so much you can say about James Shields or Joe Panik or Lorenzo Cain, but really, why bother talking about something else during the most important games of the year?

With that finally behind us, we can look forward to 2015, and I keep thinking about the team that seems most likely, at this far-too-early date before any real offseason moves have been made, to make a move next year. You probably think I’m talking about the Cubs. I’m not talking about the Cubs. I’m talking about the Cleveland Indians. I was asked, during a live chat of one of the World Series games, whether I thought the Royals could hold off the Tigers in the AL Central next season. At the time, I said I thought Cleveland might be better than both, and now it’s time to put some words behind that feeling. In fact, let’s do this internet style. On to the <h3>’s! Read the rest of this entry »

So! Tonight, there’s going to be a Game 7 of the World Series. Your cheering allegiances aside, that’s a rare and wonderful thing. Appreciate it, because now we’ll have the most possible baseball before the long stretch of no baseball, and this isn’t an occasion that comes around all that often. We had a Game 7 three years ago between Texas and St. Louis, but it had been nine years since it’d happened before that, the longest stretch in big league history. Sometimes, you get classics like Curt Schilling & Randy Johnson against Roger Clemens & Mariano Rivera in 2001; sometimes, you get John Tudor allowing eight runners in 2.1 innings on the way to losing 11-0 in 1985. What’s important is that we’re set up for history, and often the biggest impediment to that is simply the opportunity for it to happen. Not tonight.

Jeremy Guthrie against Tim Hudson doesn’t really sound all that exciting, and maybe it won’t be. It’s difficult to imagine either pitcher going more than five innings, and perhaps it won’t even be close to that. It won’t be the worst-ever matchup of Game 7 starters — 1997’s Jaret Wright against Al Leiter probably still tops that list — but it will be the oldest, thanks to a combined 74 years of age. Or at least it will be for a few innings, since both managers are likely going to dig into their bullpens early, since it doesn’t get more “all hands on deck” than this. On the other hand, maybe that makes it more exciting. This could be baseball unlike baseball.

Obviously, any Game 7 is fascinating, but this one might just be moreso, if only because of the way the postseason has gone so far. You’ve heard in more than a few places that this is “the best postseason ever,” and while that’s probably a bit hyperbolic because of the effects of recency, you certainly understand the sentiment. To merely name a few of the lasting impressions — the AL wild card game madness, the divergent Octobers of Madison Bumgarner & Clayton Kershaw, an 18-inning NLDS game, Lorenzo Cain and the Royals defense, literally every single thing Ned Yost has done — is to unfairly neglect so many others. For a postseason like that to end with a Game 7, well, it seems like a fitting capper. Read the rest of this entry »

We’ve talked about James Shields a lot this postseason, and most of it hasn’t been all that positive. “Big Game” James had been lousy throughout this magical Kansas City run, and he was particularly bad in Game 1 of the World Series, getting pounded with line drives left and right and leaving after three innings. In Game 5, he went up against Madison Bumgarner again, and again he lost, mainly because Bumgarner was outstanding, to the point that we’re now talking about him in a historic context.

The big picture view there is that Shields has started two World Series games against Bumgarner and lost both, likely ending his Royals career and helping to put his team in a 3-2 hole headed back to Kansas City. That’s a factual statement, but it also misses something that was largely overshadowed by Bumgarner’s dominance and more confounding Ned Yost decisions: Shields was actually pretty good last night. As the indispensable Daren Willman of Baseball Savant noted, Shields’ 21.2% swinging strike rate in Game 5 was the best any starter had this postseason, topping Zack Greinke’s NLDS start.

It’s fair to note that Lorenzo Cain’s fantastic catch on a Hunter Pence ball in right field saved Shields at least one run and perhaps two, but there were also some questionable plays by Alcides Escobar and Jarrod Dyson that didn’t go down as errors, so, noted and moving on. Shields can’t control his defense, so let’s focus on what he could control.

Here’s what that meant: Shields pitched differently than we’d seen him pitch as a Royal, and perhaps differently than he ever has. It’s actually a little terrifying to think that a pitcher who has been very good for many years would change his approach in Game 5 of the World Series. Fortunately for him, it worked.

* * * Read the rest of this entry »

In the bottom of the fourth inning of last night’s Game 1, there was a moderately humorous moment when Salvador Perez “struck out” on an 0-2 pitch in the dirt. Buster Posey retrieved the loose ball and tagged Perez for the “out,” all while Perez looked on in amazement, insisting he’d fouled the pitch off.

As it turned out, he had, and after a brief discussion the call was overturned, but you can certainly understand why home plate ump Jerry Meals figured no actual major leaguer would have offered at a pitch that had bounced so far in front of the plate:

Perez would end up striking out anyway, and while this entire post isn’t going to be just about Game 1, I can’t help but show you what are easily some of my favorite Gameday maps of the postseason. At left is Perez’ first plate appearance of the night, a second inning double play that erased a Billy Butler single. At right is the fourth inning appearance we just talked about:

Madison Bumgarner threw eight pitches to Perez in two plate appearances, and not a single one was really close to being a strike. He still managed to get three outs from it. Bumgarner, obviously, was outstanding. He also got at least a little help from Kansas City’s free-swinging catcher.

Perez has always been a free swinger, of course. At The Hardball Times just last week, Perez was ranked among the 10 worst hitters in the game at making “correct” swing choices. If he’d had enough plate appearances to qualify in 2012 (a knee injury cost him most of the first half), he’d have been tied with teammate Mike Moustakas for 18th-highest O-Swing%. In 2013, he was tied for Ichiro Suzuki for 20th. That’s just who he is. He’s never had a walk rate of even five percent, and even in the minors, he’d walked more than 18 times in a season just once. He’s not as talented a hitter as Pablo Sandoval, but the profile is similar. It’s who he is.

This year, the O-Swing% jumped to second, but at least it had remained somewhat steady through the first three months of 2014. But then…

In the second half of this season, his O-Swing% was 52.6, easily the highest rate in the big leagues. More than half of the pitches that head to the plate that wouldn’t be within the PITCHf/x strike zone, Perez offered at, and that’s a tough way to succeed. And he didn’t — in the second half, Perez hit just .229/.236/.360, good for a 61 wRC+, which was not only one of the worst marks in the bigs, it was basically identical to the last few months of the Derek Jeter retirement tour.

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We — and I suppose by “we,” I do mean “the people I enjoy on Twitter” — have gotten a lot of joke mileage this postseason thanks just to a few never-ending items that have been pounded into the ground by baseball media and observers. I’m talking about things like Ernie Johnson’s complete lack of emotion, the eternal Viagra ad, TBS insisting on trying to make “shutdown innings” a thing, and so on.

Included among that has been that every single time James Shields‘ name is mentioned, he’s referred to as “Big Game James,” as though it’s his legal name. Shields is a very good pitcher, but he’s picked up a certain reputation for doing well in big spots entirely because of a rhyming sound his name makes. If only he’d gone with “Jim Shields,” right?

The gag there is obvious. “Big Game James” hasn’t actually come up that big at all in the postseason. For his career, he’s got a 5.19 ERA in nine starts. Five times, he’s allowed four runs or fewer, which is great, but four of those times came way back during Tampa Bay’s 2008 run to the World Series, which is not. Between 2008 and 2014, his postseason experience consisted of being hit hard by Texas twice, allowing a combined 11 earned runs across an ALDS start in 2010 and another in 2011.

This year, he’s made three starts, and while the Royals have of course won all three, it hasn’t necessarily been thanks to him. In the wild card game, he allowed four runs and nine baserunners in five innings, including leaving a meatball of a changeup for Brandon Moss to drive out of the park. (Though Ned Yost was later crushed for his decisions in that game, the mistake was bringing in Yordano Ventura, not deciding that Shields was done.) Against the Angels in the ALDS, he was better, allowing two earned runs in six innings, though he again allowed nine baserunners, along with solo homers to Mike Trout & Albert Pujols. And in Game 1 of the ALCS against Baltimore, he allowed 11 baserunners and four runs, helping to turn what had been a 4-0 lead into a game the Royals had to win on 10th inning Alex Gordon & Mike Moustakas homers.

The Royals have been winning in ways we might not have expected, but “having your best starter underperform” isn’t exactly a welcome part of that menu. So, as Shields prepares to throw the first pitch of the World Series against Gregor Blanco and the Giants tonight, is there anything we can draw from his postseason struggles? Anything the Giants might want to keep in mind? Read the rest of this entry »

There’s no shortage of reasons why the Giants find themselves in the World Series for the third time in five years, really, and you can start anywhere. Maybe that’s Jake Peavy, a disappointment in Boston and now a revelation in San Francisco. Or rookie Joe Panik, filling a hole that was so bad it had led to Dan Uggla desperation, or the hilarious story that is Travis Ishikawa. There’s help from outsiders like Mike Matheny & Randy Choate, not to mention the Pirates deciding they’d rather have Edinson Volquez on the mound for the wild card game rather than Gerrit Cole. There’s been 18-inning playoff games, and the complete disappearance of Tim Lincecum, and the much more explainable absences of Matt Cain, Angel Pagan and Marco Scutaro, and 12 October runs that came in without the benefit of hits.

For an 88-win team to get to the World Series, a lot has to go their way. Much of it is going to be of their own doing, and some of it is going to be the usual insanity that comes in short-series baseball, which is less about crowning the “best” team and more about rewarding the right team, the one that did what needed to be done at the appropriate times.

This Giants team has all of that and more, and certainly Bruce Bochy and his staff have earned the credit they’ve been given. But in our rush to try to identify all the unusual ways that a team that always seems to be more good than great keeps getting this far in the playoffs, it’s easy to look past some of the more obvious reasons, like the fact that the Giants have two of the best players in baseball. Ace Madison Bumgarner is really, really good. So, of course, is Buster Posey.

* * * Read the rest of this entry »

Watching the late innings of of the ALCS, I had but one thought: The Orioles have no chance here. With the exception of stolen bases, that series was basically “the Royals way” in a nutshell. Get better starting pitching than you’d expect, scratch out just enough offense, receive some outstanding defense, and turn the game over to Kelvin Herrera, Wade Davis and Greg Holland for the final three innings.

The Royals haven’t discovered some new market inefficiency there, because “have good relievers” isn’t exactly cutting edge. It’s easier said than done, of course, because as difficult as it is to find one reliever like that, the Royals have come up with three of them. It’s why it’s very much selling Davis short when we refer to the deal that brought him to town as “the James Shields trade,” because while Shields has obviously pitched significantly more innings, Davis’ impact has been enormous. It’s the redundancy there that’s really incredible, because if one has an off night — which rarely ever happens — Ned Yost still has two others at his disposal.

Still, it got me thinking about how anyone could come back in the late innings against that group, and when Buster Olney’s column yesterday pointed out that the Royals were an AL-best 65-4 when leading after six innings, it really drove home how rarely such a thing happens. But there’s still that “4” out there, so it’s not like it never happens, and by diving into the Baseball-Reference innings database, we can see that they also blew a game apiece when leading after seven and eight.

So, how did it happen? How, other than waiting for the inevitable imperfections of humanity to show up, do you beat the unbeatable? Let’s break it open. First, a note: There’s actually slightly more occurrences than the six times B-R indicates. Why? Because they have it defined as “leads after X innings,” and that’s not always how baseball works. For example, the Royals could be tied or behind at the end of an inning, take the lead in the top of the inning, and then blow it in the bottom of the inning. That would be a late lead blown, but not counted because a lead was never held at the end of a full inning. Sometimes, also, the bullpen could blow a lead and be saved by the offense later.

I’ve accounted for that as much as possible, but with the understanding that there may be one or two that slipped through the cracks, here’s how you come back from a deficit against the Kansas City bullpen in the late innings. Spoiler alert: Mostly, you don’t. Read the rest of this entry »

When the Royals and Orioles resume their rain-interrupted ALCS tonight in Kansas City, the Royals are going to use their fifth-best starting pitcher, and on the surface this doesn’t make a lot of sense. Not that Yordano Ventura was going to pitch on two days rest, or that James Shields was likely to go on three days rest, but with Jason Vargas and Danny Duffy around, Ned Yost has options. Instead, he’s going with Jeremy Guthrie, who hasn’t pitched since Sept. 26, a full 17 days of rest. Though he’s 35 years old, Guthrie has never thrown a pitch in a postseason game, so the often-seen “but playoff-tested” excuse doesn’t work here.

When we say “fifth starter,” that’s based entirely on performance. Of the five regular Kansas City starters, Guthrie’s ERA this year was the worst. His FIP was the worst. His WAR, despite throwing the second-most innings, was the worst. Over the last five years, his FIP is 215th of 228 qualified pitchers, basically making him Randy Wolf with fewer injuries. Just two seasons ago, he was getting traded straight-up for Jonathan Sanchez after a brutal half-season in Colorado. Now, he’s starting a playoff game, one of the most important games for his franchise in years.

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