On Tuesday night, Aaron Judge did nothing less than tie Babe Ruth’s long-insurmountable total of 60 home runs, but Giancarlo Stanton hit a homer that nearly upstaged him. Just minutes after Judge’s ninth-inning blast off the Pirates’ Wil Crowe trimmed Pittsburgh’s lead to 8-5, Stanton hit a walk-off grand slam. The shot offered some hope that he’s emerging from a prolonged slump, but until he sustains something close to his normal level of production, there’s plenty of reason for concern.

After Judge’s homer off Crowe, Anthony Rizzo doubled, Gleyber Torres walked, and Josh Donaldson singled to load the bases, still with nobody out. Crowe ran the count to 2-2 and then went down and in on a changeup. Stanton turned on it and hit a laser to left field:

First off, the home run was extreme. At 118 mph off the bat, it tied Shohei Ohtani’s June 25 homer off Logan Gilbert for the second-fastest of the year; Stanton also hit the fastest, a 119.8-mph blast off the Cubs’ Matt Swarmer. The home run’s 16-degree launch angle was just one degree off Stanton’s lowest homer of the season on April 8 off Nathan Eovaldi, though Xander Bogaerts had a 14-degree clothesline on August 31, and both Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Kevin Kiermaier had 15-degree ropes this year as well. Read the rest of this entry »

Instead of accepting a long-term extension with the Yankees before the season, Aaron Judge made a gigantic bet on himself. A seven-year, $213.5 million deal that starts at age 31 is no small bid for any player, and it was more than the projections — at least ZiPS — predicted at the time. But Judge clearly felt that his chances of doing significantly better outweighed the risks involved in playing out his final year of team control. Well, short of discovering he can throw 102 mph and pair it with a wicked slider, it’s hard to imagine a better season in terms of increasing the value of his next contract than Judge’s 2022. To my mind, he will almost certainly win the American League MVP — not because what Shohei Ohtani has done isn’t magical, but because the Yankees outfielder has put up one of the rare offensive seasons in MLB history that can match such an extreme level of two-way excellence. So just how high might Judge’s contract realistically go this offseason?

First off, let me stress that some appear to be underrating Judge’s season. In some quarters of the tired AL MVP debates on social media, you’ll see it described as just an ordinarily great offensive season rather than one that belongs in the history books besides those of Barry Bonds. By our reckoning, there have only been 55 position players seasons in history that notched double-digit WAR, and not all of those were driven primarily by hitting, but rather fielding (Cal Ripken Jr.), a healthy dose of transcendent baserunning (Rickey Henderson), or an incredibly weak league (Fred Dunlap). The vast majority of years like this are put up by Hall of Famers, so Judge is in rarefied air. There’s no question that he is having a special season.

The problem is that Judge isn’t likely to be paid directly for his special 2022 season, only the increased expectations resulting from such a high-level performance. Even if the Yankees were inclined to give a franchise player a bonus for an MVP season that was played in their uniform but was cost-controlled, no other team is likely to be as generous in rewarding a performance from which they didn’t benefit. When trying to gauge what Judge is likely to get, a few factors work against him, factors over which he has very little control. The biggest is that, again, the first year of his new contract will fall in his age-31 season, which means that no matter how high you think Judge’s baseline expectation is, he’s going to be expected to decline quite significantly throughout the course of the contract and relatively quickly. It’s not a coincidence that, with the nearly sole exception of Joey Votto, the mega-contracts that work out from the perspective of teams are those that start off at a very young age. Read the rest of this entry »

Clarke Schmidt has added an important weapon to his arsenal since he was first featured here at FanGraphs in January 2021. Given the organization he plays for, it isn’t much of a surprise that that addition is a sweeping slider — or, in New York Yankees vernacular, a “whirly.” The 26-year-old right-hander is throwing his version of the pitch 37.2% of the time this season, and with great success: Opposing hitters are batting just .148 against the offering, with a .164 SLG and a .186 wOBA.

His overall numbers are likewise impressive. The 2017 first-round pick has made 23 appearances this year — all but three out the bullpen — and boasts a 2.82 ERA and a 3.17 FIP. He’s allowed 41 hits and fanned 51 batters in the same number of innings.

Schmidt discussed his “baby whirly” when the Yankees visited Fenway Park earlier this month.

——

David Laurila: We talked pitching prior to last season. What’s changed since that time?

Clarke Schmidt: “When we spoke, I wouldn’t have been throwing a slider. That’s the main thing I’ve added, and it’s probably been my biggest pitch this year. My usage has been high, and I’ve had some really good results with it. Beyond that, I’ve cleaned up some things — some arm path stuff — and there has probably been more maturity in my pitch selection. But I’d say that the slider has been the number one change.”

Laurila: I recall you saying in January 2021 that some people considered your curveball more of a slider.

Schmidt: “For sure. I’ve always had a big breaking ball, but it’s hard — it’s 84-85 [mph] — so even though people are throwing harder curveballs now, it does get considered a slider sometimes. But now that I’m throwing both, there are distinct differences. I have two different shapes. Read the rest of this entry »

Another series, another bundle of home runs for Aaron Judge. The Yankees’ superstar has set a scorching pace this September, and on Sunday, he hit his 58th and 59th home runs in a victory over the Brewers. As is customary, I’ve updated our game-by-game odds of him reaching his 60th, 61st, and 62nd home runs in a given game the rest of the season. If you want to see Judge tying Babe Ruth, tying Roger Maris, or leaving every previous Yankees (and American Leaguer) in the dust with 62, you can see our predictions below.

One note: I’ve added a few bells and whistles to this projection to handle Judge’s rest situation. The Yankees have been more aggressive than I expected in terms of getting him into games this September. To reflect that, I’ve changed the way I handle an off day. Previously, I set a specific day and simply gave Judge no plate appearances that day. As we’re getting closer to that scheduled off day, and closer to some milestones, that deterministic way of handling a day off feels wrong to me. Read the rest of this entry »

Sheesh. It’s been exactly one game since our last update on Aaron Judge’s pursuit of hitting 60, 61, and 62 home runs. At that point, Judge seemed more likely than not to eclipse Roger Maris‘ 61-homer mark, though only marginally. But after two home runs last night against the Red Sox, the pace is heating up again. Now, my simulation model thinks Judge is extremely likely to surpass Maris:

If that feels like a huge jump in odds to you, you’re in good company. If you think about it for a bit, though, it’s not so crazy. Judge has played 138 games this year and hit 57 homers. That’s a pace of less than half a home run per game, and still wildly impressive. Two in one game is always unlikely, though; it’s Judge’s 10th time doing it this year, for example. The finish line is getting close now; with 20 games to accrue five homers, one more barrage could put him over the top. Read the rest of this entry »

Last week, we at FanGraphs came up with a fun idea: we simulated Aaron Judge’s remaining games a million times to figure out if and when he’s likely to hit some milestone home runs: numbers 60, 61, and 62. At the time, the takeaway was clear: Judge was most likely to hit each of those milestone home runs during the Yankees’ series in Toronto on September 26–28.

Since that article was published, Judge has played six games and hit only one home run. That changed the odds significantly. More specifically, per my simulation, here are his odds of reaching at least 60, 61, or 62 homers, both now and six games ago:

Read the rest of this entry »

Yesterday, I took a look at a few starters who have changed their pitch mix after being traded halfway through this season. Today, I’m finishing the set. Here are the relievers who have changed their pitch selection the most in the month after joining new teams. One note: since relievers throw fewer pitches, the variability in their mix is greater; a few extra sliders to get the feel for them in a random game can tip the percentages meaningfully. I’m focusing on five relievers who made interesting changes, but you could add others to the list.

Lou Trivino, New York Yankees

The Change: -12% Four-Seamer, -6% Changeup, +8% Cutter, +14% Slider
Trivino is a rarity, a legitimate five-pitch reliever. He’s thrown his changeup, slider, sinker, cutter, and four-seamer each at least 10% of the time this year, and mixed in an occasional curveball for good measure. The Yankees are working to change that.

Since donning pinstripes, Trivino is down to three pitches he uses at least 10% of the time: sinker, slider, cutter. His slider is new this year, one of the sweeping types that are all the rage these days, and he’d already taken to the pitch in Oakland, using it nearly 20% of the time. He’s using it even more in New York; a third of the pitches he’s thrown as a Yankee have been sliders. Read the rest of this entry »

Aaron Judge is doing something that most baseball fans, myself included, haven’t seen in their lifetime: He’s making a run at the American League home run record. Even if you don’t do some steroid-related asterisking of Barry Bonds et al., passing Babe Ruth and Roger Maris is a heck of an accomplishment; if you want to stick your fingers in your ears and ignore the late 1990s and early 2000s, it only makes Judge’s chase more consequential. Truly, this is an exciting time to follow baseball.

Normally, I’m the writer who pours cold water on everyone’s fun during chases like this. “Sure, he’s doing well now,” I’d say, “but if you look at his career numbers, he’s on pace to fall short.” Well for once, that’s not true! If you look at our Depth Charts projections, our median expectation for Judge gives him a 62-homer season.

That’s a boring and dry number, but in baseball statistics nerd land, it’s rare and exceptional. Projecting someone to break a record is obviously rare – records usually get broken by phenomenal performances, not by median outcomes. In celebration of that, I thought I’d layer on a bit more analytical rigor and give people an idea of not just if, but when Judge might hit home runs number 60, 61, or 62.

I wanted an easy-to-understand process, so I kept it simple. I took the Yankees’ remaining schedule, then noted each remaining team’s HR/9+ (from our suite of Plus Stats), the venue’s righty home run park factor (from Statcast’s new park factors), and whether I think Judge will play that day. I also used our projections to get what we consider to be Judge’s current true home-run-per-plate-appearance level (it’s 7.14%, for those of you keeping score at home). Read the rest of this entry »

Episode 989

This week on the show, we hear great stories from a veteran minor league broadcaster and discuss those darn Yankees, but not before talking about the new FanGraphs app!

• In the first segment, David Laurila welcomes Tim Hagerty, broadcaster for the Triple-A El Paso Chihuahuas. We learn about a number of interesting Padres prospects playing for El Paso, including Jay Groome, Luis Campusano, and Ryan Weathers, before hearing about Tim’s upcoming book, Tales from the Dugout: 1,001 Humorous, Inspirational & Wild Anecdotes from Minor League Baseball. Tim tells us about the PA announcer who got tossed by an umpire, the minor league team that spent a night in jail, the team that set its field on fire on purpose, the pitcher who got locked in a bathroom, and many more fun tales from his research. [6:50]
• After that, Ben Clemens and Jay Jaffe get together to talk about the New York Yankees, who dominated the first half of the season but have found themselves in a skid since the trade deadline. Jordan Montgomery has been superlative since his trade to the Cardinals, while Frankie Montas has been inconsistent with New York, and the combination isn’t helping the mood among Yankees fans. The duo discuss those deals as well as the Yankees having their eye on October, how hard it is to catch a home run on video at the ballpark, and how it seems like everyone in the Yankees lineup (apart from Aaron Judge) has struggled. [28:59]

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NEW YORK — More than three weeks after the Yankees made him their top trade deadline acquisition — and a night after the pitcher he replaced, Jordan Montgomery, spun a one-hit shutout to further an impressive opening run with the Cardinals — Frankie Montas was able to show the Bronx a representative version of his capabilities. Facing the Mets in front of a Yankee Stadium season high of 49,217 boisterous fans, the 29-year-old righty survived a rocky first inning, got strong support on both sides of the ball (save for one glitch), and moved Pete Alonso to bat-breaking frustration in what turned out to be a 4-2 Yankees win, giving the team its first series victory in August and salvaging a split of the season’s four-game Subway Series.

Montas allowed two runs in 5.2 innings, scattering six hits and a walk while striking out six — his highest total since his seven-strikeout effort at Yankee Stadium on June 28 while pitching for the A’s. His 15 called strikes was his highest total since that outing, and his 27% CSW (which included 10 swinging strikes) matched his season rate, heralding a return to form following a rough stretch of nearly eight weeks, during which shoulder inflammation, the trade, a trip to the bereavement list and poor performance limited him to a 5.90 ERA and 5.08 FIP in seven starts totaling just 29 innings.

“Packed house in the Bronx, [his] first Subway Series, he went out there and did his thing,” marveled Aaron Judge afterwards. “Working all his pitches, kind of similar to [Domingo] Germán… Backdoor cutter and backdoor slider to some of those lefties early on to kind of steal a strike, and then he got to that sinker-splitter combo. It’s pretty tough to tell the difference between both of those.”

“He showed some bulldog,” added Judge, whose fourth-inning solo homer — number 48 for the season and his second in as many nights — off Taijuan Walker kicked off the scoring. Judge also capped off a go-ahead two-run rally in the seventh by plating the Yankees’ final run via a single off Joely Rodríguez. Read the rest of this entry »