Archive for Daily Graphings

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Yesterday, lead prospect analyst Dan Farnsworth published his excellently in-depth prospect list for the Toronto Blue Jays. In this companion piece, I look at that same Toronto farm system through the lens of my recently refined KATOH projection system. The Blue Jays have the 28th-best farm system in baseball according to KATOH.

There’s way more to prospect evaluation than just the stats, so if you haven’t already, I highly recommend you read Dan’s piece in addition to this one. KATOH has no idea how hard a pitcher throws, how good a hitter’s bat speed is, or what a player’s makeup is like. So it’s liable to miss big on players whose tools don’t line up with their performances. However, when paired with more scouting-based analyses, KATOH’s objectivity can be useful in identifying talented players who might be overlooked by the industry consensus or highly-touted prospects who might be over-hyped.

Below, I’ve grouped prospects into three groups: those who are forecast for two or more wins through their first six major-league seasons, those who receive a projection between 1.0 and 2.0 WAR though their first six seasons, and then any residual players who received Future Value (FV) grades of 45 or higher from Dan. Note that I generated forecasts only for players who accrued at least 200 plate appearances or batters faced last season. Also note that the projections for players over a relatively small sample are less reliable, especially when those samples came in the low minors.

*****

1. Richard Urena, SS (Profile)

KATOH Projection: 6.2 WAR
Dan’s Grade: 45 FV

Although he played the entire year as a 19-year-old, Urena belted 16 homers as a shortstop in A-ball. His 21% strikeout rate and 3% walk rate speak to his unrefined plate discipline, but Urena’s so good in other areas that KATOH doesn’t much care.

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If you look at the positional adjustments for Wins Above Replacement on our website, it looks like left and right field are equally valuable, and the second-easiest positions to play on the field. Generally, that seems about right — first base is where you put your slugger, and the corner-outfield spots is where you put your other sluggers.

And yet, if you look for bats that qualified for the batting title (and didn’t play catcher, the most platooned position on the field), you’ll find that there are fewer left fielders than any other position, and significantly so. Only 15 left fielders qualified last year. Even shortstop had 20 guys who reached that threshold. If you look at the Fans Scouting Report, left fielders were better defensively last year (overall and in almost every component) than they had been before in the life of the Report.

It seems that there’s a bit of a difference between left and right field, and in the types of players who are playing those positions. So I thought it made sense to ask the players what the difference actually was. It’s not as easy as putting the better arm in right field because he has a longer throw to third base.

Tim Leiper, Blue Jays first base coach: “The nuances for me… when the ball is hit directly at you, it’s learning how to open up toward the line. If you’re in right field and it’s a right-handed hitter, and he hits it directly at you, he probably stayed inside the ball and it’s going to slice to the line a little bit. Same thing with a left-handed hitter to left field. But I find that left-handed hitters actually have more slice to the ball than right-handed hitters. That’s probably because they’re right-hand dominant. The spin is different. I think the right-handed hitter’s balls have a lot more chance to stay true. I also think some outfielders maybe open up in one direction better than the other.”

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Seung Hwan Oh has faced 25 batters this season, and thus, 25 batters in his major league career. There. You can’t say I didn’t warn you about sample sizes limitations. But sometimes, a number just sticks out at you, and you can’t ignore it. Sometimes, a number is separated so far from the pack that even when you consider the limited sample and factor in the expected regression, it still means something. Sometimes, that number looks like this:

Blink, rub your eyes, do whatever you need to do, and then look at that last column again. More than half of all swings offered against Oh pitches this year have resulted in whiffs. He’s got nearly a 20 percentage point lead over Craig Kimbrel and Ken Giles. Look at that rate of contact inside the zone. Look at it! Oh has gotten whiffs at would-be strikes like Francisco Liriano has gotten whiffs at would-be balls. He’s been completely untouchable. Through 25 batters faced.

The lowest single-season contact rate ever allowed by a qualified reliever was 56% by Aroldis Chapman, in 2014. Both Chapman and Andrew Miller checked in below 60% last year. Oh clearly won’t stay near where he is, and he might not even stay near where Kimbrel is, but his first handful of big league appearances have been about as meaningful as they possibly could be, and I think I’m already comfortable saying that, at the very least, Oh isn’t going to be an easy at-bat for anyone. It seems like the Cardinals have found themselves a real weapon. The question is, just how strong is that weapon?

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Over the last few weeks in this space, we’ve conducted a ball-in-play based analysis of position players’ and starting pitchers’ 2015 performance, the most recent post featuring an examination of starting pitchers in the AL West. Next, we’ll take a similar look at relief pitchers. It’s admittedly a little dicey to evaluate relief pitchers in this manner. The sample sizes are much smaller, and filled with more noise. Still, it’s a worthwhile exercise that can show us the different manners in which closers, set-up men, et al, get it done.

First, some background on the process. I identified the 214 relief pitchers from both leagues who yielded the most batted balls in 2015, making sure that all team save leaders were included in the sample. From that group, I selected 28 pitchers from each league for further scrutiny. Pitchers are listed with their 2015 league mates; those who were traded during the season will appear in the division in which they compiled the most innings. Pitchers are listed in “tru” ERA order. For those who have not read my previous articles on the topic, “tru” ERA is the ERA pitchers “should” have compiled based on the actual BIP frequency and authority they allowed relative to the league. Here we go:

First, a little background. The larger group of 214 relievers had a cumulative strikeout rate of 22.2% and walk rate of 8.2%. Both rates are higher than the comparable marks for starters (19.8% and 7.0%, respectively). The larger group of relievers also conceded less authoritative contact than starters, allowing lesser overall (88.02 mph for relievers, 88.46 mph for starters), FLY/LD (91.24 vs. 91.78) and grounder (85.76 vs. 86.30) authority. With regard to BIP frequency, relievers outpaced starters in the key grounder rate category by 45.6% to 45.2%, and matched them in pop-up rate (3.2%).

The subset of relievers listed above generally represents the cream of the relief crop. Most of the column headers are self-explanatory, including average BIP speed (overall and by BIP type), BIP type frequency, K and BB rates, and traditional ERA-, FIP-, and “tru” ERA-. Each pitcher’s Adjusted Contact Score (ADJ C) is also listed. Again, for those of you who have not read my articles on the topic, Unadjusted Contact Score is derived by removing Ks and BBs from opposing hitters’ batting lines, assigning run values to all other events, and comparing them to a league average of 100. Adjusted Contact Score applies league-average production to each pitchers’ individual actual BIP type and velocity mix, and compares it to league average of 100.

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If George Springer’s rookie season was like a breath of fresh air, then last year represented a sigh of relief. The breath of fresh air, because Springer was not only great, but great in such a unique way. The sigh of relief because Springer’s uncommon profile made him an outlier in some potentially worrisome areas, and last year, he patched up his most glaring weaknesses. Namely, he made more contact, and while that didn’t boost his production, it didn’t hurt his production either, and it also made him feel like a much more certain thing. George Springer comes with fewer caveats now. His production is easier to explain.

I’ve compared Domingo Santana to Springer before. That comparison comes with the important disclaimer that Santana isn’t nearly as fast as Springer, nor does he appear to be as useful a defender, and so he’s never likely to be as valuable a package as Springer. But at the plate, they sure look similar, and Springer at the plate is one hell of a threat, as is. They’re both massive, freak athletes who swing and miss a ton but have enough power to where pitchers feel compelled to work around the zone, and both have good enough eyes to take their walks. They’re nearly identical in their aggression, swing plane, and penchant for going the other way.

And now, 2016 Santana is furthering the comp by making the same adjustment made by 2015 Springer. When I wrote that comparison piece last month, I included this paragraph near the end:

While being unique is interesting from the writer’s prospective, it also means that essentially nobody else is succeeding in the way Santana is attempting to, and that’s not exactly optimistic. It’s hard to be a big league player making as little contact as Santana does, and it’s hard to see Santana being able to put this all together and keep it up without making some adjustments to increase the contact rate, just like Springer did last year.

And now, for a few relevant statistics, comparing players with at least 50 plate appearances in each of the last two years to themselves:

Largest improvement in contact rate

1. John Jaso, +14%
2. Domingo Santana, +11%
3. Joe Mauer, +10%

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Previous editions: Arizona / Atlanta / Baltimore / Boston / Chicago AL / Chicago NL / Cincinnati  / Cleveland / Colorado / Detroit / Houston / Kansas City / Los Angeles (AL) / Los Angeles (NL) / Miami / Milwaukee / Minnesota / New York (AL) / New York (NL)  / Oakland / Philadelphia / Pittsburgh / San Diego / San Francisco / Seattle / St. Louis / Tampa Bay.

Last week, lead prospect analyst Dan Farnsworth published his excellently in-depth prospect list for the Texas Rangers. In this companion piece, I look at that same Texas farm system through the lens of my recently refined KATOH projection system. The Rangers have the fourth-best farm system in baseball according to KATOH.

There’s way more to prospect evaluation than just the stats, so if you haven’t already, I highly recommend you read Dan’s piece in addition to this one. KATOH has no idea how hard a pitcher throws, how good a hitter’s bat speed is, or what a player’s makeup is like. So it’s liable to miss big on players whose tools don’t line up with their performances. However, when paired with more scouting-based analyses, KATOH’s objectivity can be useful in identifying talented players who might be overlooked by the industry consensus or highly-touted prospects who might be over-hyped.

Below, I’ve grouped prospects into three groups: those who are forecast for two or more wins through their first six major-league seasons, those who receive a projection between 1.0 and 2.0 WAR though their first six seasons, and then any residual players who received Future Value (FV) grades of 45 or higher from Dan. Note that I generated forecasts only for players who accrued at least 200 plate appearances or batters faced last season. Also note that the projections for players over a relatively small sample are less reliable, especially when those samples came in the low minors.

*****

1. Nomar Mazara, OF (Profile)

KATOH Projection: 8.8 WAR
Dan’s Grade: 55+ FV Read the rest of this entry »

The Pittsburgh Pirates fired John Russell following the 2010 season and replaced him with Clint Hurdle. It’s hard to argue with the results. The perennial also-rans went on to become one of the best teams in the National League.

Hurdle deserves the praise he’s received. Given a second opportunity to manage — Colorado had canned him in 2009 — he’s made shrewd in-game moves and overseen a cohesive clubhouse. Along the way, he has adroitly balanced his old-school instincts with the data-driven philosophy of the front office.

Could the Pirates have turned the corner had they not made the change? It’s not implausible. In many respects, Russell and Hurdle are the same type of manager. According to Pirates GM Neal Huntington, there are “similarities in their foundations,” and he described Russell as “a quality person (with a) willingness to embrace different schools of thought.”

He sees differences as well. In Huntington’s opinion, their “execution of the role” isn’t the same, and Hurdle represented “a different voice with a different approach and skill set.”

Russell — now the bench coach in Baltimore, under Buck Showalter — agrees that a different voice can be needed. That doesn’t mean he feels it’s always necessary. Read the rest of this entry »

Jaime Garcia has had Tommy John surgery, rotator-cuff surgery, and thoracic-outlet surgery. Despite those setbacks — or perhaps to spite them — yesterday Garcia pitched the game of his life, throwing harder than he ever has during his career. Garcia’s afternoon was nearly perfect: a wild pitch on a strikeout, a walk that was erased by a double play, and one hard-hit single were the only blemishes on a 13-strikeout performance. Garcia’s performance was made possible by continuing to keep the Brewers hitters off balance.

Garcia’s opposition on the day often seemed dumbfounded by his arsenal, unable to figure out which pitch was coming and frequently finding themselves frozen. Twenty-six of Garcia’s pitches were taken for strikes, and these weren’t just get-ahead fastballs. Eight of the 13 Garcia strikeouts came looking. Given that so many pitches were taken, it’s probably necessary to check the strike zone and make sure Garcia was not benefiting from an expanded zone. Here was the zone against left-handers, from the catcher’s point of view.

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The Houston Astros are not off to the start they had hoped for. At 3-7, they find themselves in last place in the AL West, and ahead of only the winless Minnesota Twins in the American League overall. The cause of their slow start? The pitching, which ranks 27th in ERA and 24th in FIP. The back end of the rotation has been particularly lousy, with Collin McHugh, Doug Fister, and Mike Fiers having combined to allow 23 runs in 29 innings. And yet, those aren’t the Astros starters I’d be most concerned about right now. Instead, I’m a bit worried about reigning Cy Young winner Dallas Keuchel.

From a results perspective, he’s been okay-ish, with a 3.55 ERA through his first two starts. But the underlying numbers during those first two starts are a bit concerning. First, there’s this.

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Shane Greene just had a nice start the other day against the Pirates. He didn’t throw a changeup. He didn’t even throw a curve, according to one pitch-type algorithm. It was all fastballs and… well… breaking balls? Greene features a cutter and a slider, but where one begins and the other ends is tough to decide.

Let’s take a look at all of his non-fastballs from Wednesday, graphed by horizontal and vertical movement and velocity. Maybe you can see two pitches, even if one system saw three. Then flip the tab to see all of his breaking balls over his career. Now how many pitches do you see?

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