FanGraphs Weekly Mailbag: May 23, 2026
It’s hard to know what to expect from a pitcher returning from a serious injury. In addition to velocity and spin rate, pitching is also about rhythm and feel, and that can take time to come back after a long layoff. But there was little rust for Gerrit Cole to shake off when he made his season debut Friday night at Yankee Stadium. In his first major league start since undergoing Tommy John surgery on March 11, 2025, Cole silenced the first-place Rays, allowing just two hits and three walks while striking out two across six scoreless innings. His only real trouble came in the first inning, when he gave up a leadoff single to Chandler Simpson and walked Junior Caminero to put two on with nobody out. After a Jonathan Aranda fly out, Cole picked the speedy Simpson off second base and then struck out Yandy Díaz looking at an inside fastball to end the inning. From there, he got in a groove. He averaged 96.1 mph with his four-seamer, and he threw 50 of his 72 pitches for strikes.
Cole left the game with the lead, but the Rays scored four runs in the top of the eighth inning to take the first game of the series, 4-2. They now lead the Yankees in the AL East by 5.5 games. Watching the Rays play Friday night, I couldn’t help but think about how annoying they would be to play against. They pitch well, put the ball in play, and are aggressive on the bases. One Yankee told me before the game that they remind him of last year’s Blue Jays because of their pesky bottom of the lineup and refusal to strike out. I’m still not sure how good the Rays are, but I get the feeling that they are always going to be better than I think.
In this week’s mailbag, we discuss another surprising team over the first two months of the season. We’ll also answer your questions about how many players in baseball have the ability to win MVP, how good Randy Johnson and other all-time-great starting pitchers would’ve been as closers, and why the 9-9-9 challenge beers are so small. But first, I’d like to remind you that 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 an upcoming 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.
The Cardinals have too many catching options in the near future. They should try to use that catching depth whether in win no or look forward mode by the deadline to get more pitching depth or some outfield depth.
The Cards and Rays feel like such a great match on paper. The Cards could trade Crooks to the Rays for someone lien Gary Gill Hill. Rays get a C they could likely start and improve their lineup and the Cards get more SP depth to help in the future.
I am real skeptical of Crooks right now. He is almost certainly a better hitter and fielder than what he showed in his cup of coffee but the fielding metrics were so bad there is a decent chance it it is directionally correct and he is striking out an unacceptable amount at AAA right now.
It feels like a trade for a post-prospect pitcher would be fair though, someone who might have been rushed and could use a new voice helping them out. Caden Dana and Hunter Barco stand out to me as players who could still be decent 2-win starters with the right pitching coach and some patience.
Eric seems pretty confident in Crooks defense and has him as a 70. I’ll trust Eric’s take on Crooks defense more than a small sample. I expected Crooks to be more doubles power than HR power, but he seems to be hitting the ball harder and lifting it a little bit more this year and I would be surprised for him to have multiple 15-20 HR seasons. Crooks really had some swing and miss at the beginning of the season but after the initial couldn weeks he has been making better swing decisions and whiffing much less.
I’m leaning heavily on Eric’s defense grade, but I would see Crooks moving up higher in the 50 FV tier and being close to a 55. His defense would give him a high floor and he seems like a guy who may be inconsistent at the plate with some above average stretched mixed in with some bad stretches to make him a league average or slightly below average. A 70 grade defense at C is very valuable.
I think Crooks would be an immediate improvement over Feduccia / Cortes.
Crooks is still a lot closer to the Big Leagues that their two other highly ranked catching prospects. If the Cardinals think they may want to upgrade over Pagés as the primary catcher in the near future, they need to hold on to Crooks at least until they decide whether or not to make that switch.
Bernal and Rodriguez are close enough they both may play in the bigs in 27 and be valuable starters in 28. That lines up with the Cards vision as Bloom has been very vocal they want to keep focus on improving to build a solid foundation for the future instead of focusing on winning this year. Crooks is trending up for me but the Cards need to move pieces around to improve the roster construction rather than being overloaded with C. They already are splitting Bernal and Crooks between C and 1B at AAA and they both lose a lot of value add to the team if they can’t play C. Trade from a strength to improve the future rotation, OF, or even 3B.
Due to the expanded playoffs and the level of parity in MLB the last couple of years it is really hard to predict who will sell at the deadline. This is especially true because many of the worst run teams like the Angels only are willing to trade pending free agents, and many of the other teams like the Orioles, Royals, and Reds are desperate to win playoff games.
There are only 5 teams that are especially likely sellers at the deadline this year: The Angels, Rockies, Marlins, Nationals, and Giants. And the Marlins, Angels, and Nationals (and maybe Giants too) aren’t doing any sort of big tear downs. In that sort of environment the value of someone like Riley O’Brien or Dustin May might be high enough that it would be hard to ignore it, and draw more bubble teams into trading breakout players or guys heading into free agency.
The Astros could be interesting sellers. They have some real talent, playoff odds below 10%.
Yeah if they wanted to they could provide a lot of bats. They would be selling low on Paredes and Pena but high on Alvarez and Walker. Only a few teams would be in on each one, though.
Hunter Brown would have to show he was healthy but he would be the prize of the deadline if he was, above even Tarik Skubal or Joe Ryan. The Cubs and Braves would be all-in on him and even so it might not be enough. Guys like Bubba Chandler and Aidan Miller would be potential headliners in a deal like that.
I think probably they’re still stuck on the idea that they’re going to compete next year, and I kind of agree that they should give it another shot before Altuve and Correa stop hitting and Hunter Brown and Jeremy Pena become free agents. In that case the most likely scenario is the long-speculated Duran for Paredes deal and not a lot else, or they deal Walker to get out from under his deal and intend to move Paredes to first next year. Except for Brown it’s not clear to me that teams are going to offer the sorts of deals that would allow them to reset even though Alvarez and Pena should be really valuable.
There are very few defined sellers in late May during any season. More sellers will become apparent the closer we get to the trade deadline.
College baseball games are the right venue for the 9-9-9. Some schools, including my grad school alma mater and current employer, allow you to bring in coolers full of whatever you like for the open outfield seating. Bring whatever beer you want, all you gotta pay for in the stadium is hotdogs.
Shoutout to the kids working the concessions at Baum Walker Stadium, once they realized what we were attempting they gave me the last 3 dogs for free.
100% correct about college baseball venues being perfect for this challenge. At Dudy Noble, you are limited on what size cooler you can bring in. But 9 cans will still fit with the customary layer of ice and bottle of water on top for “security” to see.
In addition to not wanting drunks to ruin the experience for everyone else, a team endorsing something like the 9-9-9 challenge is going to incur significant liability issues and will want to manage that as much as possible.
I love going to the park but loathe abusive drunks. As you might expect this leads to a lot of conflicting feelings.
This extends to this promotion. I usually think getting more fans out to the park is good regardless of the reason. And maybe this gives people a “out” to do the 9-9-9 challenge without ruining the day for everyone else. But advertising to people who are excited to drink nine beers in nine innings? Sure doesn’t feel like they’re going to stop with their two-beer combo deal and everyone else would have to deal with that.
Nine beers in three hours is a beer every 20 minutes. That’s mild buzz territory for all but the most amateur drinkers, especially when you’re adding in nine dogs to soak it up.
*you* think it’s mild buzz territory, but everyone else in the room can see that’s on the border of “involuntary incontinence” levels of BAC for the average 200 pound man above.
If you’re experiencing involuntary incontinence consuming nine beers in three hours, consult a urologist immediately. That’s… not normal. At all.
Totally agree. 9 beers in 3 hours is a decent tailgate party and at the end you’re still able to fully function…just not behind the wheel.
Don’t forget that the Cleveland (then) Indians once tried a 10-cent beer night promotion. It did not go well…
Define ‘well’. It’s a legend. Don’t you want legends? Probable the number 1 “people claim they were there” event in Cleveland history.
I mean it did happen, and it was bad. That’s pretty well documented.
but at least they talk about it!
This. If a team is effectively promoting you getting wasted at their venue, aren’t they liable if you end up getting injured / die on the way home from the venue ? I live in AUS, and this liability is def a thing.
Baumann deserves an award for this, but I am unaware of any for best column subsection.
I’m a bigger guy, and very tall; I can take down nine beers with ease. Nine dogs would make me throw up.
Yes I remember when I was in my early twenties and watching a game from my couch with my roommate and we “drank a perfect game”. Just nine cans of Old Style or something. Hot dogs though? That’s crazy.
I could have probably easily pulled off the regular sized beers in college, considering you had six outs for each. The hot dogs would have been a problem.
Now, they might as well call it the 9-1-1 challenge.
I think a good venue for the 999 challenge would be Your couch! cheaper, colder beer. cheaper, fresher dogs. Immediate access to “relief”.
I was at an Angels @ Rockies game in 2023, when the Haloes popped off for ~20 runs. I’m not sure if the duration would have counteracted the elevation…
Great question on what a great starter would look like as a closer. Thankfully, we don’t have to speculate as one took a 3 year turn at closing, John Smoltz.
I think he’s a better example than Eckersley because Dennis was more of a washed up starter when he re-invented himself in the bullpen.
The guys who stand out to me as ideal closer candidates in retrospect are the ones who showed incredible promise early but washed out due to injury. Maybe if Mark Prior had been a closer he would have made the hall of fame?
I think Kerry Wood became a reliever but that was when he was just hanging on.
Mario Soto was a two pitch guy with shoulder problems.
Herb Score had an incredible start to his career but had some a couple of health problems.
The first health problem was having his face fractured by a line drive. After that he hurt his arm.
They weren’t used as closers in the modern sense, but many early and mid-20th century ace starters on Jay’s list were also used as “stoppers” late in close games. For example Lefty Grove is retroactively awarded 54 saves in his career by Baseball Reference. In 1930, when he went 28-5, he started 32 games and relieved in 18 more; his 9 saves led MLB.
BR credits Dazzy Vance with 12 saves. Others on the list with their totals: Sandy Koufax 9 (2 in 1965, when he threw 335 innings and went 26-8); Lefty Gomez 10, Bob Feller 22, Dizzy Dean 31 and Walter Johnson 34.
Thanks for tackling that 9-9-9 question Mr Baumann. 60 years old. Maybe nine 12 ounce beers over 9 innings and 3 hours when I was 23 years old. My White Sox have $5 Tuesdays. Pizza slices, nachos, dogs and 16 oz beers for $5 Certain counters have brats or Polish sausages for that $5 Smother those with grilled onions and kraut and that is a bargain anywhere. I did polish off four Polishes earlier this season on a Tuesday night.. That was plenty. I couldn’t make a clean play on a foul ball as I was holding Polish #3 in my left hand at the time. Trade-offs in life.
Loved the 9-9-9 analysis!
8 WAR is an interesting choice for threshold. I counted at least 30 times the winner had less since 1994
You could make an argument for 7 WAR or 7.5 WAR — the only-sub 7 bWAR winner (non-pandemic) since 2008 was Bryce Harper’s
20152021. (Transcribed too fast. That was derpy.)If you can drink nine beers and be none worse for the wear the next morning, you’re a better man than me – or someone with a drinking problem. Yikes.
This comment is a week late, but I thought it was amusing that both of your most forgettable franchises are/were the Baltimore Orioles.