The Best of FanGraphs: August 7-11, 2017

Each week, we publish north of 100 posts on our various blogs. With this post, we hope to highlight 10 to 15 of them. You can read more on it here. The links below are color coded — green for FanGraphs, brown for RotoGraphs, dark red for The Hardball Times and blue for Community Research.

MONDAY
Corey Kluber is Making History, by Travis Sawchick
Right after Travis wrote this illuminating piece, Corey Kluber went out and did it again.

MLB’s Rookies of the Year, Visualized, by Alex Chamberlain
I dare you to be able to spend less than 10 minutes playing around with the Tableau graphs Alex created for this piece.

TUESDAY
The Players Who Market Themselves, by Ashley MacLennan
This was the first piece of Ashley’s August Residency. We’re very excited to have her! Ashley also logged the second piece of her Residency on Friday, in which she discussed the different paths the Tigers can take as they rebuild toward contention.

The Rise of the Light Hitting Shortstop, by Tony Blengino
It’s been a good year for dude’s we thought sucked at hitting.

Darrin Jackson on a Young Kaz Matsui, by David Laurila
One of the big takeaways for me here is that we need to remember that an international player’s career record is not just what he does stateside.

Fantasy Relevant Tidbits from Saber Seminar, by Jeff Zimmerman
I sat next to Jeff for pretty much all of Saturday, and it didn’t look like the notes he was taking were this detailed. But when you’re a sabermetric Jedi, you don’t have to take detailed notes. David Laurila, Ben and Jeff, and Jen and Mary were also at and wrote up/talked about/at Saberseminar, so be sure to check all that out as well.

WEDNESDAY
The A’s Might Have a Developing Star, by Dave Cameron
This would certainly be a nice development for the A’s.

The Mike Trout MVP Precedent, by Craig Edwards
As Craig explains, other players have missed time during the season and still won the MVP award.

Getting the Tigers a Real Prospect for Justin Verlander, by Dave Cameron
As usual, Dave lays out the blueprint. Now all Detroit has to do is be smart enough to follow it. Stay tuned!

Matt Chapman’s All or Nothing Tendencies, by Randy Holt
Dave wasn’t the only one to write about Matt Chapman. As Randy says, there’s a lot to be said for a high-risk player.

Is Increased Launch Angle Helping Hitters?, by Joe Douglas
Well, you don’t expect me to give you the answer, do you? You have to read the article.

THURSDAY
Lars Anderson Discovers Japan, Part 4, by David Laurila
Make sure you’re reading this whole series. Part 3 ran on Monday.

FRIDAY
Young Players Are Leading the Rise in Three True Outcomes, by Craig Edwards
Damn #millenials.

A Tangled Web, by Mary Craig
Ivy League-graduate junior law clerks are known for exacting very subtle revenge.

Home Runs and Temperature: Can We Test a Simple Physical Relationship With Historical Data? by Alan Seltzer
Some very interesting research here, following up on and old Alan Nathan study. Well, not old, but not from the last 18 months, which is usually all anyone can remember.