Dave Cameron FanGraphs Chat – 5/3/17

Dave Cameron: Happy Wednesday, everyone.

Dave Cameron: Nice to be back on the west coast after a trip to DC for Pitch Talks on Monday night.

hscer: thanks for doing Pitch Talks DC on Monday, “Previous Speaker,” great stuff as always

Dave Cameron: Thanks to the folks who came out and made it a fun night. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

The Average Sports Fan: Are the slow starts for the Royals and Blue Jays actually blessings in disguise? NO reason for misplaced hope. You are terrible, SELL!

Dave Cameron: The Blue Jays aren’t terrible, they just dug too big a hole.

Dave Cameron: This is probably the best thing for the Royals, though, yeah.

Dave Cameron: Now they can trade most of the FAs to be and not be tricked into overpaying to keep this group together.

daro: Will LAD really send down Bellinger?? He is really hitting the ball well while not striking out. And he is ok defensively

Dave Cameron: I don’t think so. He’s better than Toles.

mtsw: Given the plausible deniability involved, how do you solve the beaning problem? Someone will eventually get seriously hurt if the league doesn’t do anything. But both Dylan Bundy’s beaning of Betts and Sale throwing behind Machado could easily have been accidents.

Dave Cameron: There’s no inherent right to pitch in MLB if you’re “accident” prone. If you don’t have good enough command to not miss behind a guy, well, get better.

Dave Cameron: And here’s a week or two off to practice your command.

The Average Sports Fan: Moncada passes the Super 2 deadline in the next week or so. Do you think he gets called up?

Dave Cameron: The Super Two deadline is not next week.

Dave Cameron: There are ~183 service days in a year. We’ve run through about 30 of them since the season started. Anyone called up next week would get ~140 or so days of service, and would very likely get Super Two status.

Dave Cameron: The number changes from year to year, so there’s no exact date, but generally, teams wait until mid-June to ensure that guys end up around 110-120 and don’t get Super Two status.

Rhaegar: Eric Thames finishes the season in the top _____ of wRC+?

Dave Cameron: 12

Matt: True or False – Aaron Judge will do physical damage to the big board in LF at Wrigley this weekend.

Dave Cameron: True

Bork: Thor is headed for a second opinion. Apparently the first opinion given by Dr. Nick Riviera didn’t work out too well for the Mets.

Dave Cameron: If the three months timeline turns out to be right, he might end up being done for the year, effectively. That would put him out until August, and by then, the Mets might have dug too big a hole to come back from, so then there’s no huge rush in getting Thor back if the season is in the tank.

Dave Cameron: Maybe he makes a handful of starts in September to give him confidence going into the winter or something, but I wouldn’t be shocked if we didn’t see him pitch again this year.

Jimmy S: Hi Dave, What’s the deal with Willson Contreras’ offense? I thought he was projected to be a top 5 catcher this year? His glove looks fine but has been pretty cold offensively. Think Montero will get more opportunities at bat now? Thanks!

Dave Cameron: The contact rate going the wrong way is concerning. He’s not a monster power guy, and in the minors, he didn’t strike out much at all.

Dave Cameron: He’s at like 65% contact this year, which is Mark Reynolds territory.

Dave Cameron: Almost wonder if he’s hurt or something.

Zock Jr.: Oh thank God. I’m at jury duty. This chat will help so much.

Dave Cameron: Well this calls for a poll.

Dave Cameron:

Lord of the Infield Flies: What is the most polite way to describe Grandy’s April? “Underwhelming”?

Dave Cameron: Disconcerting.

Adam: Goldschmidt and Altuve each have 8 SB and 1 CS. Goldschmidt has 1.2 UBR and Altuve has -1.3. How is Altuve such a poor baserunner? He regularly posts negative UBR. Has anyone looked into this?

Dave Cameron: He hits into a bazillion double plays.

Ballsandgutters: With the expanding plethora of 98+ mph pitchers in the majors now isnt it possible that AAA batted ball data is less relevant in ML predictions.?

Dave Cameron: Those guys throwing 98 in the majors had to come from somewhere.

Uncle Chips: Who would you project to have more career WAR, Yelich or Conforto?

Dave Cameron: Yelich

Lord of the Infield Flies: In light of his strong April, do you think that ROS Cesar Hernandez is closer to his 2015 or 2016 form?

Dave Cameron: As always, it’s in between. But maybe 60/40 2016.

ryan: what are the odds the Giants enter a period in the next 2 years that they consider trading Buster Posey (assume Posey is still awesome)?

Dave Cameron: I don’t see it.

Dave Cameron: He’s attached to their franchise in a Jeter-esque way.

v2micca: I don’t watch many Rays games. So, can you explain to me why teams appear to be pitching around Brad Miller and his .130 ISO?

Dave Cameron: Because he has legitimate power and teams don’t base their scouting reports on April performance.

Seymour: Before the season, you chose the Yankees to win the AL East and one of your reasons was that you liked Judge more than the projections. Why did you like him more than the projections, and what do you think his reasonable ceiling is?

Dave Cameron: He hadn’t turned his raw power into game power in the minors, but it seemed pretty clear that he had elite ball-striking skills, and the contact rate wasn’t atrocious.

Zock Jr.: So, I know it’s early, but barring injury, is this the year Kershaw COLLAPSES into simply a top-2 pitcher?

Dave Cameron: Well the other guy who could make a real run at his throne is now out for most of the year.

Dave Cameron: So no.

Guest: I know this isn’t really your analytical purview – but thoughts on the Adam Jones situation in Boston?

Dave Cameron: It sucks. I’m glad he said something, and I’m glad it’s getting recognized as a real issue. But it’s sad that he still has to deal with it, and hopefully, the idiot gets banned from Fenway for life.

rustydude: Loved Sawchik’s piece on Devenski. I remember chatting with you almost 10 years ago on converting good starters and good relievers to long relief to better optimize their stuff as they go through a batting order just once. The drawback at the time was obviously getting paid. Has the worm turned on this argument? Will optimized/leveraged long relievers start getting paid more?

Dave Cameron: I think we’re headed that direction.

Ivan Nova: Based off my efficiency, ability to go 6-7+ innings per start, ground balls, and control can you see me as a ~3 war pitching going forward

Dave Cameron: I’d go 2.5, but 3 isn’t insane.

Shawn Green: How would you describe my career?

Dave Cameron: Cromulent.

Brandon M: What panic level should I be at as a Rangers fan? I just don’t see a whole lot of reasons to be optimistic at this point.

Dave Cameron: Panic is probably the wrong call, but this is a mediocre team. They’re going to have to seriously think about trading Darvish this summer.

v2micca: Due to his age, is Aaron Judge a prime candidate to sell his free agency years at a discount?

Dave Cameron: Well, he also has a counteracting skillset that will pay very well in arbitration.

Dave Cameron: So he doesn’t need to get to FA to get real money.

Win Twins?: With the hot starts by Miguel Sano and Ervin Santana (and the lackluster April records of Cleveland and Detroit), can the Twins stick around in the AL central race until the trade deadline? With Berrios pitching well in Triple AAA, should the Twins bring him up and see if he can contribute at the big league level? Cause for cautious optimism?

Dave Cameron: I don’t see it. Santana might be a solid pitcher now but that rotation is still not good.

Robert: Mariners are going to need to go find a starting pitcher, right?

Dave Cameron: Maybe two.

Kiermaier’s Piercing Green Eyes: Would you make any changes to baseball’s suspension policies for player-player aggression (including but not limited to throwing at players and actual fighting)?

Dave Cameron: Yeah, I’d double or triple the suspension lengths for everything.

Scott of Linconshire: Are the white sox going to screw up their season by thinking they’re in it, and not end up trading Q, Nate Dog Jones, Fraizer, etc for prospects?

Dave Cameron: No.

Ethan: What the heck is going on with Jedd Gyorko? Since the beginning of last season, he’s been a significantly better hitter. Is this a sustained hot streak, or has he made actual adjustments?

Dave Cameron: Cardinals Devil Magic

NYtoLA: Hey, I know that the site lives on ads. Don’t have a problem with that. It’s just that lately the ads have really slowed the load times to a crawl. Don’t know if you guys have thought about a solution but would be great to get faster loading ads to improve QOL.

Dave Cameron: Interestingly, I’ve heard the opposite from a lot of people lately, so you might just have one rogue ad that’s causing issues. If you see something that is causing problems with your browser, let us know, and we’ll try to fix it. It certainly isn’t our intent to have intrusive ads.

PTBNL: Hey Dave, thanks for coming out to DC this week, it was great to get your take on the Nats and O’s, as well as some of the big stories from April. I’m curious to get your take on larger sports news outlets (i.e. Washington Post, ESPN, regional sports networks) using so much content generated by FanGraphs, and whether that’s a positive or negative trend for the site.

Dave Cameron: As long as they aren’t just plagiarizing, we are perfectly happy with other outlets using our data. That’s part of the point of having a free site; you want people referencing your stuff.

Greg: Dave – as “King Felix” and “Happy Felix Day” were both your creations, I believe, have you ever spoken to him personally? Have the M’s ever brought it up with you?

Dave Cameron: I’ve never talked with Felix, no. I talked with the M’s PR people way back in the day.

Dave Cameron: I’m happy to see those things caught on.

Zach: How far up the chain of command does a decision to be a “seller” typically come from? I’d assume that it might be different for different teams, but is it more often the GM/head baseball decision person, or the owner?

Dave Cameron: The owner generally has to sign off.

Terry Collins’ Pen: Last year, Freddie Freeman didn’t crack your top 50 trade value chart. Since last June, he has a 186 wRC+ and after this year, has 4/86 left on his deal. I know there are a ton of great young players on cheaper deals, but any chance freeman cracks the top 15 this year?

Dave Cameron: Top 15? No. Top 50? Yes.

David: I’m a happy subscriber but I’m too lazy to actually login. I’m not missing out on anything in doing so, correct?

Dave Cameron: As long as you don’t mind clicking the x on the box asking you to think about subscribing, no.

Dave Cameron: The site runs the same for members and non-members.

Dave Cameron: The only difference is at the ad-free tier, which does what it sounds like it does.

PTBNL: Thoughts of Moustakas to the Red Sox at the deadline if the 3B issues persist for Boston? He’s in the last year of his deal and it’s the biggest weak spot in Boston’s power-starved lineup/

Dave Cameron: Would imagine he’d be a guy they’d look at.

mcgee51: speaking of the royals….do you think they’ll sell herrera? and will it be to the nats along with lo-cain?

Dave Cameron: The Cain/Herrera to WAS package makes sense, but will depend on cost and how big the Nats lead is in July. If they’re up 15 games or something, they might decide that it doesn’t make sense to give up premium assets for just a postseason upgrade.

Tj: How far could Judge hit a 105mph Chapman fastball?

Dave Cameron: Probably less far than he could hit an 86 mph slider. Pitch velocity has minimal impact on a ball’s exit velocity.

Guest: So are you still getting tons of questions about Kyle Schwarber, i.e. second coming of Christ, or are people finally getting their expectations in line with the reality that he is a good batter but flawed fielder? Your lefty-Mike Napoli comp seems more apt than ever. Dude has a K% of almost 30% right now.

Dave Cameron: Well, it’s still early. I don’t think anyone has moved dramatically off their earlier Schwarber positions.

Dave Cameron: Will be interesting to see how the Cubs handle this over the next year or two, though. If Happ forces his way onto the team, then what?

Dave Cameron: At some point, Schwarber might just be in the way.

Sam: Now keeping in mind this is Mike Rizzo. What do you think the Nationals actually do in the wake of the Eaton injury? Trade for Cain or Gardner?

Dave Cameron: Stay in-house until July, evaluate then. I’d imagine they’ll kick the tires on everyone, but if the cost is Robles or Soto, I wouldn’t be surprised if they just went with what they have.

Josh: Is Trevor Cahill a good pitcher now?

Dave Cameron: Jeff Sullivan writing about this soon.

Ace of Base: What should the Mets do now? Invest in pitching help? Ride out this wave and hope for the best?

Dave Cameron: Harvey looks bad, Gsellman might be hurt, Thor is out for most of the year… at some point, you just say “this isn’t our year” and stop throwing good money after bad.

Dave Cameron: They aren’t there yet, but I wouldn’t be pushing in on Quintana or anything.

Pinstripe Wizard: Is the handling of the Thor situation more dumb, less dumb, or equally dumb to the Bumgarner injury?

Dave Cameron: More dumb.

Dave Cameron: That was one guy making a bad call. This is a lot of people making a bad call.

Jordan : Dave I either read or was told that you had a 160 IQ, is that true?

Dave Cameron: I don’t think I’ve ever taken an IQ test. So, no.

Dave Cameron: (To clarify: I don’t think I’d score much above average even if I did.)

Dan: Just wanted to say thanks and kudos for all the great work @ FG–I think you get too many negative comments in chats.

Dave Cameron: Well thank you.

Eric Weinstein: The Orioles/Red Sox series touches on two unrelated issues that I think are actually related: Beanballs and Race. Could enforcing an anti-beaning rule help black participation in the sport long term? My thought is that beaning is the cultural enforcement that is used to prevent the types of displays of emotion that you see in sports with higher percentages of black athletes. And that the problem has gotten worse as the sport has gotten whiter. Sort of a death spiral of whiteness. By enforcing an anti-beaning rule, you could have some more displays of emotion by black and latin players that are popular with minority communities.

Dave Cameron: I guess my question would be do we think that the white culture of baseball would really not find some way to enforce itself even without throwing at hitters? It feels to me that MLB needs to work on changing the culture, not on just outlawing the current way the culture is enforced.

Murdoc: So, cross off Boston as a potential landing spot for Machado in 2019?

Dave Cameron: Yeah, probably.

Colinbaseball: If you woke up tomorrow and for some reason were driven only by the desire to see your kid play in the major leagues, what steps would you take over the next 16 years?

Dave Cameron: 1. Get a therapist
2. Let my kid be themselves.

Seymour: Any thoughts to the old Judge comp of Stanton? Do they have similar ceilings?

Dave Cameron: It’s the easy one; massive guy who hits the ball really hard. It’s also unfair a month in.

Seymour: Has Judge’s first month+ drastically changed our future projection for him?

Dave Cameron: Yeah.

Dooduh: Forget all the crazy roster decisions the Mets have made like carrying 3 catchers and 13 pitchers for half the season so far, but the craziest will be keeping Rosario in AAA when he might be the team’s best player right now. He’s gaining nothing by staying in Vegas for another month when he can upgrade the lineup and the IF defense. He’s pretty clearly ready.

Dave Cameron: Because he’s running a .480 BABIP in Triple-A?

Dave Cameron: Steamer has him projected for a 70 wRC+ over the rest of the season.

ManBearPuig: Rhys Hoskins should be called up and Tommy Joseph should be benched. What say you to this proposition?

Dave Cameron: I wouldn’t be against it.

JD: It should be guilty or NOT GUILTY. Juries don’t find people innocent. — A criminal defense attorney

Dave Cameron: I’ve gotten like 15 comments to this effect. Lawyers are very passionate about wording of polls.

Mike Fiers, probably : Arbitration raises should be based on xFIP.

Dave Cameron: Ricky Nolasco, is that you?

Steve: I know it’s early and most of their pitching staff is injured….but how do you feel about the angels making at least the WC game?

Dave Cameron: With that rotation? Not great.

Tom: Would you ever consider recording a podcast as a live event? I know writers live in different places, but it could work when some people are together for a fangraphs meetup. I would pay good money to see Dayn and Carson do whatever it is that they do on their podcast…

Dave Cameron: We’ve talked about trying to do one this summer.

RSO: Dave, when I saw you picked the Yankees to win the AL East, even as a Yankees fan I was surprised. What did you see in them that others didn’t before the season started?

Dave Cameron: I liked Bird/Judge/Pineda/Severino more than most. Three of those four have worked out so far, but let’s be real, it’s not like I knew this was coming. Some calls look good, some don’t.

Dooduh: Tack on to ads question, the pop up asking about membership every few pages is a little much. Can you guys walk that back a little?

Dave Cameron: There is a way to get rid of it permanently…

ECinDC: I wasn’t able to make it to pitchtalks… but would love to hear what was pitchtalked about. Is it released anywhere?

Dave Cameron: Kevin said he releases the audio in podcast form.

Dave Cameron: Search Pitch Talks on your podcast tool.

Nick: Dave, This seems like a nitpick, but I have a minor annoyance with the functionality of the site. I am a member (but not part of the ad-free membership), and I play Ottoneu, but the site never remembers my log in, even when I click to remember me as a user. Every time I log in, I am asked if I am a fangraphs member when I already am and would like to have that baseline when I open the site. Love the site and sorry to gripe!

Dave Cameron: We’ve heard this from other people too, and are trying to figure out what is wrong. It’s something we’re working on but don’t know exactly how to fix yet.

Nate: If Judge ends up having Richie Sexson’s career, is that a win?

Dave Cameron: Yes

Kimball: Cistulli refers to the $50 membership as “less reasonably priced” in his audio ad, but I believe it to be *more* reasonably priced since one receives the immensely valuable ad-free benefit. Should he change his ad, or should he stick with it, on the assumption that listeners know to do the opposite of what he advises?

Dave Cameron: In general, I do the opposite of Carson’s recommendation, and encourage you to do so too.

PTBNL: Schwarber profiles best as a DH – could you see the Cubs moving him to the AL for a starting pitcher if Arrieta leaves or Lackey/Lester/Hendricks start to really decline?

Dave Cameron: He probably could turn into a decent 1B; he’s not completely unathletic. I don’t think you have to trade him to just an AL team. But a team without Rizzo.

Josh: Will you be making an appearance in Chicago for Pitch Talks? It was great to talk Mariners baseball with you for 30 minutes.

Dave Cameron: No, Craig Edwards is representing us at the Chicago show. I’ll be talking Mariners baseball at the Seattle show on June 5th.

Moltar: The ads on my work computer got so bad that I broke down and got the paid membership, so I’m guessing your ad strategy is working well 🙂

Dave Cameron: I promise that we are not intentionally running slow ads to get you to switch to ad free.

Dave Cameron: But we appreciate you doing so.

Dooduh: That’s your answer? Steamer says? Really??

Dave Cameron: The claim was that “he’s clearly ready”. I provided a data point suggesting that maybe it isn’t so clear.

Dave Cameron: Alright, on that note, I’m going to take a few hours to hang out with my kid and my dog after not seeing either for the last four days.

Dave Cameron: Thanks for hanging out, everyone.