JotCast | Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat

Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 9/26/22

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Ben Clemens

3:18

sounds great

Dan

3:18

My boss (new job so I haven't met him yet) is going to Toronto to try and catch Judges home run. I should tell him to pay me more so I can afford to do that too for what ever the next cool record chase is.

Ben Clemens

3:18

You should! Attending historic games in person is amazing

Brian

3:18

I expect almost all hitter to improve with no shift next year, but Steven kwan seems like a candidate to improve less because he hits it where it’s pitched and teams don’t really shift against him. Is it possible for his production to go up next year but his ultimate value go down due to the elimination of the shift?

Ben Clemens

3:19

Theoretically yes. In practice, I don't buy it. Banning the shift isn't going to change the game THAT much

Kwan is good, and he'll continue to be good, but it's not b/c of some resilience or lack thereof against hte shift

It's because he's good

John

3:19

What do you know or believe now that you did not know or believe several years ago?

Ben Clemens

3:20

Okay, so an easy one here on the micro level is seam-shifted wake

That's changed how I think about pitching substantially. It seems like the commonplace teaching of wake-shifted pitches is changing pitching overall, too

3:21

On a broader scale, I think I am less willing to believe in player changes now

That sounds kind of like the opposite, but doing this job for a while has made me realize how often a player turns over a new leaf... and then turns that leaf back over a week later

Baseball is so dang hard. The other guy lives in a big house, too

3:22

Everyone in the game is trying really hard to get better all the time. Sometimes you think you figure something out, but you were just waking up on the right side of the bed that week or whatever. Baseball players are human, and if you reduce them to their constituent numbers, I think that on/off performance nature can be lost

M's Fan

3:22

How ironic is it that the Mariners may break a 21 year playoff drought and not get a home playoff game?

Ben Clemens

3:23

Well, just win a few then and get a home game. But yeah, sad

Appa Yip Yip

3:23

You could probably mix the sweet chili sauce with peanut butter to make a kickin peanut sauce, add some ginger and soy sauce

Ben Clemens

3:23

This seems like a great excuse to give you guys my favorite peanut sauce recipe

2 parts peanut butter, 1 part soy sauce, 1 part black vinegar, 1 part chili oil

3:24

Toast some minced garlic and ginger, add those, plus honey to taste

You can just stir that up with a spoon for a bit, it'll look weird and broken for much longer than you'd expect but then turn smooth

Farhandrew Zaidman

3:24

Dodgers are destined to have at least one pseudo-bullpen game each series this post-season, yeah?

Ben Clemens

3:25

It's sure feeling that way, huh?

I don't really know what's going on with Gonsolin's recovery, but they're just light on arms

As expected, tbh

Papa Smurf

3:25

Black vinegar = balsamic?

Ben Clemens

3:25

https://www.bonappetit.com/story/black-vinegar

3:26

This stuff

Highly recommend it, one of my go-to meals when I'm feeling rushed is just to chop up a veggie, marinate it in a black vinegar/soy sauce/chili oil mix, and then roast it to eat with some rice

RTJ

3:26

Will y'all (Fangraphs) be bringing back live chats during the playoff games?

Ben Clemens

3:27

surely

Finnegan's Seam-shifted Wake

3:27

Will teams pay for Willson Contreras over 4-5 years?

Ben Clemens

3:27

I believe so

Safety Stegosaurus

3:27

Has the next player to hit 700 jacks played in a MLB game yet?

Ben Clemens

3:27

I think the safe bet is no

700 is just SO many

3:28

On that note, you can get this kind of crack analysis -- 700 is a lot of homers -- all week at FanGraphs

3:29

I have something coming out tomorrow on Trevor Rogers, probably something on the Guardians' run to the playoffs for later this week, and now CATCHER SPEED

And by next week we'll be in full playoff mode, I'm very excited for it

Have a great week, everyone, and thank you for the sweet chili suggestions

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