A flourishing youth movement was the major reason why Cleveland went from sub-.500 also-rans in 2021 to runaway division winners in ’22. By Baseball-Reference’s measures, the Guardians were the youngest team in the majors, with a weighted average age of 25.9 years old for their position players and 26.3 years old for their pitchers. But while rookies Steven Kwan and Oscar Gonzalez played significant roles in their turnaround, the biggest surprise on the team was second baseman Andrés Giménez, who after a rough 2021 season broke out and became an All-Star. He not only edged out José Ramírez for the team lead with a 140 wRC+ but also finished a whisker behind him with 6.1 WAR, good for fifth in the AL.

The 24-year-old Giménez was one of four players acquired from the Mets in the January 2021 blockbuster that sent Francisco Lindor and Carlos Carrasco to the Big Apple, along with current shortstop Amed Rosario (who himself had a very solid season), and two lower-level prospects (outfielder Isaiah Greene and righty Josh Wolf). Even for a franchise that had endured the departures of All-Stars such as Michael Brantley (free agency in October 2018), Trevor Bauer (traded to Cincinnati in July 2019), and two-time Cy Young winner Corey Kluber (traded to Texas in December 2019) as ownership slashed payroll, the Lindor trade was a bitter pill to swallow. He had been drafted and developed by the team, becoming a perennial All-Star who was already laying tracks toward Cooperstown.

Lindor, who would have been a free agent following the 2021 season, agreed to a 10-year, $341 million extension with the Mets just before Opening Day, but followed up with a modest-by-his-high-standards 4.2-WAR season, during which he was limited to 125 games by injuries. If that was a bit disappointing — and in the context of the Mets’ 77–85 season, it was, particularly when paired with Carrasco’s 12-start, 6.04 ERA slog — then the other side of the deal wasn’t much to write home about, either. Read the rest of this entry »

Additional Detroit Tigers job openings (Multiple Analyst Positions) are available here.

Product Manager

Location: Detroit, MI
Department: Baseball Operations

Job Summary:
The Detroit Tigers are currently seeking a Product Manager, Baseball Operations. This role will be responsible for owning the product roadmap for internal baseball systems. This position will report to the Director, Software Engineering, Baseball Operations.

Key Responsibilities:

• Deliver products and features that drive baseball decisions
• Work with baseball stakeholders to understand and document user needs
• Work with software engineering team to implement software solutions
• Prioritize the roadmap for proprietary software systems
• Maximize product value

Minimum Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• 3+ years of software product experience (Product Manager, Product Owner, Business Analyst, or similar title)
• Track record of delivering product value
• Ability to turn user stories into actionable technical requirements
• Ability to coordinate between technical and non-technical stakeholders
• Strong written and verbal communication skills
• Strong organization and planning skills
• Ability to take initiative and make decisions
• Understanding of the complete software development lifecycle
• Passion for baseball and robust understanding of current baseball research

Preferred Knowledge, Skills & Abilities:

• General familiarity with data, databases, data analytics, data science, and data modeling – SQL experience preferred
• Background in software development, understanding of technical design considerations and tradeoffs
• Experience creating feature mock-ups or wireframes
• Familiarity with issue tracking systems and workflows
• Experience with software testing or quality assurance
• Experience with technical project management and agile methodologies
• Experience in sports or supporting sports personnel – softball or baseball preferred

Working Conditions:

• Office environment
• Evening, weekend, and holiday hours required

We are an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, disability, gender identity, marital or veteran status, or any other protected class.

To Apply:
To apply, please follow this link.

UI/UX Engineer

Location: Detroit, MI
Department: Baseball Operations

Job Summary:
The Detroit Tigers are currently seeking a UI/UX Engineer, Baseball Operations. This role will be responsible for optimizing the user experience for internal baseball applications. This position will report to the Director, Software Engineering, Baseball Operations.

Key Responsibilities:

• Implement consistent, easy-to-use interfaces for internal software systems
• Maximize user productivity using modern web design concepts
• Design web applications that work well for various users, in various scenarios, on various devices
• Conduct user behavior research and create usability metrics to help inform product decisions
• Communicate complex data concepts with intuitive, aesthetic designs

Minimum Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• 2+ years of UI/UX experience on interactive web applications
• Demonstrated ability to implement web front ends in HTML/CSS/JavaScript
• Understanding of user interface design principles with ability to implement those principles in real-world applications
• Experience with responsive web design for multiple form factors and layouts, including mobile devices
• Creative problem-solving ability in an agile team environment
• Ability to own user experience, make decisions, and write clear documentation for both technical and non-technical users
• Ability to collect usability metrics and use data to drive decision-making
• Ability to balance design considerations for a wide range of users with different needs, workflows, and configurations
• Passion for baseball and robust understanding of current baseball research

Preferred Knowledge, Skills & Abilities:

• Experience working with modern JavaScript frameworks such as React or Angular
• Familiarity with data and statistics, especially visualization libraries such as D3
• Experience working on a cross-functional software development team using standard tools for source control, issue tracking, documentation, etc.
• Experience with databases and data concepts, especially SQL
• Ability to create reusable components or libraries and maintain style guidelines
• Familiarity with design tools for rapid prototyping
• Familiarity with public baseball websites, terminology, statistics, and visualizations
• Experience in sports and/or working with sports data, especially softball or baseball

Working Conditions:

• Office environment
• Evening, weekend, and holiday hours required

We are an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, disability, gender identity, marital or veteran status, or any other protected class.

To Apply:
To apply, please follow this link.

em>The content in this posting was created and provided solely by the Detroit Tigers.

Additional Detroit Tigers job openings (Product Manager, UI/UX Engineer) are available here.

Principal Quantitative Analyst

Location: Detroit, MI
Department: Baseball Operations

Job Summary:
The Detroit Tigers are currently seeking a full-time Principal Quantitative Analyst in the Baseball Operations Department. This role will be responsible for performing analyses and conducting research within Baseball Operations. This position will report to the Director, Baseball Research & Development.

Key Responsibilities:

1. Develop and productionize Bayesian models to support Baseball Operations decision-making.
2. Assist with the integration of baseball analysis into our proprietary tools and applications.
3. Provide technical guidance to Analysts and Analytics Associates.
4. Complete ad hoc data queries and effectively present analysis through the use of written reports and data visualizations.
5. Monitor, identify and recommend new or emerging techniques, technologies, models and algorithms.
6. Other projects as directed by Baseball Operations leadership team.

Minimum Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

1. Ph.D. in statistics, mathematics, computer science, or a related quantitative field or equivalent professional experience (3-5 years).
2. Experience applying Bayesian statistical techniques (e.g. Bayesian hierarchical models) to real-world problems.
3. Demonstrated expert-level knowledge of baseball-specific data and sabermetric analysis.
4. Relevant work experience with statistical software (R, STATA, SPSS, SAS, or similar) and scripting languages such as Python.
5. Expertise with SQL and relational databases is required.
6. Experience with cloud computing preferred.
7. Self-starter.
8. Team player.
9. Ability to work evenings, weekends and holidays as dictated by the baseball calendar.

Working Conditions:

1. Office environment
2. Evening, weekend, and holiday hours required

We are an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, disability, gender identity, marital or veteran status, or any other protected class.

To Apply:
To apply, please follow this link.

Analyst

Location: Detroit, MI
Department: Baseball Operations

Job Summary:
The Detroit Tigers are currently seeking a full-time Analyst in the Baseball Operations Department. This role will be responsible for performing analyses and conducting research within Baseball Operations. This position will report to the Director, Baseball Research & Development.

Key Responsibilities:

• Perform advanced quantitative analysis to support Baseball Operations decision-making, including predictive modeling and player projection systems.
• Complete ad hoc data queries and effectively present analysis using written reports and data visualizations.
• Assist with the integration of baseball analysis into our proprietary tools and applications.
• Contribute to baseball decision-making by generating ideas for player acquisition, roster construction and in-game strategies.
• Support the current data warehousing process within Baseball Operations.
• Monitor, identify and recommend new or emerging techniques, technologies, models, and algorithms.
• Other projects as directed by Baseball Operations leadership team.

Minimum Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• Demonstrated expert-level knowledge of baseball-specific data, modern statistical techniques, and sabermetric analysis.
• Expertise with SQL and relational databases is required.
• Relevant work experience with statistical software (R, STATA, SPSS, SAS, or similar) and scripting languages such as Python.
• Demonstrated ability to communicate difficult and complex concepts to colleagues possessing a wide range of backgrounds and perspectives.
• Degree or equivalent experience in statistics, mathematics, computer science, or a related quantitative field.
• Self-starter.
• Team player.
• Ability to work evenings, weekends and holidays as dictated by the baseball calendar.

Working Conditions:

• Office environment
• Evening, weekend, and holiday hours required

We are an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, disability, gender identity, marital or veteran status, or any other protected class.

To Apply:
To apply, please follow this link.

Biomechanist

Location: Detroit, MI
Department: Performance Science, Baseball Operations

Job Summary:
This role will assist with the delivery of performance science solutions within Baseball Operations. The biomechanist will be responsible for translating biomechanical data into applied, actionable outcomes to be used by staffs to optimize performance. This role will work closely with Baseball Analytics, Player Development, Strength and Conditioning, Sports Medicine and Coaching staffs.

Key Responsibilities:

• Collect, analyze, and report on data from various performance science sources, including in-game biomechanical data.
• Maintain data quality and integrity for all biomechanical data.
• Collaborate with coaching staffs and external consultants to design and develop metrics and reports aimed at maximizing player performance.
• Work closely with the Director, Performance Science to develop and disseminate information from performance science initiatives.
• Assist with data management, organization, and integration into the organization’s databases and athlete management system.
• Assist with implementation and maintenance of existing performance science initiatives across the organization, including data collection, analysis, and reporting.
• Assist with the design, development, testing and support of new performance science initiatives.
• Effectively collaborate and communicate with player development, coaching, sports medicine, strength and conditioning and front office staff.
• Review research and technology updates relevant to baseball performance.
• Perform exploratory performance science research projects and analysis as directed.
• Assist with the maintenance, calibration, and upkeep of performance science related equipment.
• Other duties as directed by Director, Performance Science

Minimum Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• A graduate level degree or 3+ years of experience in biomechanics or performance science is required.
• Demonstrated experience with the following technologies preferred: Force plates, IMUs, and motion capture.
• Demonstrated experience with modeling and analyzing 3D motion capture data required.
• Research or applied experience in professional sport strongly preferred.
• Experience using an athlete management system.
• The ideal candidate must have excellent computer skills. Proficiency in R highly desirable.
• The ideal candidate must have excellent communication skills. Candidate must be able to convey complex performance science findings to relevant staffs.
• The ideal candidate must have excellent attention to detail.
• The ideal candidate must have excellent organizational skills.
• Previous experience working with professional athletes and coaches a plus.
• The ideal candidate must be willing to work longs hours, including days, nights, weekends and holidays.
• The candidate must be available full-time.
• Willing and able to relocate to the Lakeland, FL area or Detroit metro area.

Working Conditions:

• Office environment
• Evening, weekend, and holiday hours required

We are an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, disability, gender identity, marital or veteran status, or any other protected class.

To Apply:
To apply, please follow this link.

The content in this posting was created and provided solely by the Detroit Tigers.

Triston McKenzie was 19 years old and pitching for High-A Lynchburg when he was first featured here at FanGraphs in May 2017. Five years later, he’s one of the top starters on a talented Cleveland Guardians staff. In 31 appearances this season, the lanky right-hander logged a 2.96 ERA and a 3.59 FIP with 190 strikeouts in 181.1 innings. Last week, he tossed six scoreless frames and allowed just two hits in Cleveland’s Wild Card Series-clinching win over the Tampa Bay Rays.

McKenzie, the scheduled starter for ALDS Game 3 versus the New York Yankees on Saturday, discussed his evolution as a pitcher and the mindset he takes with him to the mound during the Guardians’ final home stand of the regular season.

———

David Laurila: We first talked five years ago. What have you learned about pitching since that time?

Triston McKenzie: “The biggest difference is that I’m in the big leagues. Mindset-wise, how I attack hitters hasn’t changed much outside of adapting to this level and understanding that guys are more disciplined in what they do in their approach. I’ve figured out that you can’t always be the the young gun, the kid who is going to throw his best stuff over the heart of the plate. These guys can hit that. So I’d say it’s a mix of finding my identity as a pitcher, figuring out what my strengths are and where I can beat guys, but not getting so headstrong that it’s to my detriment.”

Laurila: How much better do you understand how, and why, your stuff works? You’re obviously working with smart coaches and seeing a lot of data. Read the rest of this entry »

There were two big stories coming into Game 2 between the Astros and Mariners. The first was Yordan Alvarez, hero of Game 1, destroyer of both baseballs and worlds. Before the game, TBS reported that Scott Servais had borrowed a line from Ted Lasso, encouraging his players to be goldfish and forget Tuesday’s heartbreaking defeat. Goldfish or no, the Mariners definitely remembered to be terrified of Alvarez. They also continued their strategy of throwing him sinkers, failing to understand that there is no such thing as the right pitch to throw Yordan Alvarez.

The second story was the pitching matchup. Luis Castillo was coming off a masterful start against Toronto in the Wild Card Series. Framber Valdez had a breakout 2022, including 25 consecutive quality starts. Weak pulled contact is his strength; per the broadcast, the Mariners spent batting practice working on shooting the ball the other way in preparation.

The matchup lived up to the hype. Together, Castillo and Valdez set down the first 10 batters of the game, though the former had a couple of bad misses in the first inning, yanking two pitches in a row against Jeremy Peña and sailing a four-seamer up and away against Alvarez. None of the rest of his pitches to the latter that at-bat touched the strike zone, but that was by design. Here’s what he saw in all three of his plate appearances:

Kyle Tucker kicked off the scoring in the second inning, pulling a slider that caught too much of the plate for a 370-foot home run to right. The solo shot had a launch angle of 43 degrees, which would’ve tied for the 18th-steepest regular-season homer of 2022. Read the rest of this entry »

Taylor Walls, pinch-hitter. Pinch-hitter Taylor Walls. I keep turning the words around in my head, like a mantra. Taylor Walls, pinch-hitter. Walls, Taylor: hitter, pinch. Sometimes it makes more sense to me, sometimes less; over enough time, anything you repeat enough seems to lose all meaning. It’s called semantic satiation: your brain starts to perceive anything as gibberish if it’s repeated frequently enough.

In this case, I’m not even sure the phrase made sense in the first place. Taylor Walls, pinch-hitter? This guy? The one who hit .172/.268/.285 this year? In the game to hit? It sounds strange right from the jump. Maybe I started from a faulty premise somewhere. Maybe pinch-hitter Taylor Walls only exists in my head. Maybe this is all a strange fever dream.

Only, it’s not. There’s box score evidence of it, right on MLB.com:

There he is, pinch-hitting in a playoff game. He’s hitting for Isaac Paredes, a right-hander, which gives us our first piece of evidence. Walls is a switch-hitter. Surely, then he came into the game to bat left-handed. Indeed he did: he faced off against Nick Sandlin, a right-handed reliever, in that initial plate appearance. Read the rest of this entry »

Episode 996

We bring you a trio of AL East-flavored interviews this week as we find ourselves in the middle of the divisional playoff round.

• At the top of the show, David Laurila welcomes Eve Rosenbaum, assistant general manager for the Baltimore Orioles. The former director of baseball development, Rosenbaum shares how her responsibilities have changed in her new role as she puts much more focus on the major league club. We also hear about the Orioles’ player development machine, the details of how waiver wires and DFAs work, how the team is making pitchers better after acquiring them, what they saw in Jorge Mateo, and insight as to why they made so many transactions during this encouraging season. [5:30]
• After that, Jay Jaffe welcomes David Cone in his return to the podcast. The pair were both in attendance at Yankees-Guardians Game 1 on Tuesday night, and they discuss Gerrit Cole’s impressive performance and playoff legacy. Cole recently said being the ace of the Yankees is “the hardest job in the league,” and Cone offers his insight, adding that it can also be the most rewarding. The pair also discuss Cone’s own career (and Hall of Fame chances), and how things like pitch counts have changed the game over time. [31:24]
• Finally, David Laurila returns in the third act with Julian McWilliams, reporter for The Boston Globe. We get the story behind McWilliams’ Baseball-Reference page and short indy ball career, including how long it took him to realize he was joining a team in Las Vegas, New Mexico. The duo also talk about Xander Bogaerts‘ importance to Boston, the comparison between Rafael Devers and Matt Olson, making a comparison between Olson and Triston Casas, being in awe of Yordan Alvarez, and the difference in consistency versus championship success between the Yankees and Red Sox in recent years. [56:51]

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A game that figured to be a pitcher’s duel and felt like a 11–10 outburst was neither. Instead, 20 hits, five home runs, and somehow just eight total runs later, it was a classic, tense, tooth-and-nail affair in which neither team enjoyed the comfort of a win probability over 75% until the conclusion of the seventh inning, and even then, it hardly felt that way. At the end, the Padres punched back and evened the score against their big brother/daddy, beating the 111-win Dodgers, 5–3.

After Los Angeles took Game 1 on Tuesday, Clayton Kershaw met Yu Darvish in Game 2 on Wednesday night in a matchup of two of the league’s finest of the moment and the last decade. But both had their hands full with deeply talented lineups. Darvish was missing velocity on most of his arsenal, issued two walks, and surrendered three home runs, but spread the damage out enough to leave with a lead, albeit after just 15 outs. Kershaw kept the Dodgers in the game but also lasted just five innings, though he did manage to pass Justin Verlander and reclaim, for now, the all-time career postseason strikeout record with 213. Read the rest of this entry »

If Phillies fans had known three days ago that their squad would leave Atlanta with a split, they’d all have told you that was swell. It felt as though they were playing with house money after surviving a late onslaught by a Braves lineup that squandered two woulda-coulda-shoulda, difference-making bases loaded situations in Game 1 and escaping with the victory, and they had both Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola looming for the next two games. But at the mercy of Kyle Wright and Atlanta’s bullpen King Ghidorah of A.J. Minter, Raisel Iglesias, and Kenley Jansen, the Phillies were shut out in Game 2, sent packing in a 3–0 loss which didn’t even last as long (two hours and 49 minutes) as the rain delay that preceded it.

While leaving the den of the defending World Series champions even at a game a piece is, in a vacuum, a huge positive for the Phillies, the context of this split is somewhat alarming. The Braves have outscored them 8–1 over the last 14 innings, as Philadelphia mustered just three hits in this shutout loss. A masterful performance by Wright and opportunistic hitting in the sixth inning were pretty much all of what Atlanta needed to tie the series.

Wheeler largely performed as expected for most of the game. Second among big league starters in WAR across the last two seasons, he needed just 27 pitches to knife through three perfect innings at the start, his adrenaline-boosted fastball velocity a full tick above his 2022 regular-season mark. It’s especially encouraging to see that arm strength given that he is just a few starts removed from coming off the IL with forearm tendinitis.

It wasn’t until the sixth, thanks to some self-inflicted damage on Wheeler’s part, that the Braves broke through in a two-out rally. After he dispatched Marcell Ozuna and Eddie Rosario to start the inning, the righty hit Ronald Acuña Jr. with a fastball, resulting in a lengthy delay so the trainer could check on Acuña. (You know what it’s like to hit your funny bone on the door frame? Imagine the door frame is moving at 97 mph.) Read the rest of this entry »

Hindsight is always 20/20, a truism that is acutely felt after a particularly heartbreaking loss. It’s one ringing true in the heads of Mariners fans who witnessed a Game 1 victory in the AL Division Series slip through their fingers yesterday. Ben Clemens had the game recap, but I wanted to hone in on the final, decisive at-bat in the bottom of the ninth. More specifically, I want to try to answer the question in the headline: what were the Mariners thinking when they brought in Robbie Ray to face Yordan Alvarez?

On the surface, the move looks defensible. Paul Sewald had gotten the first two outs of the inning but had allowed two baserunners to reach to bring Alvarez to the plate. Why not bring in the lefty to gain the platoon advantage? Seattle even thought this very situation through in the lead up to this series. After the game, Mariners manager Scott Servais explained how that plan came to be:

“It was something going into the series where we were at, looking at our rotation, where we were going to head, and talking with Robbie about using him out of the bullpen as a bullet, so to speak, for that type of scenario. Bringing in a lefty against Alvarez, although Alvarez is one of the better hitters in the league … I looked at it in the seventh inning and said, ‘Hey, this could happen.’ So that was the plan going in.”

The Mariners aren’t strangers to game planning around Alvarez, having faced him dozens of times in the regular season during his career. Not that it’s done them much good: he has a career .305/.385/.597 (166 wRC+) slash line against Seattle in 179 plate appearances. You really can’t game plan around Alvarez, either; he’s one of the best hitters in the league and was one of the two best hitters in baseball this year. And it’s not like gaining the platoon advantage is much of an advantage anyway, given his impossibly small career platoon split: a .404 wOBA versus right-handers and a .406 wOBA against left-handers. His career strikeout rate against southpaws is even a few points lower. Read the rest of this entry »