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Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat - 8/27/21

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Jay Jaffe

2:54

I'd be lucky if I hit 60 mph given the conditions of my back and shoulder. I'm old enough to be smart enough not to try it just for the sake of ego or vanity.

Mike

2:55

Heads up on a page error: Rhys Hoskins minor league stats are all populating on Vinnie Pasquantino’s page. Might want to fix that

Jay Jaffe

2:55

will pass this along

Cortes

2:55

I know the current thing is gonna end, but this Nelson Cortes, I think he could turn himself into a reliable 2 WAR guy, which has a ton of value. He's only 26. And he's so fun.

Jay Jaffe

2:55

I'm planning to write about him soon

Seamball

2:56

What's your best guess as to what the Dodgers do with the Turner-Seager-Lux (mostly the former two) logjam at short? Is Seager going to be available, and if so, what does his injury record do to his value?

Jay Jaffe

2:58

I think it's really tough to know how this is going to unfold especially because the Dodgers have to deal with their pitching free agents (Kershaw, Scherzer, and whatever is going on with Bauer) as well. Seager's injuries do put a dent in his market value but the hand fracture was a fluke (broken bones happen but they're not predictive of future broken bones). I'd wager the damage to his value is less than what Trevor Story's mediocre season is doing to his value.

lastplaceteam

2:59

in terms of better health, how close are we to wanting to with that for Trout? yes, he's already had his HoF career, but I feel like we're losing so much the last few years

Jay Jaffe

3:01

it sucks what has happened this year, and we've lost some chunks of seasons, but I don't think things have gotten to the dire state that some others (there's at least one other doom-and-gloom-flavored Trout question on this topic in the queue) do.

As Mike Petriello said on Twitter recently, it might be that Trout's time in center field is coming to an end. That could save him some wear and tear

Guest

3:01

Davis/Holland or Davis/Herrera have to be somewhere in the answer to Mi Nombre's question, no? Davis alone had an ERA of 1 or lower in 2014-2015, and whichever of the other KC relievers you pair him with were not much worse.

Jay Jaffe

3:01

Yes i'd have to think about the 2014-15 Royals in that discussion, among others.

3:02

Kent Tekulve, Enrique Romo and Grant Jackson on the 1979 Pirates!

Mike Ortman

3:02

Let’s go off topic….given your music tastes, what are your thoughts on Broadcast?

Jay Jaffe

3:04

I respected them in their day but have come to appreciate them more in retrospect, and wish I'd paid more attention at the time. I still know the first half of their catalog a lot better than the second half, with The Noise Made by People the one I return to most.

Greg

3:05

Do you think the Mariners or Tigers will make the playoffs again first?

Jay Jaffe

3:05

At the risk of jinxing them and watching so many people I care about endure prolonged agony, i think the Mariners are a lot closer

Reds Story

3:06

What kind of ceiling does Jonathan India have as a player, and would the Reds be wise to lock him up for the next 10 years ASAP? He's been the answer to the leadoff question they've been failing to solve since the days Shin-Soo Choo. Obv very early for him to consider it, but the Reds have to at least be thinking about it, right?

Jay Jaffe

3:09

That's a better question for Eric or Kevin than me, but he does seem to be better than the 45 FV guy that he was forecast as. That said, his defensive metrics are unflattering (-6 OAA, -3 DRS), and when that happens, second basemen become outfielders, and if they don't have power or the ability to play center, it's tough for their bats to carry the position. I'm not so sure anybody's thinking of 10 years for him right now, as good as his rookie season has been.

3:10

(mind you, i'm not saying India doesn't have the power, but his xSLG is just .423, which suggests that his ballpark may be doing some of the work for him).

Guest

3:12

Corbin Burnes is still leading the National League in both K rate and walk rate (no one has led his league in both since Walter Johnson in 1913 in the A.L.). Yet I saw yesterday that a national poll of sportswriters has Burnes a distant 3rd in Cy young consideration, trailing Buehler and Wheeler by a big chunk. Is this an indication that a vast majority of sportswriters think FIP is junk? (Burnes has second-lowest FIP of the past 70 years.)

Jay Jaffe

3:13

I don't think it's a dismissal of FIP, but there are a few obvious things working against Burnes from a CY standpoint: he's about 35-45 innings behind Wheeler and Buehler, plays in a much smaller market, and has a single-digit win total.

3:14

not all of those play to the same audiences, but they do help to explain how he can slip through the cracks

Guest

3:14

If the AL WC game is Yankees-Red Sox, whom do you like in a Cole vs. Sale matchup?

Jay Jaffe

3:15

probably tilt towards Cole because he can go deeper into the game and is backed up by a better bullpen.

Guest

3:16

Nathan Eovaldi leads all AL pitchers in WAR. Will he get even a single first place Cy Young vote, though?

Jay Jaffe

3:17

seems less likely so long as he's also sporting a 3.72 ERA (though he's a respectable 5th in bWAR too). The AL race seems more wide open to me than the NL one

Guest

3:18

Fun facts: Yordan Alvarez has a higher career wRC+ than Juan Soto, and is averaging exactly the same WAR/600 as Soto at 5.0. (Alvarez is a bit more than one year older, for whatever that's worth.) Is Yordan Alvarez the one significant mistake the Dodgers have made since A.F. arrived?

Jay Jaffe

3:22

He's a mistake (Josh Fields??), though I'm not sure how much playing time he would have gotten as a Dodger without the DH in 2019 and this year.

Friedman's mistake in trading him pales in comparison to his signing of Trevor Bauer, which stands to cost the Dodgers a lot more than money. An all-time clinker that seriously damages my view of him as an executive.

3:23

Remember when Chris Carpenter 'only' had 192 IP which likely hurt him in CY voting in 2009, more wins, better ERA, WHIP but 33IP less than Lincecum...

Jay Jaffe

3:24

The Cy Young voting has changed a bit since then, no? Advanced metrics are a bigger part of the conversation now — which in the long run could help Burnes. I'm not sure there's a ton we should read into an at-large poll taken 6 weeks before ballots are due.

Guest

3:26

The Astros by BaseRuns have been the best team in the AL. Do you like them as WS series favorites in the American League?

Jay Jaffe

3:27

I think that right now they're the AL favorites, but I'm a bit concerned about how well their rotation will hold up. Then again, i can probably find reasons to be concerned about most contenders' rotations, worrywart that I am

Skyler

3:28

What statistics would you recommend using to evaluate a starting pitcher? Currently using FIP xFIP SIERA and ERA

Jay Jaffe

3:28

K%, K-BB%, and xERA are worth adding to the mix; I don't use SIERA or xFIP much myself but there's more than one way to skin a cat.

Nick

3:28

Joey Votto said the other day that the current MIL starting rotation is the best group of starters he has ever faced in his career (comparing favorably to, for example, the Phillies' staff of Halladay, Lee, Oswalt, and Hamels). But are the Brewers' pitchers even the best staff currently in the majors? I'd take Scherzer, Kershaw, Buehler, and Urias, personally.

Jay Jaffe

3:31

Well, I'm not sure you can include Kershaw in that group right now given that he hasn't started since July 3 and is at least a few weeks away from doing so again. If everybody's healthy, they might have the upper hand. As for Votto's response, it's worth considering that he's seen the Milwaukee rotation a lot more as an NL Central rival, so I can see why he'd feel that way.

Nameless Joe

3:33

Genuine question regarding your view of AF being damaged by the Bauer signing: What was the extent of the dodgers FO’s knowledge of all the despicable stuff he was up to?

Jay Jaffe

3:35

I don't have an answer to that but that doesn't mean the Dodgers shouldn't have done better due diligence. His misogyny was well-documented via his online behavior but beyond that, if a reporter can find out about the sealed court records in Ohio, so can a sleuth working on behalf of a team.

Nick

3:36

Victor Robles was a solid contributor and ROY candidate in 2019; 2021 and 2021, in contrast, have been very disappointing. Is he an MLB regular going forward?

Jay Jaffe

3:38

I'm skeptical, but maybe he just needs a change of scenery. Not really sure what happened given the collection of tools he had.

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