JotCast | Dan Szymborski FanGraphs Chat

Return to

Dan Szymborski FanGraphs Chat - 4/9/26

Prev Page View Full Chat Next Page

Look At This Sotograph

12:18

Don't you hate pants?

Dan Szymborski

12:18

I actually do.

12:19

I will wear shorts until it gets down to the 50s

My mom saw me outside her window from across the street shoveling my sidewalk this winter in 4 degree weather in gym shorts and no jacket and called me on my cell phone to yell at me

12:20

Any time I can wear shorts, I will.

And since I work from home, the most used part of my wardrobe is my 8 or 9 Champion gym shorts

Uncle Spike

12:21

What's Esmerlyn Valdez's ceiling? He had a strong year last year, crushed the AZFL, crushed spring training and has a strong start to AAA as a 22 year old. Small sample size but 25.5 BB%, 12.8 K% and has already hit 5 balls over 109 MPH.

Dan Szymborski

12:21

Pretty high ceiling, he has big power upside

Only limit may be his contact rate (though it has improved) and the lack of defensive value

sliptoad

12:22

normally i give credit to variance but is there something going on in the astros medical staff? it seems like this team has had the most WAR lost to injury for years in a row and this season has started off poorly again

Dan Szymborski

12:23

Dunno, since medical staff is the part of a team I never talk with, and my knowledge of the human body is basically limited to "don't drink poison" and the ability to roughly describe some of the biological process of how babies are made

But they were tops on my value-lost-to-injury piece last year

Dodgers/Braves where the year before IIRC

War2D2

12:24

Dan! DAN! The pipes are calling me! From glen to glen AND down the mountainside! What do I do?!?

Dan Szymborski

12:24

Well, the summer's gone and the flowers are dying, so seek warmer climes?

Detroit Tigers Hitting Coach

12:24

How long will it take for Kevin McGonigle to learn our process of hitting? Around here we take all pitches until we have two strikes and then assume every pitch after will be a fastball

Shandy Koufax

12:24

very Early season alarmist nonsense: Jacob Wilson spiking his K% and SwStr% and chasing a lot more looks really bad

big John

12:25

Would you have been thrilled if the O's locked up Jackson Holliday to this deal a couple of years ago? shows the downside

Dan Szymborski

12:25

I would have. and everything has a risk

Cat Latos

12:25

What do my cat frens do?

Dan Szymborski

12:25

Justinian is sleeping next to me on his pillow on my left desk

no, he's awake, just in limbless mode

12:27

Last I saw Constantine, he was trying to get in my amazon box that's sitting in the entranceway at the front door, but there's nothing in it of interest - it has my subscribe & save order of dishwasher pods and a packet of Sui mi ya cai and a think of laundry detergent

12:28

Cassie is sitting in one of the guest rooms on the bed where she usually is this time of day. She needs to have a tooth extracted, which I'm going to have done in a few weeks; I heard from the vet about 15 minutes before chat that her blood work is all good, so no anesthesia worries

Last I saw the kittens were bopping each other in the face in their roiom

Kevin Kobel

12:28

Do you think they'll be more "okay, not great, not awful" teams this season than usual?

Dan Szymborski

12:28

probably not

12:28

Ben Rice Top 10 wRC+ ROS by ZiPs! Thoughts?

Dan Szymborski

12:28

It's not that crazy

I am the Apple

12:29

Has a player, team, or agent ever been upset with you personally about a ZiPS projection?

Dan Szymborski

12:29

Mostly the occasional player

Teams/agents don't take bad projections personally. They know how projection systems work

12:30

I'm not sure how front offices 20 years ago would act, but I only talked to a few teams 20 years ago

Andy

12:30

What do you ends up happening with Didier Fuentes? He's probably got 120-130ip max this season, do they use the bullets now and shelf him when Schwell and others return?

Dan Szymborski

12:30

I think they use him early

Kevin Kobel

12:31

I know ZiPS isn't so down on the Giants, but they appear to be a poorly put together Frankenteam. They've seemed that way for quite a few years under two different front offices. Do you still have some faith they're at least a solid WC contender this year?

Dan Szymborski

12:31

I still think they're reasonable contenders, though not first tier

Busch League

12:31

Obligatory “it’s April” aside, any thoughts on Michael Busch’s slow start? He seems to be seeing the ball very well and having some bad BABIP luck, but the bat speed and maxEV is noticeably down.

Dan Szymborski

12:31

Nothing all that insightful. I'm just not worried yet

Guest

12:31

Who couldn't use a change up once in a while from "A Dan, a plan..."

Connecting…