Cleveland set a number of records last year by means of a dominant collective pitching effort. This contributor noted last summer how the Indians’ rotation was distancing itself from the rest of baseball, and on Oct. 2, Jeff Sullivan argued that the Indians might have had the best overall staff of all time. They were the best of all time by some measures, including total WAR.

Then earlier this season, remarkably, the Houston Astros appeared set to better that Cleveland staff, recording an ERA that was almost 50% better than average over the season’s first two months.

But guess what? The Indians are making another run. And while the club’s overall staff (relievers included) might not ultimately rival Houston’s, the Indians’ rotation just might be able to chase down the Astros’. Read the rest of this entry »

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We’d all like to believe we might have superpowers — if not X-ray vision, otherworldly strength or the ability to leap tall buildings in a single bound, then at least the capacity to turn the fortunes of our favorite athletes for the better. Via the miracles of selective memory, small sample sizes, arbitrary endpoints and confirmation bias, I’m here to tell you that I have the latter. Allow me to explain.

In the few months since I joined FanGraphs — and particularly since the start of the 2018 regular season — multiple readers have noted, both here and on Twitter, that several of the subjects I’ve covered, particularly (but not exclusively) slumping or underachieving ones, have experienced improved fortunes — or continued good fortunes — almost immediately after I covered them. It’s apparently the flip side of the infamous Jonah Keri Curse; over the years, my friend and occasional colleague has caused many a fan base to tremble in fear after he touts a player or team.

Let us consider the “evidence” of my powers, organized by the order of my coverage:

Paul Goldschmidt, Diamondbacks (Profile)

I swear I’m not obsessed with Goldschmidt, but I’ve already checked in on the Arizona first baseman three times thus far this season, twice in depth and once in passing as part of the Diamondbacks’ offensive struggles as a whole. When I began writing about the five-time All-Star’s slow start for my April 11 piece, he had hit just .118/.333/.206 for a 70 wRC+, but the mere motion of my clickety-clacking fingers coincided with his first home run and multi-hit game of the 2018 season, lifting him all to 101 wRC+ overnight. By the end of April, his line was up to .273/.395/.505 (144 wRC+), and it appeared that the slugger had his mojo back.

Read the rest of this entry »

Pitchers learn and develop different pitches, and they do so at varying stages of their lives. 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 the fourteenth installment of this series, we’ll hear from three pitchers — Yoshihisa Hirano, Joe Musgrove, and James Paxton — on how they learned and/or developed a specific pitch.

———

Yoshihisa Hirano (Diamondbacks) on His Splitter

“I started throwing it when I turned pro in Japan. The truth is, when I was in college, I was able to get hitters out without having a splitty. A fastball and a slider was enough. When I got to the pros, there was a lot of talk of needing a pitch that comes down and about how there’s more success with that pitch. I started toying with it a little bit my last year of college, and when I got to the pros I started using it.

“Kazuhiro Sasaki was a big splitty-forkball thrower. There are some books about him, and I studied those. No one really taught me anything. I just went out and started playing with it, checking the books on how he grips it. I found a grip that was comfortable for me. There are some guys who throw it the same way, but there are other pitchers in Japan who grip it differently, too. They have a different placement within the seams.

Hirano’s splitter-forkball.

Read the rest of this entry »

Friday night, Roberto Osuna became the latest player suspended under the Joint Domestic Violence, Sexual Assault and Child Abuse Policy policy. Per ESPN:

Toronto Blue Jays closer Roberto Osuna was suspended without pay for 75 games on Friday for violating Major League Baseball’s domestic-violence policy, the league announced.

Osuna, 23, has agreed not to appeal the suspension, which is retroactive to May 8 and extends through Aug. 4. He will wind up missing 89 days, which would cost him about $2.54 million of his $5.3 million salary.

Osuna receives the third-longest domestic-violence suspension in MLB history, behind Jose Torres (100 games) and Hector Olivera (82 games). The specific allegations which led to this suspension are still unclear, but we know Osuna was arrested for assaulting his girlfriend, that he has pleaded not guilty to those charges, and that he is presently awaiting trial. Jon Heyman reports that the severity of the penalty was related, in part, to the interview MLB had with Osuna’s girlfriend.

I’ve written before about the problems with MLB’s domestic-violence policy, both generally and in the context of specific players. Osuna’s suspension is yet more evidence of why this policy is flawed. It may seem odd to cite one of the league’s longer domestic-violence suspensions as evidence that the policy isn’t working. A look at the case in context reveals why such a claim makes sense, though.

Read the rest of this entry »

A pair of PNC Park official scorers spoke at SABR’s 48th-annual national convention on Thursday, and both shared good stories. One came from Evan Pattak, who explained why beat writers are no longer hired into the position. The precipitating incident occurred on June 3, 1979.

“Bruce Kison took a no-hitter in the late innings against San Diego,” recounted Pattak. “A Padre (Barry Evans) hit a ball down the third base line that the third baseman (Phil Garner) couldn’t handle. The official scorer was Dan Donovan of the Pittsburgh Press, and he ruled it a hit, ending the no-hitter. Everybody at the park agreed with the call except Kison.

“This created a very awkward situation for Dan, who had to go into the locker room after game. He asked Kison, ‘What did you think of the call?’ Bruce let him know, in no uncertain terms. At that point, the newspapers realized they were placing their beat writers in untenable situations. At the end of the 1979 season, they banned beat writers from scoring, a ban that exists to this day.”

Bob Webb told of a game between the Brewers and Pirates on August 31, 2008. In this case, he played the role of Donovan, albeit with a notably different dynamic. Read the rest of this entry »

Each week, we publish in the neighborhood of 75 articles across our various blogs. With this post, we hope to highlight 10 to 15 of them. You can read more on it here. The links below are color coded — green for FanGraphs, brown for RotoGraphs, dark red for The Hardball Times and blue for Community Research.
Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Lindbergh and Jeff Sullivan banter about Coors Field, Domingo German, the amazing Max Scherzer, Tyler Chatwood, Kole Calhoun‘s comeback, the writing process, Marcell Ozuna‘s catch attempt, Ichiro and the Home Run Derby, and the AL playoff picture, then bring on 31-year-old MLB-player-turned-FanGraphs-writer Nate Freiman (20:22) to talk about his recent embrace of advanced stats, coding, and blogging, his record-setting college career, his short-lived attempt at being a two-way player, how being 6-foot-8 affects hitting (and catching), getting picked in the Rule 5 draft, being a platoon player, why pinch-hitting is hard, pressure and clutchness, clubhouse chemistry, the WBC, the 2014 AL wild card game and Jon Lester’s pickoff yips, playoff shares, coordinating pickoff attempts, hitting stats vs. pitching stats, playing in indy ball and Mexico, deciding to stop playing, interacting with the media, golfing vs. hitting, and more.

Audio intro: The Jayhawks, "Comeback Kids"
Audio interstitial: XTC, "Ten Feet Tall"
Audio outro: The Baseball Project, "Twilight of My Career"

Link to Jeff’s Domingo German post
Link to J.P. Hoornstra’s Kole Calhoun article
Link to Marcell Ozuna play
Link to Meg Rowley’s AL playoff picture article
Link to Jeff Passan’s report on the Mexican League
Link to Nate’s xWOBA post
Link to Nate’s bullpens post
Link to Ben’s Mexico City altitude post
Link to Nate’s WBC post

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FanGraphs is coming to Denver, and since few things are better than talking about baseball with your friends over a drink, we’ll be hosting a meetup while we’re in town. So come join us Friday, June 22 from 6 to 9 pm at the Wynkoop Brewing Company. We’ll have appetizers for everyone to enjoy. It’s a great chance to meet other baseball fans and chat with a bunch of your favorite FanGraphs writers. And while we won’t be attending the Rockies game that evening, Wynkoop is a convenient walk to the ballpark for those hoping to grab a drink before taking in Colorado’s 6:40 start against the Marlins.

If you plan on joining us, we would appreciate you RSVPing using this handy Google form so that we know how many snacks to order.

We hope to see you there!

Details

Friday, June 22 from 6 to 9 pm
Wynkoop Brewing Company
1634 18th Street

We’ve reserved the upstairs Landing area for our revelry. Please note that this event is for those age 21 and up.

FanGraphs Attendees

David Appelman
Carson Cistulli
Sean Dolinar
Craig Edwards
Jay Jaffe
Eric Longenhagen
Kiley McDaniel
Al Melchior
Nick Pollack
Meg Rowley
Travis Sawchik
Paul Sporer
Jeff Sullivan
Jeff Zimmerman

The Mariners currently possess nearly a 70% chance of making the postseason, are six games clear of the Shohei Ohtani-less Angels, and are firmly in control of the American League’s second Wild Card.

Back at the beginning of the season, this looked unlikely. Back at the beginning of the season, the Mariners had less than a 10% chance of making the postseason by our methodology. In the meantime, the club has not only lost Robinson Cano to injury but also to PED suspension. Their one-time ace, Felix Hernandez, is nearly a replacement-level player. The club is leaning heavily on Wade LeBlanc.

The absence of Cano and the decline of Felix both count as serious hurdles to the club’s postseason’s hopes. It’s looking less and less, however, like Wade LeBlanc is a liability. It’s looking more and more, rather, like he’s someone who can continue helping this team.

Just to give some context on what Wade LeBlanc is, here are some figures of note. LeBlanc made his major-league debut with the Friars in 2008, and was worth -0.6 WAR in 21 innings with more walks than strikeouts. The next year, he posted a FIP of nearly 5.00 in 46 innings and walked nearly four per nine. The year after that, he started 25 games for the Padres, threw 146 innings, and had a 4.80 FIP. Before this year, LeBlanc’s best season was — depending on what metric you chose — either 2012, where he was worth a half-win across 68 innings as a swingman (despite a FIP once again over 4.00), or 2011, where he accrued 0.8 WAR despite a 132 ERA- and 107 FIP-.

I could keep going, but you get the idea. LeBlanc, now 33, has spent the last few years as an up-and-down depth arm bouncing across the majors and Triple-A, passing through Miami, Anaheim, Pittsburgh, Houston, and Toronto, among others, before landing with Seattle.

Read the rest of this entry »