Ben and Sam discuss the latest gossip about the Mariners and Marlins, then do another career comparison of Mike Trout and Bryce Harper.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: RSS
Three winters ago, we got into a lot of arguments about James Shields. He was at the center of a very polarizing trade and people took sides. You remember it, so I won’t rehash things other than to remark on how funny it is that the James Shields-Wil Myers blockbuster has actually become the Wade Davis trade. Wade Davis! The guy who gave up 5.92 runs per nine in the season following the deal.
Life’s little insanities aside, Shields was very good for the Royals during his two seasons in Kansas City. He was worth 4.0 and 3.3 WAR, respectively, and helped push them over the hump and back into relevance. Would they have gotten there without him? It’s entirely possible, but he was a key player on the team during their renaissance and deserves some recognition for it. You will note, however, that Shields signed elsewhere after the Royals lost the 2014 World Series and then the team won the 2015 title without him.
One of Shields’ hallmarks, and one of the main reasons the Royals acquired him, was his consistency. You were pretty much assured more than 200 innings of good, non-elite run prevention and above-average fielding independent numbers. Shields was as predictable as a person could be in baseball. Then he signed with the Padres.
If you were glancing at baseball news around the internet recently, you might have come across some announcements from MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred. A Forbes‘ article features a headline, for example, that reads “Manfred Announces 3-Year Deal With FOX To Have MLB Games Streamed In-Market“. At MLB’s own website one finds “Streaming deal a huge leap forward for MLB, fans“. Viewing the headlines alone, we might conclude, or at least be hopeful, that this is a really big deal — that MLB is finally getting rid of its blackout policy on MLB.tv, allowing fans to watch their local team without subscribing to an expensive cable television package. Unfortunately, that’s not what’s happening. In-market streaming is a small step towards making baseball more accessible to fans, but does not deal with the principal blackout problems that prevent getting MLB games any way you want them.
In-market streaming, in the iteration announced yesterday, is helpful to fans provided they already pay for a cable service broadcasting their team’s local games. As the Forbes article indicates, the deal is with FOX-owned cable affiliates. Half of the league is broadcast on a cable network owned by FOX, with the other half spread out between other owners like Comcast, Time Warner and DirecTV. While the other networks could reach a deal with MLB, Manfred’s announcement relates exclusively to the FOX-owned properties. In the chart below, the column on the left features the teams whose broadcasts are affected as a result of this agreement, while the column on the right shows teams whose rights are not managed by FOX and are therefore not part of this announcement.
| With In-Market Streaming | Without In-Market Streaming |
| Atlanta Braves | New York Mets |
| Cincinnati Reds | Philadelphia Phillies |
| Cleveland Indians | Chicago Cubs |
| Texas Rangers | Chicago White Sox |
| Detroit Tigers | Pittsburgh Pirates |
| Kansas City Royals | Houston Astros |
| Los Angeles Angels | Los Angeles Dodgers |
| Miami Marlins | Seattle Mariners |
| Milwaukee Brewers | San Francisco Giants |
| Minnesota Twins | Oaland Athletics |
| New York Yankees | Washington Nationals |
| Arizona Diamondbacks | Baltimore Orioles |
| San Diego Padres | Colorado Rockies |
| St. Louis Cardinals | Boston Red Sox |
| Tampa Bay Rays | Toronto Blue Jays |
Depending on the cable provider, one might be able to stream games through portable devices if also signed into a home wifi that has also been purchased from the same provider, for example. For the fifteen teams part of this agreement, cable subscribers should have significantly more viewing options. Prior to this agreement, a fan, even if he or she were a cable subscriber and even if he or she paid for MLB.tv, would still be unable to watch games on a cell phone or tablet while located in the home market — nor could could one watch games at the doctor’s office, friend’s home, or while commuting on the train or bus. MLB.tv blacked out the games on own its platform, nor was the local cable provider was providing its own options.
Bryce Harper was voted the National League’s Most Valuable Player. This is because he was almost certainly the National League’s most valuable player. I don’t want to get into the argument about the definition of “value,” and there are some halfway decent arguments that might conclude Harper got topped, but Harper is a wonderfully deserving winner, and his win comes absent any real controversy. The voting was unanimous, I should probably say. Harper got every single first-place vote. Which meant zero first-place votes for Paul Goldschmidt and Joey Votto, who each had maybe the best seasons for a first baseman since Albert Pujols in his prime. The National League had some awesome players! Harper ran away with things.
This was the year Harper reached a new level. It was a level people long suspected would be achievable for a player with Harper’s skills, but you have to realize how uncommon it actually is for a player to perform around his ceiling. Mike Trout has spoiled us, but now Harper’s up there, too, having broken out. Here’s an easy way to visualize this: Before the year, at FanGraphs, we published player projections. Player projections are everywhere, and we had our own numbers. Then players subsequently posted real numbers. It can be fun to compare the actual numbers and the projected numbers, and here’s a table of the 10 hitters who batted at least 500 times and who beat their projected OPS figures by the most:
| 9:06 |
: Baseball chat
|
| 9:06 |
: With you!
|
| 9:07 |
mmmmmmm content |
| 9:07 |
: Later than scheduled but earlier than normal!
|
| 9:07 |
After basically trashing they guy, what can the Marlins realistically expect for Ozuna? Any teams in particular make sense? |
| 9:08 |
: It’s funny — that leaked recording turned out to be a hoax, right? But it’s not like it didn’t still capture how the Marlins apparently feel about the guy
|
Bryce Harper won the National League Most Valuable Player this season, and the vote was unanimous. Kris Bryant won the NL Rookie of the Year, and the vote was unanimous. Josh Donaldson‘s American League MVP victory wasn’t quite as clear-cut — 23 to seven over Mike Trout — and Dallas Keuchel’s AL Cy Young even less so — 22 to eight over David Price.
Still, most of the major award victories were fairly one-sided, and they all came down to just two parties duking it out for the top spot. And this is how it usually goes. Occasionally, there’s some discrepancy between the last couple candidates, but more often than not it’s pretty clear who will take home the hardware at year end. If there is any controversy, it’s almost always between just two guys. Very rarely do you see three players eligible for the same award, all of which with a legitimate case to win.
And yet, the 2015 NL Cy Young vote looked like this:
Jake Arrieta emerged victorious, in my opinion rightfully so, but it’s clear by the vote that there was no obvious winner. And it probably came as a surprise to some that Clayton Kershaw didn’t receive more top-two votes and make the race even closer than it actually was.
I mean, Jake Arrieta finished with an ERA that started with a one, and had one of the best second halves in baseball history. Zack Greinke finished with an ERA that started with a one, and it was the lowest we’d seen since Greg Maddux in ’95. Clayton Kershaw finished with a FIP that started with a one, and it was the second consecutive year we’d seen him do that. The ERA wasn’t much higher.
Trying to pick an obvious winner from those three is like trying to pick which duffle bag full of $100 bills you want to take home without having the chance to count every last note. Just close your eyes and pick at random. Either way you’re walking out of that room with a big bag full of money.
It’s great that Arrieta won, because he totally deserved it, but it’s an equal bummer that Greinke and Kershaw didn’t win, because they totally deserved it, too. It’s a shame that seasons like the ones Greinke and Kershaw just had will go down in the record books unrecognized, solely because “sweet lord the caliber of the pitching talent in baseball today is unbelievable what a time to be alive whiffs everywhere.”
The consolation prize for Greinke and Kershaw is that they’re not alone, and they don’t have to go unrecognized. We just witnessed one of the greatest trios of single-season pitching performances in baseball history, so let’s give the runners-up of present and past their due.
The title of this post is a question I asked in my own head yesterday. As to what precise set of circumstances led to the question, I can’t say — nor does the effort required to conduct a full audit of my memory seem justified. The main virtue of the question is that it’s led to the production of Content, which one finds below and which has allowed the present author to delay briefly his perpetually imminent dismissal from FanGraphs. And perhaps it possesses a second virtue, as well: that those, having wondered idly the same thing, might now observe an attempt at supplying an answer.
And, in fact, the answer probably does have some real-live implications. Yesterday in these pages, for example, Craig Edwards performed an examination of Chris Davis’s free-agent candidacy. Edwards found something that isn’t likely to surprise anyone — namely that, whatever Davis’s virtues, a broad base of skills isn’t one of them. His power is prodigious; his contact abilities and defensive acumen, decidedly less so. To whatever degree Davis is compensated this offseason, he will be compensated for his power on contact. To the degree that Davis is successful in the future, it will be for that same trait.
Meditating on Davis in this way naturally leads to the equal and opposite line of inquiry: which player is least dependent on a single skill or trait?
On Tuesday, I looked at five free agents who I think have a chance to provide some positive value for the team that signs them, based on our expectations of what the market will pay out this winter. Today, we’re going to look at the flip side of that coin, and I’ll identify five players who I think pose the highest risk of ending up as expensive disappointments.
Of course, based on my recent suggestions, maybe teams should just sign all of these guys. Last year, I warned teams off of Max Scherzer, Nelson Cruz, and Edinson Volquez, all of whom went on to have one of the best years of their careers. At least I got Victor Martinez right, and I did a little better a couple of years ago, but even Curtis Granderson’s appearance on that list is a reminder that these guys aren’t fated for disaster. Or that I’m an idiot, depending on your interpretation.
But for various reasons, I’m still skeptical of the five players listed below, and wouldn’t want to approach their expected market price this winter.
Not too long ago, I tried to very simply figure out if there’s any extra value in having an elite reliever. I found some evidence of something, although it could stand to be confirmed, since in retrospect I don’t totally love the method I used. But generally speaking, it makes sense — a team could leverage that reliever particularly well, and bullpens are an area we have some trouble evaluating statistically.
All that did was look at the potential impact of one guy. It was interesting to me, but there are other ways to try to break this stuff down. So for this post, I’m moving from the impact of an elite reliever to the impact of an elite bullpen. Why focus on one late-inning pitcher, when every team needs a few? Can we see any hidden extra value in having an overall strong group of relievers?
The introduction of batted-ball data, first to the clubs and then to the public, certainly has caused a revolution in player evaluation. While the entirety of HITf/x and now Statcast data isn’t likely to be available to the masses anytime soon, the portions that are, including fairly complete PITCHf/x data, have changed the way fans, analysts, club personnel, and, yes, even players look at the game.
As I have often written on these pages, this data needs to be placed into context to be fully understood. There are ongoing issues with data capture, and the simple fact that not all hard or softly hit baseballs are created equal adds levels of nuance that must be understood before meaningful conclusions can be drawn. Another concern expressed by many is the uncertain predictive value of the batted-ball data, particularly with regard to pitchers. Today, let’s take a look at how this data correlates from year to year, from the pitcher’s perspective.
It’s been fairly well established over the years that a “ground ball” or “pop up” pitcher is a real thing: ball-in-play (BIP) type frequencies correlate quite well from year to year. The same applies to strikeout (K) and walk (BB) rates, both from the hitter and pitcher’s perspective. How about batted-ball authority? To examine this issue, I identified the 45 starting pitchers who qualified for the ERA title in either league in both 2014 and 2015. (Players who were traded mid-year and qualified overall but not in either league specifically were omitted.)
For each of these pitchers, the following statistics were scaled to 100 both for the 2014 and 2015 seaosns, with correlation coefficients calculated thereafter.
First, the rate stats:
Then metrics concerning projected production allowed (based on BIP authority):
And, finally, runs-allowed measures/estimators:
One note on the middle line item above. Fly balls and line drives were combined when calculating and scaling the Projected Production Allowed data. This was done due to the different manner in which was data was captured in 2014 (Sportvision) and 2015 (Statcast). In 2014, balls in play were classified as fly balls or line drives based on available vertical exit angle data. In 2015, such data was not available, so Statcast’s subjective classifications of BIP as either fly balls or liners had to be accepted.
