Congratulations to Cody Bellinger for winning the National League Rookie of the Year Award! While I’m actually writing this post before the award is announced, the case for Bellinger is pretty clear — no National League rookie had a bat like his while playing in so many games. As a bonus, Bellinger also recorded strong numbers on the basepaths and became one of 12 first basemen to add four or more games in center field since free agency began in 1974. Using a swing that the Dodgers helped him build, he hit the third-most home runs in a rookie season, ever. Bellinger had a top-20 rookie season over that time span in the National League and deserves his award for regular-season excellence.

But, as a member of the Baseball Writers Association, I had the benefit and honor of fulling out a full ballot for this award, not just one name. It’s down the ballot where things got difficult. It’s down the ballot where I began to wonder how much the future matters when believing the past. It’s down the ballot where I hemmed and hawed, considering the qualities of players as differently excellent as Luis Castillo, Paul DeJong, and Rhys Hoskins.

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Last week, the Baseball Hall of Fame announced 10 candidates for consideration for the Modern Era ballot, which includes executives and players whose careers took place mainly from 1970 to 1987. This year, the candidates include one non-player, Marvin Miller, and nine players from that era: Steve Garvey, Tommy John, Don Mattingly, Jack Morris, Dale Murphy, Dave Parker, Ted Simmons, Luis Tiant and Alan Trammell. Among the player candidates, we have an interesting mix: some who make their claim with a high peak, those who have longevity on their side, and one player with both. Over the course of three posts, I’ll examine all the candidates. We’ll start today with the three pitchers on the ballot.

First, a brief word on the rules and procedures of this ballot, which is a updated version of the old Veteran’s Committee. Baseball has been separated into eras, with Early Baseball (1871-1949), Golden Days (1950-1969), Modern Baseball (1970-1987), and Today’s Game (1988-Present). Most players up through 1969 have had their cases considered many times. As a result, during this cycle (2016-2020), the Early Baseball and Golden Days players are scheduled to be evaluated just once, in 2020, with Modern Baseball and Today’s Game receiving consideration every other year from 2016 to -19. There are 16 voting members on the Committee for election, and players must receive 75% of the vote with voting members limited to four votes.

In my evaluation of each player, I’ve included a collection of numbers. Besides WAR, the rest of these come from a system I devised (introduction here) that provides an escalating scale of points for all above-average seasons (HOF Points) averaged with WAR to come to a total HOF Rating. The averaged and median numbers that follow are first for all Hall of Famers at their respective positions — which, in this case, is all starting pitchers. The BBWAA averages and medians are for those Hall of Famers voted in by the writers, who have historically had tougher standards.

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Carlos Beltran didn’t play in Triple-A. Technically, that isn’t true — Beltran appeared in five games with Omaha in the year 2000. But by that point, he was already a major-league regular. Beltran didn’t make the classic stop in Triple-A, and, for that matter, he didn’t make the classic stop in Double-A, getting called up after just 47 games with Wichita. They were 47 deeply impressive games, and the Royals couldn’t wait to use the 21-year-old center fielder for themselves. The Royals couldn’t have known then just how long it would be until they’d be relevant, but they knew they weren’t good. They also knew Beltran might pull them out of the ditch.

I don’t know for how long baseball people have been saying that the ball always finds the new guy, but when Beltran subbed in for his big-league debut on September 14, 1998, the first batter immediately hit the ball in his direction. So, also, did the second batter. With that, Beltran recorded his first-ever putout. Minutes later, he had his first-ever hit; minutes after that, he had his first-ever run. In just the next inning, he drew his first-ever walk. Beltran didn’t start the game, but he still made the most of it, and although debuts make for lousy predictors, the signs were right there. At arguably too young an age, Carlos Beltran hit the ground running.

Two decades later, Beltran has announced his retirement. He’s 40 years old, now, and he just won his first-ever World Series. There was really nothing left for Beltran to do. Beltran will presumably one day occupy a spot in the Hall of Fame, because along the way — and it was a long way — Beltran was just about everything.

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“The best for the group comes when everyone in the group does what’s best for himself and the group.”

–American mathematician John Nash

Shohei Ohtani is fascinating for a number of reasons. We start with the dual talent, of course.

While injury limited him to just five starts as a pitcher in 2017, he struck out 29 and allowed only 13 hits in 25.1 innings — as a 22-year-old. He produced a .332/.403/.540 slash line in 230 plate appearances. In 2016, he went 10-4 with a 1.86 ERA over 20 starts in the NPB. He struck out 174 and walked 45 in 140 innings. He also OPS’d 1.004 with 22 home runs in 323 at-bats in 104 games.

He was named the league’s best pitcher and best DH.

While Clay Davenport’s deadly accurate statistical translations don’t appear to be available for 2017 NPB play, Davenport’s 2016 translations are available to the public.

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Welcome to FanGraphs’ top-50 free-agent rankings. I’ve been doing this exercise for a few years, and last year, we combined my projected salaries and rankings with the results of our contract crowdsourcing series. We’re doing that again this year, presenting you both the average and median estimated salaries provided by our readers alongside my own guesses at what these guys will sign for.

Keep in mind that the crowdsourced values are generally a good bit lower than what players actually receive, because the player generally goes with the highest bidder, while the crowdsourced results are an average of what our readers think a player should get. My guesses are generally a bit higher than the crowd’s estimate, though that isn’t true for every player; in particular, I think a bit more will be spent on the guys perceived as the best few free agents and less will be spent on the role-player types at the bottom of the list.

It’s also worth noting that opt-outs are still likely to be a thing this winter, and they’re basically impossible to price into a series like this, so we didn’t really try. You might see guys sign for less than expected but with an opt-out, which they’re accepting as part of the value of the deal.

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Regular readers of this column may recall the law school aspirations of Milwaukee Brewers prospect Jon Perrin. When he was featured here in May 2016, the Oklahoma State graduate was dominating Midwest League hitters — he’d fanned 47 and walked just one in 36 innings — but he was nonetheless contemplating saying goodbye to baseball. Perrin had applied to Harvard Law, and if accepted he was “probably going to be out of here.”

As we later reported, that didn’t happen. Perrin received a letter of rejection from the prestigious institution, and went forward with his pitching career. Harvard’s loss is proving to be Milwaukee’s gain. The 24-year-old right-hander spent this past season with Double-A Biloxi, continuing his stingy ways. In 105-and-a-third innings, he issued 21 free passes while fashioning a 2.91 ERA.

Perrin was pleased with his performance.

“I feel I proved that I can get advanced hitters out,” said Perrin, who relies heavily on his sinker. “A sub-3.00 ERA at the Double-A level is nothing to spit at. I had some up and downs and fought through an injury, but was able to finish on a strong note. I can’t complain.”

His Juris Doctor plans haven’t gone away. They’re simply on the back burner. Perrin was accepted into the University of Kansas’s law school program this past spring, and while he’s “100% committed to baseball,” he knows that a playing career only lasts so long. Once the spikes are hung up, he’ll begin his legal studies in his home state. Read the rest of this entry »

While next offseason’s historic free-agent class will create quite the hot-stove spectacle — maybe the most memorable in the free-agency era — the current class isn’t without intrigue, either. Yu Darvish and Shohei Ohtani are likely to be the top prizes. That said, first base is shaping up to be an interesting position, too.

Yonder Alonso, Lucas Duda, Eric Hosmer, Logan Morrison, and Carlos Santana, are each available to bidders on the market. Hosmer is the top brand name amongst the group and had the best season, recording a 4.1 WAR and 135 wRC+ in 2017, each mark a career best. Hosmer is among the young players in the game who elected not to trade in earning potential for security in the form of a pre-arbitration contract extension, and he’s being rewarded by entering the market in his prime, having just completed his age-27 season.

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You probably couldn’t find two more different-looking pitchers than Chris Sale and Bartolo Colon. The former resembles a slingshot made of chopsticks and a rubber band, while the latter is what might happen if a 19th-century howitzer were to assume human properties. Each pitcher throws a bunch of sinkers, sure; otherwise, though, their arsenals are a study in contrast, as well. Colon’s all fastballs, three-quarters release, right side. Sale has bendy stuff coming from a low, left-handed sidearm slot.

There’s one thing, though: they’ve both lasted longer than people thought they might. And there’s a quality they possess in common, something about their approaches, that might be helping in that regard.

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The other day, I ran a polling project, asking you to consider the 2017 season overall. I wanted to know about your fan experiences, as followers of particular teams, and this is the same project I ran after last season, and after the season before. The initial post is always fun, for the dialogue that gets started, but the real meat is in the data analysis. So I always most look forward to the data analysis, which I’ll be discussing below. Thanks to the many thousands of you who participated in the voting, since, obviously, without votes, this would be an embarrassing failure. You know those polls you occasionally stumble upon with like three or four responses? That is my nightmare. Thank you for not making me live out my nightmare.

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The worst called strike of this season was thrown in the eighth inning of a game between the Astros and the Tigers on the second-to-last day of July. I measure these things by the distance between the location of the pitch and the nearest part of the rule-book strike zone, and, here, we have a called strike on a pitch that missed the zone by 9.8 inches. It’s not a pitch that’s out there on an island — there are always a bunch of called strikes on pitches that miss by six or seven or eight inches — but 9.8 inches is a hell of a distance. I’m holding up two fingers in front of me. Are they separated by 9.8 inches? I don’t know, but they’re separated by what my eyes estimate would be about 9.8 inches. Big miss, considering the umpire is *right there*. We’ve got the season’s worst called strike identified. And maybe the most amazing thing about it: no one cared. You couldn’t even bring yourself to care today. It’s impossible. You’ll see what I mean. But first, a brief statement.

I hate SunTrust Park. I’ve never been there. It’s brand new. I’m sure a lot of thought went into its design, and I’m sure it has its perks. All the new ballparks have their perks. I don’t care about the SunTrust Park design or amenities. I care about the SunTrust Park technology. And the pitch-tracking data from SunTrust Park is garbage. It’s horribly calibrated, and it makes a project like this super annoying. I looked at dozens and dozens of potential worst called strikes. The bulk of the candidates were thrown in Atlanta, and all of them were off. By, like, several inches, in different directions. That’s been aggravating for me, today, but there are also some broader implications.

Pitch locations feed into a lot of the data we like to use. And if you can’t trust the pitch locations, you can’t trust the data. Incorrect locations would affect, say, zone rates. They’d affect chase rates. They’d affect framing metrics. I hope that people smarter than me are aware of this. I hope they’re working to fix this, if they haven’t already. There’s no excuse. In its initial year of existence, SunTrust Park was messed up. Not in a way many people would ever notice, but *I* noticed, and right now I’m the one writing.

Okay, now back to the worst called strike. We’re not going to Atlanta. We’re going to Detroit!

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