Eric A Longenhagen: Good morning from Tempe. COVID wrecked your boy’s thanksgiving but I’m good to go to winter meetings. My cat came home with dilated pupils last night and the other one couldn’t stop smelling him. I have no other life updates.

Mortons: Quick scouting report on Cobb Hightower? Do you think he’s a top 5 Padres prospect?

Eric A Longenhagen: Hightower was an $850k or so HS signee from North Carolina. Good hitting hands, can really time and swuare a fasball, on time enough to pull, athletic build, didn’t get a thorough look at him playing defense because he wasn’t on the showcase circuit much and I didn’t see SD instructs….

Eric A Longenhagen: Top 5? Maybe. I’d definitely take Salas, De Vries, Mayfield, Cruz ahead of him but I can’t think of anyone off the very top of my head. Pena is good, I’d probably take him, too.

Kate: Assuming he comes back looking the same post-surgery, what are the odds Farmelo vaults up the Top 100 into elite territory?

Eric A Longenhagen: Uhh I’d guess of any of the guys like him and Alfredo Duno where the tools are so nutty bu there’s risk for whatever reason that the “hit it big” rate is like 25%. For every Elly or Oneil or Walcott I feel like there are three Bleises.

Eric A Longenhagen: Good morning from Tempe. I indeed have COVID and am  probably going to do an abbreviated version of chat today. If anyone wants two Todd Barry tickets for tonight at Crescent Ballroom they should holler at me.

Andy: It’s early but any thoughts on next year’s draft class?

Eric A Longenhagen: I really like the HS class, I think the college pitching crop will be way better than last year, I’m not sure Ethan Holliday is actually good

Syndergaardengnomes: Too soon for a breakdown of the top rule 5 guys available?

Eric A Longenhagen: It’s just such an inefficient, open-ended exercise with an enormous player pool. I could spend a while just scrolling through Roster Resource picking names that stand out to me, but now is not the time for it.

Eric A Longenhagen: Evan Reifert was one, just browsing the site like normal this week, that stood out to me.

Dan Szymborski: Welcome!

Dan Szymborski: Since it decided not to post in the queue for some reason at 11:40 and I had to force it at 11:57, there’s no queue built up, so feel free to ask any question, no matter how ridiculous

Dan Szymborski: And there’s a good chance I’ll be able to answer it, since asking me about how I evaluate pretzels or how many weird AIs I’ve made of Lindsey Graham is way better than awkward silence

Kate: Would Grant Holmes projection be worse if he was projected in the rotation?  In terms of how ZiPS projects his role, is that something you do manually?

Dan Szymborski: As a default, ZiPS will project a player based on their recent usage. It looks at the last four years and VERY heavily weights recent play.

Dan Szymborski: However, I have clickboxes for “full-time starter” or “full-time reliever” which will cause ZiPS to go back and translate the past baselines for a pitcher into full-time starter or full-time reliever lines, and then make a new projections

Jay Jaffe: Good afternoon, folks, and welcome to the first edition of my Tuesday chat in awhile. Between playoff coverage, election day, and a family emergency, I haven’t been able to fill this timeslot in awhile; apologies if you’ve been itching for a chat (also, please see a doctor if the itch persists).

Jay Jaffe: Yesterday I took a first look at this year’s BBWAA ballot, which features Ichiro Suzuki and CC Sabathia as the top first-year candidates and  Billy Wagner as the top holdover (https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-big-questions-about-the-2025-bbwaa-hal…). Today, my Era Committee series continues with a look at the candidacy of Dave Parker

Jay Jaffe: That one will go live at 12:30 I’m told. Vic Harris will follow tomorrow.

Jay Jaffe: One more bit of adminstration before I get into the questions. Since I last chatted, Bluesky has taken off as the social media platform of choice for baseball chatter of a certain bent, and almost everybody from the FanGraphs family now has an account there. Dan Szymborski helpfully put together a starter pack of the FG-related accounts here https://bsky.app/profile/dszymborski.bsky.social/post/3layykgak222s; I’m @jayjaffe.bsky.social there

Jay Jaffe: I’m winding down my participation on Uncle Elmo’s Authoritatian Disinfo, Grift,and Harassment platform but haven’t entirely figured out the timeline for that. If you want to interact with me and my work, that’s less likely to draw a response now.

Anyway, on with the show…

Filipe: Hi Jay! Do you think there’s going to be a lockout in 2026/27? Missed regular season games?

Eric A Longenhagen: Happy Friday morning, you hosers! It’s Fall League semi-final day so I’ll be (I think boldly/stupidly) riding my bike to Scottsdale Stadium this afternoon and mourning the end of our domestic baseball-watching calendar…

Eric A Longenhagen: This week I posted an update to the Foreign Pro Prospect list, and the Angels list…

Eric A Longenhagen: I also made some tweaks to what reads out on The Board: The Board | FanGraphs Baseball

Eric A Longenhagen: Thanks to Sean Dolinar for implementing this during the week

Eric A Longenhagen: Okay, vamanos a su preguntas

Phil: Updated thoughts on Denzel Clarke after his recent season and any looks at the AFL?

Billy Butler Did It: What is a realistic move the Royals could make to upgrade the offense?

Dan Szymborski: I don’t see a reason the Royals COULDNT go after Santander. Or at least Joc Pederson

Dan Szymborski: and welcome to SzymChat! With me finally done the ZiPS prep and it rolling out, chats are back

Brad M: Are we staring down a lockout in 2027? Missed games?

Dan Szymborski: Sadly, I do not expect a clean CBA agreement and I think it’s more likely than not that we miss games

Billy Butler Did It: What 1980s player would you be most interested in seeing how he would do playing today?

Eric A Longenhagen: Howdy from sunny Tempe, Arizona where last weekend I went people watching up by the college to see some Halloween craziness, and instead the lady sitting next to me at the bar had a seizure or a stroke or something and I got to play paramedic in front of like 24 people. Sometimes things don’t go the way you plan.

AN1: How are you feeling on Creed Willems? He has smoked some balls out west. Doesn’t K a ton either and is 21 for the first half of 2025. Anything there?

Eric A Longenhagen: I’ll take the under. He has power but chases a ton for a 1B and I’m not sure how long he’s going to be athletically viable. Some model-driven team would probably take him in a deal, though.

Dk: Would you trade Tong, Williams and Gilbert for Crochet? Would it be enough?

Eric A Longenhagen: I’d be trying to do better than that (I’d rather have Sproat than either Tong or Gilbert by kind of a lot, and I’d need to pry away at least one of Baty or Ronny Mo) but I appreciate you including Jett, who I think is gonna be good.

Scott M.: What do you make of Josue Briceno and Thayron Liranzo’s AFL performances so far? And what’s the likelihood either will stick at catcher?