ashbury

Ok, but this is somewhat conflating pool limits with green dollars. In the case previously mentioned where the Cardinals voided a $3M contract due to vision issues, the kid wound up signing for $500K with Arizona. Obviously this doesn't define anything for Marte, but indicates what can happen to teams' forecasts of future value in light of a bad vision report. Pool dollars may get passed around, but when actual dollars are spent there are many things that can spoil the deal.

Assuming words match feelings. If he's getting good advice, he may understand that the $3M is gone, but high six-figures may be attainable if he doesn't burn bridges. That realization wouldn't erase a feeling of having been squeezed. I don't know either way. I just don't read much into that statement.

I'm with you on the optics of this. I am in the camp generally hoping they don't sign him; I don't want questions about "my" team putting the squeeze on players financially. The news about "no hard feelings on either side" suggests it could happen though. When the news of the contract voiding broke, the Baseball America article mentioned a similar case from about a decade ago; a different team signed him for half a million instead, and afterward his career quietly fizzled. I don't hope for bad luck like that for this player, but it's a way this could end up playing out.

Mod note: Mike, and everyone, please don't use strawman arguments like this one.

The MLB/AAA/AA logjam exists only as long as everyone stays healthy. One injury makes things less tight, and two completely eliminate the issue. What do you think the odds are that everyone reaches Opening Day ready to pitch?

I think Sam is underselling Babe as a pitcher by quite a bit. Through his age-22 season Babe was on a pace to comfortably assure eventual Hall of Fame selection with whatever he would have done by age 30, and then whatever he tacked on after that would have been gravy. Of course that's only a pace - for instance undiagnosable "sore arms" felled many a bright light in those days. But being dominant at age 21 (the only reason he wasn't the best in the Majors was a couple of more-senior guys named Johnson and Alexander) is a nice early indicator for greatness, and marked him as better than "pretty good". However, the two-way era for him in 1918-19 was a mixed success at best. Monkeying with a great pitcher in hopes of turning him into a great hitter was a gamble. So the basic point regarding a comparison to a current player trying it still stands just fine. I just gotta defend the Babe's soupbone.

Doing what, taunting fans that he won't be signing with us?

I hold no hope for him whatever. The contract extension turned a smart signing into a fiscal drag on the team.

Pitching and hitting are not mirror images of each other. Pitching is about achieving location. Hitting is about either punishing the mistakes or going with what is given to them. Batters of both kinds can succeed, and many batters adopt a blend. It's rare for a pitcher without command to get anywhere in the majors, with just his stuff. So it's no paradox for pitchers to try to strike batters out without giving them anything good to hit, while power hitters may swing for the fences when they see something they like.

They almost assuredly will get 24 of them, one by one by one - barring rain or a forfeit or other unusual and premature end to the game. The difference maker is how many balls are put in play while accomplishing that arduous task, because some of those fall in safely or leave the park as home runs. Strikeouts cut down on the chances of the first of those happening, giving no chance for good things to happen for the offense. That, plus walks+HBP, will define their success. With enough success, or with home field advantage, they may even be allowed to try for 27 outs. And that's the goal.

Let me know what different results you get from studying this question.

I ducked this part in my other reply because it's really far from my point about strikeouts in relation to other outs, but... I'm not even sure I'm willing to say one "is" better than another. Kintzler had a better *2017*, because mainly he didn't give up so many walks and (especially) HR as those other two. I spent some time explaining elsewhere my reservations about FIP for backward looking purposes, but as a predictive tool for 2018 FIP suggests it's about even-money whether Duffey or Kintzler will have the better year. Pressly... he needs to work on a few things.

The analogy of SO to dunks probably breaks down when considering that dunks are much less common. Nobody dunks often enough to make that be what defines their team's season. Likewise, I don't think I was demonstrating why strikeouts must line up precisely with ERA (they won't). And certainly not that the pitcher with the most Ks is the "best". Merely to explain a reason why a strikeout is more valuable among other outs, and not simply a paradox; you have to look further up the stream than after the out has been recorded, to notice why. As for correlation, I note if you rank major league teams by strikeouts recorded by their pitchers, you need to go down all the way to #9 (Mets) to find a team that missed the playoffs. The two teams that did make the post-season, but weren't in the top 8 in SO, both were bounced in single-game appearances. Strikeouts by batters aren't quite so dire - you can find a team at #6 (Arizona) who made the post-season. But yes, there is much in baseball that counts besides just strikeouts. Thank goodness!

It finally dawned on me that the reason I'm not a wizard with b-r.com's database in particular is that I've been too big a cheapskate to pay for their Play Index which does allow more of what I want. Perhaps Santa will hear my wish in a few weeks...

I'm taking the second half of your post separately as I see it as a separate (and interesting) issue. Baseball-reference.com has all kinds of seasonal stats that one can sort on. The stats that apply here would be SO/9, BABIP (BA on Balls In Play), and Pitches/PA. (Actually I wish they offered SO/PA, but it is what it is.) BABIP would seem to address what you are asking about. Unfortunately the site does not place these three on the same page with each other, and I am not a wizard with databases. So all I can do is sort on one stat or another, and do a bit of sampling rather than try to do something more statistical. Maybe somebody with mad skillz can help me out here. One initial observation is that BABIP is renowned for high variability. The same pitcher may have consecutive seasons of BABIP above and below average (which usually is around .300) - few pitchers are really consistent year to year, suggesting that low or high is not a repeatable skill held by the pitcher. OK, so if I sort 2017 MLB pitchers who had enough innings to qualify for the ERA title, I see at the top for pitches per PA Jake Odorizzi. Your surmise would be that his fielders are on their heels; instead, he has a very stellar BABIP of .228 this year, indicating his fielders were making the plays for him, when the batter did finally put the ball in play. I bet he doesn't repeat that feat next year, but anyway we're off to a bad start. Next on the list is Eduardo Rodriguez; his BABIP is .300, a very average figure. Third is Wade Miley, and his BABIP is .333, in keeping with your surmise. Next is Trevor Bauer, and his is .338. Next is the sainted Mike Pelfrey, and his BABIP is .276. A very mixed bag. Working next from the bottom of that list, the fewest pitches per PA belonged to Iván Nova. His BABIP was .303. Next best was Big Sexy himself, Bartolo Colon. His BABIP was not very good, .335. Next comes Clayton Richard with BABIP .354, Mike Leake with .312, and Luis Perdomo with .327. These are the guys whose fielders should be the most alert, and again it's a mixed bag or even trending the wrong way. Now, this methodology, if you can even call it that, of the 5 top and 5 bottom, is slanted toward good starting pitchers - pitchers who were trusted enough to rack up a lot of innings pitched by br-com's cutoff for rate stats. Maybe a careful study that includes relievers and/or bad starters would show a different trend. You can approach it differently, by sorting on SO/9 (since SO is the subject here), since the top Pitch/PA is not necessarily the top strikeout pitchers. Again, we'll only look at pretty good starters this way. Chris Sale was the top pitcher for strikeout rate, and his fielders allowed him to amass a BABIP of .303. Next was Robbie Ray, and he had BABIP .270. Max Scherzer, .248. Corey Kluber, .268. Chris Archer, .325. Among the pitchers with lowest strikeout rates: Ty Blach, .296. Andrew Cashner, .267. Jeremy Hellickson, .248. Martin Perez, .330. Zach Davies, .306. Every time I start to see a pattern emerge, another datapoint comes along to break it up. It reminds me of flipping coins. Interestingly, as a side note, the list of highest strikeout pitchers does not correspond to the list of pitchers with highest pitcher per plate appearance. (Edit: just as Chief expressed.) I wrote this rather stream-of-consciousness, expecting to rewrite it or at least condense it when a pattern emerged. It didn't, so for whatever it's worth, this is a very shallow but non-cherry-picked look at your question. I don't think a pattern exists, and this sampling of data doesn't motivate me to go take a course in database analysis to try to dig one out.

What you say is true, once the play is completed. But just in advance of that, a dunk is about a 95% shot to make it, versus something around 50% for various other locations around the floor. If you could work it so you had a slam dunk every time down the court, you'd win going away. And what is the On Base Percentage for strikeouts, versus walks, versus balls put in play by the batter? Those are .000, 1.000, and around .300, respectively. The strikeout is just another out, except you get about 30% more of them versus letting the batter get wood on the ball. That's what the strikeout does for your team. It is, indeed, analogous to a slam dunk by the pitcher.

Well doggies! I do believe the young fella has struck oil! (Or if you prefer, Black Gold... Texas Tea.)

... additionally, pitched well enough to record quite a number of outs in the 7th inning and beyond.

Mod note: please, let's not let a passing reference to Terry Ryan turn this thread about present prospects into yet another referendum on old topics...

FIP is mis-named. It's not fielding-independent, otherwise the formula would contain an element that distinguishes, e.g., whether you have someone like Byron Buxton playing CF behind you. It's a number constructed from plate appearances decided by not putting the ball in the reach of fielders - HR, SO, BB+HPB. That would lead to a less catchy name; I don't have a better name to propose - "What Might Have Happened If The Ball Had Never Been Put In Play". Pointing to the convergence of FIP and ERA in the long-run is circular logic - FIP is constructed as a linear regression (of the above-named factors) to actual earned runs, and contains a seasonally-adjusted additive factor to line them up more or less exactly for a given season. It seems to have some small predictive power for future ERA, versus just ERA itself. But as a method to determine pitchers' actual seasonal results with defense factored out, it's pretty far from the mark. I wouldn't use it for a HoF argument.

I see that this is your first post. Welcome!

Something I've occasionally wondered is whether the team has any choice, if the option doesn't vest. Say he pitches 165 innings but the team is happy with him and wants to pay the $14M for the next season, can they execute the option anyway, or is the option voided automatically and negotiation goes like for any free agent?

I can't argue with facts.

What you are probably thinking of is that there is a AAA phase to the rule-5 draft. After the major league phase, teams also protect players on the 38-man AAA reserve roster. An additional 37 are protected in the AA phase. Don't ask me how they picked these numbers.