Position: Chicago Cubs Analyst (Pitching Evaluation), Research & Development

Location: Chicago

Description:

The Chicago Cubs are seeking an Analyst for the team’s Baseball Research and Development group. The role will focus primarily on using an analytical approach for the evaluation and projection of pitcher performance. The analyst will work closely with the R&D team to develop methods to improve the effective understanding and application of in-game pitch data throughout Baseball Operations. The Chicago Cubs are an Equal Opportunity Employer.

Responsibilities:

• Research, develop and test methods and models of pitcher performance to support Baseball Operations decision-making.
• Prepare and explore a variety of pitch data sets and construct workflows to utilize these data.
• Conduct in-depth evaluation of a wide range of major league, minor league and amateur pitchers.
• Work closely with all groups within Baseball Operations to successfully combine analytic, scouting and player development information into integrated evaluations.
• Effectively present analyses through the use of written reports and data visualization methods to disseminate insights to other members of the Baseball Operations staff and leadership.
• Maintain working expertise of state-of-the-art analytics, including publicly available research and novel statistical approaches, in order to recommend new or emerging techniques, technologies, models and algorithms.
• Other projects and related duties as directed by Director, Research & Development and Baseball Operations leadership team.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in an analytic field such as statistics, engineering, applied math, physics, quantitative social sciences, computer science, operations research.
• Demonstrated experience with pitch data analysis and pitch-level datasets (e.g., PITCHf/x or TrackMan).
• Advanced understanding of statistical methods or machine learning techniques.
• Demonstrated experience with programming languages (e.g., C, Python or R).
• Demonstrated ability to communicate technical ideas to non-technical audiences using data visualization.
• Demonstrated work ethic and passion for baseball operations.
• Proficiency with modern database technologies.

Compensation:
This position is compensated.

To Apply:
Please apply here.

According to Jeff Passan, the A’s have signed left-handed pitcher Rich Hill to a one year, $6 million deal.

Source: Rich Hill agrees to terms with Oakland. One-year deal for $6 million, pending physical.

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) November 18, 2015

Rich Hill had a big market, and one team said it had a bigger-money offer on table than Oakland's. Hill liked A's guaranteed rotation spot.

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) November 18, 2015

This morning, I ranked Hill at #4 on my Free Agent Bargains post, and wrote the following.

#4: Rich Hill, LHP
Crowd’s Estimate: 1 year, $6 million
Dave’s Estimate: 1 year, $7 million
2016 Steamer Projection: +2.5 WAR

Probably the hardest guy on the market to value, Hill went from a non-roster invite to a fascinating test case in extreme performance in small samples with his dominating September run for the Red Sox. His success came out of nowhere, and it would be irresponsible to expect those four starts to represent some kind of new level of ability that he reached at the age of 35, but at the same time, we also don’t want to entirely ignore the fact that he put together a 29 inning stretch of Kershawian performance.

Over that four start stretch, hitters made contact on only 75% of their swings at his pitches in the strike zone, which is the kind of number that tends to identify skill more quickly than a lot of others. He’s not going to sustain that number — Max Scherzer led all MLB starters at 79% last year — but given that his lack of a track record is going to keep the commitment short, I think it’s worth betting a decent amount of 2016 salary on the chance that there Hill’s crazy finish to 2015 suggests that he’s figured something out.

No one should expect ace-like performance, and you’re basically buying a lottery ticket, but we’ve seen enough Cliff Lee transformations to not entirely discount the idea that Hill could be a quality arm for the team that takes the risk. Maybe he won’t be able to stay healthy; maybe it will turn out to be a colossal fluke. But for the kind of dollars that get you a mediocre bench player with some clubhouse chemistry voodoo, I’d take a flyer on Hill and just see what I get. If there’s even a 20% chance he’s a quality starting pitcher next year, throwing $5 to $10 million his way is a worthwhile use of funds for a team that needs to buy upside on the cheap.

The A’s are the embodiment of a team that needs to buy upside on the cheap, and this is exactly the kind of risk that makes sense for a team in their position. This is similar — though even more risky — to the Scott Kazmir bet they made two years ago, and that turned out quite well for them; it’s not a huge surprise to see them go back to this well. Hill’s upside makes this kind of gamble worthwhile, even if there’s a pretty high likelihood that he doesn’t really give them much value next year. It’s probably best to look at Hill kind of like a prospect, with an absurdly high bust rate but also a chance of returning a lot of value if he pans out.

This past Thursday, the author endeavored to publish here a pair of leaderboards featuring the top average velocities — as recorded by PITCHf/x — among pitchers currently participating in the Arizona Fall League. What the post ultimately served to document, however, was less a collection of hard-throwing prospects and more the author’s own (and already well-documented) incompetence.

Having failed to communicate with MLB Farm’s Daren Willman before publishing that dispatch, what became clear immediately — by way largely of the enthusiastic comments left by readers — was that the data was incomplete. As a result, certain pitchers who’d definitely appeared in a stadium equipped with PITCHf/x cameras were omitted.

I’ve spoken with Willman in the meantime, however, and — after certain generous efforts on his part — it would appear as though the data is currently as robust at it ever will be. That having been established, what follows is an updated pair of leaderboards featuring the top velocities among those AFL pitchers — both overall and also among starters only — who’ve appeared at either of the two PITCHf/x-equipped stadiums. Following those leaderboards are three observations of limited merit.

The pitch type FF denotes a four-seam fastball; FT, a two-seamer. Count denotes the number of the relevant pitch type to have been recorded by PITCHf/x cameras.

Read the rest of this entry »

When you give Dave Dombrowski a loaded farm system and a mandate to win, something like this is probably inevitable. The Red Sox new President of Baseball Operations swung his first deal since taking over, bringing Craig Kimbrel to Boston to assume ninth inning duties and give the team a big boost in the bullpen. The cost, however, was quite steep.

To land Kimbrel, Dombrowksi parted with outfielder Manny Margot, shortstop Javier Guerra, second baseman Carlos Asuaje, and left-handed pitcher Logan Allen, which is a pretty remarkable group of prospects to acquire for any player, much less a relief pitcher. Back in August, not too terribly long before the Braves hired him away from us, Kiley McDaniel rated Margot as the #19 prospect in all of baseball, putting a 60 FV grade on him, which put him in the tier of guys that ran from #7 to #20. For context, he ranked Dansby Swanson, who just went #1 overall in this summer’s draft, at #24, with a 55 FV.

From my perspective, Margot for Kimbrel alone would have been a deal worth making for the Padres, but in addition, they’re also getting Javier Guerra, who got upgraded to a 50 FV prospect in that same mid-season update. For context, 50 FV prospects ranked from #80 to #142 last year, so that pegs him as a back-end Top 100 prospect, also a valuable asset. Asuaje got a 40 FV grade and looks more like a part-time player than an everyday guy, but middle infielders who hold their own in AA aren’t nothing. And while Allen didn’t appear on Kiley’s Red Sox list last year or in the mid-season update, Baseball America’s Ben Badler tweeted this out tonight.

And Logan Allen's talent level is commensurate with a second or third-round pick. I know a lot of good scouts who liked that pick by Boston.

— Ben Badler (@BenBadler) November 14, 2015

So that’s a Top 25 prospect, a Top 100 prospect, a guy with 2nd-3rd round ability, and a depth piece with enough upside to be kinda interesting. That is a remarkable return for a reliever, and in my view, quite a bit more than what the Angels gave up to acquire Andrelton Simmons yesterday. Not that the Red Sox needed a young shortstop, but the fact that the Padres got more for a one inning reliever — even a really great one — than the Braves got for a 25 year old above average shortstop is pretty surprising to me.

Of course, we just saw the Royals bullpen their way to the World Series two years in a row, and Jeff just provided some evidence the other day that elite relief aces may bring more value to a team than just their own run prevention abilities would suggest. Kimbrel isn’t a rental, since he’s under contract through 2017, with an option for 2018 as well, so this isn’t necessarily just a win-now move. And the Red Sox have a great farm system, with elite young talents at both SS and CF already in the majors, so Margot and Guerra were likely trade bait at some point.

But this is a very high price to pay for a reliever. Kimbrel’s awesome, and we may very well be selling elite relievers short on their overall value, but Kimbrel didn’t fix the Padres problems by himself, and the Red Sox will have more work to do this winter, and now have fewer chips with which to do it. For A.J. Preller, this is the kind of move that, if he can repeat a few more times, can undo a lot of the damage that was done last winter, and from my perspective, this marks his first big win as a GM.

The Angels and Braves swung a trade last night that sent Andrelton Simmons and catching prospect Jose Briceno to LA in exchange for Erick Aybar and pitching prospects Sean Newcomb and Chris Ellis. Jeff Sullivan had some thoughts on the trade itself last night. KATOH has some thoughts on the prospects involved, which you can find below.

Sean Newcomb, 1.9 WAR

The Angels selected Newcomb with their first round pick in 2014, and he’s been a strikeout machine in the minors thus far. He split the 2015 season between three levels — Low-A, High-A and Double-A — and pitched well at each stop. All told, he finished up with 2.36 ERA and a 29% strikeout rate. However, those strikeouts came with a heavy dose of walks.

Read the rest of this entry »

UPDATE: Angels also getting catcher Jose Briceno. Briceno is 23, and he spent last year in high-A, but he also posted an OPS of .482, and, yes, that’s a 4, and no, that’s not a mistake. Of course, he’s hit better in the past. He’s been a decent prospect in the past. Right now, his career needs to be rescued.

—–

The day began with thoughts on a potential Andrelton Simmons blockbuster. As the day ends, half of what was discussed has come true — Simmons has been traded, and even to the general Los Angeles area. He just hasn’t been traded to the Dodgers, or for Yasiel Puig.

Rather, Simmons’ new teammates will be the rest of the Angels. And, headed to the Braves in exchange: Erick Aybar, Sean Newcomb, Chris Ellis, and a bit of money.

#Braves trade Simmons to #Angels for Newcomb, Ellis, Aybar and about $3M

— Joel Sherman (@Joelsherman1) November 12, 2015

The money is in there to cancel out the difference between Simmons and Aybar’s 2016 salaries. Beyond that, Aybar will be a free agent, whereas Simmons is under contract through 2020. His future salaries:

• 2016: $6 million
• 2017: $8 million
• 2018: $11 million
• 2019: $13 million
• 2020: $15 million

For the Angels, this is about the shortstop position both short-term and long-term. In the short-term, while Simmons is younger than Aybar, they project to hit about the same. But the defensive difference is made evident by this table, comparing Inside Edge fielding results. What you see are rates of plays made on opportunities in different categories, separated by difficulty.

Simmons leads everywhere, which of course shouldn’t be a surprise, because Simmons is considered perhaps the best overall defensive player in the game, while Aybar is more of a bat-first shortstop who didn’t hit in the most recent season. So Simmons makes the Angels better now, and he gives them another long-term core piece who’s never going to be a true financial albatross. Simmons, to this point, hasn’t really hit. His career wRC+ is 84, and he peaked as a rookie. But as much as some people complain that defensive stats are unreliable, there’s no question about what Simmons can do, and about how much he can help. He’s not a player who looks good in the numbers, only. He’s a player who’s obviously good, and though his defense will decline with age, it’s not going to drop off a cliff in the next five years. At least, there’s no reason to expect that.

But you don’t need to be convinced that Simmons is an upgrade over Aybar. The Angels are paying a real cost here, in the form of their top two pitching prospects. Newcomb is a 22-year-old lefty who reached Double-A. Ellis is a 23-year-old righty who also reached Double-A. Newcomb was picked in the first round two years ago, while Ellis was picked in the third.

The Angels do have some decent rotation depth. Garrett Richards is controlled through 2018. Tyler Skaggs, 2019. Matt Shoemaker, 2020. Andrew Heaney and Nicholas Tropeano, 2021. To say nothing of Jered Weaver and C.J. Wilson, veterans who’ll be free agents next fall. The cupboard isn’t bare. But this is still a major sacrifice, yet another injection of young pitching talent into the Braves’ developing system. The Braves, pretty clearly, believe strongly in their organizational ability to get the most out of talented pitchers. Newcomb and Ellis could be long-term assets. They just need to be polished.

Last year, throughout the minors, 578 pitchers threw at least 100 innings. Newcomb had the eighth-highest walk rate. Ellis was 47th, his rate spiking in Double-A. Right there, you get the message — pitchers good enough to be drafted high, but pitchers with real bouts of wildness. They obviously can’t be written off or anything, but it’s easy to understand the optimism and the skepticism. Some people prefer their pitchers to have a foundation of good raw stuff. Other people prefer a foundation of good command. Newcomb and Ellis are a bit riskier.

Newcomb is the better get, and the rest of the picture is that he also posted the sixth-highest strikeout rate. He had an ERA under 2.50, so the upside is evident, and he could be a quick mover. He could show up to help the Braves as soon as this season. But, you know how pitchers are. It’s another roll of the dice. There’s no knowing what Simmons will be in a few years, but he feels projectable. The pitchers could be almost anything. The Braves’ll hope they can be big-league pitchers by 2017 or so.

The Braves’ offensive plan appears to be: make sure to have Freddie Freeman, and the rest will work out somehow. The crop of pitchers is ahead of the crop of position players, and losing Simmons doesn’t help that, but if the Braves figure they’ve seen the best Simmons has to offer, then Newcomb is a high-upside asset to add to a huge collection of big arms. The Braves have made it no secret they’re building around pitching. It’s no secret that comes with its own challenges. I’m sure they’re excited to welcome the challenge of Sean Newcomb.

As of today, the Arizona Fall League has been underway for over a month. Two stadiums in that league, located in Peoria and Surprise, are equipped with PITCHf/x cameras, all manner of data from which is available at Daren Willman’s site MLB Farm.

What follows is a pair of leaderboards featuring the top velocities among those AFL pitchers — both overall, and also among starters only — who’ve appeared at either of the two aforementioned stadiums. Following those leaderboards are three observations of limited merit.

The pitch type FF denotes a four-seam fastball; FT, a two-seamer. Count denotes the number of the relevant pitch type to have been recorded by PITCHf/x cameras.

Read the rest of this entry »

Position: Detroit Tigers Baseball Analytics & Operations Internship

Location: Detroit

Description:

The Detroit Tigers are looking for a Baseball Analytics & Operations Intern who will be primarily responsible for assisting with day-to-day tasks in the front office. Responsibilities will focus on database design and maintenance, systems development and baseball research. Interns will also assist other areas within Baseball Operations as necessary (Advance Scouting, Amateur Scouting, International Scouting and Player Development). The position will run from March-December of 2016.

Responsibilities:

• Assist with developing and maintaining internal databases and monitoring the import of data feeds.
• Support internal systems development.
• Assist the Baseball Operations department with ad hoc projects as directed.
• Provide support for Baseball Operations meetings and player transaction decisions.
• Contribute to analysis of Major and Minor League Players.
• Staying current on publicly available baseball research and technology.
• Support Advance Scouting, Amateur Scouting, International Scouting and Player Development with their daily
  operations.

Qualifications:

• Candidates with a degree (undergrad or graduate) or extensive background in Mathematics, Statistics, Economics or Computer Science are preferred.
• The ideal candidate must be senior or recent graduate (within 6 months).
• Strong baseball knowledge.
• Proficient with Microsoft Office software including Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.
• Experience using SQL and statistical software such as R.
• Familiarity with advanced statistical concepts, particularly those relevant to sabermetric player evaluation techniques.
• Experience with large data sets and statistical modeling preferred.
• Knowledge of JavaScript and web development skills preferred.
• Professional attitude and work ethic with strong interpersonal skills.
• Demonstrated analytic skills and knowledge of a scripting language preferred.
• Previous work with a professional baseball organization preferred.
• Experience with software development and implementation preferred.
• Baseball playing or scouting experience a plus.
• The ideal candidate must be willing to work longs hours, including days, nights, weekends and holidays.

Compensation:
This position is compensated.

To Apply:
Please apply here.

The General Managers meetings continued today, and I once again had an opportunity to speak to several of them. You’ll hear from some of the GMs in detail over the coming week, beginning with Seattle’s Jerry Dipoto tomorrow. In the meantime, I’ll follow up on yesterday’s five snapshots with five more:

——

Al Avila, Tigers: “There’s the addition of our new analytics department that we’re in the process of creating. That will help us make some decisions in a different manner. It’s not going to be huge, like 20 people, or anything like that. Right now, it will probably be three guys in the office, and a couple of consultants outside of the office, with the addition of some interns.”

Mike Chernoff, Indians: “It’s by no means a given that we’ll trade a starter. It’s a strength of our club, so we get asked about it a lot. Teams see the depth there, and we’re in a fortunate position to have that depth. But we want to build around it. We’re not looking to move major league pieces.

“Because we’re a small market club, we have to be creative and opportunistic in how we think about trades, and how we think about balancing out our team. So we’re always open to anything, but we’re not coming in here looking to move a pitcher.”

Rick Hahn, White Sox: “As for what mechanisms we use to evaluate our defensive performance, it’s all factored in there. Fundamentally, you go back to what your eyes are showing you. At the same time, we’re very well aware of what the objective data is showing, whether it’s from a Defensive Runs Saved standpoint, or a conversion-of-balls-in-play-into-outs standpoint. We also look at the more advanced, and the recent StatCast data. All of those arrows are pointing in the same direction; they’re all giving the same consistent message: Our defense was not at the level we needed it to be.”

Dave Stewart, Diamondbacks: “I don’t think anybody has a blueprint. I’ve been a part of some good staffs, but to say you have a blueprint for build a pitching staff, I don’t think there’s such a thing.

“Right now, we have a nice young pitching staff, and ideally you’d like to complement those guys with similar guys. At the same point, when you’re young and you don’t really have leadership, sometimes you want to look for a guy that’s a little more of a veteran. You want somebody who can put his hand print, and his foot print, on these guys to show them how to get the job done.”

Dick Williams, Reds: “I’ll just say that I’m really impressed by his understanding of his game. A lot has been made of how much Joey (Votto) understands advanced statistics. But I don’t think people should forget how much time he spends working on his baseball. Apart from the theories, he’s as diligent as anyone I know when it comes to finding flaws, and fixing them mechanically.”

Despite producing the same winning percentage as Colorado, Milwaukee and Oakland survive on run differential.