Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat – 8/23/21

Ben Clemens: Hey everyone, welcome to the chat. I just got back from a dog walk, so didn’t have time to pre-populate the chat. I’m going to let the queue fill up for a few minutes before we start.

Erik: What stats have you found yourself looking at more often recently?

Ben Clemens: I’m looking more at various versions of hard hit rates for batters

Ben Clemens: I especially like this spray angle aware version that Alex Chamberlain wrote about earlier this year:

Ben Clemens: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/now-lets-tweak-hard-hit-rate-using-spray-a…

Ben Clemens: Basically hard hit rate will give pull hitters a natural advantage; pulled balls in the air are hit harder

Ben Clemens: so if you’re looking for someone with a chance to improve, looking for someone who mashes without maxing out their pull rate is a good place to start

Ben Clemens: On the pitching side, I’ve been looking a lot more at individual pitch whiff rates, looking for really good offerings rather than a pitcher’s overall performance

Ben Clemens: My thinking there is that mediocre pitches can be tinkered with

Ben Clemens: That’s been happening more and more

Ben Clemens: But great pitches? Those are a really good thing to build a foundation off of

Daniel: If you had to pick, one way or the other: Do the Giants make it past the NLDS?

Ben Clemens: I’ll take no, as that’s the smart money side

Ben Clemens: Our odds hvae them 26.6% to win the NLDS or better

Ben Clemens: Two reasons: one is that the Dodgers are right on their butts to win the division, and if that happens, it’s an obvious no

Ben Clemens: The other reason is that if they DO win the division, that likely sets them up for a winner-take-all with the Dodgers

Ben Clemens: Not great either!

Ben Clemens: It’s really rough the way things shook out for the Giants that they have the best record in baseball… and a two-game lead on a juggernaut that they’ll likely have to face in the playoffs no matter what they do

Jeff: If you’re checking out pitchers’ pitch whiff rates, surely you are on the Michael Lorenzen as SP wagon with I? That changeup! That 4 seam!

Ben Clemens: I was earlier in his career, the missed time makes me slightly more skeptical.

Ben Clemens: Also tbh his changeup doesn’t really jump out to me. Now, the cutter he’s using more this year? Into it

Zach: I saw you say a couple chats ago that statcast’s expected statistics ignore horizontal angle. Don’t you think that’s an issue given that horizontal angle absolutely matters in terms of battled ball outcome?

Ben Clemens: Yeah, it just depends what you’re using it for

Ben Clemens: There’s a lot of truth to the fact that batters exert less control over spray angle than launch angle

Ben Clemens: It would also be kind of weird to call a scorched grounder hit into the shortstop hole a 0-ish xwoba

Ben Clemens: but one hit 15 feet left a single basically every time

Ben Clemens: But yeah, I think using those stats to say what ‘should’ have happened is kinda okay, using them to predict what will happen doesn’t make a lot of sense, and they’re best treated as what they are: a composite number that tries to say ‘guys who hit the ball this hard and in the air this often do this well on average’

G.O.B.: Jayce going to lose his job if the Reds get WC2?

Rog: Reds or Padres?

Ben Clemens: I like the Reds’ odds. The Padres are entering the pain zone in their schedule, and they’re doing so while behind

Ben Clemens: That’s not what you like to see

Ben Clemens: As to whether Tingler loses his job, I don’t think he will? They fired their scapegoat already, and this one appears to be pretty squarely on the pitching/injuries side

Ben Clemens: He was also hand-picked by Preller

Ned Ryerson: Adam Wainwright Cy Young?

Ben Clemens: I mean…. no

Ben Clemens: But what an impressive season

Ben Clemens: It’d be one thing if he had a low-2s ERA or something

Ben Clemens: But he has the 10th-best ERA in the NL, and everyone in front of him is on a team with a better record (and only Marcus Stroman has a worse FIP)

David: Do the Cubs have any realistic chance to contend next year? Seems like they are close to the very worst team in baseball at the moment.

Ben Clemens: Their realistic chance to contend involves signing a bunch of free agents, extending Contreras (probably), and having Alzolay, Davis, et al turn their pitching staff into an unexpected juggernaut

Ben Clemens: So I guess no?

Ben Clemens: Because that’s not actually realistic

>this guy<: Going off an earlier question” Pat Wisdom is the best hitter for Cubs for ___ many more seasons? None of the kis are close to the bigs!

Ben Clemens: I mean, 0, I’ll take Contreras over him easy

Ben Clemens: He’s on the IL, but still

Ben Clemens: I’d take Happ too

Ben Clemens: But yeah, they do not have a fearsome lineup at the moment, it’s fair to say

Ryan: Burnes is on pace to have the second best single season FIP in the live ball era, yet seemingly everyone has him outside the top 2-3 in CY Young. Do you think the 30-40 less innings should really rule him out?

Ben Clemens: He’d be in my top 3, but I understand why some voters would rule him out.

Ben Clemens: But I just think they’re wrong? Like, pitching fewer innings is surely not ideal. But Burnes has been so good in those innings that I’d take Burnes + replacement level relievers over the field

Ben Clemens: There’s a reason he’s third in the NL in RA9-WAR despite an ERA much higher than his FIP (he’s in a tie with Zack Wheeler for first in fWAR)

>this guy<: But Ben, Contreras is sure to be traded by 22 deadline if not over the summer! Happ too if he can bounce back *at all*

Ben Clemens: Haha then gimme Madrigal

Ben Clemens: If we’re looking at next year

Re: Nats: I feel like it’s relatively rare for an organization to sell-off and try to rebuild around a retained young star the way the Nats are with Soto. Even more rare, a star who isn’t locked up long-term. Are there any comps? Perhaps some examples of what not to do?

barney gumble: seems like the nats want to lock up Soto long term. but what if he wants out? certainly messes with their future plans

Ben Clemens: Obviously if he wants out, that’s going to be a disaster

Ben Clemens: And no obvious historical comps come to mind, but I guess you could look at some of the shallow retools the Red Sox did (sometimes not on purpose) with stars on the roster

Ben Clemens: It’s certainly a weird one

G.O.B.: All this Frank Schwindel slander is ridiculous

Ben Clemens: Would I take Schwindel over Wisdom? I mean…. yeah maybe

Ben Clemens: Maybe I’m just poisoned by having followed Wisdom for a TON of uninspiring minor league seasons on the Cardinals

Ben Clemens: And I do think he’s a major league caliber player, albeit a second division one

Ben Clemens: But c’mon, 39% strikeout rate, and power numbers wildly higher than what he’s done in the past

Ben Clemens: I need to see more to believe it

Sadness: When it comes time for the O’s to start building a good team, how do they convince any top starter to pitch half of their games at the yard? Will trading end up being the only option for acquiring good starting pitching?

Ben Clemens: I think that should say ‘if’

Ben Clemens: But yes, it will not be easy to get pitchers to sign there

Ben Clemens: It won’t be easy to get hitters to sign there either!

Ben Clemens: The Orioles suck and they have to play the Yankees, Red Sox, and Rays a bunch

Guest: Can somebody write about Wainwright?

Ben Clemens: Someone should! Will it be me? Depends on whether the topics I’m considering for this week work out or not

Guest: 1999 Pedro FIP = 1.39, better than Burnes’ current FIP

Ben Clemens: I mean… yes, the best pitching season of all time is better than Corbin Burnes’s 2021

Ben Clemens: You got me

Tacoby Bellsbury: If you had to fill out an entire coaching staff (manager, bench coach, hitting coach, pitching coach, first base coach, third base coach) with members of the Avengers, who are you hiring for each role and why?

Ben Clemens: Ooh let’s see

Ben Clemens: Manager, give me Doctor Strange, assuming he can do the look at all the permutations thing

Ben Clemens: bench coach Rocket Raccoon to keep the mood light, third base coach Groot b/c he’d be good at waving people around, pitching coach Iron Man b/c he seems like he’d enjoy tinkering with mechanics

Ben Clemens: Hitting coach Thor b/c he swings a hammer?

Ben Clemens: And first base coach I dunno, let’s say Scarlet Witch, b/c she’s high on my avengers character power rankings so let’s get her in there somewhere

Will: What is the best stat you look at if you want to bet the Over or Under on a game?

Ben Clemens: probably RS/RA for each team, plus for the starters?

barney gumble: is there some legitimacy to nestor cortes? obviously he’s not a 2.50 ERA SP, but could he force himself into the yankees’ rotation?\

Nestor Cortes: I know he’s not this good, but he’s doing some genuinely skilled things out there.

Ben Clemens: there’s definitely some reality to it, but it kind of feels like his ability to live on soft contact is tenuous

Ben Clemens: Shades of Ivan Nova to me, as a Yankees rando who came up and was better than I expected despite stuff that doesn’t jump off the page

Nestor Cortes: So could he be a… 2 WAR guy going forward? He’s only 26, he could be an average pitcher.

Ben Clemens: Yeah Nova had 4 2-WAR seasons, that’s exactly the band I’m looking at

Mork Borg: “shallow retools the Red Sox did (sometimes not on purpose) ” – could you expand upon this?  When you say not on purpose, what does that mean?  Like they didn’t mean to contend or they didn’t mean to retool?

Ben Clemens: Oh, they didn’t mean to retool

Ben Clemens: That worst-to-first-to-worst stretch was presumably not on purpose

Chris: Mariners are still only at 3.2% to make the playoffs. That’s less than the mets, Cardinals and blue jays….

Ben Clemens: Yeah, that sounds about right! They’re marginally worse off than the Cardinals odds-wise… 1.5 games closer to the WC but with a team in their rearview and obviously they’ve been outscored by 62 runs this season so we’re skeptical about them

Ben Clemens: Worse than the Jays, basically same reaosn

Ben Clemens: I’ll give you that the Mets look weird though

Ben Clemens: They ahve really fallen out of it

JJ: Ben Clemens Has Arrived* (No question just thanks for everything you bring to FG)

Ben Clemens: Why thank you

Ben Clemens: Not loving the asterisk though 🙂

Ryan: Nats would be following the Freddie Freeman model

Ben Clemens: Yeah, this one is close enough!

Ben Clemens: I guess Turner is Simmons/Kimbrel in this analogy

Derek: I get to see two-way Ohtani in Baltimore on Wednesday and I am unreasonably excited for it. Any players in your lifetime you remember being similarly excited to see play in person?

Ben Clemens: First time I saw Trout was like that

Ben Clemens: Other than that, I saw Michael Jordan in Double-A when I was a kid

Ben Clemens: Well, that’s not true, the game got rained out

Ben Clemens: But I saw him get off the bus

Appa Yip Yip: If you’re the Jays do you try to bring back Semien, Ray, both, or look to find next year’s bounceback/breakout candidate?

Ben Clemens: Ray for me

Ben Clemens: I’m a long-term Robbie Ray believer

Mi Nombre: Brent Suter is 18-4 with a 60 ERA- in 95 relief innings since 2019 all while throwing his 87 MPH heater over 75% of the time & working at a Buehrle-esque pace. Is Brent Suter the most interesting pitcher in baseball?

Ben Clemens: Yeah he’s the best! Really fun to watch

CoryMC: In the NFL, a team’s record in close games tend to stabilize year to year. Is this true in the MLB as well? Does a team’s record in which 3 runs or less is needed to decide the outcome shift dramatically year to year?

Ben Clemens: Not exactly sure what you mean by stabilize, but it tends to revert heavily to the mean over time

RP: Reliever WAR is… odd but would you care to guess who is the top AL reliever by fWAR?

Ben Clemens: Hm

Ben Clemens: I haven’t looked, so I’m gonna be way off probably

Ben Clemens: But I have to think it’s gonna be someone weird like…. Paul Sewald maybe?

Ben Clemens: He’s been wildly good, as this chat comment helped remind me:

Chris: Is Paul sewald secretly the best reliever in the majors? He struck out the side with the bases loaded in extras!!

Loaisiga: (It’s me)

Ben Clemens: That is not who I would have guessed

Ben Clemens: Scott Barlow is second!

Appa Yip Yip: How long before the Avengers as coaches get popped for running a super power based cheating scheme? Sneak Vision into the stands and have him phase baseball’s through gloves. Groot poking a teeny root up to trip a dude as he rounds third. Iron Man doing all manner of stuff to the equipment.

Nomad T. Tam: Nomad T. Tam     Thanks Ben

Club Dub: Jake Cronenworth: Underappreciated in the wider world of baseball outside of San Diego?

Ben Clemens: I mean, we had him in our top 25 for trade value and didn’t get much team pushback

Ben Clemens: But fans? Probably

CoryMC: In regards to “stabilize”, yes what you said. The average close-game record is around .500 any given season so stabilize would be to revert back to .500.

Ben Clemens: Yeah, that happens in baseball as well

Alby: Roy Halladay pitched a perfect game for the Phillies, but his 27 consecutive outs in a single game is not the team record. That record is 32, second-longest in history to Harvey Haddix. Guess who holds it.

Ben Clemens: Wow, we’re doing some great old trivia now

Ben Clemens: Hm, it’s gotta be someone from WAY back in the day

Ben Clemens: Let’s go with Pete Alexander, b/c I know he was a Philly and it’s from the right era

Jeff: Any thoughts on Corey seager’s FA? Is he getting a huge deal no matter what or is he the most likely FA to take a one year deal ala Semien?

Ben Clemens: I think he’ll get a large deal. I dunno if it’s gonna be ‘wow can’t believe these numbers’ level but I think he gets 100mm+

Alby: Much more recent. Rick Wise. Same year he threw the 2HR no-hitter.

Ben Clemens: Wow I was way off

Ben Clemens: That’s a lot of consecutive outs

Judge: Aside from COVID, first fully healthy year (so far) since 2017 (when he actually did hurt his shoulder). How much does that (and what looks like a 5 WAR year) help his post-22 contract if he can do anything close to it again next year?

Ben Clemens: Oh, hugely so

Ben Clemens: The concern with Judge has mostly been health, and he has a scary track record there

Ben Clemens: So two straight years of health would go a long way toward convincing teams that he can handle a full workload

Drake: What do you think Stroman gets this offseason? Or will he take the QO again?

Ben Clemens: You can only get a QO once

Ben Clemens: I think he’ll get a Zack Wheeler light deal, or a Hyun Jin Ryu deal if you prefer

Ben Clemens: 4-5 years, 20-ish million a year

Alby: Wise gave up 3 runs before recording the first out in the 2nd. Gave up the next hit in the 12th. He also went 3-for-6.

Ben Clemens: Baseball is so weird!

Ben Clemens: I love old baseball lines

Cards: Wainwright now sitting 12th in fWar among all pitchers. How awesome is that?!!!

Ben Clemens: Yeah it’s tremendous

Ben Clemens: He was so cooked three years ago that I was tired of seeing him start

Ben Clemens: What a renaissance

barney gumble: RE: Judge: you say “convincing teamS”, plural. think there’s a shot he ends up somewhere other than the bronx?

Ben Clemens: Yeah, not incredibly likely, but why not? I’d be happy with the Cards signing him, and if the Yankees start caring more about the tax maybe they’ll do something dumb and let him go

Ben Clemens: But also, the more teams you convince, the more leverage you hvae

chilly: what sort of effect does having a manager like larussa have on the clubhouse?  idk if he permanently wrecked yermin, but scars were left.  Vaughn at the start of the yr.  sheets who maintained great plate discipline and k numbers, maybe just a babip issue…sent down.  others im prob forgetting.  thoughts?

Ben Clemens: Really hard to measure

Ben Clemens: I could let my bias creep in and say I’m sure it’s a bad effect

Ben Clemens: But I honestly just don’t know

Okra: Would teams be better off leaving guys like Bohm and Ke’Bryan Hayes in the minors until they learn to elevate the ball better?  Want your high ceiling prospects to reach their full potential and not much value is rushing to get another Hosmer to the majors.  Thoughts?

Ben Clemens: I mean, no

Ben Clemens: Teams who leave their good players in the minors for forever just suck and don’t give their fans good players to watch

Ben Clemens: If you could give me an example of a winning team doing this with success, I’d be more into it

Ben Clemens: But like…. no

BettsBellingerCaruso: Is there a Third-Time-Thru the order penalty kind of thing for relievers in a 5-7 game series if they see the same hitters more than once?

On the one hand maybe the hitters definitely will pick up on the delivery after seeing the same guy multiple times in a span of 5-7 days

on the other hand, maybe TTO penalty also comes from the fact that you’re seeing the same guy in multiple PAs in a row, and seeing some other arm slots in between lessens that effect

Has there been any research done on this?

Ben Clemens: Ben Lindbergh wrote something nice about it

Ben Clemens: https://www.theringer.com/2016/10/21/16043096/mlb-playoff-familiarity-…

Ben Clemens: Not exactly th e same thing but quite similar

Ned Ryerson: Is the Tyler O’Neill breakthrough for real?

Ben Clemens: If by real you mean he’s a sometime All Star with streaky but above-average overall offense

Ben Clemens: then yeah I’m in

fWAR and bWAR: What do you do when you’re looking at two wildly different results for a player? Like Miley right now, or Minor a few years ago. Do you just split the difference (like I do)?

Ben Clemens: I mean, basically?

Ben Clemens: If I’m doing a deeper dive I’ll look at more granular things, but if I want a rule of thumb? Split em

Ben Clemens: Over a very long time period, I’d prefer RA9-WAR

Ben Clemens: I’m not a huge fan of the way B-Ref handles defense

Ben Clemens: Er, let me rephrase. I’m a huge detractor

LFC Mike: Hi Ben. Have you seen any  of Luis Gil?  Minor league numbers had a high walk rate. Is he long term starter material or bullpen in the long run. Thanks

Ben Clemens: Watched his first start, I think he has a shot to stick as a starter but there’s reliever risk there

Ben Clemens: It’s basically what you’re saying, just control issues

Trout: I am deeply concerned about Trout’s longterm counting stats. I don’t think he’s going to get the big non-WAR milestones. This is like 5 straight years.

Ben Clemens: Yeah I agree

Ben Clemens: Health is a skill, sadly

Ben Clemens: I wish it were not the case, but blah

Will: Rate your top 5 bullpens at the moment

Ben Clemens: Wow, I have to be honest, I watch a ton of baseball and I’m still not sure I could do this

Ben Clemens: Brewers and White Sox probably 1-2 in some order

Ben Clemens: Just a ton of good arms there

Ben Clemens: Then I’d have the Mets, Yankees, and Rays in some order

Cronezone: Do you think Karinchak has any value at this time or is he done without the sticky stuff?

Ben Clemens: Leaning towards the latter

Ben Clemens: Since June 21 he has a 19.6% K rate, 14.4% walk rate

Ben Clemens: Yeeeeeesh

Joe: If you could change one thing to improve competitive balance in baseball what would it be?

Ben Clemens: One thing is a very small number of things

Ben Clemens: Um…. I’d change service time and salary rules so that the minimum salary is $1.5 million, and you become a free agent at 28 regardless of years of service

Ben Clemens: I’d like to do it with a cap/floor system and revenues that are automatically split with the players a la basketball, but that’s really hard with RSN’s

Laffy Tuffy: If you’re running the Pirates would you offer Wilmer Font a one year deal for $2.5 million with a 2023 team option for $2.75 million?

Ben Clemens: Sure why not? Very specific!

Mitch Meluskey: The Royals seem intent on contending in 2022 based on moves this year and comments – without a drastic change in how they spend do you see an offseason path toward this? They seem far off even if you take most optimistic view of what they could get from their current roster and prospects next year internally

Ben Clemens: Uh… I do not see an offseason path. I thought what needed to happen this year was for their young pitching to take a leap forward and well

Ben Clemens: It didn’t

rulescrap34: Recently Dan Connelly wrote in the Athletic that the Orioles prospects lack pitching depth other Grayson Rodriguez. Is that a fair assessment?

Ben Clemens: The BOARD can help with this, because I am certainly no expert in Orioles pitching depth

Ben Clemens: https://www.fangraphs.com/prospects/the-board/2021-in-season-prospect-…

Ben Clemens: We have Mike Baumann as their only non-Rodriguez starter prospect with much value

barney gumble: why do teams fire coaches midseaon (recently, Padres and Larry)? surely they know it won’t help. just to appease fans?

Ben Clemens: Maybe to light a fire under the players, too

Ben Clemens: But yeah, largely it’s optics

JB: re changes to baseball: I really like Goldstein’s take of starting service time upon signing.

Ben Clemens: That works for me too

Ben Clemens: Just something that defeats the ‘oh we’ll hide them in the minors for our own financial gain’ incentive

Jacques Pederson: the Cardinal outfield features 2 speed/power statcast darlings….and Dylan Carlson who is the opposite.

Ben Clemens: Yeah, Carlson’s hard hit numbers were never great and they’ve dipped as the year wears on

Ben Clemens: Max exit velo fine, overall hitting numbers fine, but it’s weird how low his hard hit rate is given that the other numbers are mostly middle of the pack

Ben Clemens: He’s kinda reverse O’Neill

>this guy<: re: changes to baseball- new extra innings rules will scrap the free runner but from now on only position players can pitch and only pitchers can hit

Ben Clemens: I’d like to see one game done this way

Ben Clemens: Ohtani’s value just keeps going up

Okra: How much longer can RSN’s survive with streaming getting more and more popular?

Ben Clemens: I think RSN’s will survive, they do sell the streaming broadcasts so they get a piece of that. But I thikn rights fees might be headed down rather than up

Jacques Pederson: Baumann is a much better writer than pitcher

Ben Clemens: And a pretty good pitcher at that, which means he must be a great writer

Lash: Any thoights on the owners initial CBA offer?

Ben Clemens: Not a serious one, put out there so that they could float a trial balloon to the media

Ben Clemens: Proposing a vastly lower luxury tax cap to the players was always gonna be a non-starter without far more serious concessions than a salary floor that affects about 5 teams

Ben Clemens: But I think the owners knew that

Ben Clemens: So they’re just putting it out there to gauge perception and maybe see if the plyaers say ‘oh we’re interested in some type of cap/floor system under different terms’

Ben Clemens: Seems like a totally fine negotiating decision to me. The serious offers are just gonna be backloaded, this is definitely a brinksmanship kinda situation

Beeks: How cool that Giannis is now a part owner of the Brewers!!!

Ben Clemens: Very neat. I think Aaron Rodgers is a part owner of the Bucks too

Ben Clemens: Wisconsin has a very cool sports community

Ben Clemens: I think it has something to do with the fact that there’s nothing to do but drink beer and watch tv for 8 months out of the year

Ben Clemens: And I mean that with love, my wife is from there and she’s a diehard Packers fan

Desmond: Ben please just take your out on a limb way to early guess on the team the following players sign with ? Seager,Correa,Bryant, Story and Seimen?

Ben Clemens: Hm. I’ll say Seager stays with the Dodgers, Correa goes to the Yankees, Bryant stays in SF, Story is a surprise signing in Cincinnati, and Semien

Ben Clemens: hm

Ben Clemens: signs with the…. Angels? I dunno that’s a tough one

Jay: Giants projected .510 win pct rest of season is 8th in NL …more a reflection of their schedule or still skeptical about roster?

Ben Clemens: More about the schedule, really. On our projected standings page, you can see what we project their ROS record to be against neutral competition

Ben Clemens: https://www.fangraphs.com/depthcharts.aspx?position=Standings

Ben Clemens: And that has the Giants at .547 ROS

Lash: Re: the question about keeping Bohm and Hayes down.. Don’t the Rays leave their good players in the minors forever? And it works for them…

Ben Clemens: I guess Franco is a recent example of that

Ben Clemens: But that was kinda different — he was clearly good enough to play in the majors and didn’t exactly have a skill to work on.

Ben Clemens: I’ll take that as a counterpoint, but honestly, as much flack as the Rays catch for that, their bigger move is usually shipping guys out before arb salaries go up

Ben Clemens: Rather than leaving them in the minors two years too long

Ben Clemens: They have such a 40-man crunch that they usually can’t afford to stash valuable contributors in the minors for TOO long

Excited: When I see my question pop up in blue it’s pretty gratifying

Ben Clemens: Gotta love when things flash

Ben Clemens: I feel the same way whenever I “win” anything, no matter what it is

JB: But Baz and Brujan are stuck down. Then again, they are in a thick playoff race, so maybe not the best time to tinker.

Ben Clemens: Yeah. To be honest I’m not sure Brujan would fit, which is a crazy thing to say

Ben Clemens: I don’t exactly get why we haven’t seen Baz in the majors

Ben Clemens: There’s no service time to be gained at this point

barney gumble: if the yankees do sign Correa or one of the other SS FA’s, what becomes of their infield logjam? Torres to second, Lemahieu to first? Voit to DH, and Rizzo walks?

Ben Clemens: Yeah basically this

Ben Clemens: With some chance that someone gets bumped to third over Urshela

Lash: Did you )now there are 12 teams with salaries under 100MM this year, for a total of $300MM. And only 6 non-Dodger teams over $180MM, for a total of $57MM. The $100MM minimum will affect more teams for more money than the $180 cap (which is a soft cap, just treated like a hard cap by 29 teams)..

Ben Clemens: You’re not looking at salary cap salary

Ben Clemens: which adds ~15 million to each team’s number

Ben Clemens: If you have a BP membership, you can look at Cots’ Contracts here

Ben Clemens: https://legacy.baseballprospectus.com/compensation/cots/

Ben Clemens: There are 6 teams under, if you count the Mariners (92.3mm)

Ben Clemens: 9 teams over

Ben Clemens: And the teams that are under are under by a combined 145, while the teams that are over come to 233

Ben Clemens: So uh, basically no?

Jason: Have you followed Daulton Varsho recently? Any thoughts on whether his recent uptick could continue into next season?

Ben Clemens: I’m in! And not just b/c I have him in Ottoneu

Lash: im not sure what the $15MM per team is for, but felt like I must’ve been missing something, so thanks..

Ben Clemens: Benefits and such

Ben Clemens: That counts against the tax

Ben Clemens: Health insurance, per diems, all that nonsense

Ben Clemens: I don’t know the exact details but it’s not just what’s written on contracts, it counts operating expenses for players in some ways

jaysfan9293: wrt the ‘yankees add a shortstop’ example above, is the best option really to lose rizzo?  I’d have thought they shop voit first (which apparently they’ve been doing since last winter) just to keep the lefthander (need to keep the dh spot open for stanton aswell)

Ben Clemens: Yeah, they could do that too

Ben Clemens: I’m not sure how much they want ot keep Rizzo but I would be very interested in it if I were them

Ben Clemens: He’s great!

Ben Clemens: And it feels like he’s healthy (he said hopefully)

Randy: Why does it seem that projections continue to undervalue the production the Giants have sustained this season? I recognize the Dodgers are a substantially better team, but shouldn’t results speak for themselves? When was the last time a team was in first since the end of April still so doubted this far along in the season?

Ben Clemens: Because projections weight several years of performance and the Giants have a ton of players having career-best or turn-back-the-clock years

Ben Clemens: It’s an interesting question, and you could argue that maybe the projections are too slow to pick up changes

Ben Clemens: But Dan (and Jared Cross of Steamer) didn’t just build models 10 years ago and sit on them without changing them

Ben Clemens: They’re constantly trying to improve them and eliminate blind spots and bias

Ben Clemens: I’m not saying they’re right, but I am saying that they’re not just saying ‘nope I think the Giants suck’

Correa: Would that be an even bigger story than a former Red Sox player coming to the Bronx? Wow.

Ben Clemens: Oh yeah it’d be AWESOME

Ben Clemens: Also the fans would love him right away obv

Ben Clemens: Assuming he produced

Steve O: Isn’t it absolutely insane that those benefits count against payroll?

Ben Clemens: I dunno, I’m not so weirded out by it

Ben Clemens: It’s weird that they’re variously reported or not reported

Ben Clemens: But if you said, say, half of revenues go to players

Ben Clemens: Wouldn’t you count paying for health insurance as some of that money th at goes to players?

Ben Clemens: I think I would

Bob: Better future value, Kelenic or Adell?

Ben Clemens: I’m on Kelenic but can neither confirm nor deny that it’s mostly b/c A-Rod was drooling over Adell last night and he’s the kiss of death

Steve O: I just thought it was strange since the NBA and NFL don’t do that. I’m sure it’s factored in somehow, just not into payroll.

Ben Clemens: Yeah, I think it makes sense to have it more in the background somewhere

Ben Clemens: But I think it does factor into the NBA’s revenue sharing. I should do some more reading on that

Lash: How do you feel about Aaron Ashby? Over 14 K/9 in the minors and with the organization with the Midas touch. Anything to be excited about there? Part 2 – do the Brewers add any value to a SP prospect compared to an average org?

Ben Clemens: Definitely something to be excited about there. I think at this point I’m a buyer of Brewers starting prospects

Ben Clemens: I dunno what the organization is doing right but they’re inarguably doing something right

Billy Beanie: Remember when Isaiah Kiner-Falefa was mad he didn’t get all-star votes… what happened?

Ben Clemens: Bat got cold, and defense too. I almost wonder if he’s hurt

Ben Clemens: He’s been making a ton of contact even as he slumps, which is not how you u sually see it

Rothschild: With 36ish games to go, do you think we see Mackenzie Gore appear in a major league game this season?

Ben Clemens: No. Think they’re likely to let him keep revamping his delivery over the offseason

Ben Clemens: Alright, a quick lightning round, and then I’m gonna go have some lunch.

Ben Clemens: Reheating some kung pao chickpeas I made over the weekend

Joe: Re: the salary floor, why do you add the 15 million per team?

Ben Clemens: I’m not adding it, I’m looking at the CBT calculations major league baseball d oes. They count non-payroll player expensese

Lash: What grade would you give the Cubs and Nats on their tear downs/rebuilds? Did any other team do a good job in your opinion?

Ben Clemens: Incomplete on both

Ben Clemens: The Cubs got good value trading their expiring contracts, now we see if they want to suck for five years while they develop 19-year-olds or try to be good quickly again

Ben Clemens: Nats, I like what they’re doing building around Soto but they need to sign people this offseason to make that work

Billy Beanie: At some point the A’s have to bench Andrus and see what Chapman or Harrison or Lowrie or even Pinder can do at SS, right? They’re running an NL-style lineup out there every day with his sub-.600 OPS… (Also, why were they not making calls on, like, Miguel Rojas?)

Ben Clemens: Them not picking up a shortstop at the deadline was surprising

Lash: Crystal ball me. Rank these teams in 2025. Pirates, Diamondbacks, Orioles

Ben Clemens: DBacks, O’s, Orioles

Ben Clemens: Wasn’t super sure on DBacks/O’s

Ben Clemens: Whoops, that should have Pirates third

Ben Clemens: But sick burn not ranking them at all, yeah that’s definitely what I intended…

Chris: He might stay a Dodger, but if he’s available do you think the yankees would be more likely to target seager than correa both because of the history and for the lefty bat?

Ben Clemens: Sure, but I don’ thikn the history matters so much

jaysfan9293: jays moves this offseason?  they’re in a weird spot at the moment with on one hand their core set and a 40-man crunch looming, but on the other a thinnish farm and shaky depth / bullpen – is their best move to spend rogers’ money to paper their issues or try and trade off their fringier pieces for improvements (up to and potentially including cavan biggio and lourdes gurriel jr)?

Ben Clemens: Some mixture. I don’t think trading Biggio is the way to go, I think with Semien leaving they need him

Chester Arthur: Pitchers stand ~53 feet away from these guys mashing 110+mph line drives… if someone can calculate the odds of Randy Johnson exploding a bird in flight, surely we can determine what the odds are of a pitcher getting a linedrive hit at his head is without time to react. I’m growing less and less optimistic baseball will protects pitchers until something terrible happens (I know Eric shares my opinion that something terrible already has happened more than once this year), but I’d be curious what the odds being reckoned with are, and am realizing this is a shameless request for an article on the topic.😬

Ben Clemens: Terrifying, I wish they wore those goofy hats

>this guy<: kung pao chickpeas? this is ‘merica, bub!

Ben Clemens: And what’s more American than taking some other culture’s food and putting a spin on it?

Lash: Does Greinke get the Wainwright treatment this offseason? Or is he still in demand?

Ben Clemens: Similar treatment. Age came for him

chilly: so frustrating that az keeps giving pt to asdrubal, peralta, etc almost equal to that of rojas, varsho and other youngsters.  can u think of any logical reason theyre doing this?  ive tried and im stumped

Ben Clemens: Just to have some semblance of competition, but yeah, I dunno, I’d like to see more of Varsho

Appa Yip Yip: Canned or dried?

Ben Clemens: Canned, but coated in corn starch and pan fried

Ben Clemens: Alright, have a great day everyone, and I’ll talk to you all next week.