Click here to read a transcript of Tuesday’s chat with MLBTR’s Steve Adams.
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For the record, I am not an O’s fan that wants to trade Gunnar. What O’s fans actually think they should? Do they watch him play?
Definitely wouldn’t trade him, but keep him at SS? For now, yes. But with Holliday on the horizon, were to play him in the future? If it were me, I’d save his legs and put him on first. Let Ortiz and Westburg and Norby and Prieto and Bencosme and whomever I’m forgetting, fight it out for dibs at 2nd and 3rd.
Lots of dumb questions I see in that chat
Yeah. In fantasy or reality, who wouldn’t trade Nico for Cease? Who would even offer that trade to begin with?
At least one dumb comment in this comments section
you mean like Dodgers fans thinking they’re getting Arenado? derp
Any chance the Cubs don’t sell?
People love to die on that analytical hill.
The fact of the matter is, you don’t have to hit everything hard. You know who hits everything hard? Patrick Wisdom. Wisdom smokes everything he runs into but he also has a terrible strike out rate and terrible batting average on balls in play. It simply doesn’t matter how often you hit a ball hard, the key is making contact and taking walks, just what Bellinger is doing. Getting overly concerned about quality of contact ruins players. See the ball, hit the ball, if you have natural power, you’re going to hit it over the fence. The ball will find openings and a bloop single is more valuable that a 115 mph line drive to left fielder.
The player with one of the lowest exit velocities is Louis Arraez. Who cares how hard you made your out. Hitting is a skill.
stymee – Absolutely! It’s all about placement. I don’t put a lot of stock in RBI, but when you have a guy on 3B with less than 2 outs you want someone at the plate like Turner who is skilled at making contact and driving the ball deep in the outfield or far enough in the infield to score the run. A high exit velo hitter is useless when he can’t make contact.
There are always exceptions, but the fact is, as exit velocity goes up, so does the odds of getting a hit/HR. Look at the top and bottom 10s in exit velocity.
Top 10:
Aaron Judge, Ronald Acuna Yandy Diaz, Matt Olson, Corey Seager, Vlad Guerrero, Shohei Ohtani, Matt Chapman, Joey Gallo, and Yordan Alvarez.
Bottom 10:
Kris Bryant, Jace Peterson, Aaron Hicks, Jon Berti, Steven Kwan, Jake Meyers, Geraldo Perdomo, Andres Gimenez, Jake Fraley, and Esteury Ruiz.
Also, check out this link and look at how BA generally declines as exit velocity goes down.
baseballsavant.mlb.com/statcast_hit_probability
Not that every guy that hits the ball hard is great, and not everyone at the bottom is bad, but clearly hitting the ball hard is a big advantage.
Great post manos.
I’m definitely on the nerds side of baseball but where I disagree with them on is the situational hitting. If a guy is standing on 3rd with less than 2 outs and the batter is 0-2 I don’t want him swing for the fences. Now I’m not sure the analytics guys do either all the time but the players certainly look like they’re doing that and rightfully so when in arb and free agency you’re paid for power.
I completely agree. I think a guy who’s a team player realizes he can help his team in that situation by not getting too greedy. Whereas a guy who’s more concerned with his own stats may still swing for the fences rather than just put the ball in play. I’m more on the nerds side as well, but believing in analytics doesn’t negate the importance of a player’s makeup.
This is the “stupid is as stupid does” argument.
Sure you can compile a bunch of stats to support your argument but disregard the fact that aside from Bryant, all the bottom 10 traditional suck anyway.
Guess what Bellingers batting average is AFTER being down 0-2.. i won’t keep you in suspense, it’s .375. Bellinger is hitting over .300 when down in the count. Today, he picked up three RBIs with beautiful pieces of hitting, weak contact, couldn’t be more than 85 mph off the bat. His approach has been text book this season but Steve Adams doesn’t believe in him because his exit velocity? His barrel rate? Please. He’s basically being Nico Hoerner if Nico had more power and took walks, or, to sum it up, he’s playing like an mvp candidate.
Sure, making hard contact is great when guys like Soto are slumping. One can take solace in idea that he’s still making hard contact. However, when guys are adjusting their approach with two strikes and taking what the defense gives them that shouldn’t be held against them. It’s an idiotic statement to say “lowest exit velocities of his career” while a.) having one of the best seasons thus far of his career and b.) putting on a clinic for situational hitting.
The writers on this site are bias in favor of high strike outs and hard hits. It took them months to even acknowledge Steele as a TOR starter. They continue to think Hendricks has zero chance of having his option picked up, Kyle Hendricks who also has 6 quality starts in just 11 games and an era under 4 but they salivate over Ks. It would be laughable if it was so annoying
Tell me you don’t understand current baseball without telling me you don’t understand.
“Current baseball” you think you’re smarter than you are because of implied analytics. It offers a glimpse but not the entire picture. Such as being able to change location and eye level when pitching and being able to adjust your approach with two strikes.
It’s just like when Beane thought he was changing the game by not stealing or taking extra bases without taking in the entire pulse of the game.
Analytics is doing the outside of the puzzle first to make things easier but the it’s not going to give you the complete picture