The Best of FanGraphs: January 15-19, 2018

by
January 20, 2018

Each week, we publish in the neighborhood of 75 articles across 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, 1/15
Giants Add Another Face of Another Franchise, by Jeff Sullivan
Jeff wrote about the Giants new acquisition and also created the premise for a Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake.

TUESDAY, 1/16
How the Pirates Are Forced to Value Players, by Kiley McDaniel
Kiley posits that the Pirates small market requires the team to evaluate players differently.

Random Box Score: May 4, 1993, by Stacey Gotsulias
The 1993 Rockies, the inaugural team, were what the experts call “not good.” Stacey writes of a night at Wrigley Field during which Colorado fans had reason to forget the standings.

Colin Moran Looks Dramatically Different, by Jeff Sullivan
New year, new Colin Moran. The contrast between Moran’s 2016 and 2017 seasons has left consensus on his value hard to pin down. How did he improve? The proof is in the swing.

WEDNESDAY, 1/17
The MLBPA Has No Leverage, by Nathaniel Grow
It seems the entity that can save us from this and future excruciatingly slow offseasons has slowly relinquished the leverage needed to do so.

You Aren't a FanGraphs Member
It looks like you aren't yet a FanGraphs Member (or aren't logged in). We aren't mad, just disappointed.
We get it. You want to read this article. But before we let you get back to it, we'd like to point out a few of the good reasons why you should become a Member.
1. Ad Free viewing! We won't bug you with this ad, or any other.
2. Unlimited articles! Non-Members only get to read 10 free articles a month. Members never get cut off.
3. Dark mode and Classic mode!
4. Custom player page dashboards! Choose the player cards you want, in the order you want them.
5. One-click data exports! Export our projections and leaderboards for your personal projects.
6. Remove the photos on the home page! (Honestly, this doesn't sound so great to us, but some people wanted it, and we like to give our Members what they want.)
7. Even more Steamer projections! We have handedness, percentile, and context neutral projections available for Members only.
8. Get FanGraphs Walk-Off, a customized year end review! Find out exactly how you used FanGraphs this year, and how that compares to other Members. Don't be a victim of FOMO.
9. A weekly mailbag column, exclusively for Members.
10. Help support FanGraphs and our entire staff! Our Members provide us with critical resources to improve the site and deliver new features!
We hope you'll consider a Membership today, for yourself or as a gift! And we realize this has been an awfully long sales pitch, so we've also removed all the other ads in this article. We didn't want to overdo it.

Is Prince Fielder the Next Anthony Bourdain?, by Brian Reinhart
Yes. The answer is yes. After you read this article about the former first baseman’s new cooking show, please Google image search “Fielder Beltre press conference head touch.” It’s important.

A Well-Rested Marco Estrada, by Scott Spratt
Spratt writes: “Estrada’s assertion is that anxiety over trade rumors and other issues prevented him from sleeping well, and that sleep deprivation led to his decline in performance on the mound.” If nothing else, the man is #hashtag# relatable.

THURSDAY, 1/18
Ronald Acuna for Christian Yelich Is Not a Crazy Ask, by Jeff Sullivan
Some people want diamond rings. Some just want everything. Others want Ronald Acuna. And you know what? That’s just fine.

The One About The Terrible Tweet – Plus Easy Solutions, by Brad Johnson
If you come for daily fantasy leagues, you best not miss.

The Twins Reside in No Man’s Land, by Travis Sawchik
God bless the Twins, who are leaving crumbs out in this long, transactionless winter.

Manager Influence on Stolen Bases, by Jeff Zimmerman
Your mom did always tell you to stop hanging out with managers.

The Tale of Purnal Goldy, A Ballad of Us All, by Steven Goldman
The trajectory of a life is fragile. This path of gain and loss makes it all too clear.

FRIDAY, 1/19
How the Pirates Got Here, by Travis Sawchik
Travis quite literally wrote the book on the Pirates. Let him bring you inside the team’s short spiral.

Do Fielders Commit More Errors Playing Out of Position in a Shift?, by Evan Weiss
It’s the defensive alignment your local announcers all love to hate. Is this particular criticism of the shift warranted?





 

Find Mina on Twitter @maddc8.

Comments are closed.