FanGraphs Baseball

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The last pitch of Kyle Hendricks’ nine-strikeout appearance on Monday.

This past spring, the author published a three–part series in these electronic pages with a view towards examining the amateur origins of baseball’s good players — where “good” was defined by the half-arbitrary threshold of three wins in a given season. The results of the study suggest that — over the five years in question, at least — that a number of junior-college players outperform the win totals expected from their draft slots; that second basemen go to college, but shortstops not so much; and that three-dimensional pie charts are unambiguously cherished by all readers of this site.

Another revelation facilitated by the research: zero players drafted from an Ivy League school produced a 3.0 WAR or higher between the years 2010 and -14.

The point is noteworthy today because, if extended through the year 2015, the study would now include an Ivy Leaguer. On the strength of a nine-strikeout performance against Kansas City last night, Cubs right-hander and Dartmouth College product Kyle Hendricks has now recorded 3.1 WAR over 31 starts and 174.0 innings this year.

There are multiple caveats which accompany this observation, of course. For one, the three-win threshold is necessarily arbitrary. And two, the WAR being considered here is the sort based only on fielding-independent pitching and not on runs allowed. Using the latter input instead, Hendricks has produced only about two wins of value this year. Still, the point remains that one of the schools responsible for providing a lot of the front-office talent in the game is responsible, in the case of Hendricks, for providing on-field talent, as well.

A few weekends ago, I wrote myself a note, reading “Jose Bautista — oppo.” I watched Bautista hit a home run to right field in Yankee Stadium, and I figured that might be the sort of thing worthy of a post. Bautista generally clobbers his dingers to left, and I thought maybe there could be something there. I thought also that maybe, just maybe, Bautista had a history of going out to right field in New York, which has maybe the most forgiving right field in baseball. Ultimately, I didn’t do anything. I mean, I eventually did some research and played with some numbers, but I didn’t have enough for a post. Not a post that anyone would care about.

Stupid me — I was watching the wrong player. Genius me — I at least had a decent general idea. Rare opposite-field home runs? Potentially interesting. And while I didn’t get enough of interest on Bautista, it wasn’t much later that Brian Dozier pulled off a career first. I have to apologize for the lack of timeliness; this is a post about an event from last Wednesday. I don’t know why I didn’t notice sooner. But last Wednesday, facing Corey Kluber of all people, Brian Dozier stepped in and, in a 2-and-1 count, hit a home run down the right-field line.

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The way Jake Arrieta has thrown the ball this year — especially in the second half — has ended any discussion about who the Cubs #1 starter is. Arrieta has propelled himself into the discussion of true aces, and he’ll be the guy the Cubs put on the hill with their season on the line next Wednesday. With Jon Lester slotting in to the #2 spot, the Cubs top two starters should be able to hold their own against any other staff in baseball.

After that, though, things get a little more interesting. When asked who his third starter in the postseason might be, Joe Maddon stated simply “I don’t know.” Jason Hammel began the year as the team’s third starter, and his overall numbers are quite good for a middle-of-the-rotation guy, but those numbers are based on an excellent first half and a pretty lousy second half. Prior to the All-Star break, opposing hitters posted just a .261 wOBA against Hammel, but since the break, they’ve put up a .371 mark against him. The problems may be tied to a hamstring injury that landed him on the DL in July, and unless he really shows them something in the last week of the season, it’s not clear that the Cubs can trust that he’s healthy enough to be effective in high-leverage postseason innings.

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Last week, I addressed the Cy Young battle in the senior circuit and titled it “The NL Cy Young Showdown.” This time, it’s the AL’s turn — and “discussion” (as opposed to “showdown”) seems to be the proper way to characterize it. It’s been a low-key pitching season, comparatively, in the AL, with no one posting an ERA near Zack Greinke‘s, or pitching no-hitters or engaging in zany second-half shenanigans like Jake Arrieta. In fact, a general consensus seems to be building that the award is David Price’s to lose. Today, let’s have a full discussion, including utilization of batted-ball data, about the AL Cy Young and its three likely frontrunners, Price, Chris Sale and Dallas Keuchel.

Price, who turned 30 in late August, is the only one of the three with a Cy (2012) on his mantle, though he hasn’t finished above sixth in the annual voting since then. Sale has come progressively closer in the voting, checking in at sixth, fifth and third in the last three seasons, while this will be the first time on a ballot for Keuchel, 2015’s foremost pitching breakthrough.

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Gerrit Cole might not be the best player on the Pittsburgh Pirates — Andrew McCutchen probably still holds that distinction — but over the course of the next 10 days, perhaps no pitcher in the National League, or perhaps in Major League Baseball, will have a greater impact on his team’s season. Cole has slid under the radar of the Cy Young race as Clayton Kershaw, Jake Arrieta, and Zack Greinke are all having historically good seasons. While Cole is a bit behind that NL pitching triumvirate, his 2.60 FIP is third in MLB behind only Kershaw and Arrieta. His nearly identical 2.61 ERA is sixth, behind the above three, as well as Dallas Keuchel and David Price. Cole has already pitched some important games down the stretch this season, but how he pitches in the near future could frame how many people view the Pirates’ season as they head to the playoffs for the third straight year.

Cole has pitched very well as the regular season comes to a close. Over his last four starts, he has faced only playoff teams in the Chicago Cubs (twice), the St. Louis Cardinals and the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Pirates have won all four of Cole’s starts, during which time he’s recorded a 32:5 strikeout-to-walk ratio and allowed just one home run over 27.1 innings, good for a 2.30 ERA and 1.94 FIP. The starts against division rival were of particular importance. One September 6, the Pirates trailed the Cardinals by 6.5 games. A loss at that time would have put the team 7.5 games back, making their shot at a divisional comeback almost impossible. The win also kept the Pirates three games ahead of the Cubs. His next start, against those same Cubs, lengthened the lead for home-field advantage to five games and briefly put them within two games of the Cardinals.

Cole just recently turned 25 years old, and in his age-24 season, he has been one of the best in recent history at his age. Among qualified pitchers 24 and under, Cole’s 5.5 WAR is the best such figure, a full two wins better than Carlos Martinez’s mark. Since 2010, the only pitchers 24 and under with a season exceeding Cole’s current 5.5 fWAR are Clayton Kershaw (twice), Matt Harvey and Felix Hernandez.

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Detroit at Texas | 20:05 ET
Norris (53.1 IP, 113 xFIP-) vs. Hamels (197.1 IP, 86 xFIP-)
With the loss on Monday by Texas — plus the wins by Houston and Los Angeles — the latter two clubs trail the Rangers by only 1.5 and 2.0 games, respectively, now and all three clubs still possess at least a 15% probability of claiming the division despite the fact that the season is a mere six games from completion. It’s unlikely, the entire scenario — although not so unlikely that one is compelled to announce, while throwing his hands in the air, “You couldn’t make this stuff up!” Gabriel García Márquez, for example, could’ve probably made this stuff up pretty easily were he still alive. Also, so could probably most little brothers, given an afternoon to really explore the space.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Texas Radio.

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When the New York Yankees signed Jacoby Ellsbury to a seven-year, $153 million contract before the 2014 season, the team was certainly hoping for a version of the 2011 center fielder: a speedy, defensively-sound player with serious power upside. A prevalent thought was the short porch in Yankee Stadium’s right field might help him regain some of his power after injury-marred seasons in 2012 and 2013.

Following a healthy 2014 — in which the left-hander was able to post a respectable power/speed combination while staying relatively healthy — the 2015 season has seen Ellsbury take a step back. In recent weeks, during the thick of a September pennant race, he’s actually sat against left-handed pitching in favor of Chris Young. These are the depths of the slump that Ellsbury is currently in, and it’s obviously not the return on investment the Yankees had in mind when signing him to a long-term deal.

With New York headed toward a very probable Wild Card berth, it’s time to take a close look at Ellsbury. What are the driving factors behind his current struggles? What is the outlook for the Yankees without his production?

We assign many beginning and end dates to baseball statistics, which is a part of our natural desire to organize things we’re trying to understand. We’re going to do that now, because it’s necessary for us to understand Ellsbury’s season before and after a certain event. The Yankees’ center fielder has had two very different halves  — separated by seven weeks on the disabled list with a knee injury — and understanding how they’re different is the first step we’ll take in evaluating his performance.

During the first six weeks of the season, Ellsbury was putting up great leadoff numbers: Although the power stroke wasn’t quite there — he hit only one home run along with a .047 Isolated Power average before May 19 — Ellsbury was still creating runs for his team at a 25% greater rate than a league-average player.

The classic Ellsbury tools were on display during this stage of the season. He was hitting lots of line drives, showing great speed on the base paths and playing sound defense in center field. Between April and the first two weeks of May, the 32-year-old was even walking at a much higher clip than his career norm (11.2% vs. 7.0%). The caveat with those stats, of course, is six weeks is a small sample size, so whether he would have continued his early season production is hard to gauge.

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Ben and Sam banter about Clayton Kershaw, Jake Arrieta, and Jerry Dipoto, then pick the player each playoff team would be most screwed without.