Around the League 2020 Edition

Super said:
couldn’t disagree more here.
they’re lucky they were able to get out of that Santana contract. that was such a dumb signing for them as he had no where to play. it helped make their defense one of the worst we’ve seen.

Arrieta was also a poor signing. an older pitcher who was clearly on the downside and they blinked and signed him.

they’ve overall done a pretty bad job building a team for the present and future. their roster going into last year was a joke. ignore the fact that they signed expensive relievers in the first place and all of them got hurt, their bench was a joke and Maikel Franco was plan A at 3B, and Nick Williams and Aaron Altherr were their main bench pieces. and then you had their rotation which they didn’t address at all going into that season.

they’re going to have to pay Hoskins soon or let him walk. JTR is going to command a lot of $$. Harper is signed until he’s 39. Kingery isn’t good and is already signed. another decline year of Andrew McCutchen. Wheeler is good, but 4 more years with him at high dollars. they’re going to have a lot of them because they don’t have particularly strong young players and their farm is below average. so they’re going to have pay a lot of players a lot of money to be competitive.

i’m curious how it can be argued that they’ve spent well.
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WTF happened to him? I get that fans get drawn in the little, gritty, hustling guy, but he's been worthless this season. I've always believed that almost any player can have a remarkably good season--at least compared to their projections (think Camargo)--or a remarkably bad season like Kingery is having. But he absolutely has to turn it around or that is going to amount to one of the worst contracts in baseball. Lucky for the Phils that everything beyond 2023 is a team option (at pretty big money).
 
50PoundHead said:
WTF happened to him? I get that fans get drawn in the little, gritty, hustling guy, but he's been worthless this season. I've always believed that almost any player can have a remarkably good season--at least compared to their projections (think Camargo)--or a remarkably bad season like Kingery is having. But he absolutely has to turn it around or that is going to amount to one of the worst contracts in baseball. Lucky for the Phils that everything beyond 2023 is a team option (at pretty big money).
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Dansby had a kind of similar debut and flop. I wouldn't close the book on Kingery.
 
Dansby had a downturn but he didn't drive off a cliff. Kingery is hitting .127 with a lousy walk rate. He's a subpar fielder pretty much everywhere you put him on the field, so he has to hit. Not saying he won't. Saying he has to. Hence my use of the phrase "he absolutely has to turn it around." Again, bad things can happen to a player, but those bad things don't necessarily put a guy in his baseball grave.
 
50PoundHead said:
Dansby had a downturn but he didn't drive off a cliff. Kingery is hitting .127 with a lousy walk rate. He's a subpar fielder pretty much everywhere you put him on the field, so he has to hit. Not saying he won't. Saying he has to. Hence my use of the phrase "he absolutely has to turn it around." Again, bad things can happen to a player, but those bad things don't necessarily put a guy in his baseball grave.
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he's had positive defensive WAR ratings the last two years before this. from what i've watched tho, which has been quite a bit before this year, his defense wasn't overly impressive. not sure what the other stats say.

his approach at the plate is really terrible. i think they rushed him up once they signed him. they HAD to have known by watching him in the minors that his approach was bad. on top of that, they brought him up and moved him all around. his best position and probably only viable position is 2B, but Cesar Hernandez had been there the previous couple years and was solid. who knows how much that truly messed with him, impossible to quantify, but it probably didn't help.

i don't know how he had the year he did last year. his BABIP was very high most of the year and the difference between his wOBA and xwOBA was among the largest in the league, i believe. his first half BABIP was .369 (.440 and .435 the first two months of the season) which helped a fuel a 127 wRC+. when his BABIP was a more normal .310, he hit for an 80 wRC+.
i'm not totally counting him out, but you're right in that he really better hit. the Phillies will probably have to end up declining those team options.
 
50PoundHead said:
Dansby had a downturn but he didn't drive off a cliff. Kingery is hitting .127 with a lousy walk rate. He's a subpar fielder pretty much everywhere you put him on the field, so he has to hit. Not saying he won't. Saying he has to. Hence my use of the phrase "he absolutely has to turn it around." Again, bad things can happen to a player, but those bad things don't necessarily put a guy in his baseball grave.
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I was looking to see how they compared and had to laugh when I saw Kingery has a -2 wRC+.

That's a strange result for someone that had a 101 wRC+ in 500 PA last season.

Dansby pretty clearly was rushed and has improved each season from his baseline (after a small sample successful debut). But he's been a below average hitter his first three full seasons. In some respects, I wonder if he would regress back towards average if this was a full season.

Kingery producing at an average rate for a full season after the league had seen him and then totally collapsing is crazy. I guess he's had pretty bad luck (his expected number on Balls in play is still way above his BABIP) and he might otherwise be having a more understandably bad season but for that.
 
Southcack77 said:
I was looking to see how they compared and had to laugh when I saw Kingery has a -2 wRC+.

That's a strange result for someone that had a 101 wRC+ in 500 PA last season.

Dansby pretty clearly was rushed and has improved each season from his baseline (after a small sample successful debut). But he's been a below average hitter his first three full seasons. In some respects, I wonder if he would regress back towards average if this was a full season.

Kingery producing at an average rate for a full season after the league had seen him and then totally collapsing is crazy. I guess he's had pretty bad luck (his expected number on Balls in play is still way above his BABIP) and he might otherwise be having a more understandably bad season but for that.
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he was extremely lucky last year. in multiple regards.
 
Southcack77 said:
I was looking to see how they compared and had to laugh when I saw Kingery has a -2 wRC+.

That's a strange result for someone that had a 101 wRC+ in 500 PA last season.

Dansby pretty clearly was rushed and has improved each season from his baseline (after a small sample successful debut). But he's been a below average hitter his first three full seasons. In some respects, I wonder if he would regress back towards average if this was a full season.

Kingery producing at an average rate for a full season after the league had seen him and then totally collapsing is crazy. I guess he's had pretty bad luck (his expected number on Balls in play is still way above his BABIP) and he might otherwise be having a more understandably bad season but for that.
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Dansby was a borderline All Star last year before his wrist injury. He was killing it.
 
looks like i was wrong on his wOBA vs xwOBA but i believe at one point it was very high and ended up coming down.
 
Tapate50 said:
Dansby was a borderline All Star last year before his wrist injury. He was killing it.
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Dansby also had the 5th highest difference between actual wOBA and xwOBA. aka he was getting robbed frequently (i think...). want to hedge before scheff calls me an idiot.
 
Super said:
Dansby also had the 5th highest difference between actual wOBA and xwOBA. aka he was getting robbed frequently (i think...). want to hedge before scheff calls me an idiot.
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The eye test agrees. Piss missiles all over the yard.
 
Dansby's been phenomenal - dude is top 10 in WAR this year. If his hitting and eye continues this trajectory, he'll be an all-start for the forseeable future.
 
Tapate50 said:
Dansby was a borderline All Star last year before his wrist injury. He was killing it.
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He finished with a 92 wRC+.

Usually, you can find a thing to explain regression. Sometimes it is true. Sometimes it is not.

But I'm not here to kill Dansby, I'm just pointing out after his early success, he had three full seasons of below average offensive performance (with improvement each season) objectively measured.

He's had a great season. I will say it's not the first time he's been red hot, but it seems to be the first time he is sustaining it.
 
So did Acuna and the Braves break Gerrit Cole? He was undefeated in like his last 25+ starts. He's now lost 3 in a row and has his highest FIP of his career.
 
Super said:
he was extremely lucky last year. in multiple regards.
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So last year his wOBA was .329 vs xwOBA of .321. A little lucky perhaps.

This year it's wOBA of .167 vs .xwOBA of .286.

What's happening?

Obviously his BABIP of .154 is pretty rough. (vs .337 in 2019 and .291 in 2018).

His K rate though has actually gone down from 29% to 23%.

He's seen a slight 3% bump in ground balls, his LD are down 6%, and his HR/FB is 4.5% vs 15.2% in 2019.

The only major change in his swing profile is that he's making much, much more contact on pitches outside the zone. From 54% in 2019 to 66% in 2020.

Theory: He is making weak contact on pitches outside the zone that he missed last season. (he's swinging slightly less often at pitches in the zone, but no major change in the number he swings at outside the zone). The weak contact is ending a lot of at bats before he gets to see pitches in the zone he can drive. He was better off missing those pitches? He also seems to be having bad luck on the pitches that he does drive.

(Maybe you can drill down on Outside zone contact and test this theory on Savant, I may investigate that later).
 
Southcack77 said:
He finished with a 92 wRC+.

Usually, you can find a thing to explain regression. Sometimes it is true. Sometimes it is not.

But I'm not here to kill Dansby, I'm just pointing out after his early success, he had three full seasons of below average offensive performance (with improvement each season) objectively measured.

He's had a great season. I will say it's not the first time he's been red hot, but it seems to be the first time he is sustaining it.
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I’d say pretty confidently his wrist injury was the culprit. Here’s to Lt Bae’s health!
 
Southcack77 said:
So last year his wOBA was .329 vs xwOBA of .321. A little lucky perhaps.

This year it's wOBA of .167 vs .xwOBA of .286.

What's happening?

Obviously his BABIP of .154 is pretty rough. (vs .337 in 2019 and .291 in 2018).

His K rate though has actually gone down from 29% to 23%.

He's seen a slight 3% bump in ground balls, his LD are down 6%, and his HR/FB is 4.5% vs 15.2% in 2019.

The only major change in his swing profile is that he's making much, much more contact on pitches outside the zone. From 54% in 2019 to 66% in 2020.

Theory: He is making weak contact on pitches outside the zone that he missed last season. (he's swinging slightly less often at pitches in the zone, but no major change in the number he swings at outside the zone). The weak contact is ending a lot of at bats before he gets to see pitches in the zone he can drive. He was better off missing those pitches? He also seems to be having bad luck on the pitches that he does drive.

(Maybe you can drill down on Outside zone contact and test this theory on Savant, I may investigate that later).
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so he's gotten better at hitting the pitches...outside the zone?
his approach is a mess IMO
 
Super said:
so he's gotten better at hitting the pitches...outside the zone?
his approach is a mess IMO
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Man, I don't know. He's making more contact outside the zone, but he's not really swinging more. Seems like he'd be better off missing those pitches based on results, but I'm not sure.
 
thewupk said:
So did Acuna and the Braves break Gerrit Cole? He was undefeated in like his last 25+ starts. He's now lost 3 in a row and has his highest FIP of his career.
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It makes no sense. His stuff is still amazing. I guess power pitchers can go through a bad spell with HR luck. I think we are seeing something similar with Will Smith.

But that contract could be an all timer if he falls off a cliff. The Stanton/Cole contracts could legitimately set them back even though they are the Yankees.
 
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