We’re given a few things. One, Salvador Perez is rather newly 26 years old. And he’s a catcher, and you know how they develop. Two, Perez is running what would be a career-high strikeout rate. Three, Perez is running what would be a career-high isolated slugging. We’ve seen this before, and the speculation is almost always the same. Is Perez starting to trade some of his contact for power? He wouldn’t be the first to go down that path, even if it seems like a particularly anti-Royals thing to do.

By no means has Perez been powerless in the past. Last year he socked 21 dingers! The year before, 17 dingers. The year before that, 13 dingers. But there could be more in there, and there’s no ignoring the signs. I’m not coming up with things out of the blue; I’m just following the evidence. And now, here, have some more evidence. Using Baseball Savant, I looked at all the hitters who had at least 100 batted balls tracked in both 2015 and 2016. I calculated the changes in average exit velocity and average launch angle, and then I used some simple math to find the biggest overall changers. Here are the top five, in the more-power direction. These guys have hit the ball harder, or lifted the ball more, or both.

Based on z-scores, Espinosa is up a combined 3.8, while Perez is up a combined 3.7. So maybe this could just as easily be a post about Danny Espinosa, but Perez is more interesting to me. With a batted-ball-speed increase of 3.4 miles per hour, Perez ranks fifth-best in the pool. And with a launch angle that’s increased by 6.1 degrees, Perez ranks seventh-largest in the pool. Having both things happening at once points in a direction, and that’s backed up by the increase in strikeouts. It’s not at all certain, but on appearances, Salvador Perez seems to be less of a contact hitter, and more of an extra-base-hit hitter. And after posting consecutive sub-100 wRC+ marks, he’s presently up at 120. He’s already cleared last year’s overall WAR.

This is an InstaGraphs entry, so I’m afraid I don’t have anything else. I’m going to monitor Perez for longer before I go into more detail. It’s always fascinating when a bat elects to begin a new chapter. That’s what it looks like Perez is doing, and though it could just be a fluke, it could also be the next stage of development for a potential franchise icon. The Royals have always loved Perez, from the beginning. It’s been easy to forget he wasn’t a finished product.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about my favorite Andrew Miller fun fact. It’s no longer true, but, at the time, Miller was generating a higher rate of swings at would-be balls than he was generating at would-be strikes. That is, batters were making worse decisions than they’d make by flipping a coin. It was so absurd a fun fact it almost couldn’t possibly hold up, and it hasn’t, but it speaks to Miller’s early dominance in a way that few statistics could. It painted a picture of utter helplessness.

If that kind of thing is good for a pitcher, it stands to reason it’s bad for a hitter. Allow me to show you something. From our leaderboards, over the past 30 days:

Now that I look at this again, it’s weird to see Joe Mauer. Maybe there’s something to be written about Joe Mauer. But I want to focus on the first name, that being Rougned Odor. Odor hasn’t quite posted a higher O-Swing% than Z-Swing%, but he’s come dangerously close, and much closer than anyone else, among those qualified peers. Odor has that rate gap of six percentage points. Runner-up is at 16. Big difference. And small difference. You get it.

I wouldn’t say discipline has ever been Odor’s strong suit, at least not in the way we think of it. But he hasn’t before been this ugly for this long. He’s simultaneously over-aggressive and over-passive, and I don’t know if it’s possible to spin that in a good way. Let me take that back. No, it is not. It is not possible to spin that in a good way.

The split was over the past 30 days. What’s interesting is that Odor had a good start to the season. Through May 11, he owned a 125 wRC+. Since May 13, he’s posted a 38 wRC+, with one walk and 21 strikeouts. With something like this, the endpoints tend to be arbitrary, and it’s not like these endpoints aren’t arbitrary, but I will note that, on May 13, the Rangers began that home series against the Blue Jays, the series in which Odor delivered an urgent memo of disapproval to Jose Bautista’s face. If I wanted to read too much into that, I could suggest that Odor has been playing on emotion for weeks. In reality, it’s probably a random slump with convenient timing. Odor lost control of his discipline, just as he was losing control of his discipline.

There’s something else here. Through May 11, Odor saw 52% fastballs. Since May 13, he’s seen 43% fastballs, and that’s the lowest rate in all of baseball. And this, presumably, isn’t unrelated to the plate-discipline numbers above. Odor’s been looking for fastballs, and he’s shown a willingness to over-expand. So pitchers haven’t had to come after him, as Odor hasn’t shown he can lay off of secondary pitches consistently. If anything, too many of the pitches he’s been laying off have been strikes. Everything is all tangled, and the result has been a pretty lousy second baseman.

Odor is better than this, and before long, I assume he’ll start playing better than this. It’s a question of magnitude, and it’s a question of whether Jurickson Profar should slide in every so often. When Odor is running a wRC+ around 110 or 120, you want him in the lineup every day. If he’s more like an 80 or 90, then for Profar, that should be an opportunity. You don’t want to give up on Odor, but Profar needs to play somewhere. Lately, Odor hasn’t done much to fend him off.

The White Sox announced their presence as potential contenders by getting off to a 23-10 start, the best record in the American League through May 9. Since then, things haven’t exactly gone well:

Over the last month, the White Sox have gone 7-20, plummeting to fourth place in the American League Central and dropping their playoff odds below their Opening Day mark.

They’re still just 3.5 games back in a crowded division, though, and the season is far from over. General Manager Rick Hahn is aware of this, and so moves are being made. First was the acquisition of James Shields. Then came the Justin Morneau signing, and the subsequent DFA of Mat Latos. Now this:

#WhiteSox have designated Jimmy Rollins for assignment to make space for Tim Anderson.

— Dan Hayes (@CSNHayes) June 10, 2016

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Rangers RHP Michael Matuella entered his junior year at Duke as a candidate for the first overall selection in the 2015 draft. A torn UCL in March of that year dashed those hopes and Matuella eventually fell all the way to the Rangers at 78th overall. He signed for a $2 million and had been rehabbing in Arizona until Wednesday, when he faced opposing hitters for the first time in an Extended Spring Training game against the Reds.

Matuella threw his fastball at 93-96 mph after having also sat in that range during live batting practice for me last week. He threw a few curveballs in the low 80s — all below average — and his arm action lacked conviction. This was an issue for Matuella when I saw him throw that live BP session last week, as well, and coaches both then and today were urging him to “pull down” to create more downward spin on the breaking ball. During live BP, Matuella made the adjustment and his curveball was subsequently more effective. Wednesday, in just two innings of work — the first of which was fastball-only — he didn’t really have the opportunity to make the same sort of adjustment. I think that, with a combination of additional reps and greater confidence in the health of his arm, Matuella’s curve will develop into an above average — and potentially plus — pitch.

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After just two pitches on Wednesday, Vince Velasquez had to be removed. Sometimes, when a pitcher gets injured, you don’t really see the symptoms. Maybe there’s a little wiggling of the arm, or stretching of the shoulder. With Velasquez, it was immediately apparent something was wrong. The first pitch he threw:

That’s a fastball, at 86. The second pitch he threw:

That’s a fastball, at 87, and while Velasquez got the out, it was also the end of his outing. He didn’t seem to protest too much when he was visited on the mound, or when he was removed, and we already have some early word on the issue.

Phillies say Vince Velasquez left the game with right biceps soreness.

— Matt Breen (@matt_breen) June 8, 2016

For a little extra detail:

There were concerns about Velasquez’s shoulder when trade was made last December. https://t.co/o8AUtT3cHx

— Matt Gelb (@MattGelb) June 8, 2016

Nobody knows yet exactly what this means, though I might as well point out the Dodgers put Yimi Garcia on the DL with right biceps soreness toward the end of April. He’s out indefinitely, having been moved from the 15-day DL to the 60-day variety. Sometimes biceps soreness can be nothing, but other times, it can indicate a major complication, and you never want to see a power pitcher working eight ticks below where he usually is. Especially a power pitcher with Velasquez’s own injury history.

He’s already undergone Tommy John once, and his list of historical injuries is longer than that. This has always been the one big downside, the one reason Velasquez was ever available in a trade in the first place. For as long as Velasquez has been throwing, no one has doubted the quality of his stuff. But the Astros were unconvinced he could keep himself healthy, and the Phillies assumed the risk. When Velasquez is able to throw like he did against San Diego, the Phillies look like geniuses, but this is the coldest splash of cold water. It’s always been about health, and now Velasquez isn’t healthy.

With luck, he’ll be healthy again soon. In the best-case scenario, Velasquez requires just a little rest, and to be realistic the Phillies were going to have to limit his innings this season anyway. There’s a way for this to work out for everyone. Yet there’s definitely nothing good about a pitcher needing to be removed, and for now, the Phillies are holding their breath. Velasquez has provided an enormous reason to believe the team might be close to returning to relevance. He’s been one of the bright spots, and for as long as Velasquez is sidelined, the rebuild is a little off-track. Baseball continues to occasionally be a real son of a bitch.

Happy Jameson Taillon Day to you and yours!

The right-handed prospect is set to debut for the Pirates tonight in their game against the Mets. This has been a long time coming for Taillon, who was selected second overall way back in 2010. He sat out the entirety of the 2014 and 2015 seasons following Tommy John and then hernia surgery, but has pitched better than ever in Triple-A this year.

In 10 Triple-A starts this season, he’s recorded a dazzling 1.93 FIP, striking out 26% of opposing hitters and walking a mere 3%. Running those numbers through the KATOH machine, I get a projection of 7.9 WAR for Taillon over the next six seasons, which would have placed him fifth among pitchers on KATOH’s preseason list. Given his recent performance, there’s little reason to think Taillon won’t succeed in the show. In order to account for Taillon’s missed development time, it might make sense to knock a year off of his age when calculating his projection. Running him as a 23-year-old rather than a 24-year-old yields a forecast of 10.7 WAR.

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With Jorge Soler headed to the disabled list with a hamstring injury, the Cubs have summoned outfielder Albert Almora from Triple-A. It seems Almora, who bats right-handed, will play primarily against left-handed pitching for the time being. The 22-year-old gives Joe Maddon yet another talented hitter to work into his endlessly deep and potent lineup. Almora was hitting .318/.335/.444 in Triple-A with 10 steals and a 13% strikeout rate.

The Cubs selected Almora sixth overall out of high school back in 2012, and he immediately began generating prospect hype. Baseball America deemed him the 33rd- and 36th-best prospect in baseball in 2013 and 2014 respectively. However, he didn’t crack Baseball America’s list in either of the two most recent years, likely because he’s moved slowly through the Cubs system while putting up unspectacular surface stats. He hit .270/.291/.392 between High-A and Double-A in 2014 and then slashed .272/.327/.400 in Double-A last season. Those aren’t exactly knock-your-socks-off numbers.

Yet, despite his flaws, KATOH’s maintained hope in Almora. Over the winter, my system pegged him for 5.2 WAR over the next six years, making him the 46th-best prospect in the game. Adding his 2016 numbers into the mix, Almora’s projection jumps up to 7.4 WAR.

Almora’s projection is primarily driven by two factors: age and strikeout rate. Although it feels like we’ve been hearing about him forever, Almora’s still just 22; and he just turned 22 a few weeks ago. Furthermore, he’s kept his strikeout rate between 10% and 13% the past few years, which suggests he isn’t getting fooled often.

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Recently, we massively revamped our Player Graphs and are continuing to add more features to them. Today, we added several batted-ball and plate-discipline stats both for pitchers and batters in a new drop-down menu. In addition, it’s now possible to combine certain stats on the same graph.

Here are a few release notes for the update:

• We have added GB%, LD%, FB%, HH%, MH%, SH%, Pull%, Cent%, Oppo%, O-Swing%, Z-Swing%, Swing%, O-Contact%, Z-Contact% and Contact% to all batters and pitchers.
• We’ve added K% and BB% for pitchers.
• By using the drop-down menus, readers are able to mix and match up to five stats on a graph as long as the stats are on the same scale.
• Stats are on the same scale if they are formatted in the same manner. For example, K% and GB% are both percentages. A stat like wOBA, meanwhile, uses the traditional three-decimal format. K% and GB% can be plotted on the same graph while wOBA can’t be paired with either K% or GB%.
• Readers are able to reset and clear the chart by hitting the “Reset” button on the right side of the drop-down menu.
• If a stat is greyed-out in the menu, it can’t be added to the graph. Either the player doesn’t have data for that particular stat or the stat cannot be matched with other stats currently on the graph. You can click “Reset” to start over and clear the current graph.

With this new interface we’ll continue adding more stats and features.

Remember when it was the end of spring training, and the Orioles were exploring ways to not have Hyun Soo Kim be on the roster? My computer tells me it’s June 6, and I have reason to believe my computer, and if you set a low enough minimum, Kim owns the highest wRC+ in Baltimore’s lineup. He ranks 10th in all of baseball, and though that 10th sandwiches him between Tyler Naquin and Steve Pearce — it’s early — it’s not hard to draw parallels between 2016 Kim and 2015 Jung Ho Kang. Kim presumably isn’t this good, but he’s talented, and now he’s showing that he can hold his own against big-league competition. It didn’t look like that in March, but March has lied to us before.

Let’s dig into Kim just a little bit. He’s batted 78 times, and nearly every single one of those plate appearances has come against a righty. So, that’s a factor. And he’s hit a ton of ground balls. He has one home run, but if Kim keeps putting balls on the ground, that limits his power upside, obviously. Now, Kim hasn’t chased out of the zone very much. He’s also been better than average at putting the bat on the ball. And we can address the grounders head-on. With help from Baseball Savant, naturally.

Statcast doesn’t quite record every batted ball, but it gets most of them, and Kim ranks in the 88th percentile in average batted-ball speed. That seems great, but then there’s this: Kim has hit his grounders harder. As a matter of fact, Kim leads baseball in average grounder speed. Leads baseball! Higher than 96 miles per hour. It’s good to lead in a contact metric, but then, hard grounders aren’t necessarily better than soft grounders. Generally speaking, hard contact is nearly wasted on a ground ball.

That’s the downside — Kim hits hard grounders, instead of hard flies. Now here’s the upside of that downside. Kim also has baseball’s fourth-highest average grounder launch angle. That might sound kind of funky, but Kim’s grounders so far have an average launch angle of -3.3 degrees. The league average is -9.9 degrees. So of Kim’s grounders recorded, they’ve been closer to the line between grounders and line drives. Here’s how the league has done, in batting average, by grounder launch angle:

• -5 to 0 degrees: .315 average
• -10 to -6 degrees: .200
• -15 to -11 degrees: .154
• -20 to -16 degrees: .120
• -25 to -21 degrees: .082

The closer you get to a flat exit, the more productive the batted ball. And that’s intuitive, I think, because those are the most like line drives, and defenders have the least time to react. Here’s Kim against Dellin Betances last Friday:

That was recorded as a ground ball. As a bonus, that features Kim making solid contact against elite-level velocity, but the point is that while Kim hit a grounder, he really hit more of a line-drive grounder. And there’s evidence that could be a skill of his. If this were to keep up, Kim wouldn’t hit a bunch of dingers, but he would hit liners and he’d end up with a strong average and BABIP. He’s used a lot of his hard contact on grounders, which is bad, but those grounders have almost been like liners, which is good. You understand. You’re a smart person!

Not every Kim batted ball has been recorded, but on the 15 without Statcast readings, Kim has gone 5-for-15 with two doubles, so I don’t think we’re missing a bunch of horrible contact. And data points get dropped for every hitter. We can use only what we have, and for Kim, there’s a good thing about the bad thing. And, you know, maybe in time he’ll start to elevate the ball even more. I don’t know what he’s going to do, and last year Kang hit more fly balls after April and May. If Kim puts that contact in the air, that’s great. If he stays as he is, that’s fine. Hyun Soo Kim is looking like he can cut it. Take that, March.

In The Only Rule Is It Has to Work, the excellent new book by Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller, the authors served as the baseball operations department for the Sonoma Stompers, an independent league team in the Pacific Association of Professional Baseball Clubs. The analytically inclined writers-turned-executives were given freedom to make roster, lineup and strategical decisions based on data, and among the most radical ideas explored in the book is the implementation of a five-man infield against an opposing player named Scott David.

The Stompers deploy a five-man infield against Scott David of the Pittsburg Diamonds, with Mike Jackson Jr. on the mound. (Source)

David is one of the best hitters in the league, one with seemingly no exploitable flaws in his approach, and the authors were struggling to come up with anything substantial to provide their pitchers in a scouting report. That is, until an off-hand remark was made about the possibility of enacting a five-man infield, and the realization that David was, in fact, the ideal candidate for the radical defensive alignment, for four key reasons:

1. He hits a bunch of ground balls
2. He sprays those ground balls all over the infield
3. He is an effective ground ball hitter
4. He has very predictable fly ball tendencies

As soon as I finished the chapter, I knew I needed to find Major League Baseball’s Scott David. Into the numbers I dove.

Using the FanGraphs leaderboards and BaseballSavant, I was able to put a number on each of the four tendencies above. Step one, ground ball rate, is simple enough to find. For step two, I calculated the difference between pull ground ball rate, and opposite-field ground ball rate to serve as a proxy for how often a player sprays his ground balls. For step three, I simply used ground ball OPS — no point in bringing in an outfielder if the player’s ground balls aren’t doing any damage. And for step four, I found the absolute value of a player’s pulled fly ball rate as a way to highlight predictable fly ball tendencies. Then I summed the z-scores of each of the four numbers to come up with a “Five-Man Infield Score.”

In the top five, we find guys like Eric Hosmer and Nori Aoki, but doing this to a lefty, as Lindbergh and Miller did, is admittedly more dangerous due to the exposure of the right field corner for an easy triple. Right-hander David Freese pulls too many of his ground balls; a normal infield shift will do the trick for him. Jean Segura is a decent candidate, though his ground ball rate and spray tendencies are not nearly as extreme as the number one name that pops up on our spreadsheet, far and away the most ideal candidate in Major League Baseball for the five-man infield: Howie Kendrick.

Look no further than his spray chart for convincing. The yellow dots are rough estimates of the optimal positioning against Kendrick in the proposed five-man infield:

Kendrick’s hit a ground ball on 65% of his balls in play, one of the highest rates in baseball. He hits them all over the infield, so shifting him with four infielders is impossible, and while Kendrick has been a pretty poor hitter this year, his OPS on ground balls is actually above-average, so there’s still hits to be taken away here. And as we can plainly see in his spray chart, there simply hasn’t been a need for a left fielder against Kendrick, so bring him in to play behind the second base bag, shift the the center fielder over slightly, and, voila! We’ve got a five-man infield, perfectly designed for Howie Kendrick, the only obvious candidate for a five-man infield in today’s MLB.

Now who’s going to be the first team to do it?