Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat – 3/28/22

March 28, 2022

2:01	Ben Clemens: Hey everyone, welcome to the chat.

2:02

Ben Clemens: Seems like everyone other than Michael Conforto has signed now, which means it’s time for speculation about team records, fantasy talk, and whatever else people want to talk about. I’m glad to not be talking about free agent landing spots, something I have very little insight into, for a while.

2:02	Nate: Think Sean Murphy’s offensive production will rebound this year closer to the guy he was in 2019/2020? Or is last year more in line of what you’d expect there?

2:02	Ben Clemens: Nah, I think he’s much closer to an average hitter than what he showed in those years

2:03	Ben Clemens: He has power, but not the kind he was showing off in ’19, and I don’t think he’s going to walk 17% of the time like he did in ’20

2:03	Ben Clemens: I think there’s a little room for improvement — I don’t think he’s a true-talent .257 BABIP guy and I bet he’ll walk a little more — but I think our aggregate projection of .228/.314/.428 seems quite fair

2:04	Ben Clemens: plus power, average on-base skills, works out to slightly better than league average

2:04	Ben Clemens: That’s an incredible player with just average defense at catcher — and he’s one of the best defensive catchers in baseball

2:04	Ben Clemens: Nice!

2:04	Rachel: I have a decision to make by midnight. I have to keep two of these three. Cole, deGrom and C Burnes. Would you take the risks of deGrom or go the safe route with the other two? Thanks!

2:04	Ben Clemens: Ooooooof

2:04	Ben Clemens: I kind of think you have to keep Cole, I have the least question marks around him

2:05	Ben Clemens: And I think I’d keep dG over Burnes, just because even 130 innings of him is so valuable and Burnes isn’t an innings eater, but that’s really hard

2:06	Ben Clemens: Maybe it depends on who your next options are, but presumably your replacement level pitcher is streaming

2:06	Ben Clemens: For either

2:06	chilly: hip pointer aside, do you expect a yr2 breakout from vaughn or will lack of opportunities hold him back?

2:06	Ben Clemens: I’m not concerned about the hip pointer, but I’m incredibly concerned about the opportunities

2:07	Ben Clemens: Jason’s pretty good at this roster projection stuff, and 497 PA if healthy from Vaughn is a little less than I’d hope for

2:07	Ben Clemens: And that’s with 427 from Sheets; if Sheets gets more time, it seems to me that it will eat into Vaughn’s kinda one-for-one

2:08	Ben Clemens: Really like Vaughn, and even in a blah overall season I was very impressed by his power on contact, but it’s a tough position, particularly if the division is closer than expected. TLR won’t hesitate to bury a young guy forever if he starts slowly

2:08	Matt: Who is your pick for closer in SD?

2:08	Ben Clemens: I’m not sure how much of a wild card this would be but Pierce Johnson

2:09	Ben Clemens: He’s one of five people in the ‘closer battle’ and I’m more confident in him than any of the other four

2:09	Todd Bonzalez: Is there a future where the Twins DH Buxton to keep him away from the walls?

2:09	Ben Clemens: Uh… it’s a very strange future

2:10	Ben Clemens: Never say never but so much of his value comes from the fact that he’s one of the best defensive players of his generation

2:10	Ben Clemens: I think his bat would have to improve while wall-related injuries continue to pile up

2:10	Ben Clemens: Like, could you DH Carlos Correa to protect his back? Absolutely!

2:10	Ben Clemens: But should you? No

2:10	Ben Clemens: Risk is risk — you can’t just 0 it all out no matter the cost

2:11	GBS42: Pujols is back in St. Louis!! How good or awful will this be?

2:11	CoryMC: How do you feel about Pujols returning to the Cardinals?

2:11	jas: Does Albert Pujols make the Cardinals favorites to win it all?

2:11	5 Run Homer: I’m generally pretty anti-Cardinals, but Pujols, Molina, and Wainwright ending their careers together sounds just about perfect

2:11	GBS42: Will Pujols, Molina, and Wainwright walk off into the sunset together following a playoff appearance of some sort?

2:11	Ben Clemens: Lots of Pujols questions!

2:11	Ben Clemens: As there should be

2:12	Ben Clemens: I’m not exactly sure what will transpire, but I’m not a huge fan of the move

2:12	Ben Clemens: From a baseball perspective

2:12	Ben Clemens: From a what a fun story perspective, only time will tell how I feel about it; I kind of thought his return to Busch with the Angels and hitting a homer was the perfect capper

2:12	Ben Clemens: Hate if for Juan Yepez, though…. goodbye, playing time

2:13	Ben Clemens: And I’m very high on Yepez

2:13	Spencer: How do you anticipate the Rockies using their shiny new DH spot? To me it felt like a perfect match for Charlie Blackmon in 2022, but from reading other things it seems like that’s not the consensus view.

2:13	Ben Clemens: I like our projection; Blackmon will be a part-time RF, part-time DH

2:14	Ben Clemens: Which is how you can get a CF split between Grichuk and Hilliard (fine with me) but also get Grichuk some PT in right, where he’s probably a better defensive fit

2:15	Ben Clemens: Do that, let him sit against some tough lefties, and I think the whole package will work out (Connor Joe or CJ Cron can take the rest of the DH reps)

2:15	Dave: Can you rank all 30 teams based on how likely they are to sign Conforto? Folks love a ranking

2:15	Ben Clemens: 1-30. Everyone (tied)

2:15	Ben Clemens: I just have no clue at this point

2:15	Ben Clemens: And I’m writing three positions of power rankings so I haven’t had the time to rumor-monger

2:15	GBS42: Kevin is gone. Our loss, the Twins’ gain. Sadness…

2:15	Ben Clemens: This feels like as nice a place as any to talk about this: I’m super happy for Kevin but really sad for us

2:16	Ben Clemens: One thing I thought I was not so good at was tempering my (pretty good!) natural inquisitive nature with what would actually work, or what the baseball industry thought of things

2:17	Ben Clemens: Kevin is just spectacular to bounce ideas off of; he’s never dismissive but by talking with him I got really good feedback on what made sense, where I was being too theoretical and not thinking enough about the human beings playing, that kind of thing

2:18	Ben Clemens: And honestly, he and I just get along really well, which made doing podcasts a blast

2:18	Ben Clemens: Not that I don’t get along well with the rest of the staff, but they’re not hosting me for three-hour podcasts 🙂

2:18	Ben Clemens: So yeah, congrats Minny, but booooooooooo

2:18	Appa Yip Yip: There’s a lot of hand wringing in Blue Jays land about how right handed the lineup is, but does that really matter when all the righties mash?

2:18	Ben Clemens: Yeah I think it’s much ado about little

2:18	Ben Clemens: I’d say nothing, but it’s not completely nothing

2:19	Ben Clemens: I think it will hurt their effectiveness against relievers because it’s easier to optimally deploy your relievers against them

2:19	Ben Clemens: But they’re all great hitters sooooo

2:19	Ben Clemens: I’d rather have Vlad vR than whatever rando lefty-hitting 1b platoon partner you could pick up

2:19	Ben Clemens: Same goes for Springer, Chapman’s defense doesn’t turn off when a righty pitcher is on the mound for the opponents, etc.

2:20	Ben Clemens: People make too much of handedness stuff if it’s stars

2:20	Ben Clemens: It’s a valid concern when the hitters are of the league-average variety

2:20	Dan: Kyle Schwarber would be by far the best defender in my rec league right?

2:21	Ben Clemens: I don’t know how good your rec league is, but he’d be one of the best for sure

2:21	Ben Clemens: I doubt his infield actions are polished, but if you mean outfield only, the guy is pretty fast, normal human division

2:21	Ben Clemens: I think the best comparison is that he’s about as fast as the fastest kid at your high school was

2:21	Ben Clemens: Maybe a little faster — he’s actually pretty close to major league average sprint speed, surprisngly enough

2:22	Ben Clemens: He doesn’t get good jumps, but that’s relative to major leaguers: you, Dan, don’t get good jumps either, though I don’t know you and bet you’re better at softball than me

2:22	Mike: Who ends up having more of an impact this season, Cano or Pujols?

2:22	Ben Clemens: Gimme Cano

2:22	Ben Clemens: Pujols is a short-side platoon DH who I think was largely signed b/c it’s just so cool

2:23	Ben Clemens: There’s a chance Cano is cooked, but that’s true of Pujols ,and I think Cano will have an easier time getting playing time because he can at least legitimately play several positions

2:23	Joey Caltrain: I mean, how much commemoration can one team even do in a season?

2:23	Ben Clemens: June 1: Pujols Bobblehead night

2:23	Ben Clemens: June 2: Pujols Brad Lidge Homer Bobble-bat night

2:24	Ben Clemens: June 3: Pujols MVP plaque night

2:24	Ben Clemens: rinse, repeat

2:24	Ben Clemens: They are going to commemorate the CRAP out of the best Cardinal since Ozzie Smith, and I’m cool with that

2:24	Ben Clemens: Also, fine, Pujols was better than Ozzie was, but he never signed a baseball saying “Ben, you are my wizard, good luck”, so nuts to him

2:24	Phil: As a survivor of David Ortiz’s last season, I can see the answer to the question of how much commemoration one team can do is, quite a lot.

2:25	Ben Clemens:

2:25

Joey Caltrain: Do you know anything about how Molina and Wainwright feel about the Pujols signing? Feels like it could be kind of weird to have spent a decade sticking by the franchise working hard to cement your own place in its history, and finally deciding – seemingly with your friend and longtime battery-mate – to hang up the spikes after one last year… only for the team to bring back the superstar who always overshadowed you for his own goodbye tour.

2:25	Ben Clemens: I’m confident they asked them**

2:25	5 Run Homer: The last time the Blue Jays had a very powerful right-heavy lineup, they won 93 games and the division. They’re fine

2:25	Ben Clemens: Yeha, this is basically how I feel

2:25	Chris: Did the As overplay their hand on manaea? Seems like they are asking for a ton

2:25	Ben Clemens: I don’t think so, but let me elaborate

2:25	Ben Clemens: Yeah, they asked for too much

2:25	Ben Clemens: But if they come back at a lower asking price, so what?

2:25	Ben Clemens: Teams will still trade for him

2:26	Ben Clemens: I like the idea of starting kinda big and then dropping down when that doesn’t work

2:26	5 Run Homer: I was about to say, Pujols is the best Cardinal since Stan Musial

2:26	Ben Clemens: I think there’s an argument to be made that Bob Gibson fits the bill, for the sheer peak dominance

2:26	Ben Clemens: But yes

2:27	Farhandrew Zaidman: Is Matt Beaty the answer to the Padres’s outfield woes?

2:27	Ben Clemens: Nope!

2:27	Ben Clemens: But he’ll improve them and he wasn’t doing much on the Dodgers

2:27	Ben Clemens: Pretty reasonable trade

2:28	Ben Clemens: I love that the Dodgers are willing to trade their blocked role players, even to competitors or other good teams

2:28	Ben Clemens: Really smart long-term idea

2:28	bob: am i wrong to think trevor story might hit, like, 40 HR this year? savant seems to indicate colorado suppresses HR in general and that story’s xHR was 37 (!) last year. that, plus the monster … ?

2:28	Ben Clemens: xHR doesn’t actually work for Coors

2:28	Ben Clemens: as I understand it, at least

2:28	Ben Clemens: because it looks at the distance stuff?

2:28	Ben Clemens: I should look that up to be certain

2:29	Ben Clemens: but the whole ‘that would be a homer in 29 of 30 parks and the only one it wouldn’t be in is Coors’

2:29	Ben Clemens: Is nonsense

2:29	Ben Clemens: Coors is huge b/c the ball travels farther

2:29	Ben Clemens: I think Story will top 30 but 40 is a lot of dingers

2:29	Farhandrew Zaidman: I just joined Twitter, and boy are there some bad takes on there. Any recommended follows for baseball nerds?

2:30	Ben Clemens: I’m going to give you exactly three, and my huge apologies, because there are plenty of good names out there

2:30	Ben Clemens: Cameron Grove, @pitching_bot, is my vote for best public-side analyst

2:30	Ben Clemens: Russell Carleton, @pizzacutter4, is Russell Carleton

2:32	Ben Clemens: Those are my two favorite, and after that I really enjoy @FoolishBB, though to be honest his Twitter is secondary to his Youtube

2:32	Ben Clemens: For me Russell and Cameron are must-follows, and I have them both on notification actually b/c they don’t flood the timeline

2:32	Ben Clemens: Tango is an interesting follow but also tweets 20 times a day about hockey, for exmaple

2:33	The Great Giambino: Leaving Pitching Ninja off your Twitter follow list is blasphemy

2:33	Ben Clemens: I mean, I follow him. He posts 100 things a day, though, it’s too much!

2:33	Colton Anderson: On a scale of 1-10, how far off do you think Bellinger is from being a 4th outfielder/role player at this point?

2:33	Ben Clemens: The early returns on spring training are not great

2:34	Ben Clemens: I don’t think he’s quite there yet, but boy, I’m getting worried

2:34	Ben Clemens: I was on the ‘should the Dodgers DFA him’ fence but if he’s the same player again, I think they’d do it

2:34	Ben Clemens: Our 115 wRC+ projection seems like a 55th percentile outcome to me

2:34	Mike: Is it possible the Yankees are actually underrated? I don’t like that they gave Donaldson and Rizzo the same AAV as Correa but they’ll still have a great bullpen and they’re better on paper than they were in 2021

2:35	Ben Clemens: I think they might be marginally underrated by Yankees fans b/c what a weird offseason

2:35	Ben Clemens: But overall, I’m pretty worried about their pitching and outfield depth

2:36	Ben Clemens: I think they’ll make the playoffs, and I guess I’d even make them the favorites in the ALE by a hair, but when guys get hurt, it’s going to go quite badly

2:36	Deep End of the Kranepool: Would it make sense for the Mets to bring back Conforto on a one year make good deal? Canha becomes excellent 4th outfielder (plus, injuries/Mets). And the DH to run folks through, although that’s already a crowd.

2:36	Ben Clemens: I don’t think so; I like Canha more than that

2:37	Ben Clemens: It would be one thing if they needed to fill PA’s at DH, but that’s definitely not their problem

2:37	Ben Clemens: If they move J.D. Davis I guess I’m more into it, but that would be a lot of hoops to jump through

2:37	2014 rays: with the giants having Cobb, McGee, Casali, and Longo, who else from the 2014 rays is the most realistic add?

2:38	Ben Clemens: Did you know that Madison Bumgarner had 1.3 hitting WAR that year?

2:38	Ben Clemens: Wow!

2:38	Ben Clemens: Uh…. deadline trade for Sergio Romo if things don’t work out in Seattle

2:38	Ben Clemens: or Posey gets lured out of retirement, though I don’t see it; he just sold his house in SF

2:39	Guest: Do you think the Twins rotation has sneaky upside?

2:39	Ben Clemens: Yeah, because I don’t think people understand variance very well

2:39	Ben Clemens: You just don’t know!

2:39	Ben Clemens: Joe Ryan could be a 2nd starter level guy

2:40	Ben Clemens: Or unplayable

2:40	Ben Clemens: Just huge variance in so many of their back-end arms

2:40	Dc in nova: Ankh v rising sun v blood rage?

2:40	Ben Clemens: I love Rising Sun

2:40	Ben Clemens: Haven’t played Blood Rage

2:40	Ben Clemens: Rising Sun just looks SO cool

2:40	Ben Clemens: That carries it for me, I have a great time when playing it b/c it’s legitimately a beautiful game

2:42	bob: appreciate the answer about story! i had no idea about xHR/savant and coors, i’m gonna read up on that more. here’s another if you’ll allow me … how much am i allowed to believe in mitch keller?

2:42	Ben Clemens: Someone else asked this earlier and I didn’t have a chance to get to it

2:42	Ben Clemens: Um…. I think it’s reasonable to be hopeful about Keller

2:42	Ben Clemens: He throws hard now, that’s neat

2:43	Ben Clemens: I have a hard time believing he can get back to the command he showed in the low minors, which really limits his upside

2:43	Ben Clemens: But I think he can be a league average starter which is nice considering a bumpy career so far

2:44	Ben Clemens: Not sure I’m buying him as an ace anymore

2:44	bosoxforlife: Story and Baez, same money, same number of years but I think the Red Sox got a Stradivarius and the Tigers got an ukelele.

2:44	Ben Clemens: Mmmm… I think that they just have different shortcomings. Baez is a great bet to be a better defender, but I think he’s a worse offensive player

2:45	Ben Clemens: I do think that Story is a better fit for Boston

2:45	Ben Clemens: In that park, you want more balls in play, and that’s Story

2:46	Ben Clemens: Also a lot of the time when Baez connects, it’s just obliterated, and the monster might turn HR’s into doubles

2:46	Ben Clemens: Story lifts the ball more, better fit imo

2:46	Ben: The depth charts projections have Seiya Suzuki with a higher OPS this year than Ohtani, Olson, Judge, and Freeman! Do you think that is too aggresive or are you buying the hype?

2:46	Ben Clemens: Personally, I tihnk it’s too aggressive

2:46	Ben Clemens: I’m not a projection system though, which is great, b/c I’m a human being and that sounds more fun

2:46	Ben Clemens: I just have more doubt ballast, as it were

2:47	Ben Clemens: I’ll believe it when I see it

2:47

5 Run Homer: I feel like Baez was perfect for Detroit as a team trying to exit a rebuild; he’s exciting and fun to watch and a fan favourite, while Story is a bit more boring and doesn’t feel like as exciting an add to the Torkelson/Greene core. Baez in Boston would probably become a lightning rod because of how streaky he is

2:47	Ben Clemens: A good non-baseball take on it as well

2:47	Ben Clemens: I’m a Cards fan and yet LOVE watching Baez

2:47	Ben Clemens: He’s just so fun

2:48	Ben Clemens: Perhaps I’m biased by media coverage, but I also agree that the way Boston sports fans seem (and a few of the Sox fans I know are like this, but most aren’t), Baez would be a bad fit

2:48	Ben Clemens: He’s a lock to have abysmal stretches b/c of the shape of his production

2:49	Gil: On Cano (since you mentioned liking him more than Pujols): What are your expectations of him? Is Pujols’ last season with the Dodgers fairly close?

2:49	Ben Clemens: Yeah, that’s a great way of thinking about it. Pujols-esque hitting, only against righties instead of lefties, and he can stand at second or third for a few games when the team needs him to

2:50	Ben Clemens: That’s more valuable than Pujols was for the Dodgers, particularly b/c the Mets could use a second option at 2b after McNeil

2:50	RAGBRAI: Who has a better year. Hilliard, Tellez or Beer. I feel they all come with quetions on playig time. I have them all at a dollar.

2:51	Ben Clemens: I’ll take Hilliard for fantasy, I like the speed potential even if it’s mostly just potential and think that with the DH he’ll get enough PT

2:51	Ben Clemens: Little worried that Tellez will lose his job to Hiura, and worried that Beer just won’t play enough

2:52	Josh R: If teams are going to start using electronic signal calling wouldn’t it make more sense for the pitcher to be the one to pick the pitch? I don’t see any point in the catcher doing it that way just to get shaken off. The pitcher should always know what he wants to throw.

2:52	Ben Clemens: I’ve been thinking about this of late. I think that things will probably go that way eventually, but that baseball convention has taught catchers how to decide what to throw, and pitchers to hear and react

2:53	Ben Clemens: I like the idea of sticking with that at the major league level, because pitchers aren’t so much deciding what they want to throw and waiting for the catcher to give that sign as having a discussion

2:53	Ben Clemens: Having the pitcher do it removes that, unless the catcher can shake HIM off

2:54	Ben Clemens: but catchers study scouting reports, and put down the target so that htey can pair pitch with location, and I just kind of think the way it works makes sense

2:54

jimmy: i feel like i’ve seen too much hate on the phillies – FG standings actually looks like it loves the moves, and the haters are coming from the “super analytic” place. Seems like they’re overthinking it. This team will be good and I could honestly see a scenario where they win the east. Thoughts?

2:54	Ben Clemens: I think that Dan’s article on Castellanos was on point

2:55	Ben Clemens: digigng it up now

2:55	Ben Clemens: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/for-outfielder-starved-phillies-castellano…

2:55	Ben Clemens: Is he a weird fit? Yes. But they are in a spot where improvement helps so much that fit doesn’t matter much. Good work by them improving, nevermind the fit

2:57	Logic says: Universal DH means a bump in runs per game in the NL this season. How significant a bump do you think?

2:57	Ben Clemens: The AL has scored about 3% more runs than the NL in non-2020 seasons of late. So… that’s around a tenth of a run per team per game

2:57	Chamaco: Really enjoy the chats. I have noticed that when you respond to a question, you usually post several times instead of one typed out response. I do the same thing – what does it mean??

2:58	Ben Clemens: I think I might be the only person to do that here, I don’t read enough chats to be certain though

2:58	Ben Clemens: This is just how I think; bursts of thoughts that are related but distinct

2:58	Ben Clemens: I don’t write that way for articles b/c I have time to smooth it all out, but this is stream of consciousness

2:58	Ben Clemens: I’m an annoying texter too

2:59	Ben Clemens: Not sure it means much about how good my thoughts are… just how my brain is organized

2:59	Dc in nova: looking at bb ref comp scores, it seems freeman is more likely to age well than Olson is likely to improve / maintain his performance. Agree? What’s your opinion of bb ref comp scores?

2:59	Ben Clemens: I think they are neat for illustration and say nothing about what will happen to the player after that

2:59	Ben Clemens: Or, at least near-nothing

2:59	Ben Clemens: They aren’t designed to do that, I think they’re just fun tools. I also expect Freeman to age a bit better than Olson, though, b/c Freeman has already aged more than Olson and remained good!

2:59	Phil: As a Red Sox fan: I think how streakiness is responded to depends a lot on the personality of the player. I remember sitting out in the bleachers for a game during Tony Clark’s one awful year in Boston, and they loved him out there: “you’re due, man.” Jose Offerman, on the other hand. . .

3:00	Ben Clemens: Seems reasonable

3:00	Vin: It would be interesting if you wrote your articles in bits and pieces and then Meg had to edit them together into one post.

3:00	Ben Clemens: Today in ‘Meg’s nightmares’

3:00	Dan: Fangraphs depth charts show the Yankees have the second best rotation. Elsewhere I’ve seen people rank them 6-16. The 16 seems absurdly low but is the discrepancy another example of you can’t just add up a team war and use that as a projection?

3:00	Ben Clemens: 16 is too low, for sure

3:01	Ben Clemens: I think it boils down to this: the Yankees had the 6th-best rotation by WAR last year, but I would assume that if you asked Yankees fans they’d guess lower

3:02	Ben Clemens: They get more value than most teams do out of the back of the rotation, or at least they did last year

3:03	Ben Clemens: But yeah, adding up team WAR and using it as a projection doesn’t handle injury risk very well, and we knew that about last year’s Yankees

3:03	Ben Clemens: I believe I even wrote the PPR for that one

3:04	Ben Clemens: We projected them 3rd last year, and haha, first line:

3:04	Ben Clemens: If this one looks optimistic to you, I find it hard to disagree.

3:04	Ben Clemens: “If this one looks optimistic to you, I find it hard to disagree.”

3:04	Guest: Hi Ben, do you think Oneil Cruz has a chance of making the OD?

3:04	Ben Clemens: Ah, what a delight

3:05	Ben Clemens: Let me tell you what Ben Cherington said about Cruz

3:06	Ben Clemens: Oof, sorry, Derek Shelton, Cherington is only paraphrased in the article I found

3:06	Ben Clemens: “There’s still development to be had there. Oneil is goin to have an impact on our club this year at some point. When that is, I don’t think any of us know.”

3:06	Ben Clemens: Let me translate for you

3:07	Ben Clemens: “After the Super Two cutoff, he should start looking for apartments in Pittsburgh.”

3:07	Farhandrew Zaidman: Jake Lamb….once again an above average major league hitter??? How do the Dodgers keep doing it?

3:07	Ben Clemens: So, I kind of believe it?

3:08	Ben Clemens: But as Paul Sporer has pointed out to me, Lamb was pretty good before injuries derailed him

3:08	Ben Clemens: And he wasn’t bad the past two years! Just barely played

3:08	Ben Clemens: I mean, he wasn’t good

3:08	Ben Clemens: But he was still hitting the crap out of the ball, which has always been his carrying tool

3:09	Montoyo: Am I going to give Tapia 450+ PAs like RosterResource says, will my front office give me another bat, or will I play some combination of Kirk/Espinal/Bird more expected?

3:09	Ben Clemens: I tend to think that his PT will get shaved down somewhat

3:10	Ben Clemens: More the Espinal/Kirk/Bird version, but I could also see them getting a rental outfielder at the deadline

3:10	Ben Clemens: Nice to have a lefty, and Tapia is fun to watch, but I don’t think he should be a full-time outfielder for a contending team

3:10	J6: What’s the most overlooked aspect of defense that brings under the radar value? Cutting off the ball in gaps? Scoops? Tags? Throwing accuracy?

3:11	Ben Clemens: Ooh!

3:11	Ben Clemens: I don’t think it’s throwing accuracy

3:11	Ben Clemens: Those are pretty well accounted for

3:11	Ben Clemens: I think that cutting off doubles into singles is VERY hard to account for and also tremendously valuable

3:12	Ben Clemens: That’s my bet for most overlooked, because it’s just the hardest to account for. The other ones are difficult too but outliers are less common

3:12	Numpty: If you could never watch another baseball game but could still read about it, analyze data, and listen to others talk about it, how interested would you be in following the game? (Assume for the sake of the question you don’t earn a living doing these activities.)

3:12	Ben Clemens: Oh, great question!

3:12	Ben Clemens: I mean, I’d be a lot less interested

3:12	Ben Clemens: Going to and watching baseball games is a blast; I’m watching Jays/Braves right now

3:13	Ben Clemens: I don’t need to watch every game to enjoy baseball, and I have fun analyzing it even when I’m not watching, but I think watching it SOMETIMES is a necessary part of the fun

3:14	Ben Clemens: Some of my OOTP leaguemates wanted me to write analytical articles about our teams and I just wasn’t into it

3:14	Ben Clemens: Doesn’t scratch the same itch

3:14	Brian: Cardinals really going into the season expecting 40yo Wainwright to be an ace?

3:15	Ben Clemens: I suppose so, given Flaherty’s injury. They don’t really need him to be an ace, they need him to limit homers and walks, and I think he’ll do that fine, but we have them as the 24th-best rotation in baseball and that’s not great for a contender

3:15	5 Run Homer: How many years do the Astros have left in this competitive cycle? They keep losing pieces, and I know Yordan and Tucker are young and great but I can’t help but see a team on the decline

3:16	Ben Clemens: Uh… I think they’re gonna be fine. Yordan, Tucker, the young pitching is good, I like Pena, supplement it with some veterans, you could keep this going for quite a while

3:17	Colton Anderson: Think there’s any chance Alex Reyes gets innings this year for the Cardinals?

3:17	Ben Clemens: Innings? Sure. Probably not many though

3:17	Ben Clemens: Alright guys, I’m gonna go edit some positional power rankings for tomorrow. Have a great day, and to whoever asked me what’s for lunch, homemade hummus today but I made some GREAT kung pao chickpeas over the weekend, gonna run that one back soon

3:17	Ben Clemens: Have a great week!

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Nathanielmember

2 years ago

can you elaborate on the kung pao chickpeas recipe?

Ben Clemensmember

Reply to Nathaniel

Most definitely. It’s a Meyers and Chang recipe, available here:
https://www.splendidtable.org/story/2017/12/04/kung-pao-chickpeas

BAL	CHW	LAA
BOS	CLE	OAK
NYY	DET	SEA
TBR	KCR	TEX
TOR	MIN	HOU

ATL	CHC*	ARI
MIA	CIN	COL
WSN	MIL	LAD
NYM*	PIT	SDP*
PHI	STL	SFG