After having been permanently suspended from baseball for performance-enhancing-drug use, relief pitcher Jenrry Mejia announced this past March that he would be challenging his suspension in court, insisting that he’d been wrongfully accused of using PEDs. Mejia even went so far as to hire an attorney, Vincent White, who levied some pretty serious accusations against Major League Baseball. In particular, White contended that he had discovered evidence that the league had illegally hacked into MLB players’ social-media accounts in order to obtain evidence of their PED usage.

Despite the salacious nature of these allegations, Mejia has, to date, not yet elected to make good on his threat of filing suit against MLB. Mejia’s apparent unwillingness to sue hasn’t stopped his attorney from pursuing a case against the league, however.

This past Monday, White sent out a press release announcing that he would file a new lawsuit against MLB on Thursday, a case that he claimed was based on a “multi year investigation” that would bring to light “corrupt mob-like activity” by the league. Rather than filing the suit on behalf of Mejia, however, it turns out that White is instead representing Neiman Nix, a former 29th-round draft pick of the Cincinnati Reds, who went on to establish both his own baseball training academy, as well as an anti-aging clinic, in Florida.

Nix contends that MLB intentionally interfered with both of these business endeavors, perhaps most notably by subjecting his anti-aging clinic to many of the same, allegedly unsavory investigation techniques that the league used during the midst of the Biogenesis scandal. Nix’s lawsuit thus seeks to hold the league legally responsible for his resulting financial losses.

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The Padres continue to capitalize on the short-term success of their big leaguers by parlaying what might just be small-sample mirages into good prospects. For those of you missed my report on RHP Chris Paddack, who San Diego got from Miami in exchange for Fernando Rodney, that write up is here. The Padres arm du jour is Anderson Espinoza, one of baseball most electric young arms and, in my opinion, a great return for the likes of Drew Pomeranz. Read the rest of this entry »

The All-Star break is often just that — a much-needed break, for players and executives alike. You might’ve heard this before, but the regular season is something of a grind. Yet the break also comes just in advance of the trade deadline, so one can never get too comfortable. And as trades go, today there’s been a big one: Drew Pomeranz is going from the Padres to the Red Sox, and Anderson Espinoza is reportedly going from the Red Sox to the Padres.

Let’s get this out of the way now: The A’s look really silly. They looked silly even before this — Pomeranz was an All-Star! — but Espinoza is a major return, and quite preferable to Yonder Alonso and Marc Rzepczynski. This is a move I’m sure Oakland regrets. There’s another move I’m sure they regret more.

The Oakland part of this is funny. But the Boston and San Diego parts are also interesting, and obviously more relevant. For the Padres, this moves the rebuild forward, getting another boost from the Red Sox farm system. Perhaps the team learned a lesson from last summer’s inactivity. And for the Red Sox, they’ve now picked up one of the only quality starters known to be out there. Pomeranz’s sudden breakout appears to be legitimate. In question is how much he has left in the tank.

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One fact for you: After Tuesday, the American League has won 16 of the past 20 All-Star Games. The National League has won a lousy three, and then there was the silly one. That’s a pretty striking set of results.

Another fact for you: The fact above doesn’t really mean much. Leaving aside all the countless other considerations — we’re talking about 20 games. The Cubs have lost 14 of their past 20 games. The Phillies have won 12 of their past 20 games. The Cubs are a lot better than the Phillies. No one would ever argue that.

A third fact for you: Fans don’t really have league allegiances. It doesn’t really matter to fans which league is better. You just want your team to be good in its league, and then you want to win the last series. There aren’t rival AL and NL street gangs. Differences can exist, and so what.

But, a fourth fact: It’s often said the AL is better than the NL. It long has been. Is it still? It’s an easy thing to check up on, and we are now more than halfway through the season. We can look at things. These have been introductory facts. Let us now consider even more facts.

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The All-Star Game is behind us, the unofficial second half of the season is set to kick off and, today, we present the last installment in our position-by-position look at hitter contact quality. Last time, it was right fielders; this time, catchers. Granular ball-in-play data such as BIP frequencies, exit speed and launch angle are the key inputs in this analysis.

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Over the past few weeks I’ve seen Cleveland Indians prospects in several different places: at the club’s Spring Training complex in Goodyear, Arizona; at the Cal/Carolina League All-Star Game in Lake Elsinore, California; in Wilmington, Delaware; and at the Futures Game in San Diego. Below are my notes on some of Cleveland’s most relevant prospects scouted during this brief window.

Justus Sheffield, LHP, Lynchburg (High-A)

Once primarily a fastball/curveball pitcher, Sheffield’s most used secondary offering now appears to be a slider. His fastball sat 93-95 mph at the Cal/Carolina League All-Star Game in one inning of work and then was 92-94 in his first post-ASG start in Wilmington. Frequently, Sheffield, who is listed at 5-foot-10, fails to get on top of his fastball and the pitch comes in flat and hittable. The slider isn’t totally new — I wrote up Sheffield back in 2014 when it was his fourth option — but, considering how promising the curveball once looked, it’s a bit of surprise that that the slider has become his go-to secondary weapon. It was 84-86, some featured tight, two-plane movement while others were shorter and more cutter-like. It flashed above-average, and I think there’s a chance it could one day be a 55 offering, but was generally fringe-average to average. Sheffield is already trying to run his slider inside on right-handed hitters.

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One of Dino Ebel’s responsibilities as Mike Scioscia’s bench coach is positioning the outfielders. It’s a data-driven task. Ebel — now in his 12th season with the Angels — relies heavily on information provided by the front office and scouting staff. When you see Kole Calhoun move in several steps or Mike Trout shifting into the opposite-field gap, you can be sure it was done with probability in mind.

Ebel explained what goes into positioning the Anaheim outfield prior to a recent game at Fenway Park.

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Ebel on positioning the outfield: “We look at spray charts and who is pitching. We look at the last 150 at-bats to the last 1,000 at-bats, or whatever it is they give us. Our front office provides us with a lot of data and we put it all together. We have an in-house guy who does the dots.

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James McCann remains a work in progress, but he’s established himself as more than Detroit’s catcher of the future. The 26-year-old University of Arkansas product is entrenched as the Tigers’ primary backstop, having earned the lion’s share of playing time thanks to solid defense and strong leadership skills.

The one thing McCann hasn’t been providing is offense. The second-year player is slashing just .208/.259/.324, with five home runs. Those numbers have come over 53 games, as McCann missed three weeks in April with an ankle injury. Last season, he logged a .683 OPS in 114 games of big-league action.

McCann talked about his defensive game, including his game-calling and improved framing, earlier in the season.

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McCann on processing information and reading hitters: “There’s a stat for everything. You can look up what guys are hitting on 1-1 counts against sliders, and probably even what they’re doing in long sleeves versus short sleeves. That’s how crazy it gets. The information available to us is endless.

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A few months back, Jeff Sullivan asked me what type of baseball dork I am. A big one, is probably the answer, but Jeff was inquiring on a more specific level. He asked: hitting or pitching? I answered: defense. It’s what I was best at when I played the game. It’s what my favorite players did best growing up. It’s the area of the game, analytically speaking, which most interests me. I derive more pleasure doing deep dives on defense in cases of dissenting opinion — talking about guys like Eric Hosmer, Jose Iglesias, or Jay Bruce — probably moreso than any other type of post I write. This won’t be a super deep dive. This is more of an observation, some video, and maybe a few chuckles. With Bartolo Colon, there’s always some chuckles. We’re all Bartolo Colon dorks.

Because I’m a defense dork, I hand out my own Gold Glove Awards at the end of each year, which really are just the numbers’ Gold Glove Awards, because all the different defensive metrics in one is all I use for those posts. And so, because I do that at the end of each season for the posts, I often find myself doing it at the midway point of each season, as well, just to see. I bring this up because I just did it, and that’s why this post exists. Because here’s how the pitchers currently grade out:

Total Defensive Runs, Pitchers

1. Bartolo Colon, +3.8 runs saved
2. Zack Greinke, +3.6
3. Dallas Keuchel, +3.2
4. Tyler Chatwood, +3.0
5. Justin Verlander, +2.9

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Not too long ago, I wrote about how the Blue Jays have gotten back to hitting the snot out of the ball. That shouldn’t be too surprising — a year ago, the Blue Jays hit the snot out of the ball. There was something in there, though, I’ve had trouble shaking. I included it as just a throwaway remark, but with Jose Bautista sidelined for the past few weeks, Ezequiel Carrera has gotten regular playing time. And even Ezequiel Carrera has hit.

Odds are, you don’t care. At least, you don’t care much. Several of you might not have ever heard of Carrera before. He’s 29 and he’s made the rounds, and, well, low-profile players can get on good runs. Numbers like Carrera’s could be easy to ignore, but I’ve known of Carrera for years, and I dug in. Carrera has started to show something. Somethings, more like. He’s got a good batting line for the first time in his career. The Blue Jays, as an organization, seem to know something about hitting, and I’m wondering now if even Carrera is reaping the benefits.

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