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Jeff Sullivan FanGraphs Chat -- 9/12/18
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Jeff Sullivan
10:38
That's the lowest in baseball for anyone with at least 100 plate appearances, and it's the lowest by like five percentage points
10:39
He's looking up at Drew Robinson of the Rangers, Joey Gallo of the Rangers, and Jorge Alfaro formerly of the Rangers
James
10:39
What do the Dodgers need to do to get back to being a contender next season?
Jeff Sullivan
10:39
They're a contender this season
They have the best run differential in the National League
10:40
They have the best BaseRuns record in the National League
There'll be some work for them to do, but I have been assuming for a while they'll figure out a way to keep Kershaw around
10:41
I don't think they'll miss many of their other free agents. Obviously they're going to lose Machado, but they have more financial flexibility than any other team that isn't the Yankees
The Dodgers are going to be fine
The Old Buccaneer
10:42
Has the season long slump of Carlos Correa dimmed his future outlook at all? Or is this just a one-off hampered by injury?
Jeff Sullivan
10:43
Carlos Correa before the DL: 128 wRC+
Carlos Correa since the DL: 31 wRC+
It's been his power that's disappeared, but I can't imagine there's anyone in baseball who's worried this will become a long-term problem
Johnny
10:44
Serious question - why do you think teams still give expensive long-term contracts to players like Eric Hosmer, Ian Desmond, etc?
Jeff Sullivan
10:44
Because they don't think they'll work out like the long-term contracts given to Eric Hosmer, Ian Desmond, etc
10:46
Free agency makes things "easy," and it's tempting to believe in the power of immediate solutions. Teams are more comfortable spending money than spending prospects. Teams find it easier to talk to an agent than to a competing GM. And free agency is just good for short-term PR. It feels good to receive positive offseason attention. I bet the Twins loved all those articles about how they won the winter!
10:47
Free agency has been a tease forever. The danger is that teams are more aware of that now than ever before. Which is why there should be such urgency to shift money toward the earlier seasons of a player's career, because free agency isn't likely to ever be what it was
10:48
And it's fine in a way -- complaining about the free-agent market is complaining about how the 0.1% take advantage of the 1%. Everyone's wealthy. The players who deserve our collective attention are the players who aren't even close to their FA years
Jacrispy
10:48
Per FG, the Dodgers have the best odds of any NL team of winning the WS despite having a 35% chance of missing the playoffs. Are they really that much better than the other NL teams?
Jeff Sullivan
10:49
The projections are still too low on the Braves and the Brewers, but, yeah, the odds don't give a shit about the Dodgers' unclutch performance, and I can't blame them. By almost all indications, the Dodgers are great
Jared
10:51
Does Brad Keller profile as a #3 going forward? how many AL ROY votes does he pick up?
Jeff Sullivan
10:52
I'm not convinced he has any answer for left-handed hitters. He's a ground-ball guy with a platoon split and no special putaway pitch. Not even sure he's a long-term starter at all
For the Royals, he's been more good than bad, but I wouldn't be pinning my future organizational hopes on Brad Keller's right arm
The 13th Inning
10:54
Stadium of the future - the outfield walls move in by 20 feet in each inning after the 9th. I mean, right?
Jeff Sullivan
10:54
If a game ever reached like the 27th inning, all the players would be crushed to death :(
Which, hey, what a spectacle!
Stay out of the splash zone
Sleepy
10:55
The A's lead all of baseball in position player WAR.  What a world.
Jeff Sullivan
10:55
In the second half they have a wRC+ of 121. No one else is above 110
10:56
It's been quiet, but the discovery of Ramon Laureano and the understandable turnaround of Stephen Piscotty have been enormous
It's no fun to analyze a situation like Piscotty's, since he's been through more than most people could imagine, but holy hell has he ever been good
Buck Schowalter
10:57
Astros are one win away from owning the most road wins over a two year period in baseball history (surpassing the 01-02 Seattle Mariners). That's pretty incredible when you think about it.
Jeff Sullivan
10:58
Home/road splits always trip me up. Like, in this case, I can't tell if it's good that the Astros have been so good in other ballparks, or if it's bad that they haven't been better in their own
Chuncey Wiggins
10:59
Do you have a personal limit when it comes to analytics "ruining the game" or at least making it less pleasant to watch? I sometimes find myself hating the shift when a well struck ball is fielded by a third baseman standing behind second.
Jeff Sullivan
10:59
I don't think we're yet at the point where we can really understand whether the game is better or worse
11:00
What we know is that the game is different from what we became used to. And, initially, different almost always feels bad. We loved baseball for what it was, and now it plays differently. That requires an adjustment
11:01
It's like when a website undergoes a redesign. It doesn't matter whether the redesign is way better than what came before it -- at first, people lose their minds, because they became accustomed to something
11:02
Eventually the shift won't be the shift anymore. It'll just be the defense. Defenses change alignments, just like they do in football. It's just going to take a long time to rewire our baseball-watching brains
And *then* we'll be able to conclusively determine whether things like bulpenning are good, bad, or mixed
Pio
11:03
Luis Urias hit an upperdeck shot in the rain and then the gods punished him and took out his hammy.
Jeff Sullivan
11:03
Nature abhors a showoff
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