Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat – 8/29/22

Ben Clemens: Hey everybody, welcome to the chat

Ben Clemens: I spent so long listening to arguments about how it’s good to give up home runs this weekend, and how spin rate is overrated but pitches with backspin are the best, that my brain is mush

Ben Clemens: So forgive me if I’m a little bit slow starting off

The Guy who asks the lunch question: What’s for lunch?

Ben Clemens: Leftovers. We made hakka-style eggplant last night (highly recommend, it’s from the Meyers+Chang cookbook) and some spicy summer squash

Ben Clemens: So those two on rice, basically

James: I have a hypothesis that umpires are less likely to give a called strike if the hitter checks their swing, even if the pitch was in the strike zone. Do you know if anyone has tested this or if there is any way to find stats on it?

Ben Clemens: I’ve always wondered bout this!

Ben Clemens: I don’t think it’s an easily trackable thing, unless Synergy is secretly tracking this and I didn’t know it

Ben Clemens: I would totally but it, but it’s totally anecdotal

Ben Clemens: My thinking is that if you start to offer at a breaking pitch and then hold up, the umpire is watching your bat instead of the ball. And then hey, you didn’t swing and the catcher finished low to catch it (presumably), probably a ball

Sammy So-so: I know this is all conjecture, but in a counterfactual where Cody Bellinger never had shoulder issues, do you think he still has the same career collapse? Is it more holes in his games that would have been exposed regardless or more the injury + surgery? Thanks.

Ben Clemens: I think that the best evidence in favor of it happening anyway is that all the problems he’s had in ’21 and ’22 were already happening in ’20 before he hurt his shoulder

Ben Clemens: Maybe he wouldn’t have fallen so far so fast, but I think it’s clear in retrospect that something was going wrong

Fan: Hello Ben, I had a question about platoons. I was trying to find the average platoon split for the average RHB and the average LHB. Can you help at all with this? Or do you know about how much better the average hitter is with the platoon advantage?

Ben Clemens: The website has an amazing tool called Splits Leaderboards that lets you do this

Ben Clemens: We should really make a tutorial of it sometime

Ben Clemens: But you can go to that page (it’s under ‘Leaders’ on the top menus), select MLB (to get leaguewide stats), and then ask for whatever split you want

Ben Clemens: Here, for example, is MLB, vs RHP, as LHH

Ben Clemens: https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders/splits-leaderboards?splitArr=2,3&spl…

Ben Clemens: You can come up with whatever splits you want by doing this, it’s really cool. The ‘Count’ splits really taught me a lot about the value of controlling the count

Tom: Ben, how could the Giants not repeat their 2021 season? I don’t understand

Ben Clemens: The Giants are a real mystery. I don’t exactly understand what was going on in the first place, but I also think they’ve been unlucky this year

Ben Clemens: I think it’s fair to say that they’ve got some things figured out, but you can think that and also think a lot of guys had career years last year

Ben Clemens: That’s kinda where I am at the moment

Ben Clemens: They could really use some actual stars so that they don’t need to build the whole team out of role players they’re maximizing

Lou Perltzman: Does John Smoltz share any of his salary with you? Ostensibly he’s being paid to explain things on TV but it appears his explanations require the Clemens Treatment to be understood

Ben Clemens: I wish!

Ben Clemens: I think that’s a bit unfair to him, he has a lot of air to fill, whereas I got to goof around Sunday afternoon at my leisure and write that

Ben Clemens: But I do wish there were former players who were good at expressing probabilistic ideas

Ben Clemens: someone in the comments mentioned that Jim Palmer does a good job of it, so there’s one example

Russell: Which team do you think has the best broadcast? That includes camera work as well.

Ben Clemens: The Mets. There are four or five teams whose announcers I really enjoy listening to. Of those, the Mets have the best camera work

Ben Clemens: The split screen of players facing off is one I particularly like, but they seem to get the best replay angles as well

Matt (Oceanside): Hi Ben! I have often wondered if some or all teams routinely lie about injuries to rest players, especially pitchers. The Dodgers just put Tony Gonsolin on the IL with a forearm strain, which sounds scary. However, all year the talk has been what are they going to do with his innings because he’d only thrown 128 before. He’s past that now, and I am not a conspiracy theorist or anything, but this seems like a situation where maybe an “injury” would be in the best interest of the player and the team. Thoughts?

Ben Clemens: This could definitely be precautionary

Ben Clemens: Think of it this way — let’s say there’s a 50% chance it’s a phantom injury, 40% it’s a tiny injury and the team is taking no chances given his innings and their division lead, and 10% it’s actually bad

Ben Clemens: That’s still more worrisome to hear than it was yesterday, even if you’re not tremendously concerned

Fan: Thanks Ben, I will use that. I always found the splits pages on Bref easier to work with, but I have not tried it on the leaderboard page as you suggest. I will do just that

Ben Clemens: Yeah, it took me a second to get used to, which is why I think we should maybe make a tutorial. But I really like it

Blake Seams: Alex Bregman has a 229 wRC+ so far this month. Is it Dad strength, or has he used some Mon-Star-esque power to absorb Yordan’s talent?

Ben Clemens: Just wrote about him!

Ben Clemens: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/alex-bregmans-triumphant-non-adjustment/

Ben Clemens: Also I think Yordan is hurt

inquirer: Is there a large difference in injury rates/time spent on IL between starters, relievers and position players at the MLB level?

Ben Clemens: Yes, pitchers get hurt far more frequently than position players

indecisive: Should I go see Corbin Carroll’s debut tonight?

Ben Clemens: If you live in Arizona, I wouldn’t go out of my way to see his debut specifically, but I’d try to catch a game with him playing this year

Ben Clemens: If you’re visiting, go out of your way to catch it

Jeff: Myers + Chang is amazing. So is Flour (her coffee shop / bakery) chain in Boston

Ben Clemens: I’ve never actually been to the restaurant, but my friends recommended the cookbook and it’s excellent

Prospects: With Bobby, Adley and Jrod as MLB Pipeline’s top 3 prospects to begin the season, I can’t remember any other season in which the top 3 preseason prospects have broken out and all looked like budding superstars in the same year. Truly amazing to watch.

Ben Clemens: The only one it really reminds me of is 2018 with Soto and Acuna

Ben Clemens: I haven’t followed prospectdom forever, obviously, but that’s the last time it felt quite so WOW THESE GUYS ARE AWESOME

Derek: How much do you care about award races? If at all, which race do you think is the most intriguing down the stretch?

Ben Clemens: I like them! I cared so much about them growing up that they have a hold on my brain

Ben Clemens: I think that AL Cy Young is a really intriguing race. I think NL MVP would be interesting if people valued defense a bit more, I think Arenado is a worthy candidate, but it seems like Goldschmidt has it sewn up

Kingpin: I know you’re not the fantasy expert, but I’m in 3rd right now & trying to move up as a lot of cats are close…would you trade Grissom (who would be a keeper next yr) for Betts (who would not be kept)?

Ben Clemens: I would, I am a bit down on Grissom’s long-term value just based on team construction, I wonder if he’ll get fewer PA’s than he merits

Mike: Kris Bryant certainly has had a better career than Bellinger. But did you except his career to fare better than it has?

Ben Clemens: I did

Ben Clemens: They’re very different players, obviously, but they kind of remind me of each other

Ben Clemens: Lofted swings, more power than you’d expect from their frame, defensively versatile (Bellinger is better by a ton there, but they’re both quite versatile)

Ben Clemens: I definitely expected Bryant to be better than he’s been, particularly after the start he got off to. It’s a good reminder of how tough baseball is

Ben Clemens: Everyone is good

Ben: Has anyone looked at just the top half of the order to understand the 3rd time through the order curse?  There seems to be some bias in the 3rd time through the number since the pitcher may get pulled before going all the way through the lineup (bad hitters bat lower).  Thus, a better comparison is how the pitcher does against the top 4 hitters the first and second time through compared to the third time.

Ben Clemens: Yes, that’s accounted for in all of the TTO penalty things I’ve read of late

Ben Clemens: I think last time I looked at it I bucketed it out by batting order position to account for it

Ben Clemens: it’s totally a real effect, though, and makes the headline number look worse than the actual effect

Bob: Mike trouts fly ball percentage is really high. Do you think it’s too high?

Ben Clemens: I do

Ben Clemens: I thikn it’s gonna come back down, though. Things like that are a bit volatile, and he’s obviously taking a more fly-heavy approach of late

Ben Clemens: But I don’t think it’s at an unacceptable level or anything like that

Jacob DeGrom: I’ve pitched less than 30 innings and I already have accrued more WAR than 10 qualified pitchers

Ben Clemens: God I love deGrom stats

Tim Teufel: Jrod or Tatis for the rest of their  careers?

Ben Clemens: post-suspension, Ii’m gonna take JRod by a hair

Ben Clemens: I actually had Tatis comfortably out in front beforehand, and I don’t *think* Tatis has just been juicing his whole career or anything of the sort. But you have to apply at least some chance that his stats should be downgraded, and that tips it over for me considering Tatis’s health concerns

Bob: Peak steroid era pedro or peak degrom? Who do you think is better.

Ben Clemens: I never really watched Pedro pitch that much

Ben Clemens: TV didn’ work the same then

Ben Clemens: I remember his postseason relief appearance against Cleveland, remember him just being dominant when I saw him, but I don’t have the same visceral wow factor with him

Ben Clemens: That said, I think I’d take Pedro’s stats? I dunno, it’s almost not worth parsing

Kwanbelievable: If somehow, someway the Orioles make the playoffs, does Rutschman become the favorite for AL ROY? He already surpassed Julio in WAR, and presumably he would maintain that lead if the Orioles do clinch a wild card

Ben Clemens: Yeah, I think that would be enough of a story for the voters even if you’re not really supposed to take that into account

Matt (Oceanside): What makes deGromm so good? I don’t get to watch a lot of his starts, but I have heard he usually throws only two pitches (FB and SL) but has a good CB and change? Is it more his velocity or more his command?

Ben Clemens: He has 80 command, throws 101, tunnels his pitches really well, and his mechanics are just perfect

Ben Clemens: The command is just unreal to watch

Ben Clemens: You can see an entire at-bat where all he does is throw 94mph sliders that dot the corner of the zone

Ben Clemens: the same corner, of course

Ex O’s: Funny that you mentioned Palmer as someone who expressed things well. He once said on air: “The lead arm is one of the more important arms for power hitters.” He is a pitching genius and I am not; I suspect he pitched off of hitter traits differently, and he tracked power hitters at least partly by their lead arm. It didn’t stop me from saying, ” Yep, the lead arm is definitely in the top two.”

Ben Clemens:

The Grand Nagus: Ben, do you have a favorite Star Trek episode

Ben Clemens: Oh, interesting

Ben Clemens: I watched a ton of TNG as a kid, but more the ‘whatever is on TV’ style than anything else

Ben Clemens: I think my favorite genre of episode is Q episodes, but the one I remember most is the poker game temporal causality loop one

Wally Backman: Do you believe in the Mets offense in the postseason?

Ben Clemens: Yeah as much as I believe in their offense in the regular season. They hvae the sixth-best offense in baseball so far, that doesn’t sound out of line to me

Appa Yip Yip: The episode where everyone on the enterprise starts de-evolving was so scary for seven year old me I went into the other room and played with bubble wrap while my family watched it.

Ben Clemens: Oh I remember that too! And the one where the world keeps collapsing around Dr. Crusher, that one stuck with me

Matt (Oceanside): At this point, if you are the Dodgers, you have to start Trayce Thompson over Bellinger in the post season right? Thompson is quite as good defensively, but he is solid, and Bellinger’s offense seems worse than any defensive downgrade at this point?

Ben Clemens: Boy, this is a tough one

Ben Clemens: I think they might just platoon them

Caribou: How do you feel about the Dodgers pitching staff in the playoffs. Most of them are way outperforming their FIP. Is that good defense or luck?

Ben Clemens: The Dodgers ALWAYS outperform their FIP

Ben Clemens: their defensive positioning is second to none

Ben Clemens: I reserve the right to change my opinion if Gonsolin is actually hurt

CB: What exactly is Moises Gomez? Seems like one of those Aristedes Aquino/Wily Mo Pena types who could come up and catch fire through the end of the season (before pitchers figure him out). IDK if the Cardinals have the ABs for him though.

Ben Clemens: Yeah, if the Cards had a spot for him, I’d try it out. They are just really slammed with guys they should be getting PT at the major league level though

Ben Clemens: What a wild season for a minor league veteran

Kwanbelievable: From your Star Trek episode answer, I take it you are a fan of time travel? What’s your favorite mind-bending TV show/movie of all time? I need recommendations

Ben Clemens: Oh, watch Dark

Ben Clemens: it was mind-bending to the extreme

Ben Clemens: I generally like convoluted plots and suspense. I’m watching ‘Surface’ on Apple TV right now and I’ve also really been enjoying that

Josh R: The new playoff format will have the 1 seed playing the winner of the 4/5 seed wild cards. But the 4 seed top wild card IMO will be better than the 3 seed worse division winner 80% of the time or more.  The Dodgers might have to face the Braves in the Dodgers first playoff round.  How dumb is this?

Ben Clemens: BP wrote about this, it’s definitely a problem but was already kind of a problem before

Ben Clemens: Like, the wild card is usually a better team than the worst division winner

Ben Clemens: always

Charl: RE: DeGrom and peak Pedro, I offer Buster Olney’s write-up of the time Martinez left the ’99 Yankees speechless: https://www.nytimes.com/1999/09/11/sports/baseball-1-hit-17-strikeouts…

Ben Clemens: Well that is fun

Sonny: The Angels, for a new owner, would have Mike Trout and probably not Ohtani. The Nationals have a great ballpark but no Juan Soto and lots of deferred salaries to pay. If you’re a billionaire looking for a high-profile tax shelter/pastime which would you prefer buy?

Ben Clemens: Boy I think I’d prefer to own the Nats but it’s kind of close

Ben Clemens: DC is a really good baseball town, at least in my experience, which tilts the needle that way

Ben Clemens: I wouldn’t care overly much about the current state of the team if I were an owner, it’s more of a long-term play. But I would care about the MASN deal, and I don’t know the specifics of how the O’s/Nats profit sharing works, so that’s a potential red flag

Didace: Do you listen to radio announcers? Are they all terrible (except for the home team, of course)? I had to listen to the Cubs radio recently and the announcing went something like this. “It’s top of the inning and the Cubs take the field. (A bunch of stuff about non-baseball things.) And there’s a grounder to second for the third out and the Cubs are out of a jam.” Seriously, I had no idea what was actually happening.

Ben Clemens: I had the FanGraphs readership crowdsource rankings for radio announcers a few years ago

Ben Clemens: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/radio-broadcast-crowdsourcing-results-part…

Ben Clemens: Here’s who people like the most

Jacob: How much does who specifically a GM is matter in this day and age? Given analytics departments, owners, and on field coaches, is it all just by committee at this point? (or, does it even matter who the tigers hire as a GM if they won’t pony up for more analytics and scouting)

Ben Clemens: I think it matters a ton. Setting the direction of the organization is really big. Coordinating an organization so that your scouts, analysts, coaches, etc. are not duplicating work, and are doing the best job of a)helping players perform their best b)finding new players to perform their best

Ben Clemens: That’s just really valuable

Ben Clemens: I think you can make an argument that who specifically manages a team isn’t very important in the grand scheme of things. But setting the organizational goals by itself is a really hard job

LoveMILBUnion: Hey Ben! Appreciate all the work! Could you pass along a request? Would really appreciate a sortable leaderboard based on the Roster Resource Power Rankings? Downloading all of the excel files and scrubbing them together is pretty arduous and the algorithm seems to be really good!

Ben Clemens: I definitely will

Sodo Mojo: How worried should I be about JP Crawford hitting long term and should the Mariners look at making an upgrade in the off season or their other more obvious upgrade paths for them?

Ben Clemens: I would not be worried about it at all

Ben Clemens: JP Crawford is a career league average hitter. This year… he’s league average

Ben Clemens: I’m curious why Statcast thinks his defense has been atrocious this year, but defensive metrics are still really noisy, so I’m not concerned about that just yet

Ben Clemens: If you want an above-average OBP shortstop with a good glove, Crawford fits that bill perfectly

Ben Clemens: And now that they don’t have Noelvi, it’s not like he’s blocking anyone

Trev: Stats philosophy question: We evaluate hitters by wOBA. Why not pitchers by wOBA? Or wOBA with a FIP element (Tango did this recently – k, bb, hr retains current weight, all others were set to .3 or so)

Ben Clemens: wOBAFIP is basically the same as FIP

Ben Clemens: since FIP does the same thing, just on a different scale

Ben Clemens: So I’d argue that evaluating pitchers by FIP is kind of like using skill-intensive wOBA

GraphsFan: Ben, ever tried a game called One Deck Dungeon? Had high hopes for it, but the rules learning curve seemed pretty steep.

Ben Clemens: Never heard of it, but I’ll ask some of my board game friends, it sounds like the kind of game I’d only play if one of my friends already knew it

paul: Andrew Knizner is not a good hitter but can you justify starting Yadi at this point (when it’s not wainwright on the bump)? He is slashing .180/.219/.180 since he came back from injury Aug 2 and is 0-17 recently. Since the break Knizner is slashing .306/.414/.429 (with an unreasonably high BABIP)

Ben Clemens: Yadi looks COOKED

Ben Clemens: Catching is just awful on your body

Ben Clemens: I think the team is already kind of leaning this way, he’s getting fewer starts than he used to and just taking time off, etc.

Ben Clemens: It’s going to be interesting to see what they do in a playoff situation

comish4lif: Are the Nationals measurably bad at developing players? Have they grabbed anyone off the scrap heap lately and “fixed them up?”

Ben Clemens: Yeah, I don’t think they’re great? They’re notably a tools-over-results front office

Ben Clemens: And they haven’t really turned those tools into results at a high rate

Ben Clemens: Or even an average rate

Ben Clemens: It’s no surprise to see Cade Cavalli and Josiah Gray with drool-worthy stuff and command that, uh, could be better

Tim: Did Yelich finally find an answer? He’s been good recently

Ben Clemens: Seems like hte best thing he’s done is hit two homers in two days

Ben Clemens: Overall, I’m skeptical that he’s suddenly turned back into a home run hitter, but it’s encouraging to see him able to turn on some balls

Ben Clemens: I still think he’s more leadoff hitter than slugger at this point

James: When the robots take over, how much do you expect the walk rate to increase from pitchers no longer getting a courtesy strike on 3-0 counts?

Ben Clemens: Not that much, to be honest

Ben Clemens: You can run some numbers on this; 14.9% of pitches outside the rulebook zone on 3-0 are called strikes

Ben Clemens: So, that sounds like a lot, but counts don’t reach 3-0 all that often, pitchers don’t miss the zone all that often in 3-0 counts, and pitchers still walk plenty of people on 3-1 anyway

Ben Clemens: It’s not like if you get that courtesy call the at-bat ends in a strikeout

Ben Clemens: Batters have walked 44% of the time on 3-1 this year (thanks splits leaderboard)

Ben Clemens: So let’s say that for every 100 3-0 counts, six that were courtesy strikes are now walks

Ben Clemens: so we have six extra walks, but of those 6, probably 3 would have been walks anyway

Ben Clemens: so 3 extra walks per 100 3-0 counts

Ben Clemens: There have been 5,730 3-0 counts this year. So 172 extra walks. That would move the needle roughly 1%

Ben Clemens: But umpires sometimes go the other way! 138 3-0 pitches this year have been in the zone but called balls

smoo: Do you think Stanton will be an impact bat ROS?

Ben Clemens: Yes

Some Guy: Speaking of Josiah Gray, is he using his fastball incorrectly? Seems like it’s not suited to work at the top of the zone due to the low spin rate and poor arm extension.

Ben Clemens: Eh, I don’t tihnk this is quite right, that thing has some nice carry to it, and the extension thing is just not a big deal to me because he gets a nice shallow angle on it

Ben Clemens: I think the bigger issue is that his command with it is terrible

Ben Clemens: He’s just leaving too many 94mph cookies middle-middle

Ben Clemens: I don’t thikn he deserves this many homers, but the way he pitches leaves him susceptible to loud contact

Carlos!: Is Bo Bichette just… like this now? Or just a bad year?

Ben Clemens: Bad year in my opinion, but it’s fair to be concerned

Ben Clemens: call it 75% bad year 25% new normal

Mariners Fan: Jared Kelenic, what does your gut tell you about his prospects at being an average MLB starter?

Ben Clemens: Low!

Rib: Expanding the MLBPA to include minor leaguers will have a tremendous impact on the game, will it not?  Not just for quality-of-life for minor leaguers, but for the salary scale, roster maneuvering, international players, the draft.  Seems to me like it will be huge.

Ben Clemens: It definitely will, and it will have far-reaching knock-on consequences that I haven’t really thought through

Ben Clemens: One thing’s for sure: the minors are going to look different in a few years

Carlos!: Is it me or is Sonny Gray often underrated by statheads yet often manages to beat expectations?

Ben Clemens: I feel like he’s pretty much properly rated

Ben Clemens: He’s a pretty good pitcher! And good in a lot of ways that we statheads value, good breaking ball and nice strikeout rates

Ben Clemens: His career ERA/FIP differential is tiny, and all his other ERA estimators (SIERA, xERA, xFIP, etc) come in pretty close to the mark as well

Ben Clemens: I think the biggest issue that keeps him from being seen as a top pitcher is consistency, and I dunno, if you’re a mid-3’s ERA pitcher, you’re bound to have some ups and downs

Ben Clemens: But ‘above average starter’ is a really nice thing to be in baseball and I think he’s squarely that

Brad: Think the last NL wild card spot comes down to which locker room, between SD and MIL, doesn’t end up imploding? Feel like both are less than ideal right now (Tatis news, Hader trade)

Ben Clemens: I guess so? I think the Padres are a bit better, clubhouse imploding or no, which gives them an edge

Ben Clemens: But both of those teams feel like they’re on the verge of collapse at the moment, anecdotally

Nate: Have you watched/will you watch the new League of Their Own?

Ben Clemens: I don’t have Prime, so

Matt (Oceanside): Question about the Athletics. If they eventually do move the team, would they get a lot of backlash if they tried to change the name? Seems like the Athletics have so much history behind the name, it would be kind of sad to see something different.

Ben Clemens: Yes, I think so. The A’s are just great

Ben Clemens: As a name

Ben Clemens: As a franchise…

Sonny: If you purchased the Angels how long before you renamed them the ‘California Angels?’

Ben Clemens: 1 minute

The Real Ben Clemens: How much more does Brady Singer have to pitch the way he has this year to be considered a top 30 pitcher in baseball

Ben Clemens: I’d say a few more months. For example, he’s third in RA9-WAR since the all star break, amazing!

Ben Clemens: But Justin Steele, Chris Bassitt, Drew Smyly, and Merrill Kelly are all in the top 10, and I wouldn’t consider any of them top 30 pitchres

Ben Clemens: I think Singer will need, say, two more full months of it

Ben Clemens: The prospect pedigree makes me believe more, and I’ve always thought he’d be great, but a little perspective is usually a good thing with pitchers

Mariners Fan: Does the new CBA have rewards for teams who win ROY?

Ben Clemens: Yes, if the player was on the team’s roster on opening day (and if they meet some other requirements)

Ben Clemens: It’s a bonus draft pick, which the M’s would be in line for

Some Guy: Is Emmanuel Clase the best closer in baseball right now?

Ben Clemens: For me it’s Edwin, but Clase and Helsley deserve spots too

Cryamongo: Does Cal Raleigh have the talent to be a top five overall catcher? Weird prospect development

Ben Clemens: Top 5 is too much

Blake: What’s happened to Josh Hader? Do you think the change of scenery has contributed to his inability to get out of this funk?

Ben Clemens: I think I’m incapable of speculating on that, it’s not knowable as far as I’m concerned

Big Fan: Ben, am I reading too much into the sequential monthly improvement in Michael Harris II’s walk rate?

Ben Clemens: Probably

Ben Clemens: His chase rate doesn’t show any appreciable trends, and honestly, his walk rate didn’t either until the last week

Ben Clemens: let’s give it a little longer

Guest: What do you think of sandy alcantara not really getting any run as an nl mvp candidate? He’s been so dominant and I think the innings are too many to ignore

Ben Clemens: In a down year, sure

Ben Clemens: Goldschmidt is hitting .338/.421/.629

Ben Clemens: He leads the NL in all three slash categories, and leads the majors in AVG/OBP (Judge has him in slug)

Ben Clemens: Also he’s on a good team, which voters still care about

Appa Yip Yip: The Jays fanbase has turned on Bichette pretty hard (we call him Bo and 2 it is both mean and factual) but it’s not uncommon for players to have a breakout season then struggle when the league adjusts. We’re just not really seeing Bichette adjust back thus far.

Ben Clemens: Yeah. Baseball is a game of adjustments…. but it’s fair to be worried about whether he’ll adjust this time

Guest: The Guardians have outperformed virtually all preseason expectations. Obviously their pitching has been crucial. What chance do you give them of winning vs. the Twins? Do the White Sox better than a 10% chance of winning the Central?

Ben Clemens: The Sox are done imo

Ben Clemens: This isn’t scientific but wow their clubhouse seems AWFUL

Ben Clemens: I think our odds seem about right, 2/3 Guardians 1/3 Twins

Ben Clemens: We have them as both pretty similar teams — they’ve been pretty similar teams so far this year. They have similar remaining schedules. Two games in the standings accounts for the difference in division odds, I buy that

Bob: Will Tony La Russa be fired after this season? How much does ownership effect these kinda of decisions. His two years in Chicago have been all sorts of weird and bad

Ben Clemens: Ownership has final say

Ben Clemens: And Jerry Reinsdorf has historically been a meddler and also very loyal

Ben Clemens: Alright, gonna go make the aforementioned lunch, and get to writing about Jose Berrios

Ben Clemens: Preview: his four-seam fastball would be best buried in the Mojave desert

Ben Clemens: Have a great week, everyone, and thanks for an extremely strong slate of questions todya.