Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 355: The Last and Longest Show of 2013

Episode Date: December 27, 2013

Ben and Sam answer listener emails until Sam’s battery dies.

Hey, Yankees, you can take your apology out of your trophy and shove it straight up your ass. And another thing, just wait till next year. Good morning and welcome to episode 355 of Effectively Wild, the daily podcast from baseball prospectus. I'm Sam Miller with Ben Lindberg. And Ben, we've finally done it. We've ended the week. On a multiple of five. Ended the year on a multiple of five. Feels good. It does feel good. It doesn't feel so good that we are going to lose that immediately.

But it's nice for now. Yeah. How are you, Ben? I'm well. Do we need to do anything to note the end of the year i mean i guess yeah last night's was kind of an end of the year themed show do we i mean should we should we pop something or uh countdown you want to count down something or i don't know what we'd count down to um yeah i don't know other than thanking people for for listening to us this year i don't i don't have much to say if you if you got a if you got a lot of money for christmas by a baseball

perspective subscription all right um all right so we've got some questions uh not not well organized but uh some good ones so I'll just go down and pick some so Robert friend of the podcast says we often hear elimination games described as all hands on deck scenarios with managers employing

shorter hooks all available starters in the bullpen and other tactics that ignore the future beyond the day's game does this change in strategy actually help any and if so how much uh and then there's a bonus question which we will also get to and then there's a worst question which we will also get to um so first off um it seems to me that i mean almost nothing you can do in baseball does much i mean you could you could do things to materially hurt your chances of winning. But I mean, once you start with the premise that the best and worst teams

in baseball, you know, have very little difference even in one game, there's not much you can do to make yourself, you know, better than the best team in baseball. And given that, even the advantages that you could get seem to not ever actually be applied or I guess the strategies don't seem to be applied in a way that would actually capture them. The all hands on deck strategy is really, it's a half measure at best as usually applied. You very rarely see know manager take out a pitcher who's pitching well after you know three innings or you know like really really empty out the bullpen in a in a dramatic way you might get a couple more outs out of your closer you might have one starting pitcher in the bullpen yeah that's the thing it's not even really hint it's not even really all hands on deck one extra hand on deck and one hand that is being asked to squab a bit yes if you had a

squab a verb swab is a verb swab there you go swap the decks because they're because they're on the on the deck everyone's on the deck. Embarrassing. Yeah, if you could take a few days off before the all-hands-on-deck day and you had your entire rotation available, that might help. But by the time you get to an all-hands-on-deck day, there are generally a couple people who are below decks. So I don't know that it helps that much. It would be nice if we could do a controlled experiment of teams that were playing with all hands on deck

and others that were not. I guess if you looked at teams that were down 3-0 in a series or something, and one of them would be playing all hands on deck and the other one would not, I don't know whether that would be a... hands on deck and the other one would not. I don't know whether that would be a – you'd have such a tiny sample you couldn't even tell what the effect was probably. So let me ask you this. Imagine a world where baseball treated the game seven, a potential game seven, only a game seven.

So it would only happen in those occasional years where it goes seven. They treat game seven the way that the World Series of Poker treats the final table, where they stop playing and then go away for four months and set up the cameras and have this big showcase tournament months later. Also like a bowl game in college football where the season just stops and everybody goes away. And then a month later they come back to play their playoff game. So imagine a scenario where baseball did this and they stop after game six and then they save game seven for a neutral site in a warm weather state and they play it on New Year's Eve or something like

that, which... It's the Scott Boris suggestion. Exactly. Almost, I guess, without the delay. But, you know, in a way, it also solves the problem of home field advantage, which baseball has never solved in the World Series, where everybody seems to think that most solutions to the home field advantage problem are flawed in some way. Well, this would eliminate it. There would be no home field advantage. The seventh game would be on a neutral site. So each team would have three chances at home in the series, and then the seventh would be a neutral site. So anyway, the point is that I'm getting to is in this scenario where presumably at least five days have elapsed, it truly is all hands on deck or could be all hands on deck. Everybody could be fresh.

Everybody could be rested. in seeing or does the you know does it just get too you know too too unlike baseball too unrestricted for you to enjoy yeah I think I like the limitations we talked about how how baseball has a built-in respect for limitations the other day right with the yeah the replacements on the rosters you can't you can't come back into a game after you leave a game. So we enjoy that on some level, and I also enjoy that on some level. It almost bothers me that you can play differently in the postseason to any extent, that you cannot use your fifth starter or your last guy in the bullpen or whatever it is. Yeah, I agree.

What if, yeah, okay. All right. That's as far as I'll take that. All right. Bonus question. Tougher division next year, AL West or AL East? East, I think. The East doesn't really have a Houston.

And Houston might be better, should be better, but probably still the worst team in either division. But that's not quite the same as asking. I don't know. I mean, tougher division, you could take that one of two ways. You know, which division can you win more games against is one way of taking it. But another is which is tougher to win. Oh, well, yeah, I thought he meant sort of talent level.

He might, but he didn't say. He didn't say. If that's what he meant, of talent level. He might, but he didn't say. He didn't say. If that's what he meant, then I'll say East. East? Either way, you say East. Yeah, I guess I say East. So you think that East is going to be tougher to win than the West next year? Yeah, I don't know. About the same, probably. Whose fourth place team is better next year?

Probably pretty close. I would say East, probably. Who's better, the Mariners or the Blue Jays? That's close. I don't know. I don't know if that's the same question that I just asked. I don't know what the standings are. I don't know whether it's the Orioles or the Blue Jays who would be my fourth place pick,

but one of those and probably Seattle. So, yeah, I don't know. I'd probably take the East team. While we're here, who's better, the Angels or the Yankees? While we're here, who's better, the Angels or the Yankees? I'd like to see if the Yankees add Tanaka, but if they do, I would say them. I don't know that I'm buying the Angels right now. And if I may, who's better, the A's or the Rays?

I think I might go A's. And finally, who's better, the Rangers or the Red Sox? Probably Red Sox. Really? I don't know. Adding Fielder and Chu and removing Ellsbury. And Kinsler. Oh, yeah. And removing Kinsler, yeah.

But, you know, you've been adding Profar, too. But removing Ellsbury and Salty and... Yeah, you're right. I don't know. It's close. You know, maybe Drew, right? Drew, probably. Maybe Drew, yeah. Having Bogarts for a full season. I don't know um close i i don't yeah i don't know i'll take yeah i'll take i'm gonna take rangers in that one i'm

gonna take rays in the second one i'm gonna take angels in the third one i'm gonna take blue jays in the fourth one and clearly or i mean or obviously but uh if you just look at the top top four uh uh that's tough uh stuff top four is close have you ever noticed how similar it is when the uh when the angels and rays play how similar that is to when the rangers and a's play no phonetic phonetically if not rangers a's angels rays the american league has signed like is to when the Rangers and A's play? No. Phonetically? If not. Rangers, A's, Angels, Rays? The American League has signed like every free agent this winter. I did a thing.

Every winter? Yeah, pretty much every winter. I did a thing, maybe it was two winters ago, trying to figure out how much better the AL had gotten relative to the NL over the winter just from like adding NL free agents um and I forget what it was I think it was like a few wins I calculated like if you if they played head-to-head or something all year it wasn't it wasn't huge but this year they have maybe even more than usual signed everyone um and I don't know whether it used to be that the theory

for why the AL was better than the NL or one of the theories was that just sort of that the Yankees were in the AL and that the Yankees being in the AL would make the Red Sox spend a lot of money and then other teams would have to, the Tigers would have to spend a lot of money to compete with them.

And it would just sort of raise the whole talent level of the league um but now i don't know now you have the dodgers in the nl so that would seem to be a counterbalance to that and then there was also a theory that just like the the al just happened to have smarter front offices for a while either by chance or or part of that competition uh aspect i don't so i don't know why it is that the al would be spending a lot more it seemed like like the nl had by far the better crop of of young players this year i'm just i'm just talking out loud here but uh the dh seems to not be irrelevant to this discussion if if you have a league where, first of all, some small portion of veteran players, post-free agent players, can only play in that league, but also a large portion

of free agent players, the back ends of their contracts look a lot better when you at least have that exit valve. Prince Fielder is an example of this. You have a number of players who are presumably more valuable in the American League or at least less risky in the American League. Meanwhile, you have... I don't know if this actually works out, but I mean, you, I don't know. Well, you, you might, uh, no, that you probably wouldn't, nevermind. I'm going to stop saying that. Uh, but then you have, um, because of that, you need, um, you know, you have a more offensive

league by nature because you have nine hitters. So you're going to have slightly more pitching attrition and you need slightly more pitching investment for that yeah true yeah yeah just just talking out loud it's a theory uh all right uh last question of this email uh in which pocket do you keep your wallet, and is there any change in it? So I used to walk around. Are you Googling which pocket do I keep my wallet in? No. I used to walk around like Kramer in that Seinfeld episode where he buys the calzones with stacks of pennies and gets exact change. I used to be known as the guy who always had exact change uh and i almost i prided myself on that um these

days i don't carry a wallet or change what do you keep your metro card in if i if i am going to have to use a metro card i'll just put it in my pocket just put everything in my pocket. Just put everything in my pocket. What kind of pants do you wear? Jeans mostly. Do you ever, I mean, it seems like that's a recipe for washing a MetroCard. Uh, I, yeah, I've done that. I think I did that once. Do you own a wallet? I do. It doesn't really, it wouldn't fit comfortably in my pocket. I do. It wouldn't fit comfortably in my pocket. Yeah. How about you? I'm a little bit exempt, I think, from this question. Not the same way that you are, but my wallet and my keys are attached to each other, which sounds like the sort of thing that you would do for a child. And so when I say it out loud, it's sort of embarrassing.

But in fact, I don't know. I don't have any idea why everybody... It's like having those mittens that are attached to your coat or something. It's like having your name on the tag of your shirt. I don't know why everybody doesn't do it, though. It's so, so sensible. You never... It's impossible to lose your wallet. You can't drive away without your wallet.

You can't do it. It's physically impossible. Try to do it with this combination and you will see how impossible it is. So I've been rocking the wallet key combo for probably 15 years. So because of that, it's not very comfortable to keep my wallet in my back pocket. I don't have one of those classic grooved wallets that you can just slide in your back pocket. So, I keep my... I also wear a hoodie all year, every day, all year.

If you ever watch an Angels game and you see a guy... I mean, this is true. If you see a guy sitting behind home plate next you know next to the scouts uh in august and it's it's like 98 degrees and there's a guy wearing a black hoodie that's me i wear a black hoodie one and soak up the sun every day of the year at all times i'm wearing one right now i sleep in one i wear it on sunny days i wear it it constantly. And so my keys either go front pocket or sweatshirt pocket. And no change. No change in a wallet. That's absurd.

I don't drive and I don't work elsewhere. So I don't need to bring my keys anywhere. I don't go anywhere. All right. anywhere i don't like them don't go anywhere all right um michael bowman asks if your goal as a gm was to maximize your wins to home run ratio what lineup would you choose assuming average pitching um and gosh i spent a lot of time trying to figure out what his motive was when asking this question and i just can't think of what the motive is. I mean I like to know the subtext of the question so I can actually answer it and pivot.

In this case I think the subtext is what query can I get you to run? You said you made a spreadsheet to answer this question. I did. I also made a spreadsheet to answer this question. Yeah, and I did. I also made a spreadsheet. I was wondering if the subtext is the Yankees, where they're criticized oddly. They are criticized absurdly for having too many home runs. Yes. And so Michael takes as a given, perhaps, that the traditional sports writer's platonic ideal of a winning team is the 1985 Cardinals,

and therefore you might try to actually, you know, this might be where it's coming from, that it's a more noble way to win without hitting home runs. And I did play baseball when I was a kid in a confined space where home runs were illegal, and if you hit a home run, you were out. So maybe that's where it's coming from. Well, the 1985 Cardinals hit 87 home runs. Yeah, I didn't go that far because... I think I've constructed a lineup that would hit fewer home runs and... And be better?

Oh, you actually have a lineup. I have a lineup. I don't know if it would be better. The 1985 you actually have a lineup. I have a lineup. I don't know if it would be better than 1985 Cardinals won 101 games, but it would be, I think, a pretty good team. So they hit 87 homers and they won 101 games? Yeah. So that's like a 1.2 ratio or 1.1 ratio? Mm-hmm.

I didn't go that far back because I didn't want the noise of generational issues at work. So I only went five years. Well, I didn't I didn't look for a team that did this. Oh, you actually. I just I made a team. Yeah. Oh, I see. Oh, OK.

Well, I didn't make a team. So first, let me just share the results of my spreadsheet. Uh huh. The in the past five years, do you want to try to guess in the past five years who the least home run hitting winning team is? It's not necessarily a winning team, but the team that hit the fewest home runs per win is? I'll give you, you can guess year and guess franchise

is it like the 2010 Padres or something maybe it is not it is not the two they actually are 17th though good guess they are at.68 home run .68

wins per home run which is you know that's good. The number two team is at 0.79 wins per home run. And so what's striking is that, so 0.79, keep that number in your head. What's striking is that the number one team is at 0.91. There is a huge gap between one and two. Massive, massive gap. I mean, this is like one of those classic stats where it's like Barry Bonds has more intentional walks than the number two hitter,

than the number two hitter has than, like, you know, that stat. That way of formulating a fun fact. Right, yeah. This is that. Uh-huh. Huh. I don't know. I should probably get this.

Probably could if I thought about it for a few minutes, but that would be boring for everyone. I don't know. Is there a raised team? I'll give you one more notable thing, is that the team that did this, the team that's number one, I looked for five years, right? No, I guess I looked for six years. But five of their six seasons in that stretch are in the top 13. Oh, is it? It wouldn't be like last year's Royals, would it? Last year's Royals are fifth. You're not bad.

You're not bad at this, Ben. Well, I know that you can't hit home runs in Kauffman. And I know they were a decent team, so they had to have been pretty high. I don't know. Is it? I don't know. I was going to guess maybe it was like one of those

Mike Socia teams or something that ran a lot, but you didn't go back that far. They've been a slugging team since then. Yeah. It's the 2012 Giants that won the World Series. Oh, okay. So the Giants are 1st, 6th, 10th, 12th, and 13th on this list. 6th, 10th, 12th, and 13th on this list.

And so, I mean, you know, Michael asked us to consider league average pitching and presumably league average ballpark. And the Giants don't have a league average ballpark. It suppresses home runs, you know, in every direction. However, they also didn't have a league average pitching. They had poor pitching in 2012, as I recall. Or, I don't know, maybe it was league average, but it wasn't World Series caliber. And yet they did it.

So I don't know what to take from that team specifically, but they didn't have a lot of power hitters. They had a 96 ERA plus that year. Yeah, so that's below average and they were despite the home runs they were a very good hitter I think they had the second best OPS plus in the league behind only the Cardinals

and I mean you know they didn't have a big power hitter but where did they get their production from I mean I don't really know the answer to that I mean Posey was awesome, and Andres Torres was good. Sorry, not.

Angel Pagan was good. They outplayed their Pythag by six games. Oh, that helps. That helps. Maybe, I don't know, defense? Crawford? Pagan? Yeah. I guess, ideally, you'd have a lot of...

I think that you actually probably wouldn't want a lot of walks in a weird way. Yeah, because OPP guys are often power guys. Exactly, yeah. There's just such a correlation there. So, yeah, I'm not sure where the Giants stand out. They didn't strike out much, and they haven't struck out much. Their strikeout totals all those years has been fairly low. So I guess ideally, yeah, you'd have nine Angel Pagans, more or less,

or eight Angel Pagans. Well, unlike you, I actually attempted to answer Michael's question. Do your team. How does it do? So I started with the Pakoda spreadsheet, which I guess is still not official Pakodas, but just about.

And I filtered so that it was MLB guys, people who were actually projected to play this year, and I sort of ruled out utility infielders who maybe are projected for 250 plate appearances or something looking for full-time players and then I just sort of uh

I I made everyone have a 600 plate appearance season and and just prorated everything and uh so then I ended up with one guy per position and so so I guess I'll just, I'll go down the lineup. So at catcher, I have, and then I just created a column for like warp over home runs or something. And so the catcher on this team would be John Jaso, who is projected to be in 600 plate appearances, like a three and a half win catcher with nine home runs, which is nice. He walks a lot and is not a big power guy, or I guess it's the ballpark partially too.

Hang on. Can I interrupt real quick? Sure. I did not listen to your instructions exactly, but if I may, can I give a, before you reveal the correct answer can i do a quick guess at the answer an uneducated guess all right so just just to be clear i would have guessed carlos ruiz there okay um are you fat you're factoring in defense

yes yeah well yeah to the extent that that pakoda is i am also, yeah. All right, first base? I would go with Freddie Freeman. First base, I sort of cheated and went with Joe Maurer, who is in this spreadsheet projected as a catcher. That explains why I got a bunch of emails about Joe Maurer's positional eligibility in the book. Yes, he did. That was why. Okay. Yeah, so he's projected to hit 10 homers and as a first baseman, something like three and a half wins or so. Much more incidentally as a catcher. As a catcher, he's like a four-and-a-half win player at least.

So back of the envelope sort of thing, he's like a three-and-a-half win first baseman with 10 homers. Whereas, let's see, I can find Freddie Freeman is... Pakoda, I think, has never really liked Freddie Freeman, if I remember right. So he's only projected to be like a two and a half win player, which is low. But, okay.

Second base. And do you have a position switch trick here too? Because I'm not going to. Actual second baseman. Okay, I'm going with, I'll go with Pedroroia i went with scudero uh scudero is projected to be like an average player and hit like three home runs so um again this is kind of it's ballpark influence we've got an oakland guy and a giants guy and now well uh, who would your shortstop be? Elvis Andrews. Andrews was very close.

Probably the second best choice, but the first best choice, according to this, would be Everett Cabrera, another big ballpark guy projected for a little over three wins and, like, four homers. Third base? Matt Carpenter. three wins and like four homers um third base um matt carpenter uh yeah i don't actually know about matt carpenter because he's probably still in here as a second baseman but i i guess i cheated a little bit and made alberto callaspo a full-time player um there's no cheating about that he is a full-time player yeah i guess he wasn projected for – he was projected for 400-something play appearances.

But, yeah, if he's a full-time player, he's like a little over a two-win guy with nine homers. Left field? Martin Prada. Well, I went with Gardner. Okay. We're putting him as a left fielder, which he will be. And center field? Michael Bourne.

which he will be um and centerfield michael born thick born was close but denard span is projected for like four homers and almost three wins i think thought about him yeah thought about it likes the defense right field norioki yes uh and then dh i there like isn't anyone actually projected yeah you've got but, you've got Butler or Ortiz. Yeah, right. So I just sort of tried to think of what hitter I would want. And most of these people that I've named are good defense guys, which makes sense. They would be valuable but not hit a lot of home runs.

But at DH, obviously, that doesn't matter. So you just kind of want a guy who's a good hitter but not a great power hitter. So I went with Shinsu Chu. I don't know if it's the best possible choice, but he's projected for almost a 380 on base percentage and 17 homers. So that would, I think, be pretty good. That's where I would have put Maurer. If I were that's where I would have put Maurer if I were doing this

I guess that makes sense but I think the gap between Maurer and the next most valuable but not power hitting first baseman was pretty big so if you add up all those guys you get like 25 wins above replacement with 71 homers, which is not a lot of homers. The Marlins hit 95 home runs last year.

So if you factor in, I mean, I guess there'd be some bench guys getting at bat, so maybe this team would get up to 80 home runs or something like that. But it would be a pretty good team. Not on my watch. If the lineup is, well, yeah, ideally not, but if the lineup is like 25 wins above replacement and then you have average pitching, that's a good team. Yeah, that's like mental math here.

That seems like 94 ish, 94 ish. I think so. So this would, this would probably be a playoff team that, that hit fewer home runs than the Marlins last year by a pretty wide margin. So fun question. Okay.

Ryan asks, I'm guessing this is the last question of the year, Ben. Wow. Might be. Ryan asks, my question, it's got a pun too, an economist pun. My question pertains to the applicability of an economic model to baseball in the Ricardian

model named after economist David Ricardo. Countries unequivocally gain by specializing in a certain product and subsequently trading said product on the international market for other goods. By engaging in free trade, each country utilizes its comparative advantage to become better off in terms of utility. Could the same thing work in baseball and farm systems? For the purposes of baseball puns, it could be called the Richardian model. Complete specialization, like J.P.

Richardi. Richardy. I get it. Complete specialization would most likely be infeasible, as trading a stockpile of, say, second basemen for a roster of nine other players would probably make the savviest GM's head spin. But let's say 30 teams, each partially specialized in one of 10 positions, lumping relievers and starters together to simplify the math, thereby leaving three teams per position. Could you envision such a model working?

No. You'd have to think, I mean, the reason that this works, if I'm not mistaken, in economics is that building the infrastructure to support an industry is extremely expensive, takes a lot of time, takes a lot of time to do it and also to do it right. And then once you build that infrastructure, all sorts of ancillary industries start building up around it to support it and make cheaper the entire process. So if you're the cell phone region, then you start getting these chip makers and these like, I don't know, flip maker. I don't know. What do you call the part that flips out of a cell phone? And so, and transportation know, to transport the chips is much cheaper because it's being built right there and all that.

And so the thing about baseball is that it just, I don't know what the investment is in teaching third baseman compared to a right fielder other than one coach. teaching third baseman compared to a right fielder other than one coach. I mean, it's one coach and then maybe there's, you know, presumably up to 30. You can spend all your time doing right field drills and just throwing to third base for all spring training. But the right fielder could already do that, you know? Yeah. Like, I mean, your coach can't spend all spring training teaching throws

from right field to third base and um you know even if you got the best right you know the best minor league manager for right fielders like presumably of the 30 managers one is slightly better than the others at managing right fielders for some reason even that it's pretty small i would think it's pretty small margins and um so it's pretty small margins. It's hard to imagine. The other thing is that I continue to believe that in baseball, every transaction has a little bit of spillage. All transactions are slightly inefficient and you don't want to have to trade. Generally, if you're trading surplus, you're not quite getting full value out of it for whatever reason.

Maybe because teams know that you're trading from surplus and don't have quite as much leverage. More likely it's because these GMs are incredibly risk averse and in particular that there is a kind of, for the sake of simplicity, a public relations factor in every trade, more or less. The idea that you're scared to trade things that go away and become better under someone else's watch. And so teams don't like to trade. And so even if you have all the second basemen, that's great. But teams aren't going to give you, If you're trading a 10 second baseman, you can't rely on getting a 10 right fielder to fill your right field hole.

I haven't done the research to prove this, but it has always been my impression that it is inefficient to trade, that you lose your 6% to the realtor on every transaction, and ideally you don't do it. Unless the right opportunity falls into your lap, which, I mean, teams do make profit on trades because they're not trading four times a week out of necessity. Yeah, I don't know. If a team devoted itself to being the best second base development team, it probably still wouldn't end up with the best second baseman.

Some other team would just happen to draft a guy who was better and just would be a better second baseman, even if he wasn't getting the same quality of instruction. So I don't know. Maybe it would be different at certain other positions that have more, I don't know, specific skill sets. If second base is kind of like the place where you put people who don't fit at other positions that have more, I don't know, specific skill sets. If second base is kind of like the place where you put people who don't fit at other positions,

maybe that's not a good example. But yeah, I don't think you could differentiate yourself that much. However, let's now, let's take this. I mean, okay, so imagine catching where you might see a team that's specialized in developing catchers would actually produce better catchers. And so now we're not talking, let's say, I mean, we're suggesting that it's hard to trade. Say you develop, you know,

say the average catcher that's currently developed is a five and it's hard to get full five value for every five catcher. But, you know, maybe this team actually does a better job of teaching catching which doesn't seem unrealistic it's a complicated job maybe they get a six although on the other hand where are those catchers going to play it's hard to get them to full reps but anyway let's assume that they could make them all into sixes that might theoretically make sense i mean certainly we've talked about the knuckleball idea and it wouldn't shock me to find out that this question was actually inspired by our knuckleball discussion because it does seem like there are

very very specific skills that aren't super labor intensive and that could potentially be beneficial that teams would have um you know some incentive to carve their their niche uh you know with so knuckleballing seems like one possibility. Catching, maybe it is. I mean, teams need catchers. I don't know what else there would be. Yeah, I don't know. There are other specialties, like if you have a great training staff, maybe, a great medical staff, and you can keep players healthy,

like the White Sox have seemed to be able to do, then you can you can either trade for pitchers who have been injured for other teams and you can fix whatever is responsible for their injuries and you can get them on the cheap and they'll be good for you or or you can keep them healthy and then trade them at full value before they break down for someone else or that sort of thing so i don't know there are things that you can do. But the the Richardian model, I think, is a little extreme. Just out of curiosity, does the White Sox reputation take any sort of hit from from last year with with Danks and Floyd? Yeah, I don't know. It

wasn't like they had zero injuries before that. No, of course not. But these are two guys that they've had for a very long time. It's not so much that, oh, two injuries kill the whole idea. It's just that those are two of the pieces of evidence. I mean, those are two of the primary examples of White Sox pitchers being around a long time without getting injured. primary examples of White Sox pitchers being around a long time without getting injured. So, you know, it's just, it does feel like a lot of things that we sort of take to be true.

Maybe we take to be true because nobody ever looks at them again. Yeah, or just because there's bound to be one team that over the course of several seasons has better luck with injuries than all the others, and then we attribute that to some skill on their part. All right, I have another one. This is from Scott, who asks, Can catcher framing skills break out like Chris Davis' home runs did in 2013? I think so, yeah. Not, I mean, rarely, but Chris Davis is pretty rare too.

I think, I don't know, I've written about JPR and Sebia and how he seemed to go from a very poor pitch framer before last season and even early last season to a good one for the rest of the season. And there seemed to be a reason for that. I'm just looking at the transaction analysis thing I wrote when he signed with the Rangers. And he was, according to Max's ratings, he was 45 runs below average from 2010 to 12. And then he got down to 50 below average, like in the first, I don't know, month and a half or so of last season. And then there was a point during the season where Sal Fasano worked with him.

Sal Fasano, the former catcher and mustache haver, who is now the Blue Jays' roving catching instructor. Wait, does former also modify mustache haver? I don't know. I haven't seen a current picture of him. You'd think that he would be a current Mustache Haber. If not, we're breaking hearts tonight. Yeah. But yeah, so then he worked with Aaron Seabia,

and someone in the Toronto media wrote about that. And from that point on, Aaron Seabia rated really well, and he ended up significantly above average on the season in in framing and when you watched him he he seemed to be he looked better I don't I don't I'd have to go back and and compare what exactly he changed but he he just looked a lot you know a lot more quiet before that. He was always moving around, and he had no sort of stable base, and he was getting crossed up a lot. And it seemed like after that he looked better, and the numbers reflected that. So I think that sort of thing is pretty rare.

When I talk to coaches and players about framing, they all sort of emphasize that you just have to put a ton of work in and you have to do drills and you catch pitches, and it's just this sort of experience-based improvement where you just have to get a lot of reps and see a lot of pitches and you just gradually get better at it. But I think from time to time, if someone like Chris Davis can adjust his swing and become a great power hitter, then I think a catcher who's not good at receiving could adjust his glove

or his stance somehow and become better at it. I think it's similar. I don't know that it's been answered yet whether catcher framing, pitch framing, is a skill or a talent at this point. And it does seem to me that there's probably a significant portion of it that is probably comparable to plate discipline. It's instinctive. It's how you see the ball. It's how quickly you identify the ball. And it has to do with your eyes and your cognition. And that it probably is somewhat out of your control.

There are cases of guys who develop patience, but they're very rare. And it wouldn't surprise me if catcher framing was closer to that than anything else. Yeah, I think it's more teachable than that, but there's definitely a skill element to it. I tried to ask people that question or answer that question when I was writing the thing for Grantland, and I would ask them, like, well, can you take someone who's not good at catching and make them into a Molina

if they're willing to work hard enough and you have a good enough coach. And the consensus seemed to be, no, that you, you can't make everyone a Molina, but you could, you could get most players up to like competence, at least if they're willing to work at it.

Yeah, I've, I've, I've definitely been there where I asked that question and then I, but, but that's the wrong question. That's a straw man. By asking the extreme, you're

trying to provoke a good reaction so that you get a good quote. In fact, it gives them an easy out because they don't want to say anything interesting and it's very easy to uninterestingly say, no, not Molina. Yeah, I got a lot of that. Here I am telling you how to do your job.

I have another one. Wow. This is from Cody. I don't want to leave anything on the floor. This is from Cody. We should go back and answer all the ones we've gotten this year that we never got to. We'll just do a five-hour show. This is from Cody.

My question concerns the defensive development of young players who break in at positions other than their long-term position. For example, if J.J. Hardy leaves the Orioles or if Drew re-signs with Boston for one year, how difficult would it be for Machado or Bogarts to move over? I guess if Drew doesn't re-sign with Boston. Or no, if Drew does re-sign with Boston for one year and then leaves that. How difficult would it be for Machado or Bogarts to move over to shortstop? Assuming, of course, they're competent defensive shortstops to begin with.

After a year or more of playing third base, similarly if Oscar Tavares is playing all three outfield positions most of 2014, how much does that hinder his ability to play center field in 2015 or 2016? I don't know. We don't know, but what's your thought? I don't think it would be that difficult. I think if you're switching someone over at AA or A ball or something because there's some top prospect at the same position and then he just never never gets those developmental years in then it would be difficult like once he gets to the major league level or something to try to switch him there

even if he had the skill set he just wouldn't have wouldn't have seen enough balls off the bat or wouldn't have you know wouldn't have developed the muscle memory or whatever it is to make throws from that angle. I think if you reach the major leagues like Machado or Bogarts did, basically as short stops or at a certain position, and then you have to wait a year for someone else to leave, I don't think it's that big a deal. I think it's zero deal whatsoever. I think zero.

I think that the effect on his defensive metrics compared to playing there all year, you know, upon arrival, would be zero. Yeah. I actually have... Occasionally you'll see a player just change positions to a position he's never played before. It happens probably once a year for every team. Yeah. And, like, I remember Howie Kend probably once a year for every team. And like I remember

Howie Kendrick playing left field for the Angels and he had never played left field and he had like an hour and a half's notice and he did it for like weeks after that and you never would have known. It's just, it's pretty easy to fit in if you're athletic enough to handle the position if you've been holding a glove your entire life if you've been catching baseballs forever and if you have the arm to handle the position you can basically do it immediately and um certainly that's not even nearly the obstacle machado and bogarts wouldn't face nearly the obstacle uh in moving back to a position they've been playing literally their entire life, but for the last 11 months. I mean, it's like if they lived in LA their entire lives,

and then they moved to New York for 11 months, it would not be difficult to come back and find their favorite sandwich. It's really the best metaphor I've come up with all year. But they might. Saved it for the end. What if they don't want to move back because they now like New York and so they're now unhappy in Los Angeles, which probably would be the case based on my experience of Los Angeles and New York. Alexi Amorista did this too.

I think he had played like one game in rookie ball in the outfield and then they moved him out there with an afternoon's notice he was out there before the game like taking fly balls and then the game starts and he's totally fine and makes like this incredible leaping catch his first his first game um i mean it's hard to move down the defensive spectrum or it's hard to move up uh the defensive, or it's hard to move up the defensive spectrum. It's really easy to move down. I mean, Bogarts and Machado, they're both artificially moved over. They haven't lost their abilities.

The question presumes even that they haven't lost their abilities. And as far as feel, I don't think it's an issue. Now, I've never done it. I've never been a major leaguer. And I'm certainly, even if I'm lying to you, and I have been a major leaguer, I have never been a major league shortstop who then had to move to third base. That I can say for sure. You have, however, been a California resident who moved to New York and then moved back. And then came back and found his favorite sandwich. So you've lived this. So it's conceivable that if someone smarter said,

oh no, you don't understand the speed of the game is different. If somebody smart told me that it would take a couple of weeks to catch up to the game, I wouldn't argue. But I would bet that it's not even that. I would bet that it's literally four innings. Yeah, sure. Should we do one more wow this is unprecedented i i don't know if i have anything to say about anymore but um let's see we'll just do all of them whatever the year blow all hands on deck it's an all hands on deck show uh we are squabbing away actually i made it the entire year without mispronouncing swab that was my new year's resolution too uh i'm gonna answer this one

or ask this one because we have gotten this one many times and never answered it um annie asks uh and it's funny because uh it's always it's always prefaced with something like this. Goofy hypothetical here. Yeah, there's a real example of this. Yeah. Yeah, okay. While perusing baseball reference pages recently, I came across the bio of a fellow named Icebox Chamberlain,

which is a good way to start your question uh if you want to get it answered at the end of the year a pitcher who apparently was ambidextrous and would occasionally switch arms during the course of a game this got me thinking obviously it would be just about impossible for anyone to consistently do this the major league level today but let's say it were possible let's say that then and that a person could exist who would be able to get major league hitters out with both his left and right arm, what kind of impact would he have on the game? How much more valuable would that make him than someone who is a league average pitcher using just his left or right arm? And we have a quick answer to this. You can go ahead and

give the quick answer, because we've written about it a couple times on the site, and then I have a thought. So go ahead. Have we? What did we write? Did we write about Pat Venditte? And then I have a thought. So go ahead. Have we? What did we write? Did we write about Pat Venditte?

Yeah, exactly. Matt Corey did a long piece about the Venditte rule. Yeah, right. So Pat Venditte is a minor leaguer who was in the Yankees system. Still in the Yankees? Still, I think he was a Rule 5 eligible. And then, yeah, I don't know. Yeah, he was playing for the Trenton Thunder in AA this year in late August.

So, yeah, he's a 28-year-old ambidextrous pitcher. Oh, you know, I've always wondered how Baseball Reference would handle this. And I'm now looking. It says bats both, throws left, comma. Venditte typically throws with the hand needed to gain the platoon advantage. Poor Sean Foreman probably had to, like, code. I know, that messed up his code so badly. So, yeah, Pat Venditte is a minor leaguer

who actually does this and has done it, you know, minor league successfully, which is to say he's been one of the 1,200 best pitchers in the world, but not good enough to make the majors and has been famous mostly for this fact. Although, really, he was always old for his level, but through age 25, he was completely hot stuff in the minors, but always very old for his level.

And he's unlikely to make it to the majors, especially at this point. But, you know, he came close. He came close in that suggestion. I think he should. I mean, if there's any decency in the world. If that guy on the Marlins got to do it. Yeah, come on. He has a career 2.41 ERA in 306 and a third minor league inning.

So he'd be probably pretty terrible. His FIP is absurd. Have you looked at it? He's good. Oh, my gosh. Okay, so he's got 10.2 strikeouts per nine, 2.4 walks per nine, 0.4 home runs per nine. Yeah.

0.4. This is a Gagne F nine. Yeah. 0.4. This is a Gagne fit. Yeah. So a lot of that is lower level stuff. But even at the upper levels, he hasn't been hit hard, really. I mean, worst people have gotten cups of coffee. So sure. Someone, I hope, will do it at some point.

So I guess the, the, the only thing is that, I mean, this is something that we all want to see and that makes tons of sense. Um, does it surprise you that it hasn't happened yet? I mean, it, it, it feels like the, the, the barrier for entry to the major leagues is, is actually relatively low when you think about how many players do get called up on every team every season. I mean, there's going to be 1,500 players who make the majors this year at some point. So, or slightly fewer. So, I mean, this seems like such an obvious gimmick to try. Why wouldn't Venditte have made an appearance? I mean, why would you keep him in double-A, I guess is the question.

Like, really, what is the point of keeping him in double-A? Either bring him up and see if it works, or just don't. It's so pointless to keep him in double-A when he's 28. Well, he was in triple- a briefly at the end of 2012 he pitched 13 innings there and and was good pretty good in those 13 innings and then i think i think he might have had an injury uh because then he was back in the gulf coast league and and florida state league and then worked his way back up to Trenton. I forget what the story was, but I think if there hadn't been whatever that was, he might have pitched this full season at AAA, and who knows? It feels like an underrated, well, maybe it's not underrated, but perhaps-

He had a torn labrum in his right shoulder, and he did not continue pitching with his left shoulder while he didn't he did not continue pitching with his left shoulder while okay while he rehabbed that so that was my that was what i was about to say it seems like one potential benefit of this yeah is that you have once you once you break an arm as you inevitably will you have another arm um which seems good except uh this goes back to the question that we once asked about if you're if you had a pitcher who was a good enough hitter to play first base on his on his off days what would you do when he inevitably had to have tommy john surgery would you would you give up that year

of hitting to get his arm back and i guess with vendita it's the same thing do you just let him throw through it um do you do basically like that an advantage, or does the first arm surgery take him out anyway? If he were actually really good with both arms, then it would be a tricky math problem to decide whether a year of his career is worth giving up 30% platoon advantage for the rest of his life. And that's a good question. That would actually be a fun one to solve. Somebody could solve that. It looks like I'm reading this article written when he returned to trenton in august and it looks like he when he was rehabbing the right arm he pitched in the world baseball classic for italy with only his left arm um i think by that point i think he had healed enough that he could he could pitch with one arm and not the other um i guess if if it's an injury that serious

then you you probably can't even move your other shoulder enough to pitch with the other arm but i guess once he got to a certain point where his his one arm wasn't all the way back but it was close enough that he could pitch with the other arm and then it looks like he is now uh he has now dropped down he used to be over the top from his right side and sidearm from the left but he has now dropped his arm angle from the right side also i think it's more likely that you would see someone who uh who just who uses this ambidextrous ability to barely make it to the majors it's more likely that that happens than that someone comes along who's like legitimately

good with either arm like it would be a sort of thing where a guy's on the bubble and oh he can he can kind of pitch with his other arm so maybe that just barely makes him worth a roster spot because it would be really difficult to be really good from both sides he was always he was always like from one side he was like more of a soft tosser. I forget which was which, I guess from the, from the sidearm, from the left side, maybe he was slower and sort of more of a junk baller than from the other side. You think it would be really difficult. You, you, you, uh, so you don't think that if you were, and I'm not challenging you on this, I don't know the answer, but if you were working on your change up with your right hand you don't think that there would

be any portion of that that would help you throw your change up with the left hand i mean you you think it would be like developing two pitchers in in 20 you know in in you know two to two and one shampoo and conditioner two is not big enough for one that's that's what one means you know in in you know two to two and one shampoo and conditioner two is not big enough for one that's that's what one means you know that joke you know that one yeah yeah well delivered um i i think i think there would be some carryover probably you'd be able to you'd be able to tell like the grip or something maybe. But I don't know. The whole arm motion would be just different and weird. Think about how hard it is to write with your other arm if you're not this way.

It's difficult. Yeah, but you are this way. That's the point. You're this way. We can't even imagine what it's like. They're this way. We can't even imagine what it's like. They're this way. So let me ask you. I mean, presuming that the two arms are of equal strength,

if a Steven Strasberg were born with Steven Strasbergian abilities as well as complete ambidextrity, would he punt one for the benefit of the other or would he keep both for the benefit of all mankind? I think, I don't know. I think it might be worth it to keep both, but. But would he? I'm asking, would he? Cause you're, I'm just trying to figure out what you said when you said that it would be someone who's just on the bubble who would use this to just barely punch it. You're just saying because ambidextrousness is so rare or because it actually would be detrimental to develop this way

unless it were your only shot. Yeah, I don't know because I just feel like, I don't know, we should have like a neurologist or something on to tell us how this would work because I feel like... Well, Bennett, you're in luck. I am a neurologist. Oh, well, that's convenient. Even if you had equal ability with both arms i feel like it would be like different neurons that would control each arm and if you didn't practice with one then they wouldn't wire together the same way that the other side did so you'd have to you'd have to devote equal

time to both i think or maybe close to equal time to both, I think, would be my guess. And that would be difficult to do. If that were the case, it would be very difficult to do. Now explain switch hitters. Yes, I don't know. I've never understood that. But they exist. They do. This seems to be pretty compelling evidence.

They do. Maybe it's, yeah. Well, maybe the fact that both of your arms are involved in, no matter which side you hit from, you're using both of your arms. One is more dominant than the other, but they both play a role. Maybe that makes it easier to do than switch pitching. I don't know. And even switch hitters aren't often equally skilled from both sides.

They're often better from one side and just... Yeah, they only manage to play at a major league level from both sides to a near equal degree. Yeah, pretty pathetic, really. So, I don't know. I hope it happens. I'd love to see it alright one more

wow this is going to be an hour long show I think I don't know if we have an answer for this one so this is from Brett who asks though BP's brand allows for a great deal of latitude there are still interesting ways to talk about baseball

that don't seem like they would fit within the BP brand what talk about baseball that don't seem like they would fit within the BP brand. What podcast or website that doesn't yet exist and wouldn't be a good fit for BP do you wish you could listen to or read? Do you have any thoughts about this question? Well, I'd like to disagree with the premise, I think, that there are interesting ways to talk about baseball that wouldn't fit with the BP brand. I'd like to think that we could fit any interesting way into our brand somehow, which doesn't mean that we have, but just that we could. I don't know.

I mean, we haven't had a podcast with ex-players who come on. If we had a podcast with Gabe Kapler or someone like that who has the playing experience and was paired with people like us, that would be interesting. You're starting to see that a little bit more on some baseball broadcasts or baseball tonight type shows. Um, so I, I mean, I guess that would be interesting. I don't know. There's no, but that would be, that would be, that would fit perfectly within our brand. That's more a supply problem, right? Yes. I don't know what wouldn't fit within our brand. We're willing to talk about

all kinds of outrageous things. We can talk about anything. Yeah, sometimes though, I assume that you'll have this experience. You'll go back and you'll be reading something from 2001 on our site. And you'll be like, oh yeah, we would never say that now. We could never say that. It's too kind of like, I mean, the easy word is snark, right? There's a level of snark that, you know, we've largely moved past and that I wouldn't feel comfortable using right now.

And I don't think that's limited to us. I think, you know, there's this sort of phenomenon that I see on Twitter sometimes where the player will kind of jokingly and kind of not jokingly confront the writer who says something. And you'll see it with like, you know, somebody reports a rumor about, somebody reported a rumor about Brett Anderson. Yes, right. Someone said he used to be like an A-type pitcher

and now he's a B-type pitcher or something. Yeah, yeah. And so then Brett Anderson tweeted and made a joke about it and there's this way that players are able to um you know to confront writers now in a way that um i i think probably does to some degree um factor into what you choose to say subconsciously maybe and not just that that's not the only way that it does it. But snark is not a marketable commodity in the same way that it used to be. If you're really negative and really biting, you set yourself up for a lot of criticism

and people mock you and use your words against you. mock you and use your words against you. There's a way that that sort of incisive tone doesn't play real well anymore. I don't think that tone would fit with BP exactly anymore. We're not dismissive of 30 clubs the way that we used to or 28 clubs the way that we used to. We more or less start with the premise that these guys know things that we don't that they're you know hired for reasons that they're smart guys who've risen to the top of their field and that we can criticize them but we also evaluate them with a certain degree of respect um but brett's question is uh is there a kind of podcast that we don't do that we would want to do or that we'd

want to hear? That we would want to hear. And so either of us would want to hear that one. I wouldn't necessarily want to hear that one. And that's not the one that I would want to hear. You're right. But I would just guess that there is a self-censorship that happens in a lot. Probably there's a self-censorship that happens. Well, let me give you, I probably shouldn't, if I'm smart, I'll stop talking. But every once in a while, I remember this idea that I had once and that I wouldn't do because it's weird, it's unprofessional, it's slightly embarrassing, and I think it would be the funniest thing in the world which would be to find out uh say um uh all right i'm gonna keep talking um i i thought once about

how it would be funny to go through the major league injury logs over the previous years and try to determine which ones happened while pooping. Because you got to figure that there's a certain percentage of the world's hospital visits are caused by pooping. And so baseball players have almost certainly missed time. Sure. There are good players who have missed time due to sneezing. So you'd figure it's a similar level of stress at times. So I thought, well, you know, I wonder what injuries major leaguers have that might have been caused by poop. Now, I would never do that. I would never.

That's not a piece that would necessarily fit our brand. No. that i would never that that's not a piece that would necessarily fit our brand no but but i i and so i and i don't even even in even in the what do you want to hear or what do you want to listen to category i don't think i'd want to hear that either i moved on from that idea for about a thousand reasons and i i apologize for having remembered it three minutes ago. But what I'm saying is that there is a degree of complete id that might be fun to hear in a podcast. A podcast by people who are both knowledgeable about the game, who might have some connection to the game, who are educated about the game,

and yet have absolutely no feeling of self-censorship for any reason, for professionalism, for decency, for their future job prospects, for any reason whatsoever, who just absolutely just are pure id, might be a fun show. So I guess that's my answer. And that doesn't exist anymore. That almost existed 10 years ago, and that's what got a lot of us into this. But right now it doesn't exist, I would say.

So that's what I'm saying. Sort of like a Fire Joe Morgan podcast, maybe. Yeah, more or less. I think even those guys acknowledge that that doesn't play anymore. They don't even like really want that. Yeah, I would listen to that, though. If someone just sort of read and critiqued terrible articles about baseball, I would, if the person were clever enough,

as the writers of Fire Joe Morgan were, I would probably listen to that. So, I don't know. If you have an idea for a podcast that we're not doing that we should be doing let us know first uh sorry second google uh result for injuries defecating is man falls to death after defecating between subway cars. Well, that's, yeah, I don't know if that's defecating. Oh my gosh, Ben. Yeah.

Ben, the seventh result is a Wikipedia page for toilet-related injuries and death. Are there any baseball players on there? Historical deaths. There's a subcategory historical deaths and a sub subcategory possible occurrences so historical deaths in 1945 the german submarine u-1206 was sunk after the toilet malfunctioned that's not quite a defecating injury that's a stretch the king wenzel sloss the third of bohemia was murdered with a spear while sitting in the garden injury. That's a stretch. King Wenceslas III of Bohemia

was murdered with a spear while sitting in the garden on August 1, 1306. That happens in Game of Thrones. Someone is killed with a crossbow. Ben! Ben! Ben! Ben! Ben! Come on! What? I'm a season behind you. I didn't say who it was.

Yeah, but you said it was. I said it happened then then someone died ben ben ben everyone dies all right george ii of great britain died on the toilet from an aortic dissection according to horace walpole's memoirs king george rose as usual at six and drank his chocolate for all his actions were invariably methodic a quarter after seven he went into a little closet his german valet chamber is in waiting heard a noise and running in found the king dead on the floor in falling he had cut his face uh there's some good ones in here.

Oh, this is a good one. Michael Anderson Godwin, a convicted murderer in South Carolina who had his sentence reduced from death by the electric chair, sat on the metal toilet in his cell while fixing his television. While he bit one of the wires, the resultant electric shock killed him. All right, so maybe there's enough material for you to do this, but there's no baseball connection as of yet. Not as of yet.

Do some digging. Why did you just message me? Sent you a picture from Wikipedia of someone. I completely expected that to be stopped now. Oh, my gosh. I completely expected that to be stop now. Oh, my gosh. It's a picture of someone on a toilet in a squatting position.

So that's the year. This is what happens when we go for over an hour. We end up talking about this. The only reason we're stopping is because my battery is about to die. Otherwise, we would just continue recording into the new year. All right. So that's 355. Thanks for a very good year. recording into the new year. All right. So that's three 55. Thanks for a very good year.

We had a, a good year. This, I, um, I don't know that I expected to be here a year ago. I thought we'd make it the entire year, but we did. It was really fun.

Your guys' email questions are, uh, easily the highlight of the show. Um, and, uh, you know and highlight of my week. So thanks, and we'll be back with 356 on Thursday. Thursday, yes, I think so. In the meantime, please rate and review us on iTunes

and subscribe to us on iTunes. That helps us attract new listeners. And you can join our Facebook group at facebook.com slash group slash effectively wild, where there is currently a 40-comment thread that started with someone asserting that Jeff Bagwell's 1999 was the greatest offensive season in MLB history. Didn't we actually, didn't we, no, I'm sorry. We did the best fantasy season ever at one point.

And I don't think we did do that. I think I went with Larry Walker's like 2000 or something like that. But yeah, Bagwell 99 is not a bad choice for that. Yeah. But if you want to jump in and be comment number 41 on that thread, go to our Facebook group.