Craig Edwards FanGraphs Chat – 4/2/2020

Craig Edwards: Let’s get things rolling.

Alex: Given the news that Manfred is going to arbitrarily allow Hinch and Luhnow to get off completely free without getting suspended for many (if any) games, don’t you think the MLBPA is going to vigorously challenge any existing suspensions to players (Pineda, German, etc.) unless the league drops them? They can easily argue that those guys accepted their punishments under the belief that their suspensions would be treated like all others.

Craig Edwards: It’s a weird situation. Hinch and Luhnow are still unable to get paid by an MLB team this year. Pineda and German’s suspensions won’t last until 2021, either I don’t think so it would seem that both groups received similar treatment. I think being upset about it has more to do with being upset about the original suspensions being light rather than unfair treatment if baseball loses an entire season due to a pandemic.

Nolan: Forbes values the Rays and Royals at about $1 billion each, and we recently saw the Royals sold for almost that exact amount.  Meanwhile, the farm system rankings unveiled on Fangraphs today have the Rays’ system worth $510 million and the Royals’ system $171 million.  Does that mean a potential buyer of the Rays paying the Forbes-estimated price would stand to receive a significant windfall?  Or does Forbes already account for farm-system values in franchise valuation?

Craig Edwards: Keep in mind that those values are compared to what it would cost to find a similarly valued player in free agency. The values are within the system we currently have. If players could be free agents after three seasons, the values would go down due to less team control.

Craig Edwards: As for baking in that the Rays are generally good and the Royals are generally not, it is more less included because they look at how much money each has made with attendance over the last few years and projects that forward. For the Rays, winning and losing hasn’t had that much affect on attendance compared to say a new stadium, while the Royals do decently well in attendance when they are good, less so when they aren’t.

John: Craig –  lots of conflicting info on whether the league will play to empty stadiums.  Passan said the agreement says no.  What have you heard ?

Craig Edwards: I though there was some wiggle-room requiring player input with safety being the biggest concern. They aren’t yet at a place where they have to decide on empty stadiums. If the option becomes empty stadium or no season, I have to imagine that empty stadiums will be the answer if it safe.

Jason N: Ever since that Madoff/Wilpon mess, the Mets have been financially constrained way beyond expectation.  If the season is cancelled, any chance the Mets “fold” (MLB takes them over and manages a sale)?

Craig Edwards: That would be a bit of a last resort, I would think, and complicated by the fact that the Wilpon’s own the tv network as well. I would also note that we don’t actually know how constrained the Mets have been. Many just assume so because they haven’t spent.

Big League Choo: I doubt it would even happen, but I would love MLB to encourage the use of some Twitch-type platform that would allow anybody to stream their live commentary over an announcer-less live game feed. Just so many fun ways people could take it. An armchair analyst. A superfan homer. Some friends commenting Bevis & Butthead style. A young kid with dreams of becoming an announcer with an easy way to make a demo real. They could all have channels and anyone with an MLB.TV subscription could access any of them.

Craig Edwards: Will they be allowed to talk over broadcasters reading promos or the ad breaks. How would they ensure it passed FCC guidelines regarding language? How would they separate what is MLB-sponsored and what isn’t. And if it isn’t MLB sponsored, then who gets the money? It is unfortunately, somewhat difficult terrain to navigate.

Seeforman: While there are a zillion good shortstops, there are ( and always have been) few good center fielders. Why?

Craig Edwards: I’m not sure that’s exactly true. Here’s the seasonal split for SS and they haven’t always been good. https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=ss&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=0&…

Craig Edwards: Here’s CF: https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=cf&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=0&…

Craig Edwards: Since 1999, there have been 154 CF with at least 2-WAR seasons compared to just 114 for SS.

nlites: Craig I am new to these chats and fairly recently joined Fangraphs, so you or someone else may have already discussed this, but if it is considered safe, without fans, it would help many fans, just to be able to watch games on MLB, or to be able to see stats, etc.  If that were to occur, what do you think the chances of MLB dropping the rule regarding allowing only out of market games?

Craig Edwards: I think there is almost no shot of that happening, unfortunately. If they are playing games in front of no fans, that means they are playing for the tv audience and the network that is paying the team wants those eyeballs on their cable channels, not an MLB.tv subscription, where they don’t get that revenue.

Jeff: Gimenez and Dom Smith for Matthew Boyd? Who says no?

Craig Edwards: Maybe nobody, though it is highly dependent on what the Tigers think of Gimenez and whether they think Boyd can drive his value higher with a more consistent season.

Alex: Here’s another problematic element to eradicating Hinch and Luhnow’s suspensions (yes, I know they aren’t getting paid this year but neither are a plethora of people around the game): What happens to Alex Cora when the Red Sox investigation is complete? Will Manfred be able to suspend him effective the start of the 2021 season after completely botching the Hinch and Luhnow “punishments?” There’s no way he can claim that any time Cora misses while the game is out during a pandemic is considered a “suspension.”

Craig Edwards: Seems likely that Cora will be suspended longer and just cite worse transgressions than Hinch, starting the system in Houston, doing more when he was with Boston, etc.

David: I talked myself into the Mets winning the division before Syndergaard  went down—in the unlikely event that there’s a season are they the fourth best team in the division or can their young core position players and deGrom carry them to a wild card game?

Craig Edwards: In a shortened season, the might Mets still have a good shot at the division because of increased variability. Dan had a good post about this. https://blogs.fangraphs.com/how-much-do-the-playoff-odds-change-in-a-s…

nlites: Not being a Yankee or Dodger fan, I have not as hard of feeling against the Astros, although they did carry this to a new level.  So, why is the Commissioner’s Office holding off on the Red Sox decision, since they know the results of the investigation?  Are they just hoping this will all be lost in all of the other pandemic whirlwind?

Craig Edwards: I think if they were hoping it would get lost, they would have announced it already. I’m not sure exactly why the decision is being delayed, but I’m guessing the league feels this is sort of an inappropriate time given everything else going on in the world.

Alex: How do you think the long layoff will impact upcoming 2021 free agents who specifically have lengthy injury histories or small sample sizes of top production? Will both the former (James Paxton, George Springer, etc.) and latter (Semien, Hendriks, Minor, etc.) be able to secure multi-year deals or do you think some of these guys will have to take one year pillow contracts?

Craig Edwards: I think the health at the end of the season is going to matter more for the type of deals those players get. They all have enough of a good track record that as long as they finish the season fine, they will do well. I think the bigger question affecting them is what the season looks like and what the world looks like in December. If owners have recouped most of their money on the season and next year looks like a return to normalcy, we could see a normal winter. If there are a lot of concerns, then we might see more one-year deals if the multi-year offers aren’t rolling in like normal.

Craig Edwards: I should take this time to thank everyone who has become a member, particularly those who signed up this week. It was really great to see all of the support and love for FanGraphs this week. It’s a very special place for me and it means a ton to me. It’s more than just a job and I really do appreciate everyone who has said kind things about the site and signed up to become a member.

Craig Edwards: Here’s the post from earlier this week by David Appelman. https://blogs.fangraphs.com/a-fangraphs-update-were-asking-for-your-he…

gway: I know there is a lot of information we don’t have yet, but if the plan is the 100 game season rumored yesterday, how do you think it effects the trade market? Teams that aren’t trying don’t have to worry about selling tickets because attendance is going to take a huge hit anyway, so do they ditch any pretense of competition and trade aggressively?
With a compressed schedule will fringe contenders have to make a decision sooner?

Craig Edwards: I think we’ve seen over the past few years that pitching, particularly good starting pitching, commands the biggest returns at the trade deadline. Those pitchers are almost always replacing bad starters which makes them valuable in the regular season, even if it is just a couple months, and then they are valuable in the playoffs because starters can take on outsized importance due to pitching in more games proportionally than the regular season. I think that’s going to be the case this season as well. Position players aren’t going to worth as much in trade because they can only have so much impact.

Craig Edwards: The interesting thing is going to be how the playoffs look and when the deadline will be because it is possible 2/3 of the league will still be in the playoff race at the deadline which could serve to drive up prices, particularly for relievers who are always available, but perhaps less so this year.

boxcar stoopid: Since I’ve been working from home I’ve been taking a lot more walks and bringing walking beers. You ever notice the walk seems to throw off the taste? What’s going on with that?

Craig Edwards: That is not something I’ve noticed though I will take more care to see if I feel like it is true in the future. An outdoor beer is one of life’s little pleasures and it would be a shame that some people aren’t able to enjoy a walking beer as much as they should. I will need to do a lot of testing to get to the bottom of it. Slow walks, fast walks, bottle, can, coozy, etc. It’s going to be a lot of work, but we’ll get there.

nlites: Having retired a little over a year ago, I now have time to dig into these new analytics being used and when Fangraphs was recommended to me, after a few weeks of watching, it is the best site around in my opinion.

Craig Edwards: Thanks. That’s great to hear.

fighter of the nightman: tell me optimistic things about dakota hudson please

Craig Edwards: Hudson had swing and miss stuff coming out of the draft so it was weird to see him not able to do it as much as a professional. Presumably those skills are still there somewhere and he looked pretty good in spring training. As a ground ball pitcher, he might be able to get away with a few more walks than a typical pitcher if he has a good defense and the Cardinals have a good defense.

ghabe: There was an article over at Viva El Birdos about which teams would be hurt if they don’t play baseball this year. Which teams would see the most benefit (relatively speaking)? How would a team even benefit, just bad teams with bad contracts expiring?

Craig Edwards: If a team was heading toward a rebuilding phase but still had a lot of bad contracts without much to trade, I suppose that team could benefit. A team like the Giants, for example. The problem with examples like that are even though the Giants will be bad and have some big contracts still there, they would probably still do well enough at the gate and with local and national tv money, that they would make money being bad and they will not make money doing nothing.

Andy: Are MLB clubs eligible for the CARES act small business loans?

Craig Edwards: Do MLB teams really have fewer than 500 employees even if a lot of the ballpark workers are contractors? Each org has what like 200 or more players to begin with plus another 50 coaches or so. Add in scouts, front office, ticket sales, and other stadium employees and it seems like they would not be eligible. It also might be a pretty bad look to borrow $10 million or whatever to try and get some forgiven when the owners are billionaires.

our savior aaron miles: Will we see teams going with 6 man rotations or other non-traditional setups with a compressed schedule? Do you see a new type of relief role coming out of this?

Craig Edwards: That depends on how they do the schedule. If there are a bunch of doubleheaders and increased roster sizes, a 6-man rotation might be a necessity though a lot of teams would probably go the opener/bullpen route so long as they get the extra arms.

Scot: What would Jeter’s career have been like if he had switched to 3B when AROD joined the Yankees? Did he have the range to play better there than at SS?

Craig Edwards: I think it would have been much the same. It’s not like his reputation would have gone down. He was plenty good as a hitter to play at third base. Would he have ended up with more WAR? Maybe, but not enough to really change the way he’s thought of, I wouldn’t think.

ebo: I’ve gotta tell you, when we get through this thing I’m going to get hammered on beer and listen to or watch baseball every chance I get and it will be great.

Craig Edwards: That sounds like a great plan.

Craig Edwards: That’s going to do it for this week. Thanks for all the questions.