Clarke Schmidt is more than a talented, 24-year-old right-hander who made his major league debut with the New York Yankees in 2020. He’s also a bona fide pitching nerd. Selected 18th overall in the 2017 draft out of the University of South Carolina, Schmidt leans heavily on analytics as he strives to further develop an already formidable four-pitch arsenal.

His top two offerings — per Eric Longenhagen, “a power-sweeping, mid-80s breaking ball” and a two-seamer with “nasty tailing action” — have each been honed with the help of data. A third pitch, his four-seamer, is currently on that same path, while his changeup has likewise been undergoing nuanced tweaks. Big-league hitters have barely gotten a glimpse of Schmidt’s smart weaponry — last year’s cup of coffee comprised just six-and-a-third innings — but they can expect to see a lot more of him in the future. Clarke heads into the 2021 season as a strong candidate to capture a spot in New York’s starting rotation.

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David Laurila: You have a plus breaking ball. What is the story behind it?

Clarke Schmidt: “In college, I was a slider and curveball guy — mainly a slider guy — and my sophomore year, I think I led the SEC in strikeouts. I had [129] strikeouts, and if I had to guess, I got 90 of them on sliders. That was like my go-to pitch. It wasn’t very hard, but it was hard for hitters to see the spin. It was an interesting-spinning slider, and it had a good movement profile, but it wasn’t a sharp-breaking slider.”

Laurila: What made the spin interesting?

Schmidt: “It was very depth-y. Normally, when you see sliders from guys who throw mid-90s [fastballs], it’s like a Gerrit Cole slider, or more of a sharpness with it staying on the plate longer. Mine was more of a sweepy slider, kind of like Chris Sale has. It was a low-80s slider. Read the rest of this entry »

Position: Advance Information Coordinator

Location: Boston, MA; Travel is required with the Major League team

Description:
The Boston Red Sox are seeking an Assistant to support the Major League coaching staff while working closely with the Major League Hitting Coach and baserunning coach, Analyst in Baseball Analytics, and their Advance Information department.

This is an opportunity to work in a fast-paced, intellectually curious environment and to potentially impact player performance and on-field strategy.

Responsibilities:

• Effectively present analyses through the use of written reports and data visualization to disseminate insights to members of the Major League coaching staff.
• Travel with the Major League team throughout the season, including to Boston’s spring training facility. During the offseason this position will be based in Boston working with Baseball Analytics.
• Other projects and related duties as directed by the Major League Hitting Coach, Analyst in Baseball Analytics, and other members of Baseball Operations leadership.

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Position: Player Valuation Analyst

Reports To: Assistant Director, Professional Player Valuation
Department: Professional Player Valuation

The Pittsburgh Pirates are currently seeking a full-time Analyst to join their Professional Player Valuation team. The Professional Player Valuation team is responsible for producing internal valuations of players and for communicating the insights from their research to others within Baseball Operations. This role will provide candidates with opportunities for growth and the ability to learn from others throughout the organization. In this role, you will have the ability to influence roster construction and to see the impact of your work on the field. Read the rest of this entry »

The White Sox don’t need an elite bullpen to compete. They had the most valuable position player group in baseball in 2020, and that was without two stars, Yoán Moncada and Luis Robert, playing to their full potential. They also have a rotation that boasts two aces and a fair amount of rotation depth. Give them last year’s Phillies bullpen, and they’d still likely be able to fight for a playoff spot, especially in their division. Fit them with an average ‘pen, and their postseason expectations begin to look like more of a certainty.

Much to the chagrin of the other AL Central teams, Chicago’s bullpen doesn’t look like it’s going to be average, and it definitely doesn’t look like it will be awful. That much was made clear when the White Sox signed Liam Hendriks — the best reliever in this year’s free-agent class and at worst a top-three-or-four reliever in baseball — on Monday. Since the start of 2019, he has been nearly two wins more valuable than any other relief arm in baseball, posting a 1.79 ERA and 1.70 FIP in 110.1 innings. Our Depth Charts have Hendriks forecast for 1.6 WAR in 2021, tying him with Aroldis Chapman and Edwin Diaz for the highest relief WAR projection in baseball. With that considerable boost, the White Sox’ bullpen now projects to be the second-best in the majors, albeit with loads of free-agent talent still unsigned.

Read the rest of this entry »

With the White Sox signing Liam Hendriks, the top option for teams looking to upgrade their bullpen is now off the market. Perhaps that will open up the floodgates for the other free-agent relievers, as nearly every would-be playoff squad is in the market for relief help. But whether it’s financially motivated or a matter of roster construction philosophy, there are a few contending teams who simply won’t be making a splashy addition to their bullpen. The Twins fall into that category.

In 2020, Minnesota’s bullpen was the unheralded strength of a division-winning team. The Twins’ relief corps was fifth in the majors by park- and league-adjusted FIP and ERA, and their relievers posted the majors’ third-best strikeout-to-walk ratio. But two of their best relievers from last year — Trevor May and Matt Wisler — have left via free agency. With their starting lineup and rotation mostly carrying over from last year, replacing them both should be a high priority.

Read the rest of this entry »

While there were plenty of good options in this year’s free-agent reliever class, with Trevor May, Brad Hand, Archie Bradley, and Blake Treinen representing the near-top tier, there was just one ace available: Liam Hendriks. That elite reliever is now off the board, with the White Sox continuing their aggressive offseason by signing the former A’s closer to a four-year deal worth $54 million. Yahoo Sports’ Tim Brown was the first with the news of the signing, and ESPN’s Jeff Passan was the first to report the unusual structure of the deal: Hendriks will be paid $39 million in the first three years, with the remaining $15 million coming either as a fourth-year team option or as a deferred buyout if the option is declined.

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On the heels of a year in which a record seven Hall of Famers died, the baseball world couldn’t get a full week into 2021 without losing another. Tommy Lasorda, the charismatic and voluble manager who piloted the Dodgers to four National League pennants and two championships during a run of 19 full seasons (1977-95) and two partial ones, died of cardiopulmonary arrest on January 7.

The 93-year-old Lasorda had returned home earlier in the week after being hospitalized since mid-November due to a heart condition. He had been the oldest living Hall of Famer since Red Schoendienst passed away on June 6, 2018; that title now belongs to 89-year-old Willie Mays.

For over 60 years, as stars and even Hall of Famers come and went from the Dodgers, Lasorda remained a constant. Including the final years of his professional career as a pitcher, he had been continuously employed by the team in one capacity or another since 1957, their final year in Brooklyn. He spent the past 14 years as special advisor to the chairman during the ownership tenures of Frank McCourt and Guggenheim Baseball Management. He professed a loyalty to the franchise that transcended his own mortality, a subject on which he spoke with frequency. “I bleed Dodger blue and when I die, I’m going to the big Dodger in the sky,” he often said.

As the manager of the Dodgers from September 29, 1976, when he replaced Walter Alston with four games remaining in the season, to June 24, 1996, when he suffered a heart attack and left the team in the hands of Bill Russell, Lasorda won 1,599 games, the 22nd-highest total in major league history; he’s 21st in losses (1,439, for a .526 winning percentage), and he’s the runaway leader in both categories among managers who were primarily pitchers during their playing careers. The Dodgers won seven NL West titles during his run, in 1977, ’78, ’81 (via the split-season format necessitated by the players’ strike), ’83, ’85, ’88, and ’95. They won pennants in the first three of those years, losing to the Yankees in the World Series in 1977 and ’78 before beating them in ’81; those teams were powered by the legendary Longest-Running Infield of first baseman Steve Garvey, second baseman Davey Lopes, shortstop Russell, and third baseman Ron Cey, all of whom Lasorda managed in the minors. In 1988, with an already-meager offense hamstrung by the limited availability of MVP Kirk Gibson, they upset the heavily-favored Mets in the NLCS and then the A’s in the World Series, a victory that is widely considered Lasorda’s greatest triumph.

Stylistically, Lasorda was less a tactician than an emotional leader, one who broke down the traditional walls that separated a skipper from his crew. He hugged his players, ate dinner with them, pulled pranks with them. “I brought a whole new philosophy of managing into the major leagues,” he told Steve Delsohn, author of True Blue, an oral history of the Dodgers published in 2001. “I wanted my players to know that I appreciated them. I wanted them to know that they were responsible for whether I’d even stick around or not.” Read the rest of this entry »

Mickey Tettleton was largely underrated throughout a career that spanned from 1984 to ’97. A switch-hitting catcher who blossomed after finally getting an opportunity to play full time at age 28 — this after being released by the Oakland A’s — he quietly excelled thanks to plus power and a keen eye. Playing with the Baltimore Orioles, Detroit Tigers, and Texas Rangers, Tettleton had baseball’s third-highest walk rate (18.2%) from 1989 to ’95, a seven-year stretch where he slashed .245/.384/.474 with 185 home runs and a 133 wRC+.

There are those who took notice. In The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, published in 2001, Tettleton is ranked as the 37th-best catcher of all-time. A low batting average and high strikeout numbers may have sullied his reputation with casual fans, but those who truly understand the game know better. Tettleton — a proud son of Oklahoma — provided a lot of value to his teams.

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David Laurila: You’re from Oklahoma. Were you a big baseball fan growing up?

Mickey Tettleton: “I was. Of course, it was different back then. The one game a week was on Saturday, and you were glued to your TV to watch it. I was a huge sports fan in general — I played football and basketball growing up — and was always a big-time baseball fan.”

Laurila: Did you follow a specific team?

Tettleton: “Cincinnati was obviously very big, and their main rival was the Dodgers, who had Bill Russell at shortstop. He’s from Oklahoma. But with the Johnny Bench connection, Cincinnati was really big around here.”

Laurila: I’ve read that you were named after Mickey Mantle. Read the rest of this entry »

We’ve written many words talking about the blockbuster deal that sent Francisco Lindor and Carlos Carrasco to the Mets, and rightly so: It’s rare for two players of such impact to be acquired by a single team in the same trade. We know that the Mets are now a better team than they would have been if not for the trade, at least if you hold onto the apparently quaint notion that bringing in superior players makes your team win games and, as a result, is desirable. But just how much better? Read the rest of this entry »

In 2020, the Nationals had an outfield problem. You might not have noticed it, because of human cheat code Juan Soto, but think of it this way: Soto accounted for 2.4 WAR. The outfield as a whole, Soto included, managed 2.0 WAR. The other six players accounted for a whopping negative 0.4 WAR, and you don’t need a fancy analyst to tell you that’s bad.

On Saturday, the team made a step toward remedying that weakness for 2021. They signed Kyle Schwarber to a one-year deal worth $10 million, immediately upgrading their second corner outfield spot from Andrew Stevenson (projected near replacement level in 2021) to Schwarber’s league-average stylings. Jesse Dougherty first reported the deal.

What you think of Schwarber depends on when you picture him. If your mental image was formed in 2015, he’s an up-and-coming slugger with defensive issues. If it was formed in 2016, he’s a World Series hero. If it’s been formed since then, he’s an inconsistent but exciting hitter with a problem on defense, a cypher who might have his best days ahead of him but who might also never re-scale the heights of his 2015 debut.

When Schwarber is at his best, he embodies baseball’s move toward whiffs, walks, and home runs. In fact, that’s true even at his worst: in each of his seasons, he’s had a higher walk rate, strikeout rate, and isolated power than average. Whether each of those seasons turned out well or poorly depends on the balance between those three factors.

In 2020, nothing worked quite right. His strikeout rate, a gruesome 29.5%, might sound like a problem, and it’s certainly not great! It was also only 1.5 percentage points higher than his career average, and it wasn’t the worst single-season mark of his career. His 13.4% walk rate wasn’t the culprit, either: that mark is almost exactly the same as his career rate. No, the problem was in the power.

How do you think of power? Home runs are one obvious metric, and Schwarber set new lows in that category in 2020, though only marginally. He cranked 11 homers in 224 plate appearances, a 4.9% home run rate. That’s the worst mark of his career, but it’s only narrowly behind the 5.1% rate he posted in a disappointing 2017. In fact, if you care instead about home runs per fly ball, Schwarber’s 25.6% mark was instead his best.

Doubles are another important component of power. Schwarber managed only six in 2020, the second-worst rate of doubles per plate appearance of his career. In all, he produced extra base hits in 7.6% of his plate appearances, the worst rate of his career, and nowhere near his nearly 10% rate entering 2020.

Another way to measure power is to ignore the outcomes completely and focus on process. Schwarber’s barrel rate dipped from 13.8% (career before 2020) to 11.2%, and his groundball rate spiked above 50%. More grounders and fewer smashed balls in the air go hand in hand, and they conspired to limit the number of chances Schwarber had to get the extra bases he thrives on.

If you’d prefer to separate barrels into two categories, as Alex Chamberlain outlined here, something interesting emerges. Chamberlain created a new subdivision of barrels that he calls “blasts.” Essentially, they’re the hardest-hit half of the population of barrels, the most valuable half of the most valuable subset of batted balls. In this category, Schwarber’s 2020 looks different (my numbers differ slightly from Chamberlain’s because I removed untracked balls from the denominator):

In fact, that’s a more honest way of describing his most recent campaign. The balls he hit hardest, the ones that carry the most predictive power from year to year, looked basically like every other Schwarber season. An 11.2% barrel rate is solid — it places Schwarber in the top 25% of the league in terms of power on contact. He fares better in terms of blasts, where he’s in the 92nd percentile. In other words, Schwarber is still a premium power hitter, even if his doubles and homers wouldn’t tell you that in 2020.

Should we worry about the walks and strikeouts? Maybe a little bit, at least if Schwarber repeats his 2020 walk and strikeout rates. Expressed as one number, he would need to be 4% above average when he puts the ball in play to end up average overall. That’s not a problem — again, he’s a great hitter when he makes contact — but it helps set a rough idea for what Schwarber will be. His plate discipline will hurt him slightly, his power will make up for it, and it will probably work out to an above average but not standout offensive line.

Of course, baseball is more than just offense. Schwarber has to play the field — at least unless and until the NL switches to a DH for 2021 — and the picture there is decidedly less rosy than it is at the plate. Schwarber is a large gentleman — he’s listed at 6-foot and 235 pounds — and saying that he’s been bad on defense in his time in the majors undersells things. Schwarber is bad on defense in the way that Cleveland likes saving a little money or AJ Preller enjoys the occasional trade.

Per Statcast, Schwarber has been 29 runs below average as an outfielder in his career. That’s the fifth-worst mark in the majors over that period, ahead of only noted butchers Nick Castellanos, Matt Kemp, Melky Cabrera, and Shin-Soo Choo. He put together one solid defensive season, in 2018, and that season shows the best case scenario for Schwarber: he tallied a whopping 11 outfield assists that year, only one off the league lead, which was worth between 7 and 8 runs per both UZR and DRS.

Schwarber’s arm is no joke. When he first reached the majors, the Cubs still considered him a part-time catcher in large part because of that cannon arm. If the Nationals can somehow entice runners to take off against Schwarber, they might be able to wrangle another positive defensive season out of him despite his lack of range.

More realistically, Washington is hoping for a DH slot where they can hide Schwarber. With Howie Kendrick’s retirement, the Nationals don’t have an obvious candidate to fill that role, which means they can slide Schwarber there without losing anything on offense. That would leave them with Stevenson and Soto flanking defensive standout Victor Robles, which sounds to me like a solid defensive outfield. With Schwarber’s offensive value firmly in the green, that sounds like the best possible case here.

How does this deal work out poorly for Washington? The worst-case scenario is this: the NL plays 2021 without a DH, Schwarber’s plate discipline takes a step back, and he ends up as an average bat with painful outfield defense, more of the replacement level soup that they ran out around Soto in 2020. Even that, though, is hardly a disaster: at only one year, there’s no chance of this deal sticking around to haunt them.

For Schwarber, this contract fits his needs as well as can be expected. First, there’s the money: Schwarber will earn more on this deal than he projected to earn in arbitration with the Cubs. That’s a clear upside. Second, he’s still eligible for free agency after 2021 — his contract has a mutual option for 2022, but that’s merely a fancy way of telling a player you like them; the player can, after all, always decline his end of the deal.

More importantly, Schwarber will get everyday playing time in Washington. After the first five years of his career, I’m not sure that any team is clamoring to give Schwarber a long-term deal. That remains the brass ring for players: after six seasons at collectively-bargained low wages, free agency theoretically unleashes the forces of capitalism in their favor. For Schwarber, however, those forces aren’t yet guaranteed to work; bat-first corner types have found soft markets as teams realize they can replace those players with pre-arbitration talent without losing much on-field production.

For Schwarber to strike it rich, he needs to rise above the fray of slightly-above-average bats to become a premium one. For teams to believe that, he needs to do so in as big of a sample as possible. In that sense, the best thing Schwarber could do for himself is find somewhere with thin outfield and DH depth, and Washington fits the bill exactly. As a bonus, they’ll be playoff contenders, which is always a plus.

After their disappointing 2020, the Nationals could use some offensive help. After his arrested development, Schwarber could use some exposure. With this deal, both sides are getting what they want, at a rate that should make everyone happy. That’s a solid outcome for everyone — other than the rest of the NL East, perhaps.