After finishing first or second in in the American League in scoring in each of the past four seasons, the 2021 Yankees were supposed to be yet another iteration of the Bronx Bombers. Yet this time around, they scored just 4.39 runs per game, good only for 10th in the league. When they lined up for their do-or-die appearance in the Wild Card Game behind Gerrit Cole, they did so with a lineup featuring just four hitters with a wRC+ of 100 or better, two of whom didn’t join the organization until the trade deadline. After an abrupt exit from the playoffs at the hands of the Red Sox, the question of where the Yankees go from here looms particularly large, but for all the “if the Boss were alive” shrieking from some quarters — fans and media hot-take artistes alike — a radical overhaul of the roster this winter doesn’t appear likely.

For years, the Yankees have relied upon a model of power and patience for their offense, accepting the high strikeout rates that come with it as the cost of doing business. The model worked well enough when juiced baseballs were flying out of parks at record rates; they set single-season team home run records in both 2017 and ’18 and blew past those marks in ’19 even as the Twins edged them by a single dinger.

Amid the backdrop of the de-juiced ball, the Yankees still placed third in the league in homers, but their overall offense was far less potent. Where the major league rate of home runs per plate appearance declined by about 5.5% relative to 2020, theirs dipped by 12%, and that’s with a reasonably full season from Giancarlo Stanton, who clubbed 35 homers in 139 games after being limited to 23 games in 2020. Even with that rebound, injuries deprived the team of some big bats and led to inferior replacements.

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Despite reaching the playoffs in dramatically different ways, the Brewers (95–67, NL Central champions) and Braves (88–73, NL East champions) look rather alike. Our power rankings give Atlanta the slight edge, but our projections land slightly on the side of Milwaukee. And while the Brewers may have the advantage in record, the Braves had a better run differential. To make matters even tighter, they split their season series, 3–3. Still, our staff predictions, where 26 of 28 folks chose the Brewers, would suggest that this is the most lopsided of the first-round matchups, but I don’t think that captures how close this series is on paper.

The Brewers won the NL Central with elite starting pitching that helped make up for their poor offense, which scored just enough runs to make those starts stand up. The Braves have a more well-rounded team that is strong on offense, pitching and defense, but is perhaps not elite anywhere.

Milwaukee coasted into the playoffs, with a 52–27 stretch in the heart of the season giving them a 99.9% chance to win the division on September 1. Going 14–15 in that final month may have made fans uneasy heading into October, but Craig Counsell was able to use his team’s large lead to go a bit easier on a pitching staff that will be asked to do the heaviest lifting going forward.

Of more concern for the Brewers is the injury to Devin Williams, who broke his hand while celebrating the division clinch and will miss the postseason. He was their best right-handed option out of the pen, and his loss will put added pressure on Brad Boxberger, Hunter Strickland and Jake Cousins, all of whom move up a rung on the ladder and none of whom are sure bets. Boxberger had a great season but pitched poorly in September, with 10 earned runs and three homers allowed in 8.2 innings. Strickland has been stellar since joining the Brewers in mid-June, but that came with a .198 BABIP. Cousins has the most electric stuff of the trio but is fresh off a biceps injury that kept him out of Milwaukee’s final week of games.

Unlike the Brewers, the Braves have been playing meaningful games all September, sweeping a big series against the Phillies at the end of the month and surviving just enough shaky outings from volatile closer Will Smith to clinch their fourth straight division crown. That latest title did not come easy. Atlanta lost its best player, Ronald Acuña Jr., to a torn ACL on July 10th, and went without one of their best pitchers all season when Mike Soroka suffered a setback in his recovery from an Achilles tear. Add some poor play to the mix, and the Braves had just a 10.4% chance to win the NL East on the day of the trade deadline. But thanks to a number of small moves made at the deadline, like bringing in Eddie Rosario, Adam Duvall, and Jorge Soler, the team took off.

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Position: Director, Baseball Data Infrastructure

Summary:
The Detroit Tigers are currently seeking a Director, Baseball Data Infrastructure. This role will be responsible for leading all internal data and infrastructure initiatives within Baseball Operations. This position will report to the Vice President and Assistant General Manager, Baseball Operations. Read the rest of this entry »

Position: Full-Stack Software Engineer

Summary:
The Detroit Tigers are currently seeking a Full Stack Software Engineer. This role will be responsible for development and maintenance of software projects within Baseball Operations. This position will report to the Director of Baseball Systems.

Key Responsibilities:

• Perform development and maintenance on internal software products.
• Utilize modern software techniques and best practices in all parts of the software lifecycle.
• Support the integration of baseball analysis into the Tigers’ proprietary tools and applications.
• Assist with the design and development of new software products.
• Other projects or responsibilities as directed by Baseball Operations leadership.

Minimum Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• BS degree in Computer Science, similar technical field of study, or equivalent experience.
• 3+ years of experience developing web applications in a production environment.
• Demonstrated knowledge of modern web development including at least one popular single-page web application framework.
• Experience working with large-scale relational databases using SQL.
• Ability to work in all phases of the product lifecycle, including requirements-gathering, design, testing, and implementation.
• Ability to learn new technologies and techniques as necessary.
• Familiarity with the sport of baseball, baseball-specific data, modern statistical techniques, and sabermetric analysis.

Preferred Knowledge, Skills and Abilities

• Experience in the sports industry or with sports data
• Experience working on cloud-based software systems
• Understanding of User Experience principles and practices
• Experience with JavaScript visualization tools such as D3 or Plotly
• Preference for the declarative programming paradigm

To Apply:
To apply, please use this link.

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

Please note, this posting contains two postings.

Position: Analyst, Baseball Operations

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 Analytics. Read the rest of this entry »

Please note, this posting contains two positions.

Position: Biomechanist, Performance Science

Summary:
The Detroit Tigers are currently seeking a full-time Biomechanist in the Performance Science Department. 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 Baseball Analytics, Player Development, Strength and Conditioning, and Sports Medicine. Read the rest of this entry »

Any team down 1-0 in a five-game series has problems. That’s where the Boston Red Sox find themselves after losing Game 1 of their American League Division Series tilt against the Tampa Bay Rays 5-0 in St. Petersburg on Thursday night. But before this series began, the Red Sox already had plenty of issues, and while Alex Cora did his best to mitigate them with some unexpected decisions concerning his pitching staff, he was left helpless thanks to a moribund Boston offense.

Problem No. 1: The Red Sox are all but forced to lean on left-handed starters against a team that crushes them

The Red Sox had to use Nathan Eovaldi just to get to this point. Unfortunately, the understandable decision to have their right-handed ace start the AL Wild Card game means that Tampa will likely face a left-handed starter in at least three games should the ALDS go the full five. That’s a problem when squaring off against the Rays, whose offense finished second in the AL only to the Houston Astros in terms of runs scored and features one of the most dangerous lineups in baseball against southpaws. Here’s Tampa’s Game 1 lineup, with their 2021 performance against lefties:

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Coming into the American League Division Series, the Chicago White Sox faced a tough task: controlling the tireless Houston Astros offense, which paced the majors in scoring. They’re a nightmarish matchup; high on-base hitters up top, power in the middle, and enough firepower that Carlos Correa (134 wRC+) bats sixth and Kyle Tucker (147 wRC+) seventh.

Chicago’s plan? Fastballs. That’s less by design and more because Lance Lynn, their Game 1 starter, throws more of them than anyone else in baseball. Is that a smart plan against the Astros? No, it is not — they were the third-best fastball-hitting team in baseball this year by run value. On the other hand, they were also the third-best team against breaking pitches and the second-best against offspeed offerings, so it’s not as though there were easy choices. But fastballs? In this economy? It felt like it might be a long afternoon.

For an inning, Lynn managed it. He mixed four-seamers and cutters, keeping Houston hitters off-balance. His cutter could almost be called a slider, and it’s key to keeping opponents uneasy; it’s the only pitch he throws with glove-side movement. He set the side down in order — but even then, Alex Bregman smashed a line drive directly at Leury García for the third out. The cutters weren’t doing enough to keep Astros hitters from sitting on other fastballs.
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Bobby Bradley is both a power hitter and a work-in-progress. Swinging from the left side, the 25-year-old Cleveland first baseman swatted 16 home runs this year in 279 plate appearances, but he also fanned 99 times. At 35.5%, his K-rate was fourth-highest among major league batters with at least 250 PAs. But again, Bradley hits for power. Despite an uninspiring .208/.294/.445 slash line, his 99 wRC+ was a mere tick below average. With further maturation and improved contact skills, Bradley could very well emerge as a force in the middle of the soon-to-be-Guardians lineup.

Bradley talked hitting when Cleveland visited Fenway Park in early September.

———

David Laurila: Do you view hitting as more of a science, or as more of an art?

Bobby Bradley: “More of an art. Personally, I don’t look at it from the scientific side; I don’t get into all the data and all that. It’s more something that I take pride in, and I try to take care of my swing. So I’d say that it’s a work of art to me. I obviously haven’t perfected it, but at the same time, it’s like my masterpiece.”

Laurila: Do you have the same swing now that you did as a younger player?

Bradley: “It’s pretty close. For instance, it’s not entirely different from when I got drafted [in 2014]. There are maybe a couple of things, like where I put my hands. I also have a little bit bigger leg-kick now. But overall, it’s pretty close to where I was in high school.”

Laurila: When did the bigger leg-kick come about? Read the rest of this entry »

The Boston Red Sox summarily dispensed with the New York Yankees in their winner-takes-all Wild Card matchup on Tuesday night, with Nathan Eovaldi cruisin’ and Gerrit Cole the subject of a bruisin’. Boston now faces the Tampa Bay Rays in a five-game American League Division Series matchup that represents just the third time the teams have ever squared off in the playoffs.

One of the interesting things about this matchup from a projections standpoint is that it features two of the teams with the largest gap between their FanGraphs Projected Standings and the ZiPS-concocted ones. Indeed, if it weren’t for the St. Louis Cardinals, these two squads would have the biggest separation in the two systems’ respective preseason outlooks, with the FanGraphs Projected Standings preferring the Red Sox and ZiPS leaning toward Tampa Bay:

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