Manny Machado and Bryce Harper were never supposed to be free agents all the way into spring training. There are several different reasons why things have dragged on, but among them is that Machado is represented by Dan Lozano, and Harper is represented by Scott Boras. Neither agent wanted to be the first one to sign, believing that would cede the other too much leverage. And so we had a waiting game, up until Tuesday. Tuesday, someone finally blinked, and Machado agreed to a ten-year contract with the Padres worth $300 million. In theory, that makes it easy for Boras: He’ll be looking for at least $301 million to beat Machado, if not $326 million, to beat Giancarlo Stanton. Rumors have already started flying around.
Harper’s decision point is coming, and it stands to reason it’s coming soon. With Machado signed, there’s less reason to wait. Days ago, a number of people reported Harper was close to agreeing with the Phillies for $300+ million. Now, Wednesday, we have this, from Jon Heyman:
Bryce Harper is believed to have turned down multiple offers over 300M in recent weeks. at least 5 teams are believed still in contact, tho Philly, SF and perhaps Wash appear to have more chance than SD (just gave 300M to Manny) and CWS (seemed more focused on MM)
It was widely reported that, at the end of last season, the Nationals offered Harper a $300-million extension. That’s just another reason why Boras would be trying to get something bigger. I’m not sure there’s a more prideful agent in the world. Despite everything, though, I’m skeptical there’s an actual $300-million offer for Harper on the table. My best guess is that Boras finds himself in a tricky position.
He wasn’t the majors’ first African American pitcher, or even the first to pitch for the Dodgers, but Don Newcombe collected some very important firsts in his role as an integration pioneer. Though he spent just 10 seasons in the majors in a career bookended by the color line and his own alcoholism — with a two-year detour into the Army during the Korean War to boot — Newcombe was the Dodgers’ ace during a period when they were a National League powerhouse. After his playing days ended, he found sobriety, and spent over four decades as the Dodgers’ director of community relations, as a counselor for players in their battles against alcohol and substance abuse, and as an exemplary ambassador for the game.
Newcombe’s full, rich life came to a close on Tuesday. He died at the age of 92 after battling a lengthy illness.
Alongside Jackie Robinson and Roy Campanella, who reached the majors ahead of him, Newcombe endured the indignities that came with being at the forefront of integration — the racial epithets, segregated and substandard accommodations, orders not to fight back — while helping the racially mixed Dodgers become the class of the NL. In his 10 major league seasons, the imposing, 6-foot-4 righty was part of three pennant-winning teams and two agonizing near-misses. Indeed, he became somewhat infamous for his hard and even heartbreaking luck in big games. Nonetheless, his talent was undeniable. On the mound, he went 149-90, with a 3.56 ERA (88 ERA-), 3.67 FIP (90 FIP-), and 35.9 WAR. He won 20 games three times, including in 1951, when he became the first African American pitcher to reach the milestone, and in 1956, when he won an NL-high 27 en route to the league’s MVP award and the first Cy Young Award, which at that point was given to just one pitcher for the two leagues. A legitimate threat with the bat as well, he often served as a pinch-hitter, and overall hit .271/.338/.367 with 15 homers, an 88 wRC+, and 8.7 WAR. After leaving the majors (1949-51, ’53-60), he spent a year in Japan as an outfielder and first baseman. Read the rest of this entry »
The first weekend of the 2019 NCAA baseball season is in the books, and the two of us were out in Georgia and an uncharacteristically chilly Arizona to see players. Presented here is the first of what will be a periodic collection of notes from games we’ve seen, as well as some things we’ve learned over the phone. We plan on updating our draft rankings in a week, after we have two weeks of college games under our belts; many of the players whose stock has changed are noted below.
An Update on College Pitching
In last week’s pre-season draft ranking update, we maligned the depth of the college pitching in this year’s draft. While the first weekend wasn’t universally sunny for college hurlers (more on that below), there were some strong performances. The game most heavily-attended by scouts in Arizona was Stanford left-hander Erik Miller’s start on Sunday (5IP, 4H, 2BB, 9K). Miller was consistently in the mid-90s last summer on Cape Cod, but was walk-prone. Sunday, his fastball was 89-92 for the meat of his start, but he threw strikes and was reaching back for 93-95 when he wanted it, even in his final few innings. His vertical arm slot (if you were to imagine a clock face, Miller’s arm swings through the 1 o’clock position) generates efficient backspin direction on the baseball and also creates tough plane for hitters both at the top and bottom of the strike zone, and he can get outs simply by varying the vertical location of his heater.
Miller’s changeup is his best secondary. When trying to fade it away from right-handed hitters, it was fairly easy to identify out of his hand, but beneath the strike zone it was often plus. At 82-86 mph, it was just bottoming out beneath hitters’ barrels and into the dirt, garnering several ugly swings. The better of his two breaking balls is a firm, mid-80s cut-action slider. It doesn’t have the vertical depth typical of a bat-missing slider (again, if you imagine a clock face, his slider moves from the 2 to the 8), but Miller uses it in a variety of creative ways (for early-count strikes, back door vs. righties, away from lefties) and it’s consistently average, flashing above. His loopy, 80 mph curveball gives hitters a different look, and is best deployed as a first-pitch surprise to get ahead of hitters looking to cheat on his fastball.
As a quick comparison, Stanford lefty Kris Bubic was drafted 40th overall last year as a changeup-heavy lefty, and Miller is much better than Bubic was when Eric saw him last year. With a future plus change, above-average slider, and average everything else, Miller is off to a start befitting a first rounder.
Scouts indicated to us that Texas Christian LHP Nick Lodolo was throwing harder in the fall, and he was mostly 92-94 on Friday after sitting 88-92 in each of Eric’s looks last year. The fastball didn’t miss many bats, though, and while Lodolo held Cal State Fullerton in check for five innings, he only struck out two. His slurvy, upper-70s breaking ball was often plus and he has great feel for dotting it on the edge of the plate; otherwise his usage was fairly limited. He threw just two, maybe three changeups and all were below-average. Lodolo has a well-made frame similar to Tyler Glasnow’s. His delivery is very smooth, there’s a lot to like, and the lefty velo and spin combo is enticing, but there is more pitch development necessary here than is typical for a college arm.
Meanwhile, TCU lefty Brandon Williamson seems to have made the right decision by not signing as a 36th round junior college draftee last year. He struck out seven Vanderbilt hitters in 3.2 innings on Sunday, and utilized four good pitches to do so. He was up to 93 but mostly sat 89-90, and commanded all of his secondary stuff. It took him a while to get feel for his changeup but once he did, it was great, and Williamson sometimes threw it three times in a row without diminished effectiveness. It was 84-86 mph and had surprising tail given Williamson’s vertical arm slot. He has advanced command of an average, low-80s slider, gave hitters a different look with a slower curveball a few times, and threw any pitch in any count. He executed several unpredictable sequences, and fought back with secondary stuff a few times when he had fallen behind hitters. We don’t yet know if he can retain this kind of stuff deep into games, but what he showed Sunday was better than some of last year’s third round pitchability college arms.
West Virginia righty Alek Manoah started the season ranked 44th on our latest rankings but will be higher in the re-rank next week after a loud season debut vs. Kennesaw State. The report on Manoah coming into this game was that he didn’t have the starter traits needed to comfortably see him turning a lineup over multiple times, but flashed two plus pitches in his mid-90s heater and slider. There was also some thought that he may need to watch his weight. His body composition was strong and likely contributed to improved feel to go along with the same high octane stuff: he sat 95-97 mph and located a 65-grade slider, occasionally mixing in an average changeup over the first few innings.
Manoah still had some reliever tendencies but they didn’t seem like long-term issues. Kennesaw State couldn’t hit 94-97 mph up in the zone, so Manoah just kept throwing it there and getting results. In pro ball, he’ll need to mix it up more, but you can’t blame him for taking the shortest path to 13 K’s over 6 innings. He held his stuff, sitting 93-96 just before he exited the game, and while his fastball was more of a blunt instrument, he showed good feel for locating his slider for a strike on his arm side and burying it as a chase pitch to his glove side. His control was average to slightly above and you can project the command to average if you believe he can be more precise with his fastball when he needs to be. When Manoah got in trouble a couple times, he kept his composure and worked his way out of it. Chatting with scouts and comparing this new version of Manoah to other players we just ranked, it seems like he’ll move into the 20’s along with rising, massive college arms like Jackson Rutledge and Miller.
Ball State RHP Drey Jameson, a draft-eligible sophomore, didn’t allow a single hit over six innings against Stanford on opening night. He was up to 97, flashed a plus breaking ball, and threw a few good changeups in the 88-90mph range, including one that struck out possible first round outfielder Kyle Stowers. Jameson is wiry and a little undersized, but is very athletic, has feel for locating the breaking ball, and his delivery is pretty deceptive. He could go in the first round.
**Editor’s note: Drey Jameson was originally in the 2020 section of this article, but he is a 2019 Draft-eligible Sophomore due to his age (he’s 21 on draft day)**
2020s
Jameson was opposed by Stanford right-hander Brendan Beck, who arguably out-pitched Jameson with lesser stuff. Beck was a two-way player in high school and his velocity was in the mid-80s as a prep senior and during his freshman year at Stanford. It’s not 88-90, but he hides the ball well and has plus command of a late-breaking curveball. Some other arms to watch for 2020 are Cal State Fullerton righty Tanner Bibee (90-92, some above-average curveballs, unleashed a diving split change late in his start, threw a ton of strikes) Vanderbilt lefty Hugh Fisher (94-97 with cut action, some plus sliders), and Virginia righty Griff McGarry (was wild but 92-93, good arm action, flashed plus curveball, change, average slider).
2021s
We had first round grades on right-handers Kumar Rocker and Mike Vasil when they were draft-eligible high schoolers last year. Vasil ended up at Virginia, Rocker at Vanderbilt. They each had rocky first collegiate starts. Vasil pitched pretty well but his velocity is down. He was 88-92 with feel for locating several fringe secondaries. Rocker’s first bolt was 97, then he settled into the 93-95 range for the rest of the first inning, but got hit around. His breaking ball was also well-struck several times and his upper-80s changeup was well-below average. It’s too early to be down on either of them; this is just a snapshot of where each of their stuff is right now.
On the Phone
Arizona St. righty Alec Marsh was up to 94 and threw four pitches for strikes on Friday. Gonzaga righty Casey Legumina has had a velocity spike. He used to sit 88-90 but was up to 97 over the weekend. Baylor catcher Shea Langliers is 11th on THE BOARD, but will be out for weeks with an injury that usually impacts power for a season or more, which is a hole in Langliers’ profile currently. Our 10th 2019 draft prospect, Duke lefty Graeme Stinson, was 89-93 in his season debut, down a good bit from his best relief outings when he’s be into the upper-90s. Stinson is moving to the rotation this year and maintaining his stuff over longer outings and showing more starter traits is key, so this is a down first note on the season.
On the other hand, our 58th-ranked prospect, Elon righty George Kirby, had lots of preseason late first round buzz and will now move into that range when we update our rankings next week. This week, he was up to 96, showing three above average-to-plus pitches and starter traits. Fresno State righty Ryan Jensen (who just missed the Top 100) threw a solid five innings on Saturday and is on scouts’ radar after hitting 99 mph in the fall with plus sink; the velo was still there, with him sitting 96-98 mph in his first inning. 2020 draft-eligible LSU freshman righty Cole Henry was 94-97 mph in his college debut.
On the prep side, there’s been a lot of velo in Florida lately. Our 27th prospect, righty Matthew Allan, was 93-97 and flashed a plus breaking ball Monday night; one scout said he was in the top half of the first round for him now. Our 49th-ranked prospect, lefty Hunter Barco, was 90-95 with an above average breaker and changeup, throwing from a higher arm slot (a concern scouts had over the summer) that delivered a tighter slider. Further down the list, our 93rd-ranked prospect, righty Joseph Charles, was 92-95 mph with a plus-flashing curveball in his first start last week, which helps his profile as a prep righty who’s 19.2 years old on draft day. Lastly, prep righties with velo in Texas are like death and taxes, and Houston-area righty J.J. Goss (57th in the 2019 rankings) has been 93-95 mph with a plus slider in his early starts, including on Saturday against our 36th-ranked 2020 draft prospect, catcher Drew Romo.
Kiley McDaniel: Hello from ATL, just wrapped up a call and now I’m here to chat with you while Scout is busy in the other room eating what the food robot provides
12:42
Jay: Does the Machado signing move up a potential Tatis callup from June to say, late April?
12:43
Kiley McDaniel: Will be interesting to see how SD handles this situation. Do you speed up Tatis’ 2019 look so he’s ready for the 2020 push? Same with the pitching? If they aren’t ready, do you trade some depth for now help? Or is Machado just a solid piece and he’ll be there when the kids show up? Do they have a bunch more money to spend or was this all of it?
Lots of questions and I do not have those answers right now. I would assume this means more aggressive in the right spots and so Tatis may move up quicker, which shifts Kinsler to utility.
12:43
tommyboy: 2019 draft question. How concerned are you about Logan Davidson’s lack of wood bat performance and how much higher would he have ranked if he at least performed a little on the Cape?
12:44
Kiley McDaniel: Think he may just always be a 4 bat, 5 power shortstop, which is fine.
12:44
JH: You and Eric have mentioned about adjusting the top 100 list after getting feedback from teams.
Any players where you got that sort of feedback but decided “nah, we’re good?”
If you’re at all familiar with Matsuzaka’s time with the Red Sox, you know that he wasn’t exactly a workhorse in Boston, with injuries ranging from Tommy John surgery to neck stiffness attenuating his MLB career. But the injury the 38-year-old suffered most recently can only be described as bizarre. Per the Japan Times:
Chunichi Dragons pitcher Daisuke Matsuzaka took leave from his Central League club on Sunday in order to treat a right shoulder injury sustained when an overzealous fan pulled his arm last week.
After having typically appeared in the hallowed pages of Baseball Think Factory, Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections have now been released at FanGraphs for more than half a decade. The exercise continues this offseason. Below are the projections for the Chicago Cubs.
The outfield remains the primary weakness of the team, at least in ZiPS’ digital eyes. Consisting of Kyle Schwarber (.233/.343/.472, 1.6 WAR projection), a center field combo of Albert Almora Jr. (.271/.308/.383, 1.0 WAR) and Ian Happ (.236/.335/.435, 1.4 WAR), Jason Heyward (.260/.331/.389, 1.9 WAR), and the occasional appearances by Ben Zobrist (.261/.335/.386), the group is serviceable, but unimpressive. The spares (generally Happ and Zobrist) are at least adequate, and the outfield isn’t at the Darren Aronofsky-esque levels of bleakness as in San Francisco, which is something. Read the rest of this entry »
In an interview that ran here in March 2017, Dick Williams went in depth on innovation, infrastructure, and the rebuild his team had begun a year-and-a-half earlier. The Cincinnati Reds’ then GM — he’s now the President of Baseball Operations — told me, “In another couple of seasons, we expect to be competing again.”
The timeline was met. Baseball’s oldest professional franchise, as suggested by moves they made over the offseason (and confirmed by Williams), is no longer focusing primarily on the future. The focus is on the here and now.
Williams expounded on the moves the team has made, and on what it takes to build a sustainably strong organization, at the onset of spring training.
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Williams on moving on from the rebuild: “We’re now in a period of payroll growth. A few years ago we stepped back and looked at which areas of the business we needed to invest in away from major league payroll, and we were able to accomplish a lot of those goals. We significantly increased the resources we were providing to player development. We added coaches. We added new roles in analytics. That had been the focus. Now we’re ready to really focus on the talent we’ve got at the major league level.
“We obviously have a lot of room for improvement coming off of last year, but we knew that we were going to have some payroll to spend, and the farm system is stronger. We anticipated going into this winter with a focus on adding talent to the major league level, to help us compete. Read the rest of this entry »
Ben Lindbergh and Jeff Sullivan banter about Manny Machado signing with the Padres and what the news means for the free-agent market and the futures of the NL West, the Phillies, and Bryce Harper, then preview the 2019 Los Angeles Angels (31:34) with The Athletic’s Angels beat writer, Fabian Ardaya, and the 2019 Milwaukee Brewers (1:02:42) with The Athletic’s Brewers beat writer, Robert Murray, plus a postscript on Machado and Don Newcombe.
Audio intro: The Frames, "Finally" Audio interstitial 1: The Minus 5 (Feat. Ben Gibbard), "I See Angels" Audio interstitial 2: Chip Taylor, "Why Milwaukee" Audio outro: Led Zeppelin, "Ten Years Gone"
According to those estimated franchise values at Forbes, the San Diego Padres are in the bottom half of baseball’s 30 organizations. Perhaps even more relevant, the Padres are routinely among baseball’s bottom ten spenders. The Padres have pretty much never behaved like a big-market team, and after long enough, that creates a pretty rigid impression. One thinks of the Padres the way one might think of, say, the Reds. When it comes to high-profile free agents, you feel comfortable ruling them out. Why would you think the Padres would be a player?
Of course, teams can choose to change. And as much as we might still think of free agency as directing players toward certain big spenders, you never know when someone might surprise you. One offseason ago, the biggest free-agent contract went to Eric Hosmer, and it was given by the Padres. And now this offseason, the biggest free-agent contract so far is going to Manny Machado, and it’s being given by the Padres. According to reports, the deal will be worth $300 million over ten years, with an opt-out after year five. It’s close enough to the contract we’ve always expected. I just don’t think anyone really expected the team.
The Padres read the market, and they chose to be aggressive, where other clubs were more cautious. Now the door could be open a year ahead of schedule.
Pitchers learn and develop different pitches, and they do so at varying stages of their lives and careers. It might be a curveball in high school, a cutter in college, or a changeup in A-ball. Sometimes the addition or refinement is a natural progression — graduating from Pitching 101 to advanced course work — and often it’s a matter of necessity. In order to get hitters out as the quality of competition improves, a pitcher needs to optimize his repertoire.
In this installment of the series, we’ll hear from three pitchers — Ray Black, Tanner Scott, and Matt Strahm— on how they learned and developed their sliders.
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Ray Black, San Francisco Giants
“When I was in high school, I had the privilege of working with Andy Ashby, who is pretty much a legend around Wilkes-Barre. We messed around a little bit with a slider at the time, but I really started developing it more coming back from my Tommy John surgery. I blew out my senior year.
“My curveball was too big, too loopy, and easy to distinguish. I think I was throwing it almost 20 mph slower than my fastball. When you’re younger, you see this big breaking ball, somebody is diving out of the way, and you’re like, ‘Man, that’s nasty.’ But when you get up to the higher levels, you realize it’s more deception; it’s not just movement. I tried to develop a slider like a cutter. That’s what I think when I throw my slider: cutter. If I don’t, I always end up trying to make it bigger than it should be. I need to try to keep it tight, keep it small. Read the rest of this entry »
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