JotCast | Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 3/2/26

Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 3/2/26

powered by

Prev Page View Full Chat Next Page

Ben Clemens

2:35

The Brewers have beat their FIP by 0.3 from 2020-2025. In 2026, we think they'll beat it by 0.09. I think we're probably regressing that too much

2:36

Is it fixable? Yes, but I need to think a lot more about how. And I think it's at the projection level, not the us assembling projections into odds level

Dan probably has some good thoughts on this

Alex

2:36

What is your favorite type of home run? I like the Adrian Beltre one-knee homers.

Ben Clemens

2:37

that's a good one. I love the really high ball home runs where you're like 'wait how in the world did that swing turn into a homer'

where it almost looks like me swinging at a whiffle ball pitch from my nephew

Insert Witty Name Here

2:37

Do you think Adley Rutschman can be a post hype sleeper? Any idea how he didn't develop as expected other than "catchers, man..."

Ben Clemens

2:38

I do think he can, but man, I also worry that I have a specific blindspot with Rutschman. I have been too high on him in trade value series in general. Obviously, some biases are unavoidable, but I had him in the top 35 last year. That was wrong, in retrospect.

party

1

so we'll be doing some soul searching there, basically

Mike Trout Mask Replica

2:38

Ben- I'm starting to think the Tigers break camp with Kevin McGonigle as their starting SS, am I crazy? Thank you for the chat!

Ben Clemens

2:38

not crazy at all

2:40

I don't know exactly what the likelihood is, but I think they're in ap osition where they need to try to tap into some upside variance, and trying out McGonigle is a great example of that

Hot dog inflation

2:40

Fans always talk about salary caps but what about a ticket price cap? Hot dog & drink cap? If costco and sams club can do $1.50 hot dog drink combos(better quality than mlb hot dogs too) then mlb can do it. Basically can we start a “hot dog prices are too damn high” club?

Ben Clemens

2:41

why would teams do this? and why would the players propose it? I think it's a nice pitch that will definitely never happen. You're not pay8ing for the meat in the hot dog - you're paying for the fact that you get to eat it while you watch a major league baseball game.

bosoxforlife

2:41

There is just no way that the Red Sox present roster works! Duran has to play, Anthony has to play and they say they are going to give Abreu a chance to face lefties more. That leaves out the best defensive CF in the game, who just happens to be having a terrific start to ST. Yoshida simply cannot be on the team unless he is going to turn into Smokey Burgess who, in 1966-67, appeared in 156 games, all as a PH.

Ben Clemens

2:42

I think that Yoshida is going to end up as the odd man out, and they'll just eat the money eventually

I'm with you that they just can't find a way to play him. They have four better outfielders. There are only three outfield spots

low slot (machine)

2:42

sean manaea had a rough season last year in addition to the general declining efficacy of sweepers, but also had some promising number like k-bb, stuff, sierra etc. what is your outlook on such an interesting profile

Ben Clemens

2:43

I have him on my Ottoneu team, if that answers your question. I think realistically the error bars are enormous. THe 'Manaea learned to throw like Chris Sale' narrative was always kinda silly, but likewise, this guy's been a decent major league starter before, it's not crazy to think that he just was never right last year and will have it back this year

2:44

I like the shape of the risk as a team, I'll just say: some chance he's cooked, but I think there's a reasonable chance that he is a mid-3's ERA dude again, more so than the market is pricing

I AM RANDAL

2:44

LOOKS LIKE I'VE GOT A LIST OF RESTAURANTS TO TRY https://www.yelp.com/search?find_desc=Tilapia&find_loc=New+York%2C+NY

Ben Clemens

2:44

still my favorite VEB article of all time

Jeremiah

2:44

Do you think Jakob Marsee can be a top 5-10 CF this season?

Ben Clemens

2:46

I do. Some of that is that the bar is pretty low, though. Like, my top 5 is Julio, PCA, Merrill, maybe Chourio, maybe Langford or Rafaela depending on if you count langford as a CF

2:47

but I think there's a big dropoff after the top 4. Maybe you throw Buxton in there depdning on how you feel about his health

my point is that the NEXT tier is pretty wide. Looking at Depth CHarts, we have Oneil Cruz 10th at 2.8 WAR proj, and Marsee at 17th at 2.2. Brenton Doyle is in 19th with 2.2. The difference between back half of the top 10 and average is just not that high at the moment

RE: Soto Comp

2:49

"he's like ted williams, only not as good because ted williams' stats will obviously never be matched" - If Williams' stats will never be matched, why even bother with him as a comp?

Frank Thomas, much more reasonable comp

Ben Clemens

2:49

not a bad one at all. The reason people don't use it is the lefty/righty thing

I credit you for it, though. It's a good one. Lefty/righty is overrated as a historical comp thing. We care about their aggregate production, not where they stood

bosoxforlife

2:49

What is your impression of the ABS Challenge system? It definitely adds a fascinating moment of drama but I would have liked just one more opportunity to be wrong so it would be used more often early in games. it does not effect the pace of play.

Ben Clemens

2:50

I'm happy with it, though I think the visual presentation will continue to evolve. The extremely tiny misses with the distance written out sometimes seem silly. I think I prefer the tennis style where they don't quantify the size of the miss, merely show a graphic

Guest

2:50

T/F - (gotta pick one) The fact that Soto and Naylor combined for 68 SB vs 6 CS with some of the worst sprint speed in the league means guys like Jackson Merrill and Joey Ortiz who are fast but don't get steals just don't really care (put in the work to be good).

Ben Clemens

2:50

Oh, false

2:51

Now, are there some people who just don't want to put in the work? definitely

but I bet you that it's hard to be as good at Juan Soto at a mental processing skill

2:52

I think that some people just don't have the 'time up the pitcher' skill down well enough and that it's jsut too hard to improve for some

fish

2:52

another marlins outfield question, but what's your take on stowers? 25 hr in 400 pa seems like it will come back to earth, the projection systems certainly think so, but at the same time barrel rate is one of the stickier hitting metrics and he rocked a 19% last year. what are you seeing here?

Ben Clemens

2:53

The projections think he's gonna keep thumping, we have him down for 26 doubles and 27 homers in a tough park for homers

2:54

40th highest ISO projection in baseball, right behind Fernando Tatis and James wood

the guy has a career 30% strikeout rate. WE think he's gonna strike out too much

Connecting…

Register

Message History

On Off

On Off

On Off

On Off

Your current subscriptions

None

Register now to continue managing your subscriptions

E-mail Address	Chat Owner	Status	Remove

Enter your email address to be notified when Ben Clemens hosts a chat