If the Houston Astros win tonight, they’ll go to the World Series. That’s in line with what they expected to be doing before the season — this is the fifth straight year the Astros have played in the ALCS, and they’ve been to the World Series in two of those four years. But if they make it three out of five this year, they’ll do so despite pitching injuries that have left the team rebuilding their rotation on the fly, much as they’ve been doing since the start of the year.

Yesterday, Dusty Baker intimated that Lance McCullers Jr. is out for the remainder of the postseason. Given that he was left off the ALCS roster, that’s hardly a surprise, but it does mean that the Astros need to plan for how their rotation will work without him going forward.

With their presumptive ace gone, the top of the rotation now starts with Framber Valdez. I’d argue that it might have started with him in any case, but with McCullers out, he’s clearly the best option. That lines him up to start a World Series opener if they make it that far, but does make him mostly unavailable before then. Easy enough, here’s the rotation through one spot:

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 wrapup. 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!

Chicago White Sox (93–69)

The Big Question
Did the White Sox miss out by not acquiring another bat? I wouldn’t say they had a lackadaisical offseason, considering they made two massive upgrades to their pitching staff in Lance Lynn and Liam Hendriks. But they didn’t show a similar vigor in adding to the offense. Chicago didn’t struggle to score in 2020, finishing second in the AL in runs scored, but right field and designated hitter were notorious weak spots. And while there was talk about swiping Nelson Cruz out from under the Twins’ noses, the White Sox settled for signing wayward son Adam Eaton to a one-year deal and counting on top prospect Andrew Vaughn to be ready for the majors. Both were considerable risks: Eaton was coming off the worst season of his career, and Vaughn had yet to play above A-ball, where a lot of his value came from walks.

How It Went
That part of the plan didn’t quite work out. Vaughn did a respectable job picking up the outfield on the fly and even briefly cosplayed as a second baseman and a third baseman. But while he showed a solid eye at the plate, as in A-ball, not a lot of power came out of it; he struggled to a .613 OPS in the second half, and righties dominated him with breaking stuff all season. In the end, Vaughn would have been better served at Triple-A, which already would have been a big leap; the White Sox didn’t get anything from him they couldn’t have gotten from any other random fourth outfielder on a one-year deal. Eaton, meanwhile, was terrible, saw his playing time diminish, and was released midseason.

In the end, though, it didn’t actually matter! Neither Cleveland nor Minnesota proved up to the task of contention, and the White Sox were blessed with Yermín Mercedes having the best two months of his life in April and May, giving the team a surprise reinforcement at a time when the division was still in doubt. Even injuries to Eloy Jiménez and Luis Robert couldn’t completely stop the team in its tracks. By the time Chicago acquired Craig Kimbrel at the deadline, the AL Central race was long over for all intents and purposes. Read the rest of this entry »

Episode 945

On this episode, we welcome back a major leaguer, dork out about prospects and fantasy baseball, and dive into weird October starting pitcher usage.

• To kick things off, David Laurila is joined by Andrew Miller, who last appeared in episode 891. They discuss postseason start times, relievers pacing themselves vs. throwing max effort, and how the new CBA could potentially address robot umpires. Miller also shares what it has been like to play with some of the best managers and coaches of this generation during his 16-year major league career. [2:59]
• After that, Eric Longenhagen and Paul Sporer catch up about First Pitch Arizona, which they both recently attended. The duo discuss the intersection of the prospect and fantasy baseball communities, and go over some of the players who are currently popular with both. All eyes might be on Adley Rutschman, but Paul is starting a Spencer Torkelson fan club and he can’t wait to tell you about it. [26:08]
• Finally, Ben Clemens and Jay Jaffe discuss the incredible shrinking postseason starter. Pitcher usage has been especially strange this October and the pair offer a number of reasons why, including (and most notably) the uptick in pitcher workloads after the shortened 2020 season. Ben and Jay also talk about using starters on their throw days and the concerns they have for overworked pitchers going forward. [58:34]

Read the rest of this entry »

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

It’s Friday, and thus it’s time for another episode of Chin Music. This week, I am joined by the always well-coiffed Eric Longenhagen for a wide-ranging discussion about baseball and other subjects. We begin by reviewing the League Championship Series to this point, before getting into some front office news and discussing just how silly titles have become. Then we delve below the big leagues to talk about who has caught Eric’s eye so far in the Arizona Fall League. Next we are joined by special guest Katie Woo of The Athletic to talk about the sudden and surprising firing of now former Cardinals manager Mike Shildt, and what lies ahead for the franchise. Then it’s your emails, including a discussion of how the Orioles re-build is going, followed by one hell of a story from Eric, who took a walk the other night that got very strange. We finish with a discussion of stand-up comedy, parasocial relationships, and the greatest band nobody listened to at the time.

As always, we hope you enjoy, and thank you for listening.

Music by Kowloon Walled City.

Have a question you’d like answered on the show? Ask us anything at chinmusic@fangraphs.com. Read the rest of this entry »

Podcast (chin-music): Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

For much of this postseason, the main storyline for the Los Angeles Dodgers has been a pitching staff that’s been stretched to its limit, but that focus neglects the fact that the Dodgers have also struggled to hit like they did earlier in the year. Entering Game 5 of the NLCS, they’d scored just 3.5 runs per game in their 10 previous playoff tilts. They were shutout twice by the Giants, and held to fewer than four runs four other times. It was an uncharacteristic slump for what had been one of the National League’s most potent lineups during the regular season. As a team, they were hitting just .231/.303/.356 (.286 wOBA) in October, a far cry from their .251/.339/.446 (.337 wOBA) regular season effort.

With their season hanging in the balance, the Dodgers bats finally came alive on Thursday night. They collected 17 hits against the Atlanta Braves — every position player in the lineup collected at least one hit except for Will Smith — and pushed 11 runs across the plate to force a Game 6 in Atlanta this weekend. This was the Dodgers’ seventh straight postseason win while facing elimination, the third longest streak in baseball history.

The hero of the game was undoubtedly Chris Taylor. He started his night by blasting a two-run home run off a center-cut fastball from Max Fried to give the Dodgers a 3-2 lead in the second inning — a lead they wouldn’t relinquish for the remainder of the night. In the third with runners on the corners, Taylor blooped a single into center for his second hit and third RBI of the game. He hit his second home run in the fifth inning, another two-run shot off Chris Martin, who had just entered the game in relief of Fried. Taylor came up again in the seventh inning with the bases empty and deposited a pitch into the left-center field bleachers — his third homer of the game and sixth RBI. His final at-bat came in the eighth and he came close to a fourth home run when he lined a hanging curveball down the left field line; it curved foul and he ended up striking out to end the inning:

Read the rest of this entry »

As bullpen cogs go, Tyler Matzek has been an indispensable one for the Braves in each of the past two seasons, helping them win back-to-back NL East titles and get within one win of the World Series — and this time around, perhaps to outdo that. The 31-year-old lefty has become the Braves’ “Everyday Eddie” in October, pitching in all eight of the team’s postseason games thus far and generally dominating. His performance has been all the more impressive given his backstory, an odyssey that took him from being the Rockies’ first-round pick in 2009 to taking leave from the team six years later due to performance anxiety issues to pitching for an indy-league team called the Texas Airhogs before returning to the majors.

So far this October, Matzek has pitched a total of 8.1 innings, nearly all of them high-leverage, for a unit that has delivered a postseason-best 2.60 ERA in 34.2 innings — 10 fewer than any of the other three remaining teams, if you’re looking for a commentary on the stability of the Braves’ rotation relative to those of the Dodgers, Astros, and Red Sox. The starters’ comparatively strong performance (2.55 ERA, 3.25 FIP, and five or more innings five times) has allowed manager Brian Snitker to line up his bullpen to best effect, and that’s generally meant calling upon Matzek and righty Luke Jackson ahead of lefty closer Will Smith late in the game. After the Braves’ 9-2 victory over the Dodgers on Wednesday night, during which Matzek pitched a scoreless, 14-pitch eighth inning when the margin was still just three runs, Snitker gushed, “Our bullpen guys… all they do is answer the phone and get ready. And I ride them. I told them all they got saddle cinches on their sides because I have tightened that thing so hard riding them. They have done a great job.”

In his 8.1 innings, Matzek has allowed four hits, four walks, and two runs while striking out 13 (39.3%) on the strength of his fastball/slider combination. The runs and two of the walks came in Game 2 of the NLCS against the Dodgers, and they weren’t entirely his fault. Summoned in the sixth inning of a 2-2 game — the earliest he’s entered any of this year’s postseason games — he struck out Albert Pujols with two outs and a runner on third, then returned to pitch the seventh where he lost a 10-pitch battle to Mookie Betts, whom he walked before striking out both Corey Seager and Trea Turner on three pitches apiece. During Seager’s plate appearance, Betts stole second, so Snitker ordered Matzek to walk Will Smith (the Dodgers’ catcher, not the Braves’ closer) and then called upon Jackson. The intentional walk backfired, as Jackson hit Justin Turner with a pitch to load the bases, and then served up a two-run double to Chris Taylor, giving the Dodgers a 4-2 lead and charging the runs to Matzek’s room. The Braves would come back to tie the game after Dave Roberts‘ ill-fated and puzzling decision to use Julio Urías to pitch the eighth inning, and to win in the ninth via Eddie Rosario’s walk-off single off Kenley Jansen. Read the rest of this entry »

Ian Anderson had a rough go of first innings this year. In 24 games, he compiled a 6.38 ERA, and this isn’t some case of a pile of seeing-eye singles doing him in. He allowed 2.3 home runs per nine innings, walked 14.2% of the batters he faced, and generally let the offense do what they wanted. His numbers worked out to a 5.29 FIP, which hardly seems like a fair representation of his skill. In every other inning he pitched this year, he was comparatively excellent: 0.9 home runs per nine, an 8.8% walk rate, and sterling run prevention numbers (2.93 ERA, 3.71 FIP).

I hate to use the word “narrative” because it’s mostly a lazy baseball writer crutch, but it’s unavoidable here: the narrative that Anderson is vulnerable in the first inning and bulletproof afterwards has been omnipresent in his playoff starts. When he gave up a first-inning home run to Corey Seager in Game 2 of the NLCS, it was something obvious to point to. First inning? Must just be Anderson’s unique flaw, a magic spell that makes him terrible until he gets a chance to grab some sweet dugout pine.

If you can’t tell from the way I’ve described it, I’m skeptical. Splits like that feel too hand-wavy, too post hoc ergo propter hoc, if you’re into being pretentious like I am. Every pitcher has to be worst in some inning, by sheer chance alone, even if their true talent never wavers. If I had my druthers, I’d just ignore the whole thing and go back to watching dugout celebrations. But because the first inning is the first, rather than the third or the sixth or any other random number, I thought I’d do an investigation into how much we should believe it. Read the rest of this entry »