We have a deal! By we, I mean that baseball-starved fans who live in the United States will be able to watch English-language broadcasts of regular season baseball thanks to an agreement between ESPN and the Korea Baseball Organization, whose Opening Day is Tuesday, May 5. Here’s the first-week schedule:

Yes, those hours are ungodly if you live on the East Coast, but if you have a TiVO or other DVR and can manage to avoid spoilers, it’s probably worth your trouble, assuming you’re already an ESPN subscriber. The deal covers the entire season, including the postseason and the best-of-seven Korea Series.The Worldwide Leader’s broadcasters will be coming at you remotely; they’re not in South Korea. It’s hardly a perfect set-up, but then what about this current situation in the pandemic is? Particularly with MLB’s opening a long ways off, I’ll take what I can get. Read the rest of this entry »

During the pandemic-induced outage, I haven’t had the chance to avail myself of many of the multitude of rebroadcasted classics, but on Monday night, when my wife and I were trying to figure out what to fit into the Better Call Saul-shaped hole in our TV viewing schedule, she discovered that we had TiVo’d the MLB Network re-airing of Clayton Kershaw’s major league debut on May 25, 2008. The Dodgers were at home that day, facing the Cardinals, and so on the microphone was none other than Vin Scully. I answered the question of whether we should watch it by breaking out the birthday package of imported jamón iberico. This one called for the top-shelf stuff.

Less than three minutes into the broadcast, while Kershaw was still facing leadoff hitter Skip Schumaker, Scully cut to a clip from a March 9 spring training game, likely the first time the legendary Dodger announcer saw the team’s 2006 first-round pick in action. “The pitch that we will forever remember,” began the 81-year-old announcer, witness of literally millions of pitches over the course of the first 58 years of his stint with Dodgers — including thousands from Hall of Famers like Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale, Bob Gibson, and Juan Marichal — but at this point probably fewer than 100 from the 20-year-old southpaw, “was made by Clayton Kershaw against the Boston Red Sox. He retired the side in Vero Beach, but he threw a curveball that buckled the knees of Sean Casey….” Read the rest of this entry »

FanGraphs merchandise is still available for pre-order! Pre-orders for all sizes will be available from now until May 10, with merchandise expected to ship in early June.

Items available for pre-order include:

• FanGraphs Hoodies
• Effectively Wild T-Shirts
• Men’s Gray FanGraphs T-Shirts

Read the rest of this entry »

Over at our online store, supplies have been running low, and many have asked us when we’ll be restocking their favorites. But don’t fret: FanGraphs merchandise is now available for pre-order! Pre-orders for all sizes will be available from now until May 10, with merchandise expected to ship in early June.

Items available for pre-order include:

• FanGraphs Hoodies
• Effectively Wild T-Shirts
• Men’s Gray FanGraphs T-Shirts

Also available for pre-order, and back by popular demand, our “Do you go to FanGraphs at all?” T-shirts, as well as FanGraphs hats:

Our other merch is still available to order.

Many of our readers have also expressed an interest in FanGraphs mugs. Unfortunately, the site we’ve used in the past isn’t offering them anymore, but we’re on the hunt for a new supplier, and hope to have an update on when mugs will be back in stock soon.

Thanks to everyone who has bought merchandise in the last few weeks. Every FanGraphs Membership, donation, or t-shirt purchased goes directly to paying employees and contributors, and to covering the stats and server costs that keep the lights on. We appreciate your support and hope to see you and your snazzy new FanGraphs hoodie or hat at a ballpark soon!

Last month, we updated our Player Pages. Today we are debuting a new feature on the Season Stats and Game Log Pages.

But before I take you through that new functionality, I wanted to take a minute to express my gratitude for the outpouring of support we’ve received over the last week. At FanGraphs, we have two developers who build and maintain the site: David Appelman, who started the site in 2005, and me. I have worked primarily on the front-end tools for the past five years. We are constantly trying to improve our site by adding new tools or making our existing ones better, all to fulfill our mission of providing excellent baseball analysis and allowing you to conduct great baseball analysis of your own. All of this takes time and development resources. It can take 2-4 months to complete projects like updating the Player Pages or incorporating the RosterResource Depth Charts into FanGraphs.

We plan to keep working hard to create even more tools during this baseball-less period, so that when the game does return, the best possible site for your baseball research and analysis is there for you. Your membership enables us to do so. Read the rest of this entry »

In the first instance of what could be a wave of players electing to undergo surgeries while MLB remains on an indefinite hiatus and before hospitals begin canceling elective surgeries to focus their resources on COVID-19 patients, Justin Verlander had surgery on his right groin on Tuesday. Per the Astros, the recovery timeline is six weeks, and since there isn’t likely to be any baseball in that time after the Centers for Disease Control recommended limiting gatherings of 50 or more people for the next eight weeks, it made sense for the 37-year-old righty to go under the knife now.

It’s been a rocky spring Verlander, who’s coming off a season for which he nabbed that long-elusive second Cy Young after going 21-6 with a 2.58 ERA, 3.27 FIP, 300 strikeouts — reaching that plateau in the same game in which he notched his 3,000th career strikeout — and 6.4 WAR. Recall that he was scratched from his February 27 start due to discomfort in his right groin, though the Astros felt the danger was minimal enough that they allowed him to throw a simulated game that same day. He was roughed up in his Grapefruit League debut on March 3 against the Cardinals, then left his March 8 start against the Mets after two innings, complaining of soreness in his right triceps. Read the rest of this entry »

Please note, this posting contains two positions.

Position: Quantitative Analyst – Entry Level, Baseball Research and Development

Position Summary:
The Colorado Rockies are currently seeking a full-time entry level Quantitative Analyst within the Baseball Research and Development Department. This individual will assist in the development and maintenance of player information and projection systems, statistical analysis projects and on field strategy. This position requires strong statistical development skills, ability to program in a scripting language such as Python and/or R, as well as a demonstrated ability for independent curiosity and a commitment to excellence while working within a team.

Duties & Responsibilities:

• Utilize advanced statistical techniques to analyze large datasets for actionable conclusions.
• Design and document development of new analytic applications to assist in player evaluation.
• Utilize existing Baseball Research and Development applications and databases in order to perform quantitative research related to baseball strategy and player evaluation.
• Work with Baseball Research and Development team to design and integrate new statistical ideas into existing analytical systems.
• Build automated solutions to import, clean and update datasets for use in downstream analyses.
• Complete ad-hoc projects to answer specific questions from Front Office and On-Field colleagues.

Candidate Preferences:
Education and Work Experience

• Bachelor’s degree or completion of immersive technical program in Mathematics, Statistics, Economics, and/or demonstrated knowledge and experience in a Statistical Field.

Read the rest of this entry »

In light of the continued spread of the coronavirus (and out of an abundance of caution), we’ve decided to cancel our March 13 Phoenix meetup. We’re sorry to miss everyone, and the number of confirmed cases in the greater Phoenix area is still quite small, but we’d hate to get our readers together and then have any of them, our staff, or the folks at Angel’s Trumpet get sick.

We hope to see you at other FanGraphs events later in the year!

Position: Player Development Associate

Position Overview
Oversee the daily video, sports technology, and advance scouting operations at assigned minor league affiliate. Duties will include, but not be limited to: filming and logging home and road games, as well as assisting in daily instructional film/data review sessions with coaches, players, and staff. In addition, the P.D. Associate will be responsible for maintaining all sports technology equipment including setup, logging, and uploading all data each day.

Essential Duties

• Open and oversee operations of affiliate video room on a daily basis
• Be able to operate, troubleshoot, and support IP and high speed video cameras, computer networks, and network hard drives
• Film and accurately log all home and road games using BATS video system
• Film and capture data for bullpens, batting practices, and workouts based on requests by Phillies coaches and staff
• Be able to accurately and efficiently set up and run various sports technology equipment, including but not limited to: bat sensors, motion capture tools, and ball flight tracking technology
• Assist with daily data and video review sessions between Phillies coaching staff and players
• Provide regular status reports to Assistant Minor League Video Coordinators and other player development staff in Philadelphia and Clearwater
• Assist with various player development, Integrative Baseball Performance, advance scouting, and analytics initiatives as needed

Read the rest of this entry »

After an eventful offseason, actual baseball games are happening on a daily basis again. While there’s nothing like the real thing, at least it’s a sign that we are very close — 26 days, to be precise — to Opening Day.

In the meantime, each team currently has somewhere between 59 (Houston Astros) and 73 (St. Louis Cardinals) players in major league camp. How do I know? Well, I learned this, along with many other interesting tidbits, by using FanGraphs’ newest feature: the Opening Day Roster Tracker. Since it could also be quite useful to you over the next several weeks, let me tell you all about it.

First, here’s a quick primer on who is in major league camp and what happens as rosters are pared down to 26 players.

Who is in major league camp?

The full squad is comprised of each team’s full 40-man roster and a group of non-roster invitees (NRI). A non-roster invitee must be added to the 40-man roster if they break camp with the major league club.

What happens when a player is officially out of the running for an Opening Day roster spot?

If a player on the 40-man roster does not make the team, they are optioned to the minors; non-roster invitees are reassigned. They will continue to prepare for the upcoming season in minor league camp. This does not, however, completely rule them out from making the Opening Day roster. Circumstances can change, usually because of injuries, and a player can be brought back after being sent down. Read the rest of this entry »