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Dan Szymborski FanGraphs Chat - 2/20/26

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Dan Szymborski

2:42

I have the Doughy Weirdo monetization

Brooklyngail

2:43

AI is Cliff Notes for Wikipedia.

Dan Szymborski

2:43

AI is funny

A Boy Named Yu

2:43

You should have AI write a musical about the Black Sox Scandal. Or the 1998 Home Run chase.

Dan Szymborski

2:43

I think a Moneyball musical would be great fun. Though written by an actual composer of course

Oaktown Blues

2:43

When ZiPS comes up with nearest offensive comps, are there any variables that you force it to match? E.g. handedness, position, age

Dan Szymborski

2:44

nothing is FORCED

well, except players ahve to actually exist

War2D2

2:44

I kind of doubt @mindaugas was referring to me, but I believe I’ve mentioned my Lithuanian grandma before in-chat. I only know (and phonetically at that) three words/phrases in Lithuanian: Papyte (grandpa), Mamyte (grandma), and something like “Jazus Madia” (like I said, phonetic) which was what my grandma would say when she was mad at us.

Dan Szymborski

2:45

My german grandmother (born in bremerhaven 1922) had all sorts of german phrases, but she also had phrases that I think she just completely made up

like if you were getting into trouble, she'd say you were in something like muckesen vonkuckus but I never figured out what that was

and if something was just too bad, she'd say it was tough schmuggies. I have no idea the etymology of that one either

2:46

She was a secretary for Dönitz and translated for the British at the war trials (which is how my grandfather met her)

2:47

It was really tough when she was well into dementia but could still have conversations. She had no control over what language she was saying things in, which is a problem with someone who could speak four languages (english, german, french, italian) like a native

A Boy Named Yu

2:48

Dressage is a good one, especially with people using more modern music for their routines.

Kevin

2:48

ZiPs and all the other systems are pretty bullish on an Austin Riley rebound, can you offer any insight into that? His last two years were both below his projected performance for this year and there is a clear downward trend in his performance.

Dan Szymborski

2:48

I'm not sure anything particularly insightful I have to offer. Trends aren't super useful - baselines still work best

Guest

2:48

Do you think that Judge's accelerated awesomeness in his his 30s might be attributable, in part, to the umpires getting better with calling balls and strikes? Per a Bryan Hoch article this week "Since Judge's first full season in 2017, no hitter has had more called strikes against him on pitches out of the strike zone". Could it be that the improvements by the umpires have juiced his game a bit?

Dan Szymborski

2:49

I think that's *too* eleventy dimensional chess

Fargus

2:49

Is this theoretical fangraphs villain song just theoretical?

Dan Szymborski

2:49

No, I guess I could stick it on my weird bandcamp

2:50

Or could just link it directly

Polar Bear

2:51

1st O's home run, in the books.

Dan Szymborski

2:51

should exhibition games be considered the books?

maybe the pamphlets?

matt w

2:51

How are the cats? Round here, right now Penne is on the box of CDs that Mango likes to loaf on, waiting for snacks. Earlier Mango jumped up there with him and they fought a little which made me very apprehensive.

Dan Szymborski

2:52

Pretty good! I adopted a pair of bonded kittens a few weeks ago and I'm working to integrate them with the big cats

2:53

Here's a better link as I had to do some phonetical corrections of what it did

2:54

Sorry, wrong one https://suno.com/s/XiXI7vydam5ogYhH

Cromulent

2:54

Reading War2D2’s comment makes it seem like Jesus Made is Lithuanian.

Zippy

2:54

PCA or Riley Greene for 2026 fantasy value?

Oh, and I love you

Dan Szymborski

2:54

PCA unless OBP league

I know a little German

2:54

And he told me that "Mucks dich nicht, zum Kuckuck!" would be kind of like saying "behave yourself, darn it!" or "don't stir things up, for heaven's sake"

Jake

2:55

What do you think of Tony Vitello's comments on his hiring process? It's a big story in the Bay Area but seems like a big nothing burger. What're you thoughts

Dan Szymborski

2:57

Nothing burger I think

Oaktown Blues

2:57

Follow up on ZiPS comps: So things like handedness/position are considered as inputs, but ZiPS is okay comping, say, a righty to a lefty if everything else looks similar? Do I have that right?

Dan Szymborski

2:57

Yeah, pretty much

it WANTS to find the perfect comparison, but that rarely happens

2:58

I use Mahalanobis distance

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