Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat – 5/8/23

Ben Clemens: Hey everyone, welcome to the chat.

Ben Clemens: No pithy intro, let’s dive right in.

v2micca: How do the Brewers continue turning mostly offensive value catchers into complete catchers?

Ben Clemens: You have to look at the coaching here

Ben Clemens: They’re just good at training catcher defense

diadem: Has Oviedo’s carriage turned into a pumpkin?

Ben Clemens: I would argue that it was never quite a carriage, and I don’t think he’s a pumpkin now, but yeah, I definitely remember answering a few questions about him and saying that everyone should take a breath and give him some time to see if it was real, and hey, what do you know

Polo: What is the most optimistic way to view the Cardinals signing Contreras and immediately moving him to position(s) where he doesn’t provide much value? Do you expect to see the changes that the organizational clearly expects

Ben Clemens: Optimistic?

Ben Clemens: Um…. he’s secretly hurt and doesn’t want to look wimpy by telling people, so this is all done with his blessing

Ben Clemens: I don’t know, this looks like awful process to me

Ben Clemens: I do not think there’s much of an optimistic way to view this. The process is terribly wrong somewhere, so perhaps the most optimistic way to view this is that the Cardinals are going to have to have some front office accountability for such a large misstep

Ben Clemens: But tbh, Cards fans have been really down on the front office despite not much reason to be

Ben Clemens: So I would guess that the hue and cry about this won’t bother them as much as it should

Broken Bat: Is Duran if RedSox up for good? Lower K, speed and Fenway power. Do you see him regressing, treading water, or building into something?

Ben Clemens: I think he’s up for good, yeah

Ben Clemens: I don’t think he’s actually this good, he’s not a .471 BABIP player because no one is, but I think that he’s an above average hitter who plays a good center field

Ben Clemens: really nice player, and I think that was a fair assumption for him last year, despite his struggles

Ben Clemens: I’m upgrading the bat a little bit in my head but I thought he was better than he showed last year, he hit quite well in Triple-A

Steve from Oakland: A’s-to-Vegas is giving me real Giants-to-Tampa Bay or Giants-to-Oakland vibes. Are these (or other) historical parallels apropos?

Ben Clemens: Yeah I’m getting that feeling as well

Ben Clemens: The whole ‘our land deal is complete, contingent on Vegas writing us a check for 500 million bucks’ has some Mission Accomplished banner vibes to it

The Economist: What kind of contract is Matt Chapman looking at now once he reaches free agency. And how much money has he earned for himself in about 6 weeks?

Ben Clemens: Fortuitously, Dan Szymborski just wrote an entire article about this very question

Ben Clemens: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/matt-chapman-is-a-weapon-of-mass-destructi…

Ben Clemens: Per Dan’s article, he has earned himself $36 million in 6 weeks

Ben Clemens: that’s not bad. I didn’t do nearly so well in April

Corbin: What are the differences in the projection modes on the season standings? (FanGraphs, ATC, Season-to-Date stats, and Coin Flip)

Ben Clemens: Oh, great question here

Ben Clemens: FanGraphs mode uses our Depth Charts projections, which are a 50/50 blend of ZiPS and Steamer projections using playing time numbers from Roster Resource

Ben Clemens: ATC is the same thing but with ATC projections; those are essentially composites of a bunch of different projection systems weighted by historical accuracy

Ben Clemens: Season-to-Date stats mode uses weighted statistics from this year (recent games are weighted more heavily) to construct team strength

Ben Clemens: coin flip thinks every team is .500

Ben Clemens: true talent

Ben Clemens: So basically, they’re four different ways of getting to how good each team is, and then we just simulate all the games from there

Scott So: Is this the beginning of the end for the Yankees?  The game seems to have evolved and they don’t have the right type of athletes.

Ben Clemens: Boy, that sounds like a hot take

Ben Clemens: I’m gonna say no

Ben Clemens: Weren’t they pretty good last year? I do think they’ve done a poor job of managing depth, but that’s very different from ‘the game has evolved’

JJ: Can you give any hope regarding Soto’s swing? It just seems broken right now. K% way up, LD% way down, IFFB% way up, Oppo% way down… He’s hitting the daylights out of the ball still but there are so many pop ups and grounders to 1B around the barrels.

Ben Clemens: I mean… he’s 20% above average offensively despite being out of sorts

Ben Clemens: there’s your hope…. players scuffle or go on hot streaks

Ben Clemens: probably, he’s scuffling right now

Jonathan: How worried are you about the padres?

Ben Clemens: I guess I’d say not very?

Ben Clemens: I’m not quite sure I understand all this angst

Ben Clemens: Fans are angsty this year!

Ben Clemens: Per our playoff odds, they’re 5% less likely to make the playoffs than they were before the season started

Ben Clemens: I mean, sure, they might not win the NL West, but did everyone really think the dodgers sucked all of the sudden?

Ben Clemens: Save the worry for the teams that actually look awful so far, imo

Not Good Question Asker: Are there rules about what a player can use for their walk-up music? I assume that the actual part played can’t have too much profanity or inappropriate stuff, but does the title or artist or genre matter? What’s the most interesting walk-up music you can remember?

Ben Clemens: I think there’s a profanity rule, but to be honest with you I really don’t know

Ben Clemens: That said, my favorite is Joc Pederson walking up to Dancing Queen

Ben Clemens: Really feel-good vibes

Farhandrew Zaidman: Dodgers rookies can bang. That is all.

Ben Clemens: Yeah, Miguel Vargas looks to me to still be a bit limited by his hand injury from an early HBP, and yet, he’s doing pretty well. And then Outman is en fuego

Ben Clemens: you love to see it

Ben Clemens: Again, apparently the Dodgers aren’t suddenly a bunch of frauds, shocking

Jazzy: Corbin Burnes has been pretty mediocre by his standards (112 K%+ | 82 BB%+ | 95 HR9+ | 90 FIP- | 95 ERA-) over 128 IP since the ASB last year. What happened?

Ben Clemens: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/have-you-tried-turning-corbin-burnes-off-t…

Ben Clemens: I choose to think that you were just setting me up to mention the article about this very question that I wrote literally today

Ben Clemens: so thank you

Phanatic: Does philly make the playoffs

Ben Clemens: I’m gonna say no, but I don’t have strong confidence. I’m really worried about their depth, they’ve just sustained a ton of injuries and need a lot of stuff to go right the rest of the way

Appa Yip Yip: Who finishes in 5th place in the AL East, and is their record better than the 2nd place finisher in the AL Central?

Ben Clemens: I think it’ll be the Red Sox, but I also think the Yankees will give them a run for their money

Ben Clemens: And yeah, I think it’ll easily clear second in the ALC. The ALC is baaaaaaad this year

Mike M: A question about semantics.  I hear people say that the Dodgers lack depth because Mookie has had to play SS, but I see things differently. Their starting SS (Lux) has a season-ending injury right before the season started.  Their backup (Rojas) has been injured.  Their backup to the backup (Taylor) has also been injured off and on.  So they’ve had to play some innings with Mookie at SS as the backup to the backup to the backup. Not ideal, but a pretty good 4th option.  They’ve even used Luke Williams as a 5th option. So I’d say that their depth is being tested, not that they lack depth.  Having to use your 4th option is not a lack of depth.  Nobody has a league average player as their 4th option at a position, do they?  And Mookie may actually be a league average SS or better.  So do the Dodgers actually lack depth?

Ben Clemens: With you on this one

Ben Clemens: Now, the Dodgers traded for Rojas as the depth started to thin out, so I’m not 100% sure you can count him

Ben Clemens: But depth does not seem to be this team’s problem. Proven depth, sure, but I think what actually worried people coming into the year is that they were less star-studded at the top than normal, which meant that they were susceptible to star injuries in a way that didn’t seem to bother them before

bosoxforlife: Tha Cardinals give up on Willson Contreras after one month? What the #%$^&^# is going on there? Marmol must be done but is Mozeliak also in deep trouble?

Ben Clemens: I’m not gonna harp on this too long, because Jay wrote a really nice article about it and I’ve done my hot taking on twitter already, but this is just a really bad look for the franchise. I dunno if the front office is in trouble, they have spent a long time being pretty good, but this specific move is making me really question everything

Luis Arraez, Hit Machine: Luis Arraez is currently 70 (!!!) points clear of second place on the early-season AVG list (.420 vs Chapman at .349).  His R and RBI numbers are low and he might not get to five HR, but damn this dude loves to get on base.

Ben Clemens: He’s one of the few high-BA guys who ‘loves to get on base’ accurately describes, imo

Ben Clemens: Like, lots of guys who don’t strike out much give it all back by not walking and not running a high babip

Ben Clemens: Arraez has a .377 OBP since 2020. Really impressive

Ben Clemens: Now, he has a .093 ISO and is a sieve on defense. But that bat!

Guest: I’m sure you’re going to get a lot of questions about the Cardinals today. After a couple good-to-mediocre seasons, it really seems like things have totally fallen apart
My question: will Kyler Murray be the same when he comes back?

Ben Clemens: Oh man, you had me going with this one. I will say that I’m very down on Kyler as a going concern

stevietheshu: What are your thoughts about Seika Suzuki ROS?

Ben Clemens: So, here’s a big grain of salt: I didn’t realize how bad he’d been so far

Ben Clemens: but uh, I still like him! I think he’s a really good hitter

Oaktown Blues: Kinda crazy the number of former A’s having career years: Murphy, Chapman, Heim, Mateo, Luzardo, Muncy, even Sonny Gray! maybe someone should see if Khris Davis has anything left in the tank…

Ben Clemens: William Contreras, almost

Ben Clemens: The A’s are awesome, depending on how you define ‘The A’s’

LeBeef: Michael Conforto – what’s up with him? Do you have confidence in a return to form?

Ben Clemens: Here, my worry-meter is HIGH HIGH HIGH

Ben Clemens: missing this much time and then looking really strikeout-prone when you come back is understandable, but it does not give me hope that he’s going to quickly improve this year

Ben Clemens: I think he’ll be fine eventually, I don’t see any fatal flaws and the bat speed looks to mostly be back from the Giants games I’ve watched (many), but yeah, turns out taking that much time off might not be great

Ben Clemens: Good for him that he signed a contract with a player option, he can double down on pillow contracts if need be

Sharp: Marcell Ozuna is back. Props to the Braves for sticking with him. That is a scary good team.

Ben Clemens: Marcell Ozuna has a 70 wRC+ this year. It’s true that he’s been good in his last six games, but let’s wait for sliiiiiightly longer to declare victory, shall we?

asnbrv: Luis Garcia has taken massive steps in swing decisions, but so far nothing to show for in the production. Do you think there is any thing there?

Ben Clemens: Yeah I’m in

Ben Clemens: Assuming we’re talking about the Nats 2b

Ben Clemens: I’m still waiting on the power to show up, but I think it’s going to

Liz: Does Oli Marmol have a communication problem and/or is he on the hot seat in STL? I was less than impressed with his comments about Tyler O’Neill a few weeks ago, and this whole Contreras situation looks like a trainwreck.

Ben Clemens: I would have said no before this whole Contreras thing

Ben Clemens: Now, I think it’s an easy yes

Ben Clemens: I agree that I don’t think the O’Neill thing was handled well, but I was willing to chalk that up to a team that really has no experience with losing

Ben Clemens: But now I feel like things have transitioned into flailing

Ben Clemens: Does he have a communication problem? I’m guessing from the outside, but I mean, it doesn’t seem GREAT that the team keeps throwing players under the bus

John: I’m confused… Is the fangraphs audio podcast over? Will it ever come back? I really enjoyed it

Ben Clemens: Due to Dylan Higgins’s departure, we’re between editors for it. But it’ll be coming back

Ben Clemens: I still want to finish the backstories series, I was really enjoying it

Carlos Rodon: Am I back in the rotation before July?

Ben Clemens: before July? looking unlikely at this point

Guest: Favorite HR team celebration? The big hat to me was a bit lamer than the Mariners’ trident.

Ben Clemens: I think these have gone a little bit too far. Like, I love a good fun celebration but these are starting to feel contrived, like teams feel they have to do them because other teams also do

Ben Clemens: My favorite right now is probably the Arozarena pose

Ben Clemens: It still feels organic and joyful in a way that ‘hey let’s get out a samurai helmet’ does not

tortycraig: o/u 6 weeks before Steven Matz gets Mike Leaked in return for a low-A reliever prospect?

Ben Clemens: Heresy, I’m sure, but I’m still a Matz believer

Ben Clemens: Has he looked great? Not even a little

Ben Clemens: But uh, you want to use the pitchers BEHIND matz?

Ben Clemens: He didnt’ walk anyone in his last start, and his sudden inability to pitch in the zone without getting clobbered is what had worried me the most

Ben Clemens: So I’m gonna say, provisionally, that he should try to face the Tigers more often, but also that he might have turned the corner

Oaktown Blues: Do you think JJ Bleday figured something out? Tore up AAA and is hitting in the majors in the tiniest of samples

Ben Clemens: I see we’re asking a lot of questions about guys on my Ottoneu team today

Ben Clemens: I am interested in seeing Bleday hit a little bit more, but I’m buying in the abstract

Ben Clemens: Good prospect who lost a bit of shine in ’21 but looked like he was mostly back to hitting in ’22, we were down on him prospect-wise b/c he struggles with high heat but well, a lot of major leaguers do

Ben Clemens: I think that taking bets on guys like him is smart

Ben Clemens: Could he fail? Most definitely

Bill Spiers: Do you expect St Louis to aggressively pursue some controllable starting pitching with their overload of OFers (and perhaps Gorman) around the deadline even if they are out of it?

Ben Clemens: Honestly, no

Ben Clemens: They just don’t do that

Ben Clemens: Should they? Yeah

Ben Clemens: But their move is trading for established stars before their walk year and getting them to sign extensions

Ben Clemens: I’m not really sure what controllable pitchers who are good enough to move the needle will be available, anyway

Krusty: Two questions are that pretty interconnected:

• How worried should I be about Max Scherzer? and
• When should I start to be worried that this is more than just a funk for the Mets?

Ben Clemens: Few Mets questions today, I’ll answer this one because it encompasses most of what people have been asking

Ben Clemens: I’m officially very worried about Scherzer

Ben Clemens: Maybe he’s hurt and not saying anything, but he doesn’t look crisp at all

Ben Clemens: He’s giving up an absolute ton of hard contact and not missing any bats

Ben Clemens: I’m also worried about Senga’s command, which was the worry about him coming into the year

Ben Clemens: Like even in his great start on Friday…. four walks four k’s

Ben Clemens: So given those two things, I have downgraded my estimation of the Mets. Pitching depth was a worry, and they’ve had some rough luck there – Quintana, Verlander, Scherzer looks banged up, Senga doesn’t seem as good as expected

Whaley: Have we see the last of Franmil Reyes?  Couldn’t make in in KC.  Oakland ? No way he’s 27!

Ben Clemens: Yeah, I have no idea whatsoever on the second point, but I think he’s cooked

Tim: Anything underlying with Tork that could show him taking a step forward? It sure seems like he hasn’t been able to make the adjustments quite yet.

Ben Clemens: Nothing I’ve noticed. The Tigers young hitters just continue to look lost in the bigs, and that’s worrisome at this point

Rob Deer Zone: Tristan Cases is being allowed to wildly flail around in the Red Sox line-up. His .163 average (in 112 PA) would make Rob Deer and Chris Davis blush. Do the Sox leave him up to keep flailing? For how long?

Ben Clemens: I’m…. honestly I’m less pessimistic on Casas than I thought I’d be

Ben Clemens: He strikes out too much, but I don’t think that’s gonna keep going, he’s got decent strike zone judgment and doesn’t have crazy contact issues. He has a .186 BABIP, and some of that is that he’s hitting way too many pop ups, but to be clear, he has three infield fly balls this year, it’s not some ghastly number

Ben Clemens: He’s always gonna be a feast or famine offensive guy, but I don’t think he’s done much to change a long-term projection this year. Now, if the Sox are worried about his confidence, that’s a different thing

Ben Clemens: I think that teams do a generally good job of handling player confidence and that people like me often underestimate how important that is

Ben Clemens: But that’s where I’d be most concerned. He’s not striking out 40% of the time or anything. Let the kid play

Lily: Is the awfulness of the AL Central small sample size, a fluke, or evidence that the division system needs to change?

Ben Clemens: Those are the only three answers?

Ben Clemens: I’d say none of the above. Regardless of how you feel about hte division system, it’s not going away

Ben Clemens: But it’s not small sample size or a fluke, those are five bad teams

J: Lars Nootbar currently has a 64% gb rate and negative launch angle. Do these things stabilize, or are more fly balls just an adjustment away?

Ben Clemens: An adjustment away, and I’d add that he hasn’t really played enough to think much of his stats yet, good or bad

Ben Clemens: he has fewer games played than the Cardinals have losses

HappyFunBall: FWIW, Juan Soto’s a career 166 wRC+ against RHP and is putting up a 161 so far this season. He’s getting annihilated by LHP (49 this year vs 121 career). It’s not that he’s broken, it’s that he’s a platoon guy at the moment.

Ben Clemens: I’ve heard this a few times, and BP had a good article about how he’s struggling with sweepers, but I’d just like to remind everyone that he’s faced 55 lefties this year, it’s hardly a stable statistic

JK: I read on Baseball America about the Giants “learning the wrong lessons from 2021”, in that their success was actually due to stars (Belt, Crawford, Posey, Webb, Gausman) performing and then they were able to supplement around the roster well, but have now taken the second part of that too far and not been able to replicate the first. What is your reaction to that take?

Ben Clemens: Interesting definition of stars, but I generally agree

Ben Clemens: I think Belt and Crawford were squarely post-stardom and then got rejuvenated, and I do think the Giants were right to lean into that

Ben Clemens: but yeah, they have not done enough to add top-level talent to the roster

Ben Clemens: Whiffing on Judge and Correa this offseason is good process bad outcome imo, but it’s clear that they think this as well

Sabey Sabes: Have really enjoyed seeing guys like Justin Steele and Joe Ryan dominate this year with solid deliveries and without overwhelming stuff.

Ben Clemens: No real answer here, just yes, agree

Bryce Miller: Is my fastball good enough to thrive in MLB throwing it this much? I know the spin rate is off the charts – just seems like it won’t last. Although I did say after my last outing that until it actually gets hit – I’m going to just keep throwing it…

Ben Clemens: I’m not buying into the hype just yet

Ben Clemens: Lance Brozdowski, who is a really good follow on twitter, spotted that he’s releasing all his breaking pitches from very different release poitns b/c he can’t generate the right kind of spin from where he throws his fastball to make it do the whole four-seam backspin thing

Ben Clemens: That seems…. bad

Will: Is there any existential concern about Gunnar now that its been over a month? He seems to get in his head too much, could that mental aspect translate into a decline in his tools? Or is it all just unnecessary worry.

Ben Clemens: Look, worrying is human nature

Ben Clemens: It’s a month, existential concern seems excessive

Ben Clemens: but yeah, he’s scuffling, now we see what happens when he struggles. Everyone struggles at some point

Morbo: How has your opinion on the competency of the Cardinals Front Office changed in the last couple weeks?

Ben Clemens: The Contreras thing, specifically, makes me wonder what the hell is going on

Ben Clemens: I didn’t like the lack of pitching acquisitions this offseason but I don’t like every move they make, that is just differences of opinion

Ben Clemens: This specifically seems very bad, this is not how you should handle players, and not how you should handle player acquisition if you’re going to turn around and randomly just throw the dude under the bus

Ben Clemens: I hope that there was just a breakdown in communication somewhere, because I do not think they’ve handled this well

Guest: How high is your worry meter for the Cardinals?  OF and rotation are both a mess, and the front office’s comments about Contreras in conjunction with the move to DH make that  acquisition look very bad.

Ben Clemens: I mean, it’s high! They’re 11-24. But I don’t share your concern about the outfield, the only weird thing to me there is how much playing time they keep giving Alex Burleson, even when he doesn’t really seem like the answer

Ben Clemens: O’Neill has not been good either, but I think a lot of the OF problems are that Nootbaar missed some time, and that they were doing the whole Jordan Walker shoehorning thing

Guest: We’re well over a month into the season, and the Yankees are further out of first place than the Nationals.  Is it time to put out my “Fire Aaron Boone” decorations and do my “Fire Aaron Boone” shopping?

Sharp: “Marcell Ozuna has a 70 wRC+ this year. It’s true that he’s been good in his last six games, but let’s wait for sliiiiiightly longer to declare victory, shall we?”

His BABIP is .109. His BB/K rates are good. Statcast batted ball numbers are good. I think he’s just fine. You didn’t really look at the stats before commenting did you?

Ben Clemens: This is the last I’m gonna do on this one — Ozuna still looks bad to me, and yeah, ‘you didn’t really look at the stats’ is not a great way to get your point across. Believe it or not, I do look at the stats, a lot, that’s why it’s my job

Ben Clemens: if you just want to say “Marcell Ozuna is great, I don’t want to listen to arguments”, just go do it with your friends somewhere

Lou Perltzman: Old man Ben yells about celebrations

Ben Clemens: 🙂

Cardinals: Do you think Arenado is hiding an injury or is he just washed?

Ben Clemens: Lol wtf why are these the onoly two options?

Ben Clemens: He’s on a cold streak, he’s not as good true talent as his results were last year, and I’m quite sure he’ll be fine

Yo-Yo: How do the Cardinals build a competitive rotation in 2024 without significantly raising payroll? Losing Wainwright, O’Neill, and Dejong frees up enough money to replace Montgomery with a similar arm, but that’s still a dreadful rotation. Any chance they do a quick rebuild for 2025?

Ben Clemens: I don’t think they’ll do a rebuild, because that’s not their style, but this rotation is bad, quite bad

Ben Clemens: I think they’ll hope to make it just middling instead of awful and let the bats carry them

Choo Choo: Trade proposal time: Lucas Giolito for Jake McCarthy. Sox cash in on Gio’s final year of team control and buy low on a great athlete in McCarthy. Dbacks bolster the top of their rotation for a playoff push. Who says no?

Ben Clemens: Ooh, I have to say, I like this one

Ben Clemens: I think both teams might do that, tbh

As a Mets fan…: Thank you STL for taking the heat off for a little while.

Ben Clemens: lol

EonADS: The Guardians’ biggest problem is that they’ve started chasing everything, in contrast to the discipline of last year. Anything they can do to counteract that aside from just making adjustments as they go?

Ben Clemens: I’m writing about the Guardians for tomorrow, tbh

Ben Clemens: In my opinion, the Guardians’ biggest problem is that their contact-first approach wasn’t as good as everyone seemed to think in the first place

Ben Clemens: They were 15th in runs scored and 16th in wRC+ and we threw them a parade and declared them the future of hitting

Ben Clemens: and that was with career years from Oscar Gonzalez and Andres Gimenez

Ben Clemens: I mean, Jose Ramirez scuffling to start this year does not help

Ben Clemens: But my goodness their offense is bad this eyar

Ben Clemens: and they still don’t strike out!

Ben Clemens: so it’s not that

Ben Clemens: Everyone, I’m sorry, I’m just gonna call it a day here. I’m clearly in a so-so mood, and the chat has been overwhelmingly negative which is adding to it. I have to get some work done for tomorrow, the aforementioned Guardians article, and I’m just gonna go do that.

Ben Clemens: I don’t mean everyone, still lots of great questions, but I’ve been doing a crazy amount of filtering today

Ben Clemens: And frankly, eh, just wore me out. See everyone next week, and I’ll try to get back to my actual wheelhouse, which is talking about cooking and board games

Ben Clemens: Have a great week, everyone