Dan Szymborski FanGraphs Chat – 4/13/23

Dan Szymborski: It’s a chat!

Alex: Why is Neapolitan ice cream considered vintage now? Am I just old?

Dan Szymborski: It IS kinda old school now

Appa Yip Yip: Obviously it’s April and he only has 50 PAs, but Daulton Varsho has a 14% walk rate in this here young season. Did he level up?

Dan Szymborski: Probably not to *this* level since he’s still getting off to a lot of 0-1 counts, but his plate discipline stats have ticked up so far

YorDaddy: Is Dubon’s improvement at the plate real? They say he cut his fly ball rate after some advice from Yordan.

Dan Szymborski: Not to *this* degree, but he’s always been a bit underrated

Matt: Jo Adell… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Dan Szymborski: Hey, he’s still just 24

San Dzymborski: I saw past recommendations for those visiting Baltimore in a previous chat. I wanted to throw W.C. Harlan (speakeasy)/Dutch Courage (gin bar), Mount Vernon Marketplace (soju bar and great food like Cheezy Mike’s), Abbey Burger Bar, and Mi & Yu Noodle Bar in Fed Hill had some of the best marumen noodles I’ve ever had. Also fun to scooter around the promenade in the summer. Baltimore is super underrated!

Slapshot: Your “This has been a Mountfortress game” tweet from earlier this week was top notch content.  Also, it remains a shame that Baltimore created that LF monstrosity, as it feels like Mountcastle was hurt by the change more than anyone else on that team.  Your thoughts?

Dan Szymborski: It’s probably likely

Dan Szymborski: But any park change is going to hurt *someone*

Tom: Will this be the second time in three years the predictions get the winner of the NL West mind-bogglingly wrong?! (No, but I’d still like your thoughts on the Snakes)

Dan Szymborski: Hey, we picked playoff teams most of hte time!

Dan Szymborski: I don’t think Arizona will keep it up

Dan Szymborski: but I SHOULD note that I’ve been talking up the Diamondbacks all year

Dan Szymborski: well all winter

Tio: Dan, it seems Chaim Bloom built an offense that’s Devers, a rookie (Casas), an expensive lottery tickey (Yoshida) and an array of utility/bench players and “balanced” it with a pitching staff of high risk/moderate reward guys, plus Bello, and a couple #5 starters (Pivetta/Houck/Whitlock) two of which should probably be in their pen. Is this really a team that can contend?

Dan Szymborski: It CAN contend, but it needs to roll doubles and land on free parking a couple of times

Dan Szymborski: Though some of the talk about this team, you’d almost think they were the Nationals or Rockies, but that was really always a stretch

Billy Beane: Hey Dan, I’ve been an A’s fan my entire life, but I was thinking about washing my eyes out with bleach instead of watching their games, do you have any thoughts about which of those might be more fun?

Dan Szymborski: You know, you can watch other games; it’s not a binary A’s Game/Bleached Eyes decision

Dallas: How do you feel about Jack Suwinski? When he makes contact, his underlying metrics are outstanding, but the problem is his whiff rate on pitches in the zone is extremely high. Is this fixable?

Dan Szymborski: He’s an interesting player, but there are significant holes in his game and I expect him to kinda be a good role player/stopgap starter type

Mother’s Brother: Where are you on Kelenic? Will he end up an above average hitter this season?

Dan Szymborski: I don’t dare to offer opinions on Kelenic as everything I’ve ever said about him, good or bad, has been wrong in the opposite direction

Jake McCarthy: April, but really, did any player get more preseason hype for less of a resume?

Dan Szymborski: Was he really hyped THAT much?

Dan Szymborski: He was legitimately excellent last season, but all the projection systems basically saw him as decent league-average dude

Dan Szymborski: And Diamondbacks hitters don’t usually get a whole lot of non-stat hype – it’s not the most national-attention team

TomBruno23: So, Nolan Gorman…

Dan Szymborski: I mean, he’s not THIS good, but everyone expected he’d hit at least decently

Dan Szymborski: The problem was always finding a position for him

jim lefebvre: Is Kelenic good now?
[list-unchecked]Yes[/list-unchecked]
[list-unchecked]Of course[/list-unchecked]
[list-unchecked]Yes, and you can expect up and to the right from now on.[/list-unchecked]

Dan Szymborski:

GBS42: Grayson Rodriguez and Gunnar Henderson have started their MLB careers poorly, but 9.1 IP and 34 AB are close to nothing, right?

Dan Szymborski: Umm, about Henderson’s career start…

Dan Szymborski:

Dan Szymborski: Grayson’s last start was pretty bad though

Dan Szymborski: Because, let’s be honest, he was basically having it in AAA

ZipZip: Public Service AnnouncementI just want to warn everybody that I’ve Rostered, Aaron Nola this year… So that obviously means he’ll go 10-12 with a 4.00 ERA, and once again will underperform his expected metrics in every way.

David: Do you use any programming languages for ZiPS or is it just Excel?

Dan Szymborski: There’s some visual basic involved

Dan Szymborski: With enough third-party add-ons, I’ve gotten Statistica out of the mix

Dan Szymborski: Which streamlines it considerably

Ralph: Feeling good about the Gleyber “breakout” pick?

Dan Szymborski: After last season’s debacle, I’m not feeling good about any breakout/bust pick until November

Dan Szymborski:

Mets – Mauricio: Think Ronny Mauricio gets a shot this year?   I am thinking he is destined for a deadline trade since he is still at SS in AAA.  Afraid he ends up somewhere else and outperforms the others. (still PO’ed over Amos Otis).

Dan Szymborski: I suspect he ends up on naother team

Tacoby Bellsbury: What has been the least interesting development to you so far in the 2023 season?

Dan Szymborski: Generally speaking, the OH NO IS TEAM THAT IS OBVIOUSLY GOOD DONE BECAUSE THEY’RE 5-7? crap

Alex: The Atlanta Braves have a good team but a highly shaky starting rotation. In the meantime, they kind of need to stream a bunch of 5th-6th starter types while they’re waiting for a) Max Fried to get healthy and b) someone to emerge as a more or less reliable fifth option. Their farm system is rather famously bare at this point, beyond Quad-A guys like Elder, Shuster, and Dodd. How should a real, non-fantasy team handle this kind of back-end revolving door?

Dan Szymborski: I don’t think they’re necessarily not doing it the ideal way, given the facts on the ground

Dan Szymborski: Try to catch lightning in a bottle

Dan Szymborski: but don’t stand on the edge of a building trying to catch it

Jack: Scott Barlow has looked garbage this year – seems the Royals blew it by not trading him last deadline. SwStr is down, Ks and BBs headed in opposite directions… any sign of hope?

Dan Szymborski: He looked like garbage against the Rangers but I think it’s too soon for a reliever to be THAT worried unless he’s gone full Wohlers

Dan Szymborski: But the Royals probably should have traded him after 2021

Dan Szymborski: Decline in league offense and BABIP boost kinda hit the fact that he was worse in 2022 than 2021 by a good margin

Guest: what do you think about dean kremer’s start to his season

Dan Szymborski: ZiPS is gonna have some shame to do!

Colton: Have you ever seen a more rapid decline in production from a player than Bellinger or Baez?

Dan Szymborski: Bellinger is WAY up there

Dan Szymborski: I’m not counting guys that died or were injured of course

Dan Szymborski: Didn’t I do a Bellinger piece with steep dropoffs?

Dan Szymborski: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-bellinger-tolls-for-the-2019-nl-mvp/

leland: have you ever used the Marmol Strategy and what do you think of Matt Brash/ Honeywell as SP sv+hld options

Dan Szymborski: I don’t tend to go for the gimmicky strategies as it makes it less fun for me

Dan Szymborski: And lukewarm

Billiam: Yordan and Dubon, Attorneys at Law

Alex: Even adjusting for early-season sample size, Orlando Arcia seems to have gone from “cromulent backup” to “cromulent starter.” He’s only 28 and was a super-hot prospect in his day. How much of the improvement seems legit?

Dan Szymborski: I’m torn – he had a LOT of mediocrity

Dan Szymborski: But considering ZiPS loved him as a prospect, I have to have SOME loyalty to my creation

Liz: His plate discipline has been exactly as advertised, but so far it seems like Yoshida is hitting all of his batted balls on the ground. Is that just a small sample size effect or something that is consistent with a NPB hitter adjusting to MLB?

Dan Szymborski: I haven’t actually studied GB/FB changes in that regard from NPB to MLB

Dan Szymborski: Mainly because I don’t have THAT data for NPB

Tampa Bay Slays: I know it’s small sample size, but let’s call a spade a spade. 12-0 is quite impressive no matter which way you slice it (even if the teams they beat are not impressive). This is fun to watch! Who knew boring workmanlike Tampa was going to pull this one out

Travis: Might be content for this elsewhere, but which of the Reds “big three” starters is ZIPS most bullish about long term?

Dan Szymborski: Greene

Guest: obligatory “in the actual rules free parking doesn’t earn anything” pedantry

Dan Szymborski: Yeah, but EVERYONE plays with those rules

Dan Szymborski: You should have seen our ruleset

Dan Szymborski: In my early 20s, we played real money monopoly

Dan Szymborski: (Basically, you divide the entire bank by the number of players, put that amount of cash into the pot,a nd at the the end of the timed game, everyone keeps their money and splits the bank evenly

Dan Szymborski: We allowed very complex contracts

Dan Szymborski: Like you were allowed to buy non-competes for other unsold properties, pre-negotiate hotel visits, etc.

Dan Szymborski: And you were allowed to loan other people money with an agreed upon interest rate to be paid every time you passed go

Dan Szymborski: With properties as collateral

J: Giolito’s optimism about Giolito a couple years back, while not so terribly off because of his 2021, never really panned out. Do you think that evaluation bought in too hard too early, or is this simply like a 20th percentile outcome or so?

Dan Szymborski: He was REALLY good when he wsa really good though

Dan Szymborski: I don’t like a lot of the stuff the Sox have done, but I don’t think they’ve done anything inr egards to him

Dan Szymborski: And he had three really solid years

Smarty: Hey Dan, do you do a zips 600 projection set?

Dan Szymborski: I don’t, but I could

Planet Dust: Dan I just took a deer tick off me and am debating the prophylactic antibiotic. There are pros and cons. Right I’m leaning toward no because I don’t think the tick was on for 24 hours and I’ve been working hard on my gut health. May change my mind by the end of the chat. My question is–we are all seeing how the games are different on TV with the new rules. For those who’ve attended in person, how do you feel about the new pacing etc.?

Dan Szymborski: You’re in trouble if you’re getting health and wellness advice from me

Dan Szymborski: I’m the one who has no feeling in most of his right pinky toe because I made a gash from the toe all the way down to my heel, and just tied it up with a sock tourniquet and went about my business

Dan Szymborski: My sister, who IS a medical professional, was furious because when she saw it after it was closed up said I probably needed about a dozen stitches

Dan Szymborski: As a general policy, I don’t like antibiotics as as precautionary measure

Dan Szymborski: I’d say no

Billiam: Duvall question… Do I let him sit on my bench for eight weeks until he returns, or drop him for Nootbaar? Thanks.

Dan Szymborski: I’d drop him for Nootbaar, though I’d hope someone else in the league would give you something if THEY want to do that

Dan Szymborski: I mean it’s friggin Adam Duvall

Scuffy Mcgee: Outman for rookie of the year over Walker..tell me I’m Bananas

Dan Szymborski: At the end of the year, probably not

Dan Szymborski: but Outman would be the obvious ROY if the season edned now

YorDaddy: Should my favorite team’s star player’s daughter scream a blood curling scream before every pitch of the opponent?

Dan Szymborski: Sure

Smarty: Ha, your HTML doesn’t work!!!!

Guest: Will the Rays go 25-0?

Dan Szymborski: No

Jefferson: Is Tj Friedl now the best player in Cincinnati?

Dan Szymborski: Their best player is probably a pitcher

Dan Szymborski: and if not, It’s frigging Friedl

Insert Witty Name Here: When was the last time you stepped into the speed pitch machine at the ball park? And what did it register?

Dan Szymborski: Aberdeen Ironbirds game about 15 years ago. And it was down to 65 then.

Dan Szymborski: I through in the low 70s as a teenager

Eric: Vinnie P, what a hitter. BWJ and MJ Melendez seem to be slightly warming up as well. Are those a 3 you can confidently build a competitive franchise around (a la Cain, Hosmer, Moose)

Dan Szymborski: I think so

Dan Szymborski: But I question the Royals competence

jim lefebvre: When will ZiPS merge with “Szymage” AI to show Pixar rendered player projections?

Dan Szymborski: we’re still aways off

Dan Szymborski: I DID ask the AI for a photo of the FanGraphs staff.

Dan Szymborski:

Dan Szymborski: I also asked it for an image of FanGraphs, which it really didn’t understand

Dan Szymborski:

Nolan Jones: Do I get AB’s and can I hit?

Dan Szymborski: No, yes

Markakis: I just remember all that 3000 hit talk and was surprised to see when I checked just now that he ultimately didn’t get to 2400. Then again he ended up being done at age 36

Kevin: You are understandably critical of how the Rockies approach many things. Is that based entirely on your own observations, or do you also get insights from others who work in MLB organizations?

Dan Szymborski: There’s a mix of it

Dan Szymborski: I do talk to lots of people, and while I try to be objective, it’s hard to be truly 100% objective no matter how hard you try to squash those biases

Guest: Here are the ingredients of my stew: chuck roast; chile peppers; olive oil; chicken stock; cinamon; nutmeg; salt and pepper. Is it chili?

Dan Szymborski: As long as it’s really pepper-forward!

Bellinger: HOW IS HE ONLY 27

Guest: second part: if I do in fact have chili, then before I enjoy a bowl add shredded cheddar, mexican crema, and avocadoes to the bowl, is it still chili?

Dan Szymborski: Weirdly accompanied chili!

Marmol Strategy: is that when you publicly chastise your players?

Chip: Is Franchy Cordero a Hall of Famer now?

Dan Szymborski: heh

Dan Szymborski: I’m happy to see it though, he’s always been someone people were curious about but he always seemed to be injured

Yeah Well Hiura Towel: In the actual Uno rules, you play to 500 points

Floyd: How would you rank these hitters for ROS:
Torkelson

Dan Szymborski: Torkelson

Mando: Chaim Bloom spent $216 million and all he got was last year’s team again. Change my mind, sir.

Dan Szymborski: You’re not wrong

Re: Monopoly: This sounds like Dungeon’s and Dragons: Capitalism Edition. The only correct rule set

Patrix: My wife cuts half a banana off of the bunch every morning, and leaves the other half hanging there until the next day. Am I married to a psycho?

Dan Szymborski: Could be a sociopath

Appa Yip Yip: I think it is worth pointing out that Monopoly, like Risk, is a god awful game that should be consigned to the abyss and never spoken of again.

to Planet Dust: Tickspotters at Univeristy of Rhode Island (https://web.uri.edu/tickencounter/tickspotters/) might be able to give you advice — they respond quickly and are super helpful in my experience

Guest: Can the Rangers stay above .500 without Seager

Dan Szymborski: Probably not

A-Rod’s Bunting Fever Dream: How bad does a player need to be for the MLBPA to not fight them being cut from a team? Is Marcell Ozuna at that level yet? Could Atlanta put out an 8-man lineup instead of continuing to trot him out there for an aggressive one handed swing lineout?

Dan Szymborski: They should always pursue things vigorously, as is their duty

Dan Szymborski: I don’t know what the grievance would be if Ozuna was released. He still gets paid

Dan Szymborski: But no, you’re not supposed to DEMOTE players for non-playing reasons

Kyle: Have you ever had a dream about ZiPS? If so, what was it?

Dan Szymborski: Not that I remember.

Dan Szymborski: I can check my log

Dan Szymborski: Only a single mention that I recorded

Dan Szymborski: And it was only an ancillary mention

Dan Szymborski: I was projecting Justin Verlander to retire with 260 wins when a spaceship crashed into ESPN headquarters

Joey Baggadonuts: Is Kyle Manzardo best described as Italian Brunch, Italian Mid-Morning Snack, or Italian Shovel A Donut In Your Face While Dodging Rush Hour Traffic On Your Commute To The Office?

Dan Szymborski: I like Italian Brunch

Dijon: where did you go to school dan?

Dan Szymborski: Towson High then Loyola

JonWeisman: Your voice slays me.

Dan Szymborski: Is there a joke I don’t get?

Guest: Why do you keep a log? Are you into lucid dreaming?

Dan Szymborski: I keep a laptop on my nightstand and I type down dreams when I wake up before I forget them

Dan Szymborski: I used to do it on notepads, but i’ve along converted them to text

Dan Szymborski: And at various states of consciousness, odd things happen

Dan Szymborski: Like the time I woke up with this haunting message besides me

Dan Szymborski:

Tom: I’m new to this site.  Does BABIP tend to indicate either regression or a surge in AVG for a player?  Say if BABIP is .050 <> AVG

Dan Szymborski: It tends to regress heavily, far more for pitchers

Dan Szymborski: hitters have a larger, more predictive band of BABIP ability

Nu Roman Tick: Who is the best romantic composer and why is it Chopin?

Dan Szymborski: I’d say Mahler or Liszt, though I’d definitely get pushback in the second one

Dan Szymborski: Chopin wrote so little beyond piano that it’s hard for me to call him number one.

Dan Szymborski: And let’s admit it, the orchestral parts of the piano concertos are basically afterthoughts

Re: Dreams: I keep a dream log as well. I often hear music in my dreams and have hyper vivid dreams. So I can relate

Chef Boyardee: I’m here.

TStats: Monopoly is the single greatest boardgame ever but a timer?? smh games with my family went weeks where you just rolled when you walked by the table and left postits for trade deals

Chef Boyardee: *tiptoe through the tulips plays* …. begin scene… a cabinet slowly opens and a can creeps slightly towards the edge before rolling onto the counter and then the floor. The noise jars you awake. You wake up in a daze. The can is approaching. it stops in front of your bed. Chef Boyardee pops out like a genie in a bottle and you’re covered in soup. *end scene*

Dan Stan: Which happens first? Patrick Corbin throws a no-hitter, Blake Snell shows consistency for 25 consecutive starts, or Baltimore being consumed by the sea?

Dan Szymborski: The third

JB: Why do (bad) teams going nowhere sign boring vets to block young promising players, then give the young player sporadic AB and play them out of position which leads to bad production which they think confirms their decision to not give them an everyday job. A lot of times the talent is there to be productive if the teams would get out of their way. What possible benefit are the teams seeing or expecting when they do this? Noone is buying extra tickets or jerseys to see the Aledmys Diaz’s of the world.

Dan Szymborski: Bad teams going nowhere are generally bad teams going nowhere because they’re poorly run

banana: psychopath. the sociopath would put some lemon juice and saran or foil on the end to keep it from browning

Guest: Here’s my preferred recipe: ground chuck, and plenty of maraschino cherries. Still chili?

Dan Szymborski: There’s no peppers!

Dan Szymborski: I guess it’s cherri

jWR: Idea for segment at the 40 game mark…players who have substantially better or worse ZIPS projections based on their early season performance.

Dan Szymborski: I sometimes do that one

Dan Szymborski: but not always – it’s a little too straightforward

Dan Szymborski: Except in a couple obvious cases, I try to write using projections rather than writing ABOUT projections

Guest: i was shocked to see ’24 & ’25 projs for Jordan Walker were sub-100 wRC+, is he just too young for the sims to expect MLB production yet?

Dan Szymborski: ZiPS saw him as high risk – that’s a problem you run into with mean proejctions sometimes

Dan Szymborski: But high upside

Dan Szymborski: I talked quite a bit about this, including when I had him in my breakouts piece

Nu Roman Tick: As a piano player I am biased towards Chopin but I will concede you made good points

Dan Szymborski: I love Chopin

Dan Szymborski: I probably should explain why I chose Liszt up there

Dan Szymborski: He understood orchestral color much better than Chopin did

Dan Szymborski: And he showed more evolution as a composer. Some of his later works were *very* different and forward looking

Dan Szymborski: In some of the very latest works, there are hints of Bartok

Dan Szymborski: and a lot of hints of impressionism

Dan Szymborski: (Berlioz was the best orchestrator of the romantic era, of course)

Uncle Spike: If you were to work in an MLB front office, what would be your ideal role?  You want to be the GM, right?

Dan Szymborski: advisory

Dan Szymborski: I would not be a good GM

Dan Szymborski: I’m someone who has to have the freedom to explore projects based on whim, seeing where they go

Nu Roman Tick: I also quite like Franz Liszt. Hopefully it’s not a controversial take!

Joey Baggadonuts: Do you think Grayson’s secondaries are good enough at this time to hang in the O’s rotation? How worried are you by his most recent start?

Dan Szymborski: Yes and not at all

Dan Szymborski: It was a bad start, but I don’t see major consequences

Ian desmond was good: An addition to my previous question regarding bat speed. Would fangraphs ever publish a smash factor leaderboard? Smash factor reaches reliability quicker than any other bat-to-ball metric.

Ian desmond was good: would fangraphs ever publish an estimated bat speed leaderboard based on the equation in Alan Nathan’s book using publicly available savant data? Would be interesting to compare that to the inevitable observed bat speeds from hawk-eye

Dan Szymborski: I don’t generally make those decisions, though we do cast a wide net

Dan Szymborski: I don’t know if David’s ever considered that or not

Dan Szymborski: On that note, it’s time for me to head out for another week

Dan Szymborski: Thanks for coming everyone!