Dan Szymborski: And the chat has begun, sayeth the clock.

Dan Szymborski: And as powerful as I like to imagine I am — though I am not — I cannot stop time.

Dan Szymborski: And it’s really hard to even break a watch!

Carl: Do you happen to know what Eric means when he projects a player as a “second division regular”? I keep missing his chats to ask. Who is a current MLB player that would constitute a “second division regular”?

Dan Szymborski: I don’t have the context, but before divisions, contenders and non-contenders were widely called first division and second division in the vernacular

Dan Szymborski: so a second division regular, if Eric is using it as I would expect him to, is a starter on a bad team who wouldn’t really push a contender towards the playoffs.

Meg Rowley: Hi all, and welcome to the chat.

Meg Rowley: Hope that everyone is doing as well as can be expected.

Meg Rowley: Let us chat!

Cat Latos:

How do you think one might counter the general sentiment that baseballers are greedy and make too much? It's annoying to hear my coworkers side with ownership.

Meg Rowley: I actually think there is a really good conversation to be had as a society about how we value and compensate different kinds of work, and whether that aligns with the value it brings to society. But if we have that convo, there’s no way that say, how we value Manny Machado’s work takes a hit but Ron Fowler’s fortunate remains intact. And since that isn’t what we’re really doing when we have these conversations, the way I’ve been talking about it with family is that these guys are assuming risk for themselves and their families, aren’t asking for hazard pay, and would simply like their bosses to do what they agreed to. There are a lot more zeroes at the end of the check, but the dynamic isn’t that different from the companies that are scaling back “hero pay.”

Josh: Do you have any advice on getting into the baseball analysis industry?

Jay Jaffe: Good afternoon, folks, and welcome to the first edition of my Tuesday FanGraphs chat, not to be confused with the Monday chats that weren’t working, schedule-wise, or the Thursday chats that prevailed before my daughter started preschool. Anyway, I’m here, wiping the sweat from my face after quickly slurping down a spicy bowl of Shin Ramyun, and it’s no coincidence that I just turned on the ESPN KBO replay of the NC Dinos and Doosan Bears. Let’s talk some baseball!

David: What are the chances we get mlb baseball in 2020?

Jay Jaffe: I think it’s more likely than not – maybe 2-to-1 in favor — but it’s not going to be ideal, and it will be controversial with regards to the risk factors, the level of testing relative to the population at large, and the protocols with regards to a player testing positive. Buckle up.

C M Keller: I was looking at JAWS for relievers and was surprised to see that Rollie Fingers – a second-ballot Hall of Famer and universally acknowledged top closer of his era – was so low in the rankings. Was he overrated, or is current WAR rating of modern one-inning closers not well-suited for evaluating relievers of, say, 1990 and earlier?

Jay Jaffe: WAR doesn’t work tremendously well for relievers in the first place, and Fingers wasn’t elite at run prevention (120 ERA+, compared to 126 for Gossage, 132 for Smith, 136 for Sutter, 141 for Hoffman, 147 for Wilhelm, and 205 for Rivera). He had a distinctive mustache and played a prominent role on some playoff and championship teams (oh, what might have been had he been healthy enough for the 1982 World Series), so he did have the Fame going for him, but he just wasn’t as dominant as some of his HOF peers.

Sonny: Really appreciate you making this time to chat. Working from home with a toddler these days is no joke. It reminds me of…wait, hold on…Get down from there! How did you get on top of the Fridge!?!…sorry I’m gonna have to call you back.

Eric A Longenhagen: Good day to you, chat.

Eric A Longenhagen: Hope everyone’s as well as can be, let’s dive right in because the first question requires a sizeable answer.

Other Eric: please explain these draft models we hear about

Eric A Longenhagen: So yeah, I can’t recall ever explicitly talking about this, so while I assume a lot of our readers know, I’m gonna give a crude overview right now…

Eric A Longenhagen: If you were to take a ton of data inputs from years and years of draft prospects (this can be anything, like their stats, TrackMan data, size, run times, tool grades, anything) and run a regression to determine which of those inputs correlated with their big league success (or failure) and *how much* they drive it, you’re building a crude model. You can then put this year’s class’ inputs into the model to help line up your board.

Eric A Longenhagen: You can do this across all sports. https://www.footballoutsiders.com/stat-analysis/2020/sackseer-2020

Dan Szymborski: AND GOT HERE

Dan Szymborski: I was finishing an article and it was a race against the clock!

Danny Almonte’s fastball: If you could make a chimera of any 2 current pitchers, who would they be for: the best, the most fun to watch, the most unique?

Dan Szymborski: A Bartolo Colon who pitches like Gerrit Cole!

Dan Szymborski: AND HE WOULD BE ALL OF THOSE THINGS

Danny Almonte’s fastball: Player you love who has a surprisingly low WAR?

Eric A Longenhagen: Good morning from Tempe. Let’s have a brisk chat.

bk: Regarding the draft, will there be any real team specific, substantiated rumors leading up to it? Or is this just a year of ranking players (as you have), without any real ability to conduct a well sourced mock draft?

Eric A Longenhagen: Mock drafts are going to be tougher this year because some of who I/we attached to players was based on what personnel were at what games, and then of course that dope was rolled into more dope as we’d call around share that. Now, you have to derive more from agents and from teams without incentive to mislead you in a situation, and both of those are more often impacted by ulterior motives than “This GM is at a game in May” which is typically all signal.

Greg: How does a five-round draft change strategy for teams with extra or fewer picks than normal?

Eric A Longenhagen: Depends where those picks are, not just that there are fewer.

Buff: Which team will be your next prospect report, and when will it come out? I live for these reports, have zero interest in KBO or sim league stuff.