Minor League Discussion & Box, 4-18-24

[CaliforniaRaisin]

Scheduled Game (Central Time):

Iowa vs. Louisville, 12:08 pm
Tennessee vs. Montgomery, 6:00 pm
South Bend at Beloit, 6:35 pm
Myrtle Beach vs. Kannapolis, 6:05 pm

Probable Starters:

Tennessee: RHP Brandon Birdsell (5.1 IP, 6.75 ERA, 3.61 FIP, 7 K, 3 BB)
South Bend: RHP Sam Armstrong (6 IP, 0.00 ERA, 0.49 FIP, 9 K, 0 BB)
Myrtle Beach: RHP Ty Johnson (4.2 IP, 5.79 ERA, 4.76 FIP, 6 K, 1 BB)

[Bertz]

I checked in on Owen Caissie this morning, and honestly the Statcast data is really encouraging.  I'm going to do that annoying thing I do where I percentile his numbers against MLB averages from last year:

Avg. Exit Velo - 90.1 MPH (69th)

Avg. Launch Angle - 13.1 (54th)

Max Velo - 112.5 (59th)

Hard Hit Rate - 48.5% (87th)

Chase Rate - 31.7% (30th)

Contact Rate (all pitches) - 69.9% (14th)

Contact Rate (in zone) - 81.9% (24th)

% Pitches in Strikezone - 43.1% (1st)

It's not what I expected to see, but it makes sense.  The exit velo numbers are good but hardly elite, and the chase rate is kind of bad?  The contact numbers are bad but not atrocious, something I'd hypothesized last season based on his swinging strike rate (basically that his elevated K rate was less a Joey Gallo lack of contact deal and more of a Kyle Schwarber deep counts deal). 

So what's the deal?  It's that last number.  Pitchers at AAA are completely refusing to throw him strikes.  Bryce Harper is the only hitter in MLB who got fewer strikes last year.  Every pitcher is turning into Blake Snell when he comes to the plate and nibbling like crazy, scared of his power.  Caissie's probably getting frustrated and chasing more than he should when he finally gets a vaguely decent pitch, and that's leading to softer contact than he by rights ought to be generating.

We'll see how quickly Caissie locks it down and just accepts his Barry Bonds treatment until pitchers come back into the zone, but this does not look like a guy who is very far off.

[craig]

3 hours ago, Bertz said:

...Hard Hit Rate - 48.5% (87th)

Chase Rate - 31.7% (30th)

Contact Rate (all pitches) - 69.9% (14th)

Contact Rate (in zone) - 81.9% (24th)

% Pitches in Strikezone - 43.1% (1st)

It's not what I expected to see, but it makes sense.  The exit velo numbers are good but hardly elite, and the chase rate is kind of bad?  The contact numbers are bad but not atrocious, .......

Thanks Bertz, really interesting.  This will sound like an idiot question, but when you're listing percentile, I want to make sure I'm tracking it correctly. In most situations in academia and baseball, high percentile is desirable.  I want hard-hit percentile high, I want contact rate percentile high.  

For chase rate, is this what it says it is?  Higher percentile means you chase more?  So, 99th percentile would be the grossest chase-iest, 1st percentile would be the ideal, and 30th percentile is good, because it means 2/3 of big-leaguers chase more than Caissie?  Or is the "percentile" meaning adjusted so as to make a high-percentile desirable, so 30th percentile isn't desirable?  

Being bottom quartile for in-zone contact, that seems kinda yucky and worrisome to me.  But you don't seem to mind?  

[mul21]

27 minutes ago, craig said:

For chase rate, is this what it says it is?  Higher percentile means you chase more?  So, 99th percentile would be the grossest chase-iest, 1st percentile would be the ideal, and 30th percentile is good, because it means 2/3 of big-leaguers chase more than Caissie?  Or is the "percentile" meaning adjusted so as to make a high-percentile desirable, so 30th percentile isn't desirable?  

Being bottom quartile for in-zone contact, that seems kinda yucky and worrisome to me.  But you don't seem to mind?  

No, 99th percentile for chase rate means only 1% chase less than the guy being discussed, so that would be excellent.

The in zone contact is always going to be an issue for Caissie, more than likely, because of the power, but because he doesn't chase, it's less of a problem.  When you chase and miss in zone (Javy Baez comes to mind without any statistical back up here), that's what's really problematic.

[Bertz]

54 minutes ago, craig said:

Thanks Bertz, really interesting.  This will sound like an idiot question, but when you're listing percentile, I want to make sure I'm tracking it correctly. In most situations in academia and baseball, high percentile is desirable.  I want hard-hit percentile high, I want contact rate percentile high.  

For chase rate, is this what it says it is?  Higher percentile means you chase more?  So, 99th percentile would be the grossest chase-iest, 1st percentile would be the ideal, and 30th percentile is good, because it means 2/3 of big-leaguers chase more than Caissie?  Or is the "percentile" meaning adjusted so as to make a high-percentile desirable, so 30th percentile isn't desirable?  

Being bottom quartile for in-zone contact, that seems kinda yucky and worrisome to me.  But you don't seem to mind?  

Yeah that's a good question.  These are all higher percentile = good even if numerically it might work in the inverse.  E.g. Caissie's 30th percentil chase rate is bad because he is chasing more often than 70% of MLBers.  The last number, the % pitches in the strike zone, since that's not (directly) a skill I went with lower = lower, though now writing this out I probably should have gone the other direction.

But no I'm not worried at all about the contact.  Guys within a half a percent of him in in-zone contact rate include Mike Trout, Max Muncy, Bryce Harper, William Contreras and Austin Riley.  Like it is below average contact but totally normal for a power hitter.

Those contact numbers do require the chase to come down and the exit velo numbers to be more elite like we've seen reported previously.   But if these are the blemishes from his first few weeks at the new level I'm happy.  They indicate that he's not that far off IMO.

Edited April 18, 2024 by Bertz

[Jason Ross]

@Bertz I wanted to test your theory about the way pitchers are approaching Caissie and I think you nailed it. Below are pitch frequencies for a handful of different hitters at Iowa...

The other three are different styles of hitters, some are right handed, others more power hitters, PCA a free swinger. No one is getting the refusal to come inside like Caissie. 

[Bertz]

27 minutes ago, 1908_Cubs said:

@Bertz I wanted to test your theory about the way pitchers are approaching Caissie and I think you nailed it. Below are pitch frequencies for a handful of different hitters at Iowa...

The other three are different styles of hitters, some are right handed, others more power hitters, PCA a free swinger. No one is getting the refusal to come inside like Caissie. 

2 of those guys are in the middle of heaters where they're running OPS marks around 1.000 and yet Caissie's the one who scares pitchers so much he has more red outside the zone than inside.  He might have a special bat.

[craig]

1 hour ago, Bertz said:

....But no I'm not worried at all about the contact.  Guys within a half a percent of him in in-zone contact rate include Mike Trout, Max Muncy, Bryce Harper, William Contreras and Austin Riley.  Like it is below average contact but totally normal for a power hitter.

Those contact numbers do require the chase to come down and the exit velo numbers to be more elite like we've seen reported previously.   But if these are the blemishes from his first few weeks at the new level I'm happy.  They indicate that he's not that far off IMO.

Interesting, thanks. 

I admit being worst-third chase; worst quartile contact-in-zone; and worst quintile contact-overall.... that doesn't feel as worry-free for me!  

[CaliforniaRaisin]

 

[spaincubsfan]

17 hours ago, Bertz said:

I checked in on Owen Caissie this morning, and honestly the Statcast data is really encouraging.  I'm going to do that annoying thing I do where I percentile his numbers against MLB averages from last year:

Avg. Exit Velo - 90.1 MPH (69th)

Avg. Launch Angle - 13.1 (54th)

Max Velo - 112.5 (59th)

Hard Hit Rate - 48.5% (87th)

Chase Rate - 31.7% (30th)

Contact Rate (all pitches) - 69.9% (14th)

Contact Rate (in zone) - 81.9% (24th)

% Pitches in Strikezone - 43.1% (1st)

It's not what I expected to see, but it makes sense.  The exit velo numbers are good but hardly elite, and the chase rate is kind of bad?  The contact numbers are bad but not atrocious, something I'd hypothesized last season based on his swinging strike rate (basically that his elevated K rate was less a Joey Gallo lack of contact deal and more of a Kyle Schwarber deep counts deal). 

So what's the deal?  It's that last number.  Pitchers at AAA are completely refusing to throw him strikes.  Bryce Harper is the only hitter in MLB who got fewer strikes last year.  Every pitcher is turning into Blake Snell when he comes to the plate and nibbling like crazy, scared of his power.  Caissie's probably getting frustrated and chasing more than he should when he finally gets a vaguely decent pitch, and that's leading to softer contact than he by rights ought to be generating.

We'll see how quickly Caissie locks it down and just accepts his Barry Bonds treatment until pitchers come back into the zone, but this does not look like a guy who is very far off.

Do you think he will adjust to the múltiple 97+ MPH 4 seamers with movement in MLB? Does he have the bat speed to get around a good FB in the zone?

[Jason Ross]

3 hours ago, spaincubsfan said:

Do you think he will adjust to the múltiple 97+ MPH 4 seamers with movement in MLB? Does he have the bat speed to get around a good FB in the zone?

So I'd say this: Owen Caissie is every bit of what an elite power hitting prospect looks like. He's consistently posted great exit velocities, he's improved his contact rates (especially against RHP). Can he hit 97mph+? We don't have a lot of statcast data yet to say either way. He's faced 94+ mph in just five PA's so far at the Triple-A level (we don't have access to public statcast data for levels lower than Triple-A) and that's not enough to know anything yet. 

But I do think he's raw skills are good enough to handle that fine. He's someone who's had to shift his hit box (the point of contact with the baseball) because he was so patient early, he let the ball travel too far...partially because he has quick hands for a dude his size. As well, pitchers in Triple-A seem to be deathly afraid of attacking up and in on Caissie, another signal that other teams think his hand speed is more than enough to get in on those pitches. Usually what we see with hitters who are as tall as Caissie is a consistent diet of hard stuff up and in to attack the levers. We're not seeing that right now. 

[CaliforniaRaisin]

It's early but I wonder if Sam Armstrong is a thing. In 3 games at high-A - 9.1 IP, 0.00 ERA, 1.86 FIP, 13 K, 3 BB (12.54 K/9, 2.89 BB/9). He got the max $125k bonus for a Day 3 pick last year.