Kiley McDaniel: Alrighty sorry for the last start let’s get rolling

Comment From tigel
man this chat is pretty legit.

Comment From Bret
It can be hard to separate the media needing content in Spring Training from what the team is actually thinking, but there sure is a lot of talk about Miguel Castro especially, and even Roberto Osuna, breaking camp with the Blue Jays. Castro is even scheduled to go three innings against the Yankees tonight. Is this insane?

Kiley McDaniel: Well you want to see what you have in ST, so stretching the young guys versus top competition is your best indicator without adding them to the 40-man. Still hard to see either break with the club for development purposes, but good performances here will speed up their timetable.

Comment From meatballsfly
is there any chance daniel norris begins the year in the MLB?

Kiley McDaniel: I don’t follow the day-to-day buzz quite as closely as other writers here for MLB spots, but my assumption is Marco Estrada and Aaron Sanchez take the 4/5 spots and Norris is the top callup at AAA. Although he could take Sanchez’s spot and shift Sanchez to the pen if Norris really pitches well in ST.

Dan Szymborski: Just in time! I actually totally forgot it was Monday

Comment From mymaus
Given Xander Boagarts hits 8th in the order, do you like him better than the following SS who bat higher: Andrus, Rollins, Castro, Aybar?

Dan Szymborski: Assuming this is a fantasy question, ZiPS has Bogaerts slightly behind that group.

Comment From Dan
How’s the final zipsing going?

Dan Szymborski: Lots to do – too many damn reuqests.

Dan Szymborski: And at least half of them are nonsense – I’m not projecting 17 year olds with 20 GCL PA.

Jeff Sullivan: Hello friends, welcome to the newly regularly scheduled Friday live baseball chat

Jeff Sullivan: For anyone who missed it, I’ve swapped places with Kiley, Tuesday < — > Friday, because Kiley is going to be doing a lot of Friday scouting

Jeff Sullivan: Also, a note: this is the last you’ll see of me for a few weeks. After this chat, I won’t be back on the FG pages until Tuesday, 3/31. Or never, in the event of a plane crash! Who’s to say

Comment From jocephus
you enjoy ferrells antics?

Jeff Sullivan: I wonder what the experience would’ve been in a world without Twitter. Twitter made me roll my eyes a lot sooner than I probably would’ve if I were just catching clips and live look-ins. See, Twitter has a way of beating anything into the ground within just the first handful of minutes

Jeff Sullivan: I didn’t stay tuned all day long, but I think overall it was well executed, and I’m not even that much of a Ferrell fan. Really captured the spirit of spring training. I was hoping for more opportunities for him to play defense

Eno Sarris: be here at the top of the hour. In the meantime, of

{“author”:”xxofMontrealxx”}:

Comment From Sir Nerdlington
Very impressed with Jayson Werth’s balanced approach when writing his own 2015 FG+ commentary. http://www.fangraphs.com/st…

Eno Sarris: That is an impressive typo.

Comment From Alex
Who has a bigger 2015 fantasy season, Albert Pujols or Carlos Santana?

Eno Sarris: I’ll bet on the younger guy, actually!

Paul Swydan: Hi everybody! Jeff and I will be here at 9 pm ET, and we promise that we’ll try not to injure any pitchers!! Until then, get your questions in. See you soon!

Jeff Zimmerman: We will try to get started in 10 minutes

Paul Swydan: One sec. Jeff needs a beer.

Comment From Uncle Jesse
Any favorite new/up-and-coming type graphs/data visualizations you’ve seen recently?

Paul Swydan: I haven’t been in touch with the world much in the past week, but I know our data viz is looking up since we brought Sean Dolinar on board. If you guys have things you would point to in this vein, please share!

Comment From Bomok
Who would you prefer in a dynasty league, Dylan Bundy or Andrew Heaney?

Kiley McDaniel: Just texted an exec “this Olivera thing is getting pretty nutty.” He said “totes.”

Comment From Stanatee the Manatee
Can you grade Carson’s fielding in this video? https://instagram.com/p/z8p…

Kiley McDaniel: I was the one hitting grounders to him with one of those really skinny plastic bats, so my bad on the backspin that killed the second one. I believe his skills rate a WTF on the 20-80.

Comment From Vslyke
Your writeup successfully turned me and several other Braves fans off of Hector Olivera. What do the Braves see in him? He seems like a much better fit for a team that is, you know, trying to win now and not in 2017.

Kiley McDaniel: Here’s the thing: he’s a good player and he’s big league ready. I was trying to re-set expectations for some obvious reasons because this thing was spinning out of control. I think he’ll be a 50 FV for at least a few years with some positional flexibility and it everything goes perfectly, he could be a 60 FV. That’s worth $10 million per year for a few years and if he was 27 with no injury history and he was playing in games 6 months ago, then it would be more like $15M per for 5-7 years.

I’d encourage you to root for landing him for under $50 million and for something in the $30s. I think he’s a solid gamble for a mid-market at that price.

Comment From Keith
Any Braves July 2 info? Thanks

Dan Szymborski: Chat has started but I’m still not quite ready

:

Comment From James
Zips LOVES Lucas Duda to the point where he’s a late 2nd round player in a 5×5 OBP! Thoughts?

Dan Szymborski: He may be an interesting sleeper in OBP leagues. Haven’t done my fantasy rankings yet

Comment From Power Ranger
Kind of a random question, but who do you trust to have a better season, Pujols or Carlos Santana?

Dan Szymborski: Santana I think still has more upside left.

Jeff Sullivan: Hello friends

Jeff Sullivan: I’m trying to chat from the FanGraphs house in Arizona. It’s loud and distracting and the internet is unreliable, but we’ll do the best we can do and exactly no more than that

Jeff Sullivan: I’ll start actually doing this in just a few minutes after the queue builds up

Comment From Eric
Hey Jeff. Can you help explain: when ZiPS was added to depth charts/projections Jays moved up from 37.5 to 39.4 projected WAR but went down in projected record from 84-78 to 83-79.

Jeff Sullivan: The projections aren’t based on WAR — they’re based on BaseRuns, and that can cause a few differences depending on team interactions. There’s also a bit of random noise, and the likelihood that while it looks like they dropped a win, they dropped a few tenths of a win. It’s not really anything to worry about

Comment From Greg
Which do you prefer, Cactus League or Grapefruit League?

Eno Sarris: Good morning from the FanGraphs house in Phoenix!

{“author”:”Anthony David”}:

Comment From mymaus
Is there anywehre on FG where I can get an export of Steamer projections with PT/IP adjusted by FG staff? It looks like these adjusted stats are only used in team projections. They would be EXTREMELY valuable to download.

Eno Sarris: I maybe mistaken, but I believe all projections not labeled “Steamer 600” are powered by our depth charts.

Comment From Matt
Will Prince Fielder bounce back?

Eno Sarris: I’m optimistic for him this year, but I do think things like this will continue to crop up.

Kiley McDaniel: Insert snappy intro here

Comment From Mike
Gee for Profar, who says no?

Kiley McDaniel: AMERICA

Comment From Jimmer
What are your thoughts on Funkhouser?

Kiley McDaniel: Seen him 5 or 6 times. Without fail, every time he’s been 91-95 t97, 55-60 SL, 50 CH, command flashes 50, solid chance to be #3 starter, but still some feel issues here and there. I’d guess 8-15 in the first round if he keeps this up.

Comment From mtsw
How would you describe your role on the Jason Garcia hype train? Do you drive the train? Did you build the train? Or do you merely ride said train?