This is the latest installment of a series in which the FanGraphs staff rounds up the latest developments regarding the COVID-19 virus’ effect on baseball.

Baseball Invokes UEC Contract Provisions

Per a report by Ken Rosenthal, Major League Baseball will invoke a force majeure provision in the Uniform Employee Contract signed by all non-player personnel on May 1. The provision allows for the suspension of contracts in extraordinary circumstances. The provision has been available to teams since the declaration of a national state of emergency on March 13, but until now hadn’t been used.

The consequences of this decision aren’t yet known. Teams could do anything from leaving everything exactly as-is to furloughing all of their non-player workers, though healthcare benefits will remain the same. Still, even if teams don’t immediately act, it’s a tough situation for workers, including front office personnel, coaches, and scouts, who must now face the prospect of reduced salary or even unemployment while planning for an uncertain season. (Non-player personnel are not unionized.)

The Braves, Giants, and Phillies have already committed to paying their employees until May 31. Other teams will surely follow suit. But it’s hard to read this move as anything other than a bargaining chip for teams. With the specter of unemployment looming over them, employees might be more amenable to changing the terms of their contracts. The Players’ Association has already reached an agreement with MLB on salary changes in the event of a shortened season, and it appears that non-player employees may soon need to do the same. Read the rest of this entry »

Pitchers learn and develop different pitches, and they do so at varying stages of their lives. It might be a curveball in high school, a cutter in college, or a changeup in A-ball. Sometimes the addition or refinement is a natural progression — graduating from Pitching 101 to advanced course work — and often it’s a matter of necessity. In order to get hitters out as the quality of competition improves, a pitcher needs to optimize his repertoire.

In this installment of the series, we’ll hear from three pitchers — Anthony Kay, Pablo López, and Zac Lowther — on how they learned and developed their changeups.

———

Anthony Kay, Toronto Blue Jays

“I’ve been throwing this changeup ever since I’ve been pitching. I never really had a curveball until I was 16 or 17 years old. Growing up, it was mainly just fastball-changeup because my dad didn’t want me [throwing curveballs]. My older brother played, and he also didn’t have a curveball until he got older.

“I first learned a circle change, and I still pretty much throw it to this day. Of course, there has been a little bit of variation. When I came back from [Tommy John surgery] in 2017 it was pretty inconsistent, and I was trying to find a grip that made it more reliable. I used to be on the seams, like a two-seamer, and now I’m kind of moved over to where it’s almost the same, but just off the seams. I was cutting it a lot, and I think being on the seams was a big reason for that. Now that I’m off them, I feel I get a truer release to it.

“It was mostly an inconsistency issue. There were some days where it would be really good, and there were days where it wouldn’t be good at all; it would cut. So I figured I might as well just mess around with it a little bit and try and get it more consistent. I don’t know that I really understand why [the adjustment makes made it more consistent], but it did. Read the rest of this entry »

“That’s why I haven’t said anything. I haven’t talked to anybody. I just kind of let it go. Hopefully one day it just kind of got forgotten, and five years down the road (people said), ‘Where’s that Buehrle guy? Is he still around?'”

– Mark Buehrle on his retirement, 2017

It’s the final Sunday of the season, and the Toronto Blue Jays are playing meaningful baseball. That battle, at least, is already won. They clinched the division a few days ago, a postseason berth just before that — an August and September that, homer by homer, hammered two decades of futility into the dirt. With a win today and a loss from the Kansas City Royals, they could guarantee home-field advantage through a hypothetical ALCS. That is not why this game is important. The camera keeps panning to a nervous group of people, sitting in the stands under shadow, waiting out the top of the first, as the Blue Jays go silent — waiting for Mark Buehrle, who steps onto the Tropicana Field mound to face the Rays for the second time in three days. They can count out the numbers they are hoping for on their hands. Six outs. Six outs to get to 600, to 200 innings — to 3000 innings, spread with shocking consistency over 15 consecutive seasons. 

John Gibbons was questioned about this decision, of course. That the Jays are in the postseason at all seems a tenuous enough position to maintain. He knows, and everyone knows, that they should reach for every advantage they can get. And yet everyone knows, at the same time, that there can be multiple important things happening on a baseball field — that personal milestones, arbitrary as they are, are meaningful; that what is meaningful to one player can be almost as meaningful to the entire team. Six outs.

***

Read the rest of this entry »

With MLB in limbo, Ben Lindbergh investigates virtual baseball, talking to the designers of three new baseball video games—Ramone Russell of Sony San Diego, makers of MLB The Show 20, Markus Heinsohn of Out of the Park Developments, makers of Out of the Park Baseball 21 (37:56), and Scott Drader of Metalhead Software, makers of Super Mega Baseball 3 (1:21:50)—about the histories of their respective franchises, how their games differ stylistically, their different development plans, balancing realism and fun, how their games are helping fans and players cope with the absence of actual baseball, and much more (plus postscripts on Baseball Mogul 2020 and minor leaguers’ likenesses in MLB The Show).

Audio intro: The Alan Parsons Project, "Games People Play"
Audio interstitial 1: Jim Noir, "Do You Like Games"
Audio interstitial 2: Shout Out Louds, "Play the Game"
Audio outro: Drive-By Truckers, "Play it All Night Long"

Link to Episode 427 with Owen Good
Link to MLB The Show 20 trailer
Link to MLB The Show 20 website
Link to MLB The Show Players League
Link to MLB Network on Twitch
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Link to Ben on the ball in MLB The Show
Link to Mets broadcasters calling MLB The Show
Link to Ben on esports
Link to Out of the Park Baseball 21 trailer
Link to OOTP 21 website
Link to B-Ref’s OOTP 21 season sim
Link to MLB Dream Bracket
Link to Super Mega Baseball 3 trailer
Link to Super Mega Baseball 3 website
Link to Baseball Mogul 2020 website
Link to story about minor leaguers in MLB The Show
Link to Advocates for Minor Leaguers
Link to More Than Baseball
Link to order The MVP Machine

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I’m not privy as to whether the Cincinnati Reds assign a grade to character in their draft reports. I also don’t know how much the San Diego Padres weigh that attribute when pondering possible acquisitions. I do know that Taylor Trammell projects as more than a quality big-league outfielder. He projects as a role model.

Trammell became a Padre last summer. Part of the trade-deadline deal that sent Trevor Bauer to the Queen City, he’d been selected 35th overall by the Reds in the 2016 draft out of Kennesaw, Georgia’s Mount Paran Christian School. Blessed with plus raw tools, Trammell is slotted No. 69 on our 2020 Top 100 Prospects list.

A prima donna he’s not. When he reaches the big leagues, Trammell will do so with a genuine appreciation for what life has presented him. Moreover, he doesn’t just embrace the game of baseball. He embraces the people who come to see it played.

“I have thoughts on fans,” Trammell told me in Padres camp last month. “I love them. There are people who come to games and want to heckle, and they have the right to do that. Do I agree with it? No, but if you want to pay money to come yell at us, I mean, do whatever you want. Go to a boxing match. Go to a baseball game. Go to a basketball game. Any game. When there are a whole bunch of fans in the stands, whether they’re rooting for you or not rooting for you, it’s great for baseball. They want to see a game and we’re putting on a show for them.”

If you’re rolling your eyes with skepticism upon reading that, you shouldn’t be. By all accounts, that’s who Trammell is. Part of a working-class family — his father is a post office employee, his mother once balanced two jobs — he hasn’t forgotten where he came from. The values he grew up with remain the same. Read the rest of this entry »

Episode 884

On this edition of FanGraphs Audio, I welcome Jeff Sullivan, erstwhile FanGraphs writer and current Rays baseball person, back to the program. We discuss, among other things, the moment when we each realized just how much life was about to change in the face of COVID-19, Jeff’s quarantine hobbies, including birding, the scourge known as cruise ships, and the 2000 cheerleading film Bring It On. Plus, we contemplate what baseball might and should look like if it returns in 2020.

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Audio after the jump. (Approximate 48 min play time.)

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Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley speak to FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen and ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel about their new book, Future Value: The Battle for Baseball’s Soul and How Teams Will Find the Next Superstar, touching on topics including the best kinds of scouting stories, how technology and data have confirmed or overturned traditional scouting beliefs, how smart teams are spending, how to make a miserly owner invest in scouting and development, whether scouts should have access to data, whether scouts can accurately assess makeup, introverted vs. extroverted scouts, whether it’s good or bad for teams to have a “type,” how teams will train prospects if there isn’t a minor league season, whether it’s possible to predict injuries, Eric and Kiley’s scouting strengths and weaknesses, and much more.

Audio intro: The Weakerthans, "Relative Surplus Value"
Audio outro: Erick Dayz, "Scouting Report"

Link to order Future Value
Link to Future Value excerpt
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Link to Ben on Scout School
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Link to Russell Carleton on adolescent cognitive development
Link to Brandon Martin story
Link to Toe Nash story
Link to Ebert’s John Prine review
Link to article about serial athlete impersonator
Link to article about Joba impersonator
Link to article about Pasqua impersonator
Link to article about Mets/Marlins con man
Link to Stark on Molina’s home run
Link to order The Only Rule Is It Has to Work
Link to order The MVP Machine

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The cruelty of high expectations is having to meet them. When Stephen Strasburg made his debut on June 8, 2010, it was with the weight of a franchise and the eyes of the baseball world on him, and the belief that he’d be an ace from the first pitch. How could he not be? College superstar, Olympian, No. 1 pick, top prospect; The next inevitable step was transforming into the second coming of Roger Clemens, except without all the bad stuff.

The clamor for Strasburg was loud and endless: His Double-A debut in 2010 was nationally broadcast and featured as many media members as your average World Series game. It was only a matter of time before he came up, even despite the fact that he was just 21 at season’s start, and in early June, the Nationals finally gave in. His first assignment: a wretched Pirates team. But the opponent mattered far less than the fact that he was coming at all.

A decade, a Tommy John surgery, and a World Series ring later, Strasburg — like every other major leaguer — sits at home right now, waiting for the season to start. But in an attempt to tide over the baseball fans crawling through withdrawal right now, MLB Network aired his debut (along with those of some other current stars) on Thursday night. I vividly remember watching it live when it happened, kicking back with a six-pack of Miller High Life and giggling constantly as he carved apart a Pittsburgh lineup unfortunate enough to be there. So given the chance to experience it again, how could I resist? Read the rest of this entry »

Today’s virtual broadcast at 2 PM ET, featuring Paul Sporer, Ben Clemens, and Dan Szymborski, is a clash of aces as the Cleveland Indians (11-9) travel to Fenway Park to start a four-game set with the Boston Red Sox (12-8).

The Red Sox are coming off a much-needed day of rest following two blowout losses to the A’s (14-1, 14-5) that snapped Boston’s six-game winning streak. It’s a good time for an appearance for Chris Sale, who is 2-0 in four starts, with 30 strikeouts in 29 innings, a 2.83 FIP, and a 3.41 ERA.

The blazing start of Xander Bogaerts continued with a home run in yesterday’s A’s blowout, giving the shortstop five round-trippers in 19 games. With a .338/.483/.647 line, Bogaerts leads the American League in WAR with 1.8, ahead of Marcus Semien (1.5) and Mallex Smith (1.3).

Cleveland, third in the AL Central and a game behind the White Sox and Twins, turns to Shane Bieber (2-2, 3.45). Bieber was abandoned by the FIP gods in his last start, allowing 12 hits over 4.1 innings against the Rays in a 4-0 loss. José Ramírez is off to a better start than last year with five home runs already. In 2019, Ramírez didn’t hit his fifth home run until June. Francisco Lindor, on the other hand, is still yet to peek above replacement level and his .152/.243/.242 line in 17 games is reminiscent of Ramírez’s struggles last year.

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Earlier this week, FanGraphs’ lead prospect analyst Eric Longenhagen and former FanGraphs prospect writer Kiley McDaniel released their book Future Value: The Battle for Baseball’s Soul and How Teams Will Find the Next Superstar.

In this excerpt from the chapter “Everybody Wants a Job in Baseball (But Nobody Wants to Die),” presented with permission from Triumph Books, Eric and Kiley discuss the different paths to working in baseball, and how to become a scout – from the tools and skills you’ll need to the people who can help clear the way.

…

Plotting a Path

Depending on what your career goals and timetable are, and despite the fact that everyone in baseball took a unique path, there are lanes to place yourself in to increase your odds at success.

If your goal is to be a GM (this is the most common dream), then you need to figure out what your separating skill will be (you don’t have one right now) and go down the path to be an expert in that area. Increasingly, being an ace scout isn’t a recipe to run a team, so that’s not the smartest way to position yourself for a move up the ladder to GM. You can come up in scouting departments or player development, but be based in the office so you have a management point of view, are getting face time around those people, and are in those meetings. You may need to be a coach or scout as a first step, but know that your path needs to get you into the office sooner than later.

More commonly, GMs come from people who are office-lifer types, who come up as assistants in baseball operations (general contributors across departments), a step up to coordinator or assistant director (managing schedules and interns or entry-level employees, introduced to decision-making meetings), then becoming director of baseball operations (in charge of budgets, rules, running the office day-to-day, pitching in on hiring and higher-level decisions) then assistant GM, where your specialty (running the office, rules, overseeing a scouting or player dev department) is the flavor that your job takes, along with the thing that can headline your résumé for GM.

A sitting GM once described to us that he and his three AGMs are in charge of servicing the various departments (analytics, big league operations, international scouting, domestic scouting, pro scouting, player development). There’s more departments than the four of them, so they’re playing a zone coverage, constantly going between all the areas, making sure each department has what they need to succeed and, ideally, not needing further direction or correction. Read the rest of this entry »