JotCast | Dan Szymborski FanGraphs Chat

Dan Szymborski FanGraphs Chat - 12/3/20

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Dan Szymborski

12:30

I've had great relationships with a number of editors over the years, but Meg's the one that *challenges* what I write the most and gets on me for foibles and errors that copy desks in the past would just correct and not get on me about.

12:31

For example, I have a tendency to use ten instead of 10 and I love a good run-on sentence.

12:32

I'm someone who tends to need a bit of discipline.

12:33

I was a very free-range kid and a terror to teachers and I'm very self-sufficient. But that kind of upbringing makes me undisciplined in a lot of ways. For example while getting most people to do work they don't want to do is difficult, it's a harrowing task to get me doing an undesired task.

Sharp

12:34

Fourth wave ska? Any bands you think fit that description these days? Killing lincoln, streetlight, etc?

Dan Szymborski

12:34

I'm not sure there is a fourth-wave, but I liked making a variant of that joke from last year in the Disclaimers and I think I'll make a new oddball genre every year

Chuck E

12:34

Do you think Max Muncy’s 2020 was an outlier in a bad way or a preview of what’s to come?

Dan Szymborski

12:34

I think it's a general outlier, but he'll be in a long slow decline

Tom Emanski

12:34

Nontendering Schwarber is a poverty franchise move, right? Even if he would've been slightly overpaid, its hard to believe you couldn't have traded him for something after tendering him, whether now or at the deadline. And it seems hard to believe they can really cobble together better production for 9-10 mil

Dan Szymborski

12:34

The Cubs are a very disappoitning franchise

Todd Bonzalez

12:35

If the two "slices" that help make a sandwich somehow connect in a fourth dimension that is naturally imperceptible to humans, is it really a sandwich?

Dan Szymborski

12:35

If it's imperceptible to humans, it's not providing the stabilizing parallel contrary forces to the sandwich

And if the fourth dimension sandwich *is* doing that, then we can detect it in the same way we detect stars

Guest

12:36

What is Deivi Garcia's ceiling?

Dan Szymborski

12:37

Depends on the age of the house, but if it's as fairly recent one, drywall mounted to ceiling joists with multiple coats of paint.

Matt

12:37

SandwichGraphs is peak December content.

Mando

12:37

Listen to Five Iron Frenzy and the Supertones.

CeddyBReady

12:37

PLASTER! His ceiling is plaster. I'm fun!

Jimbo

12:37

Does Pavin Smith play his way into a starting role, 1b or otherwise?

Dan Szymborski

12:37

He does have some chance. The team released Kevin Cron helps clear the way.

CeddyBReady

12:38

There is a correlation to how active a person's inner monologue happens to be and how much they love/use run-on sentences in order to express ideas they deem complex and/or interesting when the opposite is actually true because most people prefer efficient communication and opportunities to digest the information being slung at them.

Dan Szymborski

12:38

Well, I have a very active inner monologue

Guest

12:38

were you surprised by any of the non-tenders yesterday?

Dan Szymborski

12:38

Schwarber surprised me, but it really should not have.

12:39

I didn't think the Rockies were dumb enough to actually non-tender Dahl

And I'm a little surprised the Royals NTed Franco

Sanford

12:39

Ever dabble in Old School RuneScape?

Dan Szymborski

12:39

I did not

Buck Farmers Only

12:39

If a non-baseball following friend asked you which team they should root for and they want to follow a team that will be good and fun but a bit of an underdog, who do you recommend?

Dan Szymborski

12:39

Padres

Matt

12:40

Dahl shouldn't surprise you, given everything you publicly believe about the Rockies management.

Dan Szymborski

12:40

Even *I* was surprised by the level of incompetence

CeddyBReady

12:40

Though the Rockies release of Dahl is akin to a mercy killing at this point.

Dan Szymborski

12:40

Oh, it's certainly merciful

Tim

12:40

Is it difficult for a systems like ZiPS to recognize when a player has made a jump in a particular direction, as opposed to following a smooth curve? Someone else referenced Gleyber Torres, whose projections seem positively influenced by performance a year or more ago, while I'm curious about Dom Smith, who is projected to have a significant OPS drop again (after outperforming projections by a lot for 2 years running).

Dan Szymborski

12:40

Well remember, 2019 and 2020 isn't two years

12:41

2020 was a 0.37 season.

You shouldn't be surprised about players moving less after especially good 2020 seasons.

because an unexpectedly good or lousy 2020 season is far less predictive than doing so in any other season

John

12:41

Huge shame the White Sox squandered prime position as everyone's favorite scrappy upstart team with their hiring decisions this offseason

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