Meg Rowley FanGraphs Chat – 5/28/19

2:03
Meg Rowley: Friends, we’ll get started in a moment here. Allow me a second to Issue Some Marching Orders.

2:08
Meg Rowley: Hello!

2:08
Meg Rowley: Welcome to the chat!

2:08
Meg Rowley: I have issued my marching orders, and shall now take your questions. Apologies for the delay.

2:08
Bring Back Jeff: Pedroia 🙁

2:09
Meg Rowley: It is truly a bummer. I hope that the grumpiness over his contract, which truly shouldn’t matter to folks, subsides quickly and we can just appreciate his role in that franchise.

2:09
Shick Nields: How mad should I be as an Indians fan?

2:10
Meg Rowley: I would never dare tell another person how to feel, because I dislike very much when other people tell me how to feel and also because my therapist says that I need to let go of things I can control, which easier said than done lady!, but if I were a Cleveland fan, I would feel very mad.

2:11
Meg Rowley: This set of circumstances was both very predictable and quite easy to avoid, or at least, quite easy to attempt to avoid in a more meaningful way, and they elected not to.

2:11
L00ping: Are the A’s the manifestation of underappreciated players.  It seems like even Matt Chapman is underappreciated?

2:12
Meg Rowley: I think they’re the manifestation of a smaller market team that plays after a lot of the country is sleeping so while they are capable of being properly appreciated, the overall success of the team plays a big part in demanding our attention and making us focus on their very good players. Their recent run is a good way to do it, though.

2:12
Vander: How dangerous do you think the Reds are?

2:13
Meg Rowley: To themselves? Quite, apparently. But more seriously, they could be quite dangerous. Their record doesn’t match their underlying stats. In a competitive NL they might have given up too much ground for it to matter this year, but they could definitely spoil some stuff.

2:14
oswald2319: When (and if) will the AL playoff race settle down a little bit because something has to fall, my bet is that the A’s stay hot and hold their spot and the Indians fall off the map and then MAYBE the Redsox fall but it’s very unlikely, what do you think?

2:16
Meg Rowley: I like the Rays better than the A’s, though a lot of course depends on how soon the A’s injured arms come back and how good they are when they do. If I had to pick the field right now, I’d go pretty much exactly in order of our AL make the playoffs odds, with the possibility that the Red Sox and Rays flip Wild Card spots.

2:16
Meg Rowley: The A’s would be my first team out, though.

2:16
DBRuns: On a scale of worst case scenario to best case scenario, how would you rate this season for Cleveland? Lindor misses nearly all of April, Jose Ramirez has been dreadful, your #1 and #4 starters go down with injury, odds to win the division are now below 2%. At least the bullpen hasn’t mirrored last season’s implosion.

2:17
Meg Rowley: I mean, Lindor could have been out all year, and the rotation could be more banged up. There are worse versions of the current genre they are occupying, but this hurt AND bad world is pretty dire.

2:17
Chat Announcement!: This is your weekly reminder that Meg doesn’t answer fantasy baseball questions!

2:18
Meg Rowley: It’s true. Because I realllly care about each of you as people.

2:19
phix: Do base running speed metrics adjust for incidents of low effort/laziness? I am thinking about Manny Machado’s 6.3s mosey to first base a few days ago. Will this bring his speed numbers down? Should it?

2:19
Meg Rowley: Setting aside the sea of yuck that is the low effort/laziness discourse, talk to me about how one assesses that with any kind of automated rigor.

2:19
Al Gone Quinn: Do you believe the Astros are ludicrous?

2:19
Meg Rowley: In fact, I do.

2:20
Dennis: why was statcast down for mets dodgers yesterday? Is that data lost?

2:20
Meg Rowley: I’m not sure why it was down, but it wasn’t just in LA. And I’d think so? If the array isn’t collecting data, it’s not collecting data, which I think is what happened?

2:21
Josh Bell: Look at me go!

2:21
Meg Rowley: Kind of busy looking at the ball go very far off your bat, but fine, I’ll shift my gaze.

2:21
Gaslamp Gary: Why are people so set on destroying Manny Machado’s rep? When Bryce Harper acts out, he is “just trying to fire up his guys.” Is there a difference besides skin color here?

2:22
Meg Rowley: If I felt like being generous, I would say that Machado offered a quote that has been run into the ground, but considering that I don’t think that is actually what is motivating the discussion, I don’t feel like being generous.

2:23
Confused in Chicago: Meg: why are all of my Fangraphs ads for a horny online Halloween costume store? What did I google that led me to this lowly state? I appreciate a Sexy Dragon Lady costume as much as the next person but for pete’s sake it’s May.

2:24
Meg Rowley: How publicly do you really want to explore this? I mean, I’m not here to judge, but sometimes we ask questions and then realize we don’t want to be held publicly accountable for our state of horniness.

2:24
Dash: Are the Mariners really this bad?  Its become painful to watch games.

2:25
Meg Rowley: Their pythag is perfectly in line with their record; they’re underperforming their BaseRuns slightly, but only slightly.

2:26
Meg Rowley: Only the Orioles are allowing more runs per game, and you may have heard that the Orioles are on pace to allow home runs at an historic rate.

2:26
Meg Rowley: Now, they score a bunch of runs, but they are a bad baseball team. They are a very bad baseball team.

2:27
jkim: Is there anybody that’s more exciting than Bellinger right now? I know I’m biased here as a DOdger fan but the dude is showing what a true 5-tool guy is.

top 10 sprint speed
top 2 in Homer
hitting over .380
walks at a 14.3% clip
and now the WTF outfield Assists last night

2:28
Meg Rowley: He leads baseball in wRC+. His wOBA and xwOBA are basically the same. He’s a marvel.

2:28
jobin: my boss didnt come in today so i’ve been doing nothing for 4 hours. whats your go-to time consuming site?

2:29
Meg Rowley: I am personally a fan of FanGraphs dot com. It occupies much of my work day!

2:29
Szan Dymborski: Can we turn your chat into a Dan chat once?  I want your opinions on chili.

2:29
Meg Rowley: I like chili. If you also like chili, that is cool. If you do not, I hope there are other things you do like, and that you get to eat them.

2:30
most of America: marching orders?  please tell me you’re firing Sporer!  dude couldnt be any snarkier in his chats.

2:31
Meg Rowley: Paul is lovely, spares me from having to have fantasy baseball opinions, and importantly keeps our average height up, especially since Jeff’s departure.

2:32
Rocky Colavito: Good morning, Meg. I wonder what you thought about Dave Sheinin’s Washington Post piece on Velocity’s strangling grip on baseball and any possible remedies.

2:32
Meg Rowley: I have not, but have it open in a tab.

2:32
Voldemort: Keston Hiura since being called up has looked… ok I guess? 19:1 k/bb ratio (yikes). Do you think the brewers send him back down when Shaw is done rehabbing? Or do they give him some time to try and adjust to MLB pitching?

2:33
Meg Rowley: I don’t know if they’ll send him back down, but imagine they’re ok with him adjusting. It’s 46 PAs, and we love the bat.

2:34
Meg Rowley: Eric’s piece on his call-up is good, and features a delightful hot chocolate anecdote: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/called-up-keston-hiura/

2:34
Thomas: I often hear baseball writers speak of their discomfort with referring to “trading players” or “buying players”. I totally get that, but if it’s so uncomfortable to speak of buying and selling human beings (which I agree is totally gross), why don’t baseball writers more often refer to buying a selling *contracts* rather than players? I’m sure that wording is used sometimes, but it definitely seems to be the rare usage. Not only is speaking of contracts rather than people more humane, but it’s also more accurate, as we all know that often the terms of a contract are a more attractive asset to teams than a particular players skills.

2:35
Meg Rowley: Why not just avoid “buying” and “selling” entirely? I think we generally avoid that here. I edit it out if it works its way in.

2:35
Yankees: The Yankees lost as many games (9) in their first 15 games as they did in the following 38. They would most likely be in worse position (just because of chance, not because the stars are bad) if they were healthy. Yet I still see so many fans complaining. Like, shut up, please. Please.

2:35
Meg Rowley: I might suggest better curating your twitter?

2:35
Roger: Herrera was charged with domestic assault.  The only possible response is to immediately run him out of baseball and any other profession he might choose to pursue, and to ensure that he can never earn a living again.  Correct?

2:36
Meg Rowley: If you think this is the place for bad faith DV grousing, you’ve come to the wrong chat.

2:38
Meg Rowley: I don’t support a zero tolerance policy on DV because DV experts say that it reduces reporting, imperiling victims. I do think there are things the league can and should do to reduce the incentives teams have to turn one of the worst moments in a person’s life into a valuable trade chip, and to re-center the discourse and post-suspension approach to be about assisting victims, which is what matters here.

2:39
Meg Rowley: Is it fundamentally strange that this is falling to an employer to do? Yes. But MLB voluntarily assumed that responsibility, and now they owe it to victims, their employees, and fans of the game to get it right.

2:39
Mike: Did you end up watching Fleabag?  My wife and I watched 3 episodes Sunday night, it goes by really fast! Only 6 total so we’re already half way done.

2:39
Meg Rowley: Not yet. Going to save it for a post-work week treat. There was too much compelling baseball yesterday to slot in between very comfortably paced holiday editing.

2:40
Peter: If MLB realigned the leagues again, would you like to see the Brewers go back to the AL and the Astros back to the NL?

2:40
Meg Rowley: Eh, not really.

2:40
Meg Rowley: I’m fine with it as is, and both clubs have adapted to their leagues so.

2:40
Roland: The Cardinals, Pirates, Nationals, Mets, and Indians are all at or below .500.  Do any of them make the playoffs?

2:42
Meg Rowley: I like that Cardinals team, in spite of the pitching, so if I were going to pick any one of those five, I’d say them, I guess? Nationals next.

2:42
CamdenWarehouse: Are the Indians so far out that they won’t trade for players?

2:42
Cookie Monster: and don’t say “somewhere in the middle” ಠ_ಠ

2:43
Meg Rowley: Ok fine. I don’t think they’ll do a lot. The biggest trade chip they had this offseason is hurt.

2:43
Mike: I would argue that many of the circumstances that are causing the Indians trouble right now were very much not predictable though.  Maybe predictable in a sense that there are millions of possible outcomes for a baseball season and this is one of them – but I don’t think a) Minnesota winning 2/3s of their games, b) Ramirez, Lindor, Bauer, Kluber, Clevinger, and Carrasco combining for something like 7 fewer WAR compared to this point in 2018 was predictable.  This site still had them winning the division before the season started, and I think that was a reasonable prediction even with them losing some players based on the thought that the great rotation, improved bullpen, and Lindor/Ramirez/Santana/Kipnis could be able to keep the team good enough to win in a soft Central divison.

2:44
Meg Rowley: It isn’t hard to imagine pitching, starting or otherwise getting hurt. Pitchers get hurt all the time!

2:44
Meg Rowley: It isn’t hard to imagine that if a team has no depth, and much of its projected WAR concentrated in a few spots, and something happens to those few spots, that they’ll suffer.

2:45
Meg Rowley: We projected the outfield to be terrible; it is in fact very poor.

2:46
Meg Rowley: We projected them to win the division, that is true. But my point is, the way this team could fall apart was easy to see, and the potential for their plan of dancing on a knife’s edge backfiring was also pretty easy to predict. The how of them being maybe bad was right there. And the team said, “Eh, let’s roll the dice.”

2:47
Mike: Is Matt Boyd the only reason to watch the Tigers now?

2:48
Meg Rowley: With Castellanos not hitting like he did last year… maybe. If you have a chance to catch Mize somewhere, I’d do that.

2:48
Pancakes: Which hurt player is more important to the Yank’s success ROS: Judge, Stanton, or Severino?

2:48
Meg Rowley: Severino imo.

2:49
BK: Who hits more Major League homers this year, Riley or Acuña?

2:49
Meg Rowley: Acuña

2:49
Just watch: Eventually the highly paid Yankees will return, some will struggle, and “the muscles and money are bad, we need some singles” stuff will happen and it’ll be very, very, very stupid.

2:50
Meg Rowley: We could do a better job not taking the bait on bad discourse, though.

2:50
BK: What % of Gleyber Torres’ WAR is attributed to the Orioles and therefore should be voided? I have an Ozzie vs Torres WAR bet and it’s not looking good especially with how much Torres crushes the Orioles

2:50
Meg Rowley: He plays the games he plays? Ozzie gets to play the Marlins, so…

2:51
Seattle slew: When did Bryce Harper ever act out? Machado publicly states he doesn’t hustle on purpose. As much as the SJW’s who populate this website would like to believe, not everything comes down to race.

2:51
Meg Rowley: Yeah, Bryce is famously very quiet.

2:52
Meg Rowley: I think we can acknowledge the wrinkle of Machado’s comments while understanding that a) generally this isn’t coming in moments when it matters and b) that discourse is steeped in a bunch of really gnarly racial stuff.

2:52
TKDC: Is Odubel’s value sufficiently low enough that the Phillies will have no room in their organization for that type of behavior?

2:53
Meg Rowley: I dunno. Addison Russell is a whatever shortstop with a light bat, and the Cubs held on to him.

2:53
Go Big Red: Do you ever pay attention to the College World Series?

2:53
Meg Rowley: Yup, one of my most reliable college baseball viewing periods.

2:54
CubFan: Think Vogelbach has enough staying power that he’ll be with the Mariners for a few years at 1B/DH?

2:54
Meg Rowley: Given consistent reps, he looks a lot like the guy we hoped he was.

2:55
BK: In your opinion, who has the most trade value in the majors?

2:55
Meg Rowley: Either of Acuña or Albies.

2:55
Moelicious: What percentage of Fangraphs readers play fantasy?

2:56
Meg Rowley: A lot, I’d expect. It isn’t that I don’t think it is a worthwhile enterprise, it’s just that I am not an expert and we have experts and so you should go listen to those experts rather than dumb ol’ Meg, who, again, cares about you very much.

2:57
Jay: Can you say more specific about how you think Cleveland’s situation could have been “quite easy to attempt to avoid in a more meaningful way?” Do you think they could have made better signings/trades for a similar amount of money? Was their research bad? Or does this come down to ownership wanting to cut payroll? In that latter case, what can you do?

2:57
Meg Rowley: They didn’t even make Brantley a qualifying offer?

2:58
Meg Rowley: They made no meaningful improvements to their outfield.

2:58
Meg Rowley: They didn’t go after Grandal so far as we know.

2:58
Meg Rowley: They talked about trading their best starter, who was on a super team friendly deal.

2:59
Nick: Will the Mariners make the playoffs with Dipoto as their GM?

2:59
Meg Rowley: I do not think they will.

3:00
Mike: Do you take exception to the term buyers and sellers around the trade deadline, as it implies they’re buyers and sellers of human beings?  It is such a common way to explain what position a team is in as far as trades go that I don’t typically think about it.  What is a better way to explain it? Adders/Subtracters? Playoff Pushers/Wait Til Next Years?

3:01
Meg Rowley: I think to the extent it is different, it is because it isn’t being ascribed to a particular person, and thus can be read a little differently.

3:01
brad nj: Meg, isn’t the big issue that usually the victim, has a dis-incentive to report or press charges as they alleged abuser is likely their source of finances and reporting/pressing charges ultimately hurts the victim financially as well?  This means we have no idea how big the problem even is and that we are likely not going about solving it the right way.

3:02
Meg Rowley: That is why zero tolerance policies don’t work, and why the policy doesn’t require a criminal conviction. Do I think that intimate partner violence is underreported? Absolutely. That doesn’t mean we can’t refine the policy MLB currently has to better deal with the cases we do know about.

3:03
Jay: I guess the question with Cleveland’s troubles boils down to this for me: is it on the front office for poor offseason decisions, or is it on ownership for not giving the front office cash?

3:03
Meg Rowley: Oh, to be clear, this is very much an ownership problem.

3:03
Gordon Tremeschko: Will you, like me, go through this entire work week thinking it’s a day earlier than it is? Or do you tend to normalize a holiday-shortened week at some point before Friday?

3:03
Meg Rowley: I worked yesterday so…

3:03
rubbery shrubbery: Is Franchy Cordero still alive?

3:03
Meg Rowley: God, I hope so!

3:04
Nick: Who wins the AL RoY award?  Vlad, Jr. seems to face some tough competition from Lowe, Chavis, Vogelbach, etc.

3:04
Meg Rowley: Vogelbach actually isn’t eligible (I know I goofed this a couple of weeks ago) because he surpassed the days on the roster thing, I’m like 99% sure now.

3:05
Meg Rowley: I still think it’ll be Vlad Jr.

3:05
Meg Rowley: But yes, it is a deeper field than I was expecting.

3:06
Mike: That’s fair, I just feel like very few expected Minnesota to be anything better than a .550 team, which would put them at about 29-24 with Cleveland only being 3.5 back.  And I know guys can get hurt – but I feel like if you take the top 6 in WAR from any team last year and have 3 of them miss significant time and the other 3 play very badly, you’re likely not going to have a good result regardless of who you surround them with short of spending Yankees money.

3:07
Meg Rowley: Sure– they’re encountering very bad luck, and crappy circumstances. But they also did very, very, very, very little to insulate themselves from bad luck. You can be both unlucky and a poor planner.

3:07
Voldemort: Do you think there is any chance the Nats trade Scherzer?

3:07
Meg Rowley: No.

3:07
Burdi: Hello Rowley! How do you think about Twins’ win streak? Is that just a lot of luck?

3:08
Meg Rowley: They’re a good team. It’s very fun. It’s nice that we can tell positive Twins stories, and not just bummer Cleveland ones.

3:08
Jorge: Wait, there are college baseball viewing periods *outside* of the college world series?  Are you that much of a college baseball fans?  And where do you even find the games on TV?

3:09
Meg Rowley: Aesthetically, it lends itself to weird baseball, which is famously My Kind of Baseball. Also, as a person who edits Eric and Kiley and answers chat questions, it is good for me to engage at least somewhat so that I know what the heck is going on.

3:09
Derek Dietrich: Who is in your ideal HR Derby right now?

3:11
Meg Rowley: Gallo, Bellinger, Franmil, Vogey, Springer, Bell, Alonso…  how many are there in the field?

3:11
Blind Jorge: Not sure how he struggles to find college baseball on TV these days.

3:11
Meg Rowley: It can be tricky!

3:12
Meg Rowley: ESPN+ (I have mine linked to Hulu) gets you a lot of what you need. If you want PAC 12 stuff, Sling has been great.

3:12
Cave Dameron: Do you think the Padres will actually go after that top of the rotation pitcher? If so, who do you see them going after?

3:12
Meg Rowley: I wouldn’t be surprised if they held off on the major infield prospect consolidation until next year

3:13
Meg Rowley: they aren’t wresting the West from the Dodgers and I think they know they’re a touch ahead of schedule.

3:13
Jean: The D-Backs have some solid young talent; an improving but still lackluster farm system; a record slightly over .500; some aging veterans who could be trade chips at the deadline; and 7 picks in the first two rounds of the draft.  What path should they pursue in the next year or two (e.g., full rebuild, retool, try to win now, etc.)?

3:16
Meg Rowley: Retooling seems likely– I think the assessment the guys offered in the state of the system from today’s Dback list is right, that as the major league club falls off, we’ll see veterans get moved, but guys like Weaver and Marte stick around. And then it’s all about this draft. They’ve had guys everrrrywhere. I don’t go to a lot of in-person college or high school ball, but they’ve had guys at those games. It’s an absurd opportunity to reset a franchise on one day.

3:16
PH: Which (or both?) is more likely to happen: The Nats bullpen will have the worst ERA in live-ball history or the Orioles give up the most HRs?

3:16
Meg Rowley: Orioles home runs

3:17
Meg Rowley: Ok folks, I’ve got to get rolling.

3:18
Meg Rowley: We’ll start rolling out Draft Week coverage tomorrow, so be on the look for that. It will be very easy to find.

3:18
Meg Rowley: Thanks for all the great questions, and sorry for what I didn’t get to.

3:18
Meg Rowley: Until next week!





Meg is the managing editor of FanGraphs and the co-host of Effectively Wild. Prior to joining FanGraphs, her work appeared at Baseball Prospectus, Lookout Landing, and Just A Bit Outside. You can follow her on twitter @megrowler.

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__AL
4 years ago

Two underrated aspects of the Indians’ offseason:

– Little SP depth, yet they offered Danny Salazar – still with no timetable for a return from the IL – a contract that would’ve been enough to bring in Gio Gonzalez or similar.

– In trading Yandy Diaz, they lost their only infield depth with an MLB-quality bat. With the prospect of a Kipnis rebound vanishing, and the general likelihood of at least an IL stint each for Lindor and Ramirez, you need IF depth beyond Moroff, Stamets, and Mike Freeman. Maybe they were hoping Stamets wouldn’t be so lost, or that Chang would look better in ST, but that’s a lot of hope to pin on unknowns when there were decent backups accepting minor league contracts with other teams.