Who trades players at 10 AM? The Red Sox, apparently, is who. That’s what they’ve done today, at least, picking up right-hander Nathan Eovaldi from the Tampa Bay Rays in exchange for minor-league pitcher Jalen Beeks.

Trading Eovaldi represents the successful culmination of a two-year strategy for the Rays, who signed him to a one-year, $2 million contract for a 2017 he was going to miss due to Tommy John surgery. A one-year option for $2 million gave the Rays a chance to get some serious upside in value for their patience, $4 million representing basically ashtray money when it comes to signing major-league-competent starting pitchers.

Eovaldi’s always been a bit of a puzzle, a pitcher who possessed a fastball that touched 100 mph but lacked the key to closing the deal and punching out batters, his breaking pitches never effectively complementing his velocity. Relying heavily on a cutter this year, however, Eovaldi has produced the highest strikeout rate of his career to date (23.7%). Eovaldi had fooled around with the pitch before, but this is the first time he’s had real success with the pitch, FanGraphs’ linear-weighted measure of pitch value gives him the 10th-most valuable cutter in baseball this season, ninth on a rate basic for pitchers with a minimum of 50 innings.

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The New York Yankees have the best bullpen in the game. Aroldis Chapman is great. David Robertson is having a typical year for David Robertson. Dellin Betances seems to have recovered his form and is, once again, pitching like a relief ace. Chad Green and Jonathan Holder — even A.J. Cole and Adam Warren — have pitched well.

The Yankees don’t need bullpen help. Yet, if rumors are true, they are about to get it anyway. Jon Heyman reports tonight that New York and Baltimore are close to finalizing a trade that would send Zach Britton to the Bronx.

As for whom the Orioles will receive, Ken Rosenthal reports that right-handed pitching prospect Dillon Tate is expected to headline the deal. Sources tell both Joel Sherman and Heyman that the deal will look like this:

Yankees receive:

• Zach Britton

Orioles receive:

• Dillon Tate
• Josh Rogers
• Cody Carroll

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Please note, this posting contains two positions.

Position: Data Scientist

Reports to: Manager of Baseball Analytics

Description: The Data Scientist will work with the Manager of Baseball Analytics to implement the department’s research and development efforts within new and existing applications. The Reds envision the person in this position to play a major role in the creation of new baseball analytics concepts with the ultimate goal of enhancing on-field performance.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

• Design, develop, test, implement and maintain predictive models and metrics utilizing appropriate tools and techniques.
• Work with the Reds Baseball Analytics and Systems staff to integrate new statistical analyses, models and data visualizations into existing and new applications.
• Keep up to date on new predictive modeling techniques and evaluate their potential for application to baseball data sets.
• Collaborate with Major League Operations, Player Development and Sports Science departments to design and implement statistical analyses.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities:

• 3+ years of experience in computational field, such as Statistics, Biostatistics, Data Science, Mathematics, Engineering, Quantitative Social Sciences or Analytics.
• Strong knowledge of statistical analysis and predictive modeling.
• Demonstrated experience with statistical software (e.g. R, Python) and database querying (SQL).
• Ability to communicate effectively with all aspects of Baseball Operations, Scouting and Player Development staffs.
• Experience with Bayesian statistics. (Preferable, but not required)
• Understanding of typical baseball data structures.
• Knowledge of current baseball research, traditional baseball statistics and strategy.

Work Environment:

• Remote working accommodations are available.
• Work is normally performed in a typical interior/office work environment.
• Hours may periodically include nights, weekends and holidays.

Expectations:

• Adhere to Cincinnati Reds Organization Policies and Procedures.
• Act as a role model within and outside the Cincinnati Reds Organization.
• Performs duties as workload necessitates.
• Demonstrate flexible and efficient time management and ability to prioritize workload.
• Meet Department productivity standards.

To Apply:
To apply, please visit this site.

Position: Baseball Analytics Developer

Reports to: Manager of Baseball Analytics

Job Purpose: The Analytics Developer will develop and maintain software to assist with the dissemination of analytics information throughout Baseball Operations.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

• Design, develop, test, implement and maintain software solutions.
• Work with the Reds Baseball Analytics and Systems staff to integrate new statistical analyses, models and data visualizations into applications.
• Keep up to date on new software tools and evaluate their potential for internal use.
• Work closely with Major League staff to convert requirements into usable applications.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities:

• BS degree or equivalent experience in a computational science or technical field with 3 years of development experience.
• Proficient in web development languages/standards including HTML5, JavaScript and CSS.
• Demonstrated experience with databases and query development/optimization.
• Knowledge of UI/UX on web and mobile platforms.
• Ability to communicate with coaching and baseball operation staffs to understand their software needs.
• Understanding of typical baseball data structures, knowledge of current baseball research and traditional baseball statistics and strategy.
• Experience with statistical software in R or Python is a plus.
• Ability to be a self-starter and manage ones workload to meet deadlines.
• Demonstrated ability to quickly adapt to a variety of programming environments (frontend, backend, Windows, Linux) and identify the best tools and libraries for new tasks.

Work Environment:

• Work is normally performed in a typical interior/office work environment.
• Remote working accommodations are available for strong candidates.
• Hours may include nights, weekends and holidays.

Expectations:

• Adhere to Cincinnati Reds Organization Policies and Procedures.
• Act as a role model within and outside the Cincinnati Reds Organization.
• Performs duties as workload necessitates.
• Demonstrate flexible and efficient time management and ability to prioritize workload.
• Meet Department productivity standards.

To Apply:
To apply, please visit this site.

The Cincinnati Reds are an Equal Opportunity Employer. It is the policy of the Cincinnati Reds to ensure equal employment opportunity without discrimination or harassment on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion or creed, sex, age, disability, citizenship status, marital status, genetic predisposition or carrier status, sexual orientation or any other characteristic protected by law.

The Manny Machado trade will not be the only big deal to go down during the All-Star break. Cleveland, in desperate need of relief pitching with Cody Allen struggling and Andrew Miller hurt, have made quite the move to shore up their bullpen in one fell swoop. Jon Heyman was the first to report that Brad Hand would be heading from San Diego to Cleveland in the deal. Ken Rosenthal added that reliever Adam Cimber would also be on the move. As for the return, The Padres are set to receive catching prospect Francisco Mejia. The deal looks like this:

Cleveland receives:

• Brad Hand
• Adam Cimber

San Diego receives:

• Francisco Mejia

The 28-year-old Hand is in the middle of another very good season. After totaling 3.2 WAR across nearly 170 innings the last two years, the lefty has put up an ERA and FIP right around three this season. He’s struck out 35% of batters and walked just 8% as the Padres closer. Hand signed a contract extension before the season started that will pay him a bit over $1 million the rest of this season and $13.5 million over the following two years, with a team option of $10 million for 2020 that can be bought out for one million dollars.

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After a few days of something more substantive than speculation, the Baltimore Orioles and Los Angeles Dodgers appear finally to have conducted official business with each other. Eduardo A. Encina and Ken Rosenthal outline the particulars of that business via social-media platform twitter dot com:

At the very center of the trade, of course, is Manny Machado, one of the best major leaguers currently authoring one of his best major-league seasons. Machado will help the Dodgers address a shortstop position that has created uncertainty for the club ever since starter Corey Seager was forced to undergo Tommy John surgery at the beginning of May. Machado is projected for slightly more than two wins over the rest of season — about a win more than Chris Taylor (who’s received most of the starts at short in Seager’s absence) and also about a win more than a combination of Cody Bellinger, Enrique Hernandez, and Joc Pederson (who’ve received most of the center-field starts with Taylor at short).

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Position: Entry Level Data Engineer, Baseball Research and Development

Description:

The Rockies are looking for a full-time Entry Level Data Engineer to join their Research and Development team. The successful candidate will assist with the expansion and optimization of their data warehouse and data pipeline architecture, with a focus on collecting, cleaning, transforming, managing and validating data using distributed computing and storage systems.

Responsibilities and Duties:

• Create, maintain and optimize data ETL/ELT pipelines
• Documentation of data/pipelines
• Ensure the ingestion of data and errors are handled without interruption
• Process and securely store extremely sensitive data for callback and future use
• Prepare distributed, disjoint, multi-formatted data sets for data scientists
• Research and investigate new and interesting datasets to include in our data warehouse
• Perform quantitative research related to baseball strategy and player evaluation
• Collaborate with coaches, scouts and baseball operations staff to suggest process improvements

Requirements:

Education and Work Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science/Engineering
• Candidates still in school (junior or senior level) with extensive work towards such degree will be considered
• Understanding of relational databases such as MySQL, PostgreSQL or SQL Server
• Ability to effectively use multiple programming languages
• Knowledge and understanding of baseball and baseball statistics

Functional Skills

• Ability to work evenings and weekends required
• Passion for the intersection of baseball and data
• Passion for quality data
• Strong organizational skills and ability to self-start
• Strong intellectual curiosity
• Desire to learn and contribute
• Ability to work in a collaborative and open team environment
• Ability to develop and maintain successful working relationship with members of the Front Office

To Apply:
Qualified candidates should send their letter of interest and resume to BaseballJobs@rockies.com no later than July 29th, 2018.

Position: Data Architect

Location: Pittsburgh, PA

Description:
The Data Architect is responsible for putting into place and maintaining the processes and systems to efficiently integrate and effectively make available baseball related data from both external and internal sources in order to provide the backbone of evidence based decision making.

Responsibilities

Primary:

• Responsible for the daily operation, performance, and maintenance of the data assets used within Baseball Operations. Makes use of Pirates’ standards and industry best practices to implement efficient and high performance access to data.
• Design, create, and extend processes for data extraction, transformation, cleansing, and load to and from internal and external data sources for both structured and unstructured data.
• Evaluate potential data providers and design and implement data models for storage and access to new types of data that integrate with the existing data and application architectures.
• Design, create and maintain reporting structures using SQL Reporting Services and Tableau and participate in one-off research projects to answer specific questions.
• Design and implement data mining processes as a part of predictive modeling in conjunction with the Quantitative Analyst and other staff members.
• Design and implement data mining processes as a part of predictive modeling in conjunction with other staff members.

Secondary:

• Departmentally: Participate in gathering and documenting user requirements for existing and new systems. Understand business processes and required outcomes of the system and creates requirements definition document defining the business use cases.
• Organizationally: Acts as a resource for database and SQL coding projects within the organization. Assist other staff developing SQL scripts, stored procedures, and other database objects where required.
• Industry: Acts as the point of contact with MLB in understanding and planning for future infrastructure needs and changes as the structure and breadth of information changes over time.

Position Requirements

Required:

• Bachelor’s Degree or higher in Computer Science, Information Systems, or equivalent.
• Two years experience administering enterprise level data structures using SQL Server technologies including SQL Reporting Services and SQL Server Integration Services.
• Expert knowledge of SQL and database administration tools. Knowledge of SQL Server replication topologies. Understanding of database documentation and design tools.
• Experience with cloud based architectures and tools including Amazon S3, EC2, Databricks required.
• Experience participating in multiple aspects of the software development life cycle including requirements definition, design, development, testing, and implementation.
• Demonstrated ability to work with users to understand business processes, document system requirements, and develop data structures that meet business objectives.

Desired:

• Experience with Python, .NET..
• Experience with statistical analysis software such as R, SAS, SSPS.
• An understanding of sabermetric techniques for player evaluation strongly preferred.

The Pirates are an equal employment opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status or any other characteristic protected by law.

To Apply:
Please apply here.

Notes on prospects from lead prospect analyst Eric Longenhagen. Read previous installments here.

Andres Gimenez, SS, New York Mets (Profile)
Level: Hi-A   Age: 19   Org Rank: 3   FV: 50
Line: 3-for-5, 2B, 3B

Notes
Gimenez is a 19-year-old shortstop slashing .280/.350/.430 in the Florida State League. That’s good for a 107 wRC+ in the FSL. Big-league shortstops with similar wRC+ marks are Trea Turner (a more explosive player and rangier defender than Gimenez) and Jurickson Profar, who have both been two-win players or better this year ahead of the break. Also of note in the Mets system last night was Ronny Mauricio, who extended his career-opening hitting streak to 19 games.

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Major League Baseball announced the rosters for its Futures Game last week, the annual “prospect All-Star Game” which takes place the Sunday before the All-Star Game itself. We’ve made a page on THE BOARD specifically for the Futures Game representatives. It has tool grades, scouting reports, video, and other stuff with which you can play around.

There may be some discrepancies between the player evaluations on this page and those that appear elsewhere on THE BOARD. The grades on the Futures Game section of THE BOARD represent our most current evaluations of these players. The evaluations on the team lists, meanwhile, will be updated altogether shortly in the future. Kiley and I will be in Washington D.C. a week from now to see these guys in person. The Futures Game is Sunday, July 15 in Washington D.C.

I’ve touched on it before, but I don’t think we talk nearly enough about how weird it must be to be a major-league baseball player. Sure, they’re wealthy and get annoyed with their boss like anyone else, but they’re also frequently naked around their work friends. Their workplace is so strange. People spit in the office, and those spitters don’t always aim well, which means flecks of spit on their shoes. We watch them be bad at their jobs, but they never get to see us botch a sale or split an infinitive.

Sometimes, their pants rip just a little bit, near the butt.

This happens to the literal best players. They continue to wear those pants for several hours. They then get new pants. They don’t have to pay for them.

And they litter. Gum wrappers, seeds, the sticky leftovers of athletic tape. They use a bunch of paper cups — seemingly a different one every inning! — and then just throw those cups on the floor of the dugout. It’s a move that must strike your average desk-job worker as odd; insurance adjusters are generally expected to recycle.

Perhaps Mike Leake secretly aspires to more traditional office work. In the top of the fifth inning of his July 4th tilt against the Angels, Leake was pulled in favor of Nick Rumbelow. He looked hot and frustrated. The camera finds him as he takes a long, grumpy drink of water. Here we are, watching him after he just failed. He gives the cup an angry little flick. Runners on the corners. Might be time to litter. He stares into the middle distance. Grumble, grumble, bad day. But then…

He puts the cup back! He drinks from the cup, puts his lips full on it, and then puts it back on top of the stack. Presented with this less typical baseball workplace weirdness, we are left to conclude that Leake either has a stack of cups for his own personal use throughout the game — the result of considered cup tastes — or cares deeply about the environment, or else is thoroughly untroubled by the idea of a teammate grabbing his previously full-lipped cup off the top of the stack. It might be an act of care, but it could also be sort of awful.

I suppose, in that respect, Mike Leake has shown that the dugout is actually just like every other workplace, defined as they often are by drudgery, and grumpy types, and small bits of heedlessness borne of opaque personal agenda or indifference to washing the mug you just used before putting it back in the break room dish drainer.

Maybe being a baseball player isn’t so weird after all. Except for when you’re naked with your fellows. That remains strange.