Jeff Sullivan FanGraphs Chat — 5/8/15

May 8, 2015

9:09	Jeff Sullivan: BASEBALL CHAT!

9:10	Jeff Sullivan: I thought maybe this would be the week I’d be early. Turns out it is not!

9:10	Jeff Sullivan: That’s what happens when you get your URL back from JABO right when the chat’s supposed to begin. Whatever, off we go. Hello friends

9:11	Comment From Joe So NBA teams almost exclusively use R. What do baseball teams use?

9:11	Jeff Sullivan: I wouldn’t be surprised if a bunch of them have different proprietary software

9:11	Comment From Steve Do you see Hanley’s injury lingering as the season moves forward?

9:12	Jeff Sullivan: Seems like he avoided disaster. I don’t think this particular injury is going to linger for him. But this is Hanley Ramirez, so there’s probably going to be some sort of other discomfort once this discomfort subsides.

9:12	Jeff Sullivan: One of those guys where you can’t count on him being 100% very consistently

9:12	Comment From Dan Will you be bringing back the weeks wildest pitches/swings articles? I thoroughly enjoyed reading those the past few seasons.

9:13	Jeff Sullivan: They proved to require way too much work. They were fun, but draining and difficult, so I couldn’t keep them up on a regular basis. I will probably, however, revisit the ideas at some point in an altered format

9:13	Comment From Josh G Hi Jeff. Can we attribute Ryan Zimmerman’s poor performance to his plantar fasciitis, or is it just a slow start? How confident are you in a rebound?

9:14

Jeff Sullivan: Generally, we’re probably too quick to assign blame for underperformance to injury, but in this case there have been obvious signs of discomfort, and every hitter needs his lower body. I think there are probably many things going on, but I think the foot problem is a legitimate negative

9:15	Comment From Steve You have to think Abreu will heat up with the weather…right?

9:15	Jeff Sullivan: I think he’s pretty close to being himself. In that, I don’t think this counts as a slump

9:16	Comment From LarryA Would you say Joc has better or worse than 50% chance of finishing the year with more HRs than Jose Bautista

9:16	Jeff Sullivan: Time for a fun fact!

9:17	Jeff Sullivan: As of right now, based on what data we have, Joc Pederson is the MLB leader in average exit velocity, having overtaken Hanley Ramirez

9:17	Jeff Sullivan: Also interesting: teammate Yasmani Grandal in third

9:18	Jeff Sullivan: Joc has a head start on Bautista and Bautista has a shoulder problem. I actually give Joc the edge here

9:18	Comment From Kevin Has Rubby De La Rosa “figured” out how to pitch effectively?

9:20	Jeff Sullivan: One second, browser hiccup

9:21	Jeff Sullivan: OK, back on track

9:21	Jeff Sullivan: de la Rosa has six starts, and four of them have been mediocre or bad

9:23	Jeff Sullivan: But! The Diamondbacks have him working in the strike zone a bit more, and he has a history of strikeout talent. His walks aren’t too different from last year. You’re still not looking at a guy with a ton of polish, but against righty-heavy lineups, he’s solid

9:24	Comment From adam Chances Jansen gets his closing role back and then keeps it the rest of the season?

9:25	Jeff Sullivan: The Dodgers might be organizationally moving away from the idea of having designated closers, but they’re not going to let that stop them from leaning on one of the best relievers in the world once he’s healthy again

9:25	Comment From Big Joey I’ve never had a rotation be this bad, it’s been 5 weeks of terrible. Please tell me that Kluber, Tyson Ross, Lohse, Quintana will get better and soon.

9:25	Jeff Sullivan: Some of them will, some of them won’t

9:26	Jeff Sullivan: I don’t think there’s anything wrong with Kluber, for example. I think there’s something wrong with his defense, and I think he’s not an outstanding contact manager, but the strikeouts are still there and the walks are still not there. He’s OK

9:27	Comment From adam What are the Reds doing with Cingrani? Trying to develop an 8th inning guy or do they like him as multi-inning relief?

9:27	Jeff Sullivan: For the time being, they like him as a setup arm. Longer term, he could and should be used for longer stints, but he’s still getting used to bullpen work

9:29	Comment From jon Suppose a team is down by 1 run in the 9th with bases loaded an no outs. All other factors being equal, suppose the next three batters all strike out. Rank the 3 strikeouts from least to most egregious. Me and two friends each believe its a different answer!

9:29	Jeff Sullivan: In win expectancy terms, here are the approximate costs:

9:30	Jeff Sullivan: K #1: -20% K #2: -26% K #3: -27%

9:30	Jeff Sullivan: I think strikeout #2 is the most emotionally upsetting.

9:31	Jeff Sullivan: And then you hate strikeout #1, because all that guy has to do is make half-decent contact. By the time you get to strikeout #3, that’s bad, but you’re basically already defeated

9:33

Comment From TF Fredrik
We now have technology that leads to sites like brooks baseball that give us readings on velocity, movement, release point etc. that are readily available for everyone to see. So we know how hard any pitcher in the majors throws. Seeing the increase in velocity over the past few years really makes me wonder about guys from the pre-DH era, hell maybe even into the 80s. How many guys back then were even hitting 85 on the radar gun? Is there a lower limit that you think all the great pitchers, who weren’t knuckleballers, reached?

9:33	Jeff Sullivan: It’s worth noting that, for starting pitchers, average velocity has increased less than two miles per hour since 2002, which is as far back as we have data

9:33	Jeff Sullivan: So you’re looking at a real thing, but I don’t think it’s a dramatic, crazy thing, and I also think this is a relatively recent phenomenon as we’ve had developments in analysis and training methods

9:34	Jeff Sullivan: I can’t speak to the past — I wasn’t alive for it. And we know baseball took a while before pitchers resembled how they look today. But I think pitchers were long hovering in between 80 – 90, with a few freaks beyond the upper end

9:35	Comment From Josh G What do you expect from Jake Marisnick ROS? Is 15/40 attainable?

9:35	Jeff Sullivan: I like him, but I’m not sold on 15 homers. Might write about him next week — he deserves it

9:36	Comment From Alex If I was Kyle Seager, I’d get pretty upset that everytime Corey’s mentioned there’s a reference that he’s better than me.

9:36	Jeff Sullivan: If I were Kyle Seager, I’d be happy to have a hundred million more dollars than Corey does

9:38	Comment From Rocky Bullwinkle Now that everything that’s need to be said about Cutch is said, is it time to worry about Tulo next? Batted ball looks good (can’t access avg flyball dist. however), but plate discipline in the toilet?

9:40

Jeff Sullivan: I can’t think of a good reason why an established player’s plate discipline would suddenly erode. You don’t just forget pitch recognition. What it looks like: pitchers are being aggressive with throwing Tulowitzki strikes, and he’s responding by being more aggressive in turn. I don’t know why he’s being challenged more, but it is what it is, and I think he’s good enough that his numbers look sensible some months from now

9:40

Comment From TF Fredrik
What are the best stats to look at the command a pitcher has? Obviously watching with your own eyes is the best way to see when a pitcher is missing spots, especially on 0-2, 1-2 counts. But I can’t think of any stats you can look at that directly relate. Control yes, but not exactly command.

9:41

Jeff Sullivan: I’m not sure you can really isolate command. Walks and stuff give you an idea, and you can measure it indirectly by just comparing a guy’s results to the raw quality of his arsenal. If you want to get granular, you can look at the pitcher’s PITCHf/x data and see where his pitches are going. With changeups, for example, pitchers generally want them down, with rare exception, so you can see how often the pitcher succeeds at that

9:43	Comment From Mike Honcho Peter Bourjos should be the starting CF for the Cardinals, right?

9:43	Jeff Sullivan: Probably something like half the time

9:44	Jeff Sullivan: Neither he nor Jay really have wide platoon splits, so it would be a weird job share, but I’m not sold on Bourjos’ bat and I’m not sold on Jay’s bat being toast

9:45	Comment From David Hey Jeff! Bryce Harper question. He’s always at the very least seemed passable in the outfield from the eye test to me…Do you know of any glaring faults to his defensive game that contribute to his consistently low ratings the last couple years?

9:45	Jeff Sullivan: I’m not sure what you mean. He’s got a positive career DRS and a positive career UZR

9:46	Jeff Sullivan: If you’re referring to his overall Defense rating on his player page, that includes the adjustment for being in an outfield corner

9:46	Comment From Bip What do you think about DRA?

9:47

Jeff Sullivan: It’s simultaneously impressive and mostly over my head, and it’s obviously a very good effort, that will get its kinks straightened out in the coming months. But at this point I just don’t get excited by new ERA estimators. Nothing’s being revolutionized, and I always analyze pitchers in detail, anyway, going beyond expected runs allowed

9:48	Comment From will do you have a particular favorite out of all the articles you’ve written?

9:48	Jeff Sullivan: No. And it’s always hilarious when I stumble upon an article I don’t at all remember writing. (There are hundreds of those)

9:49	Comment From adam Where is Heyward’s power, is it gone forever?

9:50

Jeff Sullivan: Pretty concerning. Now, he came up as a groundball hitter, and he still had power then, so he can work with this. And I haven’t taken a look at all the details. But the longer Heyward goes without power, the more he’s going to be challenged, and the less he’s going to walk, so this could turn into an ugly spin.

9:51	Comment From Curtis What is the MLB equivalent of Deflategate? bat corking? How serious of a violation do you think either is?

9:51	Jeff Sullivan: Maybe a pitcher or a pitching staff aiding its grip by using that Bullfrog stuff with rosin?

9:52

Jeff Sullivan: I haven’t read any more about the Patriots’ thing because I just really don’t care, but the sense I get is that they violated the rules in a way in which pretty much every team violates the rules. It’s also very unclear much of an advantage was given. It’s hard to imagine giving a shit

9:54

Comment From Brian
You are transported back in time to, say, 1960. You have none of your money or possessions. Assume you luck your way in to an assistant GM position in an MLB front office as a way of making a living. There is no Baseball-Reference. There is no Fangraphs. There is no Excel. How do you go about using your present knowledge of advanced baseball statistics to your advantage? How do you go about getting the GM to heed your advice?

9:54	Jeff Sullivan: Well, let’s see. Shifts would be easy enough. Very simple concept to convey

9:55	Jeff Sullivan: I might be able to get across the core components of DIPS theory, and I’d talk about the run value of getting on base, no matter how it’s done

9:55	Jeff Sullivan: And then we’d eyeball-test the starting pitchers, and we’d talk about fatigue and times through the order. The team would end up being aggressive with its bullpen

9:56	Comment From jon If I told you Kris Bryant would finish with one of these lines, which would you prefer as boding best for his future: 400 AB, .310 avg, 0 HR, .850 ops, 23% K-rate, 15% BB-rate OR 400 AB, .230 avg, 20 HR, .850 ops, 33% K-rate, 10% BB-rate

9:56	Jeff Sullivan: The latter. With power, the walks come; without power, the walks disappear.

9:56	Comment From Curtis Are you in favor of a shorter regular MLB season?

9:57	Jeff Sullivan: Yeah

9:57	Comment From Larry Bernandez Between what 2 levels within an organization would you say the gap in ability is the largest? The smallest?

9:58	Jeff Sullivan: I feel like you almost have to say Triple-A and the majors — every player in the majors is, in theory, too good for Triple-A, and then there’s nowhere for the best players in the majors to advance

9:58	Jeff Sullivan: There’s also a big gap between High-A and Double-A

9:58	Jeff Sullivan: The smallest differences are probably found at the lowest levels