They say all games are created equally, and that each outing in a long season is just one of 162 games. That’s certainly true, from a mathematical perspective – 90 wins is 90 wins, regardless of how a team gets there.

From a practical perspective, however, not all games are equal. While the primacy effect may make it seem like it’s the games late in the season, within a tight race, that “matter more,” the argument can be made that it’s the games earlier in the year that can shape a team’s endpoint the most. In particular, success in the games ahead of the July 31 trade deadline, when looked at together, is paramount.

The American League East is a great example of this. With five teams projected to perform similarly before the season, the spread in the division so far is perhaps wider than most anticipated, with 9.5 games separating first and last. The team quality evaluation hasn’t changed all that much, however, with each team projected to win between 35 and 37 games (.480-.521) the rest of the way. The teams who have performed well early are in the driver’s seat for a playoff push, even though they don’t necessarily project as better than the others the rest of the way.

This is important not just for building an edge within the division – it’s made three teams buyers and two teams sellers ahead of the deadline.
Read the rest of this entry »

Each weekday during the minor-league season, FanGraphs is providing a status update on multiple rookie-eligible players. Note that Age denotes the relevant prospect’s baseball age (i.e. as of July 1st of the current year); Top-15, the prospect’s place on Marc Hulet’s preseason organizational list; and Top-100, that same prospect’s rank on Hulet’s overall top-100 list.

Summary
The SAL leader in wOBA also happens to be a catcher who should stick behind the plate.

Read the rest of this entry »

Each weekday during the minor-league season, FanGraphs is providing a status update on multiple rookie-eligible players. Note that Age denotes the relevant prospect’s baseball age (i.e. as of July 1st of the current year); Top-15, the prospect’s place on Marc Hulet’s preseason organizational list; and Top-100, that same prospect’s rank on Hulet’s overall top-100 list.

NOTE: In no way are the three players presented in this article meant to represent the three singular top performers of last month in the minor leagues. They are merely players who had clearly dominant Mays about whom I have especially relevant and novel information to add.

Summary
An excellent all-around catching prospect.

Read the rest of this entry »

Each weekday during the minor-league season, FanGraphs is providing a status update on multiple rookie-eligible players. Note that Age denotes the relevant prospect’s baseball age (i.e. as of July 1st of the current year); Top-15, the prospect’s place on Marc Hulet’s preseason organizational list; and Top-100, that same prospect’s rank on Hulet’s overall top-100 list.

Summary
This converted reliever has shown some positives and negatives in his first year as a professional starter.

Read the rest of this entry »

Right-hander Ubaldo Jimenez produced his third consecutive poor start for the Baltimore Orioles on Sunday, recording just three strikeouts against 27 opposing batters while posting a single-game xFIP of 5.23 (box). It was also the third consecutive start for his new club in which Jimenez produced an average fastball velocity below his 2013 average of 92.1 mph (or 91.9 mph average when accounting for all pitches classified as either a four- or two-seam fastball).

It’s both (a) largely unimaginative and also (b) not entirely inappropriate to begin any investigation into a pitcher’s poor performances with an investigation into velocity trends. A hastily performed study by the present author, for example, demonstrates that — amongst a large pool of starting pitchers from 2002 to -11 — that every mile-per-hour was worth about a tenth of a run of xFIP. Such a study, of course, accounts mostly for pitchers who have already adapted to their own particular velocity limits. One assumes that any one individual pitcher, when compelled to work with reduced velocity, would demonstrate an even greater increase in xFIP.

Read the rest of this entry »

Monday featured, for the first time in 2014, a full slate of meaningful baseball, albeit with a bit of a lull in the late afternoon as the only live game for a stretch had the Rockies and the Marlins. I met a friend at a neighborhood bar a little after 5, and the bar had the game on all of its screens, and after a little conversation I found I was completely hanging on the action. Come August, I probably won’t be watching the Rockies and the Marlins, but this early in the year, everything’s interesting. And while we always know that anything can happen, there’s no cynicism around opening day. By the middle of the year, anything can happen, but we know what’s probably going to happen. In late March and early April, it’s more fun to imagine that baseball’s a big giant toss-up. That Marcell Ozuna looks good. If he hits, and if the Marlins get their pitching…

I don’t remember what most opening days are like, but this one felt like it had an unusual number of anything-can-happens. That is, events that would take one by complete and utter surprise. What are documented below are, I think, the five most outstanding miracles from a long and rejuvenating Monday. From one perspective, this is evidence that the future is a mystery and all a surprise is is a run of good or bad luck. From another, more bummer of a perspective, this is evidence that opening day doesn’t matter at all in the grand scheme of things and come on why are you already projecting Grady Sizemore to be a five-win center fielder? Why are you already freaking out about the 2014 Blue Jays? Be whatever kind of fan you like. Just remember that baseball is a silly game, and you’ll never outsmart it.

Read the rest of this entry »

Watching the Braves rotation grab appendages has been tough this spring. Kris Medlen has ligament damage in his elbow, Brandon Beachy has biceps soreness, and Mike Minor survived a scarred urethra only to encounter shoulder soreness. None of the three is a lock to make the opening day rotation. And this is a team that brought two veteran free agents in for depth and had extra youth at the back end of their rotation. They might be fine without Ervin Santana, but yet that team does inspire a question. How many major-league ready starting pitchers should a competitive team field in a given year?

Read the rest of this entry »

If there are two somewhat separate skills when it comes to defense — getting to balls and converting the chances you can get to — we all know which one gets more attention. The leapers and divers get the oohs and ahs while those watching the ball all the way into the glove gets golf claps at best. It’s time to appreciate the guys that make the plays they are supposed to.

The All Sure-Handed Team.

Read the rest of this entry »

All offseason long, Nelson Cruz was thought of as a terrifying land mine. Plenty was written elsewhere, plenty was written right here, and in early November, Dave used the term “land mine”, specifically, to refer to Cruz as an acquisition. It was understood that Cruz was seeking a major contract. It was understood that Cruz was overrated as a contributing player. It was understood that everyone was to prepare to laugh at the team that eventually gave Cruz a whopper of a deal. Cruz became something of an unfunny offseason punchline. Then he signed with the Orioles for a year and eight million dollars. There are incentives, worth a total of less than one million dollars.

All along, it was assumed Cruz would end up with something statistically unreasonable. What he got instead is something that’s more or less fine for that kind of player, and this is one of the dangers of reaching conclusions about the market before the market reaches a conclusion about a player. As Dave has illustrated, or will illustrate, it’s interesting that this is what Cruz was reduced to. Something else that’s interesting is how the Orioles’ earlier acquisition of Ubaldo Jimenez in part allowed the Cruz signing to take place.

Read the rest of this entry »

Recently, the Orioles have finally gotten active with regard to improving their ballclub. Such behavior was long overdue, because inactivity was likely to leave the Orioles in a non-competitive place despite a roster littered with upper-level talent. Their offseason, for a while, was as disappointing as Cincinnati’s, and on the heels of the Ubaldo Jimenez acquisition, writers all over the place have emphasized that the Orioles are working with a short-term window. That is, the Orioles need to win in 2014 or 2015, because after that, they could easily be without both Matt Wieters and Chris Davis.

Wieters is good, and next year is his last year of team control, and he’s represented by Scott Boras. Davis is good, and next year is his last year of team control, and he’s represented by Scott Boras as well. Certainly, the Orioles would rather have more good players than fewer good players, and if they do lose these two, they’ll have to work hard to make up for it. But I want to talk about the Orioles’ perceived window, just as I talked some time ago about the Royals’ perceived window, because the actual reality is always more complicated than the sound-byte reality. For Baltimore, it doesn’t have to be two years or bust.

Read the rest of this entry »