JotCast | Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 9/8/25

Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 9/8/25

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Ben Clemens

2:45

but yeah, Weaver is just good

jerry

2:46

re $216 million. think were still not able to comprehend the impact of inflation / gambling money inflating salaries. times are different, suddenly

Ben Clemens

2:46

yep!

that's definitely what happened to me

i went whoa that's many dollars

and then thought about it more and eh, it was not that mnay dollars

Nervous Flyball Pitcher

2:46

O's need two front liners, right?

Dude A, Dude B, Bradish, Rogers, Kremer (fingers crossed), and then anything you get out of Rodriguez, Young, Povich, Wells is gravy

they won't get two, but they might get one? Cease pillow contract (see Giants Snell), Framber 4/$160M, something like that? Burnes contract seems to imply, as usual, it's the years not the dollars

Ben Clemens

2:46

i mean, first allow me to say 'HA!' in re: your suggestion of Baltimore giving $160 million over four years, one of the largest contracts of all time, to a pitcher

2:47

but uh, yes, I continue to think they need to be more serious about signing good starting pitchers

Matt VW

2:47

Follow up on the Anisimova DelPo comparison: if we set the over under at AA's career major titles at 1.5, where do you land?

Ben Clemens

2:47

oof

that's a good line

okay she's 24, and she's played in the last two slam finals

but like, got pretty wrecked in both

2:48

I think I'd take the over but I would not be happy about it. the bench is really deep in women's tennis right now but her game is well suited to 3 of the 4 majors, and also it's best of 3s so she can spike some

Hundreds, perhaps thousands

2:48

Mets re-sign polar bear Pete, right?

Ben Clemens

2:48

I think so for sure

so I went to a Mets game a few weeks ago, Tong's debut

and my wife and I were baffled by how much more love Pete gets than like every other met

2:49

not because he isn't a fan favorite who's also great, but like, Juan Soto? Crickets. Pete Alonso? men rending their garments in joy that they got to see him hit

I think it'd be a massive fail on their part not to re-sign him, and I think the market happens to line up to make it quite likely

Bosoxforlife

2:49

But Anisimova did come back from being double-bageled by Swiatek to beat her at the US Open.

Ben Clemens

2:50

yeah and she beat Sabalenka at Wimbledon too. has a winning record against Sabalenka, even. I think she'll break thorugh. but I do understand the hesitation

Dan

2:50

Can you give us a two sentence board game review?

Ben Clemens

2:50

yeah let me look at what I've played recently

2:52

"Taverns of Tiefenthal takes the engine building, buy one thing that improves a second thing that improves a third thing style so common in Euro games and makes them all feed into running your own delightful medieval tavern. It feels cozy and has a great mix of your decisions feeling meaningful enough to think about them for a little bit, but enough continuing variance that planning ahead is for suckers."

Jeremy

2:52

Has the Rays constant roster churn has cost them meaningful numbers of fans? Same question for the Brewers.

Ben Clemens

2:52

I think it has for the Rays, but I actually don't think it has for the Brewers

I think that Wisconsin is kind of special, though. Don't try to replicate what the Brewers are doing and think you'll get sports fans like that

Jordan "The King" Lawlar

2:53

It is happening for me in 2025 or am I bench fodder until 2026 when I get an opening day gig?!

Ben Clemens

2:53

yeah 2026

Justin

2:53

How much do you factor in expected stats when you evaluate a player?

Ben Clemens

2:53

like, xwOBA? I mean some but I care a lot more about the components. xERA? I'm interested in it over multi year spans for sure, I think it does a better job of capturing contact quality than other stuff I look at

2:54

basically I think I'd prefer projections to expected stats, and then I like to try to create my own predictive stats or come up with reasons why I think a player has room to imrpove/is being overrated

the blanket 'wOBA - xwOBA' doesn't actually work all that well, I'd say, in beating projections, so I don't need to use it

Insert Witty Name Here

2:54

Enjoy all the tennis talk! How’s your game on the hard courts? I have zero real experience but my toddler loves it so I’m going to grow it with him. Do you really agree that it’s the world’s healthiest sport? How many curlers get hurt?

Ben Clemens

2:54

my game is so bad! so bad!

2:55

but it's fun. I think that a lot of the healthiness of tennis is from the fact that you run around for an hour, anecdotally speaking I play at the Golden Gate Park tennis center and it's a meaningfully healthier crowd than the already healthy crowd in the park

jerry

2:55

remotely interested in EPL ? just w/r/t liverpool and red sox. liverpool spent like $600 mil on buying contracts alone this "offseason". at the same time sox are pinching pennies. As a liverpool fan, and sox hater, its very ideal for me!

Ben Clemens

2:55

i follow kind of vaguely. and yes, I definitely find this funny

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