Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat – 6/9/25

Ben Clemens: Hey everybody, welcome to the chat

Pat: Tarik Skubal’s last 11 starts- 95K, 3 BB..Holy Moses! Never seen anything like it.

Ben Clemens: Yeah I mean “getting ridiculous” does not cover it anymore

Ben Clemens: I wrote about how ludicrous Skubal’s 2025 performance was a few weeks ago and it’s maybe more ludicrous now?

Trent Grisham: Why oh why did he decide to go back to his old and tired ultra-passive ways as soon as you wrote about how well he was pitch-hunting?

Ben Clemens: This is kind of a classic “SI cover jinx” kinda thing

Ben Clemens: Like, I wrote about Grisham b/c he was doing a thing multiple SD’s different than he had all of his career

Ben Clemens: so surely the go-forward expectation of that thing was less extreme than it had been

Ben Clemens: also, for this skill in particular, it probably will always go in waves. You get more aggressive early and feast on pitchers throwing you meatballs. So the pitchers start nibbling, but you’re still aggressive, and it doesn’t work. So you get less aggressive and get ahead in the count. But then the pitchers start throwing you meatballs again…

Ben Clemens: I hope he can keep it going but this is the kind of adjustment that’s never going to be done and always going to be a work in progress

Guest: I hope this entire chat is dedicated to talking about this Kershaw comment!! He made an offhand, tongue-in-cheek reply to a reporter about something he didn’t even think worth bringing up! This is truly the story of the year!!

Ben Clemens: I honestly thought the comment, and the Cardinals video board operator that led to it (looping a famous Kershaw playoff implosion), were both very funny

Inaccessible Rail: What do the Mets do once Winker & Siri come off the IL? Option Baty & Acuna? Seems like that might make the team worse. Same thing with Montas & Manaea. Option Megill? Brazoban? They don’t have a lot of optionable guys.

Ben Clemens: I don’t think they can option Acuna if they’re sending Baty down, they need backup infielder. Surely Jared Young will get sent down, right?

Ben Clemens: WInker is presumably gonna play some DH, so I could see them saying “Ronny Mauricio was supposed to be in Triple-A longer this year, we can send him down to keep rehabbing”

Ben Clemens: but that’s tough b/c he has been hitting really well in his brief 2025 season

Ben Clemens: on the pitching side, I’d say just don’t worry. Someone’s gonna get hurt. Someone always gets hurt. If they don’t, do you really need Paul Blackburn and Brandon Waddell (and Jose Castillo and Brazoban) in the bullpen all at once?

Ben Clemens: you’re allowed to DFA guys without options if they aren’t significantly better than your replacement hcoices

Guest: Got any board game recs for two players? Something that’s more interactive between the two players than Wingspan or Azul

Ben Clemens: Ooh, yeah, a variety depending on what exactly you’re looking for. But for interaction, how about Watergate?

Ben Clemens: One player plays as the Nixon administration, one plays as the WaPo

Ben Clemens: or alternately Votes for Women, I played this as a 4 player but it works as 2 as well. In this one, one side plays the suffrage movement and the other plays the anti-suffrage political establishment. You fight for control of the Senate, fillibusters, popular appeal, etc. Both have a ton of interaction and both scratch the asymmetric, figure out your opponent’s weakness b/c it’s different from your own, itch that I have in two-player board games

J: What do you think of Ben Brown going forward? Of pitchers with 60 innings he’s got the 8th worst ERA yet the 20th best FIP and 18th best xFIP. Easy to say he’s due for better luck, but when hitters make contact they pummel the ball.

Ben Clemens: yeah, this is a case wehre I don’t really buy FIP. His approach leads to a ton of so-so fastballs getting put in play

Ben Clemens: There’s just no way around it – that has to lead to a higher wOBACON than someone who’s harder to predict and or square up

Ben Clemens: I get that hitters have more to say about contact quality than pitchers – but Ben Brown seems like the kind of guy who will coax the best results out of hitters more often than average, for the foreseeable future

Guest: In your Carlos Santana article, you included a table showing that pulled fly balls hit 90-95 mph result in a .812 wOBA, but opposite field fly balls hit 90-95 mph result in a .289 wOBA.  Why would that be?  I thought pulled balls were better because they were typically hit harder and/or at a better launch angle, but it seems like there’s more to it……

Ben Clemens: I think a lot of it is that we’re saying “fly balls with exit velocity x” but missing a lot of other factors. Like, the fly balls hit oppo have, on average, worse other characteristics. They’re mishit, so maybe they have the wrong spin or they’re disproportionately pop ups, t hat kind of thing

Ben Clemens: for sure, the hook on pulled fly balls contributes to their success, the ball hooking away from the left fielder and toward the foul line is very easy to conjure up in your mind’s eye, but can you picture a righty hitting one with that kind of spin to right field? probably not

Sodo Mojo: I get Judge is way ahead of Raleigh in the MVP race but he is running a BABIP 100 points above his career average.  If that regresses over the back 60% of the season could we see a much closer MVP race?

Ben Clemens: oh yes, Aaron Judge regresses but not Cal Raleigh haha. I mean…. sure?

Ben Clemens: realistically, though, this is Judge’s to lose. If he posts ANOTHER wRC+ above 200, with all the counting stats that inevitably go with that, I’m not sure that voters will ignore it even if Raleigh continues his own absurd stretch

Ben Clemens: Raleigh is beating his projections by more than Judge, and Judge’s xwOBA is  a lot higher than Raleigh’s wOBA (which itself outstrips his xwOBA by a decent amount)

Ben Clemens: like, yeah, Judge isn’t gonna keep BABIP’ing .468, because that’s not how reality works. But .375 and maybe some more home runs? feels resaonble to me!

NeedOffense: Jose Ramirez has a .947 OPS & is on pace for 30 HR & 35 2B, but he’s on pace for only 78 RBI because non-Jose Guards hitting 2nd have a .372 OPS (not a typo). No question, just slowly losing my mind

Ben Clemens: Well here’s the good news

Ben Clemens: The Guardians have never struggled with offense before and they’ve shown a penchant for quick fixes, so they’ll solve this

Ben Clemens: wait, no, this team has historically been super bad at figuring out offense. It’s wild, I doubt they’re going to suddenly crack the code, I’m sorry for your slow descent into madness

Idiotic Failson: Is Shane Baz kind of a lost cause? He had a ton of prospect shine back in the day, and had a great start to the season, but seems like he’s never going to be an above-average pitcher.

Ben Clemens: No one is ever truly a lost cause. That said, we have to be probabilistic. The odds here are that Baz isn’t gonna figure it out

Ben Clemens: And I mean, hyou watch him and that feels about right

Austin: Saw someone already put something about Skubal but just curious how much concern you put into extending hardthrowing pitchers. I feel like he’s bound to get TJ at some point, you think the Tigers are baking that into extension talks?

Ben Clemens: I think that it’s baked into the contracts that pitchers get

Ben Clemens: So yeah, it’s certainly in there, but every pitcher who signs a contract is a risk to blow out

Ben Clemens: that’s just how it works, and in fact I think that’s a benefit to signing these longer deals for young pithcers. If you have a guy for 2 years and he misses one, that really sucks. If you have him for 6 and he misses one, eh, it was baked into the cake

….eventually?: Like this Judge season has to ‘stop’ at some point. Right? Right?

That Guy: There’s a distinct possibility that we might have back-to-back non-Judge 10 WAR seasons in the AL that result in exactly zero first place MVP votes.

YouBeTheJudge: Judge’s stats are definitely insane. Is there perhaps some luck that is going to deflate things? Looking at his stats, he is hitting more opposite field fly balls and pulled ground balls than in the past.  That isn’t supposed to improve your results. The majority of his home runs have gone the other way. Is this more than just luck?

Ben Clemens: I could just put Judge questions in here all day if I wanted

Ben Clemens: I guess what I’d say about the opposite field fly ball thing, in particular, is that what you’re saying is true for the majority of players but Aaron Judge is not the majority of players

Ben Clemens: the reason that we don’t love oppo fly balls is that they don’t, on average, travel as far as your best contact

Ben Clemens: but Aaron Judge does not need his best contact to leave the yard

Ben Clemens: for him, the tradeoff might be “if I try to make contact deeper, I’m both getting longer to decide whether to swing and keeping more contact fair”

Ben Clemens: doesn’t really matter whether you hit your home run 115 mph/470 feet or 106 mph/370 feet

Bosoxforlife: The Red Sox win 2 in the Bronx and the cloud over the season fades then I look at Giolito and Buehler listed as starters on Tuesday and Wednesday and a darker cloud reappears. Are these two guys as cooked as I think they are and if they both explode again do the Red Sox admit that they threw $40 million away.

Ben Clemens: I mean, I don’t hate the way they’re handling it for the time being. That said, I mostly think that because they’ve had a ton of pitching injuries. If we have a full strength Sox rotation, those guys are still churning out replacement level results, and they stay in the rotation, then I think it’s a case of sunk cost fallacy

Ben Clemens: for now, sure, they cost more money than you’d love to spend for replacement level pitching. But do you know how many teams would happily accept some replacement level pitching?

jerry: and regarding wilson: we now have him, arraez, kwan, all firmly showing the value of contact. is this going to be a trend?

jerry: jacob wilson isn’t geting the buzz he deserves. is he the antidote to sterile baseball, the prince that was promised?

As: Is Jacob Wilson someone that will defy hitting metrics for his career (Exit Velo, Barrel, Hard Hit, Bat Speed all below 10th percentile)? Or do you see some huge regression coming?

Ben Clemens: I’m not sure that you want Arraez in this example anymore. He’s been just kinda bad the last two years

Ben Clemens: 900 PA of the emptiest .304 average you’ll ever see in ’24-’25

Ben Clemens: my colleague Dan Szymborski is writing about him this week, in fact, I think

Ben Clemens: that said, I think Kwan in particular is a great example of how contact can play at the highest level

Ben Clemens: good defense, good OBP b/c of few strikeouts and enough walks to get free bases, at least passable baserunning

Ben Clemens: That feels easily achievable for Wilson. He’s even starting to take walks, a HUGE positive sign for me

Ben Clemens: He’s almost certainly not going to keep up his 20-homer pace, but he doesn’t need to to be really valuable

Ben Clemens: I’ve been in for a while on Wilson, I’m always in on these guys. bat control at a premium defensive spot. If you get Arraez’s bat out of him, you’re probably quite happy

Nate: Has Maikel Garcia done enough to pencil him in as at least a league average regular, if not a 140 wRC+ guy

Ben Clemens: I’ll be honest, I haven’t looked deeply into Garcia this year aside from seeing his name a few times and going “huh, better than I thought.”

Ben Clemens: looking through his page now, I mean, I’m willing to believe average regular

Ben Clemens: I love the defense, and I’m basically ignoring his down year by the metrics this year. I have always thought he should hit more homers than he showed in games. So yeah, the .375 BOP is not here to stay, but what about like .335 with the occasional cheeky homer? I’d be into that

Bosoxforlife: In an previous chat you said that in today’s game a catcher would not get enough starts in be a viable MVP candidate like the great Berra and Campanella did in the 50’s. I offer up for MVP consideration Cal Raleigh who has started 62 of the Mariners 63 games and appeared in the one game he didn’t start. I wish no injury on the apparition that claims to be a mere human but a lengthy slump might allow Raleigh to have a chance.

Ben Clemens: Yeah, Raleigh is having a season for the ages in availability, not just in production

Ben Clemens: first in PA for catchers, fourth in innings caught, without seeming to wear down at all

Ben Clemens: the other guys putting up volume like this look ground down. Realmuto, William Contreras, Keibert Ruiz (!) (what are the Nats doing???)

Ben Clemens: okay seriously, why in the world is Keibert Ruiz on this list

Cal Raleigh: and damn sure I’m going to be part of the HR derby.  I’m flexing this year baby!!!!!

Ben Clemens: I’m very much looking forward to this

UT: Does Polar Bear opt out if he becomes the Met’s all-time HR leader?  And do the Met’s get involved in the bidding?

Ben Clemens: I think he HAS to opt out after this season

Ben Clemens: like, do you think Pete Alonso is at risk of being a below average first baseman in the next few years? I do not anymore

Ben Clemens: So he should try to get multiple years, and someone will give it to him. I assume it’ll still be the Mets, honestly. He and hte team are a great fit

Ben Clemens: Money is clearly not a limiting constraint for them, and he is an important part of the offense who also surely helps with marketing and whatnot

Ben (DC): CJ Abrams seems to run hot or cold at the dish, never in the middle. Is he someone you’d attempt to extend long-term, or still need to see more consistency and find a more suitable defensive position?

Ben Clemens: I have to say, CJ Abrams frustrates me to no end even as a fan

Ben Clemens: like, I just envision him putting it all together, going on the baseball equivalent of an all-night gambling heater where you stay up until 6 a.m. just stacking chips up

Ben Clemens: but something, I can’t say quite what, keeps him from ever really ascending to that level

Ben Clemens: I’d have moved him off of short by now FOR SURE, but maybe that’s just the frustration talking

appa yip yip: Lots of catcher talk, but does Alejandro Kirk not get the respect he deserves because he’s short and fat?

Ben Clemens: Yes

Ben Clemens: Presumably as a long-time reader you’d consider me a Kirk truther, I’ve certainly always been higher than consensus on him

Ben Clemens: Kevin Goldstein told me the ‘if you didn’t know what Kirk looked like you’d like him much more’ thing in the year where we did the trade value list together, and that really opened my e yes

Ben Clemens: has me liking Moises Ballesteros too!

Catch: There seems to be a glut of young offensive focused hitters emerging this year – Baldwin, Narvaez, Teel, Rushing, A Ramirez, Dingler and so on, while some aging stalwarts like Realmuto, Murphy, Perez, are floundering a little – any thoughts or favs for you moving forward?

Ben Clemens: I talked myself into Luis Torrens after writing about him last week. Narvaez looks GREAT to me

Ben Clemens: I’m not ready to buy in on Baldwin yet, but Dingler is pretty good I think

Ben Clemens: yeah it’s fun! I want new blood in catching

HappyFunBall: Using a gambling analogy for CJ Abrams is just cruel…

SPArn: A late night casino gambling analogy for Abrams?! Bold! (And potentially on purpose?)

Ben Clemens: Pure coincidence, I assure you

Serious Question: Why aren’t RBI groundouts to the right side considered a sacrifice, when a moderately deep fly ball, or a well placed bunt are?  Doesn’t it take just as much skill to direct a grounder?  Is it because, without the force at home, you can’t assume the fielder wouldn’t go home?  Couldn’t the same be said for a bunt?  I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately.

Ben Clemens: It’s because they made the rules a long time ago and just kinda did it this way

Ben Clemens: I completely agree with you

Ben Clemens: It’s really arbitrary, and doesn’t make that much sense

Ben Clemens: that’s why I largely prefer statistics that treat sacrifice flies and RBI groundouts the same. So wRC+ is one. if you want a win probability type stat, RE24 and WPA would both treat those events as equivalent

Matt Damon: MATT. DAMON.

Nico Hoerner: Its F***ing BS that RBI groundouts to the right side arent considered a sacrifice

Ben Clemens: well see, I know this isn’t Nico Hoerner b/c I just saw Nico Hoerner get so heated he got ejected

Ben Clemens: and what he said was “you’re having a bad game so far”

TugMcGrawFan1996: Do you believe the Braves have any chance of turning things around before the deadline, or are they completely sunk?

Ben Clemens: you know, I am still a believer, but I have to caveat that with the fact that I was veyr high on them coming into the year and am starting to be very worried about Strider

Jeff Zimmerman the meanie: Yankees no longer looking for a 3b w/Jazz there now?  Actually will be happy with Lemehiehoohoo at 2b?

Ben Clemens: I think that 2b is the upgrade spot. If DJLM doesn’t start hitting for power, or getting on base a lot more, that’s a tough spot. I don’t really want to rely on his defense and health there if he’s not bringing something truly exceptional at the plate

Steve O: After several years of the 6th wildcard.. any general thoughts? Are you in favor of it now? Would you like to go back to the old format, etc?

Steve O: 6th playoff spot, not WC spot

Ben Clemens: man, I guess I’m into it? I like it more than the 5 playoff team setup, at least

Ben Clemens: I would have more games on consecutive days in the divisional round to make those WC games hurt more

Ben Clemens: like, what about five games in a row with no days off for the DS?

Ben Clemens: but I think rewarding the top two teams with a bye has at least given a bit of meaning back to winning the regular season

Beve Salboni: re: Judge’s BABIP and such, Petriello also theorized he’s hitting the ball so hard he’s creating an overperformance cushion by forcing the outfield to play prevent defense that allows more hits to fall in. Nuts!

Ben Clemens: I absolutely believe that

Ben Clemens: you try defending aaron judge with nine players

Dan: Games 2 and 3 of the wildcard should be on the same day.

Ben Clemens: great! into it!

Motivational Speaker: If Roman Anthony REALLY wanted to be in the show, he would’ve picked up a 1b glove 3 weeks ago….

Ben Clemens: Devers had a spare one

Guest: I’m trying to find a board game I can play with my wife, who is very uncompetitve.  Any recs for a *cooperative*, 2-player game?

Ben Clemens: okay, I have more of these than competitive ones

Ben Clemens: our favorite is this game called “Mass Transit”, you are trying to build transit lines and get commuters home from work

Ben Clemens: it’s a little bit of a constraint juggling game, and they limit communication so that one player can’t take over as captain

Ben Clemens: in a similar vein: Tranquility, a beautifully illustrated and lightly themed game about sailing and/or putting numbers in order

Ben Clemens: they’re both quiet, both come in tiny boxes and play fairly quickly, both very pleasant for an afternoon on the patio

appa yip yip: it’s difficult to admit but a lot of manfred’s changes have ended up being really good. i just wish the ghost runner started in the 11th instead of the 10th.

Ben Clemens: you know, you can have the wrong intentions and still come up with good solutions

Ben Clemens: I don’t agree with Manfred’s motivations in general, but I do think that the game is a lot better for the on-field rules changes

Ethan: What are your thoughts on Jarren Duran? He is hitting the ball harder this year (92.5v 90.8, better launch angle and better hard hit rate 47.2 v 43.9 and he is pulling the ball in the air more 12.4 v 10.3) and yet his underlying numbers and actual numbers are down from a season ago. Would you trade him to a OF needy team like Mets, Phillies, Padres and call up Anthony?

Ben Clemens: well, I don’t think you’re supposed to pull the ball in the air more as a lefty at Fenway, so I wouldn’t really consider that a plus

Ben Clemens: but I guess I’d say that my opinion of Duran when he broke out last year was that this felt like a late breakout and that I’d put my expectations around “slightly above average hitter with excellent baserunning” going forward

Ben Clemens: I left him off the top 50 trade value, for exmaple, and honestly I didn’t get a ton of pushback from industry contacts on that

Ben Clemens: I think that these ‘trade a good player while contending and just call up a reinforcement’ trades are fun in theory but that they almost never happen in practice

Ben Clemens: so like…. I think the actual solution here is that Duran is just gonna keep playing left, and that it’s nice to have a bunch of good players so that even when some of them tail off you have others to pick up the slack

appa yip yip: how do you feel about the ball/strike challenge system coming next year? i think it threads the needle pretty nicely myself – keeps framing important for borderline pitches but lets teams not get burned by the really egregious calls.

Ben Clemens: I absolutely love it

Ben Clemens: yesterday, please

Ben Clemens: also have you ever been to either a minor league game with the challenge system or a tennis match with the old challenge system?

Ben Clemens: it’s fun! audience involvement

Why Always Mets: Went to Safeco (T-Mobile now i guess) for the first time last Thursday vs Baltimore. Great park, great city

Ben Clemens: it’s the park I haven’t been to that I most want to go to (now that I’ve crossed off Wrigley)

Ben Clemens: I’ve heard nothing but good things, particularly about the views and food

A’s line of thining: Do the A’s try to make Soder pick up third base over the offseason for next year? If not, who is the third baseman of the future?

Ben Clemens: I think that’s asking too much and that left field makes a bit more sense to me

Ben Clemens: I could completely see him ending up as a good left fielder. I’m very skeptical that he could suddenly pick up third without a ton of experience as a quick-twitch infielder in the minors

A Boy Named Yu: What did you think of your trip to Wrigley?

Ben Clemens: you know…. the atmosphere was amazing, and I completely understand the reason it’s considered such a Mecca. Great place to watch a baseball game, the fans are fun and friendly, I had a wonderful time

Ben Clemens: but like… that stadium is not good from a me watching a baseball game in 2025 standpoint

Ben Clemens: the food, for one thing!

Ben Clemens: I love it, I love that it exists, but I’m glad I’m not watching every game tehre

Matt VW: I’m all for the ABS challenge system too, but I do want to give some credit where credit is due. It feels like umpiring is waaay better than it was twenty years ago. Quantification and accountability have already done a pretty good job of raising the bar.

Bosoxforlife: The more I watch the more I can’t wait for the challenge system to be implemented. Maybe it is just because I am a crotchety old man but the umpiring seems poorer than usual capped off by yesterday’s ejection of Nico Hoerner on an awful call. There needs to be more than 3 challenges to make it really effective because the teams will be forced to conserve them.

Ben Clemens: Yeah, I tend to agree with both of these, which can seem paradoxical. I think that umpiring is unquestionably better than it was 20 years ago, and actually, you can measure it

Ben Clemens: but also, yes, because it’s so much easier to do this now, it shoudl be a lot better. there were two bad line calls in the french open finals yesterday and I lost my mind

Ben Clemens: ‘we have the computers, why are we letting this happen?’

Ben Clemens: and that was two calls in a 5.5 hour match. What the hell is baseball doing?

A Boy Named Yu: In response to Wrigley, same.  Even as a diehard Cubs fan, same.

Boston Beans: Have you been to Fenway?  Whew, I know it’s historic and all, but modern day humans barely fit in those tiny seats.  My first game there, I felt like I had arms on both of my arms, knees in the back of my shoulders, and my knees in the shoulders of the person in front of me.   Next time I spring for the Monster seats.

Ben Clemens: Yeah very similar feeling there. I went the first time the Cards played there in interleague, I was in high school and in town looking at colleges anyway so I wrapped it all up into one trip

Ben Clemens: I had so much fun and loved the good-natured ribbing I got from the fans

Ben Clemens: and yeah, look, it’s just not as luxurious as modern stadiums, it can’t be

Skenes: It’s so sad watching this unfold.  Every Skenes start looks like 7.1 2hits 1bb 9ks, L

Ben Clemens: it’s so sad

Ben Clemens: so so sad

Ben Clemens: I don’t know

Ben Clemens: I find all these ‘trade Skenes’ articles to be ghoulish, like come on, no, the Mets aren’t getting Paul Skenes for three bags of used baseballs and Ronny Mauricio

Ben Clemens: but at the same time, I find the ownership situation in Pittsburgh objecitonable. Maybe if Nutting forced his front office to trade Skenes, there would be enough popular outcry to force him to sell?

Eternally Hopeful: How long before Dom Smith slumps his way out of a job?  Clearly the clock is ticking with Bryce in the wings.  Do you think Dom can contribute for a while?

Ben Clemens: Did you know that Dom Smith is 29?

Ben Clemens: I’m 39, and my wife and I used to go to a ton of Mets games when we lived in New York (mid-to-late-2010s). When she saw Dom in the lineup (we went to his debut game, it was $5.01 ticket day at Oracle and I’m not about to turn that deal down) she was like “oh look, a baseball player your age’

Ben Clemens: nope, decade younger! just has that always-been-in-baseball vibe

Ben Clemens: as to your actual question instead of my stories about myself, yeah, the clock is ticking

Ben Clemens: the way I see it, LaMonte was just so bad that they couldn’t ride it out any longer. But their willingness to do so for as long as they did feels like they’re trying to find a way to tread water until Eldridge is ready

Ben Clemens: if Dom doesn’t just consistently mash, he’s eventually going to find himself out of a job

Ben Clemens: but hey,  he’s in the bigs, getting AB’s, that’s about as good as you can ask for as a first baseman who hasn’t been league average with teh bat since 2020

Guest: As a Yankee fan transplant in Boston I can confirm both the good-natured reception by the fans as well as the war crimes that the seating commits on my posture

Ben Clemens: I guess it’s self-indulgent story day. I went to the 2018 Red Sox Yankees ALDS in the Bronx, fun game, I’m sure I’ve told the stories of the creative Benintendi heckler before

Ben Clemens: we’re leaving, the Red Sox have won, and on our way to the subway there are a Yankees fan and Red Sox fan in a straight up shoving match, screaming, we’re like oh crap, is a fight gonna break out?

Ben Clemens: My wife crossed their path, and oh my god, they BOTH calmed down so quickly. “Oh excuse me, sorry about that, didn’t mean to get in your way.”

Ben Clemens: so we get five feet away, and bam, right back to yelling and shoving

Ben Clemens: delightful!

Dos Muncys: What do you think the Mariners will do with Ford, since he is being blocked by Hank Aaron 28 yr old Raleigh?

Ben Clemens: tough one for me! I like Ford a lot and think he could be legit behind the plate. I like what they tested out last year, giving him just a few reps in left, I could see a situation where Raleigh is more like a C/DH even split, Ford is the catcher half the time and gets some reps in elsewhere as well

James wood lover: Also are there any things that the consensus really values when analyzing players that you dont. for me that would be average, OBP is just superior

Ben Clemens: well yeah but that one’s kinda cheating

Ben Clemens: I think that I’m a little down on fastballs, just overall, relative to consensus

Ben Clemens: like for me, 95% of pitchers, I’m nearly ignoring the fastball when I evaluate them unless it’s ‘throw this less’

Ben Clemens: because I just don’t think the difference between a 60th percentile fastball and a 40th percentile fastball is that important. They both suck. Don’t throw that pitch so much

James wood lover: who are your top 5 favorite players personality wise in baseball and why?

Ben Clemens: oh, fun one

Ben Clemens: Mookie is up there for me, I love how he manages to clearly love baseball and yet be very cool and collected even in big moments

Ben Clemens: Masyn Winn, potentially a residual from this tweet:

Ben Clemens: https://x.com/MasynWinn/status/1543096300324982785

Ben Clemens: Shota

Ben Clemens: oh, huuuuuuge Manny Machado teen movie villain energy fan

Ben Clemens: Alex Bregman fits into that category as well

Ben Clemens: Sean Doolittle is obviously an all time favorite, not active so I guess he doesn’t count anymore

Ben Clemens: Strider seems cool

Ben Clemens: there are a bunch!

Bosoxforlife: Francisco Lindor, Francisco Lindor, Francisco Lindor, Francisco Lindor and francisco Lindor.

Ben Clemens: yep, see, somehow I forgot him

Bosoxforlife: I was hoping to catch Skenes when I go to PNC park tomorrow night. If I am lucky tonight’s game gets rained out, 80% chance, and I can see two tomorrow.

Ben Clemens: Fingers crossed. Our editor, Matt Martell, saw him for the first time last year and was just raving about it for days. I’m sad I ahven’t gotten to see him in person yet

Ben Clemens: I remember the first time I saw deGrom in 2018 to this day

Guest: Years ago now Rowdy Tellez hit a home run at Fenway that statcast had as being longer than Ted Williams’s. It was immediately declared to be a glitch, the only statcast glitch that whole game. I am wrapping my body in tinfoil. Did the deep state meddle with history?

Ben Clemens: well now I have a new favorite conspiracy theory

barger believer: can we get some #bargerchat #addisonbarger #bargerincharger

Ben Clemens: I like

Ben Clemens: I want to write about

Ben Clemens: Thus, I sandbag takes

Why Always Mets: Lotta Mets fans freaking out over poor results in a couple Montas rehab starts. Justified? And the larger question is how worried should you about results while on rehab?(specifically for pitchers, who are presumably more focused on stuff/command than results)

Ben Clemens: I basically ignore them completely

Ben Clemens: b/c yes, they’re focused on small particular things

Dan: If you force your opponent to make a mid inning pitching change next inning you get a runner on first. More base runners, less mid inning pitching change. Rewarding good offense rather than arbitrary base runners.

Ben Clemens: love it

Eurybouttime: Excited at all for Eury Perez to return to the mound today?

Ben Clemens: Absolutely

That Guy: There’s a lot already written about players like Judge bucking the conventional wisdom of athletes of that size and stature excelling at the major league level. How much of that you think might just be selection bias? Athletes built like Judge end up in football or basketball more often than not for obvious reasons, so we never get to see more than a smattering of these tall, hulking goliaths being dedicated baseball players. Perhaps in another universe the league is overrun with Giancarlo Stanton clones and we’re making up even more juiced ball epidemics.

Ben Clemens: Loved this question but missed it earlier

Ben Clemens: I think a lot of it is selection bias, for sure

Ben Clemens: if you’re that athletic and that big, you’re going to get funneled into basketball, right?

Ben Clemens: every kid I knew growing up did

Adenolith: Dont know if you read Washington’s comments about launch angle and exit velo in the Sunday Notes column, but it struck me that there must be either be a pretty large disconnect between Wash and the LAA analytics dept (both purpose and execution), or there isnt an analytics dept. Is this still pretty common between front offices and managers?

Ben Clemens: I did, and yeah, I also read the comments section with popcorn in hand

Ben Clemens: I thought that was a really interesting interview, and I think it showed that the Angels front office hasn’t done a good job in communication, because if I got to talk to someone every day for years, as a numbers person who likes signing players like Zach Neto and Jo Adell, and didn’t convince my manager that they had real skills not including slap hitting that I wanted to nurture

Ben Clemens: well…. what was I doing with all those conversations?

Ben Clemens: I refuse to believe that Ron Washington is incapable of learning or changing. He’s clearly a bright guy and clearly a good teacher

Ben Clemens: this quote in particular:

Ben Clemens: See what I’m saying? Because, why? The industry has allowed it. The industry don’t care if you hit a buck-98 if you hit 25 or 30 out. If I could hit 30 home runs and get paid, and they don’t care about average, then I’m going to go for the home run.

Ben Clemens: like, the Angels front office is a part of ‘the industry’. They do not seem to be trying to impress that upon the guy they trust as a steward of their players. That feels poor ot me

Ben Clemens: Alright, I’m gonna do a lightning round because you guys have absolutely been killing it with the questions today

Ben Clemens: I need to go eat lunch but there are SO many good ones left

Ben Clemens: so gonna go really fast for five minutes

Adenolith: I’m a big fan of guys who bring energy, seem to love playing, don’t mind showboating a bit. Acuna, Jazz, Joey Bats from his peak playing days.

Ben Clemens: 100%

Ben Clemens: Joey Bats, love him

roger dodger: What kind of pitcher could Wilyer Abreu fetch on the trade market from an OF-needy team? Quinn Matthews? Andrew Abbott? Brandon Sproat?

Ben Clemens: more Abbott than Matthews/Sproat I think

Ben Clemens: I think the Mets are just not in the business of trading guys like Sproat anymore, unless they’re getting superstars back, not solid-rate regulars

Jonathan: Is Strider cooked or can he bounce back next year with a full offseason and Spring Training?

Ben Clemens: i mean, my money is on not cooked

Ben Clemens: that’s just a reasonable bet, right?

GBS42: My wife and I bought Ticket to Ride: Rails and Sails recently. So far it’s just the two of us who have played, but we’ll get a group of 4-5 soon. Thoughts on the game?

Ben Clemens: haven’t played it but I never really gravitated to train games. My stepbrother who is a big board gamer loves them, though, and I mean, they’re very popular

Guest: Why do you hate american cheese?

Ben Clemens: I actually do, even if I haven’t mentioned it before. Or rather… I think it’s fine, but there’s so much good cheese in the world

Ben Clemens: rare that I don’t see a better option

Ben Clemens: I love a good sharp cheddar more than almost anything else

Miami Fan: When I look at Alcantara stuff plus and pitching plus it is very good. I don’t know why he is struggling so much. Help me!

Ben Clemens: i dunno! let’s give him more time

James wood lover: I have a feeling Doolittle will be promoted from assistant pitching coach to pitching coach, and then eventually manager for the nats in the future. does he count as a favorite personality if he were to become a manager?

Ben Clemens: for sure

Ben Clemens: Dusty was on my list when he was active

Guest: Today’s chat is especially entertaining.  Thanks for taking all the questions!

Ben Clemens: thanks!

Vin da Bona: Worse contract so far ……Soto or Vladito?

Ben Clemens: haha

Re: Skenes: Odds Skenes is still a Pirate on Aug 1, 2026? I could see the pressure really mounting on them to cash in if they’re still directionless by then, which it certainly looks like they’ll be

Ben Clemens: 83%

Dos Muncys: Why does it seem like Minnesota has more injuries every year than most other teams? I know it’s unlikely but could there be an intrinsic organizational conditioning issue?

Ben Clemens: could be possible but like, could also be that they signed a guy who had failed two physicals that winter, and got him for a discount rate b/c of the expectation that he might be injury prone

“what if judge regress”: Not that I think he will hit .396 all year, but I keep seeing “well, Judge might lose the HR title to Raleigh and the RBI title to Devers and the BA to Wilson” like of all of those players to regress the most… JUDGE?

Ben Clemens: haha yeah when I did a Judge article about IBB’s I just used his stats for the last three+ years

Ben Clemens: and he has a 208 wRC+ over those 2146 PA’s

Ben Clemens: like…. stop wondering when he’s gonna suddenly just be a normal 140 wrC+ player

Ben Clemens: that ship sailed

Ben Clemens: and it’s already docked, dropped off its cargo, and returned

Guest: if pitch velocity has been of major human interest for decades, why is there still such old school resistance to batted ball velocity?

Ben Clemens: b/c it wasn’t on broadcasts in 1987

Adenolith: When I was growing up, youth baseball teams were always named after major league franchises. This year my daugher’s t-ball team is named the Yard Goats and I’m here for it.

Ben Clemens: ha that’s great

Ben Clemens: yeah our little leagues (boys club, I think) were the same

Bosoxforlife: Joey Bats club throw is one of the defining moments in my baseball watching history.

Ben Clemens: Soto bat carry for me is in that same general tier, but yes

AA: Will the braves bounce back and reach the postseason?

Ben Clemens: I have them missing despite playing very well

Judge’s peak: Already will be 6th all time in Yankees WAR soon (right behind Yogi). Fastest to completely change career perceptions from good to all timer?

Ben Clemens: truly crazy, and yeah

Ben Clemens: the guy is just….

Ham Fighter: Going back to 2023 Brewers pitchers have a 99 FIP-, Brewers batters have a 97 wRC+, and they’ve won the third most games in MLB (tied with ATL, two behind PHI for 2nd). Is “willful defiance of sabremetrics” the “New Moneyball”??

Ben Clemens: okay, loved this question, so one last long answer and then I’ll call it

Ben Clemens: i mean, you’re leaving out that they have had the best defense in baseball by a sizeable amount over that time

Ben Clemens: and the best baserunning in baseball, also by a lot

Ben Clemens: like…. those definitely matter, and very clearly to me, the Brewers front office has decided that those types of skillsets are cheaper for them to acquire

Ben Clemens: and provide more bang for their buck as a result

Ben Clemens: it’s no accident that they keep pushing further in those directions, and it’s definitely working

Ben Clemens: alright, with that said, I’m going to call it a day. Again, thank you all so much for the incredible variety of great questions this week

Ben Clemens: Let’s do it again next Monday.

Bob Loblaw: Taking Oracle out, what is your favorite park?

Ben Clemens: fine one last…. PNC or Citi

Ben Clemens: eh, PNC or Petco

Ben Clemens: but I love Citi