Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat – 3/11/22

Jay Jaffe: Good afternoon, folks, and HAPPY BASEBALL SEASON!

Jay Jaffe: Brooklyn resident here, and I’m trying to get my blood pressure under control after this:

Jay Jaffe: But nonetheless, i’m delighted that the lockout is over and that we’re going to get a full baseball season in. My coverage of the new CBA deal is here https://blogs.fangraphs.com/we-have-a-cba-deal-and-a-162-game-season/

Jay Jaffe: I’ve also got a fun podcast spot with SB Nation’s Jon Bois here https://blogs.fangraphs.com/fangraphs-audio-jon-bois-on-dave-stieb-lou…

Jay Jaffe: My recent piece about Dave Stieb’s Hall of Fame case (https://blogs.fangraphs.com/cooperstown-notebook-born-in-the-fifties/) and the first installment of Jon’s four-part documentary series on the great Blue Jay () coincided so it seemed only natural for the two of us to nerd out together.

Jay Jaffe: Anyway, let’s get to it! A word of warning: between my Hall of Fame coverage and the negotiations, I haven’t thought about transactions very much since early December. Things could be a bit rusty.

Sirras: Home opening weekend is right before a major, work-all-weekend deadline on 4/18. Remind me that work comes before baseball when baseball isn’t your job please?

Jay Jaffe: Gotta make time for the important stuff! And if you’re working all weekend you deserve some fun before that drudgery begins, so you can have a little baseball, as a treat

Frank Thomas the Tank Engine: When is the last date on which you will hear anybody under age 50 complain about the DH in the NL?  June 15?

Jay Jaffe: the year 20037 — yes, nearly 18 thousand years into the future, sourasses will still be complaining that baseball was better way back when.

Jay Jaffe: Baseball has been trying to get rid of pitchers hitting since before the mound moved to 60-foot-6, so please stop with the purity of the game nonsense https://ourgame.mlblogs.com/the-origins-of-the-designated-hitter-7608d…

Guest: If Goldschmidt has another great/solid season, 5+ WAR or so, how well-established is his HOF candidacy looking?

Jay Jaffe: woof, crashed the browser a minute ago. Tabs overloaded from CBA coverage

Jay Jaffe: I wrote about Goldy here https://blogs.fangraphs.com/seven-pitchers-and-some-more-position-play…

Jay Jaffe: First Base (25th):
50.7career WAR |42.27yr-peak WAR |46.5JAWS |5.6WAR/162
  Average HOF 1B (out of 23):
    65.5 career WAR | 42.1 7yr-peak WAR | 53.8 JAWS | 4.9 WAR/162

Jay Jaffe: His case is starting to round in to shape. it’s not so much that he needs another 5-WAR season (his 7th-best is at 4.7, so that won’t help his peak score much) as that he needs to lay down a few 3+ seasons. Very doable but short of an MVP-caliber season I don’t think it’s something that will come into focus so quickly

Guest: Do you think the pre arb pool will drive down the practice of team-friendly extensions?

Jay Jaffe: eh, probably not. Teams already understand they’re getting production at a great discount for pre-arb players, and that will continue. They do love some cost certainty, and the multiyear extensions give them that.

Doug: When can we expect major moves to re-commence? This weekend?

Jay Jaffe: I expect it will be a wild weekend for transactions. Between signings and PPRs I think i’ll be working every day between now and when i head on my previously planned spring trip to visit my parents, March 22-27.

Frank Thomas the Tank Engine: What are the chances Manfred or Clark (or neither) is still around for the next CBA?

Jay Jaffe: Manfred will be there. He is doing his job for the owners, making them money and acting as human shield. Clark it’s less clear. The players did much, much better this time around than they did on the previous CBA on his watch, and that probably gives him some momentum… the question is whether he still wants the job, or if the split between the executive sub-committee (which voted 8-0 against the new CBA) and the rest of the executive committee (26-4 in favor) is indicative of a schism within the ranks that would result in his ouster.

Dick Allen is a Hall of Famer: How happy are the owners about the split between MLBPA leadership and the rank and file?  Seems to me there will be long term consequences (a further weakening of the union).

Jay Jaffe: I don’t think it’s as serious as it’s made out to be. Gerrit Cole certainly downplayed it in this interview with The Athletic’s Lindsey Adler https://theathletic.com/3176217/2022/03/10/exclusive-qa-with-yankees-g…

Jay Jaffe: As part of the executive subcommittee, you voted no on this proposal. What led to that decision?
The sub wanted to stick together, and that was how our vote was reflected. I’m not really looking to talk about negative things right now while everyone is excited about the deal. We had our reasons, but those can be discussed at another time.

Jay Jaffe: I get the sense the subcommittee thought they could have pushed a bit further, but it’s not like they were going to get an 11th-hour decision to move free agency up a year or expand super-2. The CBT and minimum salary jumps are the largest in the history of the CBA; the players did pretty well and didn’t lose any of the season. Could they have done better by holding out for a month and making it hurt a bit for the owners? Perhaps, but it would have hurt for them as well.

Sam: Jaye, I wanna be you when I grow. Thanks for all you do. My question is, can you give as an out of left field crazy FA signing off the top of your head?

Jay Jaffe: Kris Bryant to the Dodgers

Jay Jaffe: add another moving part to that lineup, with Turner picking up more time at 1B

Future: Assuming the contracts are the same, who do you think would be a better long term signing for the Mariners: Bryant or Story?

Jay Jaffe: In isolation, without considering the roster, my gut says Bryant, whose production has peaked at MVP level, though he’s been much less consistent in recent years, but ZiPS says Story by about 1 win per year over the next three seasons. A lot depends on whether they would move Crawford off SS; his glove is a plus there and i”m not sure the bat plays at anywhere else besides 2B. But having said that, Story at 3B would work well, as would Bryant at 3B.

Cold Stove: So much for the flurry of moves a lot of the media was talking up.. Why do you think we aren’t seeing any movement?

Jay Jaffe: Either because teams really did adhere to the radio silence or because they didn’t want to out themselves as having not by dropping moves just a couple hours past the lifting of the freeze.

Jay Jaffe: Also because these things are complicated, and agents want to get the best deals for their clients, not just the first one. And right now, they and the 30 GMs have a lot on their plates

SS market: Kind of getting the feeling that Correa’s market might be less than everyone initially thought. Do you think he signs for more or less than Seager?

Jay Jaffe: More.

Nelson Cruz: Will I be bashing bombs at Petco Park for the Padres?

Jay Jaffe: wouldn’t surprise me, but he’s going to have lots of options now that the DH is in the NL

Travis: What is your main takeaway from the lockout? And looking into the crystal ball, do you anticipate baseball repeating this process in five years?

Jay Jaffe: The players were galvanized by Manfred’s actions during the 2020 season and since, and stuck together in a way that they haven’t since, like, 2002.

Jay Jaffe: There was better message discipline on both sides

Jay Jaffe: And the owners were always going to have the advantage, but the players did better than expected without actually costing themselves games

Ross: Over/under on top 20 remaining FA deals done today?

Jay Jaffe: i bet we get a couple today, picking up speed over the next few days. Again, it’s get the best deal not the first deal.

Eric Hosmer: Since I have zero ambition to be better, a desire to pursue a declining physique, and love pounding balls into the ground, will the Padres be able to send me anywhere or am I anchoring a terrible first base for them for the next four years?

Jay Jaffe: I suspect you’ve played your last game for the Padres. They’ll eat significant cash to send you away

Mork Borg: Am I crazy, or does it seem like the players gave up extra playoffs for minor increases across the board that still aren’t keeping up with inflation, let alone the rising team valuations?  There’s a big bump in numbers this year, but that’s really just making up for the lost increases they should have had in the last CBA, right?

Jay Jaffe: They’re about 2 CBAs behind in keeping up with revenue. They did get a big jump and bigger y-t-y increases for the minimum salary than ever. Can’t recall where I read it but somebody (a player, I think, maybe Miller or Cole) said they thought it would take 15 years to make up the ground they’ve lost over the two previous CBAs.

Carlos Correa: Do you think that spending over the next week will indicate how teams look at the CBA?  Do you see any major changes in the way teams spend?

Jay Jaffe: It’s going to take a lot longer than one week to see how teams look at the new CBA. The draft stuff (domestic and international) will take years to unfold.

A Boy Named Yu: Which Wander will spend more time in AAA this year: Franco or Javier?

Jay Jaffe: Wander Franco will never play another minor league game unless it’s on a rehab assignment

joe: Freeman? Correa? Olson? What do you see happening for NYY? They can’t possibly do Rizzo and a stopgap can they?

Jay Jaffe: Trevor Story strikes me as the most likely addition, moving to 3B when Volpe is ready. Correa ain’t happening. Rizzo if they miss out on Story. It won’t be a very happy fan base one way or the other.

A Boy Named Yu: Are you aware they made a sequel to the Sandlot in the early 2000’s?  I’ll save you 90 minutes…..it’s not good.

Jay Jaffe: I’ve never watched the Sandlot, TBH.

Matt VW: Jeff Coltin’s harrowing anecdote is in itself a basis for a recall election.

Jay Jaffe: agree 100%

Carlos Correa: When did “rebuilding” become negatively rebranded as “tanking?”

Jay Jaffe: during the Astros and Cubs rebuilds, thanks in part to the caps on amateur spending from the 2011 CBA

Jay Jaffe: teams suddenly had a lot more cost control over the rebuilding process, which made it more palatable

cmkeller: Hall of Fame voters seem to usually be willing to vote for players whose excellent careers were cut short by injury that isn’t a result of aging, e.g., Sandy Koufax, Kirby Puckett. I would have thought Thurman Munson would fall well into this category (death being the most extreme sort of injury). Any thoughts as to why HoF voters haven’t seen him that way?

Jay Jaffe: I don’t think that’s as true as it appears from Koufax and Puckett. So much of the voting historically has had to do with career milestones and totals and guys with short careers generally don’t reach them. Munson… really didn’t get along with writers and I think that had something to do with his particular reception from the voters.

A Boy Named Yu: I’m trying to get the wife to greenlight a trip to Cooperstown for our anniversary later this summer.  She is a big baseball fan but is worried there aren’t enough “non-baseball-date-night” things to do.  I’ve never been myself.  Any thoughts?

Jay Jaffe: There’s good food and beer up there, including the Ommegang Brewery (which I’ve actually never been to, because my time in Cooperstown is as regimented as that of Apollo astronauts on the surface of the moon). There are other museums such as the Fenimore Art Museum and the Farmer’s Musuem. There’s a film society that my pal (and former C’town mayor) Jeff Katz runs. Find him on Twitter @splitseason1981 and he can sell the town better than I can!

A Boy Named Yu: With the universal DH, are teams more or less willing to dabble with two-way players?

Jay Jaffe: it’s so complicated to do but maybe we’ll see somebody else try; I don’t see Brendan McKay or Hunter Greene as likely ones though, so the next Ohtani, if there is one, isn’t apparent yet.

Jay Jaffe: Honestly i think we’re going to see a lot of teams just use the DH spot as free parking for regular players to give them a partial rest rather than lock in more Nelson Cruz types

WinTwins0410: Jay, a HoF question. But first, thanks for your hard work in creating S-JAWS and for some of your recent profiles on those who rank well in S-JAWS, including Stieb and Reuschel. I especially appreciated your “Born in the Fifties” profile on Frank Tanana, and I had a question for you in comparing the careers of Tanana (whom I previously had asked you about in the 8/4/2020 chat) and Mickey Lolich (whom I had asked you about in the 11/17/2020 chat). I realize that despite their impressive career strikeout totals, neither one was great at run prevention. But what explains why Tanana’s bWAR is so much higher than Mickey’s? (57.0 to 48.0) Is it simply that Frank (whose ERA actually was higher) had a longer career than Mickey? Or is there some other aspect that I am missing here?

Jay Jaffe: ~500 more innings for Tanana, against generally tougher offenses (4.42 runs/game to Lolich’s 4.10) with slightly lesser defenses behind, albeit in slightly friendlier ballparks.

Jay Jaffe: See https://stathead.com/sharing/LJWB3

Rich: Have you talked about Graig Nettles’s HOF case before?  Seems like he’s right there.

Jay Jaffe: I have an entry on Nettles in The Cooperstown Casebook. I think the .248 batting average has been hard to overcome when it comes to the oldsters who bypassed him on the BBWAA ballots and still  have control of the Era Committee ballot assembly process

A Boy Named Yu: I’m relieved baseball is back, but is it bad that in a weird way I also wanted it to drag on further so it would make the owners feel the burn more?  Help the players get a better deal I guess.

Jay Jaffe: You know who really feels the burn with no games? The people living paycheck to paycheck, ballpark workers and others around the game who have absolutely no control or direct stake when ti comes to the battle over millions or billions of dollars. I’m not trying to shame you here, just to keep things in perspective. A whole lot of people would suffer if a month or half a season went away. The billionaire owners aren’t among them.

Dan: Your story on the CBA said that a term could send a player to the minors a maximum of five times. After five times, what happens? Club needs consent from player to go down or player becomes free agent? And your story also referred to draft and follow, but didn’t seem to explain further. Do you have more color on that?

Jay Jaffe: i believe the player has to pass through waivers after five times. As for the draft-and-follow, I added a link to Jim Callis’ explanation later last night once the details came in

Guest: Not a question about the new CBA, but about team control for veteran international players like Yoshi Tsutsugo. After his 1 year contract is done this year, is he a free agent or does Pittsburgh still have control given his limited service time?

Jay Jaffe: He can apparently become a free agent after this season despite having less than 2 years of service time. Not sure exactly how that works but it was in place when he came over from Japan and signed with the Rays.

Guest: Who do you think advocated for cancelling the R5 draft?  And do you think it was much of a sticking point?

Jay Jaffe: I believe that I read somewhere (sorry, i’ve seen a million tweets go by in the past few days) that it was apparently the preference of front office folks, who have enough on their plates with the rush of free agents and spring transactions to deal with the Rule 5.

Bea: Which owner would be the worst at Wordle?

Jay Jaffe: Dick Monfort

Josh: As a Dodgers fan, the option limits is a very interesting part of the CBA. How do you see this affecting teams and players this year? More gassed relievers, starters going longer, nothing? Curious your take on it

Jay Jaffe: I thought this, from a YES Network researcher, got it right

Jay Jaffe: maybe the effect won’t be extreme — but it will make the lives of the Mitch Whites and Louis Heads of the world easier as well.

Phil: As a veteran of a few CBAs (in a very different industry from baseball), I wasn’t that surprised to see the split between the exec committee and the rank and file. That has happened for every contract I’ve been involved with, mostly because the exec committee is always older (closer to retirement) than the average worker, which means that they have different interests.

Jay Jaffe: Interesting perspective, thanks. Also worth pointing out that the exec subcommittee had 4 Yankees and Mets (Cole, Britton, Scherzer, Lindor) and those were 2 of the 4 teams that dissented as well — because they’re potentially among the biggest spenders.

guy who asks the lunch question: what’s for lunch?

Jay Jaffe: I had my usual: cracked pepper smoked turkey with Jarlsburg, cucumber, and Potbelly Giardanera on Arnold Country White.

Jay Jaffe: https://www.bonappetit.com/story/potbellys-giardiniera-underrated-cond…

Jay Jaffe: I’ve lost some lunch options in recent months including the beloved doner kebab place and the decent premade sandwich place and so now everything for lunch starts at about $12. Between that and the omicron wave, i’ve been very disciplined towards lunches at home in 2022 so far.

Insert Witty Name Here: I’m about to have my first born son in a few months. What advice do you have to give from your experience as we’re both older fathers?

Jay Jaffe: Savor the moments, don’t try to look too far forward (“I can’t wait until he can ————”), look for ways you can be helpful to your wife because she’s inevitably got the harder job than you.

Jay Jaffe: and keep track of things if you can. it will be fun to look back even when they’re 4 or 5 at when they did things like say their first word, take their first step, move out of the crib, potty train, etc.

Phil: How would you assess the overall performance of baseball writers/reporters over the last three months? Better or worse than you would have expected?

Jay Jaffe: I’d like to think mostly better. There’s a more diverse media covering  baseball than ever before, many of which have fought union battles of their own and thus isn’t reflexively pro-owner. There’s a lot more room for analysis and the kind of number-crunching that can set the record straight when a commissioner lies about baseball ownership not being very lucrative or the players having it better than past generations

Jay Jaffe: Exceptions abound, and we still see some of older writers with a willingness to carry water for management while preserving their access and their relevance.

Phil: I was really interested to read David Ortiz’s comments on the international draft (though the tone of them was characterized differently in different outlets, I felt). Do you think international HOFers like him, Pedro, etc. carry any sway with MLB, or are they just not that interested in input except through the bargaining process?

Jay Jaffe: I absolutely think that the likes of Ortiz and Martinez have sway with the Latin American players. They rose from poverty to become legendary players, a road that so many of their fellow Dominicans (in this case) want to replicate. They know how much corruption and exploitation there is in the current system but also know that MLB has played a part in that system being preserved, and that there’s no quick fix.

Matt VW: Has anybody benefited more from the NL adoption of the DH than Kyle Schwarber? His market has suddenly doubled while he’s still pretty close to his prime and coming off the best year of his career.

Jay Jaffe: I think Castellanos, who’s a year older and coming off an even bigger season, with a similar lack of defensive value, is in the same boat. The universal DH also gives Freeman a longer runway for a deal that draws down his AAV

Dave: Do you think the Cubs would flip Stroman already if he has a good first half and the team stinks?

Jay Jaffe: not unless he explicitly wanted out. IIRC you can’t trade a free agent you signed to a multiyear deal within the first year of signing him without his consent.

olethros: You’re the Cardinals and can sign one of the following: Greinke, Rodon, Kershaw. Assume the contracts are the FG projections. Which do you choose?

Jay Jaffe: Rodon (4/$76M starting with 3.5 WAR at age 29) is the way to go there.

Dave: re: Hosmer, what kind of prospect capital do you think SD would have to attach if the new team is willing to eat the entire contract?

Jay Jaffe: A Wander Franco clone.

Jay Jaffe: Ok, that’s probably an overstatement. But he’s owed $59 million and that is A LOT of prospect talent to give up.

A Boy Named Yu: Follow-up to Wander AAA question, I guess that was my point.  Is it more likely Franco has some rehab time or that Javier gets his s**t together and decides to start hitting the ball?

Jay Jaffe: Javier finished the season in High-A. He’s not going to reach the majors this year.

M’s Fan: King Felix, was his career not long enough or peak not high enough for HOF consideration?

Jay Jaffe: Both

Jay Jaffe: Starting Pitcher (95th):
50.2career WAR |38.57yr-peak WAR |44.3JAWS |44.3S-JAWS |4.1WAR/162
  Average HOF P (out of 66):
    73.0 career WAR | 49.8 7yr-peak WAR | 61.4 JAWS | 56.8 S-JAWS | 4.5 WAR/162

Jay Jaffe: He had a very nice run of ~42 WAR from 2008-15, albeit with a couple of good-not-great seasons in there so it’s not a massive peak. Bigger problem is a net of 0.4 WAR in his 30s.

In There Like Fred Astaire’s Swimwear: Please rank in order of “how is this guy not in the HOF conversation much less the actual HOF” bafflement: Rick Reuschel, Kenny Lofton, Jim Edmonds, “King Kong” Keller, “The Crime Dog” Fred McGriff, Lou Whitaker, Craig Nettles, and Bobby Grich.

Jay Jaffe: Should be in:

Grich
Lofton
Whitaker
Nettles

Easier to understand why they’re not, but I’d rather they were:

Edmonds
Reuschel

Will be, soonish:

McGriff

I understand the appreciation, but no:

Keller

Carlos Correa: Why wouldn’t the Phillies sign Kris Bryant?  Complete no brainer.

Jay Jaffe: If you mean relative to my Dodgers example above, it’s just a matter of which team spends money and which doesn’t

Jay Jaffe: The Phillies do spend but they have been careful with regards to the CBT, the Dodgers burn through it.

nats guy: Ready for a Ryan Zimmerman write up, do we have to wait 5 years?

Jay Jaffe: Yeah, far too much on my plate now.

brad penny for your thoughts: perhaps impossible but how would you, if you can, compare fan discontent from ’94 to the ’22 bargaining?  obviously different timelines and such but do you think mlb “lost” fans like in ’94?

Jay Jaffe: come on, this wasn’t nearly as damaging as 1994 when a World Series went away and half of Canada’s teams were dealt what proved to be a fatal blow

Jay Jaffe: Fans have a bigger megaphone thanks to social media in 2022, but they will bitch about the smallest things so it’s tough to believe that anything that happened in this past lockout is worse. If anything, they understand the players and owners better than before

Ben M: Used to wear a BK Dodgers cap a lot in NYC and caught a lot of grief for it. Folks don’t know their history!

Jay Jaffe: I don’t wear any contemporary major league team logos anymore so the Brooklyn caps (including the earlier B in the diamond, c. 1912) have been among my defaults. Nobody’s ever said a negative word to me about them

guy who asks the lunch question: oh man, bonus points for giadiniera, you made this Chiagoan happy

Jay Jaffe: Get ahold of that Potbelly stuff, it’s amazing.

A Boy Named Yu: How can Cubs ownership cry poverty the past few years then show interest in buying a football club?

Jay Jaffe: this tweet cracked me up and i actually found it on the first try

Guest: Everyone here needs to know about this: https://wardle.app/

Jay Jaffe: Played this yesterday and it was fun, but hard!

Guest: Is Nettles basically Robin Ventura with longevity?  Nettles 111wRC+, Venture 113

Jay Jaffe: Longevity, better baserunning (incl. DP avoidance) and postseason impact (grand single excepted).

Jay Jaffe: Re baserunning/speed: I remember Ventura saying that for him to hit a triple, somebody had to go to the hospital

Guest: How many years will it take for two new expansion teams to be created, one East (Nashville, Charlotte, Virginia Beach) and one West (Las Vegas, Portland, Albuquerque)?

Jay Jaffe: End of the decade, if the A’s and Rays get their ballparks. that’s been the holdup and… we’re still not there.

A Boy Named Yu: Is the Rule 5 Draft just canceled this year or has it been eliminated completely?

Jay Jaffe: Canceled this year, I don’t think it’s gone forever

Guy who asks the dinner question: What’s for dinner?

Jay Jaffe: I think this, because I got the baby bok choy at the Asian market https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1021476-sheet-pan-scallion-chicken…

David: Any chance manfred can be convinced to keep the shift? Nothing entertaining about a weak ground ball getting through because teams aren’t allowed to defend that spot

Jay Jaffe: I think the newly created rules committee will study it but I suspect it’s going away at least in some form. We’ll still see players in motion to pull off some shifts

My son: My son is now 2 and I think I’ll take him to his first game this summer so I’m glad there will be games

Jay Jaffe: That’s awesome, enjoy!

Jay Jaffe: Ok folks, I’ve gone longer than expected for early spring conditions, gotta build up my pitch counts. So glad to be talking about the upcoming season for a change. Have a great week, stay safe, and let’s do this again soon!