Position: Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Research & Development Developer

Location: Los Angeles
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With regard to the ZiPS projections for Cleveland that appeared at this site earlier in the day, a few commenters have observed the statistical curiosities for which outfielder Brandon Guyer is responsible. One reader notes, for example, that Guyer is forecast for a .358 on-base percentage despite just a .272 batting average and 5.6% walk rate. The difference, of course, is a product of the copious hit-by-pitches for which he’s projected. Another reader correctly notes that, in 2016, Guyer was more often hit (20 times) by left-handed pitchers than struck out (17) by them.

Because all of us are beautiful and unique like a snowflake, it’s not surprising to learn that Brandon Guyer is also beautiful and unique like a snowflake. The purpose of this post is to celebrate Guyer’s particular set of skills, while also allowing the author to experiment with the splits leaderboard introduced earlier this week by unassuming hit man Sean Dolinar.

What I’ve done to fashion the definitive Brandon Guyer Leaderboard is to identify both hit-by-pitch and strikeout rate against left-handed pitchers for every batter season (minimum 60 plate appearances) since 2000. The full results of that search can be found here.

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So much of what we do is try to tell the future. So much of what we do is get the future wrong! But still we keep on plugging away, with any noteworthy trade, or any noteworthy signing. One noteworthy signing last week reunited the Yankees and Aroldis Chapman, with the closer getting a five-year guarantee. The history of relievers getting long-term deals isn’t great, but one thing we can’t ignore is that Chapman is kind of extraordinary. By some measures he’s even unique. Baseball doesn’t have an extended track record of Aroldis Chapmans (Chapmen?). Projecting his future is tricky, as it always is.

We know that, if Chapman stays the same, he’ll remain nearly unbelievable. That much, he’s proven. We know that he could snap something after any given pitch. That much, countless other pitchers have proven. But what else might we able to say?

One issue that’s come up is imagining Chapman throwing at lower velocities. Every pitcher eventually loses his zip. Some start at 25, and some start at 35, but it’s a guarantee. There’s no getting around it. For Chapman in particular, there’s one positive sign. Last year, his average fastball was 100.4 miles per hour. That’s the highest mark of his career, and he was around 98 in his first full season. So Chapman hasn’t lost anything yet. Maybe he’ll continue to hang around triple digits for a while to come.

Inevitably, though, there will be decline. And what then? To attempt to answer that, I want to try something. How might Chapman perform at lower velocities? Well, we can look at how he’s already performed at lower velocities.

Tables, ahoy! I looked at Chapman’s game log from 2012 to 2016. For every single game, I grabbed Chapman’s average fastball velocity, and then it was a matter of putting numbers together. In this first table, Chapman’s numbers are split into six groups.

That’s fairly informative already, but let’s increase the sample sizes. We’ll do that by condensing from six groups to three.

Surprise! When Chapman has thrown his hardest, he’s been his best. He hasn’t allowed many hits, and he’s allowed only two home runs. The home-run category here might be the most dramatic, but it’s also the noisiest, since Chapman hasn’t allowed many homers overall. Even when Chapman has worked around 96-97, he’s still been a strikeout machine. For reference, he’s a top-10 table since 2012, looking at strikeout rate minus walk rate. Chapman leads all pitchers, overall, but I took him out and replaced him with the three versions of himself.

The hardest-throwing Chapman is in first, easily. The medium-throwing Chapman is in fourth. The slowest-throwing Chapman is in ninth, out of 776 pitchers. Ken Giles just missed this table. So did Sean Doolittle. And maybe that’s older Chapman: some kind of healthier Sean Doolittle equivalent. Doolittle has sometimes given up his home runs, and he hasn’t been considered one of the highest-tier relievers, but he has been excellent when he’s pitched. So Yankees fans can be somewhat encouraged.

Aroldis Chapman, at some point, will lose some velocity. Aroldis Chapman, at some point, will get worse. But, of course, he has a lot of velocity to give. And when he’s worked at lower speeds before, he’s been only somewhat less incredible. Chapman comes with a lot of what you might consider wiggle room.

In a weak free agent class, no team looked as vulnerable to being picked clean in free agency like the Dodgers; by our rankings, they were potentially set to lose the #2, #6, and #8 free agents in this class, in Justin Turner, Kenley Jansen, and Rich Hill. Last week, they made sure they’d bring back at least one of the three by signing Hill to a three year, $48 million contract; today, it sounds like they’re going to get the other two as well.

Sources: #Dodgers close on both Turner AND Jansen.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) December 12, 2016

Hear #Dodgers Turner were close at 4 yrs, $64M, but could be higher total with deferrals to keep current value down.

— Joel Sherman (@Joelsherman1) December 12, 2016

Dodgers source confirms 5yrs $80m with Jansen

— Jim Bowden (@JimBowden_ESPN) December 12, 2016

In prior years, the Dodgers preferred to eschew free agency, making trades to round out their roster instead, often taking on salary in order to build up their base of young talent. This year, the Dodgers are just using their hoards of cash to keep their roster together. The three will cost about $50 million per year for the next three years, then Jansen and Turner will cost about $35 million per year for the final two years of their deals, so clearly, the Dodgers resources are being put to use here.

But it’s also worth noting that, for what they’re getting, these seem mostly like pretty good deals. I had Turner and Hill rated as my top two free agent bargains headed into the winter, and that was at presumed prices of 4/$82M for Turner and 2/$48M for Hill. In the end, they got both for significantly less than what I expected.

You can certainly quibble with giving $80 million to a reliever; the odds of Jansen still being a lights out reliever in a few years are pretty slim. That one is definitely a win-now move with some likely long-term pain associated with the cost of acquiring an elite bullpen arm. But whatever overpay you think Jansen might be getting, Turner is likely to offset that with his expected savings.

At 4/$64M, Turner is getting just a bit more than Josh Reddick, but, uh, Turner is a lot better than Reddick.

Our projections from the Top 50 free agents post.

Turner is not that much worse of a hitter than Edwin Encarnacion, only he can also play the field. The power isn’t the same, and teams continue to pay less for singles and doubles than home runs, but Turner gets to a similar overall value, and when you toss in the ability to play third base, 4/$64M in this market seems like a steal.

We’ll have more on these signings once they become official, but the Dodgers have made it clear that they’re going for it again, and this time, they’re just doing it the old fashioned way.

Sherman Johnson, seen here beginning a terrific double play, wasn’t selected in the Rule 5 draft.

The purpose of this post is to notify the right-thinking members of the public that, contradictory to what “sense” and “reason” would appear to dictate, that Angels infielder and future major-leaguer Sherman Johnson was not selected in baseball’s Rule 5 draft this morning.

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Position: Cleveland Indians Baseball Operations Intern

Location: Cleveland
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A day after the Nationals failed to send a bunch of talent to Chicago for Chris Sale, the Nationals have reportedly agreed to send a bunch of talent to Chicago for Adam Eaton.

Source confirms: #Nationals, if deal is completed, will send Lucas Giolito, Dane Dunning and Reynaldo Lopez to #WhiteSox for Eaton.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) December 7, 2016

According to reports yesterday, both Lucas Giolito and Reynoldo Lopez were in the Nationals offer for Sale, so the two teams appeared to have just reworked the rest of the package to get Washington an outfield upgrade instead of a rotation upgrade. And while Eaton is definitely not Chris Sale, this might be just as impactful an upgrade for the Nationals.

First off, Eaton is really good. August Fagerstrom called him “Baseball’s Quietest Superstar” back in May, and he justified the commentary over the rest of the season. Eaton’s put up three straight years with a 115-120 wRC+, and after moving to right field last year, his defensive numbers took off. He’ll have to move back to center field in Washington, but there’s definitely real defensive value here, and he runs the bases too. Eaton is a terrific all around player with an above-average bat, and he fits well at the top of the Nationals line-up.

Whether he’ll be as good back in center field is an open question, and if the defense is just okay, then Eaton won’t put up +6 WAR again. But with his bat and legs at an up-the-middle spot, his floor is probably +2 WAR as long as he’s healthy, and there’s obviously room for value well above that if the defense still plays back in center field.

And, of course, there’s the contract. Eaton is signed for $18 million over the next three years, with club options that could push it up to 5/$38M; that’s a remarkable value. As a free agent, Eaton would have gone well over $100 million, and maybe over $150 million; Jason Heyward got 8/$184M for the same kind of package of skills last winter, though he had a longer track record of success than Eaton. But there’s similarities there, and the market paid big for Heyward last winter, so this is not a player type the Nationals could have acquired cheaply.

For the White Sox, they get what looks like a great return in young pitching, though as Jeff Sullivan wrote yesterday, there are reasons the Nationals are willing to trade Lucas Giolito. But Giolito and Lopez both have a lot of upside, and Dunning was the Nationals first round pick last year, so there’s a lot of options for how this could work for Chicago. Even if you only get one good starter out of the three, that’s still probably more valuable than betting on Eaton to age well enough to still be around the next time the White Sox are good.

With this deal, Eaton’s acquisition means Trea Turner heads back to shortstop, which pushes Danny Espinosa back into a part-time role, where he can spell Daniel Murphy and Anthony Rendon. The upgrade from Espinosa to Eaton is probably worth a couple of wins, plus this gives the team more depth, and adding Sale to the rotation and then dumping Gio Gonzalez to free up a rotation spot wouldn’t have been a dramatically larger improvement.

So the Nationals got better, but at the cost of a couple of good young arms. The White Sox get upside arms to throw at the wall and see what sticks. A good team gets better, a rebuilding team gets younger, and this looks like the kind of deal that might work for both sides.

The curveballs just keep coming at the 2016 Winter Meetings, as Ken Rosenthal just reported a whopper:

Sources: Ian Desmond to #Rockies.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) December 7, 2016

While we were all trying to process exactly where Ian Desmond would play for the Rockies, since they’re nominally all set at the positions he plays, Rosenthal struck again:

Source: Desmond with #Rockies is multi-year. Likely will play 1B and also OF. Rox forfeit No. 11 pick in draft, first unprotected selection.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) December 7, 2016

This is interesting on so many levels, more of which will be sussed out later in a piece from Nicolas Stellini. What the trade appears to suggest most immediately, however, is that the Rockies are ready to push their chips into the middle of the table as they enter Year Three of the Jeff Bridich Era. This is news. The Rockies have made a habit of lying in the weeds or rebuilding for the better part of this century, having typically stayed out of the deep end of the free-agent market. With the five-year, $70 million commitment to Desmond, they have officially returned.

How much first base Desmond plays will ultimately be determined by whether the Rockies decide to move one of their outfielders. Charlie Blackmon and Carlos Gonzalez constantly see their names in trade rumors, and that’s unlikely to cease now that Desmond is in the fold. But what could perhaps be more interesting is if the Rockies choose to use Desmond in a Ben Zobrist role, letting him shuttle in for Trevor Story to help keep the latter fresh, as well as manning first base and cycling among the outfield spots.

The bottom line is that the Rockies are now officially interesting. They had already been trending that way, but this signing confirms it. They have a rotation that contains four pitchers projected at 2 WAR or better, plus an interesting rookie in Jeff Hoffman, as well as decent starting-pitching depth. The promotions last year both of Tyler Anderson and Jon Gray added much-needed substance to the rotation. They likewise have solid incumbents at second, short, third and the outfield. Now they’ve added Desmond. Their bullpen could be bolstered, but most teams can say that and the Rockies bullpen doesn’t project to be awful. There’s a good chance that there are more moves coming from the Rockies, moves that allow Desmond to shift back to a more natural outfield position, but in any event, there is now very real optimism around the 2017 Rockies.

Travis Shaw stepped in when the Red Sox needed him and provided league-average power and solid defense over the past two seasons. He’s gone now, off to Milwaukee in the trade that saw Boston acquire relief pitcher Tyler Thornburg. But that didn’t stop the Red Sox, who signed a player who is basically his offensive clone in Mitch Moreland to fill his shoes.

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The Red Sox have landed right-handed reliever Tyler Thornburg in exchange for a trio of players: big-league corner infielder Travis Shaw and prospects Mauricio Dubon and Josh Pennington. Here’s how the minor leaguers headed to Milwaukee grade out by my KATOH system. KATOH denotes WAR forecast for first six years of player’s major-league career. KATOH+ uses similar a methodology with consideration also for Baseball America’s rankings.

*****

Mauricio Dubon, SS, (Profile)

KATOH: 4.6 WAR (92nd overall)
KATOH+: 3.5 WAR (138th overall)

After hitting respectably in the low levels of the minors, Dubon broke out big time last year. He opened the year by hitting a rock solid .306/.387/.379 at High-A, pairing a 9% strikeout rate with a 12% walk rate. He continued raking following a June promotion to Double-A, but did so a bit differently. His walk and strikeout rates both trended in the wrong direction, but for the first time ever, he hit for power.

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