FanGraphs Weekly Mailbag: June 21, 2025
By most measures, the Rafael Devers trade happened suddenly. It came without advance notice of his availability, and the Red Sox reportedly weren’t shopping him around. Immediately, it drew comparisons to the Luka Dončić-Anthony Davis trade in the NBA, because hardly ever in our scoops-driven media landscape, where even the tiniest rumor is treated as currency, does a transaction involving a superstar catch us by surprise.
And yet, now that the shock has worn off, trading Devers feels like a logical outcome to the saga that began in March, when the Red Sox signed Alex Bregman to play third base without giving the incumbent a heads up. The details of the ensuing rift have been covered at great length, at FanGraphs and elsewhere, so I won’t go into them here. A lot of the reporting since the trade has described the situation in Boston as untenable, and the damage done to the relationship between Devers and the team as irreparable. But based on how badly the Red Sox botched their initial response to the conflict, and then kept bungling their subsequent attempts at reconciliation, from my perspective, it seems like they didn’t make repairing it much of a priority.
We’ll tackle your questions about the Devers trade and so much more in this week’s FanGraphs mailbag. But first, I’d like to remind all of you that while anyone can submit a question, this mailbag is exclusive to FanGraphs Members. If you aren’t yet a Member and would like to keep reading, you can sign up for a Membership here. It’s the best way to both experience the site and support our staff, and it comes with a bunch of other great benefits. Also, if you’d like to ask a question for next week’s mailbag, send me an email at mailbag@fangraphs.com.
Matt is the associate editor of FanGraphs. Previously, he was the baseball editor at Sports Illustrated. His work has appeared in The New York Times, Men’s Health, Baseball Prospectus, and Lindy’s Sports Magazine. Follow him on Twitter @ByMattMartell and Blue Sky @mattmartell.bsky.social.
Tony’s question about in season updates from an actuarial lens is fascinating and other actuaries may think of this in credibility lens. When actual results are below/above expected results, what is the appropriate method to account for that.
This is basically Hugh White’s question from the CAS Exam 7 text.
Lets say a team is projected for a .617 win % (100-wins) but through 50 games, they’re at 35 wins (.700).
What do we do? Our three options are mostly as follows:
These all three fall on the least squares continuum, but the actual true answer which we can’t know until later is somewhere between them.
Credibility is a heck of a drug isn’t it?
The fact that the Rules Book allows for a player to go on bereavement leave for the illness or death of a grandchild makes me wonder how many players have had grandchildren during their active careers. It’s not implausible. Jamie Moyer’s oldest son was wrapping up his sophomore year in college at the time of Dad’s last start.
I think Adam LaRoche was a grandfather by age 42 or so, but still well after his career. Looks like Satchel Paige didn’t have kids till his 40s, Jack Quinn never had kids, and Julio Franco’s kid was relatively young when he retired–those were my three best shots!
My guess was Ken Griffey Sr but it looks like he missed by a couple of years.
Maybe Charlie Hough?
Only reference I can find to a kid of Charlie Hough’s says he was 16 for Charlie’s last season.
Gotta be someone, but even String Bean Williams looks to have had his only known child late in life.
Give Jay a bonus. Or a day off. That was a whole freaking article he wrote there.
Regarding the bereavement issue, I strongly recommend reading about former Man City player Stephen Ireland. It pushes credulity…..
Mmmmmmm … bacon.
I don’t know why the question asker would want a more year-to-year stable version of BABIP. That BABIP is unstable is the point: when you use it you’re trying to deduce how lucky the player has been getting. Voros’ whole theory here was that BABIP is an observable source of noise and could thus be eliminated. BACON isn’t because of the homers.
As I read his question, he was postulating that “past BACON has more correlation to future BACON than past BABIP has to future BABIP”. Both BACON and BABIP are useful: BACON because it is more “stable” over time and BABIP because it isn’t.
I guess that cuts to the point in Ben’s response. BABIP is useful because it is unstable and explains outcomes. BACON is more stable, but we can look at other stats that do that job better.
It sure seemed like Bonds was blacklisted after 2007, rather than retired voluntarily.
awesome questions and illuminating answers thank you
The bacon puns were worth opening this page. Thanks!
Thanks for answering my question! Where are BACON and wOBACON available to view? I don’t see them listed with any of the stat categories on player pages.
Just very quickly re: your incredibly thorough response, Jay–I don’t think Hunter’s the most deserving candidate, but he was a high-character guy who played with a lot of teams, had a great defensive reputation (no matter the stats), and put up pretty good counting numbers.
Give me Whitaker and Sheffield well before Hunter, as well as some of the starters you’re often thumping for!