Open Thread: 3/5 Camp Notes
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(Presswire)
Sounds the alarms, the Yankees have lost two games in a row. Oh, wait, it’s still Spring Training? Disregard. They lost 5-4 to the Rays this afternoon mostly because Robert Coello allowed four runs (two homers) in his one-third of an inning of work. That dude’s having a brutal spring (48.60 ERA). Adam Warren allowed a run in 2.1 innings while Dellin Betances chucked 1.2 scoreless frames. He’s up to 5.1 scoreless innings in camp, which is pretty much exactly what he needs to do to win a bullpen spot.
Here’s the box score. Eduardo Nunez had a big day at the plate, going 3-for-3 with a double. Brett Gardner (1-for-3), Ichiro Suzuki (1-for-3), Kelly Johnson (0-for-2), Austin Romine (0-for-3), and J.R. Murphy (0-for-3) also played. Yangervis Solarte went 1-for-3 and lowered his spring batting average to .667. The Yankees didn’t send many regulars down to Port Charlotte for the game at all. Here is the rest from a slow day in Tampa.
- Mark Teixeira took some live batting practice but only saw five pitches and was pretty annoyed. Yesterday’s session was cancelled because no one was available pitch. “I thought I was going to get a lot more work the last few days, but I just do what I am told,” he said. [Chad Jennings, Andrew Marchand]
- Alfonso Soriano has a first base mitt and he’s been working out at the position. He doesn’t expect to play much there, it’s more about increasing his versatility in case of emergency. [Jennings]
This is your nightly open thread. This afternoon’s game will not be replayed anywhere but MLB Network will show the Dodgers and Reds live later tonight. The Knicks and Nets are both playing as well, ditto the (hockey) Rangers and trade deadline pickup Martin St. Louis. Talk about anything and everything right here. Enjoy.
2014 Season Preview: Final Bench Spot
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Yangervis. (Presswire)
Barring injury or a trade, 12 of the 13 position player spots are already set. Joe Girardi made it clear Brian Roberts and Kelly Johnson will be the starting second and third basemen, respectively, leaving Brendan Ryan on the bench with Frankie Cervelli and Ichiro Suzuki. The fourth and final bench spot is up for grabs in Spring Training and the Yankees have indicated it will go to an infielder. More than a few players are competing for the job.
IF Dean Anna
Acquired in a minor November trade with the Padres, Anna had a big year in Triple-A (.331/.410/.482) but was unable to land a 40-man roster spot with San Diego. They flipped him to the Yankees for a Single-A reliever rather than lose him for nothing in the Rule 5 Draft. The 27-year-old lefty hitter has a ton of experience on the middle infield and a little at third, making him prime backup infielder fodder.
Anna lacks a standout tool but he’s okay at everything. His plate discipline is his strongest skill but there is more to life than minor league strikeout and walk rates. Last year was the first year in which he hit higher than .280 and he’s never been much of a power guy or base-stealer. His defense is generally regarded as solid even though last Saturday’s play in the hole makes you think he’s the best defender ever. It’s a classic backup infielder’s profile and a strong spring could push Anna onto the Opening Day roster.
1B/OF Russ Canzler
As of right now, Johnson is the backup first baseman according to Girardi even though he only has 18 career innings at the position. The 27-year-old Canzler is the only other true first baseman in camp, though he has a good amount of left field experience as well. The Yankees had him working out at third base earlier in camp in an attempt to increase his versatility. Canzler is a pure right-handed platoon bat, hitting .307/.390/.531 against lefties in Triple-A over the years compared to .267/.346/.442 against righties. He only has 102 career big league plate appearances to his credit. Canzler is a long shot for the bench despite his ability to play first, so he’s likely ticketed for Triple-A.
IF Corban Joseph
CoJo, 25, made his very brief big league debut last season before needing season-ending shoulder surgery. They Yankees dumped him off the 40-man roster over the winter and he went unclaimed on waivers, giving you an idea of how he’s regarded around the league. Joseph had a big 2012 season split between Double-A and Triple-A (.276/.375/.465 with 15 HR) and while he’s versatile in that he can fake first, second, and third bases, he’s a liability everywhere. If he shows he can hit like he did two years ago, Joseph might have value as a bench player. If not, well there’s really nothing he can offer. He seems to be well behind the rest of the pack in the race for the final bench spot.
IF Eduardo Nunez
Boy did Nunez blow a golden opportunity last summer. Rather than cement his place in the future of the team by playing well at shortstop during Derek Jeter‘s various leg injuries, he got hurt himself and showed little improvement at the plate or in the field. Nunez had a strong September as the (almost) everyday third baseman, but one good month wasn’t enough to salvage his season, nor should it be.
Nunie. (Presswire)
Nunez, 26, came to camp as the incumbent backup infielder but that doesn’t guarantee him anything. The Yankees could have very easily handed him the job and been done with it — they really seem to like Nunez, don’t they? — but instead they brought in several players as legitimate competition. It definitely appears as though he fell out of favor with last summer’s continued lack of progress. I don’t think they would bring in so many infielders if they were comfortable with him.
We all know what Nunez can do at this point, right? He is a high contact hitter who can run but doesn’t have much power — he did say he spent most of the winter trying to bulk up and add strength, for what it’s worth — and his defense is a complete wildcard. He’ll make a stunning play one inning and botch a routine one later in the game. Unfortunately the bad plays outweigh the good ones. Nunez is not being handed a bench job and if he doesn’t make a strong case for one in camp, he has a minor league option left and can go to Triple-A.
2B/3B Scott Sizemore
After missing all but two games over the last two years due to back-to-back torn ACLs, the 29-year-old Sizemore signed a minor league contract and got into his first post-surgery Grapefruit League game last night. He had a nice half-season with the Athletics in 2011 (.249/.345/.433 with 11 HR) but given the sample size and the long layoff, I don’t think we can say that’s the real Sizemore. Healthy or not, he’s a tough guy to predict for the upcoming season.
If you’re a believer in uniform numbers being an indicator of a player’s roster chances, then Sizemore is sitting pretty after being issued Robinson Cano‘s old #24. Everyone else in this post other than Nunez has a number north of 70. Maybe that’s a sign the team considers Sizemore the favorite for the job as long as he’s healthy. Who knows. Either way, he has a lot to prove after missing two full years. I believe Sizemore has a best chance of being a league average player (that’s very valuable!) out of everyone in this post but making the team is not a given.
UTIL Yangervis Solarte
I didn’t expect to include the 26-year-old Solarte in this post initially, but he’s hit the snot out of the ball early in camp (.778/.800/1.444) and is very versatile, spending a bunch of time at the three non-first base infield positions as well as both corner outfield spots in his career. That would be nice to have off the bench. The switch-hitting Solarte has hit .282/.332/.404 in 1,145 Triple-A plate appearances the last two years, which is pretty underwhelming considering how hitter friendly the Pacific Coast League is.
The Yankees have shown a willingness to give roster spots to big Spring Training performers in recent years (2009 Ramiro Pena and 2012 David Phelps, most notably), so it’s not completely out of the question that Solarte could sneak onto the Opening Day roster if he keeps raking. A versatile switch-hitter would be nice to have. Then again, nothing in his track record suggests he’s some kind of hidden gem or in the middle of an early spring breakout.
* * *
Others like Zelous Wheeler and Jose Pirela have utility man profiles and are technically competing for that bench job in camp, but they are clear long shots to me. Solarte really belongs in that group as well, hot spring start notwithstanding. Because of the questionable starting infield arrangement and various injury risks, whoever gets that final bench spot may wind up playing a larger role than expected. Despite being the 24th or 25th spot on the roster, this bench spot offers quite a bit of opportunity.
King: Mariners scouting David Phelps
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(Presswire)
According to George King, the Mariners had a scout on hand to watch David Phelps‘ second spring start last night. He got hit around pretty hard but held the Orioles to only one run in 2.2 innings, striking out two and walking one. Phelps is currently competing for the fifth starter spot, though Joe Girardi confirmed he will make the team in some capacity.
The Mariners have been hit hard by injuries this spring. Co-ace Hisashi Iwakuma is sidelined with a finger sprain and top prospect Taijuan Walker is dealing with a shoulder problem. Manager Lloyd McClendon confirmed both guys will open the season on the DL, leaving the team with Erasmo Ramirez, James Paxton, Brandon Maurer, and Scott Baker behind Felix Hernandez. Their need for another arm is obvious.
Seattle’s top trade chip is infielder Nick Franklin, who was pushed into trade chip status by the Robinson Cano signing. The 23-year-old switch-hitter hit .225/.303/.382 (90 wRC+) with 12 homers, six steals, and a 27.4% strikeout rate in his 412 plate appearance MLB debut last season. His defense is shaky — he’s already moved off short and is error prone at second — and more than a few people think he’ll have to drop switch-hitting and stick to batting lefty down the road. Baseball America (subs. req’d) said he “profiles as a solid regular who could play in a few All-Star Games” before last season.
Franklin. (Presswire)
The Yankees desperately need a young infielder and Franklin certainly fits the bill even though I’m not his biggest fan. I’d trade four five years of Phelps for six years of Franklin in a heartbeat, but I suspect the Mariners are going to want another piece or two. Both the Mets and Rays have been talking to Seattle about Franklin — Tampa was reportedly on the verge of the deal, but then Jeremy Hellickson got hurt and they were reluctant to sacrifice pitching depth — so there is plenty of competition.
Of the various fifth starter candidates, the 27-year-old Phelps feels like the safest bet to be a productive big leaguer in 2014. In order to deal him, I think the Yankees would have to feel pretty good about Michael Pineda heading into the season and/or be open to signing a low-cost pitcher (Jeff Niemann? Jeff Karstens?) to replace the depth. Given their pitching situation, I’m guessing the Mariners would like to get a deal done sooner rather than later. That could work to New York’s advantage in trade talks.
In other news, King says both the White Sox and Brewers also had scouts on hand for last night’s game. Both clubs are looking for catching depth, something the Yankees can spare. Chicago has some infield depth to offer and we’ve already heard the Yankees will monitor Rickie Weeks this spring. Given the infield situation, the Yankees could swap Phelps+ for Franklin and a catcher for Weeks or one of the ChiSox infielders (or one of the Diamondbacks infielders). It doesn’t necessarily have to be one or the other.
Thoughts after the first week of spring games
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(Scott Iskowitz/Getty)
The Grapefruit League season is one week old and we’ve learned … well, pretty much nothing so far. Masahiro Tanaka still has a nasty splitter with the MLB ball. I guess that’s something. Otherwise it’s still too early to draw any meaningful conclusions from the handful of games that have been played. Everyone’s healthy and that’s the most important thing. Here are some scattered thoughts.
1. So far, so good for Derek Jeter. He appears to be moving well both in the field and down the line, looking far more mobile than he did at any point last year. It’s very encouraging. The Cap’n has looked awful at the plate — one strikeout, one walk, eight ground balls (three double plays) in ten plate appearances — though that is to be expected after missing just about all of last season. His timing is not even close to being there yet and he’s got a little under four weeks to find it. As far as his ability to move laterally in the field and run down the line are concerned, everything looks good. That’s most important right now following all the leg injuries.
2. It sure seems like Frankie Cervelli is being groomed as Tanaka’s personal catcher. He’s caught most of his bullpen and live batting practice sessions, plus he was behind the plate when he made his Spring Training debut over the weekend. Brian McCann has to learn an entire new staff this spring, so it makes sense to have Cervelli spend so much time with the new guy since he already knows the rest of the staff. Joe Girardi has proven himself to be a fan of personal catchers — I can’t help but think this stems from who he was as a player — and it looks like Tanaka/Cervelli will be a thing this year. They just have to make sure McCann spends enough time with Tanaka this spring so they aren’t total strangers should Cervelli get hurt or something.
3. One little thing that usually means more than nothing in Spring Training: reliever usage. Over the last few springs, the Yankees have shown that the guys who are being more seriously considered for the roster are scheduled to pitch on specific days and get to start an inning clean, at least early in camp. The guys who are further behind in the bullpen race are usually held back in case someone hits their pitch count in the middle of an inning. Based on how they’ve been used over this last week, that’s good news for Dellin Betances and Preston Claiborne, and bad news for Mark Montgomery, Cesar Cabral, and others. Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t definitive proof of anything, but the Yankees may be tipping their hand based on what they’ve done in the past and how they’ve used guys so far.
Chris Owings. (Denis Poroy/Getty)
4. Is it just me, or does a March trade feel inevitable this year? The Yankees have actually made a Spring Training trade that directly impacted their Opening Day roster in each of the last three years (Vernon Wells in 2013, Chris Stewart in 2012, Sergio Mitre for Chris Dickerson in 2011), so a deal in the next few weeks would hardly be unprecedented. The needs on the infield and in the bullpen still exist and both Austin Romine and John Ryan Murphy are so obviously being showcased given all their playing time (particularly at DH) so far. Murphy for one of the Diamondbacks’ extra shortstops make so much sense, at least from this end of the deal. Arizona simply might not like New York’s catchers all that much. Either way, I can’t shake this feeling that a trade will go down before Opening Day.
5. You’ve probably seen it by now, but the other day Robinson Cano made some comments to Jon Heyman about the Mariners’ need for another bat and another pitcher. Not exactly groundbreaking stuff, everyone knows Seattle needs more help. It sounded very much like a player who is just starting to realize he is no longer on a big payroll team that will go out and spend money to address its needs. I’m not sure how else to take the “if it was up to me, we’d have (Ervin) Santana, (Nelson) Cruz and Ubaldo (Jimenez)” comment. We all know Cano left for the biggest payday, pure and simple, but man this whole thing is so weird. It seems playing for the Not Yankees has been a shock to his system. I really wish he was still wearing pinstripes, but I can’t begrudge the team for refusing to meet those demands.
3/4 Camp Notes: Ryan, Teixeira, Austin, Nova
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Mason Williams made this catch tonight.
The totally meaningless Grapefruit League winning streak is over at four; the Orioles beat the Yankees 3-2 on Tuesday night. Here’s the box score. David Phelps was in “bend but don’t break” mode, getting knocked around pretty hard (five hits in 2.2 innings) but only surrendering one run. He escaped two on, no outs jams in both the first and second innings. Matt Thornton made his spring debut, throwing one pitch and retiring a lefty with a ground ball.
At the plate, both Jacoby Ellsbury and Derek Jeter went hitless in two at-bats. Ellsbury did draw a walk though, his fifth of the spring (only one strikeout). Carlos Beltran went 0-for-2 with a walk and a whiff. Frankie Cervelli opened the scoring with a solo tater and Spring Training superhero Yangervis Solarte plated another run with a single. Scott Sizemore went 1-for-2 in his spring debut and made a nifty diving stop at second base. Here’s the rest of the day’s news from Tampa.
- Brendan Ryan was hit by a line drive in the left hand while running the bases during batting practice. He was looked at and is fine, so much so that he played in tonight’s game. “It’s sore but okay,” he said. [Andrew Marchand, Erik Boland]
- Mark Teixeira did not take live batting practice as scheduled today because there was literally no one available to pitch. Vidal Nuno, Hiroki Kuroda, and Michael Pineda were among those to throw bullpens sessions. [Chad Jennings]
- Tyler Austin played catch and took dry swings today for the first time since being shut down when his wrist flared up. He said it felt better than expected following the workout. [Jennings]
- Ivan Nova and Phelps will start
Friday and SaturdaySaturday and Sunday, respectively. That means Nuno has been squeezed out of the spring rotation, at least for the time being. [Bryan Hoch]
The Yankees are on the road to play the Rays tomorrow afternoon, but that game will not be televised. Masahiro Tanaka will make his first start and second appearance of the spring on Thursday (CC Sabathia will throw a simulated game that day) while Michael Pineda will make his debut (in relief of Hiroki Kuroda) on Friday. Thursday’s game will be on television, Friday’s will not. For shame.
Spring Training Game Thread: Under The Lights
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Only in Spring Training. (Presswire)
For the first time this year, the Yankees are playing a night game. Only six of their 31 Grapefruit League will be played at night and that seems low to me, but whatever. Day baseball is better anyway.
Derek Jeter is playing back-to-back games for the first time this spring, though he will only serve as the DH for the first few innings tonight. Two at-bats is my guess. The back-to-back games is something of a milestone following last year’s leg injury fiasco. David Phelps, who I still think is the front-runner for the fifth starter’s job, is making his second start of the exhibition season.
The Orioles are in Tampa for tonight’s game after making the short trip up from Sarasota. As you might expect, their roster for the road night game is not exactly brimming with projected big leaguers. Jemile Weeks, Delmon Young, and starter Wei-Yin Chen are pretty much the only names casual fans may recognize. Here is Joe Girardi‘s starting lineup:
- CF Jacoby Ellsbury
- DH Derek Jeter
- RF Carlos Beltran
- 2B Brian Roberts
- 3B Eduardo Nunez
- C Frankie Cervelli
- SS Brendan Ryan
- 1B Russ Canzler
- LF Yangervis Solarte
And on the mound is the right-hander Phelps, who is likely scheduled for something like three innings or 45 pitches, whichever comes first.
Available Pitchers: LHP Matt Thornton, RHP Brian Gordon, LHP Cesar Cabral, RHP Chris Leroux, RHP Chase Whitley, and RHP Preston Claiborne are all scheduled to pitch. This will be Thornton’s spring debut. RHP Bruce Billings, RHP Graham Stoneburner, LHP Jeremy Bleich, and SwP Pat Venditte are also available if needed.
Available Position Players: C Gary Sanchez, 1B Francisco Arcia, 2B Scott Sizemore, SS Dean Anna, 3B Zelous Wheeler, LF Ramon Flores, CF Mason Williams, RF Antoan Richardson, and DH Brian McCann will all come off the bench. Sizemore will be making his spring debut. C Jose Gil, C Peter O’Brien, C John Ryan Murphy, IF Corban Joseph, UTIL Jose Pirela, OF Adonis Garcia, and UTIL Addison Maruszak are all available as well.
The forecast for Tampa tonight calls for cloudy skies and temperatures in the upper-60s but not rain, thankfully. First pitch is scheduled for 7:05pm ET and the game can be seen live on YES, MLB Network, and MLB.tv. Enjoy.
ByVia the AP: Orlando Hernandez has joined the Yankees as a Spring Training minor league pitching instructor. The 48-year-old retired in 2011 and last pitched in the big leagues in 2007. This will be El Duque’s first coaching gig as far as I can tell and he’s slated to remain in Tampa for several weeks. Since he’s working with minor leaguers, I wonder if Hernandez will stick around for all or part of Extended Spring Training as well. · (17) ·
2014 Season Preview: The Erstwhile Ace
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(Presswire)
It is in no way an exaggeration to say CC Sabathia was one of the worst pitchers in baseball last season. Out of the game’s 81 qualified starters, he ranked 76th with a 4.78 ERA and 72nd with 0.3 bWAR. He also led the league with 112 earned runs allowed. Last season was the worst of Sabathia’s career by a large margin and it was a big reason why the team failed to qualify for the postseason for only the second time in 19 years.
Why did Sabathia struggle so much in 2013? There is no shortage of theories. He lost too much weight, he lost too much velocity, he had offseason elbow surgery, all the innings are catching up to him, his mechanics were out of whack … on and on we could go. Sabathia never made excuses and pitching coach Larry Rothschild blamed it on inconsistent mechanics that led to too many pitches out over the plate. My guess? All of it. All of that stuff and more contributed to his poor year.
That disastrous 2013 season is in the past now. Sabathia is now more than a full year out from elbow surgery and he remade his body this winter, shedding bad weight and adding muscle in hopes of building power and stamina. He looks marvelous and in better shape than he’s ever been as a Yankee, but that was also true last spring, just not to the same extent. Physical condition is not going to be excuse, not that it ever was. CC is always going to be a big guy, that’s just his body type, but now he is slightly less big.
In his first Spring Training outing on Saturday, Sabathia came out firing 88 mph bullets that raised a little red flag but are not really freakout worthy yet. It was his first Grapefruit League start and we’ll re-evaluate his fastball when he builds up some more arm strength and gets another start or two under his belt. Sabathia’s velocity has steadily declined in recent years …
… and there is little reason to think that will stop. That’s the reality of being a 33-year-old workhorse who will top the 3,000 career innings (regular season and postseason) mark this summer. Once the fastball starts to go, it tends to continue going. Reversing the velocity decline is just not something that happens. The best the Yankees and Sabathia can hope for is halting the decline and maintaining this level of velocity for a little while longer.
Lefties who can pump 94-96 mph consistently — like Sabathia a few years ago — are the exception. Lefties who sit right around 90 are the rule. That’s Madison Bumgarner (91.2 mph in 2013), C.J. Wilson (90.9), Cliff Lee (90.4), and Mike Minor (90.4) velocity, and that foursome combined for a 3.06 ERA and a 3.12 FIP in 841 innings last year. Sabathia averaged 91.3 mph with his fastball last season and even if he loses another mile an hour this year, it should still be enough.
At his peak from 2007-12, CC maintained an ~8 mph separation between his fastball (93.7 mph) and changeup (86.0 mph). Last year it was only a 6.5 mph separation and that’s a big difference. That’s the difference between squaring a pitch up and hitting it off the end of the bat or flat out swinging and missing. Linear weights reflect the reduced effectiveness of his changeup (-8.3 runs saved in 2013 after +35.6 from 2007-12), a pitch that his been one of his most dangerous weapons the last seven years or so.
Of course, velocity and separation between the fastball and changeup is only one small piece of the pitching pie. Sabathia’s location flat out stunk last season, anecdotally because his arm slot wavered (he admitted as much) and his pitches cut back over the plate. According to Baseball Heat Maps, a whopping 39.2% of Sabathia’s pitches were over the heart of the plate last season, up from 30.7% in 2012 and 31.7% from 2011-12. That’s a big, big deal. He averaged 104.25 pitches per start last season, so we’re talking an extra nine pitches (!) over the heart of the plate per start on average. Big deal. Really big deal.
(Presswire)
Improving on last season’s performance will require a number of things. Sabathia’s not finding more velocity so just forget about that. He needs to improve his location first and foremost. I’m not sure there is any way you can improve performance quicker than by not throwing the ball in the hitter’s wheelhouse. If Sabathia can get back to living on the corners and at the knees, it doesn’t really matter if he’s throwing 85 or 95. Easier said than done, obviously. Regaining that 8-ish mph separation between the fastball and changeup is another key.
How does Sabathia go about improving his location and the effectiveness of his changeup in 2014? Damned if I know. That’s up to Sabathia and Rothschild to figure out. The problems could be mechanical or the result of the elbow surgery — he underwent a biomechanical analysis over the winter and things checked out okay, for what it’s worth — or they could be the result of muscling up and trying to manufacture velocity. Overthrowing is a great way to miss spots. Again, it’s probably a little of everything.
Maybe I’m just a raging homer, but I truly believe Sabathia can rebound and be an effective starter for the Yankees this summer. He has to make several adjustments first and even if he does, I still think it’s unlikely he’ll ever get back to peak CC form, that Cy Young caliber ace. Simply being not one of the worst pitchers in baseball like last year seems reasonable to me though. A guy who can give the team 200+ innings of 3.70-ish ERA ball is still really valuable, even if it is not what we’re used to seeing from Sabathia.
I don’t know if the Yankees can make the postseason in 2014 with a good but not great performance from Sabathia, but I do know they have almost no chance of going to the playoffs if he pitches like he did a year ago. Even with Masahiro Tanaka and Hiroki Kuroda around to anchor the rotation, I believe a rebound from the club’s erstwhile ace is a necessity for contention this season.
The following is a guest post from long-time reader Alex M. He attended the recent Sloan Sports Analytics Conference and in a two-part series will outline a few themes from the conference and their application to the Yankees.
The 2014 MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference is akin to Mecca for the mathematically inclined sports fan. Featuring esteemed panelists, including current athletes, coaches and front office personnel, the conference provided a forum to showcase advances in analytics across the sporting world. In particular, five* big ideas stand out for their potential to reshape our understanding of baseball going forward.
1) Disconnect Between the Availability of Information and Application on the Field – To date, the application of statistics and other analytics in sports has been primarily focused on roster construction. Going forward, new streams of data will increase the potential for in-game management. From tandem pitching to reliever usage and defensive shifts, the goal of GMs and coaches across sports will be to translate analytically-derived strategies (defensive shifts) into execution on the field (player placement and pitch selection).
2) Health Analytics as The Holy Grail– On panels covering every major American sport, health analytics, the ability to predict and prevent injuries, was consistently emphasized as “the holy grail.” Despite advances, pitcher injury rates have remained unchanged over the last 20 years, which teams hope to address through biomechanical analysis and load monitoring. Yankees fans were exposed to biomechanical analysis recently when CC Sabathia visited Dr. James Andrews to compare his delivery over time.
3) Potential for More Efficient Drafting – An interesting anecdote from the conference was about the recent tendency of the Houston Rockets to draft players with a big arm-span-to-height ratio, as chronicled in David Epstein’s book The Sports Gene. The bias towards longer wingspans highlights the variety of information teams use to assess players, and also how difficult it is to judge a draft as an outsider. Three areas where teams are making advances in evaluating draft choices include biomechanical analysis, improved comparable player projections, and, perhaps most importantly, train-ability assessments.
4) Batted Ball Profiles Have More Predictive Value than We Realized – The Houston Astros have recognized that not all line drives are created equally. By measuring the vector and speed of the ball off the bat, the Astros have been able to associate individual batted balls with a run expectancy that is highly predictive. Tracking the ball off the bat allows teams to develop individual park factors for players, potentially improving player valuations in trades or free agency. SABR President Vince Gennaro specifically cited Brian McCann as benefiting from Yankee Stadium compared to Turner Field.
5) Batter Strategies to Counter Improved Pitching and Defense – On the baseball analytics panel, multiple speakers expressed surprise at the relatively limited response of hitters to the increased use of defensive shifts. Based on the data, hitters should bunt and attempt to place hits more to overcome extreme shifts and pitching strategies. A second area for improvement is in valuing position versatility, which provides flexibility in roster construction, consistently affords platoon advances and accelerates injury recovery.
Advances in data collection, analytics and on-field implementation are happening across every major sport. The five big ideas outlined above all have the potential to improve our understanding of baseball as fans and also the performance of our favorite team. Next week, I’ll discuss applications of the next big things in sports analytics to the Yankees.
* As RAB previously reported, MLB Advanced Media’s new Player Tracking System offers fans and front offices a treasure trove of new data. Through a $300M capital investment, MLB will be rolling out network infrastructure in stadiums that will improve our understanding of defense, baserunning, and to a lesser extent offense and pitching. Most affected will be our assessment of defense with new data including first step time, first step efficiency (angle taken relative to optimal angle), route efficiency, speed, acceleration and turnaround on a throw back into the infield. Our understanding of baserunning will also be profoundly affected with data on runner leads, reaction times, route efficiency, speed at every step and acceleration. In a game of inches, MLBAM has figured out a way to measure the inches that determine the outcome of games.
Sabathia’s velocity is worth watching this spring
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(Presswire)
This past weekend, in his first outing of the spring, CC Sabathia chucked two scoreless and relatively uneventful innings against the Phillies. Uneventful unless you were watching the radar gun, of course. Sabathia topped out at 88 mph with his fastball on Saturday and sat mostly in the 86-88 mph range, which is far below what you want to see, even on March 1st. And everyone did see it thanks in no small part to the Michael Pineda velocity fiasco of 2012. The radar gun has become a focal point in Spring Training.
“My fastball is what it is. If it gets better, it will. If it’s not, it won’t. I can pitch. I’m fine. As long as I’m healthy I’ll be good,” said Sabathia to Chad Jennings after Saturday’s game because what is he supposed to say? No this is terrifying and I don’t think I’ll ever be effective again? C’mon now. It takes a lot of confidence and a certain level of arrogance to be an elite pro athlete, and part of that is never doubting your own ability despite signs of decline. Of course Sabathia is unconcerned about his fastball.
I am concerned about Sabathia’s fastball, however. Well, concerned isn’t the right word. I’m keeping my eye on it. That’s better. I wanted to go back and compare CC’s early spring velocity to past years, but there’s a bit of a problem: there isn’t any Grapefruit League pitch data out there. We’re limited to MLB.tv archives and the YES Network gun because there’s no PitchFX. Sabathia did not appear in a YES broadcast game until the middle of March in both 2012 and 2013, so we can’t even compare early spring velocities. We’re stuck lumping it all under a big “Spring Training velocity” umbrella. Here’s what we’re left with:
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Sabathia did not pitch in a YES televised game in Spring Training 2011, so we can’t go back any further. I’m not sure how useful anything from pre-2012 would be anyway.
Just to give you an idea of how unprecise this is, Sabathia had one fastball clocked at 94 mph in the 2013 start and another clocked at 57 mph (!) in the 2012 game. I can buy 94 mph, but the most relevant thing is that he was consistently in that 89-90 range with a handful of 91s during the five-inning outing. I can’t buy 57 mph, but again, Sabathia was regularly in that 89-92 range with a smattering of 93s back in 2012. That’s what’s important.
Sabathia’s velocity in his first televised Spring Training game, as questionable as it may be given the source, was right in line with his PitchFX recorded April velocity in both 2012 and 2013. He held that Spring Training velocity through the season’s first month before adding another tick or two in the summer months, after the weather warmed up and he got into midseason form. That alone makes you want to see Sabathia get his heater closer to 90 mph this month.
Because of who he is and how important he is to the 2014 Yankees, Sabathia is going to be under the microscope this spring. His first outing was less than encouraging because his fastball was a little short, but it was only March 1st. I want to see how he looks after another outing or two before getting … well … concerned. I don’t think the fastball he showed on Saturday is full freakout worthy, but as much I hate Spring Training velocity watches, I don’t think we can simply sweep it under the rug just because it’s early-March either.
