With the switch from the standard PITCHf/x pitch-tracking system to Trackman, a few missteps are to be expected. Dave Cameron, for example, recently pointed out that we have to be careful about reporting velocity right now. Jeff Zimmerman gave us a way to convert old velocities into today’s reality, and Tom Tango offered up way to use current readings to approximate velocities as they were calculated by the previous methodology. For those interested in the simplest possible method, it appears as though subtracting three-quarters of a mile per hour from a pitcher’s reported velocity arrives at roughly the same figure as the previous system would have produced.

But that doesn’t account for the situation in its entirety. If we look at what Brandon Finnegan did in his first (excellent) start, we’ll notice that the movement numbers are also a little off right now. It’s enough to want to throw your hands up and just emote, as I did on the latest episode of our Sleeper and The Bust podcast.

It’s okay to express frustration. It’s cathartic and release is good. Breathe deeply through the nose.

But we also need to pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off. Finnegan did not, as the leaderboards suggest, just record the ninth-most ride on a fastball that we’ve witnessed over the last 15 years. That’s not what was so impressive about the movement and velocities of his pitches in his 2017 debut. But discovering what was impressive can help us better navigate the suddenly unsteady waters of pitcher analysis.

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Last spring, in Dodgers camp, a remarkable thing happened without any of us noticing. It’s not uncommon, of course, for a young prospect to seek out a veteran starting pitcher for conversation. That sort of thing happens all the time. But when Jharel Cotton was soaking in knowledge from Scott Kazmir that day, something unique was happening. Baseball’s top changeup was hanging out with baseball’s second-best changeup. A baton was being passed.

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There was plenty about Clayton Kershaw’s Opening Day start that was predictable. He sat between 92 and 93 on that straight, riding fastball. He showed command of the pitch and didn’t walk anyone. He threw a fastball on his lone 3-1 count. The box score says he threw 27 sliders and got five whiffs — an excellent rate. His 15 curves got two whiffs and two outs on five swings. So a lot of Monday’s start was just vintage Kershaw. But that doesn’t mean he didn’t show us something a bit different.

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Christian Bethancourt made the Padres! This is exciting, because he’s making the team as a catcher and a reliever at the same time. His existence challenges norms in a sport that’s known for the specialized roles of its participants. That said, we’ll have to see if he’s more Brooks Kieschnick or more Kenley Jansen eventually. Because hitter-slash-pitcher Kieschnick was nearly a unicorn, while Jansen — though a special reliever since abandoning his work as a catcher — has a story that’s been told in baseball’s history before.

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By now, the most prolific pitchers of the spring have put in the equivalent of three major-league starts, some close to four with how short the average start has become. And as much as we talk about the inconsistent talent level in the spring, these starters have mostly faced major-league-quality hitters because the first four to five innings of spring baseball is a decent approximation of regular-season ball. It’s not entirely irresponsible to make certain observations about a pitcher two weeks into the season, so we might as well do it now, too. So let’s talk about Taijuan Walker. Again.

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The first time we met Chris Owings, he was a top prospect. Going into the 2014 season, he had just been named the 66th-best prospect by Baseball America and the team’s third best. He was slated for the lion’s share of the playing time at shortstop. Through the beginning of June, he was above-average at the plate thanks to good power, and better than average in the field thanks to a good arm. Both of those things took a hit, literally, on June 20th.

In the first year of the new catcher rules designed to eliminate collisions at the plate, Owings found himself colliding with the knee of Giants catcher Hector Sanchez that day. Even in slow motion, the hit doesn’t look vicious. Some called it awkward.

It was enough to keep him out until September, diminish his performance upon his return, and require Owings to undergo labrum surgery in October. Manager Kirk Gibson kept him out for a while longer because he was afraid “Owings might change his swing as a result and hurt something else” as Zach Buchanan then characterized it. Despite those best efforts, Owings retooled his swing after surgery. When I talked to him that summer of 2015, he agreed: “I had to change my swing, couldn’t quite let it eat with the one-handed follow through.”

That’s a shame, because it meant that, the second time we met Chris Owings, he was faltering. His power had disappeared, he wasn’t making contact like he had in his debut, and pitchers had begun challenging him more often in the zone. His defense had faltered, too. He lost the shortstop job to Nick Ahmed in the meantime, and ended up playing more second base to compensate for his weaker arm and worsening production against right-handers.

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The American League East is going to be tough this year. The Yankees are projected to win 81 games and yet still finish last, is how tough. That same win total, for example, would place a team in a tie for second in the AL Central’s projected standings.

There are reasons to be more bullish on the Yankees than the projections suggest. Plenty of smart people around the team are. The young core, consisting of Gary Sanchez, Greg Bird, Didi Gregorius, Aaron Judge, and Clint Frazier, provides a fair amount of upside. If the bullpen proves to offer as much depth as it is does excellence at the top, you’d have two-thirds of a really good team.

About the rotation, though. First, there’s the front three. Opening Day starter Masahiro Tanaka has been great since he signed with the team — among the majors’ top-20 starters by most metrics. Michael Pineda remains an enigma, a pitcher with elite strikeout-minus-walk rates paired with bottom-tier ball-in-play results. Even with his contradictions, though, Pineda can still provide value for a team that scores runs. At 36, CC Sabathia isn’t a front-line starter anymore, but a discovery of a cutter last year may have given him a few more years of usefulness on the back end.

And then what? Who will finish out the rotation this year? Who will step forward between Luis Severino, Bryan Mitchell, Chad Green, Luis Cessa, and Jordan Montgomery? If they’re any good, they could help fuel a surprise team in a tough division.

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Though it started with a strikeout and a ground out, the World Baseball Classic appearance by Jose Berrios Wednesday didn’t end well. He allowed a single to the scuffling Nolan Arenado, then hit Eric Hosmer and walked Andrew McCutchen before he was replaced. In essence, the outing encapsulated the ups and downs of Jose Berrios as a pitcher: tantalizing stuff, near-fatal flaws. If you focus on the former, though, maybe the latter is just an adjustment away from being a faded memory.

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