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Dan Szymborski FanGraphs Chat - 12/18/25

Dan Szymborski

12:01

And we are here.

Because we can't be there.

12:02

Can only be here.

Rick

12:02

The Phillies, Braves, and Mets have all made significant additions since their ZiPS projections were released. How do you view their division at this point in time?

Dan Szymborski

12:02

I don't think hugely different; the Phillies I think are clearly better.

But I haven't released Mets yet!

Lowetide

12:02

Are there one or two pitchers among the talented young starter group (Burns, Mis, McLean, etc) that Zips likes a surprising amount, or is it different shades of equal?

Dan Szymborski

12:02

I don't think it's SURPRISING that it likes those guys

12:03

I think the more interesting ones are the lesser fringier prospects ZiPS does like

12:04

Like Mitch Bratt and Ethan Pecko

Gideon

12:04

How far underwater are the José Berríos and Anthony Santander contracts? Could either of them be moved (maybe with a low-end prospect attached) to free up roster and payroll space?

Dan Szymborski

12:05

Don't have the exact numbers, but Santander's underwater and Berrios not SO Much

Phil

12:05

Which player is your pick to have a big bounce back year, and which one do you think is most likely to come back down to earth?

Dan Szymborski

12:05

You're making me spoil TWO columns!

OK, I usually do breakouts rather than boucnebacks so

12:06

Sandy Alcantara woudl be one of my biggest bouncebacks. Not to his Cy level

but he really improved as the team went on

Yordan Alvarez obviously

ARKNDJL

12:06

Hey Dan! Big fan of your work. Wanted to get your thoughts on a few things...

Richard Matic absolutely raked in the DSL this season, posting a 167 wRC+

Was wondering your thoughts on him (Richard Matic) going forward? He seems extremely projectable, you have his raw power listed at a 65 (!!!) FV and I'm inclined to agree, but I was even MORE interested in him after seeing a very rare 65 tool grade, which you don't tend to give out often

Dan Szymborski

12:08

A 212/309/327 translation for that level is really quite good

12:09

So there's definitely a lot of interest, though I never really go NUTS about guys unless they were college guys or in high-A ball

12:10

is his name pronounced Matick? Because it just reminded me of something we used to do to annoy my friend Dan Ribaudo

12:11

There was this series of CGI demonstration videos liek 30-35 years ago called Mind's Eye. One of them had a song called "Quantum Mechanic" and there's this lyric "I'll show you the schematic." But my friend Mike Cardiff and I used to ENRAGE Dan Ribaudo by claiming the lyric was "I'll show you bust-a-matic."

And you couldn't just look stuff like that up then

Guards!Guards!

12:11

Have you ever considered creating a composite player out of (the debatable) best tools in baseball history and running a career ZiPS on them?

Dan Szymborski

12:11

I haven't, might be fun

>this guy<

12:11

Dan is it going to take another work stoppage for us to be treated to more "what if"/Zips time machine articles?

Dan Szymborski

12:12

I've admittedly been hoarding the ideas for work stoppages

Lars

12:12

Does 1 WAR = 1 WAR no matter the position? Or could a 2 WAR elite RP be more valuable than a 3 WAR corner outfielder? Assuming relatively normal/even roster construction

Dan Szymborski

12:12

Generally it means the same, but there's a real philosophical question on how to treat relievers

Oddball Herrera

12:12

Why do I have the feeling that the fire sale and the hiring of Pirates castaways like Derek Shelton and Josh Bell signals the symbolic beginning of the "We're going to adopt the Pirates business model" era for the Twins.

Dan Szymborski

12:12

Because Josh Bell isn't very good!

12:13

I want to see small market teams spend $28 million on one good player, not four $7 million players no better than who they have

Tom Pohlad

12:13

After a bit of holiday fratricide it's time to show what a power house the Twins can be! What's my first order of business now that I have the keys? Now that Derek Shelton and Josh Bell are signed I'm kind of at a loss.

CFH

12:13

Hi Dan - you’ve mentioned in past chats not finding a correlation between bullpen quality and outplaying run differential, but this doesn’t really make sense as a hypothesis. It should be that top-end bullpen talent helps a team out win its run differential while holding overall bullpen WAR constant

Dan Szymborski

12:13

I did top-end bullpen talent specifically too!

not just overall bullpen

12:15

which..unfortunately...I can't find super quick becasue I'm a disorganized mess

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