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Dan Szymborski FanGraphs Chat - 2/20/26

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jjs

2:19

How many gms do the Tigers win the Central by??

Dan Szymborski

2:19

Kevin

2:20

Which teams do you think have the most impactful ZiPS-like system for their own internal use?

Dan Szymborski

2:20

This, I really can't say, simply because a number of teams directly use ZiPS

and the ones that don't haven't volunteered anything to me

Well, mostly

Guest

2:20

Have you ever played a board game with Keith Law?

Dan Szymborski

2:20

I have not. Not that I would be opposed to it!

2:21

Would've been fun at those ESPN conferences I used to go to for baseball writers, but Keith was never at the ones I went to

A Boy Named Yu

2:22

Do you remember Wander Javier being THE Wander before Wander Franco? Pepperidge Farms remembers...

Dan Szymborski

2:22

Wander Suero was a World Series champion!

Oaktown Blues

2:22

The postseason performance that ZiPS is aware of includes minor league postseason, right?

Dan Szymborski

2:22

yes

A Boy Named Yu

2:23

If Johnathon Long of the Cubs has a good spring training while Tyler Austin scuffles, what are the chances they break camp with Long instead?

Dan Szymborski

2:23

I think fairly low

2:24

Austin's going to be a role player, and if you like what Long does, you want him playing full time

Surplus Valuez = Stolen Wages

2:24

How do we move the rhetoric of the sports fans away from all conclusions either being “unprovenz” and/or “overpaidz(!)”? What was the point of the Moneyballz era lol?

Dan Szymborski

2:24

We're better there than 20 years ago!

A Boy Named Yu

2:24

Thoughts on baseball in the Olympics now that the WBC has a decent foothold?

Is there any gas station food that you trust?

Dan Szymborski

2:24

dangit yu, I'm going to have to answer other Qs soon!

2:25

I was never big on Olympics baseball. I think the WBC is better than Olympics baseball would be

and Olympics come at wrong time of the year

2:26

Frankly, I like seeing sports at the olympics that ARENT the big sports

And baseball is the sport that probalby gets the least benefit

Since MLB is already an international league

Surplus Valuez = Stolen Wages

2:26

Why are we all so docile and submissive to power? Its tragicomic when you consider how badass a standard issue westerner sees themselves

Dan Szymborski

2:27

The cushier you are, the easier it is to go along with things

GBS42

2:27

Which is more awful "chili," Skyline or Gold Star? This assumes you've subjected your taste buds to both, which I understand could be a very incorrect assumption.

Dan Szymborski

2:27

I have tried both, and I disliked Gold Star slightly less

Cubs Fan, ZiPS Man

2:27

They should let Dan Szymborski play the organ for a game at Wrigley once.

Dan Szymborski

2:27

I could go for that!

I've played full pipe organs with pedalboard

2:28

and when I was in college, they'd let me play the big pipe organ in the chapel if nothing was going on in there

2:29

though by "let me" I think it's just that nobody actually OBJECTED to it. Because now that I think of it, I didn't really ask for permission

Ryan D

2:29

Hi Dan - what does your data infrastructure look like for ZIPS? Do you have a relational database somewhere that you query against or what? Super interested how baseball writers actually work with all the sources etc

Dan Szymborski

2:29

I do keep a proper relational database!

But I use excel and visual basic for a lot of stuff that comes from it

2:30

As analysts go, I'm actually surprisingly low-tech

Patholer

2:30

For your ZiPS lookbacks, do you sort your misses by injury v. non-injury?

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