The Cubs and Blue Jays agreed to a trade this afternoon, sending David Phelps to the North Siders in exchange for pitching prospect Thomas Hatch. The Cubs are locked in a tight divisional race with the Cardinals and the Brewers, tied for first place entering today’s play. They are the favorites to win the division (we have their division odds at 56.8%), but they have been hampered by a weak bullpen all year. The Phelps trade is an attempt to shore their biggest weakness up.

The Cubs relief corps is a motley assortment of over-30 stalwarts (Steve Cishek, Brandon Kintzler, Brad Brach, and Pedro Strop), converted starters (Tyler Chatwood and new addition Derek Holland), and Craig Kimbrels (Craig Kimbrel). Out of the entire bullpen, only Kyle Ryan, Rowan Wick, and Kintzler have provided even 10 innings of sub-4 FIP performance, which explains the group’s collective 4.22 ERA, 4.66 FIP, and 0.1 WAR. While some of that dicey performance was traded (Mike Montgomery) or optioned to Triple-A (Carl Edwards Jr.), it’s still a position of need.

Can Phelps fulfill that need? It’s an interesting question, and Phelps is about as interesting as you can get for a journeyman reliever with 0 WAR on the year. As recently as 2016, Phelps was a dominant reliever (in his first year after converting from starting), throwing 86.2 innings and amassing a 2.28 ERA and 2.8 FIP. In the middle of a strong 2017, he was traded, as all players must eventually be, to the Mariners, where he promptly had elbow problems. A bone spur in his throwing arm cut that season short, and if that sounds ominous to you, it should: he subsequently tore his UCL in spring training, and missed all of 2018 and the start of 2019 recovering.

Before his injury, Phelps was a prototypical bullpen arm. He sat 94-95 with a sinker/four-seam combination and occasionally touched 98. The velocity hasn’t come back, at least not completely; he’s closer to 92-93 in his 17 appearances with the Blue Jays this year. To compensate for that lost velocity, he’s featured a cutter much more since returning (32.3% of his pitches this year). He also boasts a swooping curveball that he uses mainly as a change of pace. Read the rest of this entry »

Bo Bichette was ahead of his time. When he first hit the national scouting radar on the summer showcase circuit after his high school junior season, it was before the fly ball revolution had fully penetrated the big leagues. The 2016 draft class included a number of players who would be looked at differently just a few years later, as front offices saw the value of a big leg kick and an uppercut, high-intent swing (when it came with tools and performance). Bichette, Kyle Lewis, Alex Kirilloff, and Joe Rizzo all come to mind, with a number of others partially-qualifying like Josh Lowe, Will Benson, and Pete Alonso.

I remember talking with some scouts in 2015 who only got on Bichette, Kiriloff, and Rizzo at end of a summer of positive performance because their swings were of the aforementioned type, the kind scouts didn’t want to like until it was proven that they should.

Bichette got the short end of the stick even from this group, despite having the most defensive value, a pro lineage from his father Dante, solid game performance, and close to, if not as much raw power as all of them. Lowe went 10th, Lewis went 11th, Benson went 14th, Kiriloff went 15th, Rizzo went 50th, Jones went 55th, and Alonso went 64th; Bichette went 66th.

The other variable was the career of Bichette’s little brother, Dante Jr., whom the Yankees took 51st overall in 2011. Dante had a similar-looking swing and similarly solid amateur performance; he played the infield and by draft day 2016 was in Double-A, one full season of plate appearances from being out of baseball. Just 12 months after Bo Bichette’s draft free fall, scouts still pointed to Dante Jr.’s career and Bo’s loud swing mechanics as the reasons they missed on Bo so badly. Here’s video of Bichette playing in a high school tournament that was held at the Blue Jays spring training facility near his home:

Read the rest of this entry »

Pitchers learn and develop different pitches, and they do so at varying stages of their lives. It might be a curveball in high school, a cutter in college, or a changeup in A-ball. Sometimes the addition or refinement is a natural progression — graduating from Pitching 101 to advanced course work — and often it’s a matter of necessity. In order to get hitters out as the quality of competition improves, a pitcher needs to optimize his repertoire.

In this installment of the series, we’ll hear from three former pitchers — Jason Frasor, Brandon Gomes, and Pete Walker — on how they learned and developed their versions of the split-finger fastball.

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Jason Frasor, Toronto Blue Jays all-time leader in appearances

“I always called it a changeup, but I did split my fingers. If you saw it, you’d be like, ‘Oh, he throws a splitter,’ but the problem was, my hands are really small. I could never spread them really far. I came off three elbow surgeries, including two Tommy Johns, OK? So I just didn’t know how to spin the ball anymore. All I had was a fastball.

“One day, Bruce Walton — remember Bruce Walton? — was like, ‘Try this.’ He said to spread my fingers and throw it like a fastball. I practiced it for a little bit, then took it out to a game. And it was great. That was my rookie year, and for the rest of my career it was my secondary pitch.

“How deep I held the ball in my hand depended on the day. And the climate. If I was in Seattle, where it was cool — it was dry and cool — I usually had a great one. If I was in Texas, I was worried. The pitch would kind of just squirt out of my hand. Weather effected my changeup. Therefore, I’d maybe have a little pine tar in my hat. Read the rest of this entry »

Like Nomar Garciaparra before him, Troy Tulowitzki had the primary attributes of a Hall of Fame shortstop. He dazzled us with his combination of a powerful bat, good range, sure hands, the occasional spectacular leap, and a strong and accurate arm while making a case for himself as the position’s best. And like Garciaparra, Tulowtzki has been forced away from the game in his mid-30s after a seemingly endless string of injuries, leaving us to wonder what might have been. The 34-year-old shortstop announced his retirement in a statement released by the Yankees last Thursday.

Tulowitzki’s Yankees career lasted just five games, a blink of an eye compared to the 1,048 he played for the Rockies, or even the 238 he played for the Blue Jays. He wound up a Yankee after being released by Toronto in November 2018, that following a full season spent on the sidelines recuperating from surgery to remove bone spurs in both heels. The Blue Jays cut him while he still had $38 million in guaranteed salary remaining on the 10-year, $157.75 million deal he signed back in November 2010. Given that he would cost his next employer no more than the minimum salary, interest in him was heavy following a December showcase, with as many as many as 16 teams reportedly interested. Read the rest of this entry »

While it might not be a surprise that the Blue Jays’ Marcus Stroman is the first big-name player to be traded in advance of the coming July 31 deadline, the team on the other end of the transaction has raised some eyebrows. At 50-55, the Mets are running fourth in the National League East (11 1/2 games out of first place), and seventh in the NL Wild Card race (six games out). Acquiring the 28-year-old righty, who has one more year of club control remaining, in exchange for a pair of pitching prospects appears to be both a prelude to another deal involving a Mets starting pitcher and a signal that the team intends to contend next season rather than plunge itself into a more substantial rebuild. The alternative — that first-year general manager Brodie Van Wagenen is doubling down on a disappointing team whose playoff odds are just 11.2% (10.5% for the Wild Card) — well, that would be quite the four-dimensional chess move.

New York gets:

RHP Marcus Stroman
Cash considerations

Toronto gets:

LHP Anthony Kay
RHP Simeon Woods-Richardson

Stroman has pitched far better than his 6-11 won-loss record indicates. Entering Sunday, his 2.96 ERA ranks fifth in the AL, his 3.52 FIP sixth, his 2.9 WAR 10th. In a season where home runs are more common than ever before (1.38 per team per game), he owns the league’s third-lowest rate per nine innings (0.72), in part because he’s excelled at keeping the ball on the ground; his 56.3% groundball rate is the Junior Circuit’s highest. Read the rest of this entry »

The Rays and Jays pulled off a minor trade on Sunday, sending utilityman Eric Sogard to Tampa Bay for a player or players to be named later, or a player or players to be named soon.

Sogard is a good example of a player who wrings the most out of limited physical tools. You won’t often see him crushing deep homers with drool-worthy exit velocities. Like David Fletcher of the Angels, Sogard’s game is a bit of a throwback to a more contact-oriented game. Of active players with at least 500 plate appearances, Sogard has been the second-best at making contact with pitches in the strike zone, behind only Michael Brantley.

Sogard’s .300/.363/.477 triple-slash line (and 123 wRC+) this season is surprising, though not nearly as surprising as the 10 homers he’s hit. While 10 homers doesn’t exactly put Sogard into Pete Alonso territory, it’s an impressive total through the end of July for a 33-year-old who entered the season with just 11 career round-trippers. He may be an example of a player who is getting the most out of MLB’s different-but-not-different-swears-Rob-Manfred baseball; Statcast’s xSLG number gives Sogard just a .346 slugging percentage. The culprit is that Sogard still isn’t hitting the ball hard, with an 84.4 mph exit velocity and only three barrels. Despite that, more of his balls than usual have snuck over the right field fence.

After knee surgery cost Sogard his 2016 season, he was forced to settle for a minor-league contract and the chance to compete for a bench spot with the Brewers in 2017. Sogard posted pleasantly surprising production while filling in for Jonathan Villar when the latter was dealing with back pain in June of that year; his .273/.393/.378 line was enough to get him a major league contract with the Brewers in 2018, but he played poorly and was released by Milwaukee in July.

Neither Steamer or ZiPS were excited about Sogard coming into 2019, projecting a wRC+ of 79 and 69 respectively. The rest of baseball wasn’t much more excited; Sogard signed a minor-league contract with the Blue Jays in December. The projection systems now see him as a .250-.260 hitter with an OBP around .330 and a high .300s slugging percentage, which is a promising enough line for him to have value for a contender looking for depth. Sogard is an excellent fit for the Rays; they don’t need him to play much shortstop, a position where Sogard is stretched, but with many of the team’s second and third base options currently injured (Brandon Lowe, Yandy Diaz, Daniel Robertson, Christian Arroyo), Tampa will find a lot of use for him in coming weeks. I might be inclined to promote Kean Wong from Triple-A Durham, but this is a short-term addition, and the Rays have good reason to pick the safer option in a pennant race.

The cost for adding Sogard is likely to be a minimal one. While there have been conflicting rumor-inations about the players in return, it strikes me that no matter who’s ultimately identified, it’s likely that we’re talking low-level organizational players. If there were prospects of significance involved, I suspect the Rays would have considered promoting Wong more seriously.

Sogard’s acquisition is a low-key signing, but he’ll provide value to the Rays for the next two months, and the trade seems likely to be reasonable for both sides. While I reserve the right to change my opinion if the Rays give up Wander Franco or Brendan McKay, they’re not going to give up Wander Franco or Brendan McKay.

Getting traded has long been a part of the game. Players move from team to team on the whims and wishes of general managers looking to make their clubs better — be it in the near term, for a pennant push, or down the road. Sometimes these deals happen during the winter months. Other times they happen in-season, most commonly at the July trade deadline. Either way — and regardless of whether the player is happy with the change of address — more than the name on the front of uniform is going to be different. To varying degrees, getting dealt impacts the day-to-day lives of players, particularly those who have families.

With this year’s deadline fast approaching, I went in search of interesting trade stories. With a broader perspective in mind, I talked not only to current players, but also to former players, a coach who managed in the minors for nine seasons, and a couple of broadcasters. All of these conversations took place last week when the Red Sox hosted the Blue Jays at Fenway Park.

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Trent Thornton, Blue Jays pitcher

On November 17, 2018, the Houston Astros traded Thornton to the Toronto Blue Jays in exchange for Aledmys Diaz.

“I got a call from one of the front office guys with the Astros, Armando Velasco. I’d just gotten back from the [Arizona] Fall League, so I thought they were putting me on the 40-man roster. Instead, it was, ‘Hey, you were just traded to the Toronto Blue Jays.’ I almost blacked out. I kind of just said, ‘OK, thanks,’ then went in to tell my parents.

“I ended up calling [Valasco] back about five minutes later, because I hadn’t really heard anything he’d said. He was like, ‘Yeah, someone from the Blue Jays will be calling you in about 15 minutes. He’ll give you a little rundown of what’s going on.’

“About 15 minutes later, someone does call. I’m having this conversation with the guy and he’s saying, ‘We’re super excited to have you,’ blah blah blah. At the end of the conversation, I said, ‘Who are you again?’ I’d never caught his name. He goes, ‘Ross Atkins.’ I go, ‘Oh, OK.’ Then I hung up the phone. Read the rest of this entry »

Pitchers learn and develop different pitches, and they do so at varying stages of their lives. It might be a curveball in high school, a cutter in college, or a changeup in A-ball. Sometimes the addition or refinement is a natural progression — graduating from Pitching 101 to advanced course work — and often it’s a matter of necessity. In order to get hitters out as the quality of competition improves, a pitcher needs to optimize his repertoire.

In this installment of the series, we’ll hear from three pitchers — Nick Kingham, Mark Prior, and Adam Wainwright — on how they learned and developed their curveballs.

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Nick Kingham, Toronto Blue Jays

“I’ve been throwing a curveball since ninth grade, or maybe around 13 years old. I guess my dad originally taught it to me. But I never really had a good one. I threw a one-finger curveball for a little while. It was like a suitcase, you know? It kind of just spun and slowed down, and gravity would take it. Then someone told me to try spiking my finger. I’ve been throwing it that way ever since, probably for the last 15 years.

“It’s a standard spike. This is the horseshoe, the tracks go this way, and it’s right on there. Spike it up. There’s nothing… actually, I dig my nail into it. I set my index finger there and make sure that it has enough pressure. That’s comfortable to me. I like to have a secure grip on the ball. Read the rest of this entry »

A few bumpy outings aside, Shaun Anderson has had a solid rookie season with the San Francisco Giants. Since debuting in mid-May, the 24-year-old right-hander has won three of five decisions, and on six occasions he’s gone at least five innings while allowing just a pair of runs. Overall, he has a 4.87 ERA and a 4.37 FIP in 12 starts.

Anderson is comfortable on a big stage. He pitched in the College World Series while at the University of Florida, and last summer he took the mound in the All-Star Futures Game. The former Gator came into this year ranked eighth on our Giants Top Prospects list.

He was originally Red Sox property. A third-round pick in 2016, Anderson was shipped to San Francisco thirteen months later, along with now-19-year-old righty Gregory Santos, in exchange for Eduardo Nunez. The days-before-the-trade-deadline deal brought Boston a player who helped them win a World Series — Nunez has since been DFA’d — while San Francisco got an up-and-comer who doesn’t fit a conventional mold.

College relievers rarely become big-league starters, and this is an era where pitchers typically pump gas and miss a lot of bats. Anderson is an anomaly in both respects. The erstwhile closer has a pedestrian 92/93mph heater, and he’s punching out just 5.7 batters per nine innings.

Asked about his approach, Anderson described it as “attack.” Undaunted by big-league hitters in the box, he’s all about mixing and matching, and working down in the zone. Read the rest of this entry »

Below are some changes we made to The BOARD in the past week, with our reasons for doing so. All hail the BOARD.

Moved Up

Ronny Mauricio, SS, New York Mets:
We got some immediate feedback on Monday’s sweeping update, which included more industry interest in Mauricio. The average major league swinging strike rate is 11%. Mauricio has a 12% swinging strike rate, and is a switch-hitting, 6-foot-4 teenager facing full-season pitching. It’s common for lanky teenagers to struggle with contact as they grow into their frames, but Mauricio hasn’t had that issue so far.

Oneil Cruz, SS, Pittsburgh Pirates:
One of us was sent Cruz’s minor league exit velocities and they’re shockingly close to what Yordan Alvarez’s have been in the big leagues. Of course, there remains great uncertainty about where Cruz will end up on defense, and hitters this size (Cruz is listed at 6-foot-7) are swing and miss risks, but this is a freakish, elite power-hitting talent.

Marco Luciano, SS, San Francisco Giants:
This guy has No. 1 overall prospect potential as a shortstop with 70 or better raw power. He belongs up near Bobby Witt, who is older but might also be a plus shortstop while we’re still not sure if Luciano will stay there.

George Valera, OF, Cleveland Indians:
Valera is torching the Penn League at 18 and a half years old, and we’re not sure any high school hitter in this year’s draft class would be able to do it. His defensive instincts give him a shot to stay in center field despite middling raw speed, and his swing should allow him to get to all of his raw power, so it becomes less important that his body is projectable. He would have been fifth on our 2019 draft board were he playing at a high school somewhere in the U.S., so he’s now slotted in the between JJ Bleday and C.J. Abrams on our overall list. Read the rest of this entry »