Originally, this was going to be a little post about Jonathan Schoop. I wasn’t super jazzed to write about Jonathan Schoop, and you weren’t super jazzed to read about Jonathan Schoop, but, in case you weren’t already aware, Schoop is swinging a lot less than he used to. One of the very most aggressive hitters around has dropped his swing rate by right around 10 percentage points, and that’s big. That’s a significant change, for a player who had been in need of more polish. It seems like a step forward. It’s interesting.

But, at least as this post goes, the hell with Schoop, because I need to point you toward Mike Moustakas. Has it been a while since you checked in on him? I guess that depends on whether you’re a Royals fan. But let me summarize where Moustakas has been real quick. You remember he used to be a top prospect. Then he was a disappointing major-leaguer. Then the big story became that his approach matured, and he learned to take balls to the opposite field. Moustakas stopped trying to pull everything, and, at last, he found success. The game was coming together for him, and he had a strong start to 2016. Then he got hurt. Badly hurt — hurt enough to miss the rest of the year. For everyone involved, it was a tremendous disappointment.

Moustakas is back on the field. He’s played almost every game, and he’s already set a new career high for home runs. That opposite-field focus is gone; Moustakas has been killing the ball to right. In that sense, he’s reverted, although now it’s working. But that’s not what I want to draw your attention to. Before having surgery, Moustakas was more patient than ever. On the other side of surgery, he’s been more aggressive than ever. He’s jumped from one end of the spectrum to the other, as you can see in the following plot:

More swings in the zone. More swings out of the zone! More swings in and out of the zone. Moustakas has been trying to hit everything he can, and his numbers are fine, if not massively improved. To try to put this in some context, I consulted the extent of our historical plate-discipline data, which goes back to 2002. I looked at every player with at least 100 plate appearances in consecutive seasons, which gave me a sample of 5,205 individual player season-pairs. Here is a plot of their swing rates. Moustakas is highlighted in yellow.

Compared to last year, Moustakas’ swing rate is up 15 percentage points, which is the largest increase in the sample. Looking at absolute values, it’s also just the largest change in the sample, up or down. This season isn’t over yet, so, there’s that, but for now, in the past decade and a half, we haven’t seen a player so suddenly change like this. Moustakas went under the knife as a more disciplined bat. He’s come away as a hacker, and he’s really gotten no better or worse. He’s the same, but different, and to this point in 2017, Moustakas has yet to take a single called third strike.

Usually people want more from something like this. They want the author to determine whether a change is good or bad. I can’t do that. All I know is there’s been a change. It’s worked about as well as the previous changes. Mike Moustakas has already had one weird big-league career.

The Nationals finally addressed their struggling bullpen yesterday by acquiring relievers Sean Doolittle and Ryan Madson from the Oakland Athletics. In return, Oakland received veteran reliever Blake Treinen and prospects Sheldon Neuse and Jesus Luzardo. Luzardo was a third rounder out of high school last year who has just 14 professional innings to his name. As such, I don’t have a KATOH projection for him, but Eric Longenhagen gave him a 40 FV in the offseason in his offseason writeup of the Nationals system.

Neuse was Washington’s 2016 second-round draft choice out of the University of Oklahoma. He was an excellent hitter in his last season of college, slashing .369/.465/.646 with 12 steals over 55 games. He has carried his hot hitting over to pro ball, slashing .291/.349/.469 at the Low-A level this year while playing shortstop.

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It’s pretty rare these days when MLB teams get to announce a big transaction on their own, as most things leak out ahead of time, and we get a few days of speculation before a deal is finally complete. But this morning, the White Sox just threw out a shocker.

#WhiteSox have acquired OF Eloy Jiménez, RHP Dylan Cease, 1B Matt Rose & INF Bryant Flete from the Cubs in exchange for LHP José Quintana.

— Chicago White Sox (@whitesox) July 13, 2017

We were pretty sure the White Sox were going to trade Quintana, and it seemed pretty clear the Cubs needed another starting pitcher, but the presumption was that the Chicago teams wouldn’t strike a deal, given their history of not really making trades together. They hadn’t completed a trade between teams since 2006, when Neal Cotts was traded for David Aardsma, and before that, it was 1998’s Matt Karchner for Jon Garland deal.

But this time, apparently, the fit was too perfect to pass up just because they share a city. The White Sox wanted to continue to load up on future upside, and there are few prospects in the game with more long-term value than Jimenez, who Baseball America just ranked #5 overall in their midseason update. Eric Longenhagen put a 60 FV on him before the season began, and he’s gone on to hit .271/.351/.490 as a 20-year-old in high-A ball. He’s still several years from the big leagues, but he’s got some of the biggest power upside in the minors, and the White Sox have time to be patient.

Cease is a pretty nifty second piece himself, as a 21-year-old who can get his fastball into the high-90s and was destroying the Midwest League this year. Like Jimenez, he’s got a ways to go before he’s a big leaguer, but there’s plenty of potential here.

Rose and Flete are your typical add-ons in trades like this. Neither one even made the honorable mentions section of Eric’s Cubs list this spring, and it would take some unexpected development for either to become a contributor in the big leagues. This deal is about Jimenez and Cease.

As expected, Quintana didn’t bring back quite the return that Chris Sale did, but this looks like a very nice return for the White Sox. They continue to pick upside and long-term value over proximity to the Majors, and when you collect prospects like this, your success rate will naturally be lower. But if they hit on a few of the guys they’ve acquired over the last year, they’re going to find a franchise player or two to build around. With Moncada, Jimenez, Kopech, Cease, Giolito, and Lopez, the White Sox have six pretty interesting upside plays to hope on now.

Jeff will be around in a bit with a longer write-up on this deal, and will focus more on how this helps the Cubs. But they needed another good pitcher, and now they have one they can keep around for a few more years. The Dodgers and Nationals shouldn’t forget about the Cubs just yet.

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

Wes Rogers, OF, Colorado (Profile)
Level: Hi-A   Age: 23   Org Rank: HM   Top 100: NR
Line: 2-for-4, HR, BB

Notes
Rogers’ draft stock spiked during the 2014 JUCO World Series, during which he hit .538. He went straight from Grand Junction — where the JUCO World Series is held and where the Rockies’ Pioneer League affiliate plays their home games — to Scottsdale to workout with Colorado. He ran a plus-plus 60-yard dash there and the Rockies drafted him in the fourth round. He’s having a bit of a breakout year, albeit as an old-for-level prospect repeating the Cal League. But Rogers runs very well, has above-average bat speed, and exhibits terrific command of the strike zone. He’s also been an efficient and prolific base-stealer, lifting 159 career bases in 324 games at an 88% success rate. He’s also a long-limbed, small-school prospect, both late-blooming traits. Some of his power is probably fueled by Lancaster’s hitting environment, but there are big-leagues tools here, too.

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

Alex Jackson, C, Atlanta (Profile)
Level: Hi-A   Age: 21   Org Rank: 24   Top 100: NR
Line: 4-for-5, 2B, 2 HR

Notes
Jackson missed a month with a left wrist contusion and has struggled since his return in mid-June, stroking just two extra-base hits (before last night) in 16 games since coming off the disabled list. With hand/wrist injuries, though, a downturn in power is not only acceptable but almost expected for at least a little while after returning. Jackson’s plus raw power, which manifests almost exclusively to his pull side in games, is his best tool and it’s good to see a some indication that it might be returning.

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I don’t see any reason to turn this into a full-length post, when something very short should suffice. You know that not every team in baseball has an identically-difficult schedule. I mean, even most simply, the Padres have to play against the Dodgers, but the Dodgers never have to play against the Dodgers, which gives them an advantage. There are other advantages and disadvantages, for other reasons. Things are unbalanced. You know how it works.

Differences between schedules are frequently tough to notice, and it’s easy to downplay the significance. A team’s schedule will never be the major factor behind said team making or missing the playoffs. That doesn’t make it irrelevant, though, especially now, with higher-leverage baseball games left to be played. Who’s looking at the toughest schedules the rest of the way? Who’s looking at the easiest? I can give you some very simple estimates. I’m following the same method as always.

This is our projected standings page. That includes a projected winning percentage, that does not factor in opponents. This is our playoff odds page. That includes a projected winning percentage, that does factor in opponents. In other words, the latter projection is schedule adjusted, so to get an idea about schedule strength, you can just subtract the former winning percentage from the latter, and see what you have.

That’s what I’ve done below, splitting apart the American and National Leagues. These are expressed as differences in winning percentage, where a positive number implies an easier schedule, and a negative number implies a more difficult one. Note that this is based entirely on the team projections, so if you have a particular disagreement with certain projections, that’ll make a difference here. Like, the Brewers are projected to play a lot worse than the Cubs from here on out. If you think that’s not how it’s going to go, then, well, take these with a grain of salt. I just want to show you what our numbers say, at this moment in time. Don’t flame the messenger.

Here’s the AL picture:

Good news for the Indians! Worse news for the White Sox. But the White Sox probably don’t care, so, let’s just move one over, and say, worse news for the Orioles. And for the Yankees, and for the Red Sox, and for the…the AL East is a tough division. Here’s the NL picture:

I don’t think the Marlins are going to play themselves into the race, but at least they have one thing working for them. The Diamondbacks apparently don’t, so it’s good for them they have such a massive lead. I’m not going to write anything else. Anything left, I leave to you.

Mike Trout was injured on May 28. Through to that point, he’d been worth a league-leading 3.4 WAR, and he was sitting on a career-best 208 wRC+. Partial seasons are never the same as complete seasons, because complete seasons give every player equal opportunity to get hot or get cold, but Trout, at least then, was on course for the best big-league season of his life. The best big-league season of his life! For Mike Trout!

The injury was devastating, for everyone. Everyone, I suppose, but the Angels’ rivals. The Angels suddenly had to deal with the freak long-term absence of the best player in the world. Fans had to deal with the same. Personally, I’ve had fewer things to write about. It’s been about a month and a half of not writing about Mike Trout, and I don’t like that. Nobody likes that. We all need more Trout in our lives.

We’re going to get it again. On Sunday, Trout played his final minor-league rehab game, walking three times while also knocking a triple. Trout says he feels ready, and the medical team is supportive, and so Trout will return to the bigs on the other side of the All-Star break. We made it, everybody. We made it several weeks without Mike Trout, and we’re all right, and even the Angels are all right, too. There’s light at the end of this tunnel, and we are all so nearly there.

As such, to mark the imminent occasion, I want to show you a table and ask you a question. This table includes Angels team stats. Everything’s split into two groups, corresponding to two periods of time. One of the periods of time shows the Angels through May 28. The other shows the Angels since May 29. I want you to examine this table for however long you need, and then respond to the following poll. Thank you!

That’s run differential per game, by the way. And, later, stolen bases per game. Feeling good? Here you go. Have a great afternoon and evening.

It’s that time of year again. Time to gather around adult beverages (drink specials to be determined) and small plates (free thanks to FanGraphs, October, and The Athletic!) and talk baseball with some of your favorite writers. Thursday, July 13th, at 7pm at Local Option in Chicago, we have invited the writers, analysts, and brewers below (and a few more off list) to come and be merry with you in the back of the bar.

This is a 21-and-over event. No tickets required.

See you soon.

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

Jose Siri, OF, Cincinnati (Profile)
Level: Low-A   Age: 21   Org Rank: HM   Top 100: NR
Line: 3-for-5, 3B, HR

Notes
Siri’s slender 6-foot-2 frame contains surprisingly big tools. He’s a plus runner with above-average raw power and arm strength. He also has good bat control, although an aggressive approach at the plate has lead to some strikeout issues throughout his career that could be further exposed at upper levels. He has big upside if he can continue to hit. Much of what scouts are saying about Siri now were being said, verbatim, about Nick Williams two years ago.

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

Dominic Smith, 1B, New York NL (Profile)
Level: Triple-A Age: 22   Org Rank:  3 Top 100: 73
Line: 3-for-5, 2B, 2 HR
Notes
Most developmental paths are long and winding, but Smith has been robotically effective since his first full pro season. He has made hard, all-fields contact each year, his home parks always tossing his slugging figures around. Even his year-to-year batted-ball profile has been consistent. He’s a high-probability regular with a chance to be a three-plus-win player if the glove scouts see shows up on paper.

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