Just as the baseball industry was catching its breath following the news of Trevor Bauer signing with the Dodgers, the free agent market’s top hitter, Marcell Ozuna, agreed to a deal as well. After a monster season in which he helped the Braves come within one win of their first trip to the World Series this millennium, he’ll stay in Atlanta on a four-year, $65 million deal. If that contract — which includes a club option for 2025 that can take the total package to $80 million — seems light compared to what the free market’s other top players have received, your eyes aren’t deceiving you.

Consider for a moment that Bauer, a 30-year-old righty who won the NL Cy Young award during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, has yet to put together a 30-start season with an ERA or FIP below 4.00 in parts of nine major league seasons, during which he’s been about nine or 10 percent better than average according to FIP- and ERA-. Via the structure of his three-year, $102 million deal with the Dodgers, he’ll set single-season records for salary in the first two years ($40 million and $45 million), with an average annual value of $34 million if he doesn’t opt out after years one or two.

The 30-year-old Ozuna is coming off the best season of an eight-year major league career during which he’s been 17 percent better than average according to wRC+. In 2020, he set across-the-board career highs in his slash stats, hitting .338/.431/.636, all of which ranked third in the NL, as did his 179 wRC+. Additionally, his 18 homers, 56 RBI, 145 total bases and 267 plate appearances all led the league, while his 2.5 WAR — which matched that of Bauer, interestingly enough — ranked seventh. Yet the $16.25 million AAV of his contract isn’t half that of Bauer, and it’s well below those of two of the four other position player free agents who have landed deals of at least four years:

Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the latest developments for their minor league free agent draft teams, then discuss the Dodgers signing reigning NL Cy Young Award winner Trevor Bauer to an unexpected and unusually structured record contract, touching on the good and bad of Bauer, the incredible Dodgers-Padres arms race, and much more. Then (39:04) they draft their favorite responses to a recent viral tweet about the best, worst, and weirdest beliefs about baseball.

Audio intro: Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, "Trevor Forever"
Audio outro: T. Rex, "Dandy in the Underworld"

Link to Ben Clemens on the Bauer signing
Link to Bauer’s announcement video
Link to Bradford Doolittle on Bauer
Link to Sarah Griffin’s tweet
Link to article about Dandy

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The top free agent pitcher in baseball is no longer a free agent. After an interminable PR tour, Trevor Bauer has signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers, as Jon Heyman first reported. The deal, a three-year, $102 million pact with opt outs after each year, bolsters an already-stout Dodgers rotation and ups the NL West arms race after the Padres’ busy offseason.

It would hardly be honest to write about Bauer without mentioning who he is as a person, so let’s do that first. For lack of a better way to say it, he’s a jerk, a troll. That’s not harsh enough, but it points in the right direction. “Troll” undersells it: time and again, Bauer has stepped up to the line and then gone past it, lashing out and inducing his fans to harass someone before acting shocked at the fallout, claiming innocence.

I won’t detail each individual incident, but suffice it to say that this goes beyond your typical Twitter sniping. The pattern is shockingly similar each time: Bauer takes offense at some perceived slight on social media, berates and otherwise insults the source of that slight (sometimes at great length), and then with a quote tweet, points his fans and followers in the woman’s direction (and it’s almost always a woman), who then proceed to harass her.

Eventually, Bauer issues a banal non-apology about how he never intended to harm anyone and doesn’t believe he did anything wrong, despite the glib falsity of that statement. This isn’t an isolated incident, a poor decision made in his rash youth. It’s a pattern, and a well-documented one.

I’m not here to legislate how you feel about that. I’ll simply invite you to consider how it feels to root for someone who repeatedly takes advantage of his popularity and power to make life worse for people without those things; how it feels to be one of those people. For the remainder of this article, though, I’m going to talk about what this means on the field, on the days where Bauer is pitching, though that hasn’t always been without conflict either. Read the rest of this entry »

2:00	Jay Jaffe: Good afternoon and welcome to today’s chat — the first time I’ve gone back-to-back weeks with a chat since… September! Some housekeeping while we wait for the queue to fill…

2:01	Jay Jaffe: On Monday I published my latest five-year outlook for the Hall of Fame voting https://blogs.fangraphs.com/changing-times-the-next-five-years-of-bbwa…

2:02	Jay Jaffe: And then yesterday and today I published a two-part series on the remaining free agents with spring training less than two weeks away. Here are the position players https://blogs.fangraphs.com/still-on-the-shelves-part-i-top-remaining-…

2:02	Jay Jaffe: And here are the pitchers https://blogs.fangraphs.com/still-on-the-shelves-part-2-top-remaining-…

2:02	Jay Jaffe: Seems quite possible it could go down while we’re in this chat. We’ve all got one eye on it

Read the rest of this entry »

After sitting idly by for most of the winter, the Phillies suddenly sprung into action last week. They finally got their long-term deal done with J.T. Realmuto, emphatically answering one the biggest lingering questions of their offseason. They re-signed Didi Gregorius, addressing another major area of need at shortstop. But those moves overshadowed two smaller ones aimed at shoring up the back of their starting rotation, with Philadelphia signing Matt Moore to a one-year, $3 million deal with additional performance bonuses last Friday, then adding Chase Anderson on Thursday on a one-year contract worth a guaranteed $4 million. It’s no secret that many teams are worried about the workload of their pitching staffs after the abbreviated season last year, and a number have already committed to using six-man rotations to lighten the load on their starters. It appears the Phillies could be pursuing a similar strategy.

With Aaron Nola and Zack Wheeler leading the way, the Phillies’ rotation was actually a strength in 2020. That duo accumulated a combined four WAR last year, and both are returning for 2021. Zach Eflin’s revamped curveball, meanwhile, translated into a breakout season for the 26-year-old, making him a solid mid-rotation starter if those adjustments hold.

But the rest of the starting five is filled with question marks. Jake Arrieta’s three-year deal expired this offseason, so he’s out of the picture. Vince Velasquez continued to be an unpredictable enigma, posting an ugly 5.56 ERA that far outpaced his 4.16 FIP. Top pitching prospect Spencer Howard made his MLB debut in 2020, but it was an experience he’d like to forget. Poor conditioning and the delayed start to the year sapped him of his stamina during the season, with his fastball velocity noticeably dropping as the innings wore on in each of his starts. With two shoulder injuries in his recent past, it’s hard to say what to expect from Howard in 2021.

So while neither Moore or Anderson are projected to be better than back-end starters at best, they do give the Phillies some options when filling out their rotation.

Read the rest of this entry »

I’m going to spend about half this article trying to deceive you. I just thought you should know that upfront. Why? Alex Chamberlain wrote a wonderful article about Kyle Hendricks yesterday, and it reminded me of one of my favorite paradoxical findings about pitching. Now, I’m going to use that finding to bamboozle you — or at least, that’s the plan.

Hendricks, you see, is spectacular at throwing pitches in the shadow zone, the boundaries of the strike zone and the area just outside of it. That’s an obviously useful skill. When you watch a pitcher painting the corners, it doesn’t just feel like hitters are unlikely to make solid contact, it’s actually true. Batters have worse outcomes on the borderline part of the plate than in any other zone.

Here’s a statement that I don’t think is at all controversial: pitchers exercise a lot of control over where they throw the ball. It’s not like exit velocity — mostly batter-controlled — or walk rate, which depends on myriad factors that both pitcher and batter affect. Where a pitcher throws the ball should be up to, well, the pitcher.

It stands to reason that if pitchers control where the ball goes, there will be leaders and laggards at it. As it turns out, there are! As Chamberlain pointed out, no one has thrown a higher percentage of their pitches in the shadow zone (since 2015) than Kyle Hendricks; Marco Gonzales is narrowly behind in second place. Sure sounds like a skill to me. Read the rest of this entry »

With spring training suddenly less than two weeks away after the players’ union rejected Major League Baseball’s proposal to delay the start of the season, on Thursday I made note of the recent flurry of free agent activity while rounding up the top players at each position who remain on the market. Six of those placed among our Top 50 Free Agents, including two in our top 10, namely Marcell Ozuna and Justin Turner; as I was writing, a seventh, Kolten Wong, agreed to terms with the Brewers.

Likewise, as I was putting that together, relievers Alex Colomé and Joakim Soria came off the board, and as I turned my attention to this batch of still-available free agent starters and relievers, the Trevor Bauer chase appeared as though it could end before I filed, though that proved to be a false alarm. Anyway, until he signs, this group includes eight free agents in our Top 50, six starters and two relievers. Without further ado…

[Update: Further ado necessary, because on Friday afternoon, Bauer agreed to a three-year, $102-million deal with the Dodgers — not the Mets, a bit of a shock as the sequence below indicates. Ben Clemens’ analysis is here. I’ve left the rest of this article as written.]

Starters

Bauer is the reigning NL Cy Young winner and the top free agent still available according to our list; Craig Edwards placed him third behind J.T. Realmuto and George Springer, both of whom brought home nine-figure deals. The question is whether the 30-year-old righty will do the same. As of Thursday, the pursuit appears to be down to the Mets and Dodgers, with the other teams that have shown significant interest, including the Blue Jays and Padres, having falling by the wayside.

MLB.com’s Jon Heyman reported that the Mets’ offer is believed to be three years and close to $100 million, with an opt-out after the first year. Via MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand, the Dodgers are believed to be interested in a one- or two-year deal possibly worth more than $36 million annually, which would surpass Bauer’s former UCLA teammate Gerrit Cole for the highest AAV in MLB history. On Thursday evening, USA Today’s Bob Nightengale reported that Bauer had agreed to a deal with the Mets, though six minutes later, Feinsand refuted that report. Read the rest of this entry »

Barring a last-minute decision to push back the start of the 2021 season, we are less than two weeks away from pitchers and catchers reporting to spring training. And while there are still several notable free agents who have yet to sign and a long list of currently unemployed players who will end up competing for a job in major league camp, we’re close enough that FanGraphs’ Opening Day Roster Tracker could already be quite useful.

Here’s a quick primer on who will be in major league camp, what happens as rosters are pared down to 26 players, and how our tracker can help you keep up between now and Opening Day.

Who Is in Major League Camp?

The full squad is comprised of each team’s full 40-man roster and a group of non-roster invitees (NRI). A non-roster invitee must be added to the 40-man roster if they break camp with the major league club.

What Happens When a Player Is Officially Out of the Running for an Opening Day Roster Spot?

If a player on the 40-man roster does not make the team, they are optioned to the minors; non-roster invitees are reassigned. They will continue to prepare for the upcoming season in minor league camp. This does not, however, completely rule them out from making the Opening Day roster. Circumstances can change, usually because of injuries, and a player can be brought back after being sent down. Read the rest of this entry »

Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the New York Yankees. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as my own observations. As there was no minor league season in 2020, there are some instances where no new information was gleaned about a player. Players whose write-ups have not been altered begin by telling you so. For the others, the blurb ends with an indication of where the player played in 2020, which in turn likely informed the changes to their report. As always, I’ve leaned more heavily on sources from outside the org than within for reasons of objectivity. Because outside scouts were not allowed at the alternate sites, I’ve primarily focused on data from there. Lastly, in effort to more clearly indicate relievers’ anticipated roles, you’ll see two reliever designations, both in lists and on The Board: MIRP, or multi-inning relief pitcher, and SIRP, or single-inning relief pitcher.

For more information on the 20-80 scouting scale by which all of our prospect content is governed, you can click here. For further explanation of Future Value’s merits and drawbacks, read Future Value.

All of the numbered prospects here also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It can be found here.

Editor’s Note: Fidel Montero was added to this list after he agreed to a deal with the Yankees on February 6.