Jeff Sullivan FanGraphs Chat — 7/6/18

9:06	Jeff Sullivan: Hello friends

9:06	Jeff Sullivan: Welcome to Friday baseball chat

9:06	Jeff Sullivan: I was all prepared to bury the Nationals, and then they came back from down 9-0. That’s the Marlins for you!

9:07	:/: how long can the mariners pretend Ryon Healy is not a 0 WAR player and try something else?

9:07	Jeff Sullivan: The Healy thing is really not going very well

9:08	Jeff Sullivan: Not because he’s a bad player, but because he’s an entirely unimproved player

9:08	Jeff Sullivan: Meanwhile Triple-A Vogelbach is slugging .547 with 52 walks and 36 strikeouts

9:09	Jeff Sullivan: The Mariners are fooling themselves if they believe Healy is the meaningfully superior everyday player

9:09	Sam: Does the Ranger’s Ronald Guzman profile as a poor man’s Brandon Belt? If not, what’s his ceiling?

9:10	Jeff Sullivan: You’re getting pretty poor, here

9:10	Jeff Sullivan: Dollar store Brandon Belt

9:11	Jeff Sullivan: Belt destroyed the minors, and always drew plenty of walks. Guzman’s career walk rate is in the single digits

9:11	Jeff Sullivan: Right now I don’t look at Guzman and see a quality future regular

9:12

Jack: If they don’t get hot over the next few weeks, should the Nationals seriously consider selling? I know they already made a buyer’s move in acquiring Herrera, but should they maybe pull a Twins from last year and flip him before the deadline? Despite his relatively disappointing season, I’d imagine they could still drum up a serious bidding war if they let teams know Harper was available, right?

9:12	Jeff Sullivan: The Nationals would have to lose several more games of ground. As is, their playoff odds are actually 63%, and even if you’re somewhat skeptical, the history here is encouraging

9:13	Jeff Sullivan: They’re likely to get healthier and unless they go like winless until the All-Star break, they’re too talented to take apart

9:14	I’m Keith Hernandez: How soon does Kyle Tucker come up to the bigs??

9:14	Jeff Sullivan: I’ll say somewhere in the vicinity of the trade deadline, unless the Astros make a deal for an OF. Tucker has long been the favorite to finish the season as the Astros’ regular LF

9:15	mike: What would it take for the Yankees to get degrom without including Torres?

9:15	Jeff Sullivan: I don’t say this to be annoying, but I genuinely don’t think the Mets and Yankees would be able to reach an agreement

9:16	Jeff Sullivan: I mean, on paper they could, because the Yankees have the prospects, but I don’t think the Mets would be willing to send deGrom across town. Teams still care about this stuff for some reason

9:16	stever20: what do you make about the huge spike in hard hit ball % this season? It’s gone up 1st half of season: 2010 29.3 2011 23.8 2012 28.4 2013 30.4 2014 29.9 2015 28.6 2016 31.3 2017 32.2 2018 35.6

9:18	Jeff Sullivan: So, on the one hand, league-average exit velocity is also up a little bit

9:18	Jeff Sullivan: You’re also seeing a few more balls hit in the air

9:19	Jeff Sullivan: On the other hand, soft/medium/hard are subjective categorizations, and you can see an almost identical jump between 2015-2016. I think hitters overall are probably hitting the ball a little bit harder, but much of the difference here has been turning medium contact into hard contact

9:20	Jeff Sullivan: Soft contact has remained basically steady. So I think a few fliners are being pushed across the hard-contact threshold, if that makes sense

9:20	Tom: What Rangers’ position players have positive trade value other than Mazara? Choo and Andrus are on bad contracts. Beltre and Chirinos have been often injured. Odor and Profar haven’t reclaimed any value. DeShields cannot find his stroke. What would Gallo fetch?

9:21	Jeff Sullivan: For whatever it’s worth, if it weren’t for the injury, I think Andrus might’ve become tradeable. He’s restored a lot of his previously lost value

9:21	Jeff Sullivan: Profar and Beltre, in theory, could get something. Profar is getting his career back on track

9:22	Jeff Sullivan: I don’t think Gallo would get very much right now. There would be a market for him, but not so much among midseason contenders. More of a winter consideration

9:23

Ross: So what should the Blue Jays do about Donaldson? He’s been hurt most of the year, hasn’t been very good when he has played, recently had another setback and now may not even be back before the trade deadline now. I can’t imagine they’ll be able to get much for him. There doesn’t look to be a huge market for third basemen, and there are also guys like Machado, Moustakas and Beltre out there for the teams who are looking for one. Even though the Jays are obviously in a seller’s position, should they just keep him and make him a qualifying offer after the season? If you’re Donaldson’s agent, there’s no way you let him turn down a QO after this season, right?

9:24	Jeff Sullivan: Right now I do think you keep him and offer the QO. Not much of a market for a broken-down player, but the Jays could afford to have Donaldson around in 2019 if that’s the way things broke. You sort of do a DH/3B alternating swap

9:27	Jeff Sullivan: At the same time I don’t think it’s a given that Donaldson would accept the QO. Even after the year that he’s had, I could see someone in the market potentially offering $20m+ as a pillow contract. Still a lot of upside in there if you believe you can help him keep his legs healthy

9:27	Jim: Andujar for Nick Pivetta. Who says no?

9:27	Jeff Sullivan: Yankees wouldn’t and shouldn’t do it

9:28	Jeff Sullivan: You take the young position player over the young starting pitcher almost every single time

9:29	Vineet: The Brewers could probably do nothing at the deadline and be Ok? No reason to make a big push right?

9:29	Jeff Sullivan: I don’t think they necessarily have to make a splash, but they’re not that far clear of the wild card, to say nothing of the Cubs

9:30	Jeff Sullivan: There’s a ton of value in winning the division outright, and the Brewers are short a starter, especially with Jimmy Nelson seemingly not all that close

9:30	Jeff Sullivan: I’d be shocked if the Brewers didn’t make at least one semi-significant trade

9:30	Jeff Sullivan: And they’re my current deGrom favorite, if the Mets choose to go that way

9:31	Rob: Which helps the Brewers more this year in their run for a playoff spot: Machado or Degrom. If you knew they were for sure going to make the playoffs, who would you want then?

9:31	Jeff Sullivan: I think it’s deGrom. More of a difference-maker in October

9:31	Jeff Sullivan: There’s a reason why pitchers get more of a deadline premium than hitters

9:32	jason: Who do you think the Yankees go after this offseason with all the money they have to spend

9:32	Jeff Sullivan: Can we talk about the midseason Yankees first?

9:32	zvazda: I believe a couple years ago you (or Matt) said that you would record another podcast with Matt Carruth if the Mariners made the playoffs… was that only for that year or is that still true?

9:32	Jeff Sullivan: Did we say that?

9:32	Jeff Sullivan: We’re not going to do that

9:33	Jeff Sullivan: And even if we did, it would be considerably less useful for you, because we are no longer devoted Mariners fans

9:33	Jeff Sullivan: You would probably hate it!

9:33	Bill G: Hi Jeff. Thanks for doing these chats. Max Kepler was forecast by many to break out this year, that has not happened especially against RHP. What do you see? Thanks!

9:33	Jeff Sullivan: We all pretend we can predict breakouts. We cannot predict breakouts. The most we can do is identify breakouts that have quietly already begun

9:34	Jeff Sullivan: Like, Blake Snell. He broke out in the second half of 2017. Now he’s great! But he was already more or less great

9:35	Jeff Sullivan: If it makes you feel better, here are Kepler’s expected wOBAs over the years: .291, .302, .323

9:36	Jeff Sullivan: He has gotten better, in a way the surface numbers are hiding. His walks are up and his strikeouts are down, and that’s a plus

9:37	Jeff Sullivan: You’d hope that, maybe soon, he can turn on the Benintendi-style power

9:39	Zonk: Do you see a way out of the Dexter Fowler situation? A trade perhaps with St. Louis eating some money?

9:40	Jeff Sullivan: One possibility would be a bad-contract swap — would Fowler like to return to Colorado? Come on down, Ian Desmond!

9:41	Jeff Sullivan: Desmond’s no good, either, but he’d at least offer the Cardinals a greater amount of versatility, or something

9:42

Jeff Sullivan: Otherwise, yeah, you’re paying down his deal and letting someone else take him. Fowler is sinking too quickly on the St. Louis depth chart to earn his way back into good graces. Hard to justify playing him now over Bader, and if Fowler isn’t playing, how are his numbers supposed to improve?

9:43

Tim: It’s fair to say the Mariners and their luck dragons have ruined this season, right? Before the season, we were all saying thank god for the second wild card, because while four AL playoff teams seemed certain, at least the race for the second wild card should be fun and wide open. But nope, instead we already know the five AL playoff teams halfway through the season, and MLB has an attendance crisis in part because two thirds of the AL are already out of the playoff race. Way to go, Mariners. Jerks.

9:43	Jeff Sullivan: The National League is fun!

9:44	Jeff Sullivan: I don’t think anyone ever figured the two league wild cards would win a hundred games

9:44	Jeff Sullivan: At the same time, Safeco is selling an awful lot of tickets. A fan base is currently being restored, which is good

9:45	BHAM: Jesse Winker has an ISO over .200 in his last 100 PAs. Is that real and sustainable improvement? Or is his reality a number closer to .100?

9:46	Jeff Sullivan: No, I think Winker is a solid hitter all around. Should be good for a roughly .200 ISO and nearly as many walks as strikeouts

9:46	Jeff Sullivan: The issue is just that the guy can’t play defense

9:47	Jeff Sullivan: That’s a bummer, because I’m really fond of his bat

9:48	Mature Adult: Is T.J. McFarland more valuable than some of the stats suggest? He is doing his best 1999-2000 Derek Lowe impression right now.

9:48	Jeff Sullivan: 2017 McFarland: 54 innings, 29 strikeouts, 11 unintentional walks, 42 runs

9:48	Jeff Sullivan: 2018 McFarland: 54.1 innings, 29 strikeouts, 11 unintentional walks, 13 runs

9:49	Jeff Sullivan: That’s something we all just discovered at the same time

9:49	Jeff Sullivan: Let’s not collectively get our hopes up about TJ McFarland

9:49	Kyle: Are the Reds good?

9:49	Jeff Sullivan: No

9:50	Jeff Sullivan: They are simply better than dreadful

9:50	Jeff Sullivan: They are a team with good players, but still too many bad players

9:51	borksadork: How do you see Victor Robles projecting out? Do you have an active comp?

9:51	Jeff Sullivan: I don’t have a comp, especially because Robles has been hurt this season

9:52	Jeff Sullivan: But here’s what our prospect team published earlier:

9:52	Jeff Sullivan: “Andrew McCutchen comps have been pretty common here because Robles has a similar build and swing, but from a skillset perspective, Robles looks more like Lorenzo Cain. He’s a likely star and arguably the most polished high-end prospect in baseball.”

9:53	Tim Tebow’s Thunder Thighs: What should the Braves target first – relief help, starter help, or a 3B? Should they just call up Riley to fill the latter?

9:53	Jeff Sullivan: Not for nothing, but Johan Camargo is looking pretty…good

9:54	Jeff Sullivan: Reduces the urgency to make a move for Machado

9:55	Jeff Sullivan: Plus Machado might not really want to play third base anyway, and I’m not convinced the Braves want to demote Dansby Swanson

9:55	Jeff Sullivan: They could probably get a starter and a reliever in one fell swoop. Call the Padres

9:56	Jeff Sullivan: Doesn’t even have to be Brad Hand. Get Tyson Ross and either Craig Stammen or Kirby Yates

9:57	Brian Cashman: Which pitcher am I trading for to pair with Sevy this deadline

9:57	Jeff Sullivan: JA Happ actually wouldn’t surprise me very much

9:57	Jeff Sullivan: I imagine they’d like to have someone so good against lefties

9:58	Jeff Sullivan: Garrett Richards would be a fun attempt

9:58	Miguel: What role do you see Matt Strahm settling into for the Padres going forward?

9:58	Jeff Sullivan: Multi-inning reliever

9:59	Outta my way, Gyorkass: Brewers don’t seem to want to pony up what Baltimore wants for Machado. From the Brewers system, what do you think it’d take to get him, ignoring if the Brewers would actually be willing to give that up?

9:59	Jeff Sullivan: Mandatory to start with Burnes

9:59	Jeff Sullivan: But honestly I think the real stumbling block here is it’s entirely unclear how much the Orioles expect. They have the best position-player rental arguably ever available, but rentals don’t get all that much, most of the time