Sunday Notes: Graham Spraker Was a Breakout Blue Jay in Double-A
Graham Spraker will be available when this year’s lockout-postponed Rule 5 draft is eventually held. The 26-year-old right-hander wasn’t added to the Toronto Blue Jays 40-man roster prior to last month’s deadline. While this was not exactly a surprise — the former 31st-round draft pick out of a DII school has never graced our prospect rankings — Spraker is nonetheless coming off an eye-opening season. In 31 relief outings, all but one of them at Double-A New Hampshire, the erstwhile Quincy University Hawk logged a 2.62 ERA and fanned 65 batters in 46-and-two-thirds innings.
Spraker’s breakout culminated in an award-winning stint in the Arizona Fall League. Pitching for the Mesa Solar Sox, the righty threw 11-and-a-third scoreless innings, allowing just four hits and a pair of walks, with 17 strikeouts. He was named the AFL’s Reliever of the Year at the conclusion of the campaign.
All that aside, just who is Graham Spraker?
“I am who I am,” the righty responded when asked about his pitching M.O. “I’ve changed a lot every year. I’m a pretty adaptable player — that’s why I’ve had success — but I feel that I’ve found a good blueprint now. It’s something I’m going to try to stick to for the rest of my career.”
Spraker cited his four-seam fastball as his strength — “It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out” — adding that he throws the pitch roughly 70% of the time. That he throws it at all is somewhat of an accident. The Tucson native used to be a sinker-baller.
“I changed in 2020,” explained Spraker. “The organization gave me a directive to learn how to throw a cutter, so that I could mirror my sinker with a better off-speed pitch, and in learning how to throw a cutter, I also learned how to ride the four-seam. The specific metrics aren’t fantastic — I probably average 18 to 22 [inches] — but it still plays well. My approach angle to the plate is what makes it effective.”
Higher radar readings have helped. Spraker went into the season with velocity-driven goals, one of which was to average 93 mph. He got there — “plus some change” — although it did take some time. Straker started slow in his efforts, but as the season progressed, so did the giddy-up on his heater. On his best days, he’ll reach 95 with change.
Spraker acknowledges having made a few mechanical tweaks, but even more important to his success has been a fine-tuning of his frame. The 6-foot-3 starter-turned-reliever began working with a new strength coach during the pandemic, and he’s now a leaner-and-meaner 185 pounds — down from the 200 listed on his player page.
“It’s all about the preparation I put in,” said Spraker. “That’s all it really was. I got all my affairs in order. I crossed my Ts, I dotted my Is.”
He did a lot more than just that. Seven months after entering the season with a long-shot profile, Spraker has emerged as a legitimate big-league prospect.
“I exceeded my expectations by far,” admitted Spraker. “I totally changed my pitch mix. I came back with two pitches that I’d never thrown before, and I had the best season of my career.”
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RANDOM HITTER-PITCHER MATCHUPS
Tim Hudson went 2 for 2 against Tim Lincecum.
Barry Bonds went 3 for 14 against Billy Wagner.
Scott Rolen went 4 for 9 against Curt Schilling.
Bobby Abreu went 10 for 22 against Mark Buehrle.
Gary Sheffield went 11 for 18 against Roger Clemens.
Mark Teixeira went 11 for 23 against Andy Pettitte.
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The 16-member Early Baseball Era committed elected two former Negro League players into the Hall of Fame last Sunday, and while Bud Fowler and Buck O’Neil are certainly worthy of the honor, five other candidates were left on the outside looking in. One of the 42 for 21 committee members that Jay Jaffe spoke to in Friday’s episode of FanGraphs Audio offered a blunt appraisal of the process when addressing SABR’s Southwest Michigan chapter on Saturday morning.
Gary Gillette shared that he’s spoken to two people who were on the Early Baseball Era committee, and both told him that there “wasn’t a lot of knowledge in the room amongst the non-Negro League scholars.” That they were receptive to what the scholars had to say wasn’t enough in the opinion of the Detroit-based historian.
“To me, that’s a bad election,” opined Gillette. “Half your electorate is dependent on the other half to tell them how to vote… They’re not saying, ‘vote for this guy,’ but that’s really what it is. By the way you shape the debate, and by the statistics you quote, and by the emphasis you put on different players, you are recommending to them who they should vote for. Because they don’t know. And if they don’t know, they shouldn’t be on the committee.”
And then there is the Golden Days Era Committee, which elected Gil Hodges, Jim Kaat, Minnie Miñoso, and Tony Oliva… but not the every-bit-as-deserving Dick Allen, who fell short by one vote. Three years ago, Harold Baines was voted into the Hall of Fame by the Today’s Game Era Committee, and in the opinion of many, bias played a meaningful role in his selection. Two highly-influential members of that committee had close relationships with Baines.
This year’s Golden Age Committee didn’t simply have a speculative conflict-of-interest issue; it had an unabashed conflict of interest. Prior to meeting with the rest of the committee to discuss the candidates, one of the members — against what must have been his better judgement — shared on social media that he would be “pushing for” his “former roommate & great friend.”
A certain amount of bias is inherent in any, and all, Hall of Fame-voting decision(s). That said, putting together as-unbiased-as-possible committees should be a priority in any election. It’s common sense.
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A quiz:
Only one right-handed hitter won a National League batting title from 1972-1991. Who was it?
The answer can be found below.
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NEWS NOTES
The Minnesota Twins have hired Hank Conger as their first base coach. The 33-year-old former big-league backstop will also serve as the club’s catching coach.
Tim Federowicz has been hired to manage the Tacoma Rainiers, the Triple-A affiliate of the Seattle Mariners. Drafted by the Boston Red Sox out of the University of North Carolina in 2008, the 34-year-old Federowicz played for six other teams over parts of eight big-league seasons.
The Arizona Diamondbacks have hired Chris Garagiola as their new pre- and postgame show host, and secondary play-by-play announcer. The grandson of former big-league catcher — and longtime broadcaster — Joe Garagiola has been serving as the play-by-play voice of the Double-A Pensacola Blue Wahoos.
Tim Kurkjian is the recipient of the 2022 BBWAA Career Excellence Award. Currently with ESPN, the 65-year-old University of Maryland grad previously worked for The Baltimore Sun, The Dallas Morning News, and Sports Illustrated.
Mike Teevan is the recipient of this year’s Robert O. Fishel Award for Public Relations Excellence. The 42-year-old Boston College alum is MLB’s VP of Communication.
Ron Blazier, a right-handed reliever for the Philadelphia Phillies in 1996 and 1997, died earlier this month at age 50. The Altoona, Pennsylvania native won four of his six decisions and had a 5.38 ERA over 92 innings.
Chuck Dobson, who pitched for the Kansas City/Oakland A’s from 1966-1973, and for the California Angels in 1974 and 1975, died earlier this week at age 77. A right-hander who saw his career cut short by injuries, Dobson led the junior circuit in games started (40) and shutouts (5) in 1970.
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The answer to the quiz is Bill Madlock, who captured National League batting titles in 1975, 1976, 1981, and 1983. Every other NL batting champ from 1972-1991 was either a left-handed hitter or a switch-hitter.
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Spencer Strider was a guest on the aforementioned episode of FanGraphs Audio, and not surprisingly, the conversation got a little nerdy. That was particularly true when the 23-year-old Atlanta Braves right-hander talked about his slider. Improving the quality of the pitch was a primary goal this season, and the eureka moment came during a bullpen session in Double-A Mississippi. Strider explained it this way:
“It was [pitching coordinator] Dan Meyer and a teammate of mine, Sean McLaughlin, who is a wizard with TrackMan and data. He’s a great pitching coach, even though he’s still playing. My goodness, he gave me quite a bit of help when I was in Mississippi. What he told me was, ‘I’ve looked at your video, and I’ve seen your ball metrics, and your breaking ball stinks. You have no idea how to throw a breaking ball.’ I said, ‘I completely agree with you, I would love to have some type of solution to this, and I’ve yet to find one. So, I’m open ears, man. Tell me anything.’
“He said, ‘You have to feel supination, because you are not supinating’ — which is like when you’re throwing a football. When you throw a football, you supinate through release. Your pinkie is in front, towards your target. That’s what allows the ball to have that football spin, just like a slider. A slider has a true bullet-spin axis.
“My wrist was completely bent, so that my palm was flush to the target and my fingers were parallel with the first- and third-base lines. I was basically under the ball, pushing it with no power. If I was able to create the right axis, there was no way I could throw it hard enough. And when I threw it hard enough, there was no way I can make it spin the right way. So we got in the bullpen and… I changed my grip. I tucked my thumb under the ball to lock out my wrist into a supinated position, and almost instantly — having seen it [and] had it explained to me — I felt it. It was a slider.”
Strider, a 2020 fourth-round pick who’d begun the season in Low-A, went on to make his big-league debut on the final weekend of the regular season. That experience was among the topics covered in the podcast, as were his triple-digit heater, the Tomahawk chant, and the MLB lockout. The episode is well worth the listen.
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FOREIGN AFFAIRS
Cody Ponce has reportedly agree to sign with NPB’s Nippon-Ham Fighters. The 27-year-old Cal-Poly product has pitched in 20 games for the Pittsburgh Pirates over the past two seasons.
Brooks Kriske has reportedly signed with the Yokohama DeNA Baystars. Most recently with the Baltimore Orioles, Kriske shared the story of his split-change this past July in our Learning and Developing a Pitch series. Hirokazu Sawamura was featured in the same installment.
The Yomiuri Giants Professional Baseball Club announced that it is forming a women’s team. They are the third NPB club to do so, following the Seibu Lions and the Hanshin Tigers.
The Thunder Bay (Ontario) Border Cats announced that they won’t be playing in the summer collegiate Northwoods League in 2022 due to ongoing uncertainties regarding vaccination status and the requirement for COVID19 testing at the Canadian border. The Minnesota Mud Puppies will replace the Border Cats in the 22-team league.
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Regular readers of this column — ditto people who follow me on Twitter — know that I like to share statistical comps. Presented in snapshot fashion, they often show strikingly similar numbers for players who aren’t widely viewed as being equals. For the most part, the object isn’t to suggest that they are. Rather, it’s to make readers think, and to perhaps research and/or reassess one (or both) of the players.
A few days ago, I tweeted the following;
A Chet Lemon–Joe Mauer comp:
Lemon: 3,038 TB, .356 wOBA, 122 wRC+, 55.6 bWAR.
Mauer: 3,040 TB, .358 wOBA, 123 wRC+, 55.2 bWAR.
One of my followers opined that it might be the single worst comparison he’s ever seen, adding that if you look only at those stats and never saw Mauer play, you “could sell that to someone that doesn’t get baseball. Otherwise it’s laughable.”
The commenter quite clearly felt that I was saying that Lemon was equal to, or better than Mauer. Again, that’s typically not the point of these comps. Moreover, I’m of the opinion that Mauer was the better of the two. That said, there’s a pretty decent chance that the commenter, and many others who saw the tweet, are guilty of under-appreciating just how good Chet Lemon actually was. That was the point.
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LINKS YOU’LL LIKE
Our Esquina’s José de Jesus Ortiz explained his Hall of Fame ballot, which differed slightly from the one he filled out last year.
At The Sporting News, Graham Womack wrote about how Leo Mazzone learned from Johnny Sain, and how both have Hall of Fame credentials.
At Bless You Boys, Brandon Day looked at the 2021 Detroit Tigers pitching staff through the lens of DRA.
The Toronto Star’s Laura Armstrong wrote about Blue Jays prospect Spencer Horwitz, a self-described “average guy who can hit the baseball pretty good.”
Clint Hurdle is returning to the Colorado Rockies as a special assistant to the general manager. Thomas Harding has the story at MLB.com.
Larry Bird once played college baseball on a dare. James Dator has the details at SBNation.
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RANDOM FACTS AND STATS
Robbie Ray had a 2.84 ERA, a 3.69 FIP and a .268 BABIP this year. Eduardo Rodriguez had a 4.74 ERA, a 3.32 FIP and a .363 BABIP.
Fernando Hernandez has the highest career ERA among pitchers who have been credited with at least one win. Hernandez threw three innings for the Oakland A’s in 2008 and went 1-0 with an 18.00 ERA.
A total of 1,349 players have hit exactly one career home run in the modern era. Of them, Esteban Yan has the highest batting average (1.000). Jeremy Hefner has the lowest batting average (.038). Yan went 2-for -2. Hefner went 2-for-52.
Christian Yelich has 785 singles and 422 extra-base hits.
Mark McGwire had 785 singles and 841 extra-base hits.
Barry Bonds had 762 home runs and 1,539 strikeouts. Joe DiMaggio and Yogi Berra combined for 719 home run and 783 strikeouts.
The Cincinnati Reds purchased Johnny Vander Meer from the Boston Braves on today’s date in 1935. In 1938, the left-hander threw the first of his two consecutive no-hitters against the Boston Bees, which the Braves were known as from 1936-1940.
Players born on today’s date include Gorman Thomas, who logged a 114 wRC+ from 1983-1996 despite a batting average that never topped .259 in a full season. A career .225 hitter, “Stormin’ Gorman twice led the American League in home runs while playing for the Milwaukee Brewers. He went deep 268 times in all.
Also born on today’s date was Flea Clifton, who played in 87 games for the Detroit Tigers from 1934-1937. A utility infielder, Clifton had 39 career hits, none of which left the yard.
Allan Lewis — another player born on today’s date — was used primarily as a pinch-runner and had just 31 plate appearances in 156 games. Playing for the Kansas City/Oakland Athletics from 1967-1973, Lewis had 44 stolen bases and just six hits. He had one home run.
Con Starkel threw three innings and had an 18.00 ERA for the Washington Senators in 1906. A native of Neu-Norka, Starkel is one of nine Russian-born players in MLB history.
David Laurila grew up in Michigan's Upper Peninsula and now writes about baseball from his home in Cambridge, Mass. He authored the Prospectus Q&A series at Baseball Prospectus from December 2006-May 2011 before being claimed off waivers by FanGraphs. He can be followed on Twitter @DavidLaurilaQA.
Chet Lemon is a great candidate for the face of the Hall of Very Good. He might be the best player of the expansion era to never get a single MVP vote (Lemon played on some pretty crappy teams through his peak years, and even got shut out after posting 6.2 bWAR for the 1984 champion Tigers).
My Expansion Era No MVP Vote All-Star Team (based on JAWs)
C: Jason Kendall
1B: Ron Fairly
2B: Ray Durham
3B: Troy Glaus
SS: Jose Valentin
LF: Brett Gardner
CF: Chet Lemon
RF: Nick Markakis
So these are supposed to be guys who never received an MVP vote but did make an All-Star game, correct? If so, then you’ll need to replace Markakis (18th in MVP in 2018) and Valentin (never made the All-Star game).
Overall though great work and very interesting!
I would love to see a list of players, ranked by WAR, who never received an MVP vote. The closest I’ve found is a list on reddit from the mid-2010s. I’ll paste the list here since links break it:
Chet Lemon 55.5
Jason Kendall 41.5
Ron Fairly 35.2
Frank White 34.7
Jeff Cirillo 34.4
Ray Durham 33.6
Mark Ellis 33.4
Jose Valentin 31.6
Orlando Hudson 30.9
Brett Gardner 30.3
Phil Garner 29.6
Mickey Tettleton 29.3
Nick Markakis 29.1
J.J. Hardy 28.7
Bob Bailey 28.7
Terry Puhl 28.3
Rondell White 28.1
Mike Napoli 27.6
Randy Winn 27.5
Ryan Klesko 26.9
Bill Bruton 26.1
Marlon Byrd 25.5
Stan Javier 25.5
Rick Dempsey 25.3
So Chet Lemon is pretty much the definition of the Hall of Very Good.
A few thoughts I had looking at this list and tz’s team:
–I thought for sure when I saw Mickey Tettleton on this list that I’d put him as the catcher, but Jason Kendall was much better than I remembered.
–I think I’d probably stick with Troy Glaus too except he got a 10th place vote in 2006. So I think we’d probably have to swap him with Jeff Cirillo. Bob Bailey also had some excellent years near the end of his career with Montreal, so I’d consider him too.
-Between Cirillo and Jose Valentin, the Brewers had two of those guys on the same side of the infield at the same time. Cirillo left the Brewers, had a couple more good years, and then completely fell off a cliff. Meanwhile, Valentin went to the White Sox and almost instantly became a better player.
-Second base is loaded with guys with “empty WAR”–they were extremely inconsistent either offensively, defensively, or both. I was thinking there was no way that Ray Durham would be the best guy there but then I looked up Mark Ellis and Orlando Hudson and they’re uninspiring too.
-To replace Markakis in right field, thanks to his fluke MVP vote in 2018, I think I’d want to go with Randy Winn.
@sad – thanks for the catch on Glaus. Cirillo is a good fit here.
Not only did Valentin play with Cirillo, Valentin and Durham were the White Sox every day middle infield for most of 2000 – 02.
Mauer is also the face of the Hall of Very Good, in my opinion
@dl80 – I gave you an upvote even though I think Mauer’s better than that, because I suspect his “clean-cut, All-American” hometown kid-made-good image is at least a teeny bit why many others feel so strongly about him, and I enjoy trolling those folks a little. I’m kidding (on the square); I’m a Mets fan, and we nicknamed our guy Captain America, for chrissakes. Seriously though, setting position aside, Dubs won’t get much, if any HoF consideration, but he was better than the HoVG (we need another imaginary hall for players whose careers got derailed by injury). On the other hand, Mauer will be elected on the first ballot. I’m not saying he shouldn’t, nor am I saying Wright should get in, but it’s at least worth discussing, no?
P.S. Speaking of clean-cut, All-American boys, is the huge difference between Buster Posey’s fWAR and bWAR mostly about framing metrics? Sorry, I’m an ignoramus.
@Left – thanks for the catch on Markakis. His spot in RF will be taken by Terry Puhl (basically a better fielding version of Johnny Damon until injuries derailed his career in his late 20’s).
I didn’t require an All-Star game for this list, so I’ll say with confidence that Jose Valentin is probably the greatest position player of the modern era to never make an All-Star team or garner a single MVP vote.
Also, Valentin never even MADE it to a Hall of Fame ballot. He was first eligible in 2012, but was bypassed for a group that included Tony Womack and Terry Mulholland.
Sorry I misunderstood what “No MVP Vote All-Star Team” meant. In my defense, I was still on my first cup of coffee…
Bill Madlock is another Hall of Very Good luminary. A decent comp would be George Kell, who was inducted to the HoF by the Veterans Committee in 1983, the year Madlock won his fourth batting title. Surprisingly, despite all the batting titles, Madlock fell off the HoF ballot in his first year of eligibility, getting just 4.5% of the vote in 1993.
One of the great things about the Hall of Very Good is that there is no shortage of guys that we remember fondly (or in some cases, that our parents or grandparents remembered fondly) but just aren’t Hall of Fame worthy. The prototypical guys for me (some of them because of recency bias) are Torii Hunter, Bernie Williams, Jimmy Rollins, Devon White, and Julio Franco for position players. For pitchers the guys who stand out are Cole Hamels, Tim Hudson, Jon Lester, and David Wells.
I have a handy “Santo/Bando/Prado/Randa” scale that I use: Ron Santo as an average HOFer, Joe Randa as the average major leaguer. My Hall of Very Good would begin with guys who were materially above average overall (Martin Prado) and end with guys who were just short of HOF worthy (Sal Bando). For guys toward the Prado end of that group, I’d put a healthy amount of weight on how fondly I remembered them in whether or not they’re in my personal HOVG.
I’ve always maintained that Joe Randa is the most average player of all time. Also, he’s one of my favorite players of all-time for some reason.
I don’t have a real problem with the other guys you mentioned, but Cole Hamels and Tim Hudson are borderline HOFers. Neither has the plus factors which will likely get them into the Hall, IMO, but their numbers compare to pitchers in the hall like Mordecai Brown.
To be fair, there is a massive difference between Chet Lemon and Joe Mauer. It is hard to get a lot of innings at catcher so there are relatively few catchers in the hall and the standard should be lower.
It’s not just that. Mauer was dealing with concussions and injuries and was a shell of himself for his last 2500 PA. That they’re similar says more about the fact that Mauer was so impressive before injuries than anything else.
Sure, Lemon had a good career, but it’s a rough comparison because you’re comparing a relatively healthy player to one who dealt with massive injuries and a significant decline that he tried to play through. Mauer was significantly better even if their WAR totals are similar.
I think that they’re related. This kind of thing happens to catchers. A lot. It’s not like other positions.
I think that comparing him with Yadier Molina and Ted Simmons is interesting for a few reasons. Molina and Simmons are anomalies. They each had more than 15,000 innings at catcher. Mauer had about half of what they had, but he’s arguably just as good an HoF candidate as them because his peak was ridiculously good. All three of these guys are probably about #10 in the all-time catcher category.
At every other position you don’t get Hall of Famers with simply a ridiculous peak or by sticking around forever. Dale Murphy is more or less a Mauer in the outfield, but he’s nowhere near the #10 center fielder (or right fielder).
Another massive difference is that one of these players was a premium defender at an important position while also being an above average hitter at his position for 12 years (Lemon), while the other one had more than half his career starts at positions of less (or zero) defensive importance while being a below-average hitter for those positions (Mauer).
Chet Lemon: #22 for total bWAR in CF
Joe Mauer: #7 in total bWAR for C
It’s even more extreme if you use WAR7:
Chet Lemon: #27 for WAR7 for CF
Joe Mauer: #5 for WAR7 for C
I mean, if you don’t want to recognize the differences between C and CF I suppose that’s your prerogative.
Or if you want to make a big deal out of the 2014-2018 years where Mauer accrued virtually all of his time at 1B and also accrued roughly 10% of his fWAR total (probably same for bWAR, just haven’t had the time to go look it up), sure. I can’t stop you.
Funny, when I search bb-ref for most WAR by a catcher (min. 50% of games played are as C) Mauer doesn’t even appear on the list. I get it, he was one of the greatest-hitting catchers, when he played catcher, but that wasn’t very long. He accrued 34.7 bWAR from 2004-2011 while primarily a starting catcher. Beginning in 2012, a period in which he accrued his final 20.6 bWAR (37% of his total), he started 899 games but only 145 at catcher, with his high being 73.
He is 15th in FWAR for catchers, but every single guy above him played no more than 200 games anywhere other than catcher. Mauer had 600. So if you only count their WAR from catching, Mauer drops to 20th. That’s good, and borderline HOFer, but hanging on for 5 years as an average hitter at the easiest fielding position just because he had a huge contract doesn’t make him a Hall of Famer to me.
Mauer started almost 900 games (888) at 1B/DH—more than he started at catcher. He essentially had the playing time at catcher that a typical high-usage starting catcher (Russell Martin, A.J. Pierzynski, Yadier Molina, etc.) gets in about 7 seasons.
A case can be made that the relatively limited number of games he caught shouldn’t discount how good he was while he was a catcher, and I agree; by the same token, the amount of time he spent at other positions shouldn’t bolster his HoF case as a catcher, being compared to other catchers who played 1500+ games at the position.
Spahn and Sain and pray for rain!
I read, Hoyt Wilhelm also had one career home run and it was his very first of almost 500 PA. He clearly went into a deep hitting slump after that AB.
It makes absolutely no sense to have someone on the Early Baseball Era committee who is not well versed on the Negro Leagues.
As others have noted, it’s apples and oranges comparing catchers with other positions, and Mauer accomplished all of his In a compressed peak time frame, they aren’t remotely comparable, sorry David, I do like most of your comparisons, and Lemon is definitely a HOVG guy that should be remembered better than he is. I will note raw WAR does overrated him, he was a poor “clutch” performer at a negative 9 to 11 wins, one of the worst scores of all-time. Chets 50 wins are also reliant on plus defense, Retrosheet indicates he was merely average on D and closer to a 30 to 35 win career.
Where do you have the Retrosheet numbers for Lemon being only average on defense? His range factor per 9 innings was consistently higher than league average throughout his career, and he also passed the eye test, so I’m a bit surprised that he would be rated just average.
As for the “clutch” stat, Lemon did have somewhat poor splits for late/close and 2out/RISP situations, but wasn’t flat awful overall in higher leverage situations vs. lower. I’d probably only ding him about 5 wins for situational hitting, since a portion of the -10ish “clutch” stat could be a built-in bias of that stat toward right-handed power hitters (due to RH power pitchers being so prevalent as closers/high-leverage setup men).
I’m beginning to suspect these random hitter-pitcher matchups aren’t truly random.
😉
On an unrelated note…one important note. The very deserving and criminally underappreciated Bud Fowler was a 19th century Black baseball pioneer who never played in the organized Negro Leagues.
I feel fairly certain that Graham Spraker is a creation of Dr. Steve Brule.
“That is poem of Grimm Spraker, son of Dorothy Dringus.”
Check it out.