Travis Sawchik FanGraphs Chat

Travis Sawchik: Howdy folks ….

Travis Sawchik: Let’s get to it

Mike: Liked your article about Kenley Jansen, but its too bad you didn’t ask him about any of the other stuff he’s been doing to vary the use of the cutter including:

Quick pitches with the new rules for using a stretch position as a ‘windup’

The more prominent use of his slider

The addition, in that very at bat you linked against Sean Rodriguez, of a hesitation move.   In the Rodriguez AB, he threw a strike, did a Kershaw-style bounce leg kick for strike 2, and then quick-pitched strike 3.   You can see on strike 2 that Rodriguez ends up on one foot for a couple seconds and is completely off-balance.

Travis Sawchik: This is the referenced article … http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/simplicity-becomes-sophistication-for-k…

Travis Sawchik: I did focus on just one aspect of Jansen but the general point was this a pitcher who is more sophisticated in his approach than is publicly recognized and your points fit to that idea

Bronx Bombers: Barring injury, we’re at the point where Tanaka is a lock to opt out, right?

Travis Sawchik: If he can continue pitching anything like this, I agree … And even if he’s so-so down the stretch he’s a good bet to opt out

jkdff: Tyler Glasnow is absolutely clowning on the IL. He’s K-BB% is 29.4% (not a typo). Pittsburgh can’t let this continue any longer, right?

Travis Sawchik: I think the Pirates avoid Glasnow gaining a year of service time by keeping him down until Aug. 26 … so that has likely played a role. I assume we’ll see him in Sept. if the service time issues are behind him

Steve: Stanton the NL MVP favorite at this point?

Travis Sawchik: I think so. He leads the league in WAR and home runs grab our attention … but Paul Goldschmidt has been fantastic

Dunt: Lucas Giolito was really good yesterday. I don’t have a question.

Travis Sawchik: Giolito has followed a frustrating trajectory but it’s way too early to write him off and that was an encouraging outing

Dom: Do franchises have proprietary data on their pitchers similar to Rapsodo?  By that I mean, spin efficiency, spin axis, and all the other advanced pitching data points.

Travis Sawchik: I assume a certain group of teams do, perhaps not all.

Pie: Checked the August splits to see how close Hoskins batting line was to Giancarlo’s for the month (not close at all), but it turns out he isn’t even having the second best August this season. Did I fall asleep and miss something with Nelson Cruz?

Travis Sawchik: I might have missed this, too

Zock Jr.: Devers or Hoskins: ROS and Career?

Travis Sawchik: Hoskins/Devers

Travis Sawchik: Hoskins has been so fun to watch, but I will take the player who is four years younger and can play third

Travis Sawchik: for career

Kiermaier’s Piercing Green Eyes: How did you enjoy Player’s Weekend? Most of the unis were hideous, but the nicknames (an at bat of Outlaw vs Sherriff was a highlight), bats, and clips of players explaining their names or reading the lineup cards was fun for the weekend.

Travis Sawchik: I thought it was fun and inspired. I thought the uniforms were somewhat generic but not hideous. Smart of MLB to showcase their players’ personalties a bit more. I think it proved the desired results

Travis Sawchik: Now what I want to see next is a Fans’ Weekend where the people, the public, get to choose what nicknames to place on players’ jersey nameplates

LegallyEagle: Early or safe to say Chapman’s contract with the Yankee’s is officially a bad contract?

Travis Sawchik: I’m concerned … If Chapman continues to lose velocity while the rest of the league gains velocity he’s not going to be special and maybe not even that effective

Sterling Mallory Chris Archer: Fantasy question for next year.  In standard leagues, what round is Buxton, Hoskins, and Giancarlo going to be drafted?

Travis Sawchik: 9/3/1

Guest: Whats more realistic AVG/HR per 162 games for Byron Buxton — .250/20 or .270/25

Travis Sawchik: I’m bullish

Mike: Agreed, Travis, a man could write many pages about all the things Jansen does to make his single pitch effective.

Its in the same vein as Rich Hill’s curveball:  So many things besides ‘throw a 2nd/3rd pitch’ someone can do to get more mileage out of one phenomenal pitch.

Travis Sawchik: It’s an argument for mastering one, or few things, instead of trying to do many things at a ‘meh’ level

Mark: I keep hearing the relax on Hoskins train, look what happened to Eric Thames. This justifiable?

Travis Sawchik: Yes and no.  We of course want to be careful about small sample sizes, but these are different players (and some of thames’ cooling off was injury related)

MVP: Stanton has by himself put the Fish back in the WC discussion.  Not a question, just in awe.

Travis Sawchik: It’s been fun to watch from a distance. The closed stance seems to be working just fine http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/giancarlo-stanton-is-closing-off-and-tr…

Travis Sawchik: What’s scary for the league is Stanton has continued to keep his K% at a career low while his HR/FB and ISO marks have jumped to career bests

Travis Sawchik: He’s reached a new level

Pete: What would an offseason trade that sends Stanton to the Yankees look like? Let’s say Miami is paying 25% of his remaining salary.

Travis Sawchik: Stanton’s trade value is tough to figure with the remaining dollars and opt out … but he definitely has raised his value. At this point it’s not a cash dump

Hal: 7 of Hoskins’ 11 homers have come in 2-strike counts! He probably won’t hit 100 homers a year but everything about him looks legit, right?

Travis Sawchik: He looks pretty awesome … if not quite this awesome

Xi: Is Dominic Leone for real as a 10 K/9, homer-limiting bullpen arm?

Travis Sawchik: I’m so old I covered Leone when he pitched at Clemson

Spreadsheet Scout: Re: MVP, Rendon leads the NL in fWAR!

Travis Sawchik: Sorry, Anthony!

Travis Sawchik: So Rendon, Stanton and Goldy are each separated by 1/10th of fWAR

Travis Sawchik: But the home runs are going to stick with voters, I suspect

…: can we talk about how Kris Bryant’s strikeout rate is under 20% when everyone used to think that he would have a strikeout problem

Travis Sawchik: Uppercut swings don’t necessarily lead to more swing and miss

Travis Sawchik: But that’s a great point. There was concern he was going to be a 30% K guy … now if he could just pick up some clutch hits

Jay: S(uper) SSS but Yandy Diaz since recall 50% fly balls and 88.3% hard contact rate. I’m sure teams will adjust and start throwing him hard stuff inside to force him to pull the ball, but do you think we have a step forward in Diaz getting the ball off the ground finally?

Travis Sawchik: I actually spoke with Diaz this weekend and there was a focus while he was at 3A to better lift the ball … his contact rate is deep he’s going to be an oppo guy with a lot of air balls so I’m not sure we are going to see a HR spike in 2017

BlueBird: In a vacuum, which of these would GMs typically prefer: A 7 WAR position player with average defense, A 7 WAR position player with elite defense (offset by worse hitting), or a 7 WAR starting pitcher?

Travis Sawchik: The pitcher, even with the risk

Guest: What do you think should be done about Tex@Hou series this week?  Play games in Arlington until Hou can host.

Travis Sawchik: That would seem the practical and pragmatic thing to do

toki: Meadows is hurt again.  Is he going to be a tale of “what might have been”?  Is this inherent in him and the way he plays or is this something he can work through with better conditioning?

Travis Sawchik: Great question. He has an injury prone label now, and if you’re the Pirates you have to have much less confidence building around him

Ayye: Re: MVP…year by year dWAR is so wildly varying. Am I supposed to believe Rendon has saved as many runs (13.8) as he has defensively this year while someone like Kevin Kiermaier has been worth negative defensive runs? I really hope statcast can help improve this in the future.

Travis Sawchik: defensive stats are still very imperfect …Hopefully Statcast saves the day

Sam: In regards to Bryant uppercut swing + strikeouts, is Bellinger on a similar sort of trajectory? Can he be league avg on Ks. He’s gotten better every month in that department

Travis Sawchik: Technically an uppercut swing should be on a more similar plane as a pitch, if done correctly, so I could see Bellinger reducing his Ks

Bird: What is a reasonable expectation for greg bird the rest of the season?2015 greg bird?2017 spring training bird?

Travis Sawchik: I’m a big Greg Bird fan. Given the missed time, I’d have tempered expectations this season but he’s a guy that gets the ball in the air with a great batting eye

Ham Porter: Literally just thinking about asking the same Greg Bird question

Travis Sawchik: Lot of Greg Bird interest in the queue!

Travis Sawchik: I’m a big fan

Giancarlo Stanton: How many home runs do you think I’m going to finish with?

Travis Sawchik: I’m hoping for 74

Travis Sawchik: That’s not very likely

Travis Sawchik: 62 would be interesting … I’m going to say 63

toki: Speaking of uppercut swings.  Have you noticed how much plate coverage Hoskins gets on his swing?  Its crazy for a swing that powerful to get the coverage it does.

Travis Sawchik: Hoskins has no flaws at the moment, really … If only he could get that BABIP up by keeping more balls in the park 😉

Travis Sawchik: He’s been an extreme fly-ball hitter for his entire pro career, a hitter with plate coverage, contact skills an elite batting eye and power

Travis Sawchik: The Votto comps are unfair …. but the profile and early work  is incredibly promising

Al: Are you going to watch the yankees, indians game today?Sevrino vs Kluber might be the best pitching matchup this year.

Travis Sawchik: Fantastic matchup. I will be watching

Sterling Mallory Chris Archer: More Hoskins questions!  He’s gotten to the majors pretty late in his career.  Do you think AAA was necessary for his development or could any good prospect bypass it?

Travis Sawchik: I think most prospects that have the talent to excel in the majors can bypass 3A

Ham Porter: ROS Judge or Bird?

Travis Sawchik: judge

bleepbloop: What player currently in the minor leagues makes the biggest impact in 2018?

Travis Sawchik: Acuna

Mark: You must not have had a chance to watch the Brewers if you didn’t think the new unis this weekend weren’t that ugly. I’ll concede most weren’t that bad but hoo boy, navy blue and highlighter yellow is NOT a good combo out on the diamond.

Travis Sawchik: The yellow did seem a bit off

Rich: Seems like people are still high on Eric Thames. I understand about recency bias but he now has 3 months of a strikeout rate well over 30% with a OPS around 700 and thats playing in one of the better hitter parks in the game. What makes you still think he can be better than a league average player? Even if he’s playing hurt he’s over 30 so not sure we can expect better seasons ahead.

Travis Sawchik: He’s not the guy we saw in April but I believe he’s going to correct to a degree and still provide surplus value on the contract. I think the batting eye and batting speed are still there and injury played a role in leading him into this tailspin

CamdenWarehouse: Would Stanton hitting 74 just get everyone up in arms about the juiced ball and asterisks and what not so a large portion of the population would still say that 61 is record?

Travis Sawchik: He’d be way above the field, so I’m not sure there would be that much juiced ball talk. And Dr. Alan Nathan’s research indicates the 2017 ball is no different than the 2016 ball when it comes to drag

Buff: If Meadows’ injury history fails to inspire confidence, what about Polanco’s?

Travis Sawchik: Pirates

Travis Sawchik: ‘ OF development has been a disappointment, for sure

Guest: Which incredibly mediocre AL team could take the 2nd wild card, then actually have a decent playoff run?

Travis Sawchik: If James Paxton is healthy, Mariners

Will: Ive noticed some managers taking different approach with the DH where instead of listing the starting lineup with a hitter in that role the put their SP from the day before there and then PH the player they want up in that situation….do you think this really gives them an advantage or just an over thought concept that could actually hurt them if that particular player is needed in a more crucial situation but isn’t available in the later innings?

Travis Sawchik: I have not noticed this. This is happening often?

ohioastrosfan: Are Astros in best position in baseball to win division next 4 years? Weak ALWest, young core with a strong farm still.

Travis Sawchik: Astros are in a pretty strong position. I think the AL Central is a favorably landscape for the Indians, too

E: The fans get to pick what goes on the jersey? Can’t wait to see “Basebally McBaseballface”

Travis Sawchik: It would open up a lot of possibilities

E: Is AJ Pollock still good?

Travis Sawchik: Sounds like a future FanGraphs post

Dom: Is Hoskins another glaring example of the change from the AAA ball to the new MLB ball being exacerbated in new hitters?  Was is common practice for scouts to assume hitters would benefit slightly from the major league ball, even before mid 2015?

Travis Sawchik: No … and teams, this season, can expect a power spike. But Hoskins still belted 29 homers and nearly had a .300 ISO in 3A

Xavier: Can we reasonably speculate that S Marte’s loss of power is due to his PED bust?

Travis Sawchik: He only hit nine homers a year ago and is a groundball machine … So I don’t know how much the PEDs helped or when he started using

annoying cubs fan: Javier Baez walked on four pitches twice in the last two days. Have we entered an alternate universe?

Travis Sawchik: I need to go watch these plate appearances

Travis Sawchik: Imagine if Baez developed plate discipline?

Joe Douglas: Hi Travis. All ready for the move?

Travis Sawchik: Hi, Joe. Moving is one of my least favorite tasks … getting there!

Joe Douglas: The most similar comps I could find for Hoskins in past 10 years: Good Granderson, Encarnacion, Teixeira, Ortiz… Looking at Players with above average contact rates, swing rates, power, and below average ground ball rates.

Travis Sawchik: Pretty encouraging, eh?

Joe Douglas: Votto, Cutch, Bautista, Konerko also popped up with Hoskins

Travis Sawchik: More encouragement

E: What would you say the odds are of Hoskins making the hall of fame?

Travis Sawchik: Pretty remote. Particularly when his first full season will come at Age 25

Sterling Mallory Chris Archer: The DH thing isn’t true.  The DH listed must have one at bat during a game.

Sterling Mallory Chris Archer: DH Rule: Rule 5.11(a)(2): The Designated Hitter named in the starting lineup must come to bat at least one time, unless the opposing club changes pitchers.

Bo: Most to least likely to be getting saves in September: Melancon, Familia, McGee, Treinen?

Travis Sawchik: Seems reasonable. I still think Treinen can be a beast

Guest: Wait, the Rockies have a top 10 pitching staff?  How did this happen?

Travis Sawchik: This has been going on since April!

Jordan: Was that designated hitter question submitted by a time traveler from the 1970s? That move has long been illegal under 6.10(b): The designated hitter named in the starting lineup must come to bat at least one time, unless the opposing club changes pitchers.

Travis Sawchik: No idea. FakeNews is the queue, apparently

Chives: Hoskins or Conforto long-term?

Travis Sawchik: That Conforto injury was so unfortunate. Given the uncertainty around Conforto, I think most would choose Hoskins today

Joe Douglas: If you want to know what current versions of the “bad” Hoskins offensive skill set look like: 2017 Kepler/Kipnis. 2016 Conforto/Semien

Travis Sawchik: The Sobering Hoskins Facts

Moltar: Hoskins may well be a fine player, but he’s going to cool off at some point and we should wait to evaluate him until he goes through a cold snap. Can he make the adjustment? Joc never did. We’re still waiting to see if, say, Judge can adjust, and only a few months ago we was the second coming of Babe Ruth or something.

Travis Sawchik: More Sobering Hoskins Takes

bleepbloop: Is Alex Bregman a top 5 fantasy SS next season?

Travis Sawchik: Not quite

All Rise: Re:Hoskins hall of fame. Judge’s first fulll season also came at age 25. Does this mean that you think Judge’s chances of making the HOF are similarly remote.

Travis Sawchik: I do

bleepbloop: As a hoskins owner, I do not appreciate seeing these sobering hoskins takes.  Let the euphoria live forever

Travis Sawchik: You speak for thousands

BigStyx: What odds do you put @ Jeter and company trading their teams’ marquis player for a bevy of top prospects especially if Stanton would agree to remove his opt-out?

Travis Sawchik: I’m not sure a team would trade a bevy of prospects for the full Stanton deal .. and I also am not sure how willing new Marlins ownership will be to move face of the franchise

BK: I know we’re way past it, but I have a question about that Yankees-Tigers brawl. So it all started when Kahnle hit Miggy and got ejected from the game. So Girardi had to replace him with Chapman in the P spot (with Gary Sanchez still DH-ing). Then Miggy and Romine got into a fight and both got ejected. Since Romine was ejected, Gary Sanchez had to come in to catch. But if he’s catching and the DH has entered the game, shouldn’t Chapman have to come out of the game? I know it’s small and irrelevant, but it’s been bugging me

Travis Sawchik: I’m going to refrain from answering any more DH questions that may or may not be true

Hot Take: Hoskins<Ruth

Travis Sawchik: Reasonable

Sonny: What do you consider Marte’s keeper value into 2018? I’m tempted to throw him back into the draft pool and take my chances but seeing Dee Gordon’s line this year makes me reconsider making him available.

Travis Sawchik: Marte could be a value pick in 2018 just for speed element

Aaron: How surprised should we be that Stanton had another level to reach?  He is, after all, in what is most commonly the prime aged season.  It’s easy to forget how young he was when he broke into the league.

Travis Sawchik: Pretty dramatic in-season pivot, though

Anthony: With the electronic strike zone seemingly imminent, should teams reconsider the way they evaluate catchers? I.e., should a young catcher or prospect with seeming defensive limitations but offensive upside be more valued than he would be now, in anticipation of a future where catcher defense is less important?

Travis Sawchik: If and when when we see an automated zone all framing because meaningless, so catcher defense takes a hit and teams might try to sneak more offense in at the position

bleepbloop: How much has your player evaluation process changed since statcast data has become available (I find myself relying almost entirely on statcast type stats like xStats, etc these days)?

Travis Sawchik: It’s not the only tool I use, but I employ it regularly. It definitely helps better understand underlying skills

Rice, Lynn, & Evans: Hey Trav. Very deep H2H league and in playoffs. Any SP’s coming up that I should take notice?

Travis Sawchik: I’m in a deep H2H league and the waiver wire is pretty thin at the moment

Travis Sawchik: Josh Tomlin is coming off the DL this week, Matt Moore has made three straight quality starts, I’ve always had a soft spot for Erasmo Ramirez

bleepbloop: Seems like everybody wrote off kyle schwarber this season but he seems to have risen from the dead at least somewhat.  What do you expect out of him going forward? More of this season or some significant improvements?

Travis Sawchik: He’s going to be an impact bat … but would fit better in the AL

Alex: At what point do/should the Jays just cut bait on Kendrys Morales?  -0.8 fWAR, 92 wRC+.  He’s underperforming his xwOBA, but I can’t help but wonder if that can largely be explained by his speed and the groundballs he is hitting (despite the groundballs being hard)?

Having a mid-order bat that must be removed in late and close situations for a runner seems less than ideal too.

Travis Sawchik: Two years and $20m-plus left on that deal

Travis Sawchik: Jays, I suspect, misread the market when signing him

BK: Who’s the best first baseman in the NL? Goldschmidt, Freeman, Votto, Rizzo? What about in 5 years?

Travis Sawchik: I love Goldy and Votto about equally at the moment … Freeman in 5 years

Luck Dragons: Is Buxton a top 30 OF ROS?

Travis Sawchik: I’d roll the dice on his upside

Mike: A big part of Bellinger’s improvement in K rate is that he finally adopted a separate 2 strike approach where he cuts down a bit on the power swing, improving his contact.   He’s become particularly adept at using that swing to take outside pitches just to the SS side of up the middle where no one is ever playing in the shift.

Travis Sawchik: Special talent, obviously

Josh: How did Nelson Cruz end up aging so much better than V-mart?  Obviously Cruz had a longer history of elite power and has largely avoided all the health issues of vmart has suffered (catching knees, recent cardiac issues, etc.), but then V-mart was always better on plate discipline and more access to DHing over the past five years

Travis Sawchik: I thought Cruz would be slowing down at this point. No idea. Each individual players follows a different track

Pennsy: Now that it’s nearly over, how would you rate the Werth deal for the Nationals? 14 WAR over 7 years for $126m.

Travis Sawchik: When factoring in inflation, seems like a slight overpay

Travis Sawchik: But not terrible

Marc: True or false: Kenley Jensen is more dominant than Mariano Rivera always was. At this point it’s just a matter of how long he keeps it up before he catches up with Rivera.

Travis Sawchik: Rivera was never as dominant in a single season as Jansen has been this season (30 ERA-, 29 FIP-)

Travis Sawchik: Different era, but Jansen is special and getting better at his craft. I enjoyed interviewing him

Richard: I’ve frequently heard that the challenge with an electronic strike zone is the ability to correctly call the height of the pitch.  Assuming this is due to the 3-dimensional strike zone, wouldn’t a very easy solution be to just convert the strike zone to a 2-dimensional plane?

Travis Sawchik: It’s my understanding that it is the 3-D nature of the zone, rather the individual north-south dimensions for hitters. I suspect a machine would do a better job of calling a 3-D zone

BigStyx: I know I am dreaming BUT…. I would love to see Stanton in a Yankee uniform playing along side Judge and Cashman forgetting about Harper! What a lineup card Girardi would be filling everyday!

Travis Sawchik: Well, the Yankees could save $200m or so by pursuing Stanton over Harper

toki: What’s keeping Honeywell at AAA?

Travis Sawchik: Service time? I want to see the screwball and the whole skillset at the major league level right now

CubFan: Care to gaze into your crystal ball for 2018 and tell me if Marwin Gonzalez has done enough to warrant an everyday job and does Treinen have enough talent to be the A’s closer?

Travis Sawchik: yes and yes

Joe Douglas: Certainly some super hot takes on Hoskins, but even just looking at the projections, you’re around .360-.370 wOBA (I believe Camerson said only Steamer is baking in the AAA improvements this year). So,  if you want a unbiased Hoskins opinion, there you go. Don’t think anyone is saying he will run a .490 wOBA for a year.

Travis Sawchik: Most of us are only interested in dreaming, Joe

bleepbloop: Can I just say how amazing it is to see someone use Marquis instead of Marquee in a baseball chat

Travis Sawchik: Thumbs Up

benj: Is this what Xander Bogaerts is now? A sort of “empty” .280-ish guy?

Travis Sawchik: He’s only 24 so I suspect there is more power in there

All the Hoskins Fans: Just let us have this for a little while

Travis Sawchik: It’s always sunny in philly

toki: Donaldson is on pace for SS eligibility and Machado has it already.  What year is this and how did this all happen while Bautista is playing 3b?

Travis Sawchik: I’ll be curious to see if teams want Machado as a SS or 3B when he enters FA. He is, or was, a natural SS

BK: Better player next year: Acuna or Hoskins?

Travis Sawchik: Hoskins

jdrizzle: What should i research for a class i am designing for myself this school year?

Travis Sawchik: Injury prevention and clubhouse chemistry

Jackson: Hey man, big fantasy dynasty question. Rank these SPs in terms of keeper options going forward:

Luis Castillo/Jameson Taillon/Alex Wood/Aaron Nola

Travis Sawchik: Let’s see how healthy Wood is at the end of 2017

Brian Cashmon: Stanton would hit approx. 400 HRs in Yankee Stadium

Travis Sawchik: Stanton would love the RF dimensions there for sure

BK: We’re getting pretty close to the end and there’s still a 0.1% chance of a 5 way tie for the second AL Wild Card, but no contingency plan. Would this just break baseball?

Travis Sawchik: Who here is rooting for chaos?

Travis Sawchik: Thanks for the questions, folks

Travis Sawchik: We’ll be back next week

Travis Sawchik: In the meantime, we should all try to do something for the people of Houston

Travis Sawchik: Be good, do good