FanGraphs Baseball

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Many people were disappointed with Matt Adams in 2014. Most were probably fantasy owners. In real life, Adams had a solid year, and hit a really important home run off of the best pitcher in baseball during a really important playoff game. You might remember the one:

Being the first lefty to homer off of Clayton Kershaw’s curveball and clinching a playoff series in the process is a job well done in most books. There are a lot of different ways to excel in baseball, and Adams was certainly above-average offensively in 2014 (116 wRC+) — he just wasn’t the type of good that most people wanted out of him, the type in which 30 baseballs leave the yard. He was something other than expected in 2014, but that doesn’t mean he should be considered a disappointment.

Still, the awesome power potential that he flashed in limited time during 2013 (.220 ISO in 108 games) specifically didn’t reach expectations last year, so that area of letdown is at least somewhat understandable. It’s easy to get swept up in the hype when a player hits eight home runs in one month (September of 2013), but the fact remains: Adams’ true offensive output is still a question, and perhaps more than ever following a 2014 that differed substantially from 2013.

Already documented in these fine digital pages were some of his adjustments to the shift during the early part of last year, but let’s aim to answer that true talent question in depth today. What batted ball trends and adjustments did we see from him in 2014, and what might they tell us about his potential 2015? Who is the real Matt Adams: might he return at some point to his 2013 form, bashing homers left and right, or might he be more like the 2014 version moving forward?

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Last week at FanGraphs, we looked at our Positional Power Rankings for position players. As a companion to our rankings, we had our offensive projections built into an interactive data visualization. This week we are ranking pitching staffs. In the interest of synergy and symmetry, I constructed an analogous pitching projections data visualization using FIP as the primary comparison metric.

This interactive chart is similar to the one I constructed for the batters’ OPS, except there are a few more options to choose from regarding metrics. The chart defaults to FIP, but you are able to view the data by either ERA or WAR as well. Since relief pitchers have a fundamentally different role and stats than starting pitchers, you are also able to filter the players based on those two positions.

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Last week’s article on Danny Santana’s 2015 projected offensive decline generated some interesting feedback, so I decided to circle back and focus on a couple more players whose detailed batted-ball info suggests significant 2015 decline. I couldn’t pick two more dissimilar players if I tried; this week’s subjects are the Orioles’ 2014 everyman-savior, Steve Pearce, and the Royals’ postseason breakthrough star, Lorenzo Cain. The eyes and the numbers tell markedly different stories for a variety of reasons, but for both players, a preponderance of the arrows are pointing downward for the upcoming season. Read the rest of this entry »

At a lazy spring pre-game meeting with Bob Melvin a few weeks back, he mentioned off-hand that Marcus Semien wasn’t going to play every day. For half a second, it seemed we had a bit of a scoop on our hands, an emerging platoon at shortstop for the Athletics. But then, that was worth a confirmation — “You just mean he’s an Athletic, right?”

Yeah, Melvin said, “We don’t play anyone everyday. But when he’s playing, he’s playing short.” Less of a scoop, but still interesting, was this confirmation of what Billy Beane said during the winter meetings about Semien’s new-ish position.

Here’s a player that had played all over the diamond in Chicago, coming to a new team to take over one position as a starter. That hasn’t happened much before. In fact, only four players since 2002 have left one team as a utility man and arrived on their new team as a shortstop — Adeiny Hechavarria, Craig Counsell, Jed Lowrie, and Julio Lugo.

The manager and the player were upbeat about what the position switch would mean for his defense. As the latter three names show, it isn’t a move that’s usually done with defense standouts, but there might be something about focusing on one position that helps.

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Probably should have seen this one coming. Last week, FanGraphs overlord David Appelman announced some minor improvements to the way WAR is calculated on the site, one of them being the inclusion of a double play avoidance stat (wGDP). Shortly thereafter, managing editor Dave Cameron wrote a post regarding The Thing Adam Dunn Was Surprisingly Great At (hint: it was avoiding double plays) and mentioned, in passing, that Mike Trout happened to be the very best at that particular thing last season.

As a quick refresher course, I’ve created an entirely underwhelming flowchart which I believe accurately represents the state of Major League Baseball in the year 2015. My sincerest apologies go out to Sean Dolinar, for I assume this single-handedly ruins all the hard work he’s done over the past couple months in an effort to unify and improve the site’s graphics.

Behold:

So that’s how we got here. A new stat was born, and, like clockwork, Mike Trout just so happened to be the best at it. Well, he was last year at least. In 2014, Trout led the MLB by creating an additional three runs above average by avoiding the double play. If you want take it back a bit further, here’s what a top-15 leaderboard looks like over the last three years, or since Trout has been a full-time regular:

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Ben and Sam preview the Dodgers’ season with Molly Knight, and Sahadev talks to True Blue LA’s Eric Stephen (at 32:54).

Episode 544
Dave Cameron is both (a) the managing editor of FanGraphs and (b) the guest on this particular edition of FanGraphs Audio — during which edition he discusses not Kris Bryant exclusively, but also definitely Kris Bryant at some point.

Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio after the jump. (Approximately 41 min play time.)

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Episode 543
Kiley McDaniel is both (a) the lead prospect writer for FanGraphs and also (b) the guest on this particular edition of FanGraphs Audio — during which edition he discusses, almost by accident, most of the top-10 prospects for the 2015 amateur draft.

Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio after the jump. (Approximately 59 min play time.)

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In 2011, Brian Matusz had one of the worst seasons imaginable as a pitcher. At the end of Spring Training, he suffered an intercostal strain and missed the first three months of the season. In his first start back, he gave up one run in 5 2/3 innings pitched, struck out three and walked none. In his next eleven starts, broken up by a stint in the minor leagues, he pitched 44 innings, struck out 35, walked 24 and gave up 18 home runs. There have been roughly 7,000 pitcher seasons over 40 innings in the last 20 years. Brian Matusz’ 3.26 HR/9 is the highest of all of them. Matusz was given another shot to start the next season, but was sent to the minors in July and when he returned, it was as a reliever, the role he has had ever since.

There have been some discussions about moving him back into a starting role. Baltimore does not currently have an opening for him, but there have been rumors that another team could trade for him and try to recapture the talent that once made him Baseball America’s number five prospect in all of baseball. In his recent Sunday Notes column, David Laurilia asked him if he enjoyed starting more and he answered, “Absolutely. No question.” The Orioles had been ramping up Matusz with starter innings, getting up to four innings on March 20th, but have since limited him to one inning performances, readying him for the role he has held the last two seasons for the Orioles.
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