JotCast | Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 5/13/24

Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 5/13/24

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Ben Clemens

2:58

I'm still incredibly interested in it as a museum, and as a reminder of great baseball players from years past

I've absolutely loved Cooperstown both times I've been there, extremely glad it exists

Farhandrew Zaidman

2:58

If bat speed existed for Wily Mo Pena, 1) you'd expect him to be like top 5 in his prime, and 2) would said data have given him more chances at the end of his career?

Ben Clemens

2:58

1)yes 2)honestly probably not

2:59

there might not have been a quantitative measure of it but you could just watch him and know

fun fact: I was in Tokyo in 2017 and went to go see the Chiba Lotte Marines b/c they were playing Ohtani's Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters

the point was to see Ohtani, obviously. He didn't pitch but he DH'ed and it was awesome, he was so clearly great

3:00

but that's not the point of this story: Wily Mo was on the Marines, and people there LOVED him

they had a bunch of different coordinated chants for him, which is more or less par for the course in Japan, but he had more than your average player and also responded to the chants with some dance moves

there was a very memorable play where he gestured to the dugout that he was gonna try to score from first before one play, and then he actually did it

3:01

now, it was b/c of two defensive miscues and he should have been out by 30 feet, but he was FLYING around the stadium, crowd and dugout going wild

is this about his bat speed? def not. But it was great and I can still here the crowd going 'wiiiii mo peeeeeena' if I think about it

Tigers fan

3:01

Would it be possible for MLB to make baseballs with a better grip/seems that pitchers are comfortable with that also travel farther than the current balls? Seems like this would be a solution everyone would like. As a fan its hard watching my favorite all star players hitting below MLB regulars.

Ben Clemens

3:02

right? i mean, empirically it seems like they can't even figure out how to make the same baseball for two straight months, so this sounds like a lot to ask

but they should really do this

the way things are going right now is not good

Danny Dan Dan

3:02

who has been the biggest prospect you were high on but flopped?

Ben Clemens

3:02

hmmmmmmmm

3:03

Colby Rasmus maybe?

but I was just a big Cards homer then and didn't do my own research

3:04

since I've been a baseball analyst, it's maybe Carter Kieboom

I just kept thinking he'd be at least an average regular long after that seemed like an unlikely outcome

Street Cred

3:04

How come every time a guy hits a HR, it is always referred to as a mistake by the pitcher? Time and time again…. if Burnes goes 7 innings and allows just a 2-run HR, it will be described as “Burnes pitched a gem today with the just the one mistake to Soto in the 5th.” Maybe Soto just hit a great pitch? These batters are amazing but it seems like anytime they do well its just a pitching mistake. Why is that?

Ben Clemens

3:04

Yeah it's just an announcing tic, I agree with you that it is not usually correct

3:05

I watch a lot of Giants games and I've noticed that Jon Miller understands this implicitly, he'll mention mistakes not punished or great swings at tough pitches all the time

it's easier to say 'oh homers are pitcher mistakes' but I think that recognizing that the other guy lives in a big house too is important

Justin

3:06

Things like the Jo Adell breakout are fun. I feel like we usually point to reasons why a player will breakout, like he previously had a low babip, or low fip/high era in previous years, but sometimes there's nothing in the obvious data to point to a breakout and then it just happens which is cool. Your article on Reed Garrett changing pitches/pitch mix is another example off the top of my head

Ben Clemens

3:06

Oh man, I like inexplicable moves FAR more than explicable moves in general

'this guy si better than last year b/c last year he had a .220 babip and nothing changed' is not an article that I want to write or that you want to read

Funny Baseball

3:07

What are your thoughts on Jazz this year? He looks...solid (he's been hot lately). Obviously will be traded come the deadline, feel like he could be a difference maker for a contender like Cleveland or...San Diego?

Ben Clemens

3:07

Cleveland makes a lot of sense to me

Tigers fan

3:10

Would you say its true in general that the average pitcher and hitter today is better than any other time in baseball and yet....these players will never put up the statistics of the former greats of the game due to how tough the modern game is?

Ben Clemens

3:10

Yeah, I was looking up the Stephen Jay Gould argument that this is why no one is gonna hit .400 again

b/c the variation in population is declining b/c the very very best make the bigs now

3:11

https://web.colby.edu/baseball/files/2015/11/The-Extinction-of-the-.40...

Okay everyone, this chat has been fun but I gotta run and eat lunch before I get going on the rest of my day. I'm doing some more bat tracking investigations and a bit of home improvement, should be a fun week. Have a great day everyone, and let's do this again next week.

Justin

3:12

What book is the link you just posted from?

Ben Clemens

3:12

Okay last one

I dunno, but it's been reprinted a ton of times

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