JotCast | Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat

Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 4/19/22

Prev Page View Full Chat Next Page

Ben Clemens

2:11

I like what the Dodgers have done to harness his breaking ball

But the frustrating thing about Heaney has never been that he isn't capable of a great performance

It's the consistency

Give it a little time

Teddy

2:11

Current favorite / most entertaining windups or deliveries?

Ben Clemens

2:11

I really enjoy Jesus Luzardo's slide step quick pitch

2:12

It's very aesthetically pleasing

Tyler Rogers is obviously great

Paulie

2:12

Are you buying a Luzardo breakout season....or was it just one start?

Ben Clemens

2:12

Cautiously optimistic

speaking of

I'm always going to be a little worried about his fastball, it's one of those whole-is-less-than-the-parts things

2:13

And I really wish he'd either scrap his sinker or get back to throwing a true sinker instead of a wonky four-seamer

but I love the slider, I love the pitchability, and it's a refreshing change to have a prospect who I think of as a guy who 'knows how to pitch' also throwing 99

RTJ

2:13

Is Bellinger Back? High Babip, but hard to completely fake 2 HRs and a couple doubles early on, right?

Ben Clemens

2:14

Kind of depends on what you m ean by back

If you're asking whether he's back to 2019, I don' think so

the thing that made him so interesting when he was at peak was that his strikeout rate just vanished

2:15

That hasn't been the case this year. But I'm encouraged that he's making loud contact again and doing so without wildly expanding the zone

Inaccessible Rail

2:15

Once I heard about the injury Dom Smith played through last year, I thought he'd have a big 2022. So far, he has not looked good. Loads of Ks. Will he turn it around? Or is 2021 Dom what he is?

Ben Clemens

2:16

I do not think that he's 2021 Dom

I also don't think he's going to keep striking out 40% of the time; he only has 23 plate appearances

he probably won't ISO 0 either haha

2:17

Give it a little time, imo

The Real Ben Clemens

2:17

Played Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective for the first time last week. Had a great time, though one minor critique I have is that I wish it came with some way to visually mark which locations you had already visited so you didn't have to keep cross-referencing your notes.

Ben Clemens

2:17

That would be really nice!

It's definitely not the smoothest play-through, and they could make it less clunky

Glad you liked it

namiki

2:17

What kind of pitch is the Sweeper that we hear so much about these days? Also, do you think it is effective when viewed with Run Value?

Ben Clemens

2:18

I think the best descriptoin I've heard of it is that it's what people used to call a slurve

It's not a wholly new pitch or anything

2:19

I do think it's effective; I think that it especially plays well with lateral-breaking fastballs

But really, whatever you want to call it, it shouldn't be THAT surprising that a slider with big horizontal break is hard to hit

Particularly when thrown hard

Golan Norman

2:19

Will Dylan Carlson hit for enough power to fend off some of the other prospects the Cardinals have? (Nootbar, Burleson)

Ben Clemens

2:19

Yeah, not worried there

Rough first week of the season but yeah, it's a week

Jeremy

2:20

Is a sweeper the same thing as peak Corey Kluber's slider, which moved like a frisbee?

5 Run Homer

2:20

The rise of the sweeper makes me so happy, one of the nicest looking pitches in baseball

Ben Clemens

2:20

Do you guys know about FanGraphs pitch type splits?

Connecting…

Message History

On Off

Your current subscriptions

None

E-mail Address	Chat Owner	Status	Remove

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