Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat – 5/19/26
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leoneforthird
12:54
Emerson Hancock has been a bright spot this year for an underperforming Seattle squad.  Is there anything in his underlying numbers that indicated these results are sustainable or is he a SSS mirage?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:57
I don't think i'm ready to call him a true-talent 3.00ish ERA guy but both his
3.63 FIP  and 3.98 xERA are run-and-a-half improvements over last year, and his 27.1% strikeout rate and 4.8% walk rate are both exceptional. It's a  real breakout
luke
12:59
What’s your overall opinion of Ben Cherington’s career? In Boston he “won” and in Pittsburgh he’s “winning” but I was surprised he was given this chance. I thought he deserved to be fired last year with Shelton. Is he a top 50% GM?
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:03
It's very hard to judge a Pirates GM given the team's spending limitations but he's got a .500ish team with some very bright spots including Skenes and Griffin, both of whom he drafted, and it's not like they've got a lot of terrible contracts on the books. I'd put him in the upper 50% but still towards the middle of the pack
Phil
1:05
I had been planning to ask about Brayan Bello, and then just now I saw Baumann's article, which certainly eases no concerns. What are the likelier options here? When guys start coming off the IL, Tolle has to stay in the rotation,, the way he's pitching, right? So, long reliever role for Bello? Or figure things out in Worcester?
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:09
he had two very good outings in a bulk role behind an opener and then got the snot beat out of him as a traditional starter. I'm not sure why he's struggling so much, especially against lefties, but i'd probably try to keep using him in an opener/bulk format and work on finding him a better approach against lefties. Finding the missing mph would help too
Philip Christy
1:11
If Juan Soto got one plate appearance next season and then left baseball forever, would you vote for him for the Hall Of Fame?
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:13
i'd need more context than that. Is he retiring to become a doctor and cure rare diseases? is he suffering some terrible physical ailment? or is he buying the world's biggest yacht and spending his days counting his money? Would seem to be a waste of talent if it's the last of those. I'd need a good justification for retirement to vote for him.
war2d2
1:13
The Cubs have had a remarkable season from the perspective of runners left on base, being dead last in the league with just over 8 per game and more than half a runner ahead of (or behind?) the Pirates. It’s infuriating to watch them load the bases and then pop out to end the inning. This is just small-sample theater and has got to eventually come out in the wash, right? The league-leading Padres are stranding two fewer runners per game than the Cubs are.
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:15
interestingly enough, there's a table in today's Padres piece where I compare team hitting with bases empty vs. with runners in scoring position. The Padres are basically tied for the second-largest gap (RISP > Empty) while the Cubs have the largest negative gap (Empty > RISP).
1:16
I'd chalk up most of that to small-sample theater, and would expect some regression.
but I understand it's gotta be maddening to watch nonetheless
dan norman lear
1:17
What players of the 70s/80s do you think would be most helped by being active now, with the way the game is played/tech advances?  For some reason, John Wockenfuss leaps to mind. As he does.
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:19
I don't know about accounting for the tech stuff, and i'm probably not the first one to say this, but Brian Downing and his 20-homer, .370 OBP seasons would have gotten a lot more love than just one All-Star selection. And the proto Zobristian Tony Phillips would have made an All-Star team at least once.
war2d2
1:21
I missed that you had a Padres piece out. Sorry for all the questions I posted that could be answered with a URL!
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:22
Hey, it went live like half an hour ago. it won't answer all your questions but it's a start.
war2d2
1:22
Both Murakami and (to a much lesser extent) Okamoto are having better seasons than Bregman. I didn’t like the Bregman signing because of the length, but now I’m wondering if even a 3-year deal would have been too long. He’s been fine, but only just, and I feel like they could have had the exact output from Shaw for virtually nothing. With the benefit of hindsight do you think the Cubs would have been better off chasing one of the NPB guys as a DH instead of Bregman as a 3B?
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:25
I think eight weeks is a bit early to start second-guessing too much. Murakami is off to a great start despite striking out nearly one-third of the time, and maybe the industry misjudged his ability to adjust somewhat, and he does have the age advantage over Bregman, but I think the Cubs valued Bregman for non-statistical reasons as well, and I still think there's a big gap between where he and Shaw are presently.
1:26
OK folks, it's Air Conditioner Installation Day here at Casa Jaffe-Span, so i've got an appointment with a couple of windows. Thanks for stopping by!
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