JotCast | Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 3/3/24

Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 3/3/24

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Ben Clemens

2:29

Mathematically speaking: without bunts, Perdomo was at 87 mph EV and McCarthy at 84.5 in 2024. Add in the bunts, and they drop to 84.2 and 81.8

jimmy

2:30

Is SF making a mistake with their rotation? You have Webb and then 4/5 guys that you have no idea what you're getting from them.

Ben Clemens

2:31

I'm actually kind of into it. The minor league options as replacements are pretty good. Birdsong, Beck from the bullpen, Roupp, I think Mason Black is kinda fun, various Carsons

Jim

2:31

What does Zack Gelof need to do to bounce back at the plate this year?

Ben Clemens

2:32

Make a little more contact. He had the lowest contact rate among qualified players last year. Like.... worse than Oneil Cruz, Adolis Garcia in his worst year, Elly, Ezequiel Tovar

He's never going to be a super high contact rate guy -- but he needs to be bad, not awful

ppenayr

2:33

why must the pirates continually disappoint me, one legit bat in that the middle of that lineup and they could compete.

Ben Clemens

2:33

I really don't get it

It's so discouraging to see them win the lottery with Skenes, and then just kinda ignore it

Alex Anthopoulos

2:33

Am I officially regretting the Murphy trade, now that he is going to miss 4 to 6 weeks?

Ben Clemens

2:34

if 4-6 weeks is gonna change that, you probably have your priorities a little wrong

I mean, if the Braves could eitehr do that trade again or not, they wouldn't. But regret it? I don't think so. I think it was a smart swap, and I think that even in a bad-ish case (Contreras better than expected, Murphy worse than expected) they still got a lot of value out of it

2:34

What are your thoughts on Eduard Julien this year? The Ty France signing was odd

Ben Clemens

2:36

Julien is a guy I'm just going to bet on forever. I really buy the skillset. I agree that France cuts down on his PT -- but they can be platoon partners, and honestly Julien's going to provide you a lot more juice if he can fake second than if he plays first. I think that he'll get plenty of time to given the general brittle nature of Minnesota's best players

Vader

2:36

Hi Ben! What one or two metrics are your personal favorites for quickly evaluating hitters and pitchers?

Ben Clemens

2:36

Oh hm, fun question

2:37

I think that barrel rate is just a great one-off for understanding hitters. You have to look at their other stats too, but it provides really useful context. "Does the ball explode off the bat" is something we all use when we watch people in real life. I think that one statistic to explain that is about as good as it gets for a quick test of hitters

re: pitchers, it's kinda cheesy but swinging strike rate

2:38

so much stuff that pitchers do is hard to tease out. Do their pitches work off of each other? Do they tip cdertain ones? Are they tiring out early? Do they need more options for when they don't have the platoon advantage? You have to watch guys for a long time to know the answers to those questions

"Can batters hit the ball?" is much easier to measure and probably more important for performance, though

2:39

so barrel rate and swinging strike rate, if I had to pick only one stat for each. But the great part about baseball is that you can pick a ton of stats, if you want to

Jim

2:39

Why is Shea Langeliers so bad at framing and blocking pitches? He had a reputation as a defensive catching prospectCan he improve?

Ben Clemens

2:39

I don't have a good asnwer for you here. Hey, he's a good thrower

Honestly, he's not a disastrous receiver or anything

2:40

Generally speaking, though,catcher defnsive reputation has a ton to do with throwing, and he's great at it

Tom

2:40

Do you use K-BB% or CSW% to supplement whiff rate for pitchers, or do those have too many other variables at play (for instance, chase/BB rates in low-mid minors are inherently much worse)?

Ben Clemens

2:40

I mean, sure. I'm kind of skeptical of CSW just because I haven't had a ton of luck getting it to work with the way I think about pitchers. I'd prefer just strikeout rate at that point

2:41

because I feel like called strikes are so variable in their distribution among counts based on who the pitcher is that CSW ends up pretty noisy

but K-BB is obviously a better statistic in the long run than swinging strike rate, because it captures more of what makes a pitcher good

2:42

not walking people is good, and that doesn't show up directly in swinging strike rate (it does a little b/c a walk requires four pitches someone didn't swing at, but that's indirect)

just, it's noisier, and I'd rather look at swinging strike rate over a small sample to know if I should be paying attention to a guy

Henry Dodger

2:42

Is Gerrit Cole still elite?

Ben Clemens

2:42

He is to me

2:43

Our projections think he's not, though - they have him as the 26th best pitcher

I'd have him in the 10-15 range, which to me is still elite

Tim

2:43

I’ve been. Doing my reading on Yoniel Curet. Don’t see too much ink about him. Does he have a shot at the Rays’ rotation this year, and if so, how high on him can we be?

Ben Clemens

2:43

He's in our preseason top 100 and got a big writeup there:

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/2025-top-100-prospects/

2:44

I'd say he definitely has a shot - that writeup notes we predict a mid-2025 debut

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