JotCast | Dan Szymborski FanGraphs Chat

Dan Szymborski FanGraphs Chat - 9/9/21

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Dan Szymborski

12:15

Let's say 2024.

(Hopefully we're not dead by 2024, it would suck to die that close to gett my Hall vote!)

Appa Yip Yip

12:15

The AL Wild Card race has descended into madness. Who are the SzymPicks to take the spots?

Dan Szymborski

12:16

Boston, NY, but again, very three-way coin flippy

John B

12:16

Dan, I get frustrated when I see bWAR and fWAR vary by so much. You basically can see players that are 1 WAR off in a world where most players are 2-3 WAR. It seems to undermine the metric to have such wide variances. I leave out WARP, but I’ve seen similar issues. Why can’t there be more consistency to a stat that we all use every day? Why doesn’t MLB weigh in on how they want their official data presented ?

Dan Szymborski

12:16

The thing is, you don't count WAR

You *calculate* WAR. And you're going to run into different philosophical concepts of establishing value

12:17

If you visit 8 doctors with a stomach ache, you may find that the recommended treatment isn't identical either.

Some might recommend X medication, some X and Y, some may also make a point to suggest diet changes, some may see a need for further tests.

12:18

But it doesn't undermine the practice of medicine that approaches are different.

You should think of statistics as an *exploration* of an answer, rather than something that will give you the One True Answer.

And sometimes, it's complicated.

Like pitch framing.

Dansby SwanSong

12:19

Loved Don Fehr's speech representing Marvin Miller. What a shame Miller's induction came after his death. After hearing the stories from Fehr my admiration for Miller increased.

Dan Szymborski

12:20

Fehr did a good job succeeding Miller after the Ken Moffett mess.

I did not watch the speeches. I'm not generally big on speeches that I'm not intending.

12:21

It's a shame that Miller wasn't inducted when he was alive.

It's unfriggingbelievable that Bowie F'in Kuhn was in the Hall before Miller.

12:22

Bowie Kuhn in the Hall is like going to Cooperstown and finding out that Neifi Perez is in the Hall.

Guest

12:23

What do you make of Brendan Rodgers’ power outage at Coors Field? Is this something that young guys in COL have faced before?

Dan Szymborski

12:23

Haven't seen any systemic t hing.

Specific home/road splits aren't very predictive at all.

12:24

Let's put it this way: a hitter's actual platoon splits doesn't become as good a predictor of future platoon splits as generic platoon splits until you're in the neighborhood of 3000 PA. Home/road splits are actually worse.

The instances of when you should care about a player's actual home/road splits are *very* rare.

mcratsandwich

12:24

I may be living under a rock, but I have not heard anything about all the experimental rules that were instituted in the minors this year. Especially the moving of the mound back.

Dan Szymborski

12:25

Yup, they're doing that!

Guest

12:26

Is there a resource to see which hitters get the most accurate / inaccurate strike zones from umpires? Every time I see Nick Ahmed or Mark Canha at the dish, it seems that they’re getting balls called strikes, but I don’t want to rely on the eye test. Anywhere I can check this?

Dan Szymborski

12:26

An easy one? I'm not sure.

Guest

12:27

If you had a pitcher that you knew could come in and throw two pitches, and get two easy, perfect ground balls every single time they came in - but that’s it, only two pitches for two perfect ground balls, guaranteed - how do you think they’d be valued?

Dan Szymborski

12:28

Very highly. They're like a swiss army knife for tons of high-leverage situations

Basically, any time with one or two outs they kill it

Except in the case of a grounder the runner on 3rd scores on

12:29

We actually talked about this in our gamecast yesterday (these kind of theoreticals)

the *guarantee* changes the value considerably.

A pitcher with an ERA of nine has no value

BUT, a theoretical pitcher that allows exactly one run every inning, no more, no fewer, has a *lot* of value.

12:30

Once you have assumptions rather than probabilities, you can manipulate things.

Ben

12:30

What would you have thought before the season, if I told you that come Sept. Scherzer would lead the majors in ERA, Soto would lead the majors in OBP, and Trea Turner would lead in batting average, AND the Nationals would be in last place?

Dan Szymborski

12:30

I don't even know that it's all that crazy!

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