Meg Rowley: Hello! Welcome to the chat. Let’s chat!

Los: What piece are you stuck on?

Meg Rowley: Writing a thing on pitchers in blowout losses and am in that stage where I know what I want to say and have done all the research and gathered all my GIFs and now I just have to write the damn thing. I’ll finish today.

Meg Rowley: Or tonight, when the 2AM sillies hit.

tedthrilliams: with the two clear AL cy young favorites sidelined for the immediate future, who do you think takes charge of the race? gerrit cole seems to me the most likely “next best up” but i could see blake snell getting a lot of attention even with the innings deficit

Meg Rowley: I wonder how we’d react if Kevin Cash won Manager of the Year on the back of managing the opener strategy (I don’t think he’ll win, but do think he’ll get some down ballot consideration) and Snell won the Cy as their only guy who ever really starts.

Dan Szymborski: Hello, everyone! We start our 9th consecutive chat!

Jack: After the injury to Manaea, does Oakland make a last minute SP add? Who are some available names that could help that rotation?

Dan Szymborski: I’m not sure there are a lot of realistic targets left. And really, the way the A’s record is with castoff this year, they can probably sign Scott Kamieniecki and he’ll go 3-1, 3.40 for them.

John Beasley: Team that is least likely to win a World Series 2018-2027?

Dan Szymborski: Royals

Mike: Think the Yankees have what it takes in them to catch the Sox and win the division?

Jeff Sullivan: Hello friends

Jeff Sullivan: Welcome to Friday baseball chat

[REDACTED]: Ronald Acuna Jr. for the entire Mariners Farm System, who says no?

Jeff Sullivan: Let’s check in on The Board! https://www.fangraphs.com/scoutboard.aspx

Jeff Sullivan: The Mariners don’t have a single top-100 prospect https://www.fangraphs.com/scoutboard.aspx?draft=2018updated&type=0&pos…

Jeff Sullivan: Their best prospect currently has an FV estimation of 45

Eric A Longenhagen: What’s up, everybody? Baseball chat engage

Mike: Your Bryse Wilson–Michael Fulmer comp has me really intrigued. What is that based on? Velocity and GB rate? I was impressed with Wilson’s first start.

Eric A Longenhagen: The body, the pitch mix and quality of the stuff, the limitations with pitch utility and repertoire depth. Lotta similarities.

Dan: Brailyn Marquez. Thoughts?

Eric A Longenhagen: 19y/o Cubs lefty in short season. Thoughts are same as last year. Low-to-mid 90s, will show a 55 curveball and knows how to work it to both-handed hitters. I bet the changeup comes, he has good feel. Body went backwards from last summer to this year but it hasn’t affected performance.

Chris: Any clue what has happened to Mickey Moniak as of recently?

Jay Jaffe: Howdy, folks! Good afternoon and welcome to another edition of today’s chat. I’m hunched over a laptop as I write this, because for the second time within a month, my desktop computer (late 2014 27” iMac) has been sidelined by some kind of corrupted hard drive. The first time was on July 31; thankfully, this isn’t as high-stress a situation, but it’s a pain in the ass nonetheless. Apologies if bad ergonomics lead me to throw in the towel early today.

Rollie’s Mustache: Some smart people (like Jim Callis) are already predicting Vlad Jr to be a future HOF. Doesn’t that seem slightly irresponsible? Bryce Harper, for example, would need to average almost 4.5 WAR for the next 10 years to match the average HOF right fielder’s career WAR of 72.7. Entirely possible he does, but it’s not a given. And averaging 30 HR for the next decade leaves him short of 500. So if one of the most hyped prospects *ever* in Harper isn’t a lock seven years into his career, shouldn’t we exercise a bit more caution with a 19 year old likely to be a DH long-term?

Jay Jaffe: To an extent that’s half-comical and half-criminal, the Blue Jays seem to be doing everything they can to avoid calling up Vlad Jr. this year. Dude has hit .390/.447/.649, mostly in the upper minors, yet somehow he’s not ready for prime time because reasons.

I do think it’s perfectly reasonable to have reservations on Vlad Jr.’s path given the likelihood that he’s going to wind up on the left end of the defensive spectrum, but as I wrote in connection to Ronald Acuña, players who debut in the majors younger than 21 historically have a very high rate of making the Hall of Fame https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/instagraphs/acunas-hall-of-fame-chance…. For a player getting 1 PA in his age-19 season, it’s 10.5%, and at 100 PA, it’s 24%. At age 20, the numbers are 9.2% and 19%. The reality is that if you’re good enough to play in the majors at such a young age, you’re a major talent, but yes, it’s too early to start forging that plaque in Cooperstown.

Phil: Will Mike Mussina’s election hopefully either next year or 2020, help to “reset”, at least somewhat, the requirements for a SP to make the HOF? I mean, amazingly, his was still probably better than every current pitcher’s resume except Kershaw, but it feels like he could make a noticeable difference for guys like Verlander and Sabathia.

Jay Jaffe: Whether it’s next year or not (he’s on the writers’ ballot until 2023, not that I think it will take that long), Mussina’s election along with those of the late Roy Halladay (eligible this winter) and, eventually, Curt Schilling (if his mouth doesn’t set him back again) will help to define a more 21st-century oriented standard for Hall of Fame pitchers, but even then, there’s a break between them and the players we’re seeing today (Verlander et al) as far as the changing conditions.

CamdenWarehouse: congratulations on new addition. what’s Sandy’s JAWS score?

Kiley McDaniel: Hello reader, puppy took a long detour on the walk and I’m a pushover so here I am at 12:10. Lets see what you’ve got for me today.

Tommy N.: Did you see Ryan Weathers start yesterday? Looks like he’s pretty polished already is he more polished than Gore coming out of high school?

Kiley McDaniel: Didn’t see the start, but the level of polish is definitely comparable. Gore flashes 60’s with a better delivery and Weathers is more 55’s with no projection, short stride. Not like hugely different, but HS pitchers are risky and there’s lots of teenagers with big stuff, so these sorta small differences become important

Garrett: Anthopoulos just said he believes the Braves internal talent is better than what’s out on the market? Do you believe it’s true or is this just leverage.

Kiley McDaniel: Well in the sense that they didn’t need to go acquire a bunch of high octane arms bc they have Fried, Gohara, Wilson, Toussaint, Allard, Wright, etc. all hanging around is true. They still picked up a few veteran arms, but if fans think they should’ve cashed in two of those guys for Archer when there’s a chance one of those guys just is Archer going forward (but younger and way cheaper) is probably correct.

Shawn: Between Loaisiga and Domingo German – Who has the better chance to start and who would be the better RP? Overall, who has more FV?

Meg Rowley: Hello, and welcome to the chat.

Meg Rowley: There is a lot of smoke in Seattle. It is a bummer. But, a chat!

Nick : Robinson Cano had a dramatic HR for the Mariners last night. Is this the Mariners keeping their heads above water for a little longer before they finally drown? Or is there a rescue boat nearby?

Meg Rowley: I think it might be best described as there is a lifeboat nearby, but the crew of the boat has dropped one of the oars in the water and also, the A’s are a giant shark whose fin we can see.

Meg Rowley: The AL West being a race is very exciting and winning is better than losing. And surely the A’s can’t win like this… forever? I think the division still probably goes to the Astros, but it is hardly a far gone conclusion, and the A’s still probably hold on to the second wild card, but the M’s aren’t dead yet.

Nick : Why is Luis Urias still not on the Padres?

Matt: Who is less likely to break my heart this week – Bumgarner at Mets, or Pivetta in TOR?

Dan Szymborski: Pivetta mainly. The Mets are sadder.

Dbo: Whoa, new chat time. Did Carson finally decide to have two Szym chats, one for food and one for baseball?

Dan Szymborski: As Travis has moved on to 538, I reclaimed my old, classic time slot.

Dan Szymborski: When Travis came aboard, it was important to introduce him to the FanGraphs audience that may not have been as familiar with his work as mine, plus since I was only an auxiliary fangraphser, it didn’t make sense to let me keep the sweeter time slot over a paid employee!

Pie: How does ZiPs view Kopech ROS/next few years?

Jeff Sullivan: Hello friends

Jeff Sullivan: Welcome to Friday baseball chat

Jack: Concern level for Kevin Kiermaier? Just hasn’t been able to get going offensively this year, and doesn’t really seem like the same otherworldly defender anymore, either

Jeff Sullivan: Wouldn’t be a surprise if the defense were beginning to slow down — that’s the way it goes — but I think Kiermaier basically just needs an offseason reset. Seems like he’s never found his swing and timing since coming back from the torn ligament, and it doesn’t make sense to me that he would’ve just fallen apart for no other reason

Jeff Sullivan: I think he’ll get back to being a pretty good player next season, but the Rays would be wise not to count on him to play 140 games

Ross: Offseason trade idea: Marlins trade J.T. Realmuto to the Yankees for Gary Sanchez. Who says no?

Eric A Longenhagen: Hi from Tempe everyone, I’m back from Area Codes/PGAA and chatting again. I’ll get right to it so I can finish today’s prospect notes and get those up this afternoon.

Gerald: Do you like prospects? Baseball prospects to be clear.

Eric A Longenhagen: I’ve been called a ‘Prospect Pragmatist’ so I guess not. I’m interested in them, though.

Snooker: If you were to rank the various organizations based on player development, who would be up top, who would be at the bottom, and where would the Tigers fit?

Eric A Longenhagen: Top ones for me are CLE, LAD, NYY, hard not to put BAL at the bottom.  Some orgs, and I think DET falls into this category, are tough to evaluate through this lens because their roster situations have made it difficult.

Eric A Longenhagen: So for DET they’ve moved a bunch of players in trades or acquired them and two dev groups have touched them, so it’s hard to say who’s responsible for success/failure