Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 170: Jason Parks on Podcasting, Prospect Ranking, and Player Development

Episode Date: March 29, 2013

Ben and Sam talk to Jason Parks about the forthcoming Fringe Average Podcast and BP prospect book, the ranking process, and how player development differs between teams.

I'm thinking of doing a cricket death count this year. Yeah. I've killed three, but that's just a taste. I assume I will get to a thousand, so I'm thinking of actually buying a whiteboard and putting it... Spring training for cricket killing. it's spring training for cricket killing good morning and welcome to episode 170 of effectively wild the daily podcast from baseballperspectives.com i'm sam miller with ben lindbergh and we're joined today by uh jason parks uh who has had one heck of a month with us he did 30 30 top 10s for us. He did a top 101 for us.

And today, you're able to read his organizational rankings at our site. And he's about to launch a new podcast. So we're going to talk about those things, and then we're going to pivot to a question that I have for him, that I've had for him. Jason, how are you? I am well. Thank you for having me on your show. You're welcome anytime. In fact, it's not too late to cancel your plans to have a podcast, and you can just take ours. it's not too late to cancel your plans to have a podcast and you can just take ours. Yeah, that would be great, man.

I'd totally do that. I'm not going to do it every day, though. I'm going to do it like once a week. That's what we'd like to do, really. So, yeah, I mean, what's the idea behind this? What's the theme of your next podcast going to be? Well, the idea behind it is our boss, Joe Hemrahi, telling me that

I probably need to do another podcast and to stop putting it off and to do something productive that will help both BP and other people who are friends of BP. And I was reluctant because I

didn't want to do the show in the first place um the podcast I did with Kevin was kind of a you know we Kevin and I were just good friends it just happened to like to talk shop and talk other stuff and it just happened to work and I'm glad I'm glad I did because it kind of propelled me in a different direction but um I didn't want to jump back into that because I'm not friends with that many people and I didn't want to go through it again. I happen to be good friends with Mike Farron. We both have an equal want level, which is slack.

So it's going to be a completely different show than the one that... Kevin's a worker bee. Kevin, he's a hunter. Kevin put this stuff together. He got bands. He got guests. He showed a lot of hustle. I mean, Mike and I don't care.

You know, we're just going to put out a very fringe average product. I mean, the name is real. The name indicates exactly what we plan on producing. But no, I'm looking forward to it. I love Mike. Mike's a really, he's a dear friend of mine. I just can't wait to talk baseball an hour a week again.

Are there going to be guests and that sort of thing? Well, you know, here's the thing. This is what Mike does all day long. I mean, Mike is on the radio all day long talking to people. So at least initially we're going to keep it more of just a discussion between two guys. You know, we're going to do majors, we're going to do minors. It's not going to just be as

prospect-centric as up and in, but you know, down the line, if we start bringing in people for guest spots, you know, I think that would be cool, but I certainly understand Mike, all he does all day that would be cool, but I certainly understand, you know,

Mike, all he does all day long is interview people, and we all know that I'm not going to participate, so it's, we'll put all that on his lap, so it'll be best if it's just me and Mike, you know, talking shop for about 45 minutes to an hour. All right, well, I'm very much looking forward to that. 45 minutes to an hour. All right. Well, I'm very much looking forward to that.

You, uh, also there was another announcement today from Joe. Um, and that was that basically you have written a book more or less, uh, over the off season. Um, everything that you have written and ranked is going to be collected into,

uh, into one thing that people can obtain. Can you tell us a little bit about that and what people will get for that? Sure. It started a while ago, and I didn't know they were going to turn into a book. It kind of started with a very innocent email I sent to Joe after I had done a couple of them, and I started to get the feel of how long each one was going to be. And I realized, oh, you know, these are 4,000 plus words each. And I said, Joe, by the end of this, we're going to have like 120,000 words plus the word rankings.

I go, man, that's a substantial amount of work. I was probably angling for a raise or something. Who knows what my motive was? But, I mean, I brought it to his attention that it was going to be that much depth to it. He kind of got into his head, and Joe, once he gets an idea, he's going to see it through, and he's going to execute it, and that's what happened. And he said, hey, what do you think about this layout? That's the first thing I've heard about it since, and it's this cool layout, and

I think it's going to be good. Obviously, you know, I like the prospects, but if I were going to put out a book, I'd like to put out a book of all the stuff that I've written that, you know, most people don't seem to like. You know, stories about drifting off into space or falling in love with girls on planes. You know, I'd like to put that out, but we're going to go with the prospects first. And that's going to be coming out in April at some point? I have no idea, yeah. I mean, that's what I was told.

What needs to happen is the org rankings come out today, and then I need to go back this weekend and wrap up all the players that were traded, guys like Alex Meyer. I didn't get to profile him. May, a guy like him. And then go back over the list. With the trade to Tampa, Will Myers is gone.

Jake Odorizzi is gone. So the Royals need two more players added to their top ten to complete it, and I'm going to finish all the type, all the blue sums, and get everything ready to go. And then as soon as I'm done, I think we're going to move forward. So hopefully by some point in April, you can get the PDF or e-book or whatever. It's going to be fun. Before you started this whole process, I mean, obviously when Kevin was around, he was the guy who did the BP prospect rankings.

And it seemed like i mean you were perfectly happy not to do rankings right you were kind of enjoyed just seeing players and writing about what you saw and and sort of putting some effort into the actual writing of it more so than than the ranking of those prospects do you feel any differently now after having done 30 rankings and talked to tons of people to put those together and collaborated with the BP prospect people do you enjoy ranking now or are you kind of glad it's over no looking forward to stretching out a little bit I don't enjoy it but it's not look I learned a ton here's the thing I mean I don't I don't enjoy it, but it's not... Look, I learned a ton.

Here's the thing. I don't know. You can always learn more. I don't have to watch players in person. I don't have to go to different places and watch all the top talent. You can't see it all. That's just assuming that I know what I'm talking about. I learn something every single day

because every single day I'm talking to staff, I'm talking to front office personnel about organizations that they have seen. I try to stay away from the actual org that I'm ranking because I don't want their influence on the actual list, but I'll call them after the fact to get developmental ups and downs and to confirm tool profiles. Every day I'm talking to people, I'm learning. I'm very grateful for that. I'd want to do that.

You know, that's something I want to continue. And, you know, when I do the rankings next year, it'll be something that I look forward to. That said, it's very limiting. You know, I like to, you know, let my hair down, so to speak, and, you know, see where I can take the writing, see where I can take, you know take the delivery of this type of information. I mean, you can deliver prospect information a number of ways, and most people deliver it in one way. And I'd like to try to open up doors to try to get it to people in a manner that maybe they're not familiar with or not even comfortable with in some cases.

But I can't really do that when I'm working 60 hours a week trying to put together two lists a week. Next year, I'd like to get them done a little faster, but I'll know what I'll be up against. This year, I had no idea how I was going to pull it off after I started, so I'm glad it's over and I'll do it better next year. All right, so here's what I want to ask you about. And I'm going to set it up. About a year ago, Ben wrote a piece about how writing about baseball for Baseball Perspectives has changed because 10 years ago, the sort of standard perspective was that a lot of teams were idiots and we were poking holes in the idiotic things that they were doing. And right now you can't really do that because teams seem to be really smart,

and we know a little bit more about where we were idiots in the past, and it kind of feels weird to just always be saying teams are idiots when we know how smart they are. So I guess what I wanted to know is you've spent so much time talking to teams, learning about teams, learning about organizations, following the ways that they scout amateurs, the way that they develop players. And I just wanted to know how much variation there really is from team to team along the scouting and player development sides, whether they're all kind of the same and whether they're all kind of at about the same level, or whether you get the sense that there really are some teams that are significantly better and have a significant advantage and some that are significantly worse and have a significant disadvantage in those areas.

Well, it's a complicated question, but it's a good one. Yeah, the answer is that some people are superior to others. I mean, obviously that's true in all pursuits, but specific to baseball, some organizations are run by people with greater intelligence than others. Now, that's not to suggest that, you know, the organizations that I consider intelligent are the ones that are very progressive when it comes to analytics and or, you know,

progressive scouting means or coverage. It's a trickle-down. When you have, you know, a construct in place that was put into place by intelligent, you know, intelligent minds that have, you know, a view of baseball that they want to implement and they're going to stick to. You know, they're not going to wane. And it's going to be one leader and it's going to come down and it's going to be run very much like a military, I think things really work out, you know, if the people in charge are very intelligent.

I've dealt with a lot of organizations where it's more chaotic. It's, you know, one department not really working in concert with another. You know, the scouting department bringing in players with developmental staff doesn't have a good track record dealing with. And, you know, there's been organizations that only up until recently did they take the time to bring in,

you know, cultural assimilation personnel to help Latin American talent assimilate to this country. That is one of the more complex aspects of player procurement and development is getting these foreign-born players

to become professionals in a different country at a very high level. It's not something that has a very good rate of success. That is only amplified when you can do absolutely everything and more power to assist in the simulation process, in addition to the development on the field. Now, there's some teams that are just now getting into really understanding this, the teams that were ahead of the curve, the teams that realized this, and they had more success. You see this a lot.

I've talked to a lot of scouting directors that won't target certain players because they are familiar enough with their developmental woes to know that that kind of player is not going to be the type of player that can develop in their organization. Now, this is very specific, and I'm not going to name names or organizations, but I do run into it, and it does highlight which organizations are run more efficiently than others. The intelligent ones, the ones that are ahead of the curve, the caressive ones, they stand out. And normally, those are the ones who not only can acquire the best talent, but can develop that talent at a higher rate.

I will toot the horn of one organization, the Cardinals. The Cardinals have, they can draft, they can acquire talent in Latin America, they're respected in both avenues, both in amateur racing in the U.S. and abroad, and their developmental team is regarded as one of the best in the business because they can develop talent whether it's first round or 40th round. They get players to the major league level. They stand out. They're a very smart org and they continue to be a very smart org. So that's one of the success stories.

Who do you think is the most important person in the organization as far as player development? Is it the GM or is it the director of player development? Or is it somebody else? I think the key to player development inherently is talent procurement. You know, I don't think that you can develop crap into something that it's not. You know, I think everything has to start with talent. So, you know, it's not. I think everything has to start with talent. It's much like a chef. It has to start with really good ingredients if you want to make a really high-end meal.

The teams that can acquire the best talent stand the best chance of developing that talent. The best player development people, to answer your question specifically, I think the head of player development is the one who would create the construct of how development will go. And the teams that tailor developmental plans specific to the players are usually the teams that come out ahead. I mean, you have to treat players as individuals, not as farm animals or crops. How much luck would you say that there is when you look at your organizational rankings? I mean, when you rank the top prospects on a team, you're trying to say who has the best true talent

or who has the best expectation of success. But when you're ranking the organizations, I guess there's kind of a lot of, I mean, there's an element of luck there in that teams can make a pick for the wrong reasons or a pick that seems stupid knowing what you know at the time and it can work out anyway, or teams can make a pick that seems smart at the time that doesn't work out. So, I mean, how much of that is this organization that you ranked 15th is actually better at player development than the one that you ranked 20th? And how much is just sort of luck fluctuating from year to year? Well, there's a ton of luck.

I mean, we're talking about human development here. So if someone had the code, then they wouldn't be in baseball. You know what I mean? I think that there's – Look, we have to look at these things as snapshots, and really, I'm not trying to, you know, deflate my words here, but we can't take them that seriously. You know, this is a snapshot.

If I say that, you know, Team A or whatever is the 15th ranked team, it doesn't mean that they're that superior to the 16th ranked team, because go six months from now and that superior to the 16th ranked team, because go six months from now and that is all going to change. You know, this is a snapshot of what is happening right now,

right in this moment. And by the way, I've been in the sun for 35 days, so who knows what I'm writing. You know, you have to look at all the, all sides of this. I mean, this is, I'm just trying to take all the talent these guys have. I'm not trying to look, you know, historically here. I'm just looking at what they have now, you know, what they have to work with and where they rank now.

I mean, you take a team like the Phillies, they're way down the list, you know. But they have a lot of young talent that could develop into better talent. And in two years, they could be in the top ten. You know, does that mean that they're not good at player development? No, they're good at player development. They have a different drafting style than a lot of teams, but it's not really a slight on the development

as much as it's a snapshot of the moment. But as I said, some teams are definitely better than others. And historically, they're the ones who usually have the best talent. Yeah, I think that it often gets misunderstood, especially from fans who are more casual,

and when they see that, you know, like I know when the Angels, when the organization rankings come out today and the Angels are last, there will be a lot of sort of snide comments about how you don't know what you're doing, and how the Angels were ranked 30th in 2000, and then they won the World Series and all this because they don't really understand the idea that it's a snapshot and they think what you're saying is that the Angels are bad at player development and in fact it's a very complex thing that has to do with organizational needs and timing

and promotions and all sorts of things, right? But I guess the question that I might have is, do you think that it's worthwhile to actually try to also, in addition to these rankings, also try to answer the question of what team is the best at it? What team is sort of consistently the best at it? Because it's a different question, but it seems like a worthy question. Because it's a different question, but it seems like a worthy question. The problem is, I would assume that even if you're talking to people a lot, you might not have enough insight to really say with great authority. Do you think it's possible to answer that question? Do you think that it's ever possible that we'll have an organizational rankings list that actually ranks the organizations and not just the players in them?

Well, I mean, I think that we could figure something out like that, but I think that in order to get any kind of results that would mean anything, the playing field would have to be even, and it's most certainly not. Not every team allocates the same amount of resources to amateur acquisition and development. You know, there are teams like the White Sox that they don't spend as much historically in amateur talent acquisition, Latin American acquisition, because they allocate funds for major league purposes.

They try to acquire major league level talent. And you know what? The White Sox have been pretty successful in that regard. You know, you look at the Angels right now. While they haven't had a lot of draft picks, and they certainly, you know, they signed a lot of free agents, and, you know, they did better than the major league team.

They hit on Mike Trout as a superstar, but the wrestling system's pretty terrible. Caleb Coward's all right, but, you know, it's bad. I mean, it's not historically bad, but it's pretty bad. But you know what? They're probably going to win the West. So does that mean that they can't develop? No.

It means that they didn't allocate to the same level that other teams have. So I don't really think that you can do an accurate, you know, analysis when the playing field is completely uneven. I mean, if every team, you know, they were given a set amount, this is how much you can spend on your developmental staff, this is how much you can spend on your, you know, your Latin American staff, this is how much you can spend on this, this is how much you can spend on player development,

and so, well, then that's a different argument. But that's not the case. It doesn't work that way at baseball. How much would you say is the people and how much is the process that those people put in place? Because there's a lot of turnover in some teams. I mean, if you work for the White Sox, it's pretty much a lifetime appointment, it seems. But if you work for most teams, there's a lot of movement from year to year. Scouts change teams and maybe a GM gets fired and then the new GM brings in his own player development guys. I mean, how long can player development be a strength for one team as different faces leave and enter? I mean, does it last despite that turnover

just because the old people kind of put a process in place that will work no matter who's there? I'm a believer in process. Coming from an art background, process is a big part of my studies. How I approach baseball is very much about process. As I was speaking to earlier, you get an intelligent design

and that process can work with different personnel. Obviously, turnover can be a problem because personalities are always going to be different. As much as it can be run like the military, it is not the military and, you know, you will have different people at different levels, roving and hitting instructors, roving and pitching instructors, that will basically try to change a picture to the way they see fit as opposed to the way the organization might see fit. And when I say organization, I mean the people who are implementing

a certain process. But it can go funky in a number of different ways. It starts with talent and, you know, and makeup is a big component of that. And then you have the people, it's their job to nurture that talent, to get it out. Coaches and developmental people aren't going to make a player a better player, per se. I mean, what they're trying to do is just to bring out an already existing skill set and mature it. They're not going to make a three-hitter, a six-hitter. They're not

magicians. You know, they're fathers. They're you know, they're doctors, they're counselors. They're all these things wrapped into one. And their job is just to get this player to the best of his ability. Everybody's got a different approach,

but the organizations that seem to be very successful are ones that allow a process to filter down from top to bottom, which gives some continuity, and it really helps the kids level to level. All right. Well, I'm sure that you're going to go over a lot of ground on the prospect rankings and the org rankings on the first episode of your podcast, so we will not make you recycle too much material. When can people listen to you? And, Mike, when are you recording?

I fly back to New York City on Monday morning, and I do believe Tuesday is the first day that Mike and I are going to record Fringe Average. We both decided to come out of the gate strong and give a Fringe Average performance right out of the gate, not keeping the bar of expectation a slightly below average level. So we will be discussing the prospects, I'm sure. Knowing Mike, we'll get into it pretty big time. He's really good at, you know, asking questions and whatnot. But, you know, again, I don't want to,

it's not that I don't want to talk about the rankings, you know, the 30s that we've done or the org rankings. It's just that, you know, it is a snapshot, and I think people can really invest too much into one snapshot list. I mean, it's good. The information is sound. I have a lot of experience.

I talk to a lot of people. But, you know, take it for what it is. It's not a... It doesn't mean all that much. It's just kind of a guide for what's going on now and kind of a cool reference to look back on and go, oh, wow, you were really wrong. All right.

Thanks so much. Thanks for doing all the top tens. Thanks for everything you add to this world, Jason. You're helping me. All right. So we'll all be listening next week, and Ben and I will be back on Monday along with 428 teams baseball so see you then

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