Kendall Graveman surprised me with something he said during the ALCS. Talking with the 30-year-old, then-Houston Astros reliever, I learned that it was only recently that he truly learned a breaking ball. As the now-free agent put it, “I didn’t throw one forever, really. I didn’t know how to spin it.”

He spun a lot of good ones during the 2021 season. Throwing more breakers than at any point in his career, Graveman had 61 strikeouts and allowed just 35 hits in 53 relief appearances comprising 56 innings. Toeing the rubber for both the Seattle Mariners and the Astros — he switched teams shortly before the July trade deadline — he logged a 1.77 ERA and a 3.19 FIP. Opponents slashed just .130/.193/.196 against the right-hander’s slider.

Graveman signed a free agent deal with the Mariners in November 2019, six-plus after entering pro ball as Toronto’s eighth-round pick out of Mississippi State University. Why did it take him so long to master the intricacies of such an important facet of his craft?

“Some pitching coaches have a very good understanding of how to teach something, and I ran into some people over in Seattle who taught me how to throw a breaking ball,” said Graveman. “Since when I was young, I would cup out of the hand and that would get me on the outside and not creating good spin. That’s as opposed to throwing it like a fastball. We started taking it out like a fastball and letting the wrist be loose, and started seeing positive signs with the spin.”

I asked the Alexander City, Alabama native if he could elaborate on the adjustment. Read the rest of this entry »

After a one-year hiatus due to the oddity and non-celebratory feeling of a season truncated by a raging pandemic, we’re bringing back the Elegy series in a streamlined format for a 2021 wrap-up. Think of this as a quick winter preview for each team, discussing the questions that faced each team ahead of the year, how they were answered, and what’s next. Do you like or hate the new format? Let me know in the comments below. We’ve already tackled the AL and NL Central, the NL and the AL West, and the AL East. We wrap up this series for 2021 with the NL East. Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the latest batch of silly Scott Boras quotes, featuring Meg’s real-time reactions to hearing them for the first time, a “fake quote or real quote?” quiz, and a discussion of the motivations behind the superagent’s annual stand-up routine, then discuss Boras’s comments about competitive integrity and try to identify the 13 (or more) teams that Boras says aren’t trying to win. Then (41:15) they examine the idea of an official MLB player ranking system, answer emails about Clayton Kershaw’s usage, the best type of routine out with which to end a postseason series, and the least valuable entity that teams would trade, and close (1:16:12) with Stat Blasts on the Braves as a Ship of Theseus and Pedro Feliciano vs. Chase Utley and the most prolific pitcher-batter matchups.

Audio intro: The Hives, "No Pun Intended"
Audio outro: Lilys, "Scott Free"

Link to “best” Boras quotes
Link to WaPo on Boras and competition
Link to CBS Sports on Boras and tanking
Link to video of Boras on Bryant
Link to video of Boras on Conforto
Link to video of Alderson on Boras
Link to Rob Mains on competitive inequality
Link to Bill James Handbook 2022
Link to Ben on peak Kershaw
Link to Ben on Kershaw’s adjustments
Link to final out of the 2016 World Series
Link to FanGraphs post on trading data
Link to Stat Blast data on postseason rosters
Link to Stat Blast data on common matchups
Link to Stat Blast data on Johnson vs. Cobb
Link to Stat Blast data on matchups over time
Link to study on batters learning over time
Link to Feliciano obit
Link to Feliciano vs. Utley matchup summary
Link to Feliciano vs. Utley matchup details
Link to The Athletic’s FanGaphs WAR report
Link to EW interview with Jonathan Judge
Link to Stove League teaser video
Link to stream Stove League via Kocowa
Link to stream Stove League via Viki

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The following article is part of a series concerning the 2022 Golden Days Era Committee ballot, covering managers and long-retired players whose candidacies will be voted upon on December 5. For an introduction to this year’s ballot, see here, and for an introduction to JAWS, see here. Several profiles in this series are adapted from work previously published at SI.com, Baseball Prospectus, and Futility Infielder. All WAR figures refer to the Baseball-Reference version unless otherwise indicated.

Roger Maris

Casual baseball fans know Roger Maris mainly for his toppling of Babe Ruth’s single-season home run record in 1961, when he beat out teammate Mickey Mantle and hit 61 homers. The more hardcore fans might know that Maris actually won back-to-back AL MVP awards with the Yankees in 1960 and ’61, and helped the team to five straight pennants and a pair of championships. While it’s sometimes presumed that these achievements are enough to merit Maris a spot in Cooperstown, a closer look at the slugger’s 12-year career (1957-68) suggests that he’s exactly where he should be with respect to the Hall of Fame: on the outside. Read the rest of this entry »

Following the completion of the World Series last week, all eyes in the baseball world will now turn to the sport’s next major showdown: the negotiation of a new collective bargaining agreement between the owners and the Major League Baseball Players Association. MLB’s existing CBA is set to expire at 11:59 p.m. EST on Wednesday, December 1, a deadline that many anticipate could trigger the sport’s first work stoppage since 1994. Indeed, while a strike or lockout is by no means guaranteed at this point, the possibility certainly appears more likely than it has at any point in the last two decades.

This post will provide an overview of the upcoming collective bargaining negotiations, briefly summarizing how the parties got to this point, what are likely to be the major issues to be hammered out in a new CBA, and what baseball fans can expect in the coming weeks (and, perhaps, months).

How We Got Here

In many respects, the seeds of the present discontent between the players and owners were sown during the negotiation of the sport’s last several CBAs, and perhaps most notably the soon-to-expire 2016 agreement. Although there was ample reason to believe that MLB’s financial model was moving in an unfavorable direction for the players, the union has been perceived by many as having failed to sufficiently prioritize the pursuit of significant economic modifications from the owners in 2016 (a claim that at least some in the union would dispute). Instead, to many, the MLBPA appeared to focus more on quality-of-life issues in the 2016 agreement, such as more humane travel schedules and clubhouse perks like private chefs. Read the rest of this entry »