Rates & Barrels - Lance Lynn to the White Sox, and talking pitching and sandwiches w/Trevor May

Episode Date: December 10, 2020

Eno and DVR discuss the Lance Lynn-Dane Dunning swap, Adam Eaton's return to the south side of Chicago, and Carlos Santana's move to Kansas City. New Mets reliever Trevor May joins the show to discuss... the evolution of pitching during his time in Minnesota, his role in the new Fan Controlled Football League, sandwiches, and more! Rundown 0:58 The Rangers Send Lance Lynn to the White Sox 5:40 Dane Dunning in Texas 9:56 Who Is The Most Valuable White Sox Starting Pitcher After Lucas Giolito? 16:58 Adam Eaton Returns to the South Side 20:01 Carlos Santana Heads to Kansas City 23:46 Trevor May Interview Intro 24:00 Changes in Pitching Development During Trevor's Time with the Twins 27:10 Bullpen Workload Management & Relief Role Flexibility  33:28 Can You Throw Too Many High Fastballs? 37:37 Ditching the Curveball for the Slider 43:44 What Did You Learn From 2020? 46:17 Trevor's Role in the New Fan Controlled Football League 52:16 Sandwich Talk! 55:46 Mailbag Q: Caleb Cotham in Philly Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper Follow Trevor on Twitter: @IAmTrevorMay e-mail: ratesandbarrels@theathletic.com Check out Fan Controlled Football (fcf.io) on Twitch -- games begin in February: https://www.twitch.tv/fcf/about Buy a one-year subscription to The Athletic, get a one-year subscription to gift to a friend -- FREE -- theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 So let's be clear. When it comes to shipping internationally, can I provide trade documents electronically? Mm-hmm. The answer is FedEx. Okay. But what about estimating duties and taxes on my shipments? How do I find all the... Also FedEx. Impressive. Is there a regulatory specialist I can ask about? FedEx. Oh. But let's say that... FedEx.
Starting point is 00:00:22 What? FedEx. Thanks. No more questions. Always your answer for international shipping. FedEx. What? FedEx. Thanks. No more questions. Always your answer for international shipping. FedEx, where now meets next. Welcome to Rates and Barrels. It is Wednesday, December 9th, 2020, day three of the winter meetings. And to this point, I think the Chicago White Sox are winning the meetings, which are really more of a time period than a physical event this year, since it's all happening online. event this year since it's all happening online. Later on in this episode, we join by the newest member of the New York Mets, at least at this moment. That is, of course, pitcher Trevor May. We talked about a lot of interesting things with Trevor, so stick around for that interview.
Starting point is 00:01:16 Let's get right at it. Big trade that went down after we posted our Monday episode, the Rangers and White Sox hooked up on a deal that actually happened in our OOTP sim back in the spring. Lance Lynn gets traded to the White Sox. Dane Dunning, along with Avery Weems, goes back to Texas in the return. We've actually talked quite a bit about both Lynn and Dunning on this show. And I think the interesting thing here is that we've got a new park in texas from 2020 only a partial season of course but i'm curious is this a positive move for lynn or is it actually a slight negative even though guaranteed rate field doesn't play as hitter friendly as some people think that it does i don't know i think it's probable that whatever that field name is in Texas, what's it called?
Starting point is 00:02:07 Globe Life Park, I think, is what it is now. And it used to be Globe Life Field, or I have that flipped. Did he get just traded from one of the worst-named parks to the other worst-named park? Blah. Maybe the two worst-named parks, yeah. Globe Life to Guaranteed Rate. Like, ugh, I feel so corporate just saying them anyway that park in arlington i think is the most pitcher friendly park in baseball and lynn still managed to go
Starting point is 00:02:34 for the worst home run rate of his career i think he's a slightly more on the precipice and i've said this before but i think he's slightly more on the precipice than people realize when they do their rankings. They see the 3's ERA the last 2 years, 4 out of the last 5 years. They see just the durability other than the Tommy John surgery. They see the new velocity, and these are all good things. However, even at the new velocity, he saw a half-tick drop-off. If he sees another half tick drop off, he's going to be back to where he was in a Cardinals uniform pretty soon. So I'm not sure that this next season is great. And I would not necessarily be the one to sign Lin to his next
Starting point is 00:03:17 contract because I'm just not sure that he has the secondaries to go to anymore. He just used his slider more than he ever used in the past, and it's okay, but I don't think the curveball should be used more, and I don't think the change is any good. So I don't think he has another sort of old pitcher button to press, unless he goes to like 40% on the slider, which I don't think would actually be very good for him. So anyway, this next year, he is a good addition for the White Sox because they needed
Starting point is 00:03:46 innings and they needed more of a sure thing. And I think if you go Gialito, Lynn, Keuchel, and then say, okay, the rest is youngsters. You guys get together and figure out which of the best youngsters, see who plays their potential the best. That's a good way to go into the season. More sure things, and then you push the unsure things back to the back of the rotation and see what you get. So I think that makes sense. I think it makes sense for them to give up Dame Dunning, who's already 26 years old, does not have plus velocity, and may be more of a project in terms of building him up in terms of innings. I think he could probably pitch 100 to 120 next year maybe, but that would also be the most of his career or the second most of his career. So I think that it behooves the White Sox to trade innings,
Starting point is 00:04:38 team control and upside in the future for sure thing innings right now. And, and the Rangers, it's the opposite. So one of those things that where it makes sense for both teams still like Dunning, like him even more now that he's in that park in Arlington.
Starting point is 00:04:53 Yeah. It's a boost for Dunning then based on the way the new park in Arlington played in 2020, less pressure as far as candidates pushing for those rotation spots, right? If he'd stayed with the white socks you have cease and you have copec and i don't know if all three of those guys were going to open in the rotation together so i think this does give dane dunning a pretty nice boost lance
Starting point is 00:05:16 lynn has pitched more innings since start of 2019 than anybody else in the big leagues 292 in the third inning so goes deep in the games good for the bullpen yeah yep get you some rest that way so i do think it it does make sense from that sort of fit perspective i wonder and i didn't see a lot of this thrown out there when they made the trade because it's the last year of his deal and he's old enough where it's probably less than 50 likely but if lance lynn pitches well in 2021, I think you could see the White Sox put the qualifying offer on him. Because one more year at $18-ish million,
Starting point is 00:05:52 if he pitches well in 2021, isn't the worst possible thing. And if he does leave, you end up getting that draft pick back. I would rather do that, honestly, as if I was a front office person. I'd rather do that than sign Lynn to a four or five-year year deal and so Lin may find that happens on the market
Starting point is 00:06:10 too. Dunning has been one of my favorite sleepers because I really like the slider it's a slider league if you watched him pitch he puts the slider and the change and the foreseam in the right places. He commands those well. The thing that I want to see out of him is maybe increased velocity. He throws the sinker a lot at 90.5. He throws the foreseam a fair amount at 91.9. That's below average velocity. So I want to see a little bit more velocity out of him.
Starting point is 00:06:40 And I need to see better command of the sinker. He puts the sinker middle, middle a lot. And the sinker has a better movement profile than his four seam, but this is a four seam league. So there is some risks there based on the shape of his four seam and the command of a sinker. Um, but I still, I still like him. I still see a four pitch mix. Um, and I see a good park situation. So, uh, I'm in on So I'm in on Dunning. I'm probably going to have to creep him up in the rankings a bit,
Starting point is 00:07:09 maybe into the 65 to 70 range, a quick game of would you rather. So with Dane Dunning now in Texas, would you rather have Dunning or Mike Miner in 2021? Dunning, for sure. I did want to point out, I just looked at some numbers wrong. It's 92 on both,
Starting point is 00:07:30 but still below average velocity. How about Dunning versus Tony Gonsolin? Man, sometimes you got, like recency bias is so strong, dude. Like sometimes you got to like, just imagine the playoffs didn't happen. Tony Gonsolin, man. In a world in which the Dodgers get eliminated before Tony Gonsolin can make those extra playoff appearances.
Starting point is 00:07:55 You have such high lofty expectations for him. But just because of a few things that happened in October. It's like, yeah, maybe I'm not sure. When you look at the regular season numbers, they're good. You start telling stories to yourself because the command plus number on Gonsolin is not good. It's below 90. And you start saying, well, that's what happened in the postseason. I know, oh my God, with the command plus and the postseason, now I have a real reason to really denigrate Gonsolin. But right now, Gonsolin is in that rotation and has good stuff and has the strikeout and walk rates of a good pitcher. So I'm going to chill out on pushing my sleeper so hard that he goes past a legitimate pitcher that has established quality in the major leagues like Gonsolin.
Starting point is 00:08:41 All right, so Gonsolin above Dunning. How about Drew Smiley versus Dane Dunning? I think I found the right section to move him to, right? Because these are the guys that I'm looking at, and like you, I'm probably with you on Gonsolin, but it might be Gonsolin just ahead of Dunning at this point, because Smiley, I'm worried about innings, even though I liked what we were seeing when he was with the Giants. Of course, he lands in Atlanta. The numbers, the underlying numbers look really good. Command Plus was good. Called strikes and whiffs really good at 34.2%. But it was only 26 in the keep in mind. I'm going to pull myself back to reality by saying, hey, this was a very limited amount
Starting point is 00:09:30 of work from Drew Smiley. Yeah, I mean, Smiley and Dunning, you're looking at a pretty small sample stuff. And for Smiley, for Dunning, I think, to put on Velocity a couple years out of TJ, well, I guess Smiley had surgery too.
Starting point is 00:09:48 But Smiley pitched 114 innings in 2019. It wasn't like he didn't pitch at all. He pitched 114 innings with a 91-mile-an-hour fastball and then came out last year and threw 93.8. It's a real big outlier. I'm asking for Dunning to put on a half tick. We're asking Smiley to hold on to a two and a half tick increase. It's a little bit of a difference
Starting point is 00:10:15 there. I think Dunning. I think you're right generally that you've landed in the right spot. Alright. The upgrade is coming. I threw up a Twitter poll you've landed in the right spot. All right. The upgrade is coming. I threw up a Twitter poll on Monday night after the trade happened. I asked everybody, who's the most valuable White Sox starting pitcher after Lucas Chialito?
Starting point is 00:10:34 And I put that question out there expecting Lance Lynn to do well, but I really wanted to see where the field sort of was on Michael Kopech and Dylan Cease and Dallas Keuchel. Lance Lynn did win at 67.1%. Kopech came in with 16.3%. Cease, 9.9%. Keuchel, no one likes him, 6.8%. Innings eater, low K rate.
Starting point is 00:10:56 I get it. Not a lot of ceiling there, but floor matters in deeper leagues especially. Yeah, he's definitely a deep league play. But Kopech, after opting out in 2020 falls into that category of complete mystery box sorts of players. I liked him a lot going into 2020. I thought there was some reason to be optimistic about him. The stuff has always been really good.
Starting point is 00:11:17 If it clicks, we're talking about a guy that I think brings the arsenal of a number two sort of starter. And I'm by that, I mean like a top 30 fantasy starter. I think that's in his range of outcomes. And I think I would rather, at the price, go after Kopech than target Lin where he has to go.
Starting point is 00:11:38 You know, what people pay for Lance Lin, I don't think it's ridiculous, but I think there are other pitchers I like more, other players I like more, other players I like in that range. You get to the point where Kopech is more, it's not a lottery ticket, but he's outside the top 200 overall. And I think that's a sweet spot where I feel like I'm getting enough floor, even though we don't know what the workload is going to look like. And we're definitely getting a ceiling that could lead to a pretty big payoff.
Starting point is 00:12:06 Yeah. I mean, sitting 95 where he threw three pitches, 10% of the time, that's, that's the raw stuff that dreams are made out of. So, um,
Starting point is 00:12:13 you know, I think the, the command is a little bit, uh, to be wondered about even with the lowest, with a little walk rate, he had a, he'd had high walk rates in the minors,
Starting point is 00:12:21 high, high home run late last year. So, um, we'll So we'll see. But I agree with you generally. I think we should play a little quick would you rather on Lance Lynn. Yeah. All right.
Starting point is 00:12:32 Let's run it off ADP. Running it off my rankings is stupid. That's what one person thinks. Let's try to crowdsource it off of the group, and we're going to use drafts since the start of November from the NFBC. 37 drafts in total. Lance Lin, ADP, 62. And, okay, Lance Lin or
Starting point is 00:12:52 Sonny Gray? Sonny Gray. Yeah, that's an easy Gray for me. Lance Lin or Hyunjin Ryu? There's a little bit of innings versus quality, but next year might be a real problem in innings in which case i guess maybe that's an argument for lynn do you know because he'll probably just
Starting point is 00:13:14 throw a bunch of innings um but i normally go quality over innings so i'm saying just a sort of qualified Ryu. I'm snap on Ryu being better. Like that's my quick response, but I do think the, the caution sticker, the warning on Hingen Ryu should be that a 60 game season and being healthy for a 60 game season is different than being healthy for 162. Yeah,
Starting point is 00:13:41 right. Because he wasn't on the IL in a shortened season, it counts as a healthy season. And this is a guy that if he had to throw 180 last year, might not have been able to do it because he's got a lot of arm injuries in his past. So don't forget those because they are a big deal. But I do like Ryu better than Lin. We've talked a lot about the depth of his arsenal being a big part of his success over the last couple of seasons. How about Zach Plesak versus Lance Litt?
Starting point is 00:14:10 I think Plesak's ADP, he's in the top 60 overall. I can't do it. I'm going, man. I mean, at that point, I'd just be like, hey, this is someone I think is a bulk player for me. That's how I think of Plesak. So if I'm going to go bulk, I'm going to go with the proven bulk. I've got Plesak ranked ahead of Lin. I'm not drafting either of them at their
Starting point is 00:14:31 respective prices. I don't like that group. There's just too many ways it can go wrong. One more. Lance Lin or Carlos Carrasco? I see a few warning signs of Carrasco. But in some ways, they're similar to the warning signs that I see from Lynn. Because, I mean, Carrasco threw his worst fastball since 2011, which is before he kind of had
Starting point is 00:15:03 that transformation last year in terms of he threw 94 if that drops down to 93 plus next year then we're talking about perhaps pre-transformation collins carasco right um and there's just a weird thing that's been happening to his curveball and his slider where uh they they were becoming more similar. So I don't know if that's super meaningful or not, but I'm buying time. You can tell. What's a good,
Starting point is 00:15:38 it must be a decent question then. Yeah. Some of the things that, some of the stuff that was happening to slide and curveball kind of reversed last year. I'm going gonna go to carasco i've got lynn exactly one spot ahead of them it's weird those guys are as close in adp as they are since they're back to back in my rankings but there you go similarly minded people doing some drafts early on the one thing that sort of pops for carasco is the called strikes and whiffs. 30.3% compared to Lin, 26.7%.
Starting point is 00:16:08 Both a tick below average in terms of Command Plus at 96 for Carrasco, 98 for Lin. Not an alarmingly no number. I'm just a little bit surprised about that Command Plus for Lin because I just think of him as a guy with great command. And I wonder if he kind of changes the shape on his fastball kind of minutely if he's a little bit like jaime garcia where he has like six fastballs you know what i mean where he's like you know i have a two seamer and a sinker you know what i mean like i there's something about the way he shapes fastballs that may not be captured by an approach where you bin it and you just say hey this is his fastball well maybe he has you know the riding four seamer and maybe he has the cutting four
Starting point is 00:16:52 seamer and maybe you know what i mean like so i i feel like um there may be some touch that's not being captured by command plus when it comes to lin but um otherwise, called spikes plus whiffs is a good way to combine stuff plus command. I mean, the called strikes and the whiffs, right? And Lynn doesn't really show up there that strongly there. Yeah, if you're going off that,
Starting point is 00:17:16 as a tiebreaker at least, Carrasco would break through that cluster. I've also got Max Freed sort of tucked into that range too. The market has Freed a little bit earlier than both of those guys. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. Forget the pressure to be crushing your workout on day one. Just start moving with the Peloton bike, bike plus,
Starting point is 00:17:38 tread, row, guide, or app. There are thousands of classes and over 50 Peloton instructors ready to support you from the beginning. Remember, doing something is everything. Rent the Peloton bike or bike plus today at onepeloton.ca slash bike slash rentals. All access membership separate. Terms apply. White Sox also made a move. They brought back an old friend, trademark. Adam Eaton is back with the White Sox on a one-year deal. It made me wonder, are they obligated to make a move that people don't like for every move that they make
Starting point is 00:18:12 people do like? Because Adam Eaton is not what I would describe as a likable guy. He does not have a track record of being harmonious in the clubhouse. So it seems like a very curious addition with so many corner outfield options on the market.
Starting point is 00:18:30 Yeah, I mean, they could have went and got Robbie Grossman and they wouldn't have to answer any questions about, you know, Scissors and Drake LaRoche or whatever. But, you know, one of the things that Eaton is good at in the normal season is getting on base. And I think that's what they signed him for. I would expect he doesn't face a single lefty next year. And they have a Dos Adames platoon out there.
Starting point is 00:18:57 And I have the White Sox signing two more big-name free agents. I have the White Sox signing two out of the ten top free agents that I have a piece going up tomorrow about the fits for the top ten free agents. I have the White Sox signing two out of the 10 top free agents that I have a piece going up tomorrow about the fits for the top 10 free agents. So Eaton as a starting right fielder and we're done doing business, I think is what made people react really strongly to this. Eaton as a platoon outfielder, step one of a three or four step program, I can't get too angry about. I think probably, you know, I like Grossman. I like this guy. Maybe I like Jock better. You know, that's what I would have done maybe, especially if it's for a platoon anyway. I think Jock would have made sense. But for people saying like, oh, Brantley or Azuna,
Starting point is 00:19:46 well, I think that might still be coming. I think they're going to have one more signing in terms of in the lineup and in the pitching staff. Yeah, if Eden's more of a fourth outfielder plus, then this ends up being really nice. If he ends up being a fixture in the lineup, I don't know. He's not really a good defender at this point in being really nice. If he ends up being a fixture in the lineup, I don't know. He's not really a good defender at this point in his career either. The OBP, that's real. That's a skill that he's proven time and time again that he owns. But he used to be kind of like another Brett Gardner type where you get a dozen or so homers and maybe a dozen steals in a good year.
Starting point is 00:20:21 Maybe he pops a few extra homers to go to boost that total a little bit for fantasy i'm not that super no no because the speed could just totally disappear like there's there's no reason to believe the speed's gonna hold on forever and then he's like probably not a good weekly guy because i think adam angle will steal two or three uh starts a week from him so it is weird that both yeah. Platoon and Adam Engel. But I think that is a good point. They're probably not done as they continue to
Starting point is 00:20:52 give themselves a shot to really be the favorites in the AL Central. I think that's the direction they're heading if they add those two big pieces that you alluded to. One of their moves in the AL Central, Carlos Santana gets a two-year deal from the Royals. Interesting because the Royals were tied for 26th in Team OBP in 2020.
Starting point is 00:21:12 This is something that they've struggled with for a while. The park is a more difficult one for home runs compared to progressive fields, so I think you do worry a little bit about the power tapering off somewhat for Carlos Santana. He turns 35 in April. He's the kind of player that projections like, and as you've pointed out, the research that Jeff Zimmerman has done tells us to be a little weary of those projections for a player like Carlos Santana.
Starting point is 00:21:38 So how do you feel about this move? I understand how they're justifying it because I think, like Adam Eaton, Carlos Santana owns that skill of drawing a lot of walks and getting on base a lot but i could see some hits to that obp coming from the fact that he's going to hit a ton of fly balls he doesn't run well like all the things you can do to drag down your average will also pull that obp down a little bit if the power starts to dry up, he's not the stalwart filler in the corner for fantasy players either,
Starting point is 00:22:10 even though I think the Royals are just going to jam him into the heart of their lineup. Yeah, I think there just wasn't a good third baseman, necessarily, that fit because they let a perfectly bad third baseman go um and now they're moving ryan o'hearn over to third is what they're saying um and they obviously you know they're kind of up against what they spent in the past so i don't think that they had a lot more money than two years and 17 million to spend i don't think they were going to pull Justin Turner or DJ LeMayhew
Starting point is 00:22:46 away from these other teams with that kind of money. So their other choice would have been to spend a little bit more to take a shortstop and turn him into a third baseman like Didi Gregorius or Marcus Simeon. That's a possible outcome, but even by WRC Plus or projected bat, Santana's going to be better than that so there isn't there wasn't like a better alternative necessarily for that team and i laud them for trying to improve their team um and if santana bounces back and if minor bounces back and the team isn't that good they're still sellable uh players i think on those
Starting point is 00:23:23 contracts santana a little bit less because it's two years and $17 million. But if they ate like $5 million of it at the deadline, they could probably send him somewhere too. So I think it's smart for them to do what they did. I don't know that I put Santana immediately on even like a deep league must draft kind of list because of what Zimmerman found. I mean, just projected bounce backs at 35 years old are not something you want to kind of want to base your real life or fantasy team on.
Starting point is 00:23:57 Right. I'm more inclined to do it in a league that uses OBP instead of batting average. But I did that in the XFL over the weekend because he was really cheap. First base was a wasteland. I figured he'd play a lot, and it's a deep enough league. It's 15 teams where I do think
Starting point is 00:24:14 there's a chance I could flip him if my team is not contending and get something back, bundle him with someone better, whatever. Are you the Royals of your... No, come on, man. No, come on, man. No, no, no. No, no, no. No. No, no, no.
Starting point is 00:24:28 No, I think in certain instances, a player like Carlos Santana is a little undervalued, but I think in most instances, 10, 12-team mixed leagues, he's not quite where he wants to be. I mean, last year, it was a bad year, and he still had a 349 OBP, so he's probably in some lineups last year. Now it's our pleasure to be joined by the newest member of the New York
Starting point is 00:24:50 Mets. I'm frantically checking Twitter to make sure that the Mets didn't just add somebody else in the last 10 seconds, but it's pitcher Trevor May. Trevor, thanks for making some time to talk to us today. Thanks for having me on guys. So your career has unfolded in a very interesting period of time with a lot of advancements in pitching development.
Starting point is 00:25:07 As far as how the organization was handling pitching during your time in Minnesota, how much did things change over your eight years there? Oh, night and day. I think that there was a lot of different people involved coming and going. And it was very much in the height of making that transition from kind of traditional a lot of eye tests a lot of you know uh years of experience um contrasted with with you know science basically telling you uh what's actually happening when when our eyes see it um very much that transition maybe a little bit more complicated but very much similar to the way that they portrayed it in uh moneyball um and uh so i was there right at the right when i was
Starting point is 00:25:51 traded over there it was just it was a lot of traditional thinking it was a lot of uh you know makeup uh mental you know like um competitiveness and stuff of that nature and and you know i still believe that all has a very high value in the game. I mean, it's still important that your players want to win and are able to change their mindset when they need to and reinstate when they need to. Those are all skills that need to exist that can't be really quantified as well by numbers um but uh in the past few years a really really
Starting point is 00:26:31 heavy uh emphasis on understanding empirically why why balls move the way they do why guys throw the way they do um injuries are in court and incorporated in that too understanding body movements and how that contributes to to wear and tear on the body, how important rest is. I mean, all those things factor in huge. I think that's kind of talked about not enough is how much of this, how the Sabre metrics and analytics has contributed to the idea of rest. In a game where we play 162 games,
Starting point is 00:27:05 it's our regular season a month longer than any other professional sport. Like your body, yes, it's a little bit less impact on the daily, but mentally the grind is longer and there's no end in sight for a very long time. And so you kind of have to find a way to make your body feel it's
Starting point is 00:27:25 almost as if like how whoever feels like whoever can get to that 90% recharge rate more often, I think has the more successful years. So understanding that how it all works and how that happens has been a huge, huge change from the 2012 Minnesota Twins to the 2020 Minnesota Twins. huge change from the 2012 Minnesota Twins to the 2020 Minnesota Twins. That's really interesting. How did that manifest to you in doing your job? Like, did you have like more mandatory days where you were totally, you wouldn't get hot, you were unavailable?
Starting point is 00:28:01 Did you have a more sort of like regimented throw, not throw, that sort of schedule. You were also kind of transitioning from starting to relieving, but rest for reliever. Was it like if you got hot, that counted as going in the game with the new regime? It was closer. It was valued more. So we were always keeping track of the last seven days,
Starting point is 00:28:26 how many times you got up and got hot or how close you were to going into a game. We really closely monitored how many throws we made in the bullpen. And we tried to have a good idea of how guys bounced back. I actually got the reputation of being one of the better, maintaining stuff back to back days or three out of four days better than a lot of other guys just because of the way that I maintain my long toss my arm strength and like I believe in throwing a lot and that kind of and then that and
Starting point is 00:28:58 then that and always like kind of had a lot of uncertainty around like what my role was going to be whether I was going to stick I had injuries like you said there was a lot of uncertainty around like what my role was going to be whether i was going to stick i had injuries like you said uh there was a lot of like coming back from kind of falling out of favor and coming back and you know uh there was a lot of that for me so uh i've i learned very early just be ready when you get your opportunity you need to take advantage of every opportunity you get because when you're not on the field you get no opportunities so take advantage of those opportunities and make sure that you're establishing yourself. I have that mindset already, so it was easy for me to be ready. I'd say that not
Starting point is 00:29:29 necessarily having a schedule. I think that's more of minor. There's times where minor league, like in 2018, I got optioned for a month. We were very much on it. These three guys are pitching this day. It wasn't official, but we just got the flow of things. We knew we were going to pitch that night uh we very rarely ever threw back to back
Starting point is 00:29:47 um not that i couldn't it was just i was with a group of guys that were being uh kind of used in that way so that when they got called up they weren't too we kind of knew where they were like you would always know where they were in terms of uh um you know there's no time when like your triple a coach is out there trying to win every game. And then you got through four out of six times and he gets called the big leagues is worthless. Right. We always knew, we always knew that guys were fairly fresh. So that anyone being called up, we felt good about throwing them that night. And so, but in the big leagues, it was more like there was,
Starting point is 00:30:21 there's definitely more days where they're like, you're down, like you're not pitching, um, or emergency, um, 13th inning, 14th inning, like we might need you. Uh, and, and they were really good. They were over communicating, uh, over communicators, which I, I personally, I love. Um, and you know, there's times where they were just like, you, uh, you're emergency, but you're down. Right. But they don't want it.
Starting point is 00:30:44 We, we didn't have the arms to be able to tell that many guys. But we had a couple times where five of us, we were like, Sergio, Klippert, May, Rogers, and Duffy, none of you guys are pitching today. We had a couple of those days where there was eight, nine of us out there. I'm like, you four. It's you four tonight. I think that that's so valuable that like those guys who are like every night like i'm probably not going to get the high leverage but then there's
Starting point is 00:31:11 one night where they're like it could be me in the eighth tonight and they know that and they were able to prepare for it and then they go out and do their job it just made it so much much much better as a bullpen i think that's a huge testament to why we're so good so yes there there there was an active um strategy to rest guys as much as possible and and with position players it was a little bit more straightforward and obviously it was really or with with starters it's they were giving them extra days and everyone knew ahead of time and relievers is more like show up at the field that day and they're like you're down it's a lot of most of the time it was like with me especially they were like how do you feel today because i was better back to back than a lot of other guys so um and we and we yeah we followed that that that program pretty well so knowing
Starting point is 00:31:55 whether you're up or down in a day matters a lot more in your preparation of course than knowing if you're going to pitch the sixth the eighth the ninth whatever right like having a dedicated closer seems like something teams are getting away from. From your perspective, is that something you're comfortable with, moving around between innings so long as you know if you're getting into the game or if you're not getting into the game as far in advance as possible? Yes. Yes. I think that's the most ideal way to do it. I think that there are times where the completely,
Starting point is 00:32:26 like, kind of fluidity of your bullpen can be a detriment. Like, for example, a guy who surged through the eighth mostly, right? But there's times where he's in the seventh, and a couple times he got the sixth. But his window is a little bit more narrow. So if everyone has this super wide open one you you kind of like if the days you're up you're so locked in the whole time that it's it's just mentally exhausting so having those days where you're like i can check i can more or less check out in terms of preparing
Starting point is 00:32:58 to face guys tonight because i don't have to do it that was bought for good for your body but also just as good for your mind so um there were times you know there were times where a couple guys there was times where to be frank and honest uh clip and i had a little bit of a we we were seeing like we were going in the fourth and third sometimes so we're like i gotta be ready from the third to the ninth like that's a lot because there's there's got to be a point where you kind of go past where you're going to pitch and like the game is not going to dictate you going in, but you feel like you still going in.
Starting point is 00:33:28 You're just like this the whole time. And, and, and so like you Duffy always talked about it. He's like having these days where I just need to be like, like I'm, I'm a spectator today. I'm going to root my guys on and I'm going to learn,
Starting point is 00:33:40 I'm going to pay attention, but I don't need to like stretch all day and whatever. So like the days we were told we were down, like that's, those are the days I'm like, I'm taking advantage of a full down day because I'm going to pay attention, but I don't need to stretch all day and whatever. So the days we were told we were down, those are the days I'm like, I'm taking advantage of a full down day because I'm going to turn this into an off day as much as I can because you just don't get that many. And so, especially with this COVID season, man, we were just like, dude, any of these off days could just be completely just destroyed or gone because of a positive test from another team or for our own team.
Starting point is 00:34:08 Who knows, man? We could be pulling a cardinals and just been playing every day double headers for the rest of the season so uh we can't really bank on these things so we need to take advantage of them when we get them so um but the fluidity in general like the idea that you can throw whenever i like it i like i like everyone kind of being on their toes in that way because i think your bullpen's a little bit better overall. You get the most out of guys when it's like that. There was a couple more things that are kind of changing in baseball over
Starting point is 00:34:34 the past few years of your career. One of them is just everyone throwing the high fastball more. I kind of looked at what you were doing and it looks like you're throwing the fastball higher and higher and more high fastballs with every year, and the whiff rate is going up with it.
Starting point is 00:34:49 But also, frankly, the homer rate. And, you know, that's why old-school bat ball, like I grew up watching the Braves, like they were all about down and away because they wanted to suppress the homer. I know we're going after whiffs. I guess the question is, can you throw too many high fastballs? Is there a dance up there at the top of the zone that you think about? Yeah, I mean, I think that my whole career I've thrown,
Starting point is 00:35:16 when I was a starter and young in the minors, I threw up there on accident a lot. And it got lots of people. People would always wonder, like, why do you guys swing up way up high on you and like no one else and i'm like it's just the way we didn't understand how the ball moved we didn't know what carry was like and it was always four spot down and away four spot when it came to the twins they call it four spot it was like a grid and the four was the down and away they were huge down and away brad radke brad radke style, the Johan Santana style changeup, you know.
Starting point is 00:35:46 And that, I think that there's guys that do that extremely well, but it's all about, like, where your ball looks like it's going to be and then where it actually is and whether or not that is going to be a place that is high damage area. For example, the middle of the plate is always going to be mid thigh, right down the middle is going to be the easiest ball for a guy to hit square is going to be. So if you're throwing sinkers, you throw sinkers up, it's going to go there. If you're throwing carry balls down, it's going to stay up in the zone more and not
Starting point is 00:36:22 dive down. So you want your balls to be moving away from those problem areas or moving away from wherever the guy's hotspone zone is. So I think that the mass vast majority of my homers have been on pitches that were not thrown where I wanted them. I can't think of very many that I've given up high in the zone that were like up in the zone on purpose and actually located and then taking me where i was like oh i just didn't think he would do that there's a few there's not a lot
Starting point is 00:36:50 most of the homers i give up are on fastballs down because i don't want to throw them down there um you know a lot of people talk about my home rate home run rate this year which is really it's kind of it's kind of silly to me too because it was like five in 23 innings. When in 2018, I gave up four in 25 innings. Now, if you think about it, that's one more home run. But like the home run rates are drastically different, right? Right, right. So home run rate especially is like a very sample size thing and it's tough to do for early.
Starting point is 00:37:20 We just don't throw that many innings. But yeah, home runs are a thing. Everyone's trying to hit them and we're throwing places in place that it's easier to lift the ball so if you you just those two elements together are going to produce more home runs now you avoid them by um being really good at yeah being really good at commanding that top of the zone which is only getting better i feel like for me i'm getting more i'm getting a better idea of like what's a called strike and what's not going to be called, but going to be swung at.
Starting point is 00:37:48 And then missing away from the heart of the plate when I miss and I make, making decisions with that kind of mindset, it's risk reward. It's taking very few high risk, low reward, like fights, if you will. And just kind of trying to be trying to make sure I'm more in my strengths. And if I do have that day where I'm not feeling great and not commanding very well, that I'm hitting in those spots that aren't going to be –
Starting point is 00:38:19 it's not going to be down the middle. And so that's been the big one. Like, 2019, for example, curveball crushed me. I gave it three homers in a week on a curveball set. And that basically was just like, wow, this thing's not very good. Let's just get rid of it and let's go a better way. That was my next question, dude. So it seems like you turfed the curve and, but the slider got more drops.
Starting point is 00:38:45 So did you kind of find a new breaking ball? That's like different from what you had before. Like you kind of found something in between your slider and your curve ball. Like what, what kind of work for you? What, what,
Starting point is 00:38:55 what, what, what cues did you go through that? Like kind of made that happen mechanically or grip wise or change. Yeah. So I changed the grip. Um, I changed the grip closer to Irvin Santana's slider.
Starting point is 00:39:09 He has a lot of depth, but he also had horizontal movement, but that was how he threw it, and he was more kind of on the top side of the ball, and I'm definitely more throw-mind spiral like a football. It's not really a tight dot. It's like one of those weird things. It's very similar to the way the break isn't the same or anything but like the way that brad hands breaking ball comes out of his hand he throws like a grips kind of a two seam and it comes out and it spins in a way
Starting point is 00:39:35 that hitters see it and it doesn't break the way that the spin shows it should be breaking that makes sense it's kind of funky um so he gets lots of depth he gets like depth early and then he gets sweep late it's like a weird like uh you know it's similar he doesn't change his grip he has the same grip it's like a two-seam grip yeah and so but that's just his natural like how he throws it's just it just works kind of like how britain britain kind of is really close too i don't know i think he holds a two-seam but it's not a huge difference. Cutter grip. Yeah. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:40:05 Yeah. Cutter grip. And he just turns it over. Yeah. So I find those things. And so I, I have this thought in my mind, what a slider was for my whole life, but I never threw one a lot or wasn't really good with it.
Starting point is 00:40:17 And so my, it was always like a little cutter. I threw it a traditionally, a traditional slider grip. And I was trying to get it to horizontal movement, my body, my arm, everything. Horizont everything horizontal movement isn't it's gonna take your thing but depth is i've always had elite depth and i have care so those i have really good carry and i have really good depth on breaking balls why would i not just like all in on on up and down
Starting point is 00:40:41 instead of trying to get something to go off the plate that I may or may not be able to do without a lot of practice. You'll hear when Trevor Bauer talks about pitching a lot, he was, again, he was a depth guy and a rise ball guy, and through a ton of practice and pitch design, he's turned his slider more into it's not even that hard. It's like kind of a curveball still. It looks like a curveball, yeah. He throws something.
Starting point is 00:41:03 He just wanted the horizontal movement. He didn't really care about the velocity or anything he's just like i need something to go that way so when i need that i can have that and uh and you know then he wins the sign up right so uh um that's like kind of the way that you go through these things you got to understand fully so yeah so what happened was i started throwing that other slider um our our analytics linux department at uh um in was like, hey, try it out. We'll throw in bullpens and stuff. We'll get some data on it.
Starting point is 00:41:30 When they came to you, did they suggest a grip change or a cue change? Or did they tell you what you're looking for in terms of movement or velocity or something? What did they come to you with? Like, hey, we think your slider should do X and Y or Z or something. I was just like, I'm messing with the slider. Jeremy Hefner was a bullpen coach. I was like, check this out. He's like, that looks freaking gross.
Starting point is 00:41:51 And let's record it and see. And he got the video. And then Josh Kalk, the head of the analytics department with the twins. Was like, this is good. We funnel it to him. I threw some in games. They were nowhere close to the zone. No one swung.
Starting point is 00:42:04 I didn't have feel for it, but he's like your movement profile is great compared to other pitches at that velocity is like a lead elite. So you have way more depth than any, like you're throwing the hardest curve ball in the league. Yeah. Almost like there's only a couple other guys that are throwing the Lance McCullers thing or whatever.
Starting point is 00:42:22 Yeah. Yeah. Even Lance, even Lance, he is, he's got such good horizontal and such good horizontal movement. Right. There's a lot of those guys,
Starting point is 00:42:31 Taylor Rogers, sliders, same thing. Just tons of horizontal movement and good, pretty good depth. But mine was all depth, which made it like a weird, like really good tunneling off my fastball.
Starting point is 00:42:41 Um, and so more, I started throwing it. I had to start working on again like i said i want to throw this here and when i miss i want it to be a certain place so i can still maybe get swings and misses and i'll never get hurt the way the curveball was and then so i was throwing it i still had my curveball at that time what happened was curveball velocity started going up brakes started going down they started melding into each other so they were starting to break
Starting point is 00:43:02 pretty close to the same amount except it was six miles an hour slower so they're like i'm like i remember i gave it homer to dominic smith who's now my teammate uh just blew a game straight up blew it like that was probably the one that i just blew like yeah it would double start off through and homer we're up by one we're down by two and that game just exploded on us right that was just a at that point i was like i there's no way to wiggle out of this that was just uh i just was bad that was bad um that happened i remember the next day i was like i need something actionable i think i'm gonna bang it i think we're just gonna go slider and we're gonna and basically josh goes i love your slider he goes we have you know at that point we had two and a half months he goes we're gonna we're gonna be in the playoffs we were up in the
Starting point is 00:43:40 division uh he goes we're gonna go to the playoffs we're gonna need you in the playoffs we want you to be the best version of yourself in the playoffs use these two two months and just like don't worry about it and just throw the crap out of it just keep throwing it i just took that advice i picked it up way faster than i thought i would and i had my change up and the change up is a comfort level so there's an there's actually a couple outings last year you can tell uh through against the braves uh through tons of change-ups so there was like two or three outings where i was like i'm gonna use my change up while i'm figuring out this slider and uh and then i figured out a slider faster and i thought a couple weeks figured out slider and then that became my my uh my punchy pitch again um the way my curveball was
Starting point is 00:44:19 so it was a quick transition but it was on purpose and so but That was a lot of the feedback I got. I got guys going, this looks good, hitters are telling you it's good, and the data backs up that it's good. Let's use that pitch. What else do you need? I'm like, I don't need anything. Let's go. I get fired up and I work my butt off trying to get all that stuff done. I'm just going to
Starting point is 00:44:40 keep doing that. That's why I'm so fired up with Hef again because he was such an integral part of that process. There's a lot of debate in our circles right now about how to value the 60-game season, what we can learn from it, how much it matters as we try to project performance going forward. From your perspective, you kind of hinted this with the home run rate being high. That doesn't matter over 20-ish innings, but what were you able to learn from 2020 and how is that shaping your prep for 2021 oh what was it oh well um i'm really good at wearing masks that's that's a big thing that
Starting point is 00:45:11 i'm sure is going to be part of 2021 um there's there's it was just kind of trying to continue on using the process so so that i that i'd kind of come up with kind of how I prepared for teams and have had a big role in that too. But I just kept in that vein and kept going, even with the delay of the season and even with it only being 60 games and really trying to adjust when things aren't going well, making those adjustments really quickly. I think that's something that I – like you just didn't have time.
Starting point is 00:45:44 You didn't have a month to just be terrible like you you you that month need to be condensed into like two outings like you're good you can have two tough ones but you need to get back on track fast because you just you might be a free agent at the end of the year you know what i mean that was always in our mind and that's something that uh making quick adjustments like the guys that did that the best like if you saw guys who started slow, like there was very few people like picking it up. Like it was just, you just ran out of time.
Starting point is 00:46:10 Um, and so you, you learned a lot of, like there was just a more of a, a little bit more of a sense of urgency. Um, and, uh,
Starting point is 00:46:19 I, I'd say that that's something that I can take in. And then the, and I kind of just got rid of some of the, some of the eyewash i used to do um and i've been doing that for a year like i when i was 18 i was just like oh you know give me all these pro folders and programs i'm gonna do everything and all of them or i can't be a big leaguer right and then over the years you realize okay that didn't
Starting point is 00:46:37 actually help that didn't actually help so i've been starting to start like sloughing on off that extra stuff um and so that this year was definitely one. I'm like, this is what I need to do to be ready tonight. Uh, um, and, and this is the adjustments I'm making based on what the information I got in
Starting point is 00:46:53 the last couple of days and keep going. So really locking in that process. Um, I'm just gonna, I really, really excited to go to spring training and just feet on the ground, uh, off to the races.
Starting point is 00:47:03 I'm getting the whole process ready, how I'm going to work with the analytics department, how I'm going to work with Hef and Louie and everyone, how it all works and how the whole bullpen works together and just go from there. You have a lot of interest beyond baseball.
Starting point is 00:47:20 You stream, you podcast, you game a lot. More recently, you invested in a new football league, Fan Controlled Football. Games are going to get started for that in February. They're going to be streamed on Twitch. And fans will call plays in real time. So you're one of the owners of the Zappers. This league is wild.
Starting point is 00:47:37 What led you to get involved? First of all, I had the opportunity of being with Bob Mettery. If anyone who doesn't know who Bob is, you should go check out his YouTube channel. He's that guy who does all the funny commentator after the fact of funny plays in sports. He's one of the funniest guys there
Starting point is 00:47:56 is in sports media, I would say. That was big. Two, I'm plugged into Twitch, man. I believe so much in the ability for people watching to have control or at least feel like they at least have what they're saying or doing create some sort of reaction.
Starting point is 00:48:21 They feel like they're being heard or seen or that they have, they're part of it, right? So this is basically, that box was checked in a huge way. Within 10 minutes, they were like, we want fans to call the place. I was like, I don't know if that's going to, like, work in a football stand. I don't know if, like, it's going to translate to anyone winning or losing. But at the end of the day, man, like, it just matters that people watching or enjoying it. And that's the thing. Like,
Starting point is 00:48:46 like a lot of people are like, we need robo-umps because we need every call. Perfect. All the time. And I'm like, we actually technically don't, we actually need Paul calls to be, we need people to not do a good job sometimes.
Starting point is 00:48:57 So we can yell about it on Twitter. Exactly. Exactly. And all the people go on their radio shows and yell about how terrible that car was or that decision. The human beings trying to make mistakes is a huge part of sport. We're entertainers. We just go out and we entertain you.
Starting point is 00:49:15 That's what we do. If you're not entertained, what's the point? And I'm super excited just as an athlete myself, all the opportunities that a lot of these guys who are going to play in the league are going to have. There's been talk of Johnny Manziel being in the league, which would be, let's be honest, the guy's a brand. It would be hilarious. I would love for Twitch chat to pick Johnny Manziel's plays. That would be just the best melding of all the world.
Starting point is 00:49:41 If anybody would go kiss a cheerleader in between a play, too. Let's do it. I mean, I don't even know. I don't know what this is going to look like. I know it's going to be a studio. It's going to be very like arena style football. But they,
Starting point is 00:49:54 they chose our, the zappers, which is our name, which I was not my choice. They chose our colors, which is a seventies, eighties carpet, orange and yellow.
Starting point is 00:50:04 Also didn't choose that. And the logo, which is a... He did a phenomenal job. We had three really good choices. But I didn't choose that one. I'm going to be honest. That wasn't my favorite at the forgetting. We didn't choose that either. So basically what Twitch chat does
Starting point is 00:50:20 and what you need to know if you don't watch a lot of Twitch is basically whatever you want, Twitch generally just goes against you because uh that's kind of what's happening to me and bob but and but then we realized really quickly that's our brand so like we're gonna be out here we're gonna be live streaming the games people can come into our channels watch them with us live we're gonna have the on-screen widget so a lot of the voting and stuff's gonna happen in our stream obviously there's gonna be a mainstream with the game too um so but we're gonna be hyping we're gonna be he's i'm sure he's gonna be commentating mainstream with the game too um so but we're going to be hyping we're going to be he's i'm sure he's going to be commentating and having a great
Starting point is 00:50:47 time with it but we're going to try to we're going to try to guide people they're going to go directly against us so we're going to try to reverse psychology it's gonna be a lot of fun to be it's going to be you love fantasy football and love fantasy sports there's going to be a whole this is going to be a whole new world for you um and if you really need someone to go like you know we need this guy to get targeted 10 times, you can influence people to vote for him to get placed so that he gets targeted. There's going to be all these things, right? There's going to be all these things that are going to probably spring up around it that are super, just from a business standpoint,
Starting point is 00:51:19 super interesting to me. But it just combines like content, combines like engagement, all these things that I really enjoy that I'm really getting into. And I'm trying to build, um, brand brand around, um, because this is all, these are all things that I do every day.
Starting point is 00:51:34 I think baseball needs more of. Um, so it just, it's just a really good time to do it. Um, and the guy and the team behind it is working. They, they understand how content works.
Starting point is 00:51:43 They're pushing out all kinds of stuff. All the teams have their own Twitters and stuff, and now they're engaging with us and getting people hyped up. I know from my experience that that's how the world works now. It's all co-signing and all just getting the more people that you follow talking about a thing, you tend to get into it. So I cannot wait to see how this thing how it kicks off it's four games four weeks like it's not going to be anything not crazy time committed like to be a fan you don't have to like
Starting point is 00:52:13 you know you don't have to be like oh i gotta block out the next six months so i can watch you know like it'll be uh it'll be a nice taste i think of what it can be. And then obviously we have a bunch of stars involved with Mike Tyson, Miro from the WWE, Richard Sherman, Marshawn Lynch, Quavo from Migos. And then me. Me and Bob are like,
Starting point is 00:52:38 how did we get in this? We're just the other team. We're that other team. And we can't wait to be the underdogs. Do you have the biggest Twitch followers of the group. I think I technically have the most followers, but you know, we know Marshawn was like, yo,
Starting point is 00:52:52 I'm streaming. Like, these guys can move mountains, but I'm hoping to get there someday. Well, I'm excited to, to, to see what you do with the Mets. I was in New York for almost 10 years and kind of chose to be a Mets fan.
Starting point is 00:53:12 I wasn't going to be a Yankees fan. And I'm excited for 2021 to open up. Excited for concerts. Excited for being able to go to delis. And I heard that you went to a great deli in queens i do a lot of sandwiches on on my instagram and on my twitter feed and um i'm not going to ask you about that one in particular because it looked like uh uh you know you you got that's been well reported but i'm going to jump off of that what is your favorite sort of um meat like
Starting point is 00:53:42 what is your favorite sort of building block uh for a sandwich so i'm a huge uh uh baseline turkey so i'm a turkey sandwich guy but i like to add like obviously not just turkey so yeah you gotta get weird after that yeah yeah you get weird after that um that and then recently i just i'm on like i talked about this on something else i think but chicken but not not necessarily deli style like fried chicken or chicken cutlets. So that's why I was so excited about that sandwich. I actually made my own battered fried chicken sandwiches in an air fryer. Like an homage after that?
Starting point is 00:54:17 Yeah. I was just like, I got to try it. And we realized, eh, the chicken, we've been getting Instacarted groceries because we're trying to limit the number of times you go to the grocery store. They didn't choose the best chicken. So I think in the future, I'm, like, going to butcher chicken. I'm going to go to a butcher and get, like, chicken thighs, like, the best, like, dark meat, like, let's go.
Starting point is 00:54:38 That's right. Here's the thing, because I got the air fryer and I do the sandwiches. Here's the thing that might be interesting to you. Hitting coach Matt Lyle says crumble up. You can do double. So do a breadcrumbs, but crumble up some Ritz and and do double. So you kind of do into the breadcrumbs,
Starting point is 00:54:56 into the egg, into the Ritz, the crumbled Ritz crackers. And that gives a little bit, I think a little bit of sugar is probably what, what it does, but like it's, it's pretty good butteriness does. It's pretty good.
Starting point is 00:55:05 The butteriness, too. That's probably really good. I'm inspired. I'm going to do that chicken, the Ritz chicken, on a sandwich. I just got to go get the right bread. Oh, that sounds so good. I'm so excited. I was going to make a spicy ranch.
Starting point is 00:55:23 I looked in our fridge. I'm like like we don't have ranch like this is i'm so offended so we i just make straight up chalula aioli with mayo but it was it was phenomenal i mean don't know sandwich great you gotta go i go i go potato roll a lot of people like like uh like grill or go a little bit like you know ciabatta or something something a little bit like ciabatta or something a little more tough. Dutch crunch. Super soft. So you can freaking hold it. It starts to slide and you're eating all the bun and none of the chicken.
Starting point is 00:55:54 And then you just can't hold it anymore. Potato rolls are, for whatever reason, it was just like a perfect combination of super soft bread and then crunchy yeah i'm inspired all right i'm kind of paleo right now though so it was very it was very like olive oil no egg it was just like olive oil and then the spices and breadcrumbs um i mean paleo i mean i
Starting point is 00:56:22 still use a little bit of breadcrumbs but but I try to limit the bread as much as possible. But yeah, the crits, you said the sugar. I'm like, ah, sugar. I'll just make something on cheat day. Yeah, cheat day. Now I'm just hungry. Yeah. I actually am very hungry.
Starting point is 00:56:37 I'm going to eat after this, so I'm excited. Well, Trevor, thanks again for taking the time to join us today. Best of luck to you this season with the Mets and with the Zappers as well. Thank you. Thanks, guys. We got one mailbag question that I want to get to on this episode.
Starting point is 00:56:50 This one came in from Daniel, and he wanted to know, is it an overlooked story? When you look at Philadelphia, Caleb Cotham was brought in, and of course, Cotham has ties to driveline, and the question here is basically about Spencer Howard, Zach Eflin, Vince Velasquez, Hector Neres. Are there fixable pitchers in Philadelphia that we should be looking at as possibly undervalued targets as a result of Cotham's arrival and a change perhaps in how the Phillies are handling pitching? Gotham's arrival and a change perhaps in how the Phillies are handling pitching.
Starting point is 00:57:30 I do get excited, like even with Dane Dunning, like I am excited for him to have a new organization and to have a new pitching coach. And if that happens internally, that can be an exciting moment too. The Phillies, I think, did a really good job with their hitting program, installing Jason O'Chart, also from Driveline. And it's not because he's from Driveline. What they did was they put him at the top of the hitting program. They gave him the correct title. They gave him a good salary. And they basically told everyone, listen to this guy. And I did write a whole thing about Ochart about how he came to be the coach he is today. And I believe he's one of the better coaches out there. But independent of that, it was good for the whole system,
Starting point is 00:58:08 for him to be in charge and for them to say, this is the direction we want our hitting program to go. And sort of everyone fell into line. And I think they've had some real good advancements, Alec Baum being front and center. But even someone like Haseley, they've had some wins when it comes to the hitting side. Mickey Moniak came back and is now relevant again to some extent.
Starting point is 00:58:28 So the hitting program hasn't been done well. They just haven't done it on a pitching side. I'm hoping that's what the Caleb Kotham hiring means is that, you know, up and down the pitching program, they're going to sort of fall in line with this and do this. But, you know, they've had so many different pitching coaches in there in Philadelphia in the last five years even that as much as I respect
Starting point is 00:58:53 Caleb Kotham and expect him to do well, I need to know kind of personally if it is a revamping or if it's just like, hey, we stuck a different guy at the top of this kind of rotten tree? And so that is me saying, yeah, I mean, I'll keep an eye out. I think Howard has a lot of potential, untapped potential. I would love to see what Caleb could do with him. And Velasquez has the raw stuff. But, you know, there's a command issue there and like a little bit of a, a fourth and fifth inning stamina. Is it stamina? Like he definitely just like falls apart at some point. Um, so I'm, I'm not sure I'm going to push it all the way down to Velasquez until I see like that this is a part of an organizational change.
Starting point is 00:59:45 change. I've definitely taken the bait in the past with Zach Eflin. There have been little flashes on occasion coming out of 2018. His strikeout rate had jumped a ton. He went from a sub 15% K rate in 2017 to 22.4%. He's always been good at limiting free passes. You look at the underlying numbers. He's got a fastball that was averaging 94 last year, a slider and a curveball throwing the curve at about 13% of the time. Occasional change-ups sprinkled in there as well. So to me, he's at least a three-pitch starter. Probably uses the fastball too much. And it's a sinker.
Starting point is 01:00:15 Made a fair amount of use out of the front-door sinker, as you can tell by the difference between his strike rate, which is league average, and his strikeout rate, which is above league average. I've seen, I've watched him. He definitely does the front-door sinker a lot, which requires the batter not to swing. One thing I wonder about the front-door sinker, I have to study this, is if it reduces effectiveness over time because batters know it's something you do
Starting point is 01:00:42 and they decide to swing at those pitches. Yeah, so I'm a little bit intrigued by Eflin. Definitely. There's something there. Got some good B-low. Got a good strikeout rate for sure. ADP is in the early 200 range. That's a little earlier than I expected, but definitely not brushing him off at that point. I think you could be pretty happy with him as your fifth, maybe your sixth starter, depending on how you're building out that roster. Thanks a lot for the question, Daniel. We've got a lot of good stuff coming up later this week. Our next episode's coming out on Friday. Melissa Lockard will join us along with Britt, of course, as she does every Friday. If you want to get the best deal of the holiday season, we have a buy one, get one free on subscriptions right now.
Starting point is 01:01:25 So if you buy yourself a one-year subscription, you can gift one to a friend at no additional charge. The atletic.com slash rates in barrels is where you can get that deal.
Starting point is 01:01:35 On Twitter, he's at Eno Saris. I am at Derek Van Riper. Be sure to check out the fan-controlled football league. That's fcf.io. Give Trevor a follow on Twitter and Twitch. I am Trevor May is the handle.
Starting point is 01:01:49 He's a great follow on both of those platforms. Thanks again to him for joining us on this episode. That is going to wrap things up for this episode of Rates and Barrels. We are back with you on Friday. Thanks for listening.

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