JotCast | Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat

Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 9/23/24

Prev Page View Full Chat Next Page

Ben Clemens

3:02

players seem to benefit from a change in managerial styles, and honestly, while managing is a hard job, there are probably lots of people who can do it passably well

keep cycling through

Guest

3:02

In the Fangraphs Preseason Staff picks, 1 writer picked the Royals to make the playoffs; 2 writers picked the Guardians; and 2 writers picked the Mets. Do these writers get, like a fruit basket? Or just bragging rights? Or do we just shake our head and say "baseball!"?

Ben Clemens

3:02

sadly, I can tell you that it's the latter

I picked the Orioles to win the ALE last year

3:03

and I got, as a prize, a bunch of O's fans who said I hate their team b/c our models thougth they should be underdogs against the Rangers

Andre

3:03

The NYM are 65-36 since May 30. Are they a plucky bunch of lovable overachievers we've been told they are, or are they just one of the more talented teams in the league?

Ben Clemens

3:03

more the second, I think

3:04

the reason the plucky overachiever narrative is sticking is b/c the Mets had some holes get filled by guys like Jose Iglesias

who is unquestionably a plucky overachiever

and b/c Lindor is somehow underrated as a star

Bosoxforlife

3:05

I think Nick Yorke has a good chance of adding a solid bat to the Pirates lineup. They stole him from the Red Sox for Priester who doesn't ignite any excitement in Red Sox Nation.

Ben Clemens

3:05

Love me some Nick Yorke

now admittedly, some of this is b/c he had an awesome card in OOTP perfect team last year

and I used it a lot

but all he does is hit, so yeah, I'm into that kind of profile

Jeff Cirillo

3:05

Very few people picked the Brewers to win the NL Central this season, and they're kind of chronically underrated in preseason projections. Is that a tendency to focus on stars and underrate depth?

Ben Clemens

3:06

I feel like this year was something different than normal, to be honest

the Brewers had shockingly low over/under season win total lines in the gambling markets, which is not normal

they tend to be grouped in with the Cubs and Cards but this year they were at o/u 75.5, which is wild

3:07

I think that their ability to consistently turn out good defenders and position them well has led to us underrating them a bit in projections

they are fip-beaters as a team, and while we get some of that by projecting defense, we regress defensive projections pretty heavily

3:08

b/c that's the observed behavior. and Milwaukee's seems to regress less

but I think this year, they also had a ton of question marks and unproven rookies stepping in, so there was a reason that expectations dipped

Mike Trout

3:09

Any thoughts on why Luisangel was so bad after the Mets acquired him? I'm surprised by the hard contact he has made in his first week.

Ben Clemens

3:09

variance?

I don't have a strong view other than that I like to let prospects give me a few years of stats

3:10

that said, his power production is obviously silly at the moment and I do think he's gonna struggle pretty hard to keep that part up

3:11

there's minor league statcast now, and the guy had 15 barrels out of 457 balls in play

3 in 25 as a big leaguer is just a smaller sample, you know?

Mama Cass

3:11

What’s happening with Oakland obviously sucks but how favorable is it for the Giants situation in SF since they’re going to be the only game in town now?

Ben Clemens

3:12

It's definitely favorable for them, I actually have some anecdotal evidence of A's fans I know preparing to make the switch

birds birds birds

3:12

What are some real phenomena in baseball that we can't statistically distinguish from random variance because baseball is so random?

Ben Clemens

3:12

There are so many of these

3:13

I feel like teams can maybe do a better job with better data and also better statisticians, but: effect of foul balls on subsequent production

sequencing

rest

how batters do when the reliever has a different arsenal than the starter he replaced

nonsense like that

Peaks and Valleys

3:13

How do you characterize a career like Tyler O'Neill's? I get that there's an injury element to it, but also his two "good" years have starkly different ISO and wrc+ numbers. Is he reliable for future years or just a crapshoot?

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