Kevin Gausman had a career year with the San Francisco Giants last season. Pitching a personal-best 192 innings, the 31-year-old right-hander won 14 of 20 decisions while logging 227 strikeouts with a 2.81 ERA and a 3.00 FIP. Buoyed by that performance, he was bestowed a five-year, $110M contract by the Toronto Blue Jays, who inked him to a free-agent deal in December.

Gausman’s Giants experience was as educational as it was successful. Signed to a less-lucrative free-agent deal with San Francisco prior to the 2020 season, the LSU product embraced not only his new surroundings, but also the organization’s pitching development process.

“Their big thing over there is pitching to your strengths, and we’d do things to kind of teach ourselves what we’re good at,” explained Gausman, who’d previously pitched for the Baltimore Orioles, Atlanta Braves, and Cincinnati Reds. “For me, it was pitching up in the zone. My bullpens would be focused on strings up in the zone, trying to throw above them, and then on splits down in the zone.”

Brian Bannister, who Gausman called one of the best pitching minds he’s ever been around, played an important role. The righty pointed to Bannister’s knowledge of how grips work for each individual pitcher, how an arm path works, and “what you can do to manipulate a ball.” Gausman wasn’t the only beneficiary. San Francisco’s Director of Pitching also helped Anthony DeSclafani have a career year. Read the rest of this entry »

Judging by their 69-win projection and negligible odds of winning the World Series, the Pirates don’t have a great deal to look forward to from a competitive standpoint in 2022. But Opening Day is a time for celebration and optimism nonetheless, and early on Thursday afternoon, FanSided’s Robert Murray reported that the team had agreed to an eight-year, $70-million extension with third baseman Ke’Bryan Hayes, the largest contract in Pirates history.

The contract for the 25-year-old Hayes is also a record for a player with between one and two years of service time. It covers his final two pre-arbitration years, his three years of arbitration-eligibility, and the first three years of his free agent eligibility, through his age-32 season. The exact details have not been reported at this writing, including the value of his club option for the ninth year (2030).

The celebration was almost immediately dampened when Hayes left the Pirates’ opener against the Cardinals in the bottom of the first inning due to an apparent injury to his left wrist. He dove trying to catch a bloop into left field by Dylan Carlson, but the ball fell and turned into a double. After Tyler O’Neill singled Carlson home two batters later, Pirates head athletic trainer Rafael Freitas and manager Derek Shelton came out of the dugout to check on Hayes, unwrapping his left wrist and taking him out of the game.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Diamondbacks and Rangers made a minor deal on Opening Day, with Texas sending upper-level infielder Yonny Hernandez to Arizona for low-level center field speedster Jeferson Espinal. Arizona desperately needs big league infield help with Nick Ahmed (shoulder) and Josh Rojas (oblique) starting the year on the injured list. They traded cash to Chicago for upper-level infielder Sergio Alcántara a few days ago and now add the plucky Hernandez, who was squeezed out of Texas by the additions of Corey Seager and Marcus Semien from above, and by the bevy of prospects (among them Ezequiel Duran, Josh Smith, and Davis Wendzel) who are either on, or are soon-to-be-on, the 40-man from below. Read the rest of this entry »

Just before Opening Day, the Brewers played musical chairs with their catching corps in a pair of moves perhaps triggered by losing Pedro Severino to a PED suspension. They made two trades, adding two backstops and subtracting another, and shipping a couple of lower-ranked prospects out as part of the deals. They are:

From Miami: C Alex Jackson
To Miami: 2B Hayden Cantrelle and RHP Alexis Ramirez

From San Diego: C Victor Caratini
To San Diego: C Brett Sullivan and UTIL Korry Howell Read the rest of this entry »

Last Saturday, the White Sox rotation took a hit when Lance Lynn limped off the mound in pain after tearing a tendon in his right knee. In the wee hours of Tuesday, just before Lynn underwent surgery, The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal reported that Chicago signed free agent Johnny Cueto to a minor league deal. The move helps to replenish the team’s depth and offers the promise of another go-round for for a pitcher who has been beset by injuries in recent years but has long ranked among the game’s most entertaining hurlers.

Via ESPN’s Jeff Passan, the 36-year-old Cueto will make a prorated share of $4.2 million dollars if he’s in the majors. According to MLB Network’s Jon Heyman, he has a May 15 opt-out date if he’s still in the minors.

Cueto spent the past six seasons with the Giants via a $130 million deal, but the team cut bait last November by declining his $22 million option for this season, instead paying him a $5 million buyout — a move that was hardly a surprise given his ongoing injury problems. After making a full complement of 32 starts in 2016, he never made more than 25 in a season during the remainder of his deal. Blisters limited him to 25 turns in 2017, and an ankle sprain and Tommy John surgery to just 13 in ’18-19. He did make 12 starts during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, but just 21 last year, scattered around separate trips to the injured list for a grade 1 lat strain, a flexor strain, COVID-19 protocol, and then an elbow strain that limited him to just one September appearance, the first relief appearance of his major league career.

Despite those maladies, Cueto’s 4.08 ERA (101 ERA-), 4.05 FIP (100 FIP-), and 1.5 WAR made for his best season since 2016, even though his 114.2 innings were 32.2 fewer than his total in ’17, when he produced 1.2 WAR. He struck out 20% of batters, right at his career average but placing him in just the 25th percentile according to Statcast; walked just 6.1% (good for the 75th percentile); and allowed 1.18 homers per nine, 0.15 lower than the major league average for starters. Though his exit velocity and barrel and hard-hit rates were better than average, with his 6.4% barrel rate coming in at the 71st percentile, his low strikeout rate inflated his xERA to a gaudy 4.99. Read the rest of this entry »

Much of the New York-market media attention that’s followed the announcement that Ron Marinaccio will be on the Yankees’ Opening Day roster has centered on his roots. A boyhood fan of the team that he now plays for, the right-hander was born and raised in Toms River, New Jersey.

There’s much more to his story. A 2017 19th-round pick out of the University of Delaware, Marinaccio has gone from a marginal prospect to the doorstep of a major-league debut in a little more than a year. As Eric Longenhagen put it when he wrote up the 26-year-old reliever for our 2022 Yankees Top Prospects list, “Marinaccio was a 2021 revelation.” In 40 outings comprising 66.1 innings between Double-A Somerset and Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, Marinaccio logged a 2.04 ERA and allowed just 35 hits. Moreover, he fanned 105 batters.

A pitch that he hadn’t previously featured has played a big role in his ascent. Described by Longenhagen as a “trapdoor-action changeup,” the offering grades out at 60 on the 20/80 scouting scale — and it’s not his only effective weapon. Marinaccio has increased the velocity of his fastball, and he’s also revamped his slider, in the process adding a horizontal-in-the-opposite-direction component to his arsenal.

Marinaccio — No. 20 on on the aforementioned Yankees list — discussed the analytics-driven evolution of his repertoire prior to a recent spring training game.

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David Laurila: What is the story behind your changeup?

Ron Marinaccio: “I’ve always had it, and the analytics kind of helped bring it out. With the boost of my velo last year, they moved me up a level, and from there we started diving a little bit deeper into the analytics. I realized that I’d only been throwing the changeup around 5% of the time, whereas last year it was probably closer to 40%, maybe even 50%. The usage went way up.”

Laurila: You said the analytics helped bring it out. Had you not known that it was good?

Marinaccio: “Yes, but in the past things were generally more fastball/slider. That was the way people thought righties should pitch to righties. I would throw it mostly to lefties, but once I started throwing it more to righties, I started to get more confidence in it. That’s when I was like, ‘Wow, I was only throwing this 5% of the time?’ My first outing, I threw over 50% changeups.”

Laurila: When and where did you first learn your changeup? Read the rest of this entry »

José Ramírez is subtly bending the fabric of space and time. It’s the only way I can explain it. How else can you square the particular details of his hitting prowess? He’s impossibly quick to the ball, creating consistent loud contact. That should require a wild swing, but it doesn’t. He’s one of the best contact hitters in baseball. He has one of the best approaches in the game; sometimes it seems like he knows what’s coming before the pitcher throws it. He’s one of the best defenders in the game. It all feels vaguely magical.

Until today, he was also the most underpaid star in baseball. A five-year, $26 million extension he signed before the 2017 season (with two team options for another $26 million) immediately preceded his ascent to one of the best players in the game. That’s no longer true; today, he more than tripled his career guaranteed earnings by agreeing to a five-year, $124 million extension with the Guardians.

BREAKING: Star third baseman José Ramirez and the Cleveland Guardians are in agreement on a five-year, $124M contract extension, sources familiar with the deal tell ESPN. Deal includes full no-trade clause. With this year and pickup of a 2023 option, Ramirez is guaranteed $150M.

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) April 6, 2022

This deal, which starts after the 2023 season, should keep Ramírez in Cleveland for the rest of his peak, and quite possibly the rest of his career. For fans of a franchise that had seen its home-grown stars leave quite a bit of late, it’s a welcome turn of events. For Ramírez, it’s financial and — thanks to a no-trade clause — workplace stability.

I know this article is about a contract, but I can’t help it: I just want to talk about how great Ramírez is. I wasn’t exaggerating up above; I really do struggle to wrap my head around his talent. Most hitters have identifiable holes, places where they sacrifice one thing to gain greatly in another area. Level, four-seam-punishing swing? You likely struggle with sinkers low in the zone. Patient approach that hunts fastballs and waits out secondary pitches? Breaking balls in the zone will be your Kryptonite. Whip-quick pull hitter? You might struggle with pitches away. Read the rest of this entry »

On Tuesday, ESPN’s Buster Olney reported that Major League Baseball is expected to allow players to use wearable signal devices to call pitches this season. Later in the day, the Associated Press reported that the league did indeed approve the use of such devices and sent a five-page memorandum to teams’ general managers, assistant GMs, managers and equipment managers outlining the rules regarding such devices. Known as the PitchCom system, the devices were tested in the minors last season and have made their way around the majors during this year’s spring training, drawing glowing reviews. Aimed at improving the pace of play and countering sign stealing — by both legal and illegal means — their adoption addresses two issues that have been hot-buttons in recent years and have resurfaced this spring. In that light, the league could be doing more to reassure the public that it’s on top of potential abuses of the system.

Created by a company called ProMystic that provides modular technology to mentalists and magicians (!), the PitchCom system consists of a push-button transmitter that fits into a wristband worn by the catcher, and receivers that fit into the padding of the catcher’s helmet and the sweatbands of the caps worn by the pitcher and other fielders. In the transmitter’s nine-button grid, each button corresponds to a given pitch type as well as a location, the latter akin to the familiar three-by-three strike zone grid. From the AP report: “four seam high inside, curve hi middle, slider hi outside, change mid inside, sinker middle, cutter mid out, splitter low inside, knuckle lo middle, two seam low outside.” The other three buttons to the left of the grid are to cancel the selection and to adjust the volume up or down.

Through an encrypted signal, the choice of pitch and location is conveyed, with an audio output that uses a proprietary variant of bone-conduction technology (bypassing the ear canal) and has preprogrammed English and Spanish options, though players can record their own audio. Olney reported that as many as three teammates besides the battery will be allowed to wear receivers so as to aid defensive positioning; generally those will be the middle infielders and the center fielder. Read the rest of this entry »

The plight of the Los Angeles Angels is well known by now. Despite employing two generational talents in Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani, they’ve made the playoffs just once in the last 12 seasons. Even worse, they’ve had a winning record in just four of those 12 seasons, and haven’t finished above .500 since going 85-77 in 2015. It’s not for lack of trying either. They’ve signed plenty of big name free agents to massive contracts to try and get them over the hump. Those efforts haven’t paid off yet, however, and the latest veteran to get kicked to the curb before hitting free agency is Justin Upton, who was designated for assignment on Sunday with a year left on his contract.

Since 2011, the Angels have signed four free agents to contracts that are five years or longer, with four additional extensions of similar length. The track record for those signings has been pretty ghastly:

C.J. Wilson, Josh Hamilton, Albert Pujols, and Upton didn’t finish out their contract term with the Angels, while the jury is still out on Rendon; Mike Trout’s deals can comfortably be scored wins. Injuries cut Wilson’s career short while a combination of injury and off-field issues led the Angels to trade Hamilton just two years into his huge contract. Pujols’s production in Anaheim was a shadow of his career-defining tenure in St. Louis, though he did manage some late season magic for the Dodgers last year. He’ll finish out his career where it started. By signing all of these players to large, long-term contracts, the Angels were doing exactly what you’d expect them to do in their position: spend to supplement their established stars. Its unfortunate, then, that the majority of these contracts didn’t pan out, particularly when pitching remained such a consistent need. Read the rest of this entry »

It arrived stressfully, chaotically, and slightly late, but the 2022 season is here. And that means it’s time for one last important sabermetric ritual: the final ZiPS projected standings that will surely come back and haunt me multiple times as the season progresses.

The methodology I’m using here isn’t identical to the one we use in our Projected Standings, so there will naturally be some important differences in the results. So how does ZiPS calculate the season? Stored within ZiPS are the first through 99th percentile projections for each player. I start by making a generalized depth chart, using our Depth Charts as an initial starting point. Since these are my curated projections, I make changes based on my personal feelings about who will receive playing time, as filtered by arbitrary whimsy my logic and reasoning. ZiPS then generates a million versions of each team in Monte Carlo fashion — the computational algorithms, that is (no one is dressing up in a tuxedo and playing baccarat like James Bond).

After that is done, ZiPS applies another set of algorithms with a generalized distribution of injury risk, which change the baseline PAs/IPs selected for each player. Of note is that higher-percentile projections already have more playing time than lower-percentile projections before this step. ZiPS then automatically “fills in” playing time from the next players on the list (proportionally) to get to a full slate of plate appearances and innings.

The result is a million different rosters for each team and an associated winning percentage for each of those million teams. After applying the new strength of schedule calculations based on the other 29 teams, I end up with the standings for each of the million seasons. This is actually much less complex than it sounds. Read the rest of this entry »