Archive for Featured

As you may have noticed when you clicked on this post, the FanGraphs homepage has received a makeover. The previous front page worked well enough for a number of years. The way we all use the web has changed, however, so it was time for some adjustments, intended to help you find more of what you want in an easier-to-use manner. The new layout features a number of improvements, and while change is never enjoyable, we hope you’ll find these tweaks will help you get to the content you’re looking for more quickly, as well as highlight content that you might have missed previously.

The biggest change is that the new design is responsive, meaning it will work well on mobile devices, not just desktops and laptops. We’ve also designed the new front page to highlight our daily written content, the outstanding prospect work being put together by Eric Longenhagen and Chris Mitchell, and provide access to the tools that let you utilize all the great data here on the site.

More specifically, we have:

• included the daily Hardball Times article in the featured section, highlighting one of the best-kept secrets on FanGraphs; the daily THT piece isn’t to be missed. We also changed the featured-article area to better highlight popular content, including pieces from RotoGraphs, as well as identify the most recent and most read posts of the day.
• merged InstaGraphs into the FanGraphs article flow. InstaGraphs posts are still shorter, quicker articles, but they won’t be off in the corner any longer. They will be noted by an InstaGraphs tag, so you’ll still know to expect something a bit shorter than the usual FanGraphs post.
• included our standard chat schedule and a chat-alert banner for when they are happening.
• improved the Top Prospects box, so all 30 teams are accessible instead of just the last five articles Eric Longenhagen has written.
• improved our “Essential” section to include evergreen articles and site news, and to highlight some of our data tools.

The new layout will be more dynamic, including more features as the season progresses and as certain content becomes more topical, such as during the draft or the trade deadline. We hope that these improvements will let you navigate the numerous articles we publish each day, as well as better find reference pieces that you’ll want to go back and read multiple times.

Note that not every page on the site has been made mobile-friendly yet. As we become accustomed to the new design, please don’t hesitate to let us know about any questions, comments, or further improvements that you’d like to see integrated into the new homepage.

Thanks for being loyal readers and supporting FanGraphs through the years. We hope this new front page makes your visits even more enjoyable.

We’ve talked (a lot, maybe) about lifting the ball more here, and so far the discussion has revolved around hands, legs, and intent — the mechanics of the swing, more or less. There’s another way to lift the ball better, though, one that hasn’t been addressed here: swinging at better pitches. That’s what Kevin Pillar has focused on, and his story offers another look into the effort to hit the ball over the shift.

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The Minnesota Twins remain among the season’s early surprises, as they still reside in first place in an AL Central Division that includes a heavy division favorite and reigning AL champion in the Cleveland Indians.

There are a number of reasons the Twins are where they are atop the division. They have improved offensively from a 95 wRC+ club a year ago, to a 101 mark this season. Miguel Sano is the loudest reason for that — literally, as a loquacious presence in the clubhouse and also as owner of the most violent contact in the league. A more selective Sano is mashing, and the public seems to recognize this: the 24-year-old leads All-Star balloting at third base. In a world with a lame Mike Trout, Sano is in the MVP discussion, as well. Max Kepler and Robbie Grossman are raking, and while Joe Mauer remains a shell of what he was, he has posted a .359 on-base mark.

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There’s not a soul out there that thought the 2017 Brewers would be as good as the 2017 Cubs. There’s not a soul out there that thinks the 2017 Brewers will be as good as the 2017 Cubs. And yet, the 2017 Brewers have been as good as the 2017 Cubs, at least by wins and losses, which are ultimately the only numbers that matter. The Cubs have three more wins than defeats. The Brewers can say the same of themselves. The Cubs have been billed as an active dynasty. The Brewers have been rebuilding. I’ll be damned. We’ll all be damned.

One key to understanding what’s going on: Before the start of the season, we ran our annual positional power rankings, and the Brewers rotation slotted in at 25th place. By actual WAR to this point, that same Brewers rotation ranks in seventh place. A certain amount of credit ought to go to Chase Anderson, who’s exceeding expectations. But he’s not exceeding them quite as much as Jimmy Nelson. In Nelson, it looks like the Brewers might have an ace.

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The absence of Mike Trout, however unfortunate, has the possible effect of opening up the field for the American League’s MVP award. It’s also possible we’ll see a position player other than Trout lead the league in wins above replacement for the first time since 2011, when Jacoby Ellsbury posted a 9.4-win season. Trout still leads the league this season (3.3). Given that he could miss two months of time to injury, however, he could be hard pressed to finish ahead of his peers for a sixth consecutive campaign.

So that brings us to the No. 2 player on the American League leaderboard, Aaron Judge.

I received some questions about MVP odds during my Monday chat and Judge’s name came up. As impressive as Judge has been this season, including a 510-foot batting practice shot in Toronto…

… I sense there are questions, concerns about the league’s ability to punch back when it accumulates more scouting material against an inexperienced hitter who possesses both a long swing and unusual baseball body. Judge doesn’t yet have the same type of exposure to major-league pitching and defenses that other MVP candidates have. When pitchers began to refine their approach against him, will Judge be able to counter punch?

There’s already some evidence that a considerable slow down is imminent: Judge’s strikeout rate has been inching up.

While Judge deserves credit for his offseason work — including a swing adjustment that has resulted in dramatically improved bat-to-ball skills and allowed his raw power to translate into games — the forecasts call for merely a good player, not a great one. Our Depth Chart projections, which are a combination of Steamer and ZiPS with curated playing-time estimates, have Judge slashing .253/.338/.500 for the rest of the season, with 22 more homers and 2.2 wins.

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I read a FiveThirtyEight article not too long ago from Michael Salfino, and it had the following headline:

Who Needs A DH? The NL Is Outhitting The AL, Somehow

Now, I’d never actually thought before to just look at league-by-league OPS. And, since that article was published, the point around which it was built has become untrue. Nevertheless, by OPS, the leagues are close. Courtesy of Baseball Reference, here’s how the leagues have compared over more than the past century:

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This is Michael Lortz’ second piece as part of his June residency at FanGraphs. Lortz covers the Tampa Bay baseball market for the appropriately named Tampa Bay Baseball Market and has previously published work in the Community pages, as well. You can find him on Twitter, as well. Read the work of all our residents here.

According to the old stereotype, Florida is an elephant graveyard where everyone’s retired grandparents go to spend their final years. They drive slow, play bingo on Wednesdays, and clog the roads on the way to their early-bird specials.

The reality, as is frequently the case, is much more complicated.

As I mentioned in my first article, Tampa Bay is a growing region. Not only economically, but also in population. Earlier this year, the Tampa Bay Business Journal reported that the region of Tampa-St Petersburg-Clearwater is expected to top 3 million people by the end of 2017. According to the US census, approximately 330,000 people in Tampa Bay are over 65, or 11% of the population. A significant portion, but far from the majority.

Transplants are a large segment of the Tampa Bay population. In 2014, the New York Times published an article depicting where the population of each state came from. According to the Times, only 36% of Florida residents were natives, 8% were from New York, and 8% were from other Northeast states. We can probably safely assume many of the urban parts of Florida have a higher percentage of non-native Floridians. Which means Tampa Bay may have a higher percentage of transplants than other parts of Florida.

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Andrew McCutchen’s time as a Pirate was always likely to end in one of two ways: either by way of trade or departure as a free agent. Several years ago, a significant portion of the fan base — and perhaps a significant portion of the clubhouse — would have liked to have seen another contract extension for the 2013 NL MVP, but that was always unlikely. The club had little interest in guaranteeing a player entering his 30s a nine-figure contact, and McCutchen seemed uninterested in taking another below-market deal.

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Over the last three years, Max Scherzer has kicked it up a notch, progressing from simply a very good pitcher to one of the best three in the major leagues. He attributes some of that success to an improved curveball, a pitch that has served to complement his already devastating slider. Perhaps it’s because of his curveball’s effectiveness that he’s not afraid to continue tinkering. Perhaps the introduction of a new, third breaking pitch will lead to another leap forward, if that’s even possible.

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PITTSBURGH — To begin this post, I would like to remind the audience of a series of fortunate events detailed back in February, a timeline of transactions that appears to be quite consequential as related to the surprise Diamondbacks and their resurgent ace Zack Greinke.

On Dec. 2, new Diamondbacks general manager Mike Hazen announced the hiring of Mike Fitzgerald to lead the club’s analytics department, which was to take more prominent and influential place in the organization. It was Fitzgerald who was a primary table-pounder for free-agent-to-be Russell Martin and his presentation skills in the summer of 2012, when Fitzgerald was the No. 2 analytics official in Pittsburgh.

On Dec. 2, the Diamondbacks non-tendered Welington Castillo, the starting catcher who was most responsible for the Diamondbacks’ placing 26th in majors by framing runs saved last season. Castillo ranked 95th in framing runs saved last season, according to Baseball Prospectus.

And on Dec. 2, the Diamondbacks signed Jeff Mathis, the top-rated receiver available on the open market, to a two-year deal. In a part-time role with Miami, Mathis ranked 13th in framing runs last season. To date this season, he ranks eighth.

Dec. 2 was a busy day for the Diamondbacks, and some suspected it might also be an important day for Greinke, from whom the Diamondbacks needed a better season in 2017 to contend in the NL West and to justify his record contract.

Seven months later, Greinke is in the midst of a significant bounce-back season and by some measures — including strikeout rate, K-BB%, and swinging-strike rate — he’s never been more dominant.

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