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Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat - 1/27/23

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2:50

Any chance that JAWS will eventually appear on Fangraphs, using the Fangraphs version of WAR?

Jay Jaffe

2:53

No imminent plans. It's one of those things that we've kicked around from time to time but i'm just not satisfied with retroactive pitching valuations based on fWAR, particularly from lower-strikeout, lower-homer eras. Could do an RA9 version but 1) I'd have to find the time to study it; and 2) i worry about confusing potential users who already have to wrap their heads around the multiple versions of WAR

John Olerud's Helmet

2:53

Mr Jay! Just want to say thank you for all your HOF work and i think its awesome that you always point out that just to be on the ballot a player had to have a tremendous career. I think alot of people forget that even someone like who gets 1 vote still had an amazing career. Thanks again!

Jay Jaffe

2:55

You're welcome! Thank you to everybody who speaks up publicly about how much they enjoy the one-and-done series, as it's motivated me to put more time and effort into those profiles the last few years. They're some of my favorites to write, and I think they help humanize the whole process. i wouldn't have thought I'd enjoy going 2000+ words about AJ Pierzynski (2022) or Bronson Arroyo but those are some of my favorite pieces of the recent past.

2:59

>>>>>>>This is a good time to put in a pitch for membership, by the way. FanGraphs affords me a very broad runway for all of this Hall coverage, and it takes some extra resources — those pieces are long and require diligent editing, work trickles down for others to cover the news I can't get to, the crowdsource ballot and custom tables take time to manage, and so on. If you dig what I'm doing, please consider buying or renewing your FG membership. I promise that the time you save in loading your browser ad free over the course of the year will pay for it alone, and if you're into reading in dark mode, that's an option.

Expect to hear more about FG membership stuff in the coming weeks as we've been doing some brainstorming.

2:59

With Rolen finally getting in, will Helton now get over the hump? Andruw?

Jay Jaffe

2:59

Helton is a gimme putt away from a plaque. Andruw has 4 years to gain 17% and I think he'll be fine.

Ben

3:00

Right now Evan Longoria has a JAWS score of exactly 50. Do you think Hall of Fame voters will take him seriously? On a related note, will the era committees ever rectify the Hall's pattern of short-changing 3B and add Nettles, Boyer, Bell, Bando, and/or Allen?

Jay Jaffe

3:00

All of this falls under the Bando thing I mentioned above.

I promise you'll get to read my thoughts on the matter

The real dan mcgrew

3:00

mauer, molina, and posey getting into the hall?

Jay Jaffe

3:01

Yes, but not without a whole lot of debate

Adam B

3:01

Philly native, and my brother asked me this: is there any HOF inductee as despited (or at least, not embraced) by the fanbase before whom he played the most games as Rolen/Philadelphia? Not that it matters as to his merits for induction, but there's like no chance his number is retired here, and I don't even know if they welcome him back for a ceremony this season.

Jay Jaffe

3:07

Dick Allen? I don't have objective measures of booing/dislike by a fan base but he wasn't well-received in his prime there, and he played about 160 more games in Philly than Rolen.

I will say that John Middleton's outreach to Dick Allen — resulting in the number retirement and celebration of Allen's career — was classy and impressive, and he's already publicly committed to do something to honor Rolen that I would bet includes their Wall of Fame if not a retired number.

Statement from Phillies Managing Partner John Middleton on Scott Rolen’s election into the National Baseball Hall of Fame

Bubba

3:08

Seeing David Wright HOF eligible next year makes me feel old. Was there a guy you were a fan of that caused you similar feelings?

Jay Jaffe

3:12

I'm 53, and there are now generations of guys I feel that way about! Derek Jeter is a good one to mention. I moved to NYC the year before he won AL Rookie of the Year and his first World Series, watched the best of his career as a fan, covered his 3,000th hit in my first year in the BBWAA, and watched his Hall induction just 2 months before getting my first official ballot to vote in the Hall elections.

Watching and writing tributes to the wave of 300-win pitchers from my childhood who have passed away in their 70s and 80s (Seaver, Niekro, Sutton, Perry) is also worth mentioning.

Sabey Sabes

3:12

Just bought tickets to Mauer’s Twins HOF induction game in August. Looking forward to another Mauer Day next summer.

Jay Jaffe

3:13

Will do my best towards making the latter happen, I promise y that.

Nick

3:13

Without looking, how many players could you name on the 26 man rosters of, say, the Pirates or As?

Jay Jaffe

3:14

I'd have a hard time getting to a dozen between the two teams. I don't think I wrote about the 2022 A's once last year, but I did cover the Hayes extension

3:14

Mark Buehrle not only has 60 RA9-WAR, he also has so many more intriguing accolades. Looking back over the last 15-20 years, you could make a pretty solid argument for Buehrle being the face (or one of the faces) of at least five different facets of the game: health and consistency, pace of play, pitching to contact, pickoffs/steal prevention and pitcher defense. 14 straight seasons of 200+ IP, a persistent FIP-beater, one of the best defenders ever at the position and then the shiny stuff like being the ace on a drought-ending WS team, a no-hitter and a perfect game. I'm not a Sox fan but strongly believe he should be in the HOF. What are your thoughts? Should someone fight for his case more?

Jay Jaffe

3:15

My thoughts are here https://blogs.fangraphs.com/jaws-and-the-2023-hall-of-fame-ballot-mark...

3:19

to date I have not been sold on Buerhle and Andy Pettitte as more than "25th percentile Hall of Famers" which is to say that in a vacuum I don't think either is a good representative of our expectations for a HOF starter. The dearth of recent HOF pitchers has me reexamining my assumptions and my methodology, but my intermediate recalibration has been that it's much easier to get behind a Johan Santana or Cole Hamels (and David Cone and Dave Stieb and a few others). I'm glad Buehrle's remaining on the ballot while I deliberate, though.

The guy who asks the lunch question

3:19

What's for lunch/

Jay Jaffe

3:20

Naya, a Middle Eastern Grill place, opened near me and I've been hitting it hard such that it took me less than 2 months to get my first $9 off. I tried their kafta meatballs in a pita wrap today, didn't think it was as good as the chicken shawarma, which is my go-to.

3:21

My favorite neighborhood spot, the doner place, went out of business 2 years ago and this was a wasteland for middle eastern until recently but thankfully I now have multiple options

PhilsPhan20

3:22

Jay-- I find it strange that voters will find room for Utley but not for Rollins. . as a 2000s Phillies fan, I would say that Rollins was the heart and soul of that team, the literal 'captain', and the one who said 'we are the team to beat' in '07 that started the run. That, and Rollins counting stats are fairly comparible to Trammell . . . .do you think Rollins has a reasonable shot of entry?

Jay Jaffe

3:25

The advanced stats say Rollins wasn't anywhere the hitter or fielder that Rolen and Utley were, and while his counting stats superficially resemble those of Trammell, the latter has 28 points of OBP and 15 point of OPS+ in his favor. If he's going into the Hall it will be via committee. it's possible but I don't see an easy road there.

Joe

3:25

What will be the most laughable take on leaving a surefire HOFer off a ballot next year? I am going with "But Ichiro only hit singles!!!"

Jay Jaffe

3:25

"But he played the best years of his career in Japan!"

Marshall

3:26

It seems JAWS is usually used to compare a HOF candidate to the average HOFer at the position. Should the benchmark be something lower, like the bottom quartile? Essentially, this boils down to how many current HOFers do you think don't deserve to be there (and using the average as the standard implicitly assumes roughly half don't belong).

Jay Jaffe

3:32

I hear this argument with some frequency. My response is that the reality is that JAWS is clearly not the sole determinant of who gets into the Hall, nor do I think it should be; voters can and should bring other context to their deliberations as well (postseason, awards, historical importance, softer factors, and if you want to throw PED disqualifiers in there, I get it even if your line differs from mine). I myself am at least somewhat loose with JAWS in that I think anybody above 50 is probably close enough; catchers and pitchers aside, I've gone as low as Sheffield's 49.3 on my official ballots.

But ultimately what I want is to make sure those guys get in. If a McGriff or a Kent does as well, without my help, that's fine; I'm not going to throw anything at the TV. It's just that I have the types of candidates I'm going to prioritize and encourage others to do so, particularly when some old-school hard-ass is sending in a blank or a 1-man ballot.

talked about some of that on MLB Now on Wednsday

.@jay_jaffe evaluates the importance of WAR when determining if a player is a Hall of Famer with Brian Kenny. #MLBNow

Mcgraw45

3:33

Do a players HOF odds increase for things like connection with the fanbase? For instance, if Machado ends his career as a marginal HOFer, would his odds be boosted if he stayed with the Padres and became a Padre icon?

Jay Jaffe

3:34

I think it probably helps the public perception of a player if he's more closely connected to a team. Certainly afterwards when a team like the Mariners mounts a publicity campaign for an Edgar Martinez. But I think the effect is marginal

Doctored Ball Suspension

3:34

A hypothetical. Would you have voted for Gaylord Perry for HoF, given that he was suspended late in his career? Appreciate your efforts and generally agree with your drawing the line on PED suspensions, and Perry's in now now matter what, but would a candidate identical to Perry today end up closer to ARod/MRam voting outcomes? Thanks!

Jay Jaffe

3:37

suspensions for ball doctoring don't bother me in the least. i'd have voted for Perry every year. And I don't see a nouveau-Perry getting the Manny/A-Rod treatment, either. Jayson Stark, with input from Jason Sardell, noted at the Athletic that he didn't see Beltran getting treated like h was a PED user:

According to Sardell, at last look Beltrán was showing up on 70 percent of the ballots of writers who voted for at least six players with no PED ties. Beltrán was at 55 percent with voters who supported four or five non-PED candidates. But he was at only 31 percent among those who voted for three or fewer players in that group.

https://theathletic.com/4117445/2023/01/24/baseball-hall-of-fame-2023-...

Dalton Wilcox

3:37

I know it’s the MLB HoF, but what are the chances if Future candidates are looked at more holistically with an eye in MiLB and NCAA?

Jay Jaffe

3:37

zero. I just don't see it happening

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