It has not been a very good year for pitchers aspiring to reach the Hall of Fame. Two of the four starters widely perceived to have sealed the deal have yet to throw a single pitch in the majors thus far — one hasn’t even signed and may in fact be done — and the starter who entered the year with the most momentum didn’t debut until June 19 due to (gulp) an elbow injury. Just one Cy Young Award winner from the past decade has pitched a full season, while four are in various stages of recovery from Tommy John surgery. Meanwhile, the three most-likely relievers have all been erratic to some degree or another; one of them isn’t even his team’s regular closer.

With the Hall of Fame Induction Weekend circus having left Cooperstown following Sunday’s festivities to honor Adrián Beltré, Todd Helton, Jim Leyland, and Joe Mauer, it’s a good time to ponder which active players are on their way. But particularly since the last time I took stock about a year ago, the picture is less rosy for just about every starter except Paul Skenes, and it’s far too early to talk about him. Even at a time when pitching seems to be winning the daily battle — scoring and slugging percentage are near their lowest marks in the last decade, and batting average is in a virtual tie (with 2022) for the fourth-lowest mark since 1900 — pitchers are losing the war against longevity.

This isn’t exactly a new topic, of course, and while I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how Hall voters will adjust their standards in the coming years, and how we might differently evaluate pitchers through tools such as S-JAWS (which reduces the skewing caused by the heavy-workload pitchers of the 19th and early 20th-centuries) and rolling WAR leaders, I don’t have a clear answer. The main problem is that if we decide to lower the standards by which we judge more recent starters, we are left with literally dozens of pitchers from past eras with similarly impressive resumés, and logistical roadblocks to honor an equitable share of them. If the recently retired Adam Wainwright (45.2 career WAR/36.5 adjusted peak WAR/40.7 S-JAWS) is worthy of a spot in Cooperstown, then how do we reckon with the careers of Luis Tiant (66./41.3/53.7), David Cone (62.3/43.3/52.8), Dave Stieb (56.4/41.8/49.1), and Johan Santana (51.7/45.0/48.3) — to name just a few aces from the past half-century? Given the ability to fit just eight candidates on an Era Committee ballot, with Negro Leaguers, managers, and executives also in the pre-1980 mix, and the deck generally stacked against candidates who fell victim to the Five Percent Rule, there’s little chance of catching up anytime soon. Read the rest of this entry »

“An egregious error of Umpire Hurst in construing the rules helped Boston to two runs and added to the confusion of the Orioles. In the fourth inning Boston had three men on bases and one out. Ryan came to the bat and scratched out a short fly over third base. Jennings ran for the ball, got under it and muffed it. According to Rule 45, Section 9, a batter is out ‘if he hits a fly ball that can be handled by an infielder while first base is occupied with only one out.’ Ryan should have been declared out whether the ball was muffed or not…

When seen at the club-house after the game he started in defense of his position by attempting a distinction between the outfield and infield, claiming that the ball was not hit to the infield, but when his attention was called to the wording of the rule, which does not state that the ball must be hit to the infield, but simply that it shall be such a ball as an infielder can handle, he abandoned that position, and argued that it was not a fly ball, but a line drive. He soon saw the absurdity of that argument, as a line drive which does not touch the ground is as much a fly ball as if it were hit 100 feet up into the air.”

– “Errors Lost the Game,” The Morning Herald, April 26, 1894

The graph below has been haunting me for weeks now. I made it, but there’s nothing unique about it. You can find an identical graph in this Alex Chamberlain piece, this Tom Tango blog post, or any number of other articles. It shows the batting average and wOBA for every batted ball, based on launch angle.

I cut off 20 degrees from either side, but you get the point. Worthless groundballs and popups are on the sides, and valuable line drives and fly balls make up a narrow sliver in the middle. It occurred to me a few weeks ago that we’ve been splitting batted balls into those same four categories for a very long time now. Moreover, one of those categories is suspect. If you’ve been reading FanGraphs for a while, you know that line drive rate is considered fluky rather than sticky. Only a handful of elite players – Luis Arraez, Freddie Freeman, maybe Steven Kwan – are capable of consistently putting up top-10 line drive rates. According to Baseball Savant, batters have a .639 wOBA on line drives this year. Hitting line drives is what every single batter is trying to do, and yet somehow what Russell Carleton wrote seven years ago still holds true: “There is some skill in hitting line drives, but it is hard to repeat, and how many line drives you hit seems to be unrelated to where you fall on the ground-ball/fly-ball spectrum.” I set out to find some new way to look at this old puzzle, figuring that with all of the tools as our disposal, there had to be a better way to slice this particular pie. I failed, but I came across some interesting things along the way, and that (I have decided after the fact) is what’s really important. Read the rest of this entry »

We now have less than a week until the the July 30 trade deadline, and so far, not much has happened other than the Hunter Harvey trade before the All-Star break. That ought to (hopefully) change in coming days, unless we’re witnessing the heat death of the baseball universe.

As is my habit, I have suggested eight trades that teams should to consider in some form to fulfill their short-term and long-term organizational goals. I’ve tried to make broadly fair proposals in the context of historical deadline trades, but your mileage may vary. Please note that I am not reporting these as trades that are currently being discussed by respective front offices, and if you report these as such, you hereby waive all rights not to receive an ironic visit from an antagonist from a German fairy tale.

Let us know what you think about these ideas and feel free to add your own in the comments!

The Baltimore Orioles acquire P Garrett Crochet from the White Sox for 3B/1B Coby Mayo, OF Enrique Bradfield Jr., and P Chayce McDermott

I know the White Sox are dreaming of a mega-package in return from Garrett Crochet, who is a legitimate Cy Young candidate this season, but I just can’t see them doing better for Crochet than they did for Dylan Cease. I would argue that Coby Mayo, if he had been included in the Cease trade through some kind of weirdness in the space-time continuum, would have been the most valuable prospect involved, more so than Drew Thorpe was at the time. I’m sure the Sox would prefer a comparable pitching prospect to Mayo than Mayo, but I’m not sure the teams most likely to go after Crochet have that available. Mayo is likely to be an impact bat, even if he isn’t going to stick at third base. He also should to be able to contribute quickly, which appears to be (confusingly) an important goal for the White Sox, even though they are in a generally worse position than they think they’re in.

The White Sox may counter and say that they expect a return similar to the Chris Sale trade, but I can’t imagine any team doing that. Sale at the time was a much more established pitcher than Crochet is currently, and he also wasn’t a year removed from a significant elbow injury, as is the case with Crochet. The O’s are in a situation in which they can justify being even more aggressive than this, but to include more name brand talent than this starts to make the trade look quite a bit riskier. Enrique Bradfield Jr. and Chayce McDermott are ranked seventh and eighth, respectively, in the Orioles’ system — 45+ FV guys but not Top 100 Prospects. I do get the impression that at the end of the day, the White Sox don’t have to be completely bowled over to trade Crochet, while the Tigers may very well need to be for Tarik Skubal, the best lefty pitcher who might be available.

The Houston Astros acquire 3B/1B Isaac Paredes from the Tampa Bay Rays for OF Jacob Melton, SS Alberto Hernandez, OF Luis Baez, and P Alimber Santa

Corner infielder Isaac Paredes is arguably the best bat likely to be available at the deadline, so it’s hard for the Astros not to have serious interest given the utter wreck that first base has been for them this year (.205/.276/.317). While one of the prime artisans of that triple-slash, José Abreu, is gone, Jon Singleton is not much of an improvement, and at 32, he’s hardly the future of the position. Paredes, who has three years left until he hits free agency, would fill that short-term need at first and also provide the Astros with an option to replace third baseman Alex Bregman if he doesn’t re-sign with the team.

While Houston has reasons to be interested in Paredes, do they have enough to offer? I think that’s the key question here, because the farm system is pretty poorly stacked at the moment. I don’t think there’s any way the Astros can pull off this trade without giving up their top prospect Jacob Melton, who is ranked no. 78 overall, or Jake Bloss, their top pitching prospect and no. 100 on our Top 100 list. Even if one of those two are included, the Astros would have to send along a few other guys who offer enough upside to make it a worthwhile deal for the Rays. I kinda see Alimber Santa as one of those hard throwers with poor command that the Rays suddenly make into elite relievers after a midseason call-up. I could also see the Rays asking for Shay Whitcomb, who fits in with their organization’s long-term embrace of unheralded Joey Wendle-type infielders who hit in the upper minors and get no attention around the league. ZiPS has actually been rather enamored with Whitcomb for a while. The Rays have bled a lot of outfield bats over the last few years and, in addition to Melton, Luis Baez would help them restock. On top of that, Tampa Bay likes upside, and while I’m a José Caballero fan, Alberto Hernandez certainly has upside. With Jeremy Peña and Jose Altuve, Houston can spare middle infield prospects, even really good ones.

The Los Angeles Dodgers acquire RHP Jack Flaherty from the Detroit Tigers for LHP Justin Wrobleski and SS Trey Sweeney

The Tigers are no doubt asking for the moon for Skubal, but they don’t have the same need to do so for Jack Flaherty, a free agent at the end of the season. Flaherty’s been terrific this year, but he’s also a rental, and teams don’t usually give up their best for players on expiring contracts these days. I kinda wanted to center this trade around one of the Dodgers’ many young catchers, probably Thayron Liranzo, or an infielder on the rise like Alex Freeland, but that just seemed a bit too rich for them to give up for two months of Flaherty’s services. The good news is the Dodgers have an extremely deep farm system, so if a trade like this were to be discussed, there are myriad ways to get Detroit interested, even if it’s not exactly these two mid-tier prospects. Justin Wrobleski is probably too much of an innings eater for the Dodgers, who prefer to juggle high-end pitching talents based on who’s healthy, and although Trey Sweeney has been passed by other players in the organization, the Tigers could still use him in their system.

I think it would be a mistake if the Dodgers didn’t add a pitcher before the deadline. Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s goal to make it back before the playoffs is not an auspicious sign, and even with Clayton Kershaw and Tyler Glasnow returning from injuries, I think the team would be well-served to have another fairly hardy pitcher in the mix for the playoffs.

The Seattle Mariners acquire 1B Yandy Díaz and OF Randy Arozarena from the Tampa Rays for RHP Logan Evans, RHP Emerson Hancock, and RHP Michael Morales

This trade depends on the status of Yandy Díaz, who is currently on the restricted list for a personal issue, but I’m assuming that will be resolved fairly soon. If not, then I’d still be in favor of a scaled back trade in which the Mariners acquired Randy Arozarena. Rays fans might be underwhelmed by the lack of a huge name coming back in the deal, but I don’t think Díaz and Arozarena really have the same trade value they had a year ago, and we project both players to finish with just short of two WAR for the 2024 season. But I think they each hold decent value for the Mariners considering how bad their offense has been this season. The Mitch Haniger reunion hasn’t worked out, and first baseman Tyler Locklear is likely a worse hitter in the short term than Díaz. Additionally, both Díaz and Arozarena have some cost control remaining. The Rays like interesting pitching prospects the way that sculptors like marble, and the M’s are one of the few teams that can provide them without impacting to their long-term roster. Three of those interesting lesser pitching prospects are righties Logan Evans, Emerson Hancock, and Michael Morales. Paredes would probably be an even better pickup for the Mariners, who really need a bat, but I already gave Paredes to the Astros.

The St. Louis Cardinals acquire RHP Nathan Eovaldi from the Texas Rangers for RHP Sem Robberse and C Pedro Pagés

I’m still unsure what the Rangers plan to do next week, but should they decided that retooling isn’t a dirty word for them, Nathan Eovaldi is one of the logical players to trade. Technically, he has a vesting player option for 2025 at $20 million, but I’m not sure that’s really a factor here; Eovaldi’s on target to meet the 300 innings requirement should things go well this summer, and if they do, he’ll be in a position to do a lot better than a single year at $20 million. Like Flaherty, there are no moons to acquire for two months of Eovaldi, but I think the Rangers could do a lot worse than two mid-tier prospects who aren’t years away from the big leagues. Pedro Pagés doesn’t have an obvious place in St. Louis and would be a more effective long-term caddy for Jonah Heim than current Texas backup Andrew Knizner, and the Rangers have a farm system that is lighter on starting pitchers than position players. I like Sem Robberse, but the Cardinals are full of no. 3 and 4 starters, and a healthy mid-rotation arm may simply be more valuable to the Rangers than to the Cards.

The New York Mets acquire RHP Carlos Estévez and LHP Reid Detmers from the Los Angeles Angels for RHP Blade Tidwell, SS/OF Luisangel Acuña, and OF Ryan Clifford

Carlos Estévez is one of the best relievers available at the deadline – and a pure rental – and if the Mets are interested in pushing for a wild card, as I believe they are, shoring up a weak bullpen is a good place to improve. I’m also a big fan of Reid Detmers. He’s commonly talked about as a “reclamation project,” but I think there’s good evidence to say that this year in the majors he pitched better than his surface-level stats showed. No competent major league pitcher is “truly” a .333 BABIP pitcher. Before being demoted, Detmers was having his best season yet in terms of missing bats, and I think he fits in the middle of the Mets rotation both immediately and over the next few years. Maybe I’m underrating the Angels as an organization, but I don’t think they would need a marquee prospect to make this trade, so I’m not going to throw one in willy-nilly. Blade Tidwell has struggled a little with command at Triple-A, but he ought to stick as a starter, and ZiPS is a pretty big fan of him long term. Luisangel Acuña is a tantalizing athlete who hasn’t really hit since he was traded to the Mets organization, and Ryan Clifford boasts plus power and has performed well at Double-A this year, but he strikes out a lot and doesn’t offer much defensively.

The San Diego Padres acquire LHP Yusei Kikuchi and RHP Yimi García from the Toronto Blue Jays for IF Eguy Rosario, C Brandon Valenzuela, and OF Homer Bush Jr.

With Yu Darvish out for personal reasons and Joe Musgrove’s exact timetable for a return still up in the air, the Padres could use an extra starting pitcher. Yusei Kikuchi is no ace, but he’s been solid the last two years and has pitched better than his raw ERA this season. He’s also a free agent at the end of the season, which makes him more movable for the Blue Jays than either Vladimir Guerrero Jr. or Bo Bichette, as I think 2025 is still very important to the Jays. The back of San Diego’s bullpen is also less than enthralling, and a Yimi García acquisition would give them more heft for the very wide open NL Wild Card race.

Naturally, neither Kikuchi nor García merit a top prospect in return, but they should at least get an interesting package. ZiPS actually likes Eguy Rosario quite a bit, projecting him for a 97 wRC+ in 2025 with +5 fielding runs at third, good enough to be a league-average player and help the Jays retool for next season. A healthy Manny Machado greatly reduces Rosario’s utility to the Padres. Danny Jansen is a free agent after the season and the Jays are short in prospects both behind the plate and in the outfield, and Brandon Valenzuela and Homer Bush Jr. are the types of 40ish prospects that frequently go in trades like this.

The New York Yankees acquire RHP Chad Green from the Toronto Blue Jays for IF Jared Serna

I’d be surprised if the Yankees weren’t after a late-inning arm, and they have a good history with Chad Green. I also think Green is unlikely to require a large price despite his solid ERA; his strikeout rate has fallen considerably and it’s backed largely by hitters making a lot more contact. Even before you consider Bichette’s free agency after next season, the Jays are in need of infield depth; I don’t think they see Addison Barger as a long-term middle infielder, but Jared Serna could fill that role.

Amusingly, Isiah Kiner-Falefa is having a strong season and would be useful for the Yankees at third base, but because the Jays need infield depth and might want to retool for 2025 rather than rebuild, they might choose to keep IKF, who is signed through next season.

As is tradition at FanGraphs, we’re using the lead-up to the trade deadline to take stock of the top 50 players in baseball by trade value. For a more detailed introduction to this year’s exercise, as well as a look at the players who fell just short of the top 50, be sure to read the Introduction and Honorable Mentions piece, which can be found in the widget above.

For those of you who have been reading the Trade Value Series the last few seasons, the format should look familiar. For every player, you’ll see a table with the player’s projected five-year WAR from 2025-2029, courtesy of Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections. The table will also include the player’s guaranteed money, if any, the year through which their team has contractual control of them, last year’s rank (if applicable), and then projections, contract status, and age for each individual season through 2029 (assuming the player is under contract or team control for those seasons). Last year’s rank includes a link to the relevant 2023 post. Thanks are due to Sean Dolinar for his technical wizardry. At the bottom of the page, there is a grid showing all of the players who have been ranked up to this point.

A note on the rankings: As we ascend towards the top of the list, the tiers matter more and more. There are clear gaps in value. Don’t get too caught up on what number a player is, because who they’re grouped with is a more important indicator. The gap between no. 20 and 19 is next to nothing; between 12 and 11, it’s much steeper. I’ll note places where I disagreed meaningfully with people I spoke with in calibrating this list, and I’ll also note players whose value was the subject of disagreement among my contacts. As I mentioned in the Introduction and Honorable Mentions piece, I’ll indicate tier breaks between players where appropriate, both in their capsules and bolded in the table at the end of the piece.

With that out of the way, let’s get to the next batch of players. Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the likenesses, word counts, and stat citations on Hall of Fame plaques, what would happen if all past stats disappeared, the impending returns of Mike Trout and Clayton Kershaw (and the recent return of J.T. Realmuto), the end of James Paxton’s time with the Dodgers, Jo Adell’s breakout fakeout and Jarren Duran’s belated breakout, Francisco Vicioso and Shaq Thompson, the morphing meme of Nick Castellanos, and the Brewers, the Mariners, and the challenge and payoff of rostering pretty good players.

Audio intro: Daniel Leckie, “Effectively Wild Theme”
Audio outro: Philip Bergman, “Effectively Wild Theme”

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Bryan Woo wasn’t highly regarded when the Seattle Mariners selected him in the sixth round of the 2021 draft out of Cal Poly. That’s understandable. The low-slot righty had a 6.36 ERA in his three collegiate seasons, including a 6.11 mark in his injury-hampered junior year. After undergoing Tommy John surgery in April 2021, he made his professional debut in ’22.

Now, the 24-year-old is showing that Seattle’s director of pitching strategy, Trent Blank, wasn’t completely out of his mind when he reportedly told members of the Mariners front office prior to the draft that “this guy would be one-one for me.” While it’s unlikely that Woo is going to be as good or better than all of the 173 players drafted ahead of him, his numbers have nonetheless been impressive. Since making his big league debut in July 2023, he has a 3.60 ERA and a 3.96 FIP over 137 1/3 innings across his 28 starts with the Mariners. In 10 outings this year, he is 4-1 with a 2.54 ERA and a 3.25 FIP. It’s worth noting that this success hasn’t exactly come out of nowhere. Including four rehab outings this year, Woo logged a 2.97 ERA and 162 strikeouts over 115 innings as a minor leaguer.

Woo brought up his backstory when I asked him how he’s developed as pitcher.

“Going through the draft-and-scouting process, I feel like a lot of it was based on my potential,” Woo told me when the Mariners played in Cleveland last month. “I didn’t have great results at the time. It was based off of, ‘He could be this. It looks like he’s developing into that.’ For me, it was about believing that I could get there, that I could continue to get better. That’s kind of the story. I wasn’t too well-known. If you look at in on paper, it was never, ‘This guy is really good.’ The numbers never really showed that I was.”

Not surprisingly, Woo also brought up the fact that he’d been injured when he was drafted, and how that made for a lot of uncertainty. As he put it, “I didn’t quite know what was going to happen. It could have been a little higher. I could have gone a lot lower. I really wasn’t sure.”

He did know that his repertoire needed both refinement and enhancement. The Oakland native had a mid-90s four-seam fastball when healthy but nothing else to write home about. His slider, which he described as having been “OK,” was a pitch he’d throw here and there. He also had a changeup, but that mostly sat in his back pocket.

Developing a second heater has been especially impactful for him. He added a two-seamer to his arsenal last year while toeing the rubber for the Arkansas Travelers.

“Last year, before I got called up, our pitching coordinator came down to Double-A, where I was at,” Woo said. “He sat in on one of my bullpens and said, ‘Just try it.’ I was having a lot of high pitch count games — I wasn’t getting many quick outs — and he said that it could be a tool to use to get some quicker outs, some weaker contact. A lot of my game was strikeouts and fly balls. There weren’t many efficient outs, I guess you could say. So, we tried the two and it has progressed from there.”

So far this season, Woo has thrown 51.4% four-seamers and 27.2% two-seamers, as well as 7.2% changeups, 7.1% sweepers, and 7.0% sliders. The last of that mix, according to the righty, acts more like a gyro when he throws it low, and more like a cutter when he throws it toward the top of the zone. His circle changeup is a pitch he described as having “a little less vertical and a little bit more horizontal, as well as little bit slower, than my sinker.” Asked which of his off-speed pitches he sees as his main secondary offering going forward, he said that he’s satisfied with the progress of all three and wouldn’t take one over the other.

As for his two fastballs, the 6-foot-2 Woo wasn’t inclined to pick between them either. Instead of choosing favorites, he described why he’s had success with his heaters despite their relatively unimpressive metrics.

“Neither one plays super high metrically; the vertical and horizontal movement aren’t anything crazy,” Woo said. “I think it’s just my slot, kind of how the ball comes out, that makes them a little bit different.”

The slot is indeed different. As Pitcher List’s Jack Foley explained last summer, “At 4’11” off the ground, Woo has a release height a full foot below the average.”

Woo told me that he was more over the top in high school, only to have his arm “kind of lower on its own throughout college, post-surgery, and pro ball.” He claimed to have never purposefully dropped it down, but rather has just continued to throw in a way that feels most comfortable. Not so comfortable are opposing batters. They have just a .220 xBA and a 2.7% barrel rate against the low-slot righty this season. When healthy — he missed the first month with elbow inflammation and later was on the shelf for three weeks with a hamstring strain — Woo is hard to square up.

As is tradition at FanGraphs, we’re using the lead-up to the trade deadline to take stock of the top 50 players in baseball by trade value. For a more detailed introduction to this year’s exercise, as well as a look at the players who fell just short of the top 50, be sure to read the Introduction and Honorable Mentions piece, which can be found in the widget above.

For those of you who have been reading the Trade Value Series the last few seasons, the format should look familiar. For every player, you’ll see a table with the player’s projected five-year WAR from 2025-2029, courtesy of Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections. The table will also include the player’s guaranteed money, if any, the year through which their team has contractual control of them, last year’s rank (if applicable), and then projections, contract status, and age for each individual season through 2029 (assuming the player is under contract or team control for those seasons). Last year’s rank includes a link to the relevant 2023 post. Thanks are due to Sean Dolinar for his technical wizardry. At the bottom of the page, there is a grid showing all of the players who have been ranked up to this point.

One note on the rankings: Particularly at the bottom of the list, there isn’t a lot of room between the players. The ordinal rankings clearly matter, and we put them there for a reason, but there isn’t much of a gap between, say, the 38th-ranked player and the 60th. The magnitude of the differences in this part of the list is quite small. Several of the folks I talked to might prefer a player in the honorable mentions section to one on the back end of the list, or vice versa. I think the broad strokes are correct, and this is my opinion of the best order, but with so many players carrying roughly equivalent value, disagreements abounded. I’ll note places where I disagreed meaningfully with people I spoke with in calibrating this list, and I’ll also note players whose value was the subject of disagreement among my contacts. As I mentioned in the Introduction and Honorable Mentions piece, I’ll also indicate tier breaks between players where appropriate, both in their capsules and bolded in the table at the end of the piece.

With that out of the way, let’s get to the next batch of players. Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome back to Top of the Order, where every Tuesday and Friday I’ll be starting your baseball day with some news, notes, and thoughts about the game we love.

With just seven days to go until the July 30 trade deadline, let’s round up some news and developments from the last few days and discuss how these nuggets might affect what happens over the next week. Here’s what’s new:

The Mariners Blow Their AL West Lead

Remember when the Mariners had a 10-game lead in the AL West at the end of play on June 18? Well, they surely do, and not fondly, now that it’s gone. They salvaged Sunday’s series finale against the Astros to avoid the sweep and enter the new week in a virtual tie for first, but it took just 24 games for them to blow that double-digit lead. That’s the quickest that any MLB team has ever lost a 10-game lead in its division standings.

Anyone who’s watched even a small handful of Mariners games can tell you that the offense has been the big issue for the team. Potentially making matters worse: Julio Rodríguez was removed from Sunday’s game after twisting his right ankle while leaping for a ball against the wall in center field. X-rays came back negative, and after undergoing an MRI on Monday, he’s listed as day-to-day with a mild ankle sprain. Then, in Monday’s 3-1 loss to the Angels, shortstop J.P. Crawford fractured his right pinky finger when he was hit by a pitch in the first inning. It was announced after the game that Crawford will be placed on the IL; there is no timetable for his return. Meanwhile, the Mariners placed first baseman Ty France on waivers. Though he can continue to play while he’s on waivers, he was not in the lineup Monday, and after the game he was seen cleaning out his locker, an indication that even if he clears waivers, he is not returning to Seattle.

Also not helping this offense is its home ballpark: T-Mobile Park is the most pitcher-friendly park in the league. But even by park-adjusted stats, Seattle’s offense has been quite poor; only the Pirates have a worse wRC+ among the teams with a winning percentage of at least .500.

The Mariners are still clearly on the buying side of teams entering the deadline, but their playoff hopes largely rest on winning the division outright; entering Monday, our Depth Charts projects them to have a 49.8% chance to make the playoffs and 39.6% odds to win the AL West. Back on June 25, about a weak after Seattle’s high-water mark in the standings, I wrote about the team’s anemic offense and some of the players who could help improve the lineup if the Mariners were to acquire them in a trade. All of those hitters remain with their same clubs, and Seattle’s evaporated division lead should provide the team with even more incentive to add as many impact bats as possible. The Mariners should target players whose skill sets are more “T-Mobile Park proof,” but it’s hard to imagine this offense could be worse off with any of the possible upgrades that it may acquire over the next week.

James Paxton’s DFA Sets up Musical Chairs for the Dodgers

It was a little surprising to see James Paxton get designated for assignment as the Dodgers’ corresponding move to add top pitching prospect River Ryan to their roster ahead of his MLB debut on Monday, but the fact of the matter is that Paxton wasn’t going to last much longer in Los Angeles anyhow. While he’s tied with Tyler Glasnow for the team lead in starts (18), his outings were a mixed bag at best; he averaged under five innings per start and walked 12.3% of batters faced, by far a career worst.

The Paxton-for-Ryan swap is just the first of many rotation moves coming up for the Dodgers, who will welcome Glasnow back from the injured list on Wednesday and Kershaw on Thursday. The Dodgers will have to cut a reliever to make room for Kershaw, setting up a rotation with Glasnow, Kershaw, Gavin Stone, Landon Knack, and either Ryan or rookie lefty Justin Wrobleski. Alex Vesia is the only reliever who can be optioned, and he’s not going anywhere, so the team will have a tough DFA decision afoot. My guess is that Yohan Ramírez and Anthony Banda are the most vulnerable.

But that’s just the first round of musical chairs, with at least one of Walker Buehler (hip discomfort) and Bobby Miller (ineffective and banished to Triple-A) needing a spot at some point, which could leave Knack exposed to getting optioned despite his effectiveness when called upon. There’s also the trade deadline, at which point the Dodgers may well add yet another starter to the mix.

Banged-up Braves Bolstering Bats?

Max Fried and Ozzie Albies recently became the latest in a long line of Braves players to land on the injured list.

Dan Szymborski detailed the specifics of the injuries yesterday, but the upshot is this: Whit Merrifield (who, ironically, hurt his thumb taking grounders before his first game with the Braves and is currently day-to-day) and Nacho Alvarez Jr. probably aren’t enough to paper over the loss of Albies for two months, Atlanta’s strong rotation was already spread thin before Fried got hurt because Spencer Strider is out for the year and Chris Sale and Reynaldo López are often pitching on extra rest as Atlanta monitors their innings.

Fried’s injury is reportedly a best-case scenario, so maybe the Braves feel like they can get by for a month or so with guys like Dylan Dodd, Bryce Elder, AJ Smith-Shawver, and Allan Winans, but as Dan noted, losing Albies creates a not-insignificant hit to their Playoff Odds. It certainly doesn’t help matters that Matt Olson and Orlando Arcia have struggled mightily for most of the year.

Positional flexibility fits best for the Braves, who will have Michael Harris II (and almost certainly Albies) back for the playoffs. Better versions of Merrifield (guys who can slide between the infield and outfield) include Jazz Chisholm Jr., Luis Rengifo, and Amed Rosario.

The Tigers Hold the Keys

The Tigers are on a nice little run of late, but they’re a game under .500, which makes selling at the deadline all but a guarantee. The question is this, though: To what extent will they sell? Jack Flaherty is the best rental starter on the market by far, and fellow pending free agents Mark Canha and Gio Urshela should follow him out the door to make way for younger bats auditioning for roles next year. Andrew Chafin and Shelby Miller, who have club options for 2025, could be on the move as well if the Tigers don’t plan on having them around next season anyhow and want to avoid paying their buyouts. All those players, Flaherty especially, could return something of value, but none would alter the franchise even 10% as much as would a Tarik Skubal trade.

The Dodgers and Orioles are reportedly talking to the Tigers about Skubal, and while it would be shocking to see Detroit trade the best lefty starter in baseball when he has over two years left before he’s scheduled to reach free agency, it’s still worth considering the possibility. Skubal comes with as much club control as the White Sox’ Garrett Crochet, who is far likelier to be traded, and it stands to reason that Skubal would fetch a significantly better return than Crochet.

There’s not a right answer for what the Tigers should do with Skubal. Really, the only wrong answer would be getting an unworthy return package for him because they traded him for the sake of trading him. For this reason, the Tigers are most likely going to let suitors come to them with their best offers for Skubal, and they’ll trade him only if one of them is too good to turn down.

Editor’s Note, 9:37 a.m. ET: This story has been updated to include the latest information about the Mariners’ injuries and Ty France.

The number of Atlanta Braves players on the injured list has reached double digits after two of their core players, starting pitcher Max Fried and second baseman Ozzie Albies, went down over the weekend. Fried had a 3.08 ERA/3.71 FIP across 108 innings for the Braves before landing on the IL with neuritis in his left forearm, which first flared up while he was warming up for his All-Star Game appearance. In Atlanta’s 6-2 loss to the Cardinals on Sunday, Albies broke his wrist when his glove hand collided with a sliding Michael Siani on a stolen base attempt; the second baseman is expected to be out for nearly the rest of the regular season.

To replace Fried and Albies on the roster, the Braves recalled lefty Dylan Dodd and shortstop Nacho Alvarez Jr. from Triple-A Gwinnett and signed veteran 2B/OF Whit Merrifield to a major league contract.

Ozzie Albies today underwent X-rays that revealed a left wrist fracture. He is expected to miss approximately eight weeks.

— Atlanta Braves (@Braves) July 21, 2024

After missing a good chunk of last year due to forearm pain, the 30-year-old Fried stumbled in his first two starts of this season but has been dominant since then. He’d also stayed healthy through the first half of the season, which was especially crucial for the Braves given the early-season loss of righty Spencer Strider to Tommy John surgery. The silver lining here – important since any mention of a pitcher’s having forearm pain justifiably will send fans into a panicked binge of one of their vices – is that there is no structural damage in his pitching arm and he will not require surgery. Instead, the Braves are choosing to be cautious with Fried because neuritis in the forearm can be related to an underlying problem with the UCL. Fried has already had Tommy John surgery once, about a decade ago when he was still a Padres prospect. Neither the Braves nor Fried have offered a timetable for his return, but Fried was optimistic that this would be a short-term issue. Per The Athletic’s David O’Brien:

“Everything structurally looks great, just a little irritated sensory nerve,” Fried said, “not one of the major muscle-functioning nerves. … Just going to let it calm down, and (I’m) hoping to be back soon.”

That there was no mention of ulnar nerve transposition surgery, which would have kept Fried out for months, has to be considered a good sign. Or, again, at least a less bad one.

After getting off to a hot start in April, Albies has struggled in recent months, and has hit just .235/.285/.376 since the end of April. He may be having arguably the worst year his career, but Atlanta was hopeful that he could return to form over the final two and a half months of the season. Losing even this lesser version of Albies lowers the ceiling of this underperforming offense, which ranks 11th among the 15 NL teams in runs scored.

Atlanta may be punchless, but it’s not witless – or should I say Whitless – as the team quickly signed Merrifield to a major league contract. Merrifield’s peak years with the Royals are long behind him at this point, and he was only available for the Braves because the Phillies released him over a week ago after he’d batted .199/.277/.295 (65 wRC+) across 174 plate appearances in a utility role. The projection systems are not bullish on Merrifield’s performance the rest of the season; Steamer expects Merrifield to post a .250/.303/.362 line over the final months of the year while ZiPS has him slightly worse, at .244/.293/.354. That said, the Braves simply don’t have any good in-house options to turn to instead. I ran the projections for every player at Triple-A or Double-A for Atlanta who has played at least three games at second base this year. I’m also including Alvarez, who has not played second base professionally but appears to be the frontrunner to replace Albies.

If ZiPS is correct, the Braves appear to have identified Alvarez as their best short-term option at second base, with Merrifield filling a utility role and serving as the best second-base Plan B.

The Phillies were already overwhelming favorites to win the NL East, with ZiPS giving them an 85% chance of taking the division as of this morning if Fried and Albies had been healthy. Assuming two missed months for Albies and an average of three weeks for Fried, ZiPS drops Atlanta’s chances of running down the Phillies from 14% to 6%. Fortunately, the Braves remain in a commanding position for one of the NL Wild Card spots. These two injuries only drop their playoff probability in ZiPS from 91% to 88%, so while unwelcome, they shouldn’t cause any premature towel-throwing.

In one last bit of looking on the bright side, Atlanta has a lot more options now than it would if these injuries happened in two weeks. We’re just over a week from the trade deadline, and there are a variety of second basemen and pitchers, of varying plausibility, available. A package that included a relief arm – Atlanta is deep here – could conceivably tempt the Orioles into parting with a prospect like Connor Norby. Amed Rosario of the Rays and Isiah Kiner-Falefa of the Blue Jays have both been solid this season. I’m not sure Atlanta could successfully trade its entire farm system and get Garrett Crochet or Tarik Skubal if it wanted to, but the price of Erick Fedde ought to be more reasonable. The Braves might choose to stick with what they have and muddle through, but it’s always nice to be able to make that choice.

It says a lot about the Braves that despite all of their nasty surprises this season, they remain on a pace to win 89 games and comfortably make the playoffs. But with these two latest injuries, the team’s margin for error has been cut thinner than a nice piece of charcuterie.

I was standing in the Yankees clubhouse on July 5 after their 5-3 loss to the Red Sox when I received an angry text from my friend Andy, a huge Yankees fan. “How many years is it now that they light it up in the first half and because [sic] absolutely terrible in the second?”

I sent him back a few texts, first correcting his typo — Andy writes for a living, but considering that many of his texts are incoherent, this one wasn’t all that bad — and then answering his question about the trajectories of New York’s recent seasons. His response: “They’re just playing such ugly baseball.”

After the performance I’d just watched, which might best be described as the baseball equivalent of the poop emoji, it was hard to argue with his assessment. It was the first time in at least the last 115 years that the Yankees lost to the Red Sox at home when leading by multiple runs with two outs in the ninth inning. They made several baserunning blunders owing either to mental lapses, a lack of hustle, compromised health or some combination of the three. They botched two throws to second base, one from the catcher on a bunt attempt that probably should’ve been caught and another on a pickoff throw that sailed into center field. They allowed two two-run home runs to the bottom of Boston’s order — one in the ninth to tie the game and the other to lead off the 10th — and then failed to push across a run in the 10th with runners on the corners, nobody out, and their third, fourth, and fifth batters due up.

The loss was New York’s 14th in 18 games, and by the time the homestand ended with a 3-0 loss two nights later, the Yankees were 5-15 over a 20-game span. A week later, when they took two of three against the first-place Orioles, it was their first series victory in a month. Now, after a win Friday and two losses over the weekend, the Yankees enter this afternoon’s series finale against the Rays with a 9-20 record since June 15. Those nine wins are tied with the White Sox for the fewest in that span.

And yet, for as awful as the past five and a half weeks have been, the Yankees remain one of the best teams in baseball. At 59-42, they enter this week first in the AL Wild Card standings and just two games behind the Orioles in the division, and their Playoff Odds have fallen to 97.5%, down from 99.9% on June 14, the last night before all the losing began. Their 12.2% odds to win the World Series are the best in the American League; only the Phillies (16.1%) and Dodgers (15.3%) have a higher probability to win it all.

If you’re having a tough time making sense of this contradictory reality — that the Yankees have played terribly for over a month and remain the most likely American League team to win the pennant — you’re not alone. When I started writing this piece, I was skeptical, too. Living in New York surrounded by Yankees fans, it’s easy to understand why people like Andy are so frustrated; it’s difficult not to get caught up in the emotions of the moment, especially when that moment has spanned nearly six weeks. I also groan with cynicism when I hear manager Aaron Boone say, “It’s all right there in front of us,” because all we can see right now is a team standing amid the ruins of a season that was supposed to be different. However, on closer examination, it’s clear that the foundation of this once-promising team is still in tact, and I think the crumbled pieces from the caved in ceiling can be fixed and supported with beams borrowed, bought, or bartered from the neighbors.

To understand how the Yankees can keep the building from collapsing further, we need to figure out what exactly has gone wrong, and to do that, we should also determine what was working well. From there, we’ll look at how they can start putting their season back together and perhaps make it even better.

For the first two and a half months, this season really was different. On June 14, with a resounding 8-1 win against the Red Sox at Fenway Park, the Yankees became the first team in the majors this year to reach 50 wins, improved to a season-high 28 games over .500, and increased their odds to win the division to 76.6%. They had one of the best pitching staffs in baseball — this without reigning AL Cy Young winner Gerrit Cole, who hadn’t yet returned from the elbow injury that forced him to miss the first 83 days of the season — and their lineup, while still top heavy, was 20% better than league average. Aaron Judge (205 wRC+ at the time) and Juan Soto (188) were the two best hitters in the majors.

Of course, since then, their season has taken a turn for the worse in ways that feel all too familiar. Their potent lineup has become stagnant. Several key contributors have landed on the injured list, most notably Giancarlo Stanton, who was enjoying a resurgent season before suffering a hamstring strain the third week of June, and more recently Jose Trevino, who despite his reputation as a glove-first catcher was one of the handful of Yankees regulars who’d been above league average at the plate this season (103 wRC+). They are no longer hitting for average and they’re not slugging like they were over the first two and a half months. The only thing to improve since they started losing is their walk rate, but walks will only get you so far if you’re not getting the hits to bring those baserunners home. Oh, about running the bases — the Yankees have been the worst baserunning team in the majors all season, but now that they aren’t hitting for average or power, their ineptitude on the basepaths has turned into a much more glaring problem.

Some of these offensive woes can be attributed to injuries and players going cold at the same time, while some portion of it is probably due to players pressing as the losing persisted. Of course, some of it is just, to borrow one of Boone’s favorite clichés, “the ebbs and flows of the season.” We should expect some rebound here. This isn’t the case of Judge alone propping up an otherwise meek lineup as he did in 2022; remember, the Yankees held their own while their captain looked lost through April. That said, this offense still lacks depth.

Meanwhile, the Yankees pitching staff, which had been the bedrock of their success, has crumbled over the past four weeks. After posting the best ERA in baseball (2.90) over their 72 games through June 14, the Yankees have the second-worst ERA (5.37) during their 29-game slide, and they are the only team whose pitching staff has been below replacement level over that span.

Boone has cited a spike in home runs allowed as one of the main sources of trouble for Yankees pitchers — that the few mistakes his pitchers are making are ending up in the seats, whereas earlier in the year, they were staying in the ballpark, providing the pitchers a chance to escape the inning unscathed. And, for the most part, he is correct. Their opponents’ home run rate has increased 87.5%, from 2.4% through June 14 to 4.5% since then. But Yankees pitchers are also allowing a higher rate of non-HR hits than they did before. Their opponents recorded non-HR hits on 16.2% of their plate appearances through June 14; that rate is 19.0% since then. Meanwhile, using the same cutoff, the percentage of hits the Yankees allowed that were home runs has gone from 13.1% to 19.3%. So, yes, home runs are a big issue here, probably even the main issue, but the Yankees are also giving up more hits in general than they did before.

As the losing has continued, Boone and the players have resorted to the same keeping-the-faith approach that hasn’t worked for them before.

“Regardless of when we’re on winning streaks or when it’s like this, I think we have a really good clubhouse, staying even-keel and showing up every day,” said shortstop Anthony Volpe after that sloppy Friday night game against the Red Sox. “We trust each other, we trust ourselves. We know we’ve got everything in front of us. We play to win, we expect to win — we’re the Yankees.”

“We’re still believing,” Soto said after the Yankees’ loss to the Red Sox on July 7. “We’re still grinding every day. We still come in with the same energy. I think that’s really positive on our side.”

“Nobody likes losing,” Judge said after the Yankees lost their July 11 rubber match with the Rays. “Nobody is happy about it. We’ve just got to keep showing up, doing our thing.”

That implies that “showing up, doing our thing” is working, and well, at least right now, it isn’t. To the fans who have been through this with the Yankees before, many of these comments sound like a lack of urgency. Simply being the Yankees won’t save them from more losing, nor will the power of positive thinking.

However, Boone is right in a sense when he says, “It’s all right there in front of us.” Unlike in 2022, when the Yankees had an even better start to the season, this year they went cold before the All-Star break, so there are more games ahead of them to turn things around. More importantly, the trade deadline is still a week away, meaning GM Brian Cashman has had time to assess the flaws of the roster and determine which moves he needs to make to improve it, and he still has more time to work the phones and make something happen. Two years ago, the Yankees were 70-34 and 12 games up in the AL East entering the day of the deadline. Their fall to earth began a few hours after the deadline passed, when they suffered the first of five straight losses that kicked off a 3-14 stretch. They couldn’t swing a trade to pull them out of their rut; they had to make due with the players they had and hope they would snap out of it. By the end of the month, their division lead was cut in half, and it was down to 3.5 games after a loss on September 9. They rebounded from there and won the division, but they were gassed and overmatched by the time they faced and were swept by the Astros in the ALCS.

This time, the Yankees can look externally to address their weaknesses, and considering their willingness to splurge for one season of Soto, we should expect the front office to double down on its intent to win it all this year with a major acquisition or two. We know the Yankees need to add a productive hitter in the infield, especially at third base. All-Star Ryan McMahon, who has another three years and $44 million left on his contract after this year, would make a lot of sense, though it’s unclear if the Rockies would be willing to trade him because of that club control.

Otherwise, the trade market for third basemen has yet to solidify because there are so many teams caught in the mediocre middle. There has been some chatter about Rays All-Star and Ben Clemens’ favorite player Isaac Paredes, but considering he’s only in his first year of arbitration eligibility and therefore is affordable and controllable through the 2027 season, it seems unlikely that Tampa Bay would trade him without getting a haul of prospects in return — especially not to a divisional foe like the Yankees.

But that doesn’t mean the Yankees shouldn’t look to the AL East to improve at third base. The Blue Jays have old friend Isiah Kiner-Falefa at the hot corner. He’s signed through next season at a relatively affordable $7.5 million, and while Yankees fans might balk at trading for someone who was best suited for a utility role during his two seasons in the Bronx, they should remember that depth is crucial down the stretch and into the postseason. Beyond that, though, they should look at IKF’s stats for this season, because if he were in the Yankees lineup today, he’d be their third-most productive hitter by wRC+ (117), behind only Judge (208) and Soto (185). Kiner-Falefa also plays excellent defense and runs the bases well. The one concern here is that Kiner-Falefa is currently on the injured list with a sprained left knee. He has started doing baseball activities and is expected back late this month or in early August.

At this point, it seems unlikely the Yankees would trade Gleyber Torres, because for as much as he’s disappointed this season, there aren’t many available second basemen who’d represent an offensive improvement, especially not ones who’d be worth the cost. If they’re going to add a bat in their infield, it will almost certainly come at third.

New York could also seek to improve its offense with an upgrade in the outfield. The New York Post’s Jon Heyman has reported that the Yankees have discussed Jazz Chisholm Jr. with the Marlins. A lefty batter with power and speed, Chisholm would slide into center field, with Judge moving to left. That would likely move Verdugo to the bench upon Stanton’s return from injury (which MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch reported recently is “really close”). Verdugo started the season strong but has been awful (17 wRC+) since June 15. The Yankees’ outfield defense would get worse with Chisholm, a converted middle infielder now in his second season as an everyday center fielder, but he would be an upgrade at the plate and especially on the bases. New York could also mix and match its lineup and work Chisholm in at second base to give Torres a spell against tough righties. Chisholm has two years of arbitration left after this season, and trading for him would also fill the hole at second base that the Yankees are expected to have next season; Torres is a pending free agent, and given his lackluster performance this year, it seems unlikely that the Yankees will re-sign him. Another outfielder the Yankees could (read: should) target is Jesse Winker of the Nationals, who has a 132 wRC+ this season and, as a rental, would likely come cheap.

As is the case with every contender, the Yankees need to add at least one or two relievers. Their bullpen is especially light on high-leverage lefties, so Tanner Scott of the Marlins is the obvious best fit, but the Yankees should also see what it would take to get Andrew Chafin from the Tigers. Or, if the Yankees do decide to trade with the Blue Jays for IKF, maybe they could get Toronto to throw in righty Chad Green and make it a bigger reunion.

The Yankees will be in better shape if any of these players are on their roster come July 31, but those additions on their own are not going to solve all the problems that we’ve seen over the last month. The good news is the Yankees as currently constructed are still a good team, maybe even a great one. As we can see by their place in the standings and Playoff Odds even after such a disastrous stretch, one month of “ugly baseball” doesn’t erase all that came before it.