The first member of our Top 50 Free Agents list has signed, and as you might expect given that this is baseball and not basketball, it was a minor signing. Robbie Ray is remaining in Toronto after the Blue Jays extended him a one-year, $8 million contract. Depending on what you think of Ray, it’s either a sign of a slow market or a fairly priced reclamation project — for what it’s worth, Craig Edwards projected exactly a one-year, $8 million deal.

For me, there are two interesting parts of the Ray signing. First, Robbie Ray felt this close to breaking into the top tier of starters for years. In his first five seasons with the Diamondbacks, he was frequently exciting and sometimes excellent. He put up a 2.89 ERA in 2017, and it wasn’t some hollow number with concerning peripherals; he induced swinging strikes on 14.2% of his pitches, a career high, and struck out 32.8% of opposing batters.

He also walked 10.7% of opposing batters, and unfortunately, that wasn’t a fluke. He walked 13.3% the next year and a grisly 17.9% in 2020, a sure way to go from inconsistent to ineffective. Missing bats is the most valuable pitching skill, but all the bat missing in the world won’t help you when that many batters are getting a free trip down to first. Read the rest of this entry »

Without a true minor league season on which to fixate, I spent the summer watching and evaluating young big leaguers who, because of the truncated season, will still be eligible for prospect lists at the end of the year. This is the final divisional installment of those thoughts, as well as a general recap. The other divisions can be found here: National League East, NL Central, American League East, Central, and West.

Below is my assessment of the National League West, covering players who have appeared in big league games. The results of these final 2020 changes made to player rankings and evaluations can be found over on the updated Board, though I provide more specific links throughout this post in case readers only care about one team. Read the rest of this entry »

Like most big-league broadcasters, Joe Block got his start down on the farm. The radio and TV play-by-play voice of the Pittsburgh Pirates broke into the business with the South Atlantic League’s Charleston RiverDogs back in 2000. That part of his story is isn’t unique. What is unique is that Block first shared the booth with a blind man.

Looking to break into baseball, Block traveled to Anaheim for the 1999 Winter Meetings after graduating from Michigan State University. Charleston had posted a broadcast intern position, and the fresh-faced Spartan secured an interview with the club’s then-broadcaster. The sit-down went well. Block hit it off with Dave Raymond — now the TV voice of the Texas Rangers — and was offered the job.

As fate would have it, they never got to call games together. Later that winter, Raymond took a job with the Triple-A Iowa Cubs. Replacing Raymond in Charleston was a duo that had worked together with the St. Paul Saints.

“I don’t know if you’re familiar with them, but Jim Lucas and Don Wardlow had been in the minor leagues for a number of years as a tandem,” explained Block. “Don was born blind. He never saw anything in his entire life.”

As an intern, Block’s primary responsibility was doing the pre- and post-game shows. Most appealing among his other duties was the opportunity to do play-by-play when Lucas took time off. What he learned was invaluable, and the unique circumstances played a big part in that. Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Lindbergh and guest co-host Steven Goldman of Baseball Prospectus banter about MLB’s Friday news dump, covering the Red Sox hiring Alex Cora, the Mets cleaning house in the front office and the potential for new owner Steve Cohen to be baseball’s offseason spending savior, and the league announcing that it wouldn’t discipline the Dodgers’ Justin Turner for his behavior after World Series Game 6. Then (27:56) they talk to pitching coach and journalist Brian Vikander, a co-author of the new biography Dalko: The Untold Story of Baseball’s Fastest Pitcher, about the fact and fiction surrounding Steve Dalkowski, the reputed hardest thrower in history, who never made the majors but left a confounding and fascinating legacy.

Audio intro: The Who, "Break the News"
Audio interstitial: Shoes, "Nowhere So Fast"
Audio outro: The Lemonheads, "Steve’s Boy"

Link to MLB’s Red Sox sign-stealing decision
Link to Jay Jaffe on the Cora hiring
Link to Craig Edwards on advice for Steve Cohen
Link to Ben Clemens on the Mets’ offense
Link to official statements about Turner
Link to L.A. Times story on Dodgers’ COVID cases
Link to Dalko website
Link to Steve Goldman on Dalkowski
Link to Craig Wright on Dalkowski
Link to Joe Posnanski on Dalkowski
Link to John Eisenberg on Dalkowski
Link to Dom Amore on Dalkowski
Link to The Infinite Inning podcast
Link to study on the southpaw advantage
Link to article on the physics of rising fastballs

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In the least shocking development of the offseason thus far, the Red Sox have rehired Alex Cora to manage the team. Not only did the move to bring back the previously suspended skipper appear to be inevitable, but news of it leaked onto Twitter just 22 minutes after Decision Desk HQ became the first verified outfit to call the presidential election in favor of Joe Biden. This was a Hall of Fame-caliber Friday news dump, designed to minimize the attention paid to a transaction that’s clearly defiant, if not cynical.

Put it this way: I’m no Jon Heyman when it comes to the inside baseball of Major League Baseball, but I tweeted a week ago that the Red Sox not rehiring Cora to manage would be an even bigger shock than the White Sox’s strange rehiring of Tony La Russa, who hasn’t managed since 2011. Unlike the situation in Chicago, where owner Jerry Reinsdorf appears to have unilaterally decided to bring back an old crony without interviewing other candidates (or at least announcing that they had done so), the Red Sox were reported to have interviewed several MLB coaches including Mike Bell (Twins), Don Kelly (Pirates), Carlos Mendoza (Yankees), James Rowson (Marlins), Skip Schumaker (Padres), Luis Urueta (Diamondbacks), and Will Venable (Cubs). But despite that crowded field — which grew to “at least nine candidates” who received first-round interviews — it’s fair to wonder the extent to which this was an ownership-driven decision. Read the rest of this entry »

Yesterday, I did a deeply meaningless thing. I ignored our site’s excellent projections — both ZiPS and Steamer do a great job of projecting future performance — and made my own terrible ones using some old methodology. Why? Partially because I’m not smart enough to build my own ZiPS, but mainly so that I could walk through the very basic way projection systems work — not by wishcasting or hoping or by finding some sneaky data point no one else has, but by carefully using and weighing the data we all have.

Of course, that’s a buttoned-down and boring way to think about things. Let’s talk about something fun instead! The top of the 2021 projections I made yesterday is dotted with a bunch of people you’d expect, and since I didn’t even bother park-adjusting it, a few too many Rockies. The impressive Fernando Tatis Jr. comes in at 11th in wOBA, which is cool given he still has a season of zeroes in there. Freddie Freeman is continuing his ascent. But here’s a shocker: there are four Mets in the top 40.

That sounds, well, wrong. The Mets aren’t supposed to be a good offensive team. They’re supposed to be a pitching team, what with Jacob deGrom and Noah Syndergaard atop the rotation (upon Syndergaard’s recovery) and Edwin Díaz locking down the bullpen. There’s just one problem with that narrative: it’s completely wrong. The Mets were, in fact, tied with the Dodgers for the best wRC+ in baseball last year. They finished fifth in position player WAR — the defense wasn’t a strength — but generally hit an absolute ton.
Read the rest of this entry »

Episode 895

The Qualifying Offers have been extended — or not — and so begins the hot stove. On this week’s show, the FanGraphs crew looks closely at another rebuild on the rise and lays out the nature of the offseason’s transactions so far.

• At the top of the episode, David Laurila is joined by Shannon Drayer of 710 ESPN Seattle. David and Shannon discuss the Seattle Mariners, who went 27-33 in 2020 but are very encouraged by the direction they are going. And while Kyle Lewis stole the show this season, a restocked farm system means more help may be on the way. [1:45]
• Following that, Eric Longenhagen and Jason Martinez go over some of the more interesting roster moves so far. Jason and Eric look at how this weird winter could unfold. What are the Mets going to do? Is Kevin Gausman legit? And are any of these early waiver moves going to pan out? Be sure to follow all the winter’s free agent action using the RosterResource Free Agent Tracker! [25:26]

Read the rest of this entry »

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Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the status of the designated hitter and answer a listener email with a Stat Blast about hitters who’ve homered from every spot in the lineup, then (23:11) bring on Cleveland life skills coordinator Jen Wolf to talk about her career path in baseball, what a life skills coordinator for an MLB team does, how her work with players has differed from the norm this year because of the pandemic, the group text she started for women working in baseball operations, the progress women have made in the MLB workforce, the obstacles and challenges they continue to face, how to improve the pipeline of candidates and encourage the league and teams to hire more diverse candidates, and much more.

Audio intro: Other Lives, "We Wait"
Audio interstitial: Math and Physics Club, "In This Together"
Audio outro: Hamilton (Original Broadway Cast Recording), "Wait for It"

Link to Passan’s DH report
Link to Ben on the DH
Link to Adam’s home run research
Link to New York Times article on Jen’s group text
Link to Jen’s LinkedIn page
Link to Professor Manning’s Baseball/American Society course
Link to MLB Diversity Fellowship Program
Link to non-cis men in baseball group

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As Steve Cohen completes his purchase of the Mets and begins his first offseason, there is going to be considerable speculation that Cohen will use his vast resources to make a splash and try to make the Mets contenders next season. He absolutely should do that, but it wouldn’t hurt to have a plan other than drop cash out of the sky and see which players take it. There are hundreds of free agents, tons of trade options, and many internal decisions on players. While unlimited funds sounds great, Cohen and the Mets will need to target their resources to make the biggest impact for this season and beyond. With that in mind, here’s how I would plan an ideal offseason for the Mets.

Don’t Trade Away Talented Players

When Brodie Van Wagenen got the Mets job, he had an admittedly difficult task to make the Mets into more of a contender without significantly increasing payroll. That meant taking on a bad contract in Robinson Canó’s deal, but also requiring cash to cover some of the costs and sending over players with near-term bad contracts in Jay Bruce and Anthony Swarzak to offset current contracts. Then, top prospect Jarred Kelenic was added all so the Mets could get an elite reliever in Edwin Díaz. In short, the Mets took on huge future salary commitments and gave up future talent for immediate salary relief and a reliever. The Mets shouldn’t have to make those types of moves to acquire talented players. Read the rest of this entry »

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