Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat – 8/1/19

Jay Jaffe: Good afternoon and welcome to today’s post-deadline chat with what’s left of my brain after writing, filing and/or publishing 8,600 words in the last 27 hours…

Jay Jaffe: I’ve got to quickly buy some tickets to tomorrow’s Tarantino showing and I’ve got a radio spot in the middle of this chat so the going might be slow at first.

stever20: Do you think the Dodgers can win the World Series with the back end of the bullpen they currently have?

Jay Jaffe: To quote the late, great Graham Chapman in the “Flying Sheep” sketch, “A fair question and one that in recent weeks has been much on my mind” https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2v9uxz

Jay Jaffe: The Dodgers’ failure to get a late-inning arm made my list of five least-favorite moves and non-moves. I thought the price the Pirates were reportedly asking for Vazquez — two of the top 12 prospects in the game (per our Board, in May, Lux, and Ruiz) was too high but there had to be some middle ground between that and the sinkerballing lefty they got from the Rays, who’s nice but…

Jay Jaffe: If Jansen recovers from, if Kelly keeps up what he’s been doing since June started, if Maeda dominates the way he did in late 2017, if Baez can recover form, if some of Ferguson, Stripling, and Floro can still help, and if Urias keeps doing what he’s been doing, then yes, I think the bullpen can hold together. Obviously, that is one big basket of ifs

Bend it like Mandowescence: Let’s start with a lob … best new IPA you’ve enjoyed this summer?

Jay Jaffe: The quality of beers in my immediate vicinity — delis and groceries — has taken a big step up recently thanks to a new (?) distributor handling those stores and wow, I am the better for it. Not all first-time but Sloop Juice Bomb and Radiant Pig Own the Night have been great additions to my rotation. Some friends threw a party recently and laid a can of Alchemist Focal Banger on me. In Cooperstown I had a lovely pale ale called Hopstate NY. More good ones than I can count.

Jason: what is your assessment of the brewers trade haul? and do you think Trent Grisham is legit?

Jay Jaffe: I am reasonably optimistic that Pomeranz can help in the short term and Black in the long term (see my writeup here http://blogs.fangraphs.com/brewers-bolster-bullpen-with-pomeranz-and-b…) but giving up Dubon felt like a lot. I guess Faria can help but I think they’ll miss Aguilar. Don’t know enough about Grisham to have my own opinion but sure, I’ll take a flier on a guy batting .381/.471/.776  in Triple-A, even in the year of the silly ball.

Kelvin: Of the contenders who largely stood pat, which do you think is most screwed by not making an upgrade?

Jay Jaffe: The Yankees. There was a lot of decent starting pitching to be had, even if neither Greinke nor Bumgarner was likely to waive their no-trades to come to New York. Even a back-end guy could have helped them, and the decision not to sign Keuchel looks even worse in retrospect than it did at the time given the month their rotation just had.

Jay Jaffe: Compare what they did to the Astros adding Greinke plus Sanchez and Biagini, and I don’t see much chance that the Yankees can reach the World Series

JustCurious: Which teams fans should be most upset about how the deadline played out?

Jay Jaffe: Yankees, Red Sox, Dodgers, Blue Jays, Nationals. All covered in my forthcoming piece

Yankee Farm: Do you think possibly part of the Yankees’ deadline woes were simply that outside Deivi Garcia (who’s been getting knocked around at triple a) their farm system is kind of sneakily bad?  Most of their top prospects are either injured, underperforming, or both.  Teams aren’t going to trade assets for busted prospects right?

Jay Jaffe: The farm system is down, but come on, Clint Frazier is sitting right there, and if they’re committed to Aaron Hicks AND holding onto Frazier, then Estevan Florial is somebody you trade at a point like this.

Bend it like Mandowescence: RIP Graham Chapman. Brilliance.

Jay Jaffe: It’s amazing how my perspective on the individuals in Monty Python — which I got into when I was 11, via a friend showing Holy Grail, then discovered Flying Circus on PBS about a year later — has changed over time. Eric Idle was generally my favorite as a kid and Terry Gilliam had an early impact on me via Time Bandits. I didn’t fully appreciate the genius of Chapman until after he was gone. Likewise for Terry Jones. Those two guys were the glue in a lot of ways.

Tom C: Is the narrative of the Astros immediately being clear AL favorites a bit overblown? The Yankees pitching staff isn’t this bad and they’re going to continue to get healthier down the stretch

Jay Jaffe: There are no guarantees with pitcher health, none whatsoever. Counting on so many things that are currently going wrong to right themselves is not a position i would defend.

Tom: No starting pitcher for the Cardinals. Can they win the NL Central with a rotation of Mikolas, Flaherty, Hudson, Wainwright, and I guess now Wacha?

Jay Jaffe: Their lack of action flew below the radar a bit, but yeah, i think they needed rotation help, too. Hudson and Ponce de Leon aside, theirs has looked better in July, at least, but I think what the Cubs have done will separate them from the Brewers and Cardinals.

The 6ix: The Blue Jays threw in Sanchez and Biagini in a Cal Stevenson for Derek Fisher trade.

Jay Jaffe: Yes, feels like they sold low on Sanchez and Biagini.

Mike: How do you think Trevor Bauer will perform in Cincinnati and will the Reds compete in 2020 for a playoff berth?

Jay Jaffe: I think he’s going to need to generate more groundballs than he has been — his rate has fallen from 49% to 39% since 2016 – but I do think the Reds are moving in the right direction. While I never thought I’d say this, they will really need a Joey Votto rebound to contend, though.

Bevor Trauer: The Bauer trade is fascinating–do you think the Indians made the right call swapping pitching for hitting, or was it too big of a risk to mess with a team in the playoff race?

Jay Jaffe: I think it was the right call, particularly after Bauer’s embarrassing stunt the other day. Bieber and Clevinger are at least as good, and I think they did a good job of balancing short and long-term needs for both pitching and hitting

Jay Jaffe: ok, there will be a break for about 10 minutes as i go on http://nbcsports1060.com with Bob Kemp in Arizona.

Jay Jaffe: OK , back.

Kristen: Surprised at the Rangers’ lethargy at the deadline?  Had multiple interesting pieces on offer.

Jay Jaffe: Not surprised. They control Minor for another year and even with Replacement Level Killer type work at like 4 positions (C, 1B, 2B, and RF)  have been .500ish. Solve a couple of those problems and maybe they’re in the thick of things next year.

Jay Jaffe: OK, my magnum opus on the deadline is live https://blogs.fangraphs.com/deadline-deals-and-non-deals-i-liked-and-d…

Mike: Who improved themselves most in the NL East?

Jay Jaffe: I liked the Braves’ set of bullpen moves WAAAY more than the Nationals’ ones (details in that link) and have come around to the Mets’ addition of Stroman without trading Syndergaard and Wheeler.

Jon: Any thoughts as to why the price for Greene to the Nats was seemingly so much higher than for the Braves (at least per reports)?

Jay Jaffe: I hadn’t seen that, which isn’t to say that it wasn’t true, but teams do differ in their evaluations of players, and some execs get along with others. There’s a lot we don’t know about all of this

Derek : Are the Astros the only AL team to come out of the deadline with significant net improvement? They seem about as close to unbeatable in the AL as a baseball team can get…

Jay Jaffe: I think the Indians, Rays, Twins and A’s all made significant improvements. Maybe not as sexy as adding Greinke, but still those teams addressed their problems pretty well.

Nick: Is the value of a comp pick worth more than whoever the Giants would get in a MadBum trade?

Jay Jaffe: Probably not, but Bumgarner has earned his right exert some control over where he plays, and he clearly wanted to stay in SF, with Bochy. My guess is that this is probably a prelude to re-signing him

Jay Jaffe: The comp pick that he’ll be attached to via a QO will at the very least give them an edge

Brendan: On a scale of 1-10, how do you rate the Indians mid-season moves?

Jay Jaffe: eh, I deal with numbers all day. The impulse to throw arbitrary one on a team’s moves rather than acknowledging the complexities feels a bit lazy…

But OK, 12/10, would trade Bauer again.

Haddouken: Ryu has a 1.78 ERA since the beginning of 2018 over 218 innings. I’ve accepted that he is actually this good(maybe not 1.xx ERA good, but certainly top 15 SP good). If he continues this for the remainder of the season, what do you project he gets in free agency?

Jay Jaffe: off the top of my head, given his age and health track record, something like 3/60 plus a vesting option

Guest: Yea so what happens with Clint Frazier now ?

Jay Jaffe: i suspect he’s up soon

khaaannn!!!: deGrom came up at 26, has a ROY and Cy Young, and has been consistently dominant. As the HOF adjusts it’s opinion on starters, is there a chance he gets in?

Jay Jaffe: A late start is a very difficult thing to overcome, and he’s already got a TJ on him, so i worry about his longevity. I’d put his odds pretty low right now unless he goes Scherzer and brings home two more Cys.

Derek: Does the Braves revamped bullpen make them a real contender?

Jay Jaffe: Um, they’re in first atop the NL East by 6.5 games. I’m not sure what about them isn’t a real contender already.

I am the Walrus: Cubs system is way down and look how many moves they made.

Jay Jaffe: I liked the moves they made, particularly the Castellanos one given his ability to mash lefties. Adding Kemp could be good, too, given his positional flexibility and the upside he showed last year

JustCurious: Does Clint Frazier actually have much trade value? Awful defensively and a career 104 wRC+ that is mainly BABIP dependent. wRC+ in AAA this year was 86, etc. He looks more like a former top prospect who is well on his way to becoming  a bust than a big trade headliner. Florial isn’t a top 100 guy and has had a down year. Neither are huge pieces.

Jay Jaffe: The guy can clearly hit MLB pitching pretty well, and I think that he can do better defensively. Honestly, he might be a change of scenery guy given all the baggage of what’s gone on in NY, which has contributed to his overlong stay in Scranton (he’s been bypassed multiple times for promotion) and probably dinged his value. and yes, I get that Florial’s stock isn’t at a high point right now, but that’s not to say there was nothing that could have been done with either

Hi: We weren’t going to give up Kieboom for a reliever with a 3.8 FIP and 4.5 career ERA

Jay Jaffe: Unless you are a Nationals executive or paid member of their cheerleading squad, there is no “we”

stever20: so after seeing the single deadline in action, do you like/dislike it?  Would you change anything with it?

Jay Jaffe: No, i don’t like it. I think August waivers serve a purpose, not only to move big contracts and make small depth moves but also to reconsider competitive positions a few weeks later after the first big wave of moves has its impact. I think moving it to August 15 would be worse, particularly given the risk-averse groupthink that is overtaking front offices and the high valuation placed on club control years given the economics of the salary structure rules

Jay Jaffe: The whole thing needs re-thinking. Until they address pre-free agency player compensation in the next CBA, I’d keep things the way they were.

Bend it like Mandowescence: I know there are a lot of hot takes on Stroman meeting the Mets and I thought your piece was quite judicious in explaining why the Mets would make their deal … but lordy … please try to offer some sort of sane explanation for what the Jays’ FO might be thinking with these decisions?! Regardless of how folks feel about the Bauer and Greinke returns … objectively they feel far more substantive (and even quantitative!) than what the Jays received for Stroman. (I am not going to try to argue that Stroman is as good as Bauer or Greinke … but the return still feels very, very low.)

Jay Jaffe: Thanks. I wasn’t wild about the Jays’ take, as detailed in my piece above. They fired their best bullet prematurely — you can’t tell me they wouldn’t have gotten more than 2 x 45 FV guys or even 2 x 50 FV guys (if we’re using MLB Pipeline’s ratings) by waiting until at least Tuesday night.

James: Is Aaron Sanchez the Astros next Charlie Morton?

Jay Jaffe: I am not a gambling man but I would lay down $20 on that right now.

AJ: We the public have questions about health of severino, Kluber, Danny salazar…  did the trade deadline reveal their teams’ optimism in their near term health?

Jay Jaffe: Maybe, or maybe those bluffs have been called. We shall see.

Nathan: The Dodgers seem pretty intent on keeping Keibert around, but how will this square with Will Smith’s equally awesome potential? More likely that they’ll trade one of them? Or shift them off catcher?

Jay Jaffe: Before the season, it seemed like Smith was the expendable one, and even now, there’s 54 prospects between their rankings on the Board (Ruiz 12, Smith 66). I think it’s possible that they trade one for a major piece, but that likelihood has dropped. Smith is a guy whom Eric and/or Kiley have compared to Barnes, with multiposition flexibility, so that could be a route they go.

Lunar verLander: Do the Mets think they can compete for a playoff spot this year? That’s the only reason I can think of for why they didn’t move Wheeler.

Jay Jaffe: that’s the inference, and even our odds have seen them jump from 4% to 19%  during this 12-4 run. Their schedule the rest of the way is among the softer ones, and maybe they get healthier… Look, it’s a permanently dysfunctional organization so long as the Wilpons own it, and a couple of good weeks doesn’t change that, but selling low on Syndergaard and Diaz wasn’t the way out of their current mess. Even if they fade this year, their rotation is well set up for next year.

John: was there something weird going on with Gyorko ?  The cardinals kept ILing him and didn’t seem to want him on the ML roster at all

Jay Jaffe: He’s had a bajillion injuries. From my Replacement Level Killers piece: he strained a calf during spring training, suffered a lower back strain in early June, then underwent arthroscopic surgery on his right wrist in June, which will probably sideline him until September.

Jay Jaffe: I’m not saying any team is free of shenanigans when it comes to the IL, but it’s tough to call all of that phantom, which is what you’re suggesting.

Mountie Votto: I’m still baffled by the price of Bauer relative to Stroman. Can you help me understand?

Jay Jaffe: Leaving aside their respective personalities and the fact that the Jays timed the market poorly, we’ve seen Bauer challenge for a CY, he misses far more bats, and drone injuries aside, he’s been healthy. He’s got a 5.8 WAR season under his belt and the potential to get back there. Stroman has dealt with arm troubles, doesn’t miss many bats, and has never topped 3.5 WAR.

John: Amir Garret’s frontal assault on pirates dugout – best fight ever?

Jay Jaffe: That was hilarious, and I’m glad nobody got hurt. Holy hell.

Jon: Why hasn’t there been more criticism directed towards the Braves for assuming the whole Melancon contract and sending useful players to the Giants on top of it?  Am I missing something?

Jay Jaffe: Because it was about damn time the Braves spent the money they’ve screwed Acuña and Albies out of?

Fjtorres: How close to returning are the Yankee wounded? Might Cashman’s inaction be due to the woes at Boston and Tampa? The Rays injuries and Boston erratic pitching woes didn’t exactly scream “my kingdom for a horse”. Tampa’s moved seemed to be as much as for roster space as for reinforcements. We fans love action but GMs have to balance a lot of needs…

Jay Jaffe: Even if the Rays and Red Sox are fading, the Yankees still have to get past the Astros and the NL champions in October, if they’re lucky to make it that far. I don’t think they have it in them unless several things go right at the same time.

Scoops McClatchy: Does Nick Senzel move to 2B next season now that Scooter is gone?

Jay Jaffe: I was just wondering about that on that radio spot. My guess is yes, unless he’s gung ho to keep going in CF. The metrics aren’t great.

Kosch: Astros / Dodgers rematch is a foregone conclusion at this point, right?

Jay Jaffe: Ancient proverb: never assume you know the final outcome of the World Series on August 1.

Alec: I get the Giants not trading Bumgarner, but they really should have traded Will Smith. Best chip they had, from an already strong bullpen, on an expiring contract. Would you agree?

Jay Jaffe: Yeah, but but once they’ve decided to keep Bumgarner and upgrade elsewhere with an eye towards contending, I get not burning down the bullpen entirely

Curious : Hey Jaffe, which player has had the best peak, but is not in the Hall of Fame?

Jay Jaffe: Barry Lamar Bonds

Doug: Why was Stroman to Mets greeted with eye rolls yet Bauer to Reds was applauded? You can’t say the Reds are really any closer to competing next year than the Mets are. Sure, the Reds got a better pitcher (despite less of a track record) but they gave up their top prospect with huge potential ckmalred to

Jay Jaffe: as said above, I think opinions on the Stroman move (including mine) have changed in the past 72 hours. It also seems clear that Trammell’s stock was down. But a lot of it comes down to the mets org’s dysfunction; they’re not a team that gets the benefit of the doubt these days, and for good reason.

mikesixel: Did this deadline show that maybe waiting for trades to fix your team isn’t a great plan? There weren’t many starters it there, and Keuchel could be had for money. Should teams be more active in free agency, if they won’t trade prospects, or if great players just aren’t available?

Jay Jaffe: I’d have to think about this longer, but off the cuff, I do think we’re seeing some fallout from the frigid free agent market. Boston, NYY, LA and STL could have all made free agent moves that might have wound up being more reasonable than what they felt they were being pushed towards in trade

Jay Jaffe: OK folks, I’ve got more to write. Thanks for stopping by today, and remember: hug a prospect, but don’t hug him too tightly.