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Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat -7/11/19
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AvatarJay Jaffe
1:33
I'd have to look more closely at the indicators, but my hunch on the position player side is DeJong, who's presumably healthy. It's a shame that Seager was just heating up before he got hurt, and as we saw during April, he had a very hard time recovering his old form. As for Archer vs. Musgrave, the demonstrated upside of the former is much higher, but man is he lost in the weeds right now, so I'll go with Musgrove.
Draftnik
1:34
With 3 more healthy years -- not at his 2019 149 ERA+, but something closed to league average -- Cole Hamels would be above 3,000 strikeouts, around 200 wins, plus in the 65-70 range in WAR. Plus 100 IP in the ostseason with good numbers. Does that starting pitcher make the Hall?
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:36
I think CC Sabathia's case will be a harbinger of what's to come for Hamels, assuming he can stay healthy enough to reach those milestones. He won't have the Cy Young award, but he will have the championship, and that might be enough.
kd
1:36
Jay.   As a writer, how do your pre-conceived notions impact your writing?  Do you make a special effort to "let the data take you where it may"?  I ask this, since we live in a world now where the loud voices have a story they want to tell and, thus, find the data that can support that story (and leave the rest behind).
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:43
Because there are so many things to pay attention to — so many players to track, and story lines to attend to — just about every time I analyze a player I have to do so from a fresh perspective. People ask me to check into Joey Votto (for example), whom I've maybe seen half a dozen plate appearances from this yer, and I have to catch up, so it's incumbent upon me to approach the data with a fresh eye.

I may have strong opinions, and on Twitter you can get the impression that sometimes I have a hair trigger, but by body of work shows that I'm not a hot-take artist. By the time I publish something, I've poured hours of research into it, chosen and checked every word choice, and then and it's passed through the filter of an editor whose job description includes protecting writers from their worst impulses and habits. Part of the joy of this job is letting the data take you to unexpected places. I wouldn't sacrifice that.
Chris
1:44
Why hasn't Cleveland been more interested in available outfielders? The mariners and Padres have cheap, controllable excess players and yet nothing
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:46
The answer probably is similar to the reason that they botched things this winter; their budget. That said, it's unfair to judge a team on the caliber of players they're linked to via the rumor mill, because that can include a lot of misdirection and public relations expectation management (I wrote about this in the context of the White Sox's public dalliances with Harper and Machado this winter https://blogs.fangraphs.com/harper-or-machado-megadeal-would-be-out-of...). Let's see whether they can fill their glaring needs, or cut corners again.
Dan
1:46
Manfred coming into office said MLB saying the game needed more offense, and by mid-2015 it had it. Would it really be that hard to use the pre-2015 baseball as a model to "redesign" the ball? As a long-time fan I find the 2019 game as Verlander said, "a joke."
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:47
If the equipment and materials have changed, it might be difficult or cost-prohibitive to backtrack directly, but I do think MLB will have to try to find a reference point to target if they're to take an active attempt to restore order in the home run department. I'm not sure the 2014 ball, which produced the lowest home run rates in around a quarter century, is where they want to be either.
Balked
1:51
In terms of the old-timer pitchers pre data revolution, how much do we know about skills vs. today's players? Just wondering if a guy like Christy Mathweson would be like Jason Vargas in today's game or still exceptional.
AvatarJay Jaffe
1:54
that's a tough one. I think what we always have to keep in mind is that our era-transpanted players would have modern means of training, nutrition, video, etc.  And I will never believe that Christy Mathewson, renowned throughout the game as a gentleman of the highest order, should be compared to Jason Vargas, a who should have been much more severely reprimanded for his threats of physical violence against Tim Healey.
OK folks, my dumplings have arrived and I'm famished. Please keep an eye out for the Bouton tribute, and thanks for stopping by today.
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