I hope that you spared a thought over the holidays for the poor Naylor brothers. In a premise tailor-made for a lesser Hallmark movie, their time as teammates came to an end just four days before Christmas, when the Guardians traded Josh Naylor to the Diamondbacks in exchange for right-handed pitcher Slade Cecconi and a Competitive Balance Round B draft pick. Just 21 minutes after Jeff Passan broke the news that broke up the family, he also reported that veteran first baseman Carlos Santana had agreed to a one-year, $12-million deal to fill the hole Naylor left in the Cleveland infield. He failed to report on what, if anything, would fill the hole left in Bo Naylor’s heart.
After five years away, Santana is coming home to Cleveland for the third time — another solid premise for a Hallmark movie. In fact, he still has a home in Cleveland. Or he did, anyway. He put it on the market a few weeks ago and closed on a sale two days before signing with the Guardians. Another fun side note to Santana’s signing: He very nearly busted the We Tried Tracker. Ken Rosenthal listed seven other teams that were in on Santana: “The Seattle Mariners, Santana’s team in 2022, sought to reunite with him virtually the entire offseason, and were pushing for a resolution. Santana said both New York teams, Detroit and Arizona also were in the mix, while San Diego and Texas had asked him to wait.” If you’re keeping score at home, that’s four teams that were in the mix, two in the brand-new category of asking the player to wait, and then the extraordinarily thirsty Mariners. As you may have noticed, Rosenthal is citing Santana himself as the source for this information. If more players spoke to reporters about the interest they received, the tracker would look a lot more robust.
After running a combined wRC+ of 94 from 2020 to 2023, Santana suddenly rediscovered his form with the Twins in 2024. In his age-38 season, Santana ran a 114 wRC+ with 23 home runs, and his 11 fielding runs earned him his first Gold Glove. He racked up 3.0 WAR, more than he totaled in all but two of his 15 years in the big leagues, and good for the fifth-most WAR among first basemen last season. His average contact quality didn’t stray far from his career norms, and his vaunted batting eye remained about as strong as ever. The big difference is that 23.8% of his batted balls came in the form of line drives or fly balls to the pull side. That’s his highest rate since 2014. Focusing on pull-side power has been a major organizational focus for the Twins, so much so that before the season, Trevor Larnach decided he’d gone too far in that direction and needed to develop a more balanced approach. Whether or not the Twins were responsible for it, this approach change certainly worked for Santana, and the Guardians are hoping that he can keep both the bat and the glove going for one more year.
As for the Diamondbacks, they’re in for their first taste of life without a cornerstone at the cold corner since 2010. Naylor may not be peak Paul Goldschmidt or Christian Walker, but he’s been a top-10 first baseman over the past three years. As slugging first basemen who play bigger than the numbers suggest, Naylor and Santana have a lot in common. Both players are under six feet tall and both depend on the home run ball despite lacking jaw-dropping exit velocities. Naylor hits the ball on the ground more often and lacks Santana’s gift for staying within the strike zone, but he hits the ball harder. Despite comparable average exit velocities and hard-hit rates, Naylor’s 90th percentile exit velocity was 106 mph, significantly higher than Santana’s 103.7-mph mark. In 2024, despite running a bottom-quartile groundball rate, Naylor put up the first 30-homer season of his career, to go along with a 118 wRC+. He’s now reached that mark or higher in each of the last three seasons. His 2.3 WAR ranked 11th among first basemen in 2024, and his 7.0 WAR over the past three seasons ranked eighth.
Santana’s deal is for exactly the same amount as MLB Trade Rumors predicted that Naylor would get in his final year of arbitration, and that’s what makes this such a Cleveland move. The Guardians are taking on more risk due to Santana’s age and giving up Naylor’s higher upside, but essentially, they swapped out two similar players for identical prices and wound up with a draft pick and an interesting arm in Cecconi. Steamer projects Naylor to put up 2.0 WAR next season, compared to 1.2 for Santana. You can understand why, on the “Five and Dive” podcast, Jeffrey Paternostro called the move, “so Guardians (derogatory).” It took a whole lot of work for Cleveland to make its first base situation a bit dicier in exchange for a couple longshots.
Cecconi announced his arrival in Arizona with a bang in 2023, and I mean that very literally. He made four starts and three relief appearances, running a 4.33 ERA and 4.37 FIP. Cecconi entered the 2024 season as the D-backs’ no. 5 overall prospect and their system’s top-ranked pitcher, but he struggled mightily, running a 6.66 ERA and 5.02 FIP. He bounced between the minors and majors, and he was sent to the bullpen in late July, but his 4.49 xERA and 4.70 xFIP — while still nothing to write home about — were much less worrisome. Cecconi doesn’t rack up many whiffs or strikeouts, he doesn’t run a great groundball rate, and he doesn’t avoid hard contact. But what he does have is solid control, a fastball that can reach 98 mph, three other pitches that grade out as above average according to Pitching Bot, Stuff+, and StuffPro, and 0.155 years of service time.
The Rays were rumored to be interested in him at the trade deadline, and it’s entirely possible that the Guardians turn him into a serviceable pitcher. Although the fastball can reach 98, it averages closer to 94 and got rocked last season. Somehow, the Diamondbacks let Cecconi throw it 55% of the time anyway. Maybe the Guardians will get him in the pitching lab and help him figure out a fastball that works. Maybe they’ll make him a full-time reliever to bump his velocity back up to the top of its range. They’ll definitely have him throw his heater less often. Then again, maybe they just wanted that draft pick.
Which player had a better career, Dustin Pedroia or David Wright? I asked that question in a Twitter poll a few days ago, with the erstwhile Boston Red Sox second baseman outpolling the former New York Mets third baseman by a measure of 58.8% to 41.2%. Results aside, how they compare in historical significance has been on my mind. Both are on the Hall of Fame ballot I will be filling out in the coming days, and depending on what I decide to do with a pair of controversial players that have received my votes in recent years, each is a strong consideration for a checkmark. More on that in a moment.
It’s no secret that Pedroia and Wright were on track for Cooperstown prior to injuries sidetracking their seemingly clear paths. Rather than having opportunities to build on their counting stats, they finished with just 1,805 and 1,777 hits, and 44.8 and 51.3 WAR, respectively. That said, each has a resumé that includes an especially impressive 10-year stretch (Wright had 10 seasons with 100 or more games played. Pedroia had nine).
To wit:
From 2007-2016, Pedroia slashed .303/.368/.447 with an 118 wRC+ and 45 WAR. Over that span, he made four All-Star teams, won four Gold Gloves, and earned both Rookie of the Year and MVP honors. Moreover, he was an integral part of two World Series-winning teams.
From 2005-2014, Wright slashed .298/.379/.492 with a 134 wRC+ and 48.1 WAR. Over that span, he made seven All-Star teams and won two Gold Gloves. Unlike his Red Sox contemporary, he captured neither a Rookie of the Year or MVP award, nor did he play for a World Series winner. That said, as Jay Jaffe wrote earlier this month, “Wright is the greatest position player in Mets history.” Read the rest of this entry »
Although I was perhaps foolish to think that this past week would serve as something of an extension of the Winter Meetings, with a ton more dominoes falling, there was still a nice chunk of roster moves that rolled in. For most of this week, the significant updates to the Offseason Matrices document came on the Trades/Claims page, with the free agent moves being more complementary in nature. That is, until Friday afternoon, when Christian Walker and the Houston Astros reportedly agreed to a three-year deal. We’ll start with that move. Then, we’ll work our way through the other signings, move onto the week’s two major trades, and close with a two of the latest rumors.
Free Agent Signings
Astros Sign Christian Walker for Three Years, $60 Million
Walker gives the Astros their second new righty power bat, joining corner infielder Isaac Paredes, whom they acquired from the Cubs in exchange for Kyle Tucker. Walker will man first base, with Paredes staying at third base instead of sliding over to first, which would have happened if Houston had re-signed Alex Bregman or traded for Nolan Arenado. Walker’s signing almost definitely means that Bregman will not be returning to the Astros. If they add another starting-caliber position player, it will likely be an outfielder, and probably a lefty-hitting one.
More details of the signing are still to come. Michael Baumann will cover all that later in a more detailed write-up of the signing.
Effect on Other Teams
The Yankees were the other team most strongly connected to Walker, but they’re not without options at first base. They recently traded for Cody Bellinger (more on that move below), and while ideally he’d be their starting center fielder, he is also a capable first baseman. If they keep Bellinger in the outfield, they could sign Pete Alonso, Carlos Santana, or Paul Goldschmidt. Walker is an excellent player, but he’s far from the only first baseman available for teams looking to upgrade at the position.
Effect on Similar Players
Just because Walker matched his median contract prediction in both years and dollars, that doesn’t mean Alonso will get his median prediction of six years and $135 million. That said, Walker’s deal shows that there is a solid market for slugging first basemen. Alonso is four years younger than Walker and hits for more power, so he’ll almost certainly sign a larger deal than Walker. The question is how much money and for how many years teams are willing to commit to the 30-year-old Alonso, whose value all but exclusively comes from his bat. With Walker off the board, Alonso’s market could come into greater focus in the coming days and weeks.
The immediate effect on the Red Sox is basically nil. Sandoval underwent Tommy John surgery in late June, making a second-half return the best-case scenario for him. Once he’s back — which could be in 2026 — he’ll join Garrett Crochet, Tanner Houck, Kutter Crawford, Brayan Bello, and Lucas Giolito, who also is currently rehabbing from elbow surgery, in Boston’s rotation mix. He’s a good depth add to an organization that’s got some other depth arms — Richard Fitts, Cooper Criswell, Quinn Priester — but is short on impact high-level prospects.
Effect on Other Teams
Because of Sandoval’s delayed impact, there was never going to be much of an onus on teams who didn’t sign him to do something in response. He was always going to be a long-term play.
Effect on Similar Players
Sandoval’s sizable two-year rehab contract is good news for other starters in a similar boat. That group includes John Means, Marco Gonzales, Wade Miley, and José Urquidy. While Sandoval is younger than all of those guys, and therefore should beat the deals they eventually sign, Means and Urquidy are plausible to earn $10 million or more on two-year contracts.
Orioles Sign Tomoyuki Sugano for One Year, $13 Million
The Orioles shouldn’t — and probably won’t — abandon their quest for a top-end starter just because they added the 35-year-old Sugano, even if his excellent command makes him a strong upside play despite his age. Sugano will be guaranteed a rotation spot along with Zach Eflin, Grayson Rodriguez, and in all likelihood, Dean Kremer, but there’s still room for another arm to front the quintet.
A return of Corbin Burnes can’t be ruled out until he actually signs elsewhere, but the Giants and Blue Jays are viewed as front-runners for his services. A reunion with Jack Flaherty, who was traded to Baltimore in mid-2023 before his bounce-back 2024 season with the Tigers and Dodgers, is another option the team could be considering. Or, the Orioles could go the trade route and call the Padres about Dylan Cease or the Mariners about one of their starters.
Effect on Other Teams
Sugano’s upside and reasonable price tag likely earned him widespread interest, and other older free agent starters who will sign one-year deals just don’t have the track record that Sugano had in Japan. Teams will probably have to target lesser-caliber pitchers if they’re looking for rental starters, then.
Kelly takes the Cubs out of the market for another catcher; he’ll pair with Miguel Amaya in what should be a pretty even timeshare behind the plate. They’re both just keeping the seat warm for top prospect Moises Ballesteros.
Effect on Other Teams
Kelly was the last catcher available with a chance to sign a multi-year deal, so any other moves for free-agent catchers are going to be more temporary in nature. Yasmani Grandal, James McCann, and Elias Díaz are still on the market.
Effect on Similar Players
As mentioned above, there really aren’t any similar players left on the market. Kelly’s signing was effected by the similar catchers who signed two-year deals before him: Kyle Higashioka ($13.5 million) and Travis d’Arnaud ($12 million).
Phillies Sign Max Kepler for One Year, $10 Million
Barring a salary dump of Nick Castellanos, the Kepler signing may well finalize the Phillies’ outfield mix. Castellanos should be in the lineup just about every day, with left-handed hitters Kepler and Brandon Marsh playing mostly against righty pitchers, and Johan Rojas and Weston Wilson serving as their short-side platoon partners against left-handers.
Effect on Other Teams
There weren’t other teams in on Kepler, at least not publicly, so I don’t anticipate immediate cascading effects here. That said, with Kepler and Michael Conforto both off the board, the lefty outfielder market may start to percolate.
Effect on Similar Players
And Kepler gives those lefty outfielders another data point, along with Conforto’s $17 million price tag from the Dodgers. Lefties coming off rough years (as Kepler was) include Alex Verdugo and Jason Heyward. Meanwhile, Jesse Winker should be aiming higher than the $10 million Kepler got, considering he’s coming off a better season than the one Kepler had.
Soroka will reportedly return to the rotation for the Nationals, despite finishing the season on a dominant stretch out of the White Sox bullpen. MacKenzie Gore and Jake Irvin are sure to share the rotation with Soroka, with the last two spots currently coming down to a mix including (but not limited to) DJ Herz, Mitchell Parker, Cade Cavalli, Joan Adon, and Jackson Rutledge. The club may be content with that mix for now.
Effect on Other Teams
Soroka had widespread interest thanks to his excellent start to his career way back in 2019, his age (27), and his brilliance to finish the 2024 season. There aren’t exactly similar alternatives left on the market, though there are plenty of starters who will sign for right around that $9 million figure.
Effect on Similar Players
Seeing a team pay $9 million for a starter who was banished to the bullpen could be good news for other free agents who met that fate at the end of the season. However, as mentioned, those available arms don’t have the upside or traits that could translate to starting. Jakob Junis, Joe Ross, and Colin Rea are some of the pitchers who could be targeted as starters despite relieving to end the year, but none of the them brings the potential that Soroka does.
There weren’t other teams with reported interest in Canning, so as far as we know, teams won’t be pivoting en masse now that Canning is off the market.
Effect on Similar Players
Canning got a pretty strong deal after the Braves non-tendered him; his arbitration projection was $5.4 million, per MLBTradeRumors, so getting just $1.15 million less than that isn’t too shabby. That’s good news for Cal Quantrill, the other prominent non-tendered starter. Quantrill’s arbitration projection was $9 million; considering he’s coming off a better season than Canning, he should be able to sign for something in the $5-6 million range.
White Sox Sign Bryse Wilson for One Year, $1.05 Million
With a wide-open rotation competition after the Garrett Crochet trade, Wilson represents a new entrant. If he doesn’t win a spot there, he’ll head to the bullpen, where he’s pitched better in his career anyway.
Effect on Other Teams
Not much here. Wilson isn’t the type of player who drives the rumor mill, and while it’s fair to assume other teams were looking at him, there are plenty of other similar pitchers available.
Effect on Similar Players
Wilson is one of many pitchers who’ll sign small contracts in the coming weeks and months. This doesn’t change that.
Third base had been the most glaring positional need for the A’s, but they appear to have filled that hole with Urshela in the fold. The starting nine appears to be just about set, though they could always add some depth pieces.
Effect on Other Teams
The third base market was always thin beyond Alex Bregman, and it just got thinner. If you’re in need of a third baseman and don’t want to trade for one or pay for Bregman, Yoán Moncada, Josh Rojas, and Paul DeJong are just about your only choices left.
Effect on Similar Players
Urshela’s money hasn’t yet been reported, but once it is, that’ll help inform the earning potential for the above mentioned third basemen, especially because Urshela had a pretty weak season and doesn’t have much upside left at his age.
The Rangers’ biggest need entering the offseason was relief pitching, and Milner (plus Jacob Webb) don’t do a whole lot to help plug the leaks. Texas still needs a closer, whether that comes via a reunion with Kirby Yates or David Robertson, or a more expensive contract for Tanner Scott or Carlos Estévez.
Effect on Other Teams
Lefty relievers are always in strong supply in the offseason, but Milner offered an arm angle that’s different from most other lefties. Side-winder Tim Hill and soft-tossing Ryan Yarbrough are still available.
Effect on Similar Players
Milner’s contract could be something of a measuring stick for Hill and Yarbrough, though because Milner was non-tendered, he’s not in quite the same situation as the other two, who were free agents at the start of the offseason. Non-tenders tend to have their earnings more or less capped at what they would’ve made in arbitration, which for Milner would have been around $2.7 million.
You can’t replace Juan Soto, but in acquiring Bellinger, the Yankees are off to a decent start as they try to backfill the gaping hole in their lineup. Bellinger could end up playing either center field or first base for the Yankees, who entered this offseason needing to upgrade at both positions. (Yes, Aaron Judge was the best center fielder in baseball last year, but he’s better off playing a corner spot.) Bellinger’s ability to play both positions well allows the Yankees to cast a wider net looking for improvements between now and the start of the season. That’s exactly what they’re doing — look at all the players on the Matrix they’ve expressed interest in, marked in blue.
Where the Cubs Go From Here
A Bellinger trade looked like a fait accompli as soon as the Tucker trade went through, and having most of Bellinger’s money off the books will allow the Cubs to reinvest that cash into their bigger need: pitching. They could use multiple upgrades in their bullpen, and they could do that also by adding a starter, which would push Javier Assad into a relief role. With Bellinger gone, the Cubs could also use some bench depth, likely someone capable of playing third base who’ll compete with and push Matt Shaw for the job out of spring training.
The A’s rotation is in better shape than it was at the end of the season, with Springs and Luis Severino joining the fold, but their starting staff still lacks depth. They’ll probably keep looking to add starters, though their search will probably be limited to those in the market for cheap, short-term contracts.
Where the Rays Go From Here
The Rays were always going to deal from their surplus of starters, and Springs always made the most sense since he’s making real money by Tampa Bay’s standards. Getting a competitive balance pick (35th overall) is perhaps the big coup for the Rays here, though the electric, enigmatic Joe Boyle will certainly get a ton of attention from pitching coach Kyle Snyder. Springs may not be the last player the Rays trade away; Zack Littell, Yandy Díaz, and Brandon Lowe reportedly have all come up in trade talks.
Biggest Rumors of the Week
• Earlier this week, before the Astros signed Walker, they nearly traded for Arenado, who would’ve been a great fit for Houston’s Minute Maid Park with the Crawford Boxes in left. However, Arenado decided he’d to stay with the Cardinals — at least for now. The veteran third baseman reportedly exercised his no-trade clause and vetoed an agreed upon swap that would’ve sent him from St. Louis to Houston. According to MLB.com, Arenado is willing to accept a trade to six teams — the Red Sox, Mets, Phillies, Dodgers, Padres, and Angels — though it’s unclear if that’s a complete list. Several of those teams don’t have a spot for him anyway. Earlier today, Michael Baumann wrote about Arenado’s diminished performance and what his trade market might be. You should check that out for a more detailed look.
• In another installment of “things that didn’t actually happen,” Jeff Passan of ESPN has a good look at why the post-Soto free agency dam hasn’t really burst yet. Based on Jeff’s reporting, there’s no reason to believe we’re in for a glacially slow offseason a la 2018-19, but the remaining big moves look to be coming after Christmas.
Eric A Longenhagen: Good noon from chilly Philadelphia, I’m coming to you from a hotel room awaiting the arrival of a bunch of my hometown buds for a wedding.
12:02
Eric A Longenhagen: You might already know the Cubs list went live today, please enjoy.
12:02
Eric A Longenhagen: Let’s get it.
12:02
Matt: When might we expect to see the 2025 MLB Draft class to be put on The Board?
12:03
Eric A Longenhagen: Probably prospect week. Travis and I have a huge ranking lurking in the background but he wrote a bunch of the reports and is about to be hired by a team. They may want to sequester his opinions and I certainly won’t pass his work off as my own, so a lot of the college class’ reports have to be rewritten (which is fine, it’s for a great reason).
12:04
Guest: when are you going to be throwing the J15 prospects on the board
I want to start off by saying that I was devastated — devastated — to learn that Nolan Arenadoreportedly vetoed a trade to the Houston Astros. I guess it would’ve made some baseball sense, as Alex Bregman’s departure leaves a vacancy at third base, and new acquisition Isaac Paredes could easily slide across the diamond to first. Plus, Arenado is a three-time National League home run leader with a long history of hitting the ball in the air and to the pull side. Surely he’d find something to like about the Crawford Boxes.
Right after FanGraphs published my piece on the Kirby Index, the metric’s namesake lost his touch. George Kirby’s trademark command — so reliable that I felt comfortable naming a statistic after him — fell off a cliff. While the walk rate remained under control, the home run rate spiked; he allowed seven home runs in May, all on pitches where he missed his target by a significant margin.
Watching the namesake of my new metric turn mediocre immediately following publication was among the many humbling experiences of publishing this story. Nevertheless, I wanted to revisit the piece. For one, it’s December. And writing the story led me down a fascinating rabbit hole: While I learned that the Kirby Index has its flaws, I also learned a ton about contemporary efforts to quantify pitcher command.
But first, what is the Kirby Index? I found that release angles, in concert with release height and width, almost perfectly predicted the location of a pitch. If these two variables told you almost everything about the location of a pitch, then a measurement of their variation for individual pitchers could theoretically provide novel information about pitcher command.
This got a few people mad on Twitter, including baseball’s eminent physicist Alan Nathan and Greg Rybarczyk, the creator of the “Hit Tracker” and a former member of the Red Sox front office. These two — particularly Rybarczyk — took issue with my use of machine learning to make these predictions, arguing that my use of machine learning suggested I didn’t understand the actual mechanics of why a pitch goes where it goes.
“You’re spot on, Alan,” wrote Rybarczyk. “The amazement that trajectory and launch parameters are strongly associated with where the ball ends up can only come from people who see tracking data as columns of digits rather than measurements of reality that reflect the underlying physics.”
While the tone was a bit much, Rybarczyk had a point. My “amazement” would have been tempered with a more thorough understanding of how Statcast calculates the location where a pitch crosses home plate. After publication, I learned that the nine-parameter fit explains why pitch location could be so powerfully predicted by release angles.
The location of a pitch is derived from the initial velocity, initial release point, and initial acceleration of the pitch in three dimensions. (These are the nine parameters.) Release angles are calculated using initial velocity and initial release point. Because the location of the pitch and the release angle are both derived from the 9P fit, it makes sense that they’d be almost perfectly correlated.
This led to a reasonable critique: If release angles are location information in a different form, why not just apply the same technique of measuring variation on the pitch locations themselves? This is a fair question. But using locations would have undermined the conclusion of that Kirby Index piece — that biomechanical data like release angles could improve the precision of command measurements.
Teams, with their access to KinaTrax data, could create their own version of the Kirby Index, not with implied release angles derived from the nine-parameter fit, but with the position of wrists and arms captured at the moment of release. The Kirby Index piece wasn’t just about creating a new way to measure command; I wanted it to point toward one specific way that the new data revolution in baseball would unfold.
But enough about that. It’s time for the leaderboards. I removed all pitchers with fewer than 500 fastballs. Here are the top 20 in the Kirby Index for the 2024 season:
A few takeaways for me: First, I am so grateful Kirby got it together and finished in the top three. Death, taxes, and George Kirby throwing fastballs where he wants. Second, the top and bottom of the leaderboards are satisfying. Cody Bradford throws 89 and lives off his elite command, and Joe Boyle — well, there’s a reason the A’s threw him in as a piece in the Jeffrey Springs trade despite his otherworldly stuff. Third, there are guys on the laggard list — Seth Lugo and Miles Mikolas, in particular — who look out of place.
Mikolas lingered around the bottom of the leaderboards all year, which I found curious. Mikolas, after all, averages just 93 mph on his four-seam fastball; one would imagine such a guy would need to have elite command to remain a viable major league starter, and that league-worst command effectively would be a death sentence. Confusing this further, Mikolas avoided walks better than almost anyone.
Why Mikolas ranked so poorly in the Kirby Index while walking so few hitters could probably be the subject of its own article, but for the purposes of this story, it’s probably enough to say that the Kirby Index misses some things.
An example: Mikolas ranked second among all pitchers in arm angle variation on four-seam fastballs, suggesting that Mikolas is intentionally altering his arm angle from pitch to pitch, likely depending on whether the hitter is left-handed or right-handed. This is just one reason why someone might rank low in the Kirby Index. Another, as I mentioned in the original article, is that a pitcher like Lugo might be aiming at so many different targets that it fools a metric like the Kirby Index.
So: The Kirby Index was a fun exercise, but there are some flaws. What are the alternatives to measuring pitcher command?
Location+
Location+ is the industry standard. The FanGraphs Sabermetric library (an incredible resource, it must be said) does a great job of describing that metric, so I’d encourage you to click this hyperlink for the full description. The short version: Run values are assigned to each location and each pitch type based on the count. Each pitch is graded on the stuff-neutral locations.
Implied location value
Nobody seems particularly satisfied with Location+, including the creators of Location+ themselves. Because each count state and each pitch type uses its own run value map to distribute run value grades, it takes a super long time for the statistic to stabilize, upward of hundreds of pitches. It also isn’t particularly sticky from year to year.
The newest version of Location+, which will debut sometime in the near future, will use a similar logic to PitchProfiler’s command model. Essentially, PitchProfiler calculates a Stuff+ and a Pitching+ for each pitcher, which are set on a run value scale. By subtracting the Stuff+ run value from the Pitching+ run value, the model backs into the value a pitcher gets from their command alone.
Blobs
Whether it’s measuring the standard deviation of release angle proxies or the actual locations of the pitches themselves, this method can be defined as the “blob” method, assessing the cluster tightness of the chosen variable.
Max Bay, now a senior quantitative analyst with the Dodgers, advanced the Kirby Index method by measuring release angle “confidence ellipses,” allowing for a more elegant unification of the vertical and horizontal release angle components.
Miss distance
The central concern with the Kirby Index and all the blob methods, as I stated at the time, is the single target assumption. Ideally, instead of looking at how closely all pitchers are clustered around a single point, each pitch would be evaluated based on how close it finished to the actual target.
But targets are hard to come by. SportsVision started tracking these targets in the mid-2010s, as Eno Sarris outlined in his piece on the state of command research in 2018. These days, Driveline Baseball measures this working alongside Inside Edge. Inside Edge deploys human beings to manually tag the target location for every single pitch. With these data in hand, Driveline can do a couple of things. First, they created a Command+ model, modifying the mean miss distances by accounting for the difficulty of the target and the shape of a pitch.
Using intended zone data, Driveline also shows pitchers where exactly they should aim to account for their miss tendencies. I’m told they will be producing this methodology in a public post soon.
Catcher Targets (Computer Vision)
In a perfect world, computers would replace human beings — wait, let me try that sentence again. It is expensive and time-intensive to manually track targets through video, and so for good reason, miss target data belong to those who are willing to pay the price. Computer vision techniques present the potential to produce the data cheaply and (therefore) democratically.
Carlos Marcano and Dylan Drummey introduced their BaseballCV project in September. (Drummey was hired by the Cubs shortly thereafter.) Joseph Dattoli, the director of player development at the University of Missouri, offered a contribution to the project by demonstrating how computer vision could be used to tag catcher targets. The only limitation, Joseph pointed out, is the computing power required to comb through video of every single pitch.
There are some potential problems with any command measurement dependent on target tracking. Targets aren’t always real targets, more like cues for the pitcher to throw toward that general direction. But Joseph gets around this concern by tracking the catcher’s glove as well as his center of mass, which is less susceptible to these sorts of dekes. Still, there’s a way to go before this method scales into a form where daily leaderboards are accessible.
The Powers method
Absent a raft of public information about actual pitcher targets, there instead can be an effort to simulate them. In their 2023 presentation, “Pitch trajectory density estimation for predicting future outcomes,” Rice professor Scott Powers and his co-author Vicente Iglesias proposed a method to account for the random variation in pitch trajectories, in the process offering a framework for simulating something like a target. (I will likely butcher his methods if I try to summarize them, so I’d encourage you to watch the full presentation if you’re interested.)
The Powers method was modified by Stephen Sutton-Brown at Baseball Prospectus, who used Blake Snell as an example of the way these targeting models can be applied at scale to assess individual pitchers. First, Sutton-Brown fit a model that created a global target for each pitch type, adjusting for the count and handedness of each batter. Then, for each pitcher, this global target was tweaked to account for that pitcher’s tendencies. Using these simulated targets, he calculated their average miss distance, allowing for a separation of the run value of a pitcher’s targets from the run value of their command ability.
“Nothing”
On Twitter, I asked Lance Brozdowski what he saw as the gold standard command metric. He answered “Nothing,” which sums up the problem well. This is a challenging question, and all the existing methods have their flaws.
There are ways that the Kirby Index could be improved, but as far as I can tell, the best way forward for public command metrics is some sort of combination of the final two methods, with active monitoring of the computer vision advancements to see if consistent targets can be established.
But one would imagine the story is completely different on the team side. By marrying the KinaTrax data with miss distance information, these methods could potentially be combined to make some sort of super metric, one that I imagine gets pretty close to measuring the true command ability of major league pitchers. (In a video from Wednesday, Brozdowski reported on some of the potential of these data for measuring and improving command, as well as their limitations.) The public might not be quite there, but as far as I can tell, we’re not that far off.
Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to include Vicente Iglesias as a co-author on the 2023 presentation, “Pitch trajectory density estimation for predicting future outcomes.”
Brooks Lee embraces the art of hitting. The son of longtime Cal Poly head baseball coach Larry Lee, the 23-year-old Minnesota Twins infielder approaches his craft diligently. Drafted eighth overall by the Twins in 2022 after putting up a healthy 1.073 OPS across three years in college — he played for his father — Lee logged a 148 wRC+ over 114 plate appearances with Triple-A St. Paul last season prior to receiving his July call-up. The start to the switch-hitter’s minor league season had been delayed by nearly two months due to a herniated disc, which was diagnosed in early April.
Assigned a 50 FV and a no. 3 ranking when our 2024 Minnesota Twins Top Prospect list came out last June, Lee slashed .221/.265/.320 with three home runs and a 62 wRC+ over 185 plate appearances in his initial opportunities against big league pitching. He sat down to talk hitting when the Twins visited Fenway Park in the penultimate weekend of the season.
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David Laurila: How would you describe yourself as hitter? Moreover, how do you view yourself going forward?
Brooks Lee: “Ultimately, I want to evolve into a pure hitter and be able to hit all pitches in all zones. I want to hit for average. I think I can drive the ball, but most importantly, I want to get hits.”
Laurila: A lot of people will argue that batting average isn’t all that important. Why is it important to you?
Lee: “I’ve just always loved people that hit .300. As a switch-hitter, I want to be able to get on base at all times, from both sides of the plate. I really enjoy getting hits. That’s probably my favorite part of the game. For me, hitting over .300 is a benchmark. If you do that, everything kind of takes care of itself.”
Laurila: Being able to hit all pitches in all zones is an admirable trait, but at the same time, it can mean putting balls in play that you aren’t able to drive. You might be better off taking those pitches.
Lee: “Yes. That is something I’m learning, too. Sometimes you have strikes that aren’t necessarily good pitches to hit, even though they’re in the zone. For me, the pitch has to be elevated in order to drive it, because of the way my swing works, and the way I see the ball. So, when it’s up, then I go. Most likely, it’s a good pitch for me to hit.”
On Monday, Statcast took its the latest step toward the goal of consolidating all baseball data into one website so unimaginably massive that not even Joey Gallo’s batting average can escape its gravitational pull. Baseball Savant unveiled enhanced baserunning leaderboards, supplementing its leaderboard for extra bases taken with a separate leaderboard for basestealing, and also adding one that combines the two into an overall baserunning value leaderboard. (In a much quieter move that could end up being even more consequential for the super-duper data dorks in your life, Baseball Savant also introduced toggles for the first and second halves of the season into its search function.) I’ve spent the past couple days looking around at the numbers to see how this new information might change our understanding of the craft of baserunning, and I’d like to share my initial thoughts.
I think the big benefit of these data is they will teach us a lot about how particular players do what they do. MLB.com’s David Adler broke down some of the fun features of the new leaderboards, and if that’s your thing, there are indeed plenty of fun features to marvel at. If you surf around the leaderboard, you can see that on-base machine Juan Soto unsurprisingly led all players with 1,324 opportunities to steal a base this season. You can see that Mookie Betts gets excellent jumps when he’s stealing, traveling 6.1 feet between the moment of the pitcher’s first move and the moment of their release, the largest distance in the game. You can see just how anachronistic Lane Thomas’s 26-for-40 stolen base season really was. Read the rest of this entry »
Seiya Suzuki has been in the news as a trade candidate all offseason — partially because the Cubs can’t stop shipping outfielders in and out — and at the Winter Meetings, his agent, Joel Wolfe, sprinkled some enlightening details into a massive throng of onlooking reporters. Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer and Wolfe have had conversations about the 30-year-old outfielder’s future. The Cubs aren’t desperate to trade a player who hit .283/.366/.482 in 2024, but Suzuki apparently isn’t particularly keen on being a full-time DH, which is the most natural landing spot for him after the Cubs traded for Kyle Tucker.
If the Cubs were to trade Suzuki, they’d have to have a pretty good idea of how valuable he is. In fact, they would have to have a firm belief in Suzuki’s value, and a good idea of the rosiest possible picture they could sell to a potential trade partner, as well as the difference between those two numbers. Read the rest of this entry »
Junfu Han, Kim Klement Neitzel, Junfu Han, and Matt Krohn via Imagn
The Detroit Tigers and the Minnesota Twins were two of the teams I focused on during last week’s Winter Meetings in Dallas. As such, I attended media sessions for the managers and top executives of both clubs, asking questions alongside reporters who cover the AL Central rivals on a regular basis. Here are some highlights from those exchanges.
“That’s a good question,” Minnesota’s president of baseball operations said when asked about the possibility of Jax, who logged a 1.94 FIP over 71 innings out of the Twins’ bullpen, becoming a starter. “It’s a conversation we had during the season [and] it carried through to the offseason. It’s a two-way dialogue. Griff has expressed some interest in exploring the idea, but at the same time, he wants to think about what the right next steps are for him and his career. We remain in contact with his agent, and with Griffin, about that… It remains to be determined.” Read the rest of this entry »
