You are viewing the chat in desktop mode. Click here to switch to mobile view.
X
Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat - 8/22/23
powered byJotCast
Prev Page View Full Chat
Bob
3:16
Where would Joe Morgan rank among the best second basemen of all time?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:17
He's 4th in JAWS and tops among post-Integration 2B, behind only Hornsby, Collins, and Lajoie, all of whom had their best days nearly or over a century ago.
Lamonte Wade Jr's 10th place MVP vote
3:19
Do you think teams will be willing to offer Ha-Seong Kim a big contract in free agency in a couple of years? He is young and has turned into one of the best middle infielders in the game, but his value is certainly centered around the stellar defense.
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:20
He's not THAT young (27), but if he keeps up the offense he's gonna get a big payday.
DJ Tofu
3:20
What's wrong with the Giants' offense? Any hypotheses on why the whole group collectively declined so much? How do they compare to other historical offense collapses?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:22
As noted in today's piece, a whole lot of it is injuries, particularly in the outfield. They've had to play a bunch of prospects who last year were in some level of A-ball, and many of those guys have been overwhelmed. While they may be able to cobble together lineups to get a left/right platoon advantage, they're not able to match up as well in other ways and have fewer PA being taken by MLB-caliber hitters
AL Central Casting
3:22
If Bryon Buxton is done as a center fielder, or even as an outfielder, what do the Twins do with him? He's not such a great bat that he can DH full time, right? Some fans are calling for them to try him at 1B, which seems kind of ridiculous to me, but I can't put my finger on why.
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:25
They signed him to that extension with the belief that he would have enough value as a hitter to withstand no longer being a full-time center fielder. The problem is that he hasn't hit. It sounds like they're going to give him some work in center now that he's "built up" https://theathletic.com/4789532/2023/08/19/twins-byron-buxton-center-f...
Mr. Burrito
3:25
As of today, I can think of at least 13 sure-fire (or very, very close to sure-fire) HOFers currently in the bigs... Votto, Goldschmidt, Freeman, Betts, Otahni, Trout, Miggy, Kershaw, Verlander, Scherzer, Greinke, Harper, Altuve.... Is that a lot?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:26
Not at all. Historically, the average is about 1.5 HOFers per team-season, which would suggest ~45 future HOFers out there.
Tony
3:26
The NL Central has 3 decent but not great teams, a team that is usually decent but not great and the Pirates.  They also have 3 of the top 5 farm systems in baseball by most metrics.  Which team is best positioned for success over the next 5 years?
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:29
I think you could make cases for everybody but the Pirates. The Cubs can spend and have the best farm system of the other four, the Brewers have been successful running shoestring operations and at developing pitching, the Reds have a boatload of raw talent, the Cardinals... well, historically they've been the powerhouse in this division though the cracks are obviously showing now, and so I think they wouldn't be my first choice to succeed here.
John
3:29
How many current Phillies get HOF consideration if they retired tomorrow? I have Harper, Turner and Schwarber.
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:30
Harper, maybe Turner if he can get back to his 2021-22 level, maybe Nola if he can evolve. Schwarber nah. He's topped out at 3.2 bWAR and that's his only time above 3.0
Fletcher
3:31
Why is Joe Torre a 1B in JAWS? He played the most innings at catcher and 7 of his 8 top seasons by bWAR were primarily as a catcher (with the other at 3B). It doesn't seem like he accrued the most value at 1B.
AvatarJay Jaffe
3:32
tl;dr: Torre had a lot of playing time at 1B even when he was a regular C, apparently enough so that the fractional WAR from those seasons (based on innings in the field) tilts the balance such that his total WAR(1b+3b) > WAR(c). 

For standards purposes, it's a moot point since he was elected as a manager.
3:33
Ok folks, i've reached my pitch count here even though there are still some good questions in the queue. Thanks so much for stopping by!
Connecting…