JotCast | Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat

Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat - 4/4/23

Jay Jaffe

2:01

Good afternoon, folks, and welcome to my first solo chat of the 2023 regular season — last week's chat was scrubbed due to my participation in the Opening Day chat.

2:02

Anyway, I've got a piece up today on the rough start to Madison Bumgarner's 2023 season. It's grimmer than a @nihilist_arby's tweet https://blogs.fangraphs.com/madison-bumgarners-2023-is-off-to-a-rough-...

2:03

Yesterday I looked at Anthony Rendon's return and the foolishness on his part that led to a four-game suspension https://blogs.fangraphs.com/anthony-rendons-return-to-action-may-be-in...

The guy who asks the lunch question

2:03

What's for lunch?

Jay Jaffe

2:04

Smoked brisket from a friend, and some leftover roasted cauliflower. Good stuff!

2:04

Is Berrios Spanish for "sad futility"? Asking for a country.

Jay Jaffe

2:04

Woof, is he off to a rough start after last year's struggles. Might look into the Blue Jays — whom I picked to win the AL East — in an upcoming piece.

Yeah Well Hiura Towel

2:06

Is Nolan Arenado better than Scott Rolen was?

Jay Jaffe

2:10

I'd say they're pretty close to even at this stage of their careers. Using the Baseball Reference Compare tool, Arenado ended last season, his age-31 campaign, with a 124 OPS+ and 52.0 WAR. Rolen, through age 31 (2007), had a 129 OPS+ and 53.3 WAR; using those cutoffs, the difference in games played only comes out to nine (in Rolen's favor).

The big difference between the two is that the widespread availability of WAR and defensive metrics has made Arenado an obvious HOFer in waiting where for Rolen, those numbers weren't popular until late carer, and so many people didn't come around to that notion until after he retired.

Steve

2:11

Best for this year...Grove, Dodd, or Elder?

Jay Jaffe

2:12

I was impressed with what I saw of Michael Grove last night, but I'll go with Dodd, entirely based on Eric Longenhagen's prospect grade. he's a 50 FV via what Eric ran last week (https://blogs.fangraphs.com/a-starters-pistol-update-to-the-top-100-pr...) whereas the other two are 40+ guys.

Dallas

2:12

I want to travel to see Ohtani; specifically to see him pitch and hit in a game. How far out would you make your plans for this? For example, if the Angels starting rotation stays on schedule (ah shit, I just realized it could go to 6-man at anytime. Damnit.), he should pitch in St. Louis on Wednesday May 3rd. I live in Chicago so I can drive but would rather fly. When do you make your plans? Thanks.

Jay Jaffe

2:14

man, that's tough. especially given the potential for rainouts I'd be wary of making plans too far in advance. I might wait until a couple of weeks before to see what tracks as far as rotation plans are concerned. You could always rely upon the secondary market to get a ticket if plans change and you need to adjust, but it could get a bit pricey.

2:14

Is this the year Gleyber Torres puts it all together?

Jay Jaffe

2:17

I'd say he put it all together in 2019 when he hit 38 homers with a 125 wRC+ and was worth 3.6 WAR, though to be fair that was weighted down by his rough defense at shortstop (-11 DRS, -7 RAA), and last year he was average to good at second (9 DRS, 0 RAA). Offensively, while I do like the start he's off to, I think we've seen his ceiling, so I think you're looking at a ~4-win guy if it all breaks right.

Abe

2:17

Seems NYY pitching depth was a bit underrated? You could argue they haven't developed the front line guy yet but man does their pitching dev churn out big leaguers

Jay Jaffe

2:21

They've done a good job of minting mid-to back-end guys. Germán, Montgomery, Ken Waldichuk, JP Sears, maybe Jhony Brito; we'll see if he and Schmidt can hang at least in the short term

Guest

2:22

Weathers last night? Good? Bad?

Jay Jaffe

2:25

I didn't see him but five innings, two runs, one walk, two K's is reasonably solid. Scored a 106 Stuff+ for his fastball, 109 for the slider, but just 77 for the changeup — still all well ahead of where he was in 2021 https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=pit&lg=all&qual=0...

Ross

2:25

Guardians, 100-win ceiling with their roster construction and age coinciding with these particular rule changes? They've always utilized white magic with their starting pitching but Kwan and Straw seem to help in the OF where they've been traditionally weak.

Jay Jaffe

2:28

I don't have much faith in Straw's bat at all, but he can go get it. Feels like this team has been punting outfield offense seemingly since Grady Sizemore fell apart. The Guardians project for just 83.8 wins, but they do have a bit of a shot at 100 based on the distribution graph available via the Display Options:

2:29

Twins distribution shown for comparison. 100 wins COULD happen but I wouldn't hold my breath

Dan the Man McGRAWWWW

2:30

What would Judge need to do to become a HoFer? How much heavy lifting did his MVP season do?

Jay Jaffe

2:31

he's got a ways to go in terms of career stuff but he's only about 5 points short on peak — and that's having played more than 112 games just three times.

2:32

Those three seasons are 10.6, 8.0 and 6.1 in terms of WAR, and he also has a 5.9 in just 112 games and 5.6 in 102 games. That's A LOT of heavy lifting; conceivably, he could clear the peak standard with like a 5.1 WAR season this year

Marko from Tropoja

2:32

IMO, Kershaw and Trout were surefire Hall of Famers on opening day of their tenth seasons. Who, if anyone, could be the next person on that list? Mookie (2023 is his tenth season)? Ohtani? Soto?

Jay Jaffe

2:35

Mookie is 15th in JAWS (56.2/50.4/53.3), between Gwynn and Evans, ahead of Suzuki, Winfield, and Guerrero already, so I'd call him sure-fire. Once Ohtani gets to 10 years (2027), he'll have my vote if he's still able to do both roles competently. Soto is much further off, with only two seasons of 5.0 WAR or better. Pretty normal for a guy who's in his age-24 season.

Madison Bumgarner

2:35

Did anyone actually expect me to do well this year? Even my mom thinks I'm a bum.

Jay Jaffe

2:38

What really makes me scratch my head is that we don't hear anything about what he's doing to stop this slide. Is he stuck in 2015? He's on a team that has the ex-Astros pitching coach; where's the new pitch or new grip or mechanical tweak that's going to at least offer some hope he rebounds? Is he stuck in 2015? Guys turn themselves around all the time with all of this information but we don't hear anything about him going that route.

Insert Witty Name Here

2:38

If Rendon only got a 4 game suspension, should more players get in the face of unruly fans? I’d love to see Vogelbach block the sun on some drunk fan.

Jay Jaffe

2:39

This is a stupid way to look at what was a serious matter. Rendon was in the wrong — touching a fan like that is a no-no and he could still face legal probelms

Chip

2:40

I saw a lot of media people forecasting TOR to win the East this year, stating that the rotation and lineup were both better than NYY. To my eye the NYY rotation is clearly better, and the lineup is much closer than most people think. Where am I wrong?

Jay Jaffe

2:41

I think the concern about the Yankees rotation was its volatility due to injury risks, and whaddayaknow, Rodón and Severino have started the year on the IL, and Montas is out until, probably, September. The Blue Jays' rotation strikes me as les volatile.

todd

2:41

You are probably not the right guy to ask this. Nevertheless, here goes. Is there ever a chance the pitch modeling numbers are available on player pages?

Jay Jaffe

2:43

I imagine they will be there someday, not sure how soon but will ask (check this q for an update). In the meantime, a good workaround is to create a Custom Players page and select the guy(s) you want like I did for Weathers above. Here's one for Ohtani: https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=pit&lg=all&qual=0...

2:44

Note that these numbers only go back to 2020

Kiermaier's Piercing Green Eyes

2:44

Different borough, but got any food recs for Astoria?

Jay Jaffe

2:45

As it's a haul and a half and I don't have a car, Queens in general is the great unknown for food for me

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