Bertz

Annnnndd now a dong .269/.424/.615 Early season data is fun

Velo down a bit, hard contact up a bit. That said he's fine. It's not bad luck or anything, this is legit hard contact, but he's missing bats and keeping the ball on the ground. His xFIP is 3.32, and for a vet like him we know he's not a guy who's gonna underperform in that way in the long run.

If the back of my napkin is correct, PCA is up to .240/.406/.480 after that last HBP

Hopefully this gets rained out now, sheesh

The crazy amount of groundballs is definitely a red flag, but I think a less deep shade of red than an equivalent plate discipline or contact deficiency. It can and often is a canary in the coal mine that something is wrong. Like I remember Starlin's last year here he ran a 60+% GB rate for a month or so, BABIP'd his way to solid production, and then cratered the rest of the way. But at the same time, I believe it's been empirically shown that GB rate is more on the pitchers than the hitters. I don't know if the Cubs' slate of opposing pitchers has been exceptionally GB heavy, but it's easily possible in only 11 games.

Yeah I assumed that this was something they could do in 2020 with no fans but that it was a one-off. I wonder if the schedule being tighter this year because of a lockout necessitated bringing this back.

Brennen with a walk before I've even finished my first coffee of the morning is fun

Effross has been out best reliever, I certainly wouldn't do anything with him. I think you option Leiter, Rucker, and Roberts, DFA the worst of the vet relievers (as of now Chavez), and kick the worst OFer off the team. At the moment that'd be either Ortega or Frazier, and because it's so close you'd choose Frazier because he has options. I do also wonder if how easy it'd be to trade Mills, I think if that's a real option it simplifies things to an extent and would be attractive.

I know the Rays' whole thing is a roster that's greater than the sum of its parts, but man I do not see how this team keeps up with the rest of the AL East this year

He might be more than just a senior signing

Patrick Wisdom has improved his contact rate from horrendous to bad, and he's still hitting the horsefeathers out of the ball. Very early obviously, but he might be ready to level up from last year.

I'm curious if this is mechanics, the cold weather, or he really only has the juice in his arm to do a couple innings at full velo

Chris Clarke shoving too. I hope we get some video on that front

At what point does Jared Young pass Rivas on the depth chart for strong side platoon duties?

Definitely a response to the Rays using an opener, but I don't hate it? Especially while Villar is hot.

I would be very interested in giving Newcomb a shot. Even just give him 2-3 weeks until Miley is ready to show something. But we could really use another lefty in the pen, particularly one with some velo.

Yeah that's not clear, but it seems like it's the result pitch. I'd love to get greedy and get plate discipline (chase, contact, etc.) but I'd imagine it's rare for a guy to e.g. be super susceptible to something early in the count but much less so later. Maybe if more guys choked up like Rizzo? Several of those going the other way too, whereas previously I feel like batting right he's mostly just swung hard and hoped he ran into one.

Yeah and this doesn't help with velocity at all but he is leading all of baseball in wFB which I believe is weighted runs above average against fastballs, and broken down into wFB/100 fastballs seen he's 4th. It's possible with the small sample size that he's faced a number of lower velocity pitchers but he's definitely crushing fastballs better than almost anyone else in baseball. He's seeing an average fastball velocity that's slightly above the midpoint for qualified hitters: https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=4&season=2022&month=0&season1=2022&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&startdate=2022-01-01&enddate=2022-12-31&sort=4,d&page=2_50 I think I found it? This was pretty tucked away but I feel like MLB ought to make a much bigger deal that this is available: https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/statcast_search?hfPT=FF%7CFT%7CFC%7CSI%7C&hfAB=&hfGT=R%7C&hfPR=&hfZ=&stadium=&hfBBL=&hfNewZones=&hfPull=&hfC=&hfSea=2022%7C&hfSit=&player_type=batter&hfOuts=&opponent=&pitcher_throws=&batter_stands=&hfSA=&game_date_gt=&game_date_lt=&hfInfield=&team=CHC&position=&hfOutfield=&hfRO=&home_road=&hfFlag=&hfBBT=&metric_1=api_p_release_speed&metric_1_gt=95&metric_1_lt=&hfInn=&min_pitches=0&min_results=0&group_by=name&sort_col=xwoba&player_event_sort=api_p_release_speed&sort_order=desc&min_pas=0&chk_stats_pa=on&chk_stats_hits=on&chk_stats_xba=on&chk_stats_xwoba=on#results Small sample, but Seiya excels here too. He might just be perfect? Also Happ is apparently crushing velo this year too, and that hasn't always been the case.

Thompson and Steele being so good thus far has me more bullish on short term contention than I was two weeks ago. I was confident that we had enough good arms in the org to fill out a full staff, but I thought we were going to have a MUCH more painful time finding out which ones ought to actually be taking the bump. But if we can run an ~average pitching staff out here in the first half, and then supplement that in the second half with Alzolay, some Iowa reinforcements, and a trade acquisition of substance it changes the outlook for the team substantially.

I wish it was easier to find how guys do against velo. The data exists, you see it on broadcasts, but it's not easy to see anywhere. But I think that's the one open question with Seiya. I don't believe he's really turned around a good fastball. He's wrecked some at like 92, and offspeed stuff from more flamethrower types, but I think he's mostly fought off real velo. Even if he doesn't do damage on a bigtime fastballs I don't think that precludes him from being very good, but it might preclude him from continuing to do insane Juan Soto things.

Having a longman who can pitch leverage innings is really fun. I imagine the hope is that Rucker can do similar things, and while I'm skeptical of that I could see Jensen or Espinoza being similar weapons in the second half.

I know Frazier has reverse splits for his career, but I still have a hard time buying that he's not a better DH option than our admittedly good backup catcher?

On the subject of ARL, these are the guys where it's relevant. I'm doing hitters only since I don't super care about ARL for pitchers, and I don't want to double my work Iowa - Brennen Davis is the 12th youngest hitter in the International League, 18th in AAA overall Tennessee - Ball, Morel, Velazquez, and Perlaza are among the 30 youngest hitters in the Southern League, but would all be in the 50+ range for AA overall South Bend - Owen Caissie is the youngest hitter in the Midwest League, #2 in Hi-A overall - Pinango and Howard are 5th and 8th respectively in the MWL. 6th and tied for 15th in Hi-A - If Kevin Made is in fact just making a pit stop at MB before going to SB, he'll be the youngest hitter in Hi-A Myrtle Beach - Preciado is 6th in the Carolina League, 11th in A Ball - Triantos is 13th in the league, 28th in A Ball - Made is 20th and Alcantara 25th in the MWL, but like the Tennessee guys not insanely young for the level overall (Alcantara surprised me, I didn't realize he had nearly a year on Preciado) - PCA's still young for the league, but only modestly so. He's younger than Howard so if he gets a quick bump (it seemed like he was close to breaking camp with SB) it'll quickly resume being a large feather in his cap There's certainly arguments to be had for exactly how much to weight age relative to league. IMO, for guys like Caissie and Made (assuming the quick bump) it's so massive it needs to be part of essentially every conversation about them. And while not as all encompassing, even for the Preciado tier of guys it's still a big piece of context that heavily informs just about any evaluation of their performance.