Ross Stripling was the featured guest on episode 905 of FanGraphs Audio, and something he said after we finished recording prompted what you’re about to read. Stripling mentioned that he could have spent the entire segment talking about the impact Clayton Kershaw — his Los Angeles Dodgers teammate from 2016-20 — has had on his career. That bug in my ear, I made it a point to circle back to the 31-year-old Toronto Blue Jays right-hander to explore that subject for print.

We ended up covering more than just that. Along with the matter at hand, Stripling delved into what makes Kershaw Kershaw.

First things first.

“I wouldn’t have had the success that I’ve had in the big leagues if it wasn’t for Clayton’s mentorship,” said Stripling, who has a 3.85 ERA and a 3.91 FIP over 444-and-two-thirds career innings. “I met him in the spring of 2014 — that was my first big-league camp — but ended up tearing my UCL and didn’t get to interact with him nearly as much as I wanted to. But he’s a North Texas guy — Highland Park — and I’m from South Lake. We’re 20 minutes apart, so I knew everything about him.”

That includes Kershaw having committed to Texas A&M, only to sign with the Dodgers out of high school in 2006. Stripling chose a different route. He spent four years at A&M, earned a finance degree, and was drafted and signed by the Dodgers in 2012. It was four years later that Stripling’s baseball education truly began to take root. Read the rest of this entry »

The Cubs dropped their third straight game on Monday night in Milwaukee to fall to 4–6, and even that record feels like a miracle for them. Their crew of low-velo/command types in the rotation haven’t performed well, and the offense has been a non-factor with a miserable .164/.264/.321 line in 312 plate appearances; Chicago ranks last in baseball in all three triple-slash categories. Of the regular starters, just three are over the Mendoza line, only three have an on-base percentage over .300, and only three are slugging over .300. The end result is fewer than three runs per game, and even in a wide-open NL Central, that is just not going to cut it.

There are numerous rough starts to dissect on the North Side. But I want to focus on Javier Báez’s continued struggles, in terms of both approach and contact ability, and a future that grows cloudier by the game.

Read the rest of this entry »

At 4-6, with losses in two straight series, the Cubs are off to a sluggish start, but one player who has impressed thus far has been closer Craig Kimbrel. After struggling for the better part of his first two seasons in the Windy City, he has not only demonstrated dominant form in the early going, he’s actually built upon a rebound that began in the middle of last season, one that suggests his recovery is no passing matter.

Kimbrel, who last pitched on April 8, when he recorded a five-out save against the Pirates — his first outing of more than three outs since Game 3 of the 2018 World Series — has retired all 14 batters he’s faced this season, nine via strikeouts, including the first five batters he faced in the new year. What’s more, he’s retired 24 in a row dating back to last September 12, and 35 out of 38 going back to the start of last September, 22 (57.8%) via strikeouts. In that span, he hasn’t walked a single hitter or given up an extra-base hit, meaning that he’s held batters to an .079/.079/.079 line, an 83.0 mph average exit velocity, just one hard-hit ball (95.0 mph or greater), and not a single barrel. That’ll do.

In other words, Craig Kimbrel is back.

Once the game’s most dominant closer, Kimbrel made seven All-Star teams while pitching to a 1.91 ERA and 1.96 FIP with a 41.6% strikeout rate from 2010-18, making seven All-Star teams along the way. He wasn’t as dominant in his time with the Padres (2015) or Red Sox (2016-18) as he’d been with the Braves, but he did help Boston win a World Series in the last of those seasons.

Though he saved 42 games in 2018, his highest total since being traded by the Braves, Kimbrel set career highs in home run rate (1.01 per nine) and FIP (3.13) that season, and then was scored upon in his first four postseason appearances — apparently because he was tipping his pitches — before righting the ship. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s always at the end of the sixth inning that it starts to feel real, that history begins to creep in at the edges, making its way onto the field of view, even as you might try to push it out. The way the game is arranged in sets of three, radiating outward, three into three into nine; when you’ve completed six, you’ve gone through nine twice, with nine more to go. Now comes the third time through the order, when you’ve held it this close. Now comes the part of the game that, especially in our era, it is rare for a starting pitcher to see. Through six, onto the seventh: the power to continue resting on one person’s rapidly fatiguing shoulders.

There have already been several no-hitters through six this season. Trevor Bauer gave up four runs in the seventh. Corbin Burnes and José Berríos matched each other out-for-out through six; Burnes opened the seventh by giving up a homer, and Berríos’ grip loosened in the eighth. Joe Musgrove, on Friday, through six at Globe Life Field, having given the Rangers nothing outside one errant pitch in the fourth; the Padres, with 52 years behind them, the only team never to see one of their own pitchers throw a no-hitter. Through six, those dark, towering stadium walls blocking out the fading sky. This strange hour is when things become unsettled; the precipice of possibility grows closer. You can just see over the edge, almost reach it. Twice, all nine batters have been retired. Nine more to go.

***

On a website that looks like it hasn’t had a design update for the last decade, there’s a news item from 2010 accompanied by a photo: on the right, Adrián González, wearing those bland, bygone navy Padres jerseys, holding a plaque and smiling; on the left, the vice president of the San Diego Hall of Champions. Towering above them both is a young man in the middle, also holding a plaque, wearing a letterman jacket and an awkward smile. They are all on the field at Petco Park, “Grossmont High senior JOE MUSGROVE continues to make headlines wherever he pitches,” the news item reads.

The Grossmont High baseball team is called the Foothillers — the ‘Hillers, for short. Located in El Cajon, in San Diego County, the program has an impressive track record when it comes to developing major-league talent. Steven Brault of the Pirates played there; so did Barry Zito, briefly, but he transferred. Joe Musgrove, as a sophomore, didn’t make much of a mark. He had only started pitching the year before, and he didn’t spend long on the varsity team before being demoted. Read the rest of this entry »

Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Houston Astros. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as my own observations. As there was no minor league season in 2020, there are some instances where no new information was gleaned about a player. Players whose write-ups have not been meaningfully altered begin by telling you so. Each blurb ends with an indication of where the player played in 2020, which in turn likely informed the changes to their report if there were any. As always, I’ve leaned more heavily on sources from outside of a given org than those within for reasons of objectivity. Because outside scouts were not allowed at the alternate sites, I’ve primarily focused on data from there, and the context of that data, in my opinion, reduces how meaningful it is. Lastly, in an effort to more clearly indicate relievers’ anticipated roles, you’ll see two reliever designations, both on my lists and on The Board: MIRP, or multi-inning relief pitcher, and SIRP, or single-inning relief pitcher.

For more information on the 20-80 scouting scale by which all of our prospect content is governed, you can click here. For further explanation of Future Value’s merits and drawbacks, read Future Value.

All of the numbered prospects here also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It can be found here.

After pitching his way back from the outskirts of oblivion last year, Trevor Rosenthal fared relatively well via free agency, landing a one-year, $11 million deal from the A’s. Unfortunately, he has yet to take the mound for the team, and now it appears that it could be awhile before he does, even in a best-case scenario. On Thursday, Rosenthal underwent surgery to alleviate thoracic outlet syndrome, a loss that hardly helps an A’s pitching staff that’s off to a rough start this season.

The 30-year-old Rosenthal spent 2020 with the Royals and Padres, notching 11 saves while tossing 23.2 innings with a 1.90 ERA and 2.22 FIP; both his 41.8% strikeout rate and 33.0% strikeout-walk differential ranked sixth in the majors among relievers with at least 20 innings. He made an impressive rebound from a rough 2 1/2-year stretch that began with late-2017 Tommy John surgery that cost him the last quarter of that season and all of ’18; when he returned, he struggled greatly with his control, walking 26 batters in 15.1 innings while being rocked for a 13.50 ERA, and getting released in mid-season by both the Nationals and Tigers.

Rosenthal agreed to a deal with the A’s on February 18, making him the last reliever from among our Top 50 Free Agents (where he was 36th) to find work. Among free agent relievers, only the pitcher he was expected to replace, Liam Hendriks, received a contract with a higher average annual value, and only Hendriks, Blake Treinen, Trevor May, and Pedro Báez received larger guarantees. Though slowed by a groin strain in early March, Rosenthal appeared to be on track to open the season with the A’s until a bout of shoulder inflammation led to his placement on the injured list on April 1. Read the rest of this entry »

To begin, I want you to take a look at this screenshot from Saturday’s game between the Mets and Marlins at Citi Field. What do you think happened? What might have been the outcome?

First things first: That’s Jacob deGrom on the mound. He’s the best pitcher on Earth, as well as other inhabited worlds we have yet to discover. And as expected, he’s been mowing down the Marlins. In the first inning, he dismantled Corey Dickerson on four fastballs that went 99.9, 99.8, 100.4, and 100.1 mph. Next, he struck out Starling Marte with two fastballs, both above 99 mph, and a wicked slider. Could Jesús Aguilar, the next batter, save face for his team? Nope; unable to keep up with deGrom’s heater, Aguilar popped out to Pete Alonso in foul territory.

After deGrom retired two more Marlins — both on strikeouts — we’re back to the moment in the screenshot. In the batter’s box is Jazz Chisholm, one of Miami’s many promising young players. Today, in addition to manning second base, he’s tasked with facing a pitcher who has been dominant thus far. It won’t be easy.

Read the rest of this entry »

This week’s docket has several marquee matchups, but we respect your intelligence enough not to explain why Shane Bieber vs. Lucas Giolito or Yu Darvish vs. Dustin May is worth watching. Instead, turn your attention to three games where the visiting pitcher will return to their old stomping grounds, and don’t gloss over Tuesday night’s game in Atlanta either.

Wednesday, April 14, 6:35 PM ET: Joe Musgrove vs. Tyler Anderson

Joe Musgrove is baseball’s hottest pitcher at the moment, and after becoming the first Padres pitcher to throw no-hitter, he’ll try to become the latest ex-Pirates pitcher to make Pittsburgh look silly for having traded him. Musgrove, who Pittsburgh traded to San Diego in January, is looking to join Gerrit Cole and Tyler Glasnow as the latest pitcher to take another leap forward ditching his black and gold threads, and his early-season showing has been superlative. Still only 28, Musgrove was deemed unlikely to help the next good Pirates team (he’s a free agent after the 2022 season), and was traded for prospects. Over his three-year stay in Pittsburgh, during which the team had the majors’ seventh-lowest winning percentage, Musgrove was the Pirates’ best pitcher by nearly two wins. Now, he’s part of a San Diego team built to win a championship, which would already be the second of Musgrove’s underrated career. Read the rest of this entry »

In the sixth inning of Saturday night’s Diamondbacks-Reds game, Tim Locastro took off for second base. Acknowledging the blazing speed of the runner, Reds catcher Tucker Barnhart rushed to get into his throwing motion before even securing the baseball. Thus, Carson Fulmer’s pitch nicked off his glove and skipped to the Chase Field backstop. Locastro made it to second without a throw.

Not once in Locastro’s career has he been caught stealing, with Saturday’s stolen base representing his 28th consecutive successful attempt, a new major league record. It broke the mark set by Tim Raines, who went 27-for-27 to begin his career from 1979 to 1981 (stolen base attempts have been recorded since 1951). To mark the achievement, Locastro’s cleats were swiped (pun fully intended) by Cooperstown, where they will be displayed in the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

Locastro is something of a baseball enigma, one popularized by baseball YouTuber Foolish Baseball, whose video “Why Tim Locastro Should Be Your Favorite Weird Player” now has 1.1 million views. Locastro is elite — boasting a 99th percentile ability in two very niche skills: running fast and getting hit by pitches. This allows him to frequently get on base even despite a subpar 6.6% career walk rate, and immediately wreck complete havoc on the basepaths. Read the rest of this entry »

Did you know that Tyler Glasnow was once a Pirate? Yes, like every other baseball writer in existence, I’m contractually obligated to point that out in any article I write about him. Good news, though — I promise that’s the last time I’ll mention them in this article, because I want to talk about something that Glasnow has done this year to add a much-needed wrinkle to his game.

The Glasnow of the past few years was a two-trick pony, if such a thing exists. Trick one: a fastball that sits around 97 mph and touches 101 when he needs it. It doesn’t stand out for exceptional rise or transverse spin efficiency, but it doesn’t need to. Glasnow’s velocity and extension make for a flat-planed, dynamic pitch that both misses bats and induces weak contact.

You already knew that, because you can’t watch a Glasnow appearance without marveling at the graceful explosion of the pitch, seemingly catapulted by his smooth delivery. Here, watch him overpower J.D. Martinez:

Ah, what a joy to watch. Read the rest of this entry »