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Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat – 10/28/25
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AvatarJay Jaffe
12:01
Good afternoon, folks! Hope you've all recovered from last night's epic World Series game
12:02
I stayed up for the whole thing here on the East Coast, though i will admit that by the time the bottom of the 18 rolled around, I was under a blanket listening to the game with my eyes mostly closed. I did open them as soon as the pitch of Joe Davis' voice rose, in time to see Freeman's homer clear the fence
12:04
Which is better than I fared during the last 18-inning World Series game in 2018. For that one I met Mike Petriello and some of his MLB.com colleagues at the late great Pacific Standard (sigh), watched Walker Buehler shove, went home after the 10th or 11th inning, hung on til around the 14th, and then woke up to Max Muncy’s on-field postgame interview and pieced together what had transpired, which was still in the TiVo spool.
12:06
Anyway, yesterday I wrote about the contributions of catchers Alejandro Kirk and Will Smith to their teams' respective offenses through the first two games, and both had contributions last night as well, though Freddie Freeman was thrown out by a country mile on Smith's lone hit. Kirk's 3-run homer was huge at the time. https://blogs.fangraphs.com/big-nights-for-the-backstops-through-the-f...
let's get to the questions...
Dan S.
12:07
Big start for Bieber tonight. Assuming no disaster or perfect game that moves his market significantly one way or another, what kind of contract do you think he gets this winter? Does someone make a long-term offer he'd consider, or are we talking like 2/40 with an opt-out?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:09
I think a short-term, higher-AAV deal with an opt-out works. Might be for more than $40M but won't get as high as Snell's 2/$62M with the Giants. They could structure it so that declining the second year is a mere formality, say $25M for 2026 and $15M for '27 or some similar ratio like that.
12:11
I've started writing up my Top 50 Free Agents capsules and similarly had to consider Michael King, who was limited to 15 starts due to shoulder and knee inflammation
David
12:12
Rank the long post season games. Mariners - Tigers 15 Innings. Mariners - Astros 18 Innings. Blue Jays - Dodgers 18 Innings.
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:13
I couldn't even begin to rank them without putting much more thought into them but the Mariners-Tigers and Blue Jays-Dodgers ones would be in my top 5. Braves-Astros from 2005 (18 innings), the Aaron Boone game from 2003, the Grand Single game from 1999, Mets-Astros 16-innign game from 1986 NLCS...
Dan S.
12:14
Which reliever has a better 2026, Raisel Iglesias or Ryan Helsley?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:17
Iglesias is my next capsule guy to write for the FA50 and I'd probably rather have him for next year than Helsley, though I think the latter will be higher in Ben Clemens' rankings
Mr. Burrito
12:17
If the Dodgers win this  WS where would the current edition of the franchise rate, historically? They’ve combined a generation of regular season success with multiple WS appearances and (again, if they finish it off) 3 titles.   Other franchises have done a lot of one of those things (Atlanta was a great regular season team but only one title; the Yankees and Giants and Red Sox won multiple WS but flailed a bit in off years). But the Dogs are doing both… thoughts?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:23
i've mostly thought about the Dodgers' success in the context of five-year increments using records and run differentials, and after last year's World Series, I had their 2020-24 run as more or less tied for their 2nd-strongest behind 2019–23, though when you factor the '24 World Series win for a second title in 5 years, it's the one that elevates itself. Stretch it out over a longer timespan and I think it's really approaching the 1996–2003 Yankees run, which did have more titles and no real down seasons à la Boston during their 2004–13 run
12:24
Here's the piece where i took stock of the Dodgers https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-dodgers-embellish-their-playoff-dynast...
12:25
I think if they win this year, 2021-25 would probably be the aesthetic choice for their best 5-year span in the framework I used, if not the mathematical one — just because a longer-season champion is preferable to a shorter-season one (though what that squad did in the expanded 2020 playoffs validates the team's success that year)
TKDC
12:26
Since the contract crowdsourcing project is starting, do you have any particular players you think are the hardest to gauge what they will get in this market?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:28
Kyle Schwarber is one in my batch of capsules and... I think there's going to be a substantial gulf between what he should get paid on a dollars-to-WAR basis because of the DH factor and what he will get. I think it's tough to gauge any starting pitcher coming off a shaky platform season — Cease, King, Gallen, Giolito
Eric Enders
12:29
Jay, thanks for all the great coverage this month. Have you and Davis Schneider ever been seen in the same place at the same time?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:31
As a matter of fact, yes. He was one of the players with pregame availability before Game 3 of the ALDS against the Yankees (the Judge HR game). I was in the process of formulating a question to him when there was dead silence at the start of his session, so i lobbed mine out there in softball form. I also got this pic.
12:32
wheelhouse
12:32
true/false oneil cruz has future yankee written all over him
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:33
I don't see it happening. He's still so raw, and it's tough to see the Yankees taking a chance on a guy like that at a point when the Pirates will have to move him
bringbackpologrounds
12:34
Should Bassitt have pitched more innings? He came in at a tie game in the 8th; surely you have to think about extra innings at that point.
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:37
Yeah, i think so. While Bassitt needed just 8 pitches to retire Teoscar, Edman, and Kiké (6, 7, 8) in order, he's got some nasty splits against lefties that precluded letting him face Ohtani. Then again, since the obvious play was the intentional walk, that would have rendered that particular concern moot, so I think he could have been pushed through a few more batters, pulled before facing Freeman.
12:38
(sorry, had to clarify the original wording of that answer)
bringbackpologrounds
12:39
That was definitely the greatest baseball bingo game ever. Outfield assists, baserunning blunders, baserunning heroics, errors, HRs, a GOAT performance, playoff Kershaw, 18 innings, and probably more that I forgot.
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:39
in one of their more cogent comments, Davis and Smoltz agreed that just about the only thing the game missed out on was a home run robbery.
Guest
12:40
Happy I live in the Pacific time zone, it didn't quite hit my bedtime. How long can Roberts keep playing Pages and batting him ninth? He's completely lost at the plate. If he could have gotten on base even once ahead of Ohtani the game would be over three hours earlier.
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:41
I don't know what they're doing with Hyeseong Kim on the roster if not starting him against a righty while Pages sinks in quicksand.
Nancy's Friend Sluggo
12:41
If Ohtani was born and raised in the U.S., do you think he would've been shifted in only hitting or pitching? Or would his extraordinary talents have forced the system to change?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:44
I think the odds are high he would have been pushed to one or the other once he was drafted. We're lucky things worked out the way they did.
>this guy<
12:44
In the alternate timeline in which Arte sold the team last year and new owner hired an HVAC guy last off season then made you the POBO/GM this one, what 3 things do you do first? (We could also play this game for Rockies, Pirates, A's, and even Guards maybe!)
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:45
  1. Insurance fire.
  2. ???
  3. Profit
12:47
I'm not sure i can could more than 5 guys under team control I'd keep from their roster. Neto, Kikuchi, Adell, Ward, and Soriano, with Trout traded somewhere for pennies on the dollar as an act of mercy
Dan S.
12:49
Do you think Freddy Peralta gets moved and would the return be similar to the Corbin Burnes package?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:52
It wouldn't surprise me if he gets moved but I don't see him as being equivalent to Burnes at the time of trade. His track record just isn't as strong. that said, what the Brewers received (lefty DL Hall and infielder Joey Ortiz) has enough variance in terms of outcomes — will Hall eventually start? Can Ortiz hit AND field? — that the package might wind up looking better a few years down the road.
TKDC
12:53
Is the only question on Freddie Freeman’s hall of fame candidacy just how high his percent vote will be as he’s inducted on the first ballot?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:54
Pretty much. He's done it all except reach the major milestones; 2,500 hits is on the docket for next year and 400 homers the year after, and who knows what postseason heroics he'll add to the lore by that point.
Jackson
12:56
What do you see the Phillies outfield looking like come opening day? Seems like they are high on Crawford contributing. Maybe I’m just jaded from seeing the same platoons play out year after year with Marsh/Kepler/Rojas/whoever, but I’d like to see them start from scratch in the outfield. It would be nice if the entire outfield could hold their own against RHP & LHP (cough cough looking at you Marsh)
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