I imagine we’ll be accused of writing clickbait. I imagine many websites will face the same accusation. And, sure, there’s probably plenty of bad Shohei Ohtani coverage out there. But, already, this is something special. Readers have possessed a voracious enthusiasm for consuming Ohtani articles. Writers have possessed a voracious enthusiasm for composing Ohtani articles. This is something that none of us have ever seen, and, if anything, Shohei Ohtani has exceeded the hype. Of course it’s still embarrassingly early. But, this is the best thing going. There is so much for us to see, and so much for us to learn.

There’s an argument that early analysis misses the point. That Ohtani is easy to appreciate, and perhaps best appreciated, with the eyes. He hits harder than almost anyone. He pitches harder than almost anyone. He’s playing his first-ever meaningful MLB games, and he’s arguably the greatest baseball talent Japan has ever had to offer. To this point, he’s been absolutely dominant on both sides, which is something long considered impossible. Ohtani shouldn’t be able to be this good. Players aren’t supposed to actually meet the runaway hype. Was Ohtani hyped…too…little? If you want to just let his beginning wash over you, I completely understand. In many ways this is bigger than regular baseball.

But I have a job to do. My job is to generate written baseball content, which can hopefully teach you something. If you’re interested, let me teach you something about Shohei Ohtani, the hitter. Everyone in baseball ends up with a scouting report. Ohtani, I guess, will have two of them. But, hitter Ohtani? Pitchers have already tipped their plan.

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The relationship between fans and the franchises for whom they root is something I’m going to examine over the next few weeks. The Marlins provide a case study in how to cultivate tension in that relationship.

The Marlins had themselves an eventful offseason, trading away Dee Gordon, Marcell Ozuna, Giancarlo Stanton, and Christian Yelich, among others. The fire sale was so extensive that the MLBPA filed a grievance against the team for misuse of revenue sharing, a development that I discussed here.

But that’s not all. As I’ve also noted, the City of Miami and County of Miami-Dade are suing Jeffrey Loria for purportedly denying them what they believe they are due of the net proceeds from the $1.2 billion sale of the Miami Marlins to the Derek Jeter/Bruce Sherman ownership group. The latest developments in that case include a request from the city for Loria’s tax returns in discovery — and Loria’s attorneys own request that the dispute be heard in arbitration rather than in court.

And even that’s not all. The offseason has also produced a minor fracas featuring Marlins Man, whose real name is Laurence Leavy, a successful Miami attorney best known for his steady presence behind home plate at every Marlins home game. After the Marlins rejected his most recent offer to renew his season tickets — $200,000 over three years — he declared himself a free agent and is expected to “sign” with, of all teams, the Detroit Tigers. Marlins representatives had what could be characterized as an interesting response to Leavy’s six-figure offer.

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2:01	Dan Szymborski:

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How were your last seven days at work? Did you meet demanding, perhaps even impossible, expectations? While performing in unfamiliar surroundings? In front of literally millions of expectant eyes?

If not, then you probably failed to match Shohei Ohtani’s first full week as an employee in the United States.

To recap:

• Tuesday (as DH): 3 for 4, first MLB home run (off Josh Tomlin).
• Wednesday (as DH): 2 for 5, home run (off Corey Kluber).
• Friday (as DH): 1 for 4, BB, home run (off Daniel Gossett).
• Sunday (as pitcher): six perfect innings, a total of 12 strikeouts and just one walk over seven innings, 25 whiffs (including 15 whiffs via the splitter).

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After losing on a 14th-inning walk-off home run by the Giants’ Andrew McCutchen on Saturday, the Dodgers found themselves one swing of the bat away from falling to 2-7 to start the 2018 season — a pit that few teams escape, even in this age of expanded playoffs — during the 10th inning of Sunday’s game at AT&T Park. Fortunately, Kenley Jansen was finally able to tap into the mojo that’s made him one of the game’s best closers, striking out the Giants’ final two hitters to preserve a 2-1 victory, the Dodgers’ first win in a week. Even so, at 3-6, the defending NL champions are off to the worst start of any of the presumptive preseason favorites. How worried should they be?

The Dodgers entered 2018 just about as heavily favored to win their division as any team. But because Major League Baseball insists upon games being played on the field instead of on paper or pixel, things haven’t gone as planned, and they’ve matched the franchise’s worst start of the Wild Card era.

Now, nine games is a small sample size, obviously — just 1/18 of a season, in fact. While such a hiccup wouldn’t raise an eyebrow anywhere else in the schedule — each of last year’s 10 playoff teams went through at least one skid of 3-6 or worse, with the Dodgers themselves (in)famously losing 16 of 17 late in the year — it gets late early out here, as Yogi Berra allegedly said. Since the start of the 1995 season, 114 teams have begun the season 3-6, of which just 18 (including the 1996 Dodgers) made the playoffs. That’s 16%, which sounds high until you consider that, in the period during which two clubs from each league have qualified for the Wild Card, one-third of all teams makes the playoffs. Since 1995, 29% of all teams have done so. With apologies to the post-2001 Mariners, the dance just isn’t that exclusive.

Historically speaking, the real point of inflection through nine games is at 2-7, where just two Wild Card-era teams out of 37 (5.4%) have made the playoffs — namely, the 2001 A’s and 2007 Phillies. It’s four out of 54 (7.4%) if you count the two teams that began 1-8 (the 1995 Reds and 2011 Rays). Prior to the Wild Card era, just seven teams that started 2-7 made the playoffs, including two often referenced in the context of miraculous comebacks, the 1914 Braves and 1951 Giants. But these Dodgers aren’t in such dire straits yet.

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A little less than two weeks ago, Travis Sawchik and Craig Edwards wrapped up our positional power rankings series by taking a look at each team’s bullpen as composed at the start of the season. In Craig’s introduction, he noted that this was, in one sense, a bit of a fruitless exercise. Bullpen performance is very poorly correlated year to year. A combination of midseason acquisitions, injuries, and just plain bad luck can have an outsize impact on end-of-year results.

But the unpredictability of a bullpen’s performance in the future is another matter altogether from the performance of that bullpen in the past. Relievers threw a little over 38% of all innings pitched last year, and that figure is up to 42.3% through games played this past Saturday. Having a good — or at least not a terribly bad — bullpen is increasingly critical to a team’s chances of making and thereafter succeeding in the postseason, and so even if we should retain a measure of humility about our ability to predict what will happen before the season, we should nonetheless keep a close eye on how bullpens actually do once the season starts.

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Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Baltimore Orioles. Scouting reports are compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as from our own (both Eric Longenhagen’s and Kiley McDaniel’s) observations. For more information on the 20-80 scouting scale by which all of our prospect content is governed you can click here. For further explanation of the merits and drawbacks of Future Value, read this.

50 FV Prospects

Hays had a spectacular 2017 breakout campaign, hitting 32 homers and 32 doubles between High- and Double-A, prompting Baltimore to give him a look in the majors in September. His hands are electric and they allow Hays to turn on just about everything — which is what he tries to do and which is what prompted big-league pitchers to work him down and away last year. It may take an adjustment for Hays to max out his offensive potential, as his overly aggressive approach may be exploited in the majors. That said, he has bat speed and power, and should play an above-average right field fairly soon.

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Zack Godley threw 34 curveballs on Tuesday in a 96-pitch effort that saw him hold the Dodgers to four hits and one run over seven innings. The defending NL champs knew to expect a goodly amount of them. The Diamondbacks’ right-hander went to his signature offering 35.6% of the time last year, the second-most hook-heavy ratio among pitchers with at least 150 innings, behind only Drew Pomeranz’s 37%.

The results support the frequency of usage. Per our friends at Baseball Savant, opposing hitters went just 33 for 218 (.151), with a .248 SLG, against Godley’s bender in 2017. Deception was a big reason why. Everything Godley throws looks the same coming out his hand.

“Especially the curveball,” opined D-Backs catcher Jeff Mathis. “It’s coming out on the same plane. With a lot of guys, you’ll recognize curveball right away. With Zack, you’re not seeing any keys, any little tips, when the ball is being released. On top of that, he’s got good stuff.”

Arizona’s newest backstop had yet to catch Godley when I asked for his perspective, but he had good reason to concur with his colleague. 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.
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