Vladimir Guerrero Jr. is a force of nature. He’s one of the best hitters in baseball, and in a very obvious way: he scalds the baseball to all fields and hits a bunch of home runs. Last year was a down year, and he still left the yard 32 times. He perennially records some of the hardest-hit batted balls in the game. When you think about a prototypical first baseman, Guerrero’s combination of power and hit tool is probably what you’re picturing.

One of the impressive parts of Guerrero’s career has been his ability to limit strikeouts while still getting to his power. See, low strikeout rates aren’t an inherently great thing. If you don’t strike out very often but don’t do any damage when you put the ball in play, you’re not really making a good trade. Adam Frazier is a good example of this type of hitter. He struck out just 12.1% of the time last year, but posted an 81 wRC+ anyway because when he did make contact, it was generally weak. You can probably conjure a picture of this type of hitter on your favorite team. You love that they never give away an at-bat, but hate that they never take matters into their own hands and park one in the seats or smack one off the power alley wall.

Guerrero doesn’t suffer from that problem. He struck out just 16.4% of the time in 2022, but when he made contact, he wasn’t Fraziering it up out there. Let’s get that in numbers: in his career, Frazier is batting .317 with a .456 slugging percentage when he ends a plate appearance with a batted ball, good for a .327 wOBA. Guerrero is hitting .351 with a .616 slugging percentage, which works out to a .403 wOBA. One of these things is not like the other. That’s why low strikeout rates are great statistical markers for power hitters and yet broadly uninteresting in the population as a whole. What you do with those extra balls in play matters a ton, as Michael Baumann covered yesterday, and with far more Pitbull references than I could even think up. Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about whether a remedy for former Yankees slugger Moose Skowron might help current Yankees slugger Giancarlo Stanton, Cody Bellinger’s rebound and ovation violation, Domingo Germán’s sticky start, Juan Soto’s pitch-clock problem, Bryce Harper, hitting machines, and the future of minor-league rehab stints, whether Yandy Díaz’s “Ground Beef” nickname no longer applies, the reduced drag of the baseball and the overall offensive environment this season, the Atlantic League’s new experimental rules, the rules about rundowns on third pickoff attempts, a few injuries, extensions, and call-ups, the Marlins’ mediocrity despite their trades for top pitchers, Anthony Bass’s viral popcorn complaint, and more. Then (1:29:19) they do a Meet a Major Leaguer segment on Hobie Harris and Hogan Harris, check in on the Sean Murphy/Esteury Ruiz/William Contreras trade, and close with a Past Blast (1:50:06) from 1995 and a few follow-ups.

Audio intro: Gabriel-Ernest, “Effectively Wild Theme”
Audio outro: Monk Turner, “Beef Release”

Link to article on Skowron
Link to Stanton’s yoga videos
Link to article on Skowron’s swimming
Link to more on Skowron’s swimming
Link to FG post on Stanton
Link to research on static stretching
Link to EW Bellinger roundtable
Link to Voros’s Law
Link to Bellinger ovation
Link to Germán article
Link to Beck tweet about Germán
Link to Beck EW episode
Link to Soto pitch-clock tweet
Link to article on Harper’s rehab
Link to Ben on pitching machines
Link to Emma on rehab unis
Link to BP on Díaz
Link to Rob on baseball drag
Link to Baseball Savant drag values
Link to 2023 MiLB experiments
Link to Atlantic League experiments
Link to info on courtesy runners
Link to article on double-hook DH
Link to Ben on pitcher limits
Link to Harrison’s pickle expertise
Link to Sam Blum on Neto
Link to article on Arraez and López
Link to Baumann on Arraez
Link to FG post on López extension
Link to FG post on Webb extension
Link to FG post on Woodruff injury
Link to Sam Blum on Neto
Link to Bass tweet
Link to Bois on the Bass tweet
Link to article about Bass tweet
Link to Meet a Major Leaguer wiki
Link to B-Ref new debuts page
Link to Emma’s Battenfield tweet
Link to article on Hobie’s name
Link to Landrith obit
Link to Harris scouting report
Link to Mets-A’s box score
Link to Mets-A’s gamer
Link to possum story
Link to worst debut ERAs
Link to worst team ERA starts
Link to FG post on A’s pitching
Link to framing leaderboard
Link to Contreras defense article
Link to more on Contreras
Link to article on Brewers framing
Link to 1995 Past Blast source
Link to 1995 Past Blast source, cont’d.
Link to pensions article
Link to more info on pensions
Link to 2020 pensions column
Link to Teasley episode wiki
Link to David Lewis’s Twitter
Link to David Lewis’s Substack
Link to new Correa quote
Link to “Dior store” quote
Link to Wade/Ward wiki
Link to Sam’s 512 intro

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The Twins and Pablo López agreed on Monday to a four-year contract extension worth $73.5 million, ensuring that the team’s newest starting pitcher will stay in the Twin Cities through the 2027 season. López has been dynamite in his first four starts for Minnesota, allowing only five total runs and holding the current league crown in strikeouts, edging out Gerrit Cole and Jacob deGrom.

It’s not a surprise to find out the Twins are big fans of López. Otherwise, they would not have traded three years of a cost-controlled Luis Arraez, who is coming off a batting average title, a Silver Slugger award, and an All-Star appearance, in order to acquire his services. The extension would have made sense on the day of the trade; it makes even more sense with the very real chance that López has found another gear. Read the rest of this entry »

2:01	Jay Jaffe: Good afternoon, folks! Welcome to another edition of my weekly chat.

2:02

Jay Jaffe: I just went live an hour ago with my deep dive into the news that a Salt Lake City-based group has thrown its hat in the ring to bring an expansion franchise to the city where I grew up — a possibility I was immediately dismissive of last week.  https://blogs.fangraphs.com/salt-lake-citys-bid-for-a-major-league-exp…

2:03	Jay Jaffe: (I’ve reconsidered)

2:03	Jay Jaffe: Yesterday I had a quick look at the impact of Corey Seager’s latest injury https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-loss-of-corey-seager-threatens-the-ran…

2:08

Jay Jaffe: Good question. I haven’t seen much of him but I notice that his velocity is down a bit, and he’s getting hit very hard (7.43 xERA, woof). A quick look at his Stuff+ data shows that the scores for both his fastball and slider have particularly receded, (103 to 98 on the former, 111 to 101 for the latter,), with his overall Stuff+ and Pitching+ (including location) falling from 100 to 94. Velocity, shape, movement, I’m not sure what’s up but I’d guess he’s got some mechanical issues  to iron out. https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=pit&lg=all&qual=0…

Read the rest of this entry »

“I can’t imagine this at all.”

That was my knee-jerk reaction to last week’s announcement that a Salt Lake City-based group had launched a bid for a Major League Baseball expansion team. Growing up in SLC from 1973–88, I learned to appreciate the area’s mix of minor and major league sports and accept its limitations. I’d already seen prospects on their way up and journeymen on their way down while attending several games of the Pacific Coast League’s Salt Lake Gulls and the Central Hockey League’s Salt Lake Golden Eagles by the time the NBA’s New Orleans Jazz sputtered into town in 1979, financially beleaguered and thin on talent. Frankly, that operation felt minor league itself.

The Jazz eventually grew into an NBA powerhouse, but even having lived and died with that team, and watched the city’s growth mostly from afar for the past three and a half decades (my parents do still reside there), I was not prepared to accept the notion that the city’s time had come for an MLB franchise. I fully understand why the average fan — who for years has been hearing about Portland, Nashville, Montreal and other potential sites — might not be either. But upon closer investigation, this skeptic is convinced the SLC bid is a real contender — though one major and almost unfathomable obstacle looms.

MLB has no imminent plans to expand, but that didn’t prevent a consortium called Big League Utah from announcing its intent to compete for a franchise once the league does decide it’s ready for a 31st and 32nd team. Last week, Big League Utah launched an eye-catching campaign in connection with the groundbreaking of a redevelopment that could include a new ballpark. In touting the state’s growth, economy, location, local enthusiasm for sports, and quality of life, the group calls Utah “a five-tool player” — and I have to admit, that’s a pretty catchy way of putting it. Read the rest of this entry »

Steven Kwan and Myles Straw have extremely similar profiles. Both are small, speedy outfielders with great gloves. Kwan was a center fielder in both college and the minors, but Straw’s presence forced him over to left, and both took home Gold Gloves in 2022. On offense, they feature almost no pop, but they both survive through excellent bat-to-ball skills and plate discipline. They chase pitches outside the strike zone approximately never, and somehow they swing and miss even less often. You could practically snap their Baseball Savant sliders together like Legos.

Kwan’s is on the bottom and Straw’s is on top, but it doesn’t matter all that much; in most categories they’re nearly identical. That’s not to say that their performance is identical. Thanks largely to Kwan’s truly elite ability to avoid strikeouts and his lower groundball rate (plus a bit of batted ball luck), he put up a 124 wRC+ in 2022, nearly twice Straw’s. Still, the two Cleveland outfielders are very much playing the same game.

Crashing this scrappy little party after a May call-up was Oscar Gonzalez, the 6-foot-4, 240-pound right fielder with big power potential, no defense to speak of, and so little plate discipline that he finished the season just 0.4% shy of the worst chase rate humanly possible (also known as Javier Báez’s’s chase rate). He also absolutely towers over the 5-foot-9 Kwan and the 5-foot-10 Straw. Gonzalez looks like he could pick up the two Gold Glove winners and use them to play G.I. Joes. Read the rest of this entry »

The mighty Giancarlo Stanton has fallen once again. On Sunday afternoon, the 33-year-old was diagnosed with a Grade 2 strain in his left hamstring, according to Marly Rivera of ESPN. The Yankees placed him on the 10-day injured list, recalling top 100 prospect Oswald Peraza to take his place.

After he crushed a 110-mph double on Saturday afternoon, Stanton returned to the Yankees dugout while Aaron Hicks trotted out to second base. It wouldn’t be the first time the slow-moving slugger was replaced on the bases, so there wasn’t any reason to worry in the moment. Indeed, the DH walked off the field and was greeted with high fives in the dugout, where he remained to watch the game. As it turned out, however, Stanton had requested the pinch runner himself. He recognized the pain in his hamstring and knew immediately that something was wrong. Although Stanton didn’t show any outward signs of pain, it was certainly an awkward play. He thought he’d hit the ball over the fence and only realized he needed to run as he was rounding first.

While Stanton’s decision to prematurely marvel at his handiwork turned out to be a mistake, there’s no reason to blame his poor baserunning for his injury. The unfortunate truth is that Stanton’s legs – his left in particular – are quite injury-prone. He has spent time on the IL with various leg injuries in each of the past five seasons. In 2019, he sprained the PCL in his right knee and missed 72 games. The year after that, it was a left hamstring strain, much like the one he just suffered; he was out for five weeks. In 2021, he lost two weeks to a left quad strain, and last year, he missed 10 days with right ankle inflammation and another month with tendinitis in his left Achilles. Read the rest of this entry »

Logan O’Hoppe is a promising young hitter. No. 51 on our 2023 Top 100 Prospects list, the 23-year-old catcher is coming off a season during which he logged a 159 wRC+ and hit 26 home runs between a pair of Double-A stops. Dealt from the Phillies to the Angels in early August — Brandon Marsh went east to Philadelphia — O’Hoppe went on to make his big league debut with Los Angeles in late September. He saw action in five games and notched four hits in 14 get-your-feet-wet at-bats.

O’Hoppe broke camp as the Halo’s primary catcher this spring and has proceeded to slash .244/.300/.533 with four home runs and a 122 wRC+ over 50 plate appearances. He talked hitting prior to Sunday’s game at Fenway Park.

———

David Laurila: When and how did you learn to hit?

Logan O’Hoppe: “I’m still learning. I think it’s something that none of us have completely figured out. But yeah, just taking reps; I feel like that’s the best way to do it.” Read the rest of this entry »

For the purposes of researching this article, I went through Baseball Savant and watched several of Luis Arraez’s hits from the 2023 season. You can tell what kind of a heater he’s on by how the broadcast booth reacts when he gets a hit. Marlins play-by-play man Paul Severino, declaring that Arraez was in the midst of yet another multi-hit game, would chuckle as the ball touched outfield grass. On one occasion, Phillies announcer John Kruk muttered, “Jesus!” as Arraez dropped a triple down the right field line.

Arraez is so hot it’s entered the realm of the absurd. Through 15 games, he’s 24-for-51, mostly on singles that army crawl past bewildered infielders or fall softly in front of outfielders. As of Monday afternoon, he has yet to hit a ball with an exit velocity of 100 mph or greater. Ryan Mountcastle, who’s hitting .217 to Arraez’s .471, has 25 such batted balls.

The obvious thing to do in this situation would be to point out all the ways Arraez is getting lucky. He’s a fringy runner with a ninth-percentile (ninth-percentile!) hard-hit rate and a BABIP of .500, and so on and so forth. And ordinarily, I am the kind of relentless downer who goes around ruining other people’s good time. (Hope you enjoyed those wonderful shrimp tacos you had for lunch; the sea is full of microplastics and you’re going to die someday.) But I’m declaring Arraez’s hot start to be a negativity-free zone.

So let’s get to it. Is Arraez some kind of a wizard, or is he just getting lucky? The answer is yes. Read the rest of this entry »