Yesterday, the author published a post claiming to include the top players by (maybe) predictive stats from college baseball’s most competitive conferences.

What follows are three weekend series both (a) likely to feature a number of players whose names appeared within that post* and also (b) scheduled for broadcast on readily available network or video stream. MPS+ and MPS- are index metrics based on those (maybe) predictive stats and designed for batters and pitchers, respectively. In each case, 100 is average, while above 100 is better for batters and below 100 is better for pitchers. Read more about the author’s questionable methodology here.

*Except for the Ivy League game, that is, whose players weren’t featured in that post but which the author has included per orders of his capital-W Whim.

Pennsylvania at Columbia
Who It Features
The top-three hitters in the Ivy League. Columbia senior outfielder Gus Craig (158 PA, 136 MSP+) was the Jose Bautista of the Ivy League last season, producing an expected strikeout rate (11.1%) about a third lower than league average and expected ISO (.153) roughly 50% higher than it. His expected strikeout rate (18.1%) is higher than last year, but also so is his regressed isolated-power figure (.192). Teammate Joe Falcone (153 PA, 143 MPS+) is older than most of his teammates — owing, that is, to how he served as a medic for the Marines during tours in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Kuwait. Penn senior Mitch Montaldo (132 PA, 137 MPS+) has produced the conference’s second-best maybe-predictive batting line while also serving as the school’s starting shortstop. Junior second baseman Ryan Mincher (123 PA, 124 MPS+), meanwhile, is another Penn hitter who features above-average skills on both offense and defense. Columbia right-hander Adam Cline (38.2 IP, 78 MPS-) and Penn left-hander Ronnie Glenn (43.2 IP, 84 MPS-) have recorded the third- and fifth-best pitching lines, respectively, in the Ivy League. They start the second and fourth games, respectively.

When It’s On (ET)
Saturday at 1:00pm
Saturday at 3:30pm
Sunday at 1:00pm
Sunday at 3:30pm

How to Watch It
Watch ESPN on Saturday (link).
Ivy League Digital Network otherwise (link).

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Like most headlines in news media and also all other kinds of media, the headline of this particular media post has been constructed less to fully represent the truth and more to tell a version of the truth that is most compelling to prospective readers. In the case of this title, at least, the infraction is only slight. Indeed, instead of stating that a fifth of Buck Farmer’s pitches are unhittable, it’s only really accurate to state that nearly a fifth of Buck Farmer’s pitches have been swung at and missed. So far, that is.

Buck Farmer, in case it has slipped the reader’s mind, is a right-handed pitching prospect in the Detroit system — ranked third in that system by Kiley McDaniel this offseason, but also absent from McDaniel’s top-200 prospect list.

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Last night, with the Red Sox and Rays tied 5-5 in the seventh inning, Kevin Cash brought Brad Boxberger into the game. On the one hand, this was a bit weird, because Boxberger has been serving as the Rays closer while Jake McGee is on the shelf, pitching exclusively in the ninth (or 10th) inning so far this year. On the other hand, it was a bit awesome, because Cash recognized that there might not be a higher leverage situation in that game than facing David Ortiz, Hanley Ramirez, and Mike Napoli with the score tied.

Rather than risk a weaker member of his bullpen giving up the lead to Boston’s best hitters, Cash went with his relief ace, and Boxberger responded by striking out the side. The Rays then took a two run in the bottom of the seventh inning, and after regular setup man Kevin Jepsen pitched the 8th, the Rays handed the ball to Steve Geltz to pitch the ninth inning, where he recorded the first save of his career.

After the game, Boxberger said this to MLB.com about his usage.

“It’s a little bit different than the rest of the year has gone,” Boxberger said. “But Cash told me and [Kevin] Jepsen a little bit earlier that we’re just going to try and preserve anything we have.”
And preserve they did.

“It obviously worked out tonight and this was the first go of it,” Boxberger said. “So it’s a little bit different for us, but I think going forward it’s going to help keep us in some more ballgames. Just do what we can to win some.”

The idea of the ninth inning holding special powers where only the chosen can pitch has been propped up by a few decades of everyone treating it that way, but slowly, teams are starting to shift away from that rigid structure. While there may be enough value in having predetermined usage patterns to keep from going all the way back to pre-closer relief usage, it seems that it is more efficient to have the flexibility to at least make exceptions to the ninth-inning-only idea. Different isn’t always received well, but as more outings like Boxberger’s occur and random middle relievers start converting lower leverage saves, the idea of the sanctity of the ninth inning will wear off.

This change will likely occur at a glacier pace, but it is beginning.

As a member of UMass’s graduate-student union during a contract negotiation with that school’s administration in 2007, the present author may or may not have uttered the words “This is what democracy looks like” whilst walking in a circle and holding a picket sign. Luckily for the reader, what follows isn’t an example of what democracy — but rather of what very promising White Sox left-hander Carlos Rodon — looks like when the latter is making his major-league debut, which thing he did on Tuesday night in the sixth inning of Chicago’s game at Cleveland (box).

In terms of both of fielding-independent pitching and also just the regular kind of pitching, Rodon’s debut was not a success. He conceded three hits and two runs over 2.1 innings. He recorded a 1:3 strikeout-to-walk ratio. He entered the game with his club down 1-2. It was 1-6 when he departed.

Given Rodon’s arm speed, however, and his slider and his previously established levels, it’s unlikely that many of his future appearances will be so disappointing. In either case, what follows is a brief visual summary of Rodon from his debut.

Here, for example, is the fourth pitch of Rodon’s appearance and also the fourth ball he threw:

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When you think about it, strike zone is always a hot topic in baseball. While watching a game, there may be the odd bang-bang play at first; the occasional trap vs. catch on a sinking liner in the outfield. What is virtually a certainty is that there will be a collection of called pitches over the course of the game that cause one side to take issue. The hitter lowering his bat and starting down to first in anticipation of a walk, only to be stopped in his tracks by a strike call. The pitcher glaring in at the umpire after a close pitch fails to go his way, perhaps shaking his head in disgust. There are simply so many more of these judgment calls made in every game than any other, that they are bound to spur at least a modicum of debate.

With that said, in the 2015 season there is additional cause to pay particular attention to the way the strike zone is being called. My research has shown that the strike zone has been expanding in recent seasons, especially at the bottom of the zone. This growth has directly led to fewer runs scored around the league, which appears to be one issue that new commissioner Rob Manfred is concerned about in his efforts to improve the experience for fans of the game. Based on this information, MLB’s Playing Rules Committee is reportedly monitoring the strike zone in 2015, with an eye to potentially making a change to the rulebook definition of the strike zone as early as 2016 if it is deemed necessary.

So let’s check in and see how the strike zone has been looking so far in 2015. As with any look at two weeks’ worth of baseball, we don’t have the same richness of data to work with as we do when analyzing information collected over a full season. Using my method of breaking down the front plane of home plate into a square inch by square inch grid, the perimeter of the strike zone looks a little more jagged than it will once the season progresses and the sample of called pitches in each bin rises.

Nevertheless, there are some lessons that can be learned simply by comparing the opening weeks of 2015 to the first month of 2014. Consider both the calculated size of the strike zone as well as the size of the strike zone less than 1.75’ off the ground, the cutoff point I’ve identified where the expansion is clearly visible.

By my measurement of the strike zone, while the bottom of the zone has grown ever so slightly over April of last season, its overall size is actually smaller. Early strikeout rates are off as well, which is not surprising given the proven correlation with strike zone size.

It’s a bit of an interesting twist; the bottom of the zone still appears to be holding firm if not expanding, but the overall size is declining. It would appear the majority of the decline has occurred for left-handed hitters, mostly through shaving off part of the inside corner of their called strike zone, which is still per usual shifted about two inches toward the outside edge of the plate. The right-handed hitter zone is barely smaller than in April last year, with the few square inches of difference spread around equally.

How will the strike zone develop as the season marches on? We’ll provide regular updates here and at The Hardball Times to track its progress.

As noted in Sunday’s column, Koji Uehara has thrown 24 pitches this season, and 21 of them have been splitters. Even for a two-game sample, that’s pretty extreme. Only one other pitcher – Red Sox teammate Edward Mujica (57.6%) – has thrown a splitter with more than 50% frequency in the early going. Last year’s leader was Chicago’s Zach Putnam, at 56.1%, while Uehara was right behind him at 47.5%.

The Boston closer has fanned four of the six batters he’s faced, so you can’t argue with the results. But it’s hard not to wonder where his fastball is, and whether he trusts it right now. Uehara is 40 years old and began the season on the disabled list due to a hamstring injury.

Pitching coach Juan Nieves told me Uehara is healthy and has “one of the best fastballs in the league; an invisible fastball.” He said he’s fine with that many splitters, and if Uehara “keeps putting up zeroes, he can use it as much as he wants.”

I asked Ryan Hanigan, who was behind the plate for both appearances, if he’s ever called such a high percentage of a particular breaking pitch. He said he hadn’t. I also asked if throwing almost exclusively splitters was the plan going into each of Uehara’s outings. He told me it wasn’t.

Uehara won’t continue to throw 87.5% splitters, but he’ll certainly feature it in the months to come. According to his catcher, it’s not only effective, it’s more than one pitch.

“He can throw it for a strike and he can throw more of an action pitch to get more sink,” said Hanigan. “He can play with it and let it run a little bit. He can do different things with it, at different speeds, and he’s got real good command of it. There will be times we’ll go with the heater more often, but I’ll call the splitter at any time.”

The team behind the Steamer projections has put together a tool to better visualize the steamer split projections. Just click on the image or various links and start slicing and dicing.

“In the visualization, you will find a new output of the Steamer Projection system: Rest of season split projections. This visualization is customizable: you may select different stats to display on the graphs, and choose to only display certain teams and positions. It was designed to be a stand-alone tool, and it can even be embedded directly on your website or posted on social media. We plan to update it weekly so that our ROS projection stay up to date.”

Click to enlarge.

“In Soviet Russia, television watches you,” famous bearded dissident Yakov Smirnoff revealed in his politically charged comedy jokes of the 1980s. In the United States, meanwhile, the arrangement is different. In the United States — or at least the United States of April 16, 2015 — what happens is you watch Red Sox GM Ben Cherington watching draft-eligible Vanderbilt right-hander Carson Fulmer.

As for who is watching you — or, for that matter, whom Carson Fulmer himself is watching — it’s difficult to say. That these and other similar scenarios are depicted in an MC Escher drawing is almost certain, however.

Image courtesy a combination of Kiley McDaniel and Cespedes Family BBQ.

I told Rafael Betancourt that he hadn’t hit a batter with any of his last 10,307 pitches thrown. He laughed, and said nobody had ever told him that before. “I remember it. It was Marcus Thames. Funny thing was? It was an 0-2 count,” the Rockies reliever said. When I asked if it was the last time he ever went inside, he only laughed. He wanted to protest, I could tell, but he also knew he didn’t go inside much.

The rest of the interview didn’t produce much, other than the fact that the deception he shows in his delivery wasn’t crafted. The way Betancourt’s arm comes up behind his head is just the way he throws the ball. “That’s the way I’ve always thrown the ball, even when I was a fielder, even when I played shortstop — but I feel that the ball is always coming from the same spot,” he said of his uncommon release action.

Even though he lives on the outside corner — and admitted as much — he didn’t really want to get into specifics about the adjustments he’d made to combat hitters hanging over the outside corner. You can see that he’s gone to the slider a little more over the years, and has even used the pitchfork changeup some more, but the location hasn’t changed.

Nor has his ability to avoid the free pass… or the hit batter.

Earlier this week, the author published a post claiming to include the top players by (maybe) predictive stats from college baseball’s most competitive conferences.

What follows are the three weekend series likely to feature the greatest number of players whose names appeared within that post. MPS+ and MPS- are index metrics based on those (maybe) predictive stats and designed for batters and pitchers, respectively. In each case, 100 is average, while above 100 is better for batters and below 100 is better for pitchers. Read more about the author’s questionable methodology here.

Arkansas at Texas A&M
Who It Features
One of the best players in all the SEC. Draft-eligible sophomore and Arkansas center fielder Andrew Benintendi (160 PA, 151 MPS+) leads not merely the conference but all of Division 1 with 14 home runs. He’s also recorded a strikeout rate (12.5%) about a standard deviation better than conference average and occupies (one notes) a place on the more challenging end of the defensive spectrum. All five of the following also appear among the conference’s top-20 batters: junior right fielder Tyler Spoon (148 PA, 123 MPS+) and junior third baseman Bobby Wernes (151 PA, 115 MPS+) on Arkansas; plus sophomore right fielder Nick Banks (148 PA, 114 MPS+), sophomore third baseman Ronnie Gideon (107 PA, 118 MPS+), and junior left fielder Logan Taylor (132 PA, 128 MPS+) for Texas A&M. Among pitchers, Arkansas’ Friday night starter Grayson Long (51.0 IP, 86 MPS-) has produced the best numbers. Long features a fastball that sits in the low-90s and peaks at 93 mph, according to Perfect Game.

When It’s On (ET)
Friday at 7:30pm
Saturday at 8:30pm
Sunday at 4:00pm

How to Watch It
SEC Network and Watch ESPN (link).

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