On Tuesday evening, a thrill swept through the winter meetings. The rumors were true – the San Francisco Giants were in agreement with an American League right fielder on a multi-year deal. Yes, San Francisco, it’s time to welcome a new slugging right-handed hitter to town: Mitch Haniger signed a three-year, $43.5 million deal to become a Giant, with an opt out after year two.

Oh, you were expecting Aaron Judge? That didn’t quite pan out, though the Giants are reportedly still in pursuit of another hitter in free agency. But Haniger is a first course, and he fits the Giants quite well whether they look for another outfielder or pivot to the infield for help.

At season’s end, the San Francisco outfield was predominantly a lefty affair. Joc Pederson appeared in the outfield in 120 games. Mike Yastrzemski played the outfield in 147 of his own. LaMonte Wade Jr. missed a lot of time with injury, but rotated between seemingly every position in the field when he was healthy, including both left and right. The Giants theoretically love to mix and match based on the opposition, but they did a lot of running out a squad of lefties last year.
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Free agents are getting paid handsomely this offseason, and that includes Taijuan Walker. On Tuesday night, it was reported that the 30-year-old right-hander had agreed to a four-year, $72 million contract with the Phillies — not exactly Aaron Judge or Trea Turner money, yet further evidence that this is anything but a bear market for players, particularly starting pitchers.

The Dave Dombrowski-led team has good reason to be bullish on its latest acquisition. Back to full health after shoulder and elbow woes cost him all but 14 innings in 2018 and ’19 (he threw 53.1 frames in the truncated 2020 campaign), Walker has tossed 316.1 innings over the past two seasons. Moreover, he’s coming off of a year where he logged a 3.49 ERA, a 3.65 FIP, and a 21.5% strikeout rate with the Mets.

The Phillies are coming off of a World Series appearance, and while that presumably appealed to Walker — who wouldn’t want to play for a team aggressively chasing rings? — so too would the progressive pitching environment he’ll be joining. When Walker was interviewed here at FanGraphs in January 2021, roughly one month before signing as a free agent with the Mets, he spoke of how he’d previously worked out at Driveline, and how, as a pitcher, “you’d clearly prefer that your next team is one that places a high value on technology and data.”

Jeremy Hefner, the Mets’ pitching coach for each of the past three seasons, is analytically-inclined. Philadelphia’s pitching coach is Driveline-educated Caleb Cotham. Read the rest of this entry »

On a busy Tuesday at the Winter Meetings, the Cubs filled a hole in their outfield, signing centerfielder Cody Bellinger to a one-year deal with a mutual option for a second year, totaling $17.5 million in guaranteed money. The agreement gives the former MVP a change of scenery in his campaign to revive some version of the five-tool player who posted 7.7 WAR in his third full season at the age of 24 back in 2019 but has battled injuries and struggled mightily at the plate since then. For the Cubs, it’s a bet on a 27-year-old who they can reasonably expect, if healthy, to be no less than a solid defender in center field with a possibility to contribute a lot more value at the plate. It also means a chance to introduce some clarity into their 2023 outfield picture; barring further changes, Bellinger will join a pair of 28-year-olds in Ian Happ in left and Seiya Suzuki in right to form a capable starting unit for a team that was forced to employ a bit of a revolving door strategy in center in 2022.

The $17.5 million guarantee comes split over the next two years, as Bellinger will earn $12 million in 2023 with a $5.5 million buyout on the mutual option for the second year of the contract. This structure has become somewhat of a signature for the Cubs, who have signed a number of one-year deals with mutual options in the last couple of offseasons, including with Mychal Givens, Drew Smyly, and Jonathan Villar in 2022 and Jake Arrieta, Jake Marisnick, Joc Pederson, and Andrew Chafin in ’21. Mutual options are exceedingly unlikely to be picked up; in all likelihood, either the player did well enough in year one of the contract to want to test free agency or poorly enough that the club is unwilling to pay its end of the option. But the structure allows the team to offer a higher guarantee on a short-term contract while limiting its annual commitments under the salary tax and effectively deferring some portion of the money. For Chicago, Bellinger represents the beginning of what team president Jed Hoyer has indicated will be a busy offseason; just a few hours later, the Cubs signed right-hander Jameson Taillon to a four-year, $68 million deal. Attracting talent like Bellinger while managing to keep a good chunk of guaranteed money off the 2023 books is a great way to keep other doors open across the market. Read the rest of this entry »

Tommy Kahnle has once again found himself back with the Yankees. Drafted by the team in 2010, he played four seasons in the minor leagues with the organization but was scooped in the Rule 5 draft by Colorado and pitched there in 2014. His stint in Denver wasn’t long, and he eventually found himself traded to the White Sox for Yency Almonte. Chicago is where Kahnle rose up as a prominent reliever; in 2017, it all clicked for him, and the Yankees thought so too, acquiring him along with David Robertson and Todd Frazier before that year’s trade deadline.

Each of them played a pivotal role in the first ALCS run of the Baby Bomber era. But after more than three seasons with the club, Kahnle was waived due to injury — a torn UCL — and missed all of 2020 and ’21. After a long rehab, he made his comeback with the Dodgers in 2022 and showed he still has his stuff, making him a coveted reliever in this year’s free-agent class. His two-year, $11.5 million deal with the Yankees begins yet another stint in the Bronx for the 33-year-old reliever.

The reason for the Yankees’ interest in Kahnle is the same as it’s always been: he posses an elite changeup that plays perfectly with his four-seamer. When looking at the quality of his changeup, no one aspect sticks out relative to his peers. In 2022, its vertical movement was 11% above average, and its horizontal movement was 12% below average; that vertical movement was higher than it had been in any year of his career, and the horizontal movement was about in line with previous seasons. Basically, the pitch is closer to horizontal neutral and has plenty of vertical depth. The horizontal approach angle (HAA) reinforces the movement with a -0.2 degree entry into the zone, and the vertical approach angle (VAA) is steep at 7.0 degrees.

Changeups are difficult to diagnose and/or develop. Similar to any other pitch, you’re looking for unicorn qualities to see what makes it so lethal. Does it have an extremely sharp or steep entry into the zone? Does it move so much that hitters just cannot get a barrel on it? Is the movement profile unique for the given player’s extension and/or release point? These are just a few questions you ask about any pitch, but with changeups specifically, another crucial component is how the pitch plays with the primary fastball, whether it be a sinker, four-seamer, or both.

The beauty of the changeup is in the deception. If you can get a hitter to see a fastball for as long as possible, then you can get them either to swing over the pitch or hit the ball on the top third and ground out. Kahnle’s ability to do this while commanding his changeup location is why teams like the Yankees, Dodgers, and other advanced thinkers covet his services and want him to spam the pitch. Read the rest of this entry »

Eight months ago, Aaron Judge turned down a seven-year contract extension worth more than $200 million. Judge’s dice roll has officially paid off for him as, after a brief flirtation with the NL West, he remains with the Yankees on a nine-year, $360 million deal that ensures that he’ll spend most, if not all, of his career in pinstripes.

$213 million wasn’t an unreasonable offer given the facts on the ground in April. While Judge had a rookie season of mega-ultra-super-duper-star quality in 2017, he had failed to come close to that level in recent years. It would be an enormous stretch to say he struggled or was disappointing, but Judge entered 2022 with only one full, healthy season in the last four campaigns. To land a huge upgrade on that pre-season contract offer as a free agent entering his age-31 season, Judge would basically need to match his .284/.422/.627, 8.7 WAR rookie year.

He did more than that. Read the rest of this entry »

On December 2, the Arizona Diamondbacks came to terms with 27-year-old free agent reliever Miguel Castro on a one-year, $3.5 million contract. I wouldn’t blame you if you failed to catch the news amidst the flurry of moves and rumors from the Winter Meetings; the Turners and deGroms of the world have stolen much of the focus. Nevertheless, while his signing was relatively small, I was drawn to write about Castro for several reasons. For one thing, he’s just a lot of fun to watch. I mean, tell me you disagree:

Standing 6-foot-7, Castro is one of the taller pitchers in baseball, but his listed weight is only 205 pounds. To put that in perspective, he’s the same height as Aaron Judge but with about 75% of the body mass. Yet despite his slim frame, Castro throws high heat in an effortless fashion, whipping his long limbs around to sling a sinker at 98 mph. The length of his extremities also allows him good extension on top of his velocity. To finish it off, he tends to complete his delivery with a bit of extra flair on his back leg kick. Simply put, it’s a unique and satisfying pitching motion — the slime ASMR of windups, if you will. Read the rest of this entry »

We’re now in the thick of the annual Winter Meetings, and we saw a handful of free-agent starters fly off the board on Tuesday. First, Andrew Heaney signed with the Rangers. Then the insatiable Phillies gobbled up Taijuan Walker. And before an eventful day came to a close, the Cubs finally opened their wallet by inking Jameson Taillon to a four-year deal worth $68 million.

This has been a player-friendly market, and one that’s been particularly rewarding to starting pitchers. All three listed above tore through their crowdsourced contract estimates and Ben Clemens’ own: Heaney got not one but two years with an opt-out; Walker beat his projected contract total by $30 million; and Taillon also exceeded expectations by a similar margin. It’s clear teams have been willing to spend, but it’s also evidence of just how scarce starting pitching is nowadays. There’s nary a pitcher who can carry the burden of 200-plus innings, so the 170–180 mark seems like the new gold standard. Heaney’s appeal lies in his upside, not durability, but you could count on Walker and Taillon to provide a full season’s worth of starts.

The Cubs needed a rotation stalwart. That their most reliable starter last season was Marcus Stroman, who recorded a 3.50 ERA across 138.2 frames, isn’t great news. Late-bloomer Justin Steele had the best rate statistics, but he’ll probably only see a minor increase to his workload. Kyle Hendricks is on the last year of his contract and well past his prime, and counting on Adrian Sampson for a second season would be most unwise. Chicago has a couple of pitching prospects on their way, and Hayden Wesneski looked promising in his first big league forays. But as always, the issue is innings, innings, innings. The Cubs would most definitely prefer to protect their young starters and test their potential in abbreviated outings. Taillon is the big brother who can absorb the second and third times through an order. Read the rest of this entry »

A few days after signing Jacob deGrom to lead their rotation, the Texas Rangers continued to bolster their pitching staff, signing Andrew Heaney to a two-year contract that could be worth up to $37 million total. The base salary is $25 million with up to $12 million in additional incentives; the deal also includes an opt-out after 2023.

After limping to a 5.83 ERA in 2021 while pitching for the Angels and Yankees, Heaney signed a one-year, bounce-back deal with the Dodgers, and bounce back he did. With a 25.4% career strikeout rate, he’s had no problems sending batters down on strikes over the years. He took that ability to new levels in 2022, pushing his strikeout rate to a career-high 35.5% while also logging career bests in ERA (3.10) and strikeout-to-walk ratio (5.79).

However, that penchant for Ks comes with a really nasty habit of allowing far too many home runs. Over the last five seasons, his 27.2% strikeout rate ranks 28th among all qualified starting pitchers, while his 1.64 HR/9 ranks 12th. He was able to offset some of that damage with his improvements this year, but it’s a real sticking point that has held him back from becoming one of the premiere starters in baseball. Read the rest of this entry »

No team hates hitting for power as much as the Cleveland Guardians.

Roughly a league-average offense overall, the Guardians ranked near the bottom — and absolute rock bottom among offenses that were worth a damn — in home runs and ISO. You’d hope that such a team would also be particularly good at putting the ball in play, and you’d be right; Cleveland had the highest team contact rate and lowest strikeout rate in baseball. José Ramírez has been the Guardians’ franchise player for several years, and by 2022 the team had basically been built in his image: short guys with high contact rates.

Three Cleveland hitters — Ramírez, Steven Kwan, and Myles Straw — finished in the top 13 in strikeout rate among qualified hitters and were among the 21 hardest hitters to strike out. The team leader in strikeouts was Andrés Giménez, a 5-foot-11 middle infielder who hit .297 with a strikeout rate of just 20.1%. For comparison, the Braves, who won 101 games and scored the third-most runs in baseball, had nine hitters with 300 or more plate appearances last year; every single one of them had a higher strikeout rate than Giménez did.

This is the last team in baseball you’d expect to sink big money into a 260-pound first baseman with a 37-homer season in his recent past, particularly considering the franchise’s famous frugality. Cleveland ran a payroll of just $69 million last year, after all. But Josh Bell isn’t your garden variety big fella. If he were, the Guardians would not have signed him to a two-year, $33 million contract, as Jon Heyman reported Tuesday afternoon. Read the rest of this entry »

MLB’s annual winter meetings usually prompt free-agent signings. The last time they were held before COVID-19 interrupted the league’s yearly schedule, Gerrit Cole, Stephen Strasburg, and Anthony Rendon all signed. This year feels like more of the same; Jacob deGrom signed in the leadup to the meetings, Trea Turner and Justin Verlander signed during them, and several other top free agents are rumored to be next.

But not every signing can be thunderous. The Pirates aren’t going to make the World Series next year. They probably won’t win 80 games; they went 62–100 in 2022 and haven’t approached .500 since they went 82–79 in 2018. But they made two signings on Tuesday in San Diego, adding Vince Velasquez and Jarlín García on one-year deals worth $3.15 million and $2.5 million, respectively. García’s deal also contains a club option for 2024 worth $3.25 million.

Neither of these deals will alter the balance of power in the NL Central, but I think both make plenty of sense for Pittsburgh. Let’s start with the starter — or at least, the pitcher who more resembles a starter. Velasquez flashed tantalizing potential over five-plus seasons with the Phillies, but inconsistent command and secondaries held him back. He spent 2022 on the White Sox as a swingman, jumping to the rotation when injuries hit the projected starters. Read the rest of this entry »