Jeff Sullivan FanGraphs Chat — 8/24/18

Jeff Sullivan: Hello friends

Jeff Sullivan: Welcome to Friday baseball chat

[REDACTED]: Ronald Acuna Jr. for the entire Mariners Farm System, who says no?

Jeff Sullivan: Let’s check in on The Board! https://www.fangraphs.com/scoutboard.aspx

Jeff Sullivan: The Mariners don’t have a single top-100 prospect https://www.fangraphs.com/scoutboard.aspx?draft=2018updated&type=0&pos…

Jeff Sullivan: Their best prospect currently has an FV estimation of 45

Jeff Sullivan: The most recent numbers I’ve seen value a 45 FV prospect around $11-13 million https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/valuing-the-2017-top-100-prospects/

Jeff Sullivan: Acuna is probably already worth $150-200 million or more

Jeff Sullivan: Let me just simplify this — the Braves say no

Jeff Sullivan: I mean, you could eventually sum up enough prospects to equal Acuna’s estimated value, but that’s like trading one 10-WAR player for 20 0.5-WAR players

Jeff Sullivan: Nevermind the logistical headache

James: The Royals are 17-60 outside of their division. If they were in the west, might we be looking at the worst team ever?

Jeff Sullivan: Although the Royals suck and play in a sucky division, a major reason why it’s a sucky division is because of the Royals, who never get to play against themselves

Jeff Sullivan: The Royals are currently at 7.9 combined team WAR

Jeff Sullivan: The 2003 Tigers finished at 1.7 combined team WAR

Jeff Sullivan: Even adjusting for schedules, those Tigers were worse. They were so bad

Ross: So the Giants are toast. Where’s McCutchen moved before the end of August? And would Denard Span have helped them more than Longoria has?

Jeff Sullivan: Pretty easy to say now that Span has looked better than Longoria. Don’t know if the Giants should’ve seen that coming, but now Longoria is their burden, and their burden only

Jeff Sullivan: Not that Christian Arroyo has had an outstanding season with Tampa Bay

Jeff Sullivan: One obvious would-be destination for McCutchen is Cleveland, but with them being in the AL, McCutchen would have to clear NL waivers first

Jeff Sullivan: The Rockies should be somewhat interested

Jeff Sullivan: And there’s an argument, albeit a weakening one, for the Cardinals too

Jeff Sullivan: McCutchen won’t be in any great demand, however. Decent chance he could make it to the Indians

Will: Any idea who the Braves could add for a LH bench bat? They tried to get Matt Adams but the Cardinals’ claim won out.

Jeff Sullivan: And apparently they tried to claim the right-handed Mark Reynolds!

Jeff Sullivan: Curtis Granderson cleared waivers, right?

Jeff Sullivan: I just went through a quick query of left-handed bats. If not Granderson himself, then someone around that level would presumably fit

Brian Snits: With 34 games left, the Nationals are 8.5 back of the Braves and 6.5 back of the 2nd Wild Card. They are done, right? Playoffs odds is giving them an 8% chance to make the playoffs, which seems way too high.

Jeff Sullivan: Our regular playoff odds put them at 7.7%

Jeff Sullivan: Using season-to-date stats mode, though, instead of the projections-based model, then the Nationals are at…7.4% instead

Jeff Sullivan: Don’t overlook the fact that these playoff odds are still very low. The Nationals are basically screwed. But they’re not *totally* screwed. Remember, their run differential is 61 runs better than the Phillies’

Jeff Sullivan: It’s 72 runs better than the Rockies’

Jeff Sullivan: The Nationals have a mediocre record, but that doesn’t mean they suck, or that they have sucked

Jack: Could a dark horse team to trade for J.T. Realmuto this offseason (assuming the Marlins can’t sign him and make him available) be the Rays? They have the need at catcher, depending on what you  think of Michael Perez, and the prospect depth to pull off a trade. The Pham move kind of did it, but trading for Realmuto would really be statement that they want to contend next year. Sure, there’s pretty much no chance they could sign him long term, but they’d get two years of him and he’d make them a strong contender for the second Wild Card

Jeff Sullivan: I’d be surprised, but I wouldn’t be stunned, for the reasons you outline

Jeff Sullivan: Next year’s Rays should look pretty good, and they’ll probably have to do *something* at catcher. It wouldn’t be like them to push some chips in for a shorter-term addition, but Realmuto is so good you can see why they’d zag in that direction

Jeff Sullivan: The advantage of getting Pham was that his stock was down. Realmuto is as valuable as ever. So the Rays couldn’t slide in and try to pay pennies on the dollar. But maybe they decide to get bold and trade for Realmuto and one of the Marlins’ cost-controlled relievers

squeeze bunt: What changed to make Aaron Nola a front line starter?  When he was drafted it was more a mid rotation back end profile, I think.

Jeff Sullivan: That’s because those profiles are based so much around fastball velocity. They lack for imagination. Aaron Nola doesn’t throw overwhelmingly hard, so it might’ve been hard to picture him as an ace

Jeff Sullivan: But he throws hard enough, his changeup has come around well in the past 1.5 years, and his breaking ball is as good as anyone’s in the major leagues

Jeff Sullivan: Nola has exceptional command of his curve both in the zone and out of it. Which means he can use it to get early strikes, and then to get later swings

Jeff Sullivan: Saw yesterday that Nola has the highest first-pitch curve rate of any starter in the bigs. And his first-pitch *strike* rate is through the roof. He’s amazing

Jeff Sullivan: A stat for you I couldn’t possibly love any more: Nola’s curveball right now has a 46% out-of-zone swing rate. It has a 41% in-zone swing rate

Tim: Who has to go on waivers to be traded? Like, people generally just talk about the biggest player in a waiver trade, and who he was claimed by or if he cleared, but the player(s) he was traded for also had to clear waivers, or be claimed by that team, right? I guess my question is, is it only guys on the active or 40-man roster who have to go on waivers to be traded after July 31st? Can prospects and minor leaguers still be traded without going on waivers?

Jeff Sullivan: https://www.mlb.com/news/guide-to-baseballs-waiver-trade-system/c-1400…

Jeff Sullivan: “However, in order to deal a player on its 40-man roster after that date, a team must go through the waiver system.”

Jeff Sullivan: Basically, all 40-man players have to go through waivers. All others don’t

Bo: Who would be in the Braves’ playoff rotation should they make the NLDS? Who would start a one-game WC?

Jeff Sullivan: Foltynewicz is the Braves’ best starter. It always depends on matchups, but he’s the favorite to start Game 1, or a one-game playoff

Jeff Sullivan: If you assume Foltynewicz/Newcomb/Gausman, then you’re basically just choosing between Sanchez and Teheran, were a series to get that far. I’d lean toward Sanchez unless I were given a compelling reason to go in another direction

Jeff Sullivan: Sanchez has just been better than Teheran this year, but maybe you decide to go with Teheran because Sanchez has recent experience pitching out of the bullpen. Could even become a potential tandem-starter thing

Brian Snits: Thoughts on Sean Newcomb’s retaliatory drilling of Brian Anderson after Acuna was hit (yet again) by the Marlins with an up and in fastball?

Jeff Sullivan: I’m just catching up on this now, since I was focused on other baseball things last night

Jeff Sullivan: I don’t see any intent on this most recent Acuna HBP — Guerra was already ahead 0-and-2, and when Guerra has two-strike counts he throws a *lot* of high fastballs

Jeff Sullivan: The idea of intentionally hitting someone in an 0-and-2 count is borderline evil. Far worse than intentionally hitting someone at 0-and-0. I think Guerra just missed

Jeff Sullivan: Totally makes sense, though, that the Braves would be upset. Anderson was hit and Realmuto was brushed back. That’s just how this usually goes

Jeff Sullivan: Of course it seems objectively silly from an outsider’s perspective, but from the dugout, you like to see your pitcher standing up for a teammate. It’s going to be a long, long time before baseball players settle on a different means of meting out justice

Jeff Sullivan: I feel like the Braves should be content to just be where they are, in first place and defeating the Marlins on the regular. They don’t need to drag themselves down to the Marlins’ level. But this is perfectly normal

Jeff Sullivan: Violent and normal

stever20: The Cardinal/Dodger series- was that more about the Cardinals or the Dodgers in your opinion?    Cards look scary right now…..

Jeff Sullivan: Right now, the Dodgers look lost, and the Cardinals look unbeatable

Jeff Sullivan: A month ago, the Cardinals looked lost, and the Dodgers looked unbeatable

Jeff Sullivan: The Dodgers opened July by going 16-7. The Cardinals lost more than they won. Things have shifted of late but there’s zero reason to believe the current state is any more permanent than the state from before

Jeff Sullivan: The Cardinals/Dodgers series wound up defined by the Dodgers’ inability to perform in the clutch. Of course, the Cardinals were right there on the other end of that, but it was a nearly-even series determined by timing

Jeff Sullivan: I don’t know if Kenley Jansen came back too soon — impossible for me to have the answer to that — but the narrative has already been written

GSon: Who claimed Billy Hamilton?..

Jeff Sullivan: No way for me to know that, but he’d be a fit on just about any single contender in either league

Jeff Sullivan: The Cubs traded a week or two ago for Terrance freaking Gore

Matt : Why is Seranthony Dominguez terrible now?  This goes beyond just pitching on back to back nights now. See the walk off given to Nats.

Jeff Sullivan: I don’t know if this is a proper explanation, but as the season has gone on, Dominguez has thrown his slider harder and harder, and it’s been getting less and less movement

Jeff Sullivan: That wouldn’t be the problem itself; that would be a symptom of something else

Jeff Sullivan: I had a delay there because I was doing some really quick research

Jeff Sullivan: The slider has changed and it’s been thrown more often out of the zone. So hitters have been more able to look for a fastball *in* the zone

Jeff Sullivan: Going to guess this is something mechanical but I don’t have time to investigate that on the fly. I feel like this chat is already moving slow enough

squeeze bunt: This might be the wrong chat for this, but is a short stride something that is fixable/changeable with pitchers?  Is it something you would even want to change or would there be injury risk?

Jeff Sullivan: I think it’s something you think about changing at lower levels. By the time someone gets to the bigs, that pitcher has already been selected for possessing excellent skills. The stride is just part of it

Jeff Sullivan: You’ll make changes if you notice a pitcher’s stride changing from where it’s been before, but most of what you’ll see in the bigs is just tweaking a pitcher’s stride *direction*

Jeff Sullivan: Some guys have long strides, like Tyler Glasnow. Some guys have short strides, like Tyson Ross or Brad Hand. I haven’t seen that change very often at all at the MLB level

Whitty: What’s your take on Marco Gonzales? He was great in the 1st half and has been dreadful in the 2nd half, but the peripherals still sort of like him. What should the Mariners expect from him going forward?

Jeff Sullivan: On the one hand, there’s every reason to believe Gonzales would be getting tired by now

Jeff Sullivan: He’s blown by last year’s innings total, and he didn’t pitch in 2016. He’s lost average and top velocity lately from where he was in April and May

Jeff Sullivan: On the other hand, as you said, Gonzales’ peripherals of late don’t look that bad. And here’s a weird thing:

Jeff Sullivan: Gonzales through June: .314 wOBA
Gonzales since July: .345 wOBA

Jeff Sullivan: Gonzales through June: .334 xwOBA
Gonzalez since July: .305 xwOBA

Jeff Sullivan: Gonzales hasn’t actually been getting torched. I think a lot of this is just badly-timed luck

Vslyke: The Pirates have a good bullpen, a good OF, and a decent rotation. Do you expect them to pursue IF upgrades this offseason?

Jeff Sullivan: Mercer’s an FA, Hechavarria’s an FA, Rodriguez is an FA

Jeff Sullivan: Don’t know what they’re going to do with Kang

Jeff Sullivan: Bell, Harrison, Moran, Cervelli — very easy to see them all staying where they are. But there’s going to be an opening at short, for sure

Jeff Sullivan: Kevin Newman doesn’t feel like an excellent solution to that

Jeff Sullivan: You wonder if the Pirates would have any interest in trying to buy low on Addison Russell

Jeff Sullivan: Marcus Semien could turn into an alternative

John: The Rays have been taking a lot of DH at bats away from C.J. Cron recently and giving them to Ji-Man Choi, which doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. Cron has his flaws, but overall he’s had a solid year and is one of the few guys on that team who can hit the ball out of the park somewhat regularly. Especially with Ramos gone, they now essentially have no power threat in their lineup when Cron isn’t playing. He also has two more years of team control left, but I guess they’ve already decided they don’t want to pay him what he’ll get in arbitration next year. Really though, what sense does it make to be giving these at bats to a guy like Choi instead of Cron? Choi’s not a long-term piece either as a pure DH who doesn’t hit enough to be a pure DH

Jeff Sullivan: Choi is 27, Cron is 28. Choi has five more years of club control, Cron has two

Jeff Sullivan: Neither one of them has an outstanding ability to put the bat on the ball, but Choi has demonstrated that he has a better approach than Cron does

Jeff Sullivan: Cron is just the one who has better top-end power

Jeff Sullivan: For now, it’s easy enough to say that, well, Choi is the lefty and Cron is the righty, so you just run some kind of platoon. But Choi has been sidetracked for much of his career by injury. His Statcast information is encouraging, and he’s always been a good and disciplined hitter in Triple-A

Jeff Sullivan: The Rays presumably know what they have in Cron. So right now they’re trying to figure out what they have in Choi, so they can make a more informed decision in the winter. It’s not like they’re playing for anything

Jeff Sullivan: Back in April, I texted someone in the game that there are worse starting first basemen than Choi littered around the majors. The Rays are trying to find out if that’s true, basically

GSon: Matt Harvey deal to the Brewers.. is it going to happen?.. what kind of return would you expect for the Reds?

Jeff Sullivan:

 

Bobby Nightengale

@nightengalejr

 

Source: Matt Harvey will NOT be traded to the Brewers. #Reds

24 Aug 2018

Jeff Sullivan: I don’t know why the Reds wouldn’t just let Harvey go, but there was never any way they were going to receive very much

Matt: How many questions about Jeff McNeil would you like to answer in this chat? Would you prefer instead to discuss Phil Hartman’s beloved performance as The Real Deal Bill McNeal in the hit 90s sitcom Newsradio?

Jeff Sullivan: Jeff McNeil has a 139 wRC+!

Jeff Sullivan: He has a contact rate of 86%!

Jeff Sullivan: Out of 408 batters with at least 100 plate appearances, McNeil has the highest in-zone swing rate in the majors, at 84%!

Jeff Sullivan: McNeil’s exit velocity has topped out so far around a pedestrian 106 miles per hour, but this has been a fun debut

Jeff: I know the basic difference of ERA vs FIP for Pitcher WAR between bbref and Fangraphs, but my question is why at the top of the leaderboards is bWAR higher than fWAR I.e. Nola 8.7 vs 5.4, Scherzer etc.

Jeff Sullivan: fWAR basically regresses every pitcher to a standard ball-in-play baseline. bWAR is unregressed in that way, making it easier to run a high number

Tom: Is Joey Wendle good?

Jeff Sullivan: He’s okay

Jeff Sullivan: He’s somewhere in the vicinity of an average hitter, and he appears to be a plus defender

Jeff Sullivan: I guess that might make him good, depending on your threshold. If he played every day I’d peg him around 2 – 2.5 WAR

Jeff Sullivan: Puts him in a tier with, I don’t know, DJ LeMahieu?

Bobby Cox: Feels weird to call it a slump with such an excellent OBP, but Soto is hitting .208/.380/.347 so far in August. Has he lost his entire lead in the ROY race?

Jeff Sullivan: Soto: 349 PA, 145 wRC+
Acuna: 327 PA, 147 wRC+

Jeff Sullivan: But Soto is slugging .512, while Acuna is slugging .571. Acuna has gotten to his number in a “sexier” way, plus he’s drawn so much recent attention

Jeff Sullivan: I don’t think momentum or trajectory should play a role in end-of-year RoY voting, but it sure looks to me now like Acuna is the favorite

Jeff Sullivan: Pity poor, unknown, underrated Brian Anderson

Oden: Hi Jeff, regarding service time and Eloy/Vlad, if Eloy has to go on 40 man this winter (I don’t know that he does, doubt Vlad does), couldn’t CWS just bring him up say for the last week of the season, then hold him down an extra week next April?  Seems that would give them a winter of positive PR, at still not really cost them anything.  Thoughts?

Jeff Sullivan: The team would probably tell you in private that would make it all the more difficult to send Jimenez to the minors to open next year

Jeff Sullivan: It sets an expectation that Jimenez would break camp. Sets it for the fans, and sets it for Jimenez

Jeff Sullivan: The Phillies called up J.P. Crawford last September. He opened this year with the club

Jeff Sullivan: Of course, I and the rest of you hate service-time manipulation, and we all want to see the good minor-league players as major-league players

Jeff Sullivan: But if teams are intent on keeping that seventh year of club control, I doubt you’d see a move made early

Jimmy Wynn’s Toy Cannon: How for real is Tyler White?

Jeff Sullivan: He’s a good hitter. Improved his approach and contact skills

Jeff Sullivan: Not much of an athlete, but I think he’s a better overall hitter than Yulieski Gurriel

BrewCrew: So… Matt Harvey, makes sense as he has the potential to be at the top of that rotation.  What’s the best case for him, and what do the brewers do with one or two of their 4 other #5 starters?

Jeff Sullivan: I’m so glad I no longer have to think about answering this question

Jeff Sullivan: Matt Harvey with the Reds: 105 ERA-, 108 FIP-, 110 xFIP-

Jeff Sullivan: For someone so interesting, he sure is remarkably dull

Nelson: Old news but what was so bad about Shawn Kelley throwing his glove? We see stuff like that on a daily basis.

Jeff Sullivan: It seems as if the Nationals interpreted that as a show of disrespect to the coaching staff

Jeff Sullivan: as opposed to it being directed at the umpires

Jeff Sullivan: Now, why that didn’t come up before Kelley was actually dropped, I don’t know

Jeff Sullivan: If I had to guess, Kelley might’ve already been on thin ice in that clubhouse. But we can’t rule out the possibility that the Nationals were just being dumb

Guest: I was watching the Twins/Pirates series last week, and the Twins did some interesting/bizarre shifting. For most of the players, they overloaded the right side of the infield with Sano, with Polanco on the left field side of second. With Josh Bell (and only Josh Bell) at the plate though, they flipped it; Sano on the left field side, Polanco on the right.

Jeff Sullivan: I’m trying to think of why this would happen

Jeff Sullivan: The initial alignment makes enough sense — Polanco is a better athlete than Sano, so you’d want him on the side that has to cover more ground, and potentially a bunt

Jeff Sullivan: But maybe they figured Sano is actually more comfortable fielding a bunt, and Bell was perhaps the Pirates’ greatest threat in that regard?

Jeff Sullivan: Like everyone, Bell pulls most of his grounders, but he hits a decent amount the other way. I’d have to go to video to try to understand more, but for now I’ll go with the bunt idea

John Beasley: Several Red Sox are having a power resurgence, and several Cubs are having a power outage. There’s no fire, but there’s smoke, and the smoke smells like Chili.

Jeff Sullivan: Kris Bryant has a shoulder problem, and Anthony Rizzo has been amazing since recovering from his back problem

Jeff Sullivan: Don’t think anything is wrong with the Cubs. As for the Red Sox, yeah, I can buy that Davis has helped

Gerald: Do you like prospects?

Jeff Sullivan: Some of them

Eppler: Is David Fletcher an elite defender? 8 DRS in 55 games between 2B/3B. Only 22 games at 2B and he has turned 17 DP and has 4 DRS

Jeff Sullivan: According to the admittedly imperfect Davenport translations, Fletcher wasn’t an elite defender in the minors

Jeff Sullivan: Let’s put this in the “something to keep an eye on” category. I doubt Fletcher is an amazing infield defender, but I could have my mind changed if he keeps putting up numbers

v2micca: Foltynewicz made some strides this year.  What does he need to do in 2019 and beyond to take the next step towards becoming an Ace?

Jeff Sullivan: I’d like to see more swings out of the zone. He’s already quite good, but there’s another level, especially when he’s up against lefties

Jeff Sullivan: Might never come, but even if it doesn’t, Foltynewicz today is an excellent No. 2

Dipoto: Am I the king of building almost playoff contenders while ravaging a farm system?

Jeff Sullivan: In fairness, Dipoto inherited a dead farm system. It’s gotten neither better nor worse

2-D: Do you think David Price has pitched well enough and dislikes Boston enough to opt out?

Jeff Sullivan: Four years, $127 million left. Price is almost 33, with a suspect elbow, and he has the lowest average fastball velocity of his career

Jeff Sullivan: We all saw what the free-agent market looked like. I can’t imagine Price would do better than the terms he already has. He’d have to *really* hate Boston to leave

Regal Fill Bin: Taking the respective contracts they are likely to receive into account, does Harper or Machado make more sense for the Phillies this offseason?

Jeff Sullivan: Inclined to say Machado

Jeff Sullivan: Either would work, obviously, but Machado could give them coverage at both SS and 3B, depending on how they feel about Franco’s present and future

Guest: It feels like position players are punished for winning the mvp constantly – voters want new faces. But it almost feels the opposite with Cy Young awards, where story lines seem to encourage a streak like Johnson’s four in a row.

Jeff Sullivan: Miguel Cabrera won two MVPs in a row

Jeff Sullivan: Mike Trout won two in three years

Jeff Sullivan: I don’t think there’s anything to read into here

Cartulo: Jeff, I don’t want you to bad mouth anybody but I don’t know if you saw Craig Calcaterra’s twitter feud with Rays fans. In short, Craig got really mad online about Rays twitter trying to dunk on him for calling the team a disgrace during the offseason

Jeff Sullivan: Lots of people called the Rays a disgrace last offseason

Jeff Sullivan: It never looks good for any team to routinely show up at the bottom of payroll leaderboards

Jeff Sullivan: But lots of people also don’t have a good understanding of how baseball teams operate

Mac: What prevents a team in the playoffs from announcing to the public that they will start a certain lhp for a game before giving the umpire a lineup with a rhp instead to screw up the other team’s platoons? Not sure the logistics of where this secret starter would warm up, but is there a rule against it?

Jeff Sullivan: I could be wrong, but I don’t think anything counts or matters before an official lineup card is provided

Jeff Sullivan: But for one thing, yeah, there’s the warm-up part. For another thing, there’s the part where you’re just inviting that to be done to you. And for a third thing, teams these days hardly have platoons anyway, since all the extra roster spots seem to go to relievers

Jeff Sullivan: It’s not unlike asking for a pine-tar check. You might get the leg up at first, sure, but then it’s just going to happen right back out of revenge

Fahad: Hello, care to comment on Justin Upton’s curious lack of doubles this year?  He had 44 last year and averaged 33 the last 4 seasons but only 16 this year to date.  Are we witnessing the beginning of his power decline?

Jeff Sullivan: This year Upton actually has his highest single-event exit velocity of the Statcast era

Jeff Sullivan: (114.9 miles per hour)

Jeff Sullivan: Everything basically seems to be normal. I think it’s just noise

Fill in the Kyle Blanks: A’s FO can’t be happy about Canha getting the short end of the Martini-Laureano-Canha triumvirate, right?

Jeff Sullivan: Laureano is presumably a better defender in the outfield than Canha is, and Martini is left-handed. Canha will play more if/when Laureano’s hitting slows down

Mike: True or false–The Astros win the AL West by 3 or more games.

Jeff Sullivan: True

Jeff Sullivan: All right, I need to get rolling. Post-chat podcast this time

Jeff Sullivan: So thank you everybody for hanging out, and I’m sorry for what I didn’t or couldn’t address. We’ll do it again next week at the same time, and until then, be well and have great days