Hot takes are famously a huge part of the sports industrial complex, but here at FanGraphs, we’re not very good at them. I took a crack at some American League bold predictions yesterday, but honestly, they were pretty bland. Picking the relative fortunes of a bunch of good-but-not-great teams? Boring. A top prospect might be Rookie of the Year? Boring.

Today, I’m going a little further. If the last takes were jalapeños with some seeds removed, these are serrano peppers. I said I’d be ecstatic hitting half of my predictions from yesterday; today I’d be pleased with one in the first three (the fourth one is relatively unadventurous). As always, these aren’t my median predictions, merely corner cases that I think are being undervalued. Will they happen? Probably not. But they could, and I don’t think people are giving them enough credence. Onward! Read the rest of this entry »

Brady Singer played in the SEC for three seasons before being drafted by the Kansas City Royals, so he faced a ton of talented hitters prior to starting his professional career. Pitching for the University of Florida from 2016-2018, Singer matched up against the likes of JJ Bleday, Nick Senzel, Bryan Reynolds, and Evan White. Easy marks were few and far between.

Which of his collegiate opponents does Singer recall respecting the most? More specifically, which hitter had him laser-focused on making quality pitches, lest an errant offering result in serious damage?

“One that really stands out wasn’t in the SEC, but rather in Omaha,” Singer told me. “I believe it was the first game I pitched there, in 2017 when we went on to win the [College] World Series. It was Brendan McKay, from Louisville. When he got in the box, I knew I had to dial in. Just the bat path he had, and how he stood in the box — how he presented himself — was tough.”

McKay’s hitting future is obviously in limbo. Ostensibly still a two-way player, he pitched 49 big-league innings for the Tampa Bay Rays in 2019, and logged just 11 plate appearances. Last season, a positive COVID test and subsequent shoulder surgery squelched his opportunities to do either. McKay’s Ohtani aspirations remain — he’s taking cuts in camp as he rehabs — but what happens going forward isn’t entirely clear.

Singer was correct when he told me that McKay could “really swing it back in college.” As the record shows, the fourth-overall pick in the 2017 draft slashed a snazzy .328/.430/.536 as a Cardinal. Singer — the 18th-overall pick a year later — is another story. Read the rest of this entry »

Earlier this week, when I examined the potential landing spots for center fielder Jackie Bradley Jr., the Brewers stuck out as a team that didn’t appear to have a glaring need, particularly with center fielder Lorenzo Cain returning to the roster after opting out early in 2020. Yet FanSided’s Robert Murray, who previously covered the Brewers for The Athletic, had recently reported that the team was in the mix for them, and a week and a half later, they landed him via a two-year, $24 million deal that includes an opt-out after this season. The question is, how’s this going to work?

To these eyes, the bigger surprise than the Brewers adding to their stockpile of outfielders is that Bradley landed a multiyear deal in March, and at a healthy AAV at that. Aside from Bryce Harper‘s 13-year, $330-million megadeal, which was announced on March 2, 2019, in my research for the Bradley piece I was unable to find another multiyear position player deal that was completed in March during the past decade, with Manny Ramirez’s two-year, $45 million return to the Dodgers in 2009 the last one that came to mind. It’s just not a month for lasting commitments.

Given that slim history, plus Dan Szymborski’s less-than-glowing ZiPS projection for Bradley — WARs of 1.6 and 1.3 in the first two seasons over about 1,000 total plate appearances, a serviceable return if accompanied by a solid platoon partner — I figured it might be a stretch for him to approach the three-year, $27 million deal from the ZiPS contract model, to say nothing of the reports that he was seeking a contract of at least four years. Bradley (and agent Scott Boras) didn’t get the years, and his total guarantee is less than that of the model but not by much; with his opt out after the first season, he’s exchanged that for a good amount of control.

Brewers president of baseball operations David Stearns, who’s been on the job since October 2015 (initially as general manager) has a history of overstuffing the roster and letting manager Craig Counsell figure out the playing time, and it’s helped the team to three straight postseason appearances for the first time in franchise history. On back-to-back days in late January 2018, Stearns traded for Christian Yelich and signed Cain to a five-year deal, that despite corner outfielders Ryan Braun and Domingo Santana — not to mention first baseman/outfielder Eric Thames — coming off solid seasons; Santana had bashed 30 homers in his age-24 campaign. In late July 2018, he dealt for Mike Moustakas while third baseman Travis Shaw was in the midst of a 32-homer season; Shaw took up playing second base seamlessly and the team came within one win of a trip to the World Series. Read the rest of this entry »

Jackie Bradley Jr. may or may not be the best defensive centerfielder in the game. Metrics have never loved him quite as much as the eye test suggests they should — accordingly, he’s never been honored with a Fielding Bible award — but there are those who believe he’s without peer among his contemporaries. At worst, the soon-to-turn-31-year-old “JBJ” is on the short list of top defenders at his position.

Those talents will now be display in Milwaukee. According to The Boston Globe’s Julian McWilliams, Bradley, who ranked as the 18th best free agent this offseason per FanGraphs, has agreed to a two-year, $24 million deal with the Brewers that includes an opt-out after the first year, thus ending an eight-season tenure with the Red Sox that included a Gold Glove, an All-Star berth, and a World Series championship. Along the way, Bradley logged a cumulative 93 wRC+ that comprised both peaks and valleys. Notoriously streaky, the personable left-handed-hitter is anything but a sure bet to match last year’s 120 wRC+, .283/.364/.450 line, which came over 55 games.

The Brewers would likely consider it gravy if he did match that level of production. This acquisition was largely about making an already improved defense better — Kolten Wong at second base being another key acquisition — and it unquestionably will. Bradley will be joining an outfield alignment that includes not just Christian Yelich, but also Lorenzo Cain, who is back after opting out last season due to COVID concerns. Cain, who turns 35 next month, is a two-time Fielding Bible winner as a center fielder, and has rated well by the various defensive metrics both over his career and in 2019, when he posted a 7.0 UZR, 22 DRS, and 16.0 Outs Above Average, with BP’s FRAA of -1.6 the exception. Read the rest of this entry »

While Jake Odorizzi is clearly the top free-agent pitcher still available as March opens, Jackie Bradley Jr. is the market’s top position player still on the shelves, No. 18 overall on our Top 50 Free Agents list. Beyond the fact that they and their agents may have aimed too high with their contractual desires in an industry still feeling the economic pinch of the COVID-19 pandemic and treating the $210 million Competitive Balance Tax threshold as a salary cap, the pair don’t have a ton of similarities beyond their availability. But like Odorizzi, Bradley could provide a clear boost to a contending team.

Bradley, who turns 31 on April 19, spent the past 10 years in the Red Sox organization after being chosen as a supplemental first-round pick out of the University of South Carolina in 2011. It took him awhile to find his footing in the majors: Since he couldn’t keep his batting average above the Mendoza Line over the course of 530 plate appearances in 2013–14, he bounced up and down between Triple-A Pawtucket and Boston and spent nearly half of 2015 on the farm as well before finally sticking around for good.

Since the start of the 2015 season, Bradley has produced at about a league-average level offensively (.247/.331/.438, 102 wRC+) and provided exceptional and often spectacular defense. His +33 DRS in center field is tied for fifth in the majors in that span, and his 19.9 UZR is sixth, though he’s somewhere around 10th or 11th on a prorated basis, depending upon the innings cutoff one chooses. Likewise, his 42 runs via Statcast’s Runs Prevented metric ranks sixth since the start of 2016. In a league where Kevin Kiermaier has dominated the defensive metrics, Bradley has just one Gold Glove to show for his efforts, but he’s nonetheless put together some enviable highlight reels. Here’s one that covers just the last eight weeks of his work:

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Tigers manager A.J. Hinch addressed the importance of being aggressive on the base paths during his Saturday morning media session. What he shared included the following, which I quoted on Twitter:

“Your WAR gets dinged whenever you get thrown out on the bases. It’s not valued. People are very aware… players are very aware of that. Winning baseball is good for your WAR too, even if it’s not quantifiable.”

Almost immediately, people began responding critically, opining that Hinch was (pun intended) off base. Feeling that more context was in order — I’d prefaced the original Tweet by noting the subject at hand — I added that Hinch also said that if you’re safe every time, you’re probably not being aggressive enough.

No matter. Commenters went on to suggest that Hinch doesn’t understand the value of an out, sometimes in a snarky, condescending manner. (On Twitter! Imagine that!)

Hinch had a second media session following the team’s workout, so I took the opportunity to bring up the minor foofaraw I’d caused at his expense. Would he like to elaborate on, and clarify, what he’d said, lest a faction of the Twitterverse continue to question his sanity? Read the rest of this entry »

It’s no secret that strikeouts are at an all-time high. Nor is it a secret that not every strikeout is “just another out.” Balls in play can advance baserunners, and that’s especially important when the 90 feet being traversed is from third to home. What fan, or manager, doesn’t bemoan one of the team’s hitters going down by way of the K with a man on third and less than two out? It’s an opportunity wasted, one that often leads to a squander.

Save for the rare occasions when a batter reaches on a wild pitch or a passed ball, a strikeout is also a guaranteed out. Making contact — even weak contact — at least gives you a chance. While last year’s .292 BABIP was baseball’s lowest in nearly three decades, that’s still markedly better than than the infinitesimal odds of taking first base on a punch-out. Moreover, fielders make errors. In short, contact matters.

Given MLB’s ever-increasing strikeout rate, I asked six managers a simple, straightforward question: Is the ability to hit with two strikes an undervalued asset in today’s game?

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Bud Black, Colorado Rockies

“It’s been undervalued in the history of the game. It’s probably lessened a little bit more [as] something that has been talked about. I think, more so than ever, because of the stuff today, it’s harder to hit with two strikes, especially the velocities that we’re talking about. The breaking pitches. The secondary pitches. The quality of those pitches. The swing-and-miss that’s happening now is a combination of maybe not shortening your swing, and maybe the stuff is that good to where it’s tough to make contact. Read the rest of this entry »

Christian Yelich had a rough 2020. That’s true of all of us, of course — global pandemics have that effect. You might even argue that his year wasn’t so bad in the grand scheme of things. He got paid $4.6 million dollars, didn’t suffer any catastrophic injuries, and made the playoffs. On the baseball field, however, he had his worst year as a big leaguer. Was it small sample theater, or something more worrisome? Let’s dig into his brief season and hunt for signs.

The first thing that jumps out at me when looking at Yelich’s 247 plate appearances is the strikeouts. The magic of his game has always been in his ability to smash the ball — increasingly into the air as time has gone on — without disastrous contact numbers. His previous high for strikeout rate was 24.2%, as a rookie in 2013. Since then, he’d consistently kept that rate around 20% while incrementally improving his quality of contact every year. Voila — an MVP.

Let’s dig in a little more, because strikeout rate is the composite result of many inputs. First, there’s swinging and missing. Yelich has historically lived around league average when it comes to connecting on swings. Last year? Not so much:

Yes, it’s a small sample. But Yelich swung at 381 pitches in 2020, enough that we can’t completely dismiss it. He swung at 112 pitches out of the zone, again enough to worry. And let me tell you, you don’t want to be near the top of this list:

There are good hitters here, sure. The ones who are doing well are doing so on the back of their power on contact, though, and there are no MVP candidates on the list. If you’re missing that often when you chase, you’ll be striking out a ton, likely too much to make up for it elsewhere. Read the rest of this entry »

Earlier this week, Travis Shaw signed a non-guaranteed deal with the Brewers that will pay him $1.5 million if he makes the big league roster, with another $1.5 million available in incentives. (Our Jay Jaffe has the particulars in a piece from Thursday on Milwaukee signing him and Brett Anderson.) There’s also an opt-out date in mid-March, one he’ll presumably exercise if he isn’t tracking to earn a spot on the Opening Day roster. He’ll have to beat out some combination of Luis Urías and Daniel Vogelbach for at-bats, and while that may not sound likely, I think he’s a reasonable bounce-back candidate.

I’ve long been fascinated by Shaw’s career path and the way his production has bounced around with his launch angle. One notable aspect of the launch angle revolution is how frequently swing adjustments seem to pay off. Perhaps we can attribute some of that to a juicy baseball; we’ll see how well all the new flyball hitters hold up with a deader pill this year. Most players who steepened their launch angle, though, have benefited from doing so — but not everyone.

Logically, we can intuit that too steep of a launch angle leads to popups, flyouts, and more swings and misses. Anything above a 45-degree launch angle, for instance, is almost always an out (unless you’re a freak like Pete Alonso). And while nobody has an average launch angle anywhere near 45 degrees, it makes sense that someone with a comparatively high figure may be reaching for too much of a good thing.

That brings us back to Shaw. After posting consecutive 3.5-WAR seasons for the Brewers in 2017 and ’18, he slumped horribly the following year. In baseball’s most homerific season to date, Shaw went from 32 round-trippers to seven. Unsurprisingly, he lost his job, got demoted to Triple-A twice, and was non-tendered after the season. A quick look at this contact profile highlights the problem:

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In a pair of low-cost moves, the Brewers brought back two players who helped them to playoff berths in recent years. Sinkerballing southpaw Brett Anderson, who spent most of last season as a member of Milwaukee’s rotation, agreed to a one-year deal, while infielder Travis Shaw, who spent last season with the Blue Jays after three years in Wisconsin, agreed to a minor league contract.

The 33-year-old Anderson, who has been beset by injuries for much of his 12-year major league career, made 10 starts with the Brewers in a season bookended by recurrent blisters on his left index finger. Placed on the injured list on July 20, he had to wait out a few days of COVID-19-related postponements before debuting on August 3. The blister problem reared its head again in his final start on September 27 and kept him off the team’s postseason roster, though the Brewers were swept in the Wild Card Series by the Dodgers. Still, it marked the second season in a row that Anderson was mostly available, which given his litany of injuries both freakish (a stress fracture in his foot, a hit-by-pitch–induced fracture in his left hand) and chronic (elbow woes culminating in 2011 Tommy John surgery, a bulging disc that required surgeries in ’14 and ’16) counts as a victory.

In between his two bouts of blisters, Anderson pitched to a 4.21 ERA (94 ERA-) and 4.38 FIP (99 FIP-) in 47 innings. As he had to build up his pitch count, it took him until his fourth turn to go longer than five innings, but once he reached that plateau, he made six straight starts of five or six innings. As usual, he generated a ton of groundballs, with a 57.7% rate that ranked third among NL pitchers with at least 40 innings (teammate Adrian Houser was first at 58.5%). His 15.8% strikeout rate wasn’t much to write home about, but it was his highest mark since 2014 and well above his 12.1% in ’19 with the A’s. Likewise, his 10.9% strikeout-to-walk differential was his best mark since 2013 in Oakland.

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