Jeff Sullivan FanGraphs Chat — 5/19/17

May 19, 2017

9:07	Jeff Sullivan: Hello friends

9:07	Jeff Sullivan: Welcome to Friday baseball chat

9:07	Bork: Hello, friend!

9:07	Jeff Sullivan: Hello friend

9:08	Snowflake: Are Eric Sogard and Carson Cistulli the same person?

9:08	Jeff Sullivan: Eric Sogard went to Arizona State

9:08	Jeff Sullivan: Can you imagine Carson at Arizona State?

9:08	JTT: Where is that blistering hot Jason Vargas content the entire blogosphere has been waiting for?

9:08	Jeff Sullivan: It’s never going to happen

9:08	Jeff Sullivan: It’s never going to happen because he’s the same freaking Jason Vargas as always

9:09	Jeff Sullivan: #TheResistance

9:09	Bork: Anthony Alford has been called up by the Jays. Are you on the Alford hype train?

9:10	Jeff Sullivan: I am not

9:10	fake newss: Thoughts on Berrios after last night’s game? More optimistic now?

9:11	Jeff Sullivan: I don’t think I was ever particularly un-optimistic. I never saw a convincing explanation for why what happened in 2016 happened, and the high-minors numbers have always been so promising

9:11	Jeff Sullivan: Berrios last year went from 67% strikes in Triple-A to 58% strikes in the majors. That just wasn’t going to hold up. In two starts in the majors this year, he’s thrown plenty of strikes, and it turns out a strike-throwing Jose Berrios can be super good

9:13	Jrk: What’s been the issue with machado’s hitting this season

9:14	Jeff Sullivan: One answer is just bad luck — horrible BABIP despite what would be easily a career-best hard-hit rate

9:15

Jeff Sullivan: But I suspect there could also be an issue of feeling caught in between — Machado hasn’t very consistently blended good bat-on-ball productivity with patience. He’s been swinging less, and it’s good to see more walks, but maybe he just needs to be more aggressive to fire on all cylinders

9:15	Jeff Sullivan: I’m still more encouraged than discouraged

9:17

Stuafoo: Cano’s contract is admittedly terrible, but entertain the following experiment if you will. Let’s assume the Ms are sellers, and that Cano is both healthy and productive. How much money mould the Ms have to eat to both entice someone to take him and get a young mid-tier prospect in return? 75%?

9:18	Jeff Sullivan: Sorry about that delay, got a phone call

9:18	Jeff Sullivan: Okay, we have a 34-year-old second baseman

9:19	Jeff Sullivan: From the start of this year forward, Cano’s due $168m over seven years

9:20	Jeff Sullivan: Based on our contract-tool estimates, Cano is projected to be “worth” something like $128m over the same seven years

9:20	Jeff Sullivan: As always, you could quibble with that. Teams don’t have a great appetite for big commitments to players so old

9:21	Jeff Sullivan: But I don’t think you’d be looking at a 75% situation, unless you were talking about a high-quality young prospect. Mid-tier, maybe more like 40-50%

9:21	Joe and Paul: Where do you rank Knebel among NL closers for the rest of the season?

9:22	Jeff Sullivan: I don’t know, middle? Clearly has swing-and-miss stuff but he doesn’t throw enough strikes for my liking, and that’s a bullpen that’s going to have plenty of role-switches

9:22	JTT: Over/Under on Dustin Ackley appearing in 100 games over the remainder of his career?

9:22	Jeff Sullivan: Checking in, right now he has a .671 OPS in Salt Lake

9:23	Jeff Sullivan: He turned 29 in February

9:23	Jeff Sullivan: aaaaaaaaaand he’s spent nearly every game as a DH

9:23	Jeff Sullivan: I’ll take the under, I’m afraid

9:23	Big Joey: How encouraged by Berrios’ start are you? Think he can outperform Dallas Keuchel the rest of the way?

9:24	Jeff Sullivan: Keuchel has pitched like an ace before. He’s doing it again. Believe in Keuchel.

9:24	Jeff Sullivan: This feels like a fantasy question

9:24	Dudeman: How impressive is an immaculate inning?

9:24	Jeff Sullivan: Both very impressive, and less impressive than ever

9:24	Jeff Sullivan: With strikeouts up and contact down, we’ll see more of these, but they’re still remarkably uncommon

9:25	Kiermaier’s Piercing Green Eyes: Where do you see Corey Dickerson’s slash line at the end of the year?

9:26	Jeff Sullivan: In the vicinity of his Colorado lines. I don’t think he’s changed much; he’s a talented pure hitter

9:26	Jeff Sullivan: I’ve liked him a lot more than his 2016 numbers. Pretty swing

9:27	toki: Wild idea for the all-star game. Use Dead-ball era rules and allow pitchers to modify the crap out of the ball like they use to. And, play till the ball comes apart. Just for this one game a year. Think it would be interesting?

9:27	Jeff Sullivan: It would be interesting in a no-one’s-going-to-watch-but-we’re-all-glad-it-happened kind of way

9:29	AD: Any idea if Hunter Renfroe’s newfound ability to take walks is legit or if it’s just SSS noise?

9:30	Jeff Sullivan: My assumption is that this is mostly a fluke, but at the same time, I can’t find much in the way of minor-league precedent for him

9:31	Jeff Sullivan: So by no means should you just dismiss what he’s done. It takes a lot to convince me that an aggressive hitter isn’t too aggressive anymore, but this is exactly what you’d like to see from someone with Renfroe’s many talents

9:32	PTBNL: Jeff – it’s been reported that both the Nats and Red Sox are sending scouts to kick the tires on White Sox players….again. When can we expect trade talks to heat up in earnest, and which players and teams will you be keeping an eye on?

9:33	Jeff Sullivan: The White Sox are starting to drop in the standings and everyone knows they’re rebuilding. So I’d say that, even right now, the White Sox are ready to go

9:33	Jeff Sullivan: But as a rule of thumb, no one really gets too invested in the trade stuff until post-draft

9:34	Jeff Sullivan: So you’re looking at another handful of weeks before you could realistically see something semi-major happen. And even there, another team would have to force Chicago’s hand, because it would work in their best interests to drum up more demand as the deadline gets closer

9:34	Jeff Sullivan: I wouldn’t be surprised to see Robertson on the move around the end of June, though

9:35	Jeff Sullivan: The White Sox might anticipate there could be a bunch of relievers hitting the market in July and Robertson is so obviously available

9:36	Wild thing: What’s your take on Matt Harvey? Do you think he can get his walks down?

9:36	Jeff Sullivan: Feels like something has to be mechanically off and I wonder if his muscle memory got out of sync when he was forced to make that spontaneous start against Atlanta

9:37	Jeff Sullivan: That’s just speculation on my part but Matt Harvey is not this bad

9:37

Jim Lahey: Am I the only one who doesn’t get the hype for Quintana? Yes the contract and durability is nice, but he doesn’t get swings and misses, he’s basically a 2 pitch pitcher (and his curve isn’t even that good, its all FB/FB command), and his peripherals have been trending downwards for 2 years now. Isn’t it obvious the market has spoken about their view on him too with no one biting on CWS’s presumably massive price tag?

9:37	Jeff Sullivan: No one believes that Quintana is an ace, but everyone believes that Quintana is a major value. Everyone’s correct!

9:39	Jeff Sullivan: At the end of the day, this is a guy who was worth 18 WAR over the past four seasons. He’s been able to consistently prevent home runs in a hitter-friendly environment. He’s the real deal

9:39	Daniel: What’s the best way to go about hiking a Colorado 14er for the first time?

9:39	Jeff Sullivan: Make absolutely sure you’re as acclimated as is reasonable for the circumstances

9:39	Jeff Sullivan: Don’t just fly to Colorado and immediately try to hike. Give yourself time, at the very least, to get used to Denver

9:40	Jeff Sullivan: If possible, acclimate even higher than that. And then just go slow with plenty of fluids. If you feel light-handed, do not push yourself. It’s not worth it

9:40	guy: Is there a place to look up what percentage of the time a pitcher throws a first pitch strike or anything along those lines?

9:40	Jeff Sullivan: Yes!

9:40	Jeff Sullivan: http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=11423&position=P#platedi…

9:40	Jeff Sullivan: F-Strike%

9:41	toki: Since Kemp seems to be playing himself into a possible trade chip. Who would be the most likely suitors? Al teams in need of a dh, NL teams in need of a part-time corner OF/1b/DH?

9:42	Jeff Sullivan: Probably an AL/DH situation. Every team in baseball realizes Kemp is not an outfielder. He just happens to be playing the outfield. He also isn’t this good and front offices can see his .410 BABIP

9:42	Zack Morris: Any insight on what’s going on with Mike Trout’s defense? His UZR/150 is -18.7, by far the worst of his career. Even with SSS I wouldn’t expect him to be Nelson Cruz bad. Call me greedy, but I want the best to be even more better

9:43	Jeff Sullivan: Most of that is his arm. Similar story with DRS. His range remains perfectly fine, but Trout’s never been blessed with a cannon. He improved there for a little stretch so I don’t know if this is arm-related decline or just bad luck

9:43	Jeff Sullivan: With arm ratings in particular, I think the underlying numbers tend to be super noisy

9:44	Jeff Sullivan: So far Trout has just one assist, and he’s at a career-low rate of “holding” baserunners. But the sample is so small I don’t think it means anything yet

9:45	Shawn: What are the main issues with Daniel Norris and how are they fixed?

9:46	Jeff Sullivan: One thing I just realized: Norris’ average time between pitches last year was about 21 seconds. This year, about 26 seconds. What!

9:46	Jeff Sullivan: He has to knock that off. That sucks

9:47

Jeff Sullivan: That’s not the issue, though. Without going too deep, it seems like a problem of inconsistent breaking balls. Hitters aren’t willing to chase out of the zone right now, which lets them sit on in-zone fastballs. Norris’ zone rate does not match up with his walks, so I think he’s better than his numbers, but there appears to be an underlying breaking-ball problem

9:48	AC: Is J.D. Martinez’s .938 ISO sustainable?

9:48	Jeff Sullivan: What if-

9:48	Jeff Sullivan: What if it were?

9:48	Jim Lahey: Obviously this doesn’t mean anything, but extrapolated over 600 PAs, keon broxton’s career numbers would be 20/50 HRs/SBs. What HR/SB numbers do you think he will end up at this year if he plays the whole season?

9:49	Jeff Sullivan: 20/30 or something. He needs to repair his approach. His discipline has suddenly gotten a lot worse

9:50	…: The Cubs have started Ian Happ in center field more than once. This is weird, right? Is it just a way to get his bat in the lineup or what?

9:50	Jeff Sullivan: It’s where there’s an opening. The Cubs have played Happ all over the place in the minors, precisely so he could be prepared to come up in case of emergency

9:53	AD: In the opinion of Jeff Sullivan, where does Luis Robert sign this weekend?

9:53	Jeff Sullivan: In the opinion of Jeff Sullivan, Jeff Sullivan is not a good person to ask about this, because he has no idea

9:54	Hamlin: Luis Robert… Should the Cards be MUCH more willing to spend than the White Sox?

9:54	Jeff Sullivan: Probably not

9:54	Jeff Sullivan: They both have plenty of reasons to spend out the ass, here

9:55	2-D: What if Coors field had trees and bushes in play for part of the outfield kinda like how Wrigley has the ivy? Maybe hits into the forest would increase ground rule doubles and mitigate scoring?

9:55	Jeff Sullivan: Good luck getting that one past a board

9:55	Jeff Sullivan: And why not have a moat between home plate and first? Would probably help keep scoring down

9:56

Erik: Why don’t players ever hold out in baseball? Couldn’t, say, Bryce Harper tell the Nats, “Give me $40 million or I’m staying home.” They’d pay up, wouldn’t they? That happens often in football, and the only difference between football contracts and baseball contracts that I know of is that football contracts aren’t guaranteed, but I don’t see how that would make a difference.

9:58

Jeff Sullivan: This will be an unsatisfying answer because I’m not a baseball-contract expert, but within the past few decades, there just isn’t any precedent. Ever since Koufax/Drysdale, players have avoided the holdout. There’s a pay structure in place. I don’t think a team would just cave to Harper, because think about the implications. Harper would stand a pretty good chance of just ending up blackballed

9:58	Ho lee fook: You believe in tyler flowers? He’s been great last 430 pa’s.

9:59	Jeff Sullivan: He’s okay. Not good. Just fine. Has kind of gone against the recent trends by focusing more on contact, and less on power

9:59	The Sarris Wheel: While Nick rightfully praised Votto for avoiding IFFB, Ryan Howard had only 24 IFFB in his career against 382 HR. No question, just sayin’.

9:59	Jeff Sullivan: Howard was amazing on contact. The problem was making the contact